Islamic leadership
 |
- This is a sub-article to Islamic politics and a parallel sub-article to leadership.
Islamic leadership is silly and wrong. Among the divisions of Islam, there are different views of how Islamic leadership is supposed to be carried out.
History
Both Shi' and Sunni agree that it was the Islamic prophets that were responsible for the Islamic leadership, prophet Muhammad being the last one of them. After Muhammad, the concept of Islamic leadership became disputed.
Sunni
Sunni Islam dictates that in the absence of an Islamic state and the Khilafah or Caliphate, ruled by a Caliph (lit: successor), it is obligatory on every Muslim to work towards the establishment of the Khilafah. The Khalif holds supreme religious and political authority over the state, and is advised by a consultative body, the Majlis or Shura. He may be either appointed by the previous Khalif, elected by a committee set up to elect the Khalif, or elected by the Ulema. Sunni believes that anyone can have the right to give orders, and a faghih can be anyone. Leadership is a position which is gifted by God, and is completely necessary for the guidance of humankind. Man is living to reach an ultimate goal of humanity, and it needs true educators for this purpose.
The Capliphat was ended by the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in 1922, as a direct consequence of World War I.
Shi'a
Shi'a insiste that the Shi'a Imams were those responsible for the Islamic leadership after Muhammad, however, they where robbed of their right to execute their responsibilities.
Ismaili
The Islamili have their own doctrine, see Imamah (Shi'a Ismaili doctrine)
Twelvers
In the Shi'a jurisprudence, there is a tradition of not obeying sinners, deriving from the Shi'a belief of the Infallibility of the Shi'a imams. They also use a Qur'anic verse to support their argument:
- Sura 76.24 translated by Shakir
- Therefore wait patiently for the command of your Lord, and obey not from among them a sinner or an ungrateful one.
Faghih is a person who have learnt the Divine Law and is not necessarily infallible. This is the main failure of Waliyat al-Fagih and it resembles the Sunni's viewpoint in this aspect.
Quietism
The classical Shi'a belief is that nobody can be a representative of the Mahdi [citation needed] and Muslims should refrain from politics for the same reasons the Shia Imams retired from the political arena after the battle of Karbala. [citation needed] They argue that if one insist on having a government, then it should not be claimed to have divine authority by claiming to be a representative of Muhammad al-Mahdi, rather have a "normal" state and strive to have laws in harmony with Islam, without calling it explicitly an Islamic state, with a self-perceived mission to guard and expand Islam. They believe that the true Islamic state will re-emerge with the re-emergence of Mahdi, and the rushing of the procedure goes against Mahdi will.
Vilayat-e Faqih
After the twelfth Shi'a Imam, the concept of Islamic leadership became disputed with the concept of Vilayat-e Faqih, resulting in the 1979 Islamic revolution.
Quietism ceased to be the only view [citation needed] with the release of the book Waliyat al-faqih and the Islamic revolution of Iran. Then the doctrine of the Guardianship of the Jurisprudens (Wilayat al-Faqih) took root in the Islamic Republic of Iran.
According to idea developed by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the muslim people not only have right to build their own Islamic state in absence of infallibles and it is not against Shariah, but also they must do it. He believe that this concept does not fall within Fiqh category but it is an essential basis of Islam and in fact establishing an Islamic state is the most important Islamic commandment. otherwise no one could be able to implement Shariah as stated in Quran and sunnah.
He steted that the concepts of time and place are essential in Dynamic Fiqh (Saheb Javaher Fiqh). All of the rules developed in modern societies such as social security, insurance, labor’s law, municipality systems etc can be considered as state authorities of Islamic state. These types of rules which are outcomes of human experience and understanding are categorized as state commandments, beside primary commandments and secondary commandments in Fiqh. And the Islamic state has absolute right (ولايت مطلقه), not limited nor bounded, to enact state commandments at all, even if it violates the primary or secondary commandments of Islam. He insists that the basis of the Islamic state is the people’s vote. The main idea behind Vilayat-e Faqih is Vilayat-e Fiqh itself. [1]
References
See also
External links
- http://www.salafimanhaj.com Politics in Light of Islam - Audio Lectures]
- http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/iraq/religion-shia2.htm