(by: Mehdi
Noorbaksh*)
The 20th century of Iran is the century of
revolution, turmoil and reform movements. This century
begins with the Constitutional Revolution (1905-1911),
followed by the Pahalavis’ - both father and son -
ascendancy to power from 1925 to 1979, the occupation of the
country by the Allied forces in the 1940’s, the resurgence
of a religious movement that was both nationalistic and
reformist from the 1940’s, the movement for the
nationalization of the Iranian oil industry and the
establishment of a democratic government under the
leadership of Muhammad Musaddiq (1882-1967) in the 1950’s,
and finally the Iranian Revolution in 1979. The robust
movement for the establishment of the rule of law and
democratic government that began at the beginning of the
20th century ended with a grass-roots revolution that
brought to the forefront the battle for restructuring
politics, society and Iran's political culture.
The religious movement that blended
nationalism and reform in politics, society and religion
from the 1940’s was a crucial force in the process of the
Iranian revolution in 1979, and is currently a compelling
movement in the post-revolutionary politics of Iran. It has
been considered a potent alternative to the ideology of
theocratic rule and the clerical political establishment.
The proponents of this movement, called
religious-nationalism (Melli-Mazhabi), in the political
scene of Iran today participated actively in the politics of
opposition to the authoritarianism of the Shah and continued
to oppose the establishment of theocratic rule after the
Iranian revolution.
Mehdi Bazargan (1907-1995) is considered the
most influential founding father of religious-nationalism in
Iran. His reformist views in the domain of religion placed
him in an inimitable position among the reformers in the
world of Islam, as his ideas and ideals are distinctly
clear-cut and unambiguous compared to other reformers in the
Muslim world, especially in the arenas of individual rights,
limited government, the rule of law and democratic
governance. In this context, he is also considered one of
the most influential founders of Islamic liberalism in both
Iran and the Muslim world.
Besides his credentials in Islamic reform,
Bazargan possesses a very unique place among other reformers
in the contemporary Islamic world as he was both a statesman
and a professional engineer. As a university professor in
the area of thermodynamics, he was very successful in his
field as an innovator, manager, and teacher. He accepted
prominent political roles in government and remained
committed to his political ideals of Islamic liberalism,
including freedom and human rights. These ideals kept him in
opposition to authoritarianism and theocracy almost all of
his life.
Bazargan was born into a merchant family from
Tabriz. His father, Abbasquli Bazargan, was a religiously
devoted and intellectually endowed merchant who was famous
for his piety and stand against the authoritarian rule of
Reza Shah (1925-1941). He later became a resolute and
committed supporter of the national movement of Iran under
Muhammad Musaddiq (1882-1967). Musaddiq’s movement
(1950-1953) for the oil nationalization of Iran in 1951
attracted both secular nationalists and Islamists who valued
and honored the country’s total independence from outside
influence and the norms of democratic government.
Mehdi Bazargan completed his elementary
education at Soltani Elementary School and continued his
middle and high school at Dar al-Mo’allemin (central) High
School, a newly established modern high school in Iran. As
one of the highest ranking students in his class, he was
dispatched with a full scholarship to France in 1927 by the
Iranian government to continue his education at Ecole
Centrale des Arts et Manufactures. Bazargan completed his
Ph.D in thermodynamics in 1934 and returned back to Iran. He
then completed his compulsory military service and was
employed at the engineering college of the University of
Tehran as an assistant professor in mechanical engineering.
He later became the dean of the college of engineering for
two consecutive terms and was appointed by Mohammad Musaddiq
as the managing director of the National Iranian Oil Company
in 1951 when the Iranian oil industry was nationalized.
After the coup against Musaddiq in 1953, Bazargan returned
back to the university for teaching. Recognizing the merits
of his management skills and success in the operation of the
Iranian oil industry with Iranian engineers and without the
aid of the foreign companies during 1951-1953, the new
government (1941-1979) under the Shah, Muhammad Reza Pahlavi
(1919-1980), appointed Bazargan as the director of the water
authority in Tehran. During this time, Bazargan succeeded in
constructing the network of water distribution through
underground pipelines for the city of Tehran. After his
monumental success at the National Iranian Oil Company, this
was another highly remarkable professional achievement for
Bazargan as an engineer and university professor.
The Shah's government organized the first
election of the Iranian parliament, or Majlis, after the
coup of 1953. As the election was illegally carried out with
no room for the participation of opposition groups,
Bazargan, along with a few others, signed a letter voicing
his opposition to the election process. He was then
discharged from his position in the Water Authority of
Tehran and could no longer serve in the government until
after the Iranian revolution, when he became Prime Minister
of the provisional government of post-revolutionary Iran. He
was also dismissed from his teaching position at the
University of Tehran when he protested, along with another
ten professors, the decision of the Majlis to give up the
independent management of the nation's oil industry to a
consortium of oil companies lead by the Americans and the
British. After he was discharged from his government and
university positions, Bazargan established a few successful
private engineering firms in Iran while concurrently
continuing his political activities.
After the 1953 coup, Bazargan entered into
the active politics of opposition to the authoritarian rule
of the Shah. He first co-founded the National Resistance
Movement, or NRM (Nehzat-e Muqavamat-e Melli), in 1953 along
with Ayatullah Mahmud Taliqani and Yadullah Sahabi. From
1953 to 1961, leading Islamic intellectuals and liberal
minded individuals participated in the activities of NRM.
Alongside with the secular nationalists, they also
established the short-lived Second National Front which was
abandoned in 1960 under enormous pressure from the
government. Bazargan had a crucial role in establishing and
leading all of these organizations. As NRM and the National
Front could not successfully face the challenges of the new
political realities in Iranian politics and the demands of
the younger generation, Bazargan, Taliqani and Sahabi
established a new Islamic political party, the Freedom
Movement of Iran, or FMI (Nehzat-e Azadi-e Iran), in March
of 1961. The leadership of the newly established
organization was arrested in 1962, tried in a military
tribunal and Bazargan was sentenced to 10 years in jail. He
was released in 1967 after serving five years of his jail
sentence. The new party was shut down by the government in
January 1963, and FMI did not have a chance to expand its
organization into a nationwide political party. Instead, the
party succeeded in bringing Islam to the political scene of
the country and opposing the authoritarian rule of the
Pahlavi Dynasty. This was a major achievement in a country
whose politics was dominated by the government and
opposition groups, both who held secular and anti-Islamic
political orientations. The Tudeh Party, a satellite of the
former Soviet Union, considered Islam the “opium” of the
masses and was openly opposing any role for Muslims in
opposition politics. From the United States and Europe, the
FMI, under the leadership of Ebrahim Yazdi, Mustafa Chamran,
Ali Shariati, and Saddiq Qutbzadeh, succeeded in
establishing the foundation of a very broad and strong
Muslim student opposition movement to the Shah.
Bazargan remained committed to opposing
Pahlavi authoritarianism and defending human rights and the
rule of law. At the apex of the Shah's oppression in 1977,
Bazargan co-founded the Iranian Human Rights Association, or
IHRA. Similar to his past efforts to bring together people
from different political orientations in opposition to the
Shah’s rule, he brought together secular nationalists and
Islamic liberals under the umbrella of IHRA. He spent years
in the Shah’s prison, yet remained resolute in his political
principles of democratic values in government and society.
His reputation as a university professor and highly
successful manager did not encourage the regime of the Shah
to be less obdurate toward Bazargan. He received harsher
punishment each time he was arrested and jailed.
Bazargan also played a crucial role in the
process of the Iranian revolution. He went to Paris to meet
Ayatullah Khomeini in late 1978 and disagreed with him on
the nature and the name of the new republic. Bazargan
insisted on the word democratic in the name of the country’s
post-revolution political system, while Ayatullah Khomeini
assured him and the nation that Islam is democratic by
nature. He was a crucial leader in holding various forces
and groups together in Iran at the time of the revolution.
Revolutionaries, and especially Islamic liberals, had a lot
of trust and confidence in Bazargan to balance the
revolutionary zeal inside the country with his commitment to
democratic values and moderation.
He became Prime Minister of the provisional
government after the fall of the Shah in February 1979.
Bazargan accepted this position because there was no other
individual in the rank of the revolutionaries or liberals
that could compete with his credentials and the trust that
the vast majority of the people and intellectuals bestowed
upon him. He formed a cabinet and government that were the
true reflection of all involved forces in the Iranian
revolution. He included the Islamic liberals, secular
nationalists and progressive clergy in his cabinet and
government institutions.
But the politics of post-revolutionary Iran
were not in favor of a man who was committed to moderation,
reform, the rule of law and democratic values in government.
The range of political groups, from the far left to far
right and within the Islamist groups and secular forces were
contending for political power. Under the leadership of
Ayatullah Muhammad Hussein Beheshti, the more political
clerics established the Islamic Republican Party (IRP). The
party became a major political force around Ayatullah
Khomeini and advocated the rule of the clergy, or Velayat-e
Faqih - the guardianship of the jurist-consult. Although
Ayatullah Khomeini was the architect of this theory in
Shi’ite Islam, he was not adequately convinced to enact this
theory in government after the Iranian revolution. Ayatullah
Khomeini ordered the writing of a constitution for the
post-revolution republic while he was still in Paris. It was
written mostly by Islamic liberals and included no reference
to Valayat-e Faqih and was approved by Ayatullah Khomeini
before he returned to Iran in February 1979. IRP and
Ayatullah Beheshti succeed to muster enough forces to impose
the rule of the clergy and introduce this theory to the
Iranian constitution. Ayatollah Beheshti and his supporters
among the clergy filled the first Assembly of Experts for
the writing and ratification of the republics’ constitution
and they overwhelmingly supported and voted for the articles
in the constitution that bestowed upon the Vali-e Faqih a
gargantuan amount of power in the new polity.
Aside from clergy who had the tendency to
dominate power, multiple centers of authority soon
developed, while no one considered himself or herself bound
to the rulings and authority of the central government.
There was also a developing discord between the government
and the Revolutionary Council, which was mostly dominated by
the clergy and their supporters.
Multiple sources of power, clerical populism
that was prone to be more responsive to popular temper than
anything else, human rights violations and executions
without trial by courts with no governmental jurisdiction,
and the urge for domination of various institutions of power
by clergy all conspired to make his government weak.
Bazargan supported organization, the rule of law, democratic
values and a central government that could protect citizens
against the abuse of power. None was possible or available
in a political environment that was at best emotional and
irrational in its course and discourse. The last blow to the
government came when a group of students, with the support
of radical clergy, took over the American Embassy in Tehran
in November 1979. Bazargan, who had previously attempted to
resign several times, resigned after nine months in office.
With his resignation, moderation deserted the politics of
Iran. He became the only leader in Iranian
post-revolutionary politics that was both whole-heartedly
dedicated to the rule of law, ethics in politics and
democratic values in government, and was ready to openly
voice his repugnance for the abuse of power and disregard
for citizens’ rights.
Despite this, Bazargan is more recognized in
Iran and the Muslim world for his contributions in the arena
of reform in the reading and understanding of the Islamic
faith, rather than his successful professional life,
extraordinary management skills, and statesmanship.
Bazargan’s views in this domain could be traced back to the
history of the development of Islamic liberal thought in the
Muslim world, especially in Iran, from the late 19th and
beginning of the 20th century. Thomas Hobbes, the English
philosopher, in Leviathan, and John Lock, the English
philosopher during the Enlightenment, in his Second Treaties
of Government in the 17th and the 18th centuries,
established the foundation of democratic norms in government
through delineating the principles of individual rights,
limited government and the concept of social contract. From
the end of the 19th century, their Muslim counterparts,
partially under the influence of Western thoughts of the
Enlightenment, began approaching similar issues by
constructing their arguments based upon theological and
philosophical reasoning. Jamal al-Din Asadabadi (1838-1897)
is one of the first pioneers of Islamic liberalism whose
attempts were directed at the purification of religion of
both superstitions and interpretations which were not based
on human reasoning and not adaptive to modern human needs.
In the arena of politics, he devoted his attention to
authoritarianism and arbitrary rule in Muslim nations.
Others who theologically questioned the legitimacy of
autocratic rule and defended human rights in governance
belonged to the rank of ulama and were from seminary schools
in Iran and Iraq. The most recognized and well-known
document written in defense of the rule of law and
constitutionalism that reflected the liberal thoughts in
Islam was by Ayatullah Mirza Hussein Na’ini. In his
monumental work, Tanbih al-Ummah va Tanzih al-Millah: ya
Hukumat dar Nazar-i Islam (Exhortation of the Faithful and
Purification of the Nation; or Islam’s Perspective on the
Nature of Government), Na’ini defended the rule of law,
freedom, and the right of political participation, and
denounced arbitrary rule and authoritarianism (Intibdad).
This was a total break with the theology of the majority of
ulama in both Shi’ite and Sunni Islam who, for the sake of
security and relative welfare of the community, preferred
collaborating with the courts which were under arbitrary
rule. Then, in the 20th century, concepts such as Rights
(Huquq), Progress (Taraqqi), Freedom (Hurriyat-Azadi),
Prosperity (Sa’adat), Equality (Mosavat), Dignity (Sharaf),
Justice(Idalat), Authoritarianism (Istibdad), Arbitrary Rule
(Hukumat-e Mutlaqeh), Corruption (Fisad), and Reform (Islah)
entered into the lexicon of political discourse and reform
in the nation’s institutions of government.
Bazargan was an active observant of this
history in which new paradigms in the arenas of politics and
religion were flourishing and evolving. After his education
was completed, Bazargan returned home from France where the
Iranian political elite were pushing for modernization of
Iran in the tradition and experience of Western societies.
The intellectual elite were mostly secular with a negative
slant on religion. The majority in the educated strata of
Iranian society had developed a total disconnect with
religion, and Marxism was considered by many as a
progressive and scientific alternative for the restoration
and modernization of society. The clergy were completely
divorced from the reality of the socio-political and
cultural changes in the Iranian society, and, as a result,
had lost their audience in intellectual circles and the
articulate sector of the society. For many of the
intellectuals, modernization of the country was priority,
irrespective of the pervasive authoritarianism in
government. The vast majority of intellectuals were not
capable of establishing a link between authoritarian rule
and lack of progress in developing the nation’s economy and
society. They looked at the piecemeal modernization projects
that the Pahlavis had pursued, especially those that were
relatively successful. Reza Shah established security,
modern education and infrastructure in the country. It was
an achievement, but was not commensurate to the potential
and needs of a resourceful country.
Bazargan, then, faced challenges from three
segments of Iranian society: the political elite and the
Pahlavis, the secular intellectuals and Marxists, and the
clergy and traditional segments of the society. From
1941-1953, alongside with Yadullah Sahabi, Ayatullah Mahmud
Taliqani, Muhammad Taqi Shariati (the father of Ali
Shariati), he organized and established a number of civic
associations with Islamic orientations, including the
Islamic Society (Kanun-e Islami), the Islamic Engineering
Association (Anjoman-e Islami-e Muhandesin), and the Muslim
Students Association (Anjoman-e Islami-e Daneshjuyan). These
organizations continued their activities through the unrest
during the years of oil nationalization. Two of these
organizations, the Islamic Engineering Association and the
Muslim Student Association, remain active even today in
Iran. The Muslim Student Association expanded in the
universities of Iran, published a regular monthly
publication (Gang-e Shaygan), and organized regular lectures
in Tehran. Bazargan had a number of publications in this
period, including Religion in Europe (Mazhab dar Uropa),
Purification in Islam (Mutahharat dar Islam), Pragmatism in
Islam, Work in Islam (Kar dar Islam), the Paved Path (Rah-e
Tay Shodeh), the Source of Independence (Sarcheshmeh-e
Esteqlal), the Secret behind Un-Development in the Muslim
World (Serr-e Aqab Oftadegi-e Melal-e Musalman), Islam or
Communism and the Youths’ Play with Politics (Bazi-e Javanan
ba Siasat).
In Religion in Europe, he tries to convince
Iranian intellectuals that Europe respected religion and
European progress was not related to rejecting the
foundations of faith in society. Contrary to the
observations of Sayyid Qutb in Milestone and other essays,
Bazargan was not at all pessimistic about the West. He tried
wholeheartedly to pinpoint positive aspects of Western
life. Bazargan argues in this essay that, “Contrary to what
some modernists (Tajadudtalaban) have propagated in recent
years, the twentieth century has not utilized religion as a
set of traditional and superstitious rules and regulations
in life. In the years that Iran launched its campaign of
modernization, these modernists prescribed that faith in God
is against progress.” (Religion in Europe, 15) He is very
critical of secular intellectuals who have tried to negate
religion and its positive impact on Iranian society. In
Pragmatism in Islam, he argues, “Qur’an and Islam are
completely pragmatic. They expect work and actions that are
positive and bring fruitful results for human welfare.”
(Pragmatism, 45) His ideas in this context are not far from
the ideas of William James in Pragmatism. In Work in Islam,
he tries to bring the ethics of hard work to society and
insists on the notion that only hard work can change society
and bring prosperity to the community. In Islam or
Communism, he tries to rebuff the concepts of a classless
society and the notion of equality in a communist society
and argues that these societies are based on economic
exploitation of the working class and political domination
of a special group over the rest of the society. In the
Source of Independence and the Secret Behind Un-Development
in the Muslim word, Bazargan directs the attention of his
audience to four maladies in the Muslim world: lack of
innovation and intellectual independence, obliteration of
productive capacity, lack of active participation in global
commerce, and finally lack of the practice of true faith. In
the last point, he is not critical of unfaithful seculars,
but of their attempts to invalidate faith. He is also
critical of the clerical establishment who were not up to
the task of purifying the faith from superstitions that
prevented its simple and true practice. In line with his
argument in Work in Islam, he encourages the younger
generation in Youths’ Play with Politics to be pragmatic and
educate themselves before participating in the politics of
the 1940’s and 50’s.
Between 1953 and 1961, the autocratic rule of
the post-coup government dominated Iranian society and
gradually stabilized its political grip on power. With oil
revenues increasing ten-fold from the beginning of this
period, the Shah began to invest in the infrastructure of
the country. But this effort brought with it rampant
corruption and mismanagement. The Shah was more resolute
than ever in modernizing Iran according to Western models,
and more palpably neglected the persisting elements of
Iranian culture that emphasized a native approach and
nationalism. In the Mission for My Nation (p.335), Shah
later discussed that freedom and political independence is
meaningless for a nation that is not economically developed.
This was the Shah’s justification to the end of his reign in
obstructing any path toward political development and
participation in the country’s politics. During these years,
his hold on power gradually suffocated embryonic and weak
civil societies and the opposition movements to his rule.
The National Resistance Movement and the
Second National Front were shut down under government
suppression. Bazargan was arrested in 1955 and 1957, when he
spent five and eight months in prison, respectively. In this
period and in the political scene of opposition, he was
relentless in his advocacy of the rule of law,
constitutional government and independence in foreign
policy. His emphasis on independence was in response to the
Shah’s foreign support and suppression of the forces of
nationalism in Iran. He wrote a few books during this
period, and among them were Love and Faith: the
Thermodynamics of Human Beings (Eshq va Parastesh ya
Thermodynamism-e Ensan), Needs of the Day (Ehtiaj-e Rooz),
and Faith in God and the Contemporary Ideologies (Khoda
Partasti va Afkar-e Rooz). Similar to his argument in Paved
Path, Bazargan attempts to delineate in these books the
notion that religions develop as human beings go through an
evolutionary process. Human beings, he argues, were
worshiping idols in the beginning, and different prophets
came to them with new and evolving revelations to usher
truth and faith in various communities. The argument leads
to the conclusion that faith is an essential component of
human life. In Love and Faith, he discusses the role of the
individual in a society that is run by the rule of law. To
convince his audience that societies need laws that bind all
its members together irrespective of their positions, he
employs the metaphor of a machine that works when all of its
components work together in a systemic way. That systemic
approach to society was an intentional response by Bazargan
to the arbitrary rule of the Shah. He intended to convey
that authoritarianism breaks the law and contributes to the
malfunction and breakdown of society.
Bazargan and his colleagues established the
Freedom Movement of Iran (FMI) in March 1961. During this
period, the Kennedy administration had put pressure on the
Shah to open the politics of Iran. Nineteen months later, at
the beginning of 1963, he and other leaders of FMI were
arrested. Before the arrest, Bazargan published more than
twenty books, each ranging from thirty to a few hundred
pages. Among these books, one of the most famous theoretical
works was Political Struggle and Religious Struggle
(Mobarezat-e Siasi va Mobarezat-e Mazhabi). In this book, he
defines the boundaries of national and religious identities.
He believes that religious identity is a crucial part of
national identity. He traces back the history of many
conflicts and struggles in the Middle East and Iran and
pinpoints the role of religion in each. He specifically
ascertains the positive role that Islam and the progressive
clergy played in the Constitutional Revolution in Iran in
1905-11.
Another very famous publication of this time
was Bazargan’s defense in the Shah’s court. The 350 page
defense document, Modafe’at dar Dadgah-e Gheir-e Saleh-e
Tajdid Nazar-e Nezami, which was first published outside the
country in the 1960’s and has published several times since
then, was aimed at articulating two distinct arguments. The
first was to defend the legitimacy of his political party,
FMI, which took up Islam as the ideology of opposition to
despotism. From early on, the Shah was unwavering in
dishonoring any opposition social movement to his rule that
had religious roots. He called Ayatullah Khomeini and his
supporters in the 1960’s the black bashful (Erteja-i Siah),
and later he called the Muslims who took arms against his
regime in a guerrilla war in the 1970’s the
Islamic-Marxists. He considered himself the shadow of God
(Zellullah) on Earth and did not want that legitimacy
questioned or that perception taken away in a society
wherein religion was a fundamental part of the social
composition. The second point was to present an argument in
defense of the rule of law and democratic norms in
government and in rejection of the existing arbitrary rule
(Istibdad) and authoritarianism. The latter part of his
defense was not allowed by the judge to be read in court. To
show that FMI leaders had a fair trial, the court allowed a
military lawyer to represent them. However, the travesty of
justice was completed when, after they were charged with
treason and imprisoned; their lawyer was also arrested and
convicted on similar charges.
In the argument against authoritarianism,
Bazargan raised three lines of reasoning. First,
authoritarianism contributes to instability in society and
diminution of the growth of a unique national and historical
political culture. Second, authoritarianism promotes
corruption and lack of faith in one's own God-given
potentials. Third, authoritarianism causes social discord,
irresponsibility, and lack of progress in developing viable
economies and social institutions. Authoritarianism, he
argues, “does not have any support within the society, and,
as we have observed in the history of our nation, it is
exposed to instability and riddance.” (Modafe’at, 242) He
further extends his argument to the incompatibility of faith
and authoritarianism. “Religion and authoritarianism cannot
coexist. The conflict between the two has existed in the
past and it will persist in the future. God does not allow
absolute rule and the people’s submission to such rule, and
absolute rulers are not satisfied with anything short of
complete submission of their subjects to their rules.” This
stand stayed with Bazargan to the end of his life. He was
not only against authoritarianism for political reasons, but
also for religious convictions. That religious conviction
aided Bazargan after the Iranian revolution in opposing
authoritarianism under the name of faith and the mantle of
religion.
Bazargan was convicted in court and spent
five years in jail and exile(? Not true). When he was
released in 1967, he began to publish his writings and wrote
a number of new books. Between 1967 and 1979, the year of
the Iranian revolution, he published fourteen new books. In
the book Mission and Ideology (Be’that va Ideology),
Bazargan tries to introduce Islam as a dynamic faith that
can play the role of a viable ideology for change. In Is
Marxism Scientific? (Elmi Bodan-e Marxism), Bazargan argues
that Marxism as an ideology is more a utopian ideal rather
than a well-grounded scientific approach to politics and
society. These were the years that the Marxist elements
within the Mujahidin Khalq Organization (the People’s
Mujahidin Organization) eliminated their Muslim members
through bloody confrontations. One of the most famous works
of Bazargan, the Evolution of the Qur’an (Seir-e Tahavvol-e
Qur’an) was completed and published in this period.
Resorting to his engineering background and training,
Bazargan tries to prove, in this three-volume book, that the
Qur’an followed an evolutionary process in the history of
its revelation. The book has been recognized as one of the
best studies on the Qur’an in the Muslim world. Ali Shariati
(1933-1977), the Iranian-Islamic reformer, refers to this
book in a later letter to Bazargan as elevating his faith in
the scientific methodology of the Qur’an.
With the Iranian revolution in February 1979,
Bazargan was destined to play yet another role as statesman
in the government of the country. Bazargan was chosen by
Ayatullah Khomeini to lead the provisional government of
Iran, as no one else was bestowed with the high level of
respect and trust of the clergy and the intellectuals. He
was also a man with enormous skills in management and
integrity in his personal conduct. He was a committed
liberal who had fully devoted himself to democratic ideals
in government, which were the credentials needed in a
revolution that was carried out under the slogan of
independence (Istiqlal), freedom (Azadi), and an Islamic
republic (Jomhour-e Islami). His appointment satisfied most
of the Islamic and secular liberals who devoted time and
energy to the revolution. But these characteristics of
Bazargan later became a justification for his foes among the
puritanical clergy and the proponents of radicalism to
criticize his views and policies, to oppose his government,
and to ostracize his moderation and gradualism.
After nine months as head of government, he
relinquished the position as the revolution took a different
course. He was for moderation, but the radicalism of
post-revolutionary politics was against any moderate steps
in domestic and foreign policies of the country. He was for
gradual change in society and economy, while his foes were
for abrupt change and radical measures. He(and his foreign
minister Dr Ebrahim Yazdi) was for a foreign policy that was
non-confrontational, while his foes were for a
confrontational and unrepressed foreign policy. He was for
the rule of law, while his opponents in the clerical
establishment were for the rule of Velayat-e Faqih and the
absolute power of the clergy. He was for human rights, while
his opponents were for the theological interpretation of
rights that were limited to the perceptual understanding of
those clergy who were approaching these issues in the arena
of government for the first time in their lives. Those
clergy who were in charge of the judiciary did not have a
keen understanding of how judicial reviews and verdicts
should be dispensed in a society that carried out a
revolution under the motto of justice and human rights.
Finally, he was for democratic rule and formal politics
within the framework of a viable constitution that insisted
on accountability and responsibility, while his clerical
foes neither valued democratic rule nor formal politics with
ingrained mechanisms for checks and balances.
His political views on issues pertaining
government policies and individual rights in the
post-revolutionary politics of the nation placed him and his
party in a precarious position with respect to the ruling
clergy. He was elected to the Iranian parliament (Majlis)
representing Tehran in 1980 with a sizable vote. He used
that platform to challenge the government and galvanize
support for moderation and rationalization in Iranian
politics. He showed more interest in forcefully voicing his
opposition to the politics of the ruling clergy in four
specific areas: challenging the clergy on their reading and
interpretation of faith that had an impact on government,
politics and policies; the war with Iraq; human rights; and
freedom.
In the books Rediscovery of Values (Bazyabi-e
Arzeshha), Return to the Qur’an (Bazgasht-e be Qur’an) and
The Misled (Gomrahan), Bazargan tries to introduce his
audience to the misleading interpretation and the fallacious
reading of the faith that the ruling clergy offered in order
to justify their control of power and restrictions on
freedom and human rights. In Religion and Liberty (Din va
Azadi), which is part of the book Rediscovery of Values,
Bazargan forcefully argues that Islam unequivocally supports
human liberties and rights in society and its affairs. In
the book The Misled, Bazargan takes the example of medieval
Europe to prove how wrong the Church was in limiting and
dismantling liberties and imposing its unquestionable and
absolute power over society. In Religion and Liberty, he
begins, “Now, the question is whether all God’s emissaries,
particularly the founders of Islam, approved of the medieval
Christian practices. Are religion and freedom essentially
mutually exclusive? Were God’s prophets instructed to
instigate bloody revolutions on Earth, beheading skeptics,
destroying anti-revolutionaries, sowing the seeds of hatred
and discord, and swaddling or tying down the youths in the
school yard of religion? The Qur’an explains the mission of
the prophets both directly, through commandment, and
indirectly, through the explication of the general divine
plan of creation. What we learn from the story of the
prophets and our own slogan ‘There is no god but God,’ is
that the mission of the prophets has been to liberate human
beings, not to enslave them.” (Kurzman 1998, p. 78) In
another part of this essay, he extends his argument to the
meaning of the word freedom. “Let me reiterate: freedom
means freedom to oppose, criticize, and object - even if
criticism is untrue and unjust. Where there is freedom there
are opponents and currents that disturb routine stability
and normalcy. Otherwise, freedom would be meaningless and
useless. This notion of freedom is hard for many zealots -
if sincere - people to digest, as they consider such freedom
unwise and deleterious to the survival of the nascent
Islamic Republic (of Iran). They may even consider it a
blunder on their part to have allowed this notion of freedom
to prevail in the constitution of the Islamic Republic of
Iran. However, omniscient, compassionate God has not only
sanctioned freedom in many affairs, he has made it very
foundation of survival and revival in the world.” This
theology was powerful and unique in a society in which a
class of people, under the mantle of religion and religious
authority, attached to their position a sufficient amount of
sacredness that put them above the law and beyond criticism.
Clergy were immune to criticism in a culture that trussed
them to God and infallible imams, and that was exactly what
the theory of Velayat-e Faqih was poised to institute - the
God-given mission of the clergy to establish an “Islamic
Government.”
In the books The Iranian Revolution in Two
Phase( Directins) (Enqelab-e Iran dar do Harekat), The
Problems and Difficulties of the First Year of the
Revolution (Moshgelat va Masel-e Avvalin Sal-e Enqela), and
The Revolutionary Council and the Provisional Government
(Shaowray-e Enqelab va Dowlat-e Movaqqat) he describes the
political problems that the country faced as a result of the
ruling clergy’s domination of power. In The Iranian
Revolution in Two Phases, Bazargan sees the roots and ills
of politics of Iran in Ayatullah Khomeini’s diversion from
the pre-revolution slogan of and commitment to unity and
equality. He argues that before the revolution, Ayatullah
Khomeini insisted on the slogan of Hameh ba Ham (all
together in unity) while after the revolution, the slogan
was changed into Hameh ba Man (all with me). This, according
to Bazargan, was the root cause of many problems that the
nation was facing and the ensuing alienation of a
substantial portion of the society from participation in the
nation’s politics. In 1986, FMI wrote a book (Bahthi
Piramoon-e Velayat-e Mutlaqeh-e Faqih- A Diascussion on the
Absolute Authority of Faqih) questioning the doctrinal
legitimacy of the theory of Velayat-e Faqih. Bazargan wrote
chapters of this book in which he based his argument mostly
on religious documents, prophetic tradition, and previous
debates on the issue of faith and governance among the
theologians of Shi’ite Islam. The significance of this book
was that it was published when the architect of the theory
of Velayat-e Faqih, Ayatullah Khomeini, was still alive. The
well-articulated and convincing discussion of the book, in
addition to Bazargan’s respect in Iran, discouraged the
authorities to take drastic measures against him and his
party except in banning the publication of the book. In all
of these books, he is forceful and relentless in his
criticism of the policies that brought disunity, discord,
radicalism, and alienation to the politics of the nation.
Bazargan and his party, FMI, stood against
the odds and the emotions that the patrons of the
continuation of the war with Iraq instigated inside the
country. While they were advocates of the defense of the
country against the invading forces of Saddam Hussein, they
opposed the continuation of the war after 1982, when the
Iranian army had successfully expelled the Iraqi invading
forces from Iranian soil in Khorramshahr. They argued that
aggression should not be a response to the aggression of the
invading Iraq. The moral dilemma for FMI was the fighting of
two Muslim nations and the killing of thousands in the
battlegrounds. The questions of the justice of the war and
the justice in the war were both consequential to Bazargan
and his party in articulating their opposition to the
continuation of the war. However, FMI was not only voicing
its opposition to the continuation of the war, but to many
policies of governments that restricted freedoms and ignored
human rights under the emotional climate that the patrons of
war had created. The party and his leadership paid heavy
prices for these positions by the government imposing
restrictions on their activities, arresting and jailing its
members in the leadership, abducting its leaders, and
setting on fire the residences of a few among its
leadership.
In 1992, three years before his death,
Bazargan expressed a new theological argument and reading of
the faith that had been at the heart of the debate of Muslim
thinkers concerning the ultimate mission of the Islamic
faith. In the article, The Purpose of the Mission of the
Prophets (Hadaf-e Ba’that-e Anbia), he concluded that the
prophetic mission was only to educate people about God and
to inform them about the hereafter. He questioned the
legitimacy of arguments that accommodated any role for Islam
in establishing governments. Bazargan argued that Islam does
not prescribe any specific kind of government or politics.
We as Muslims, he contended, should configure what kind of
government is upright, worthy, and more prone to serve the
interests of the community. In other words, he questioned
and disposed of the notion of “Islamic Government.” In
another small book, The Kingdom of God (Padeshahi-e Khoda),
written after the revolution, Bazargan sees the kingdom of
people at the heart of the kingdom of God when it comes to
government and the affairs of the Muslim community. The
reason for this rejection is abundantly clear for Bazargan
and the proponents of the liberal Islam. The term “Islamic
government” in the current dominant Shi'ite theology of
Ayatullah Khomeini means the government by the
jurist-consult, Faqih, and a hierarchy of power that
suspects democratic governance. The problem with Ayatullah
Khomeini’s theology was that he advocated this theory as an
essential and unquestionable component of the faith. In the
real world of Shi'ite theology, that was an innovative
theory that was based on a specific reading of the tradition
(Sunnah) and did not have any direct relation to any
understood principles in Islam. Ayatullah Khomeini’s attempt
in this regard was mostly directed at establishing a
hierarchy of power around the clergy within the world of
Shi'ite Islam that would control and dictate conventions in
politics, society, and faith.
Both Bazargan and( Yazdi as the present
Secretary General of the) FMI remained, until the present, a
viable force in Iranian politics. Bazargan’s views and
teachings were not appreciated by the nation in the days
during which emotions and radicalism remained rampant and
dominant in the nation’s politics. With the war with Iraq
ending in 1988, a new rationale and reality set in the
society that brought with it a different and new discourse
in national politics. In the 1990’s, most of Bazargan’s
critics became apologetic to him and admired the man for his
conviction to democratic norms, commitment to moderation,
and especially for his faithfulness to ethics in politics
and government. The generation that instigated radicalism,
took the American embassy, established the foundation of the
information ministry with austere rules to protect the
revolution, was in favor of clerical absolutism, and was
indifferent to and effortless in upholding democratic norms
in politics, divorced itself from its past and advocated
reform and democratic government. Khatami, the country’s
president from 1997 to 2005, came to power as this new force
mobilized for reform. Much of the seeds of this reform
movement were planted by the legendary reformer, Mehdi
Bazargan. His life-long struggle, over a span of half of a
century for purification of religion, establishment of
democratic rule, respect of human rights, and approbation of
ethics in politics, began to show its impact in Iranian
politics. In Iran today, even his foes cannot question his
integrity, his piety, and devotion to the interests of his
nation. His impact on the new discourse and debate over
democratic rule is more evident and perceptible than ever.
Although radicalism still holds sway in Iranian politics,
its time has passed as it failed both in theory and practice
to accomplish viable politics and economies.
*Associate professor of International Affairs
Coordinator of General Education
Harrisburg University of Science and
Technology
Fellow, Center for International Studies
University of St. Thomas
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Hamid Enayat, Modern Islamic Political
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Abdul-Hadi Hairi, Shi’ism and
Constitutionalism in Iran, Leiden, 1997
Charles Kurzman, Liberal Islam: A Sourcebook,
New York, 1998
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