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Refashioning Iran: Language and Culture During the Constitutional Revolution

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Mohamad Tavakoli‐Targhi
Mohamad Tavakoli‐Targhi*
Affiliation:
Department of History, Illinois State University
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Extract

The dialogic interaction among India, Europe, and the Arab-Islamic culture in the 18th and 19th centuries led to a refashioning of Iran and a rescripting of “the people” and “the nation” in Iranian political and historical discourses. The newly imagined Iran, constructed of textual traces and archaeological ruins, fashioned a new syntax for the reconstruction of the past and the formation of a new national time, territory, writ, culture, literature, and politics. Language, the medium of communication and signification, and the locus of tradition and cultural memory, was restyled. Arabic words were purged, “authentic” Persian terms forged, and neologisms and lexicography were constituted as endeavors for “national reawakening.” Iran-centered histories displaced dynastic and Islam-centered chronicles. In order to recover from historical amnesia, people reinvented pre-Islamic Iran as a lost Utopia with Kayumars as a Persian prophet predating Adam, Mazdak as a theoretician and practitioner of freedom and equality, Kavah-yi Ahangar as the originator of “national will” (himmat-i milli), and Anushirvan as a paradigmatic just-constitutional monarch.

Type
Research Article
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 23 , Issue 1-4 , 1990 , pp. 77 - 101
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 1990

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Footnotes

*

This essay is dedicated to Firaydun Adamiyat, in appreciation of his historiographic contributions. It is a product of extensive dialogue with many friends and colleagues, including Catherine Peade, C. M. Naim, Palmira Brummett, Khosrou Shakeri, Valentine Moghadam, and Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak, as well as Shahla Haeri, Houchang Chehabi, and Abbas Amanat; I am especially thankful to Afsaneh Najmabadi for her intellectual support. Needless to say, I alone am responsible for the rhetoricality and theatricality of its approach.

References

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5. By neo-Zoroastrianism I have in mind the movement led by Azar Kayvan and his disciples. The publication and dissemination of their works, especially Dasātīr, Dabistān-i maż āhib, Chāristan-i chahār chaman, Zardast-i Afshār, Zindah rūd, and Khīshtāb contributed to the revitalization of the pre-Islamic history of Iran. On Azar Kayvan and his disciples see Mu'in, Muhammad, “Āżar Kayvān va payravān-i ū,” Majallah-yi dānishkadah-yi adabīyāt-i Tihrān 4.3 (Farvardin 1336 S./March 1957): 25-42Google Scholar. Dasātīr was claimed to be a “collection of the writings of the different Persian Prophets, who flourished from the time of Mahabad to the time of the fifth Sasan, being fifteen in number, of whom Zerdusht or Zoroaster was the thirteenth and the fifth Sasan the last” (The Desatir or Sacred Writings of the Persian Prophets, 2 vols. [Bombay: Courier Press, 1818], iii). The Dasātīr was collected by Mulla Firuz and taken to India during the reign of Shah ‘Abbas. The second volume of the published text included a glossary of obscure Persian words. Scholars such as Purdavud have questioned the authenticity of the Dasātīr. Dabistān-i maż āhib also flourished during the same period with similar claims. These attempts seem to have been an important component of the contestation for constructing an Iranian identity at a time of Shi'i ascendancy. On the controversial issues surrounding Dasātīr see Bharucha, Sheriarji Dadabhai, The Dasātīr, being a paper prepared for the tenth International Congress of Orientalists held in Geneva in 1894 a. c. (Bombay, 1907)Google Scholar.

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11. Quoted in Lisan, 15. Also see Safar nāmah-yi Mirzā Fattāḥ Khān Garmrūdī bi Urūpā, ed. Fath al-Din Fattahi (Tehran, 1347 S./1968), 919.

12. According to Iraj Afshar, Davari's copy was in the possession of Farah Pahlavi and was held in her personal library. See his “Shāhnāmah, az khaṭṭī tā chāpā“Hunar va mardum 14.162 (1354 S./1975): 24.

13. For Davari's introduction see Hamidi, Mahdi, Shi'r dar ‘aṣr-i Qājār (Tehran, 1364 S./1985), 210-15Google Scholar.

14. Ibid., 175.

15. Kirmani, Mirza Aqa Khan, Āyinah-yi Sikandarī (Tehran, 1324/1906), 14Google Scholar.

16. Nāmah-yi bāstān, completed by Shaykh Ahmad Adib Kirmani after the execution of Khan, Mirza Aqa, was also known as Sālār nāmah (Shiraz, 1316/1898)Google Scholar. The alternative title bears the name of ‘Abd al-Husayn Mirza Farmanfarma Salar Lashkar who sponsored the publication of Nāmah-yi bāstān in Shiraz. On this point see Kirmani, Nazim al-Islam, Tārīkh-i bīdārī-yi Irānīyān, ed. ‘Ali Akbar Sa'idi Sirjani (Tehran, 1346 S./1967), 175-88Google Scholar.

17. With some minor changes in translation, see Browne, Edward G., The Press and Poetry of Modern Persia (Cambridge, 1914), xxxvGoogle Scholar. For the Persian original see Kirmani, Nazim al-Islam, Tārīkh-i bīdāri (Tehran, 1362 S./1983), 1: 222-3Google Scholar.

18. ‘Ali Akhundzadah, Mirza Fath, Maktūbāt-i Mīrzā Fatḥ ‘Ali Ākhūndzādah, ed. M. Subhdam ([Paris], 1364 S./1985), 33-5Google Scholar.

19. See Bahar, Malik al-Shu'ara, Sabk shināsī: tārīkh-i taṭavvur-i naṣr-i Fārsī (Tehran, 1337 S./1958), 3: 348Google Scholar.

20. By transference I have in mind the dialogic relation of cultural interlocutors and cultural texts, i.e., the Shāhnāmah-narrators and the Shāhnāmah, whereby the language and the themes of the text reappear in the works of the interlocutor. For a theoretical formulation of transference in the field of historical research see LaCapra, Dominick, “History and Psychoanalysis,” in Soundings in Critical Theory (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1989), 30-66Google Scholar.

21. Kirmani, Mirza Aqa Khan, Āyinah-yi Sikandarī, 9Google Scholar.

22. It should be pointed out that Persian chauvinism became a component of the new secular political strategy. This anti-Arab tendency was to some degree similar to the Shu'ubiyah movement, which had developed as a reaction to the Muslim conquest of Iran. Concerning the Shu'ubiyah movement see Gibb, H. A. R., “The Social Significance of the Shu'ūbiyya,” in Studia Orientalia Janni Pedersen dicata (Copenhagen, 1953), 105-14Google Scholar; Mumtahin, Husayn ‘Ali, Nahżat-i Shu'ūbīyah: junbish-i millī-yi lrānīyān dar barābar-i khilāfāt-i Umavī va ‘Abbāsī (Tehran, 1975)Google Scholar; Zarrinkub, ‘Abd al-Husayn, Du qarn sukūt (Tehran, 1957)Google Scholar.

23. Akhundzadah, Maktūbāt, 20-21.

24. Kirmani, Mirza Aqa Khan, Sah maktūb: maktūb-i Shāhzādah Kamāl al-Dawlah bah Shāhzādah Jalāl al-Dawlah, ed. Bahram Choubine ([Paris], 1370 S./1991), 68-9Google Scholar.

25. The idea of Anushirvan as a just king was not a novel development. In the genre of “mirrors for princes” the Sasanian king was projected as a just ‘ādil) ruler.

26. Letter to Mirza Malkum Khan, dated 15 Jumada I 1311, quoted in Firaydun Adamiyat, Andīshahhā-yi Mīrzā Āqā Khān Kirmānī, 55.

27. Kirmani, Āyinah-yi Sikandarī, 17, 14.

28. Idem, Sah maktūb 270

29. al-Mulk, Mirza Muhammad Taqi Lisan, Nāsikh al-tawārīkh (Tehran, 1344), vol. 2, part 2, 359-61Google Scholar.

30. Kirmani, Āyinah-yi Sikandari, 522-3.

31. al-Saltanah, Muhammad Hasan Khan I'timad, Durar al-tījān fī tārīkh-i Banī Ashkān, 3 vols. (Tehran, 1308-1310/1890-1892), 1: 106Google Scholar.

32. Afghani, Jamal al-Din, “Tārīkh-i ijmālī-yi Irān” appearing in Fursat Shirazi, Dīvān-i Furṣat, ed. ‘Ali Zarrin Qalam (Tehran, 1337 S./1958), 28-73Google Scholar.

33. Jalal al-Din Mirza Qajar's Nāmah-yi khusravān: dāstān-i pādshāhān-i Pārs bizabān-i Pārsī kah sūdmand-i mardumān bivīzhah kūdakān ast, 2 vols. (Tehran, 1285-1288/1868-1871). According to Mumtahin al-Dawlah, Mirza Shaykh ‘Ali and Mirza Muttalib assisted Jalal al-Din in the writing of Nāmah-yi khusravān. See al-Dawlah, Mumtahin, Khāṭirāt-i Mumtaḥin al-Dawlah, 2 nd ed. (Tehran, 1362 S./1983)Google Scholar, 264 Furughi, Muhammad Husayn, Tārīkh-i salāṭīn-i Sāsānī, 2 vols (Tehran, 1313-1315/1895-1897) Mirza Isma'il Tusirkani, Farāzistān (Bombay, 1894)Google Scholar.

34. I'timad al-Saltanah, Durar al-tījān, 4.

35. In an appendix to Durar al-tījān (1: 202-35) I'timad al-Saltanah introduced eighty-two European historians and classicists whose works he had used. Among the authors authorizing his text were: Edward Gibbon, Sivester de Sacy, Comte de Gobineau, Èitienne Flandin, Friedrich Max Müller, John Malcolm, Victor Delacroix, Henry Rawlinson, and George Rawlinson. I'timad al-Saltanah had collected the works of these authors during his visits to Europe with Nasir al-Din Shah.

36. Nasir al-Din Shah's letter to I'timad al-Saltanah, dated 1309/1891, was added to the first volume of Durar al-tijān. For I'timad al-Saltanah's speculation that the Qajars were descendants of the Ashkanids see op. cit. 3: 154-7.

37. Furughi, Tārīkh-i salāṭīn 1: 5, 194; 2: 196.

38. Akhundzadah to Jalal al-Din Mirza, 15 June 1870, in Alifbā-yi jadīd va maktūbāt (p. 172), quoted in Hamid Algar, Mirza Malkum Khan, 92.

39. Dust al-Mamalik, ‘AH Khan Mu'ayyir, Rijāl-i ‘aṣr-i Nāṣirī(Tehran, 1361 S./1982), 54Google Scholar.

40. The first issue of Millat-i sanīyah-yi Irān was published on 14 Rabi’ I 1283.

41. Akhundzadah, Maqālāt, ed. Baqir Mu'mini (Tehran, 1351 S./1972), 44-5Google Scholar.

42. A few years after the Constitutional Revolution, a group of Constitutionalists exiled to Europe began to publish a newspaper with the title of Kāvah. The title page of this newspaper, the first issue of which came out on 24 January 1916, bears a picture of Kavah leading a popular movement.

43. Furughi, Tārīkh-i salāṭīn 2: 194.

44. Kirmani, Āyinah-yi Sikandarī, 75-6.

45. Furughi, Tārīkh-i salāṭīn 2: 195-6.

46. Kirmani, Sah maktūb, 260.

47. On the Indian School see Ahmad, Aziz , “The Formation of sabk-i Hindi” in Iran and Islam: In Memory of the late Vladimir Minorsky, ed. C. E. Bosworth (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1971), 1-9Google Scholar; Kadkani, Muhammad Riza Shafi'i, “Persian Literature (Belles-Lettres) from the Time of Jami to the Present,” in History of Persian Literature: From the Beginning of the Islamic Period to the Present Day, ed. George Morrison (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1981), 145-65Google Scholar. Among the leading figures of the Indian School were poets such as Kalim Kashani (d. 1650), Sa'ib Tabrizi (d. 1670), Ghani Kashmiri (d. 1667), Shawkat Bukhari (d. 1695), Nasir ‘Ali Sirhindi (d. 1696), Juya Tabrizi (d. 1706).

48. Siraj al-Din ‘Ali Khan Arzu, Dād-i sukhan, ed. Muhammad Akram (Rawalpindi: Iran-Pakistan Institute of Persian Studies, 1974). The controversy developed over Muhammad Jan Qudsi's (d. 1646) eulogy to the eighth Shi'i Imam, ‘Ali b. Musa al-Riza. Shayda Fatihpuri (d. 1632) sharply criticized Qudsi for rhetorical and linguistic mistakes in his eulogy. In return another poet, Abu al-Barakat Munir Lahuri (d. 1644), writing in the same rhyme and meters as Qudsi and Shayda, criticized Shayda for his errors in criticism.

49. Arzu, Dād-i sukhan, x.

50. Ibid., xxx-xxxii.

51. Nostalgia for classical literature was also an important component of both Arab and Turkish nationalism. In this regard, S. Moreh wrote, “The return to classical Arabic sources seems to have been inevitable especially among the Muslim poets and writers not only because it suited admirably the poetry of the court and of religious and national revival (being a genre suitable for addressing rulers and crowds from a platform) but also to emphasize their cultural identity by recalling its glorious and profound classical heritage. This seemed to them the best answer to the alien European literature and the invading and aggressive Christian civilization of the West” (“The Neoclassical Qaṣīda: Modern Poets and Critics,” in Arabic Poetry: Theory and Development, ed. G. E. von Gruenbaum [Wiesdbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1973], 156).

52. For an insightful reevaluation of the “Return Movement” see Azarakhshi, Ghulam ‘Ali Ra'di, “Darbārah-yi sabkhā-yi shi'r-i Fārsī va nahżat-i bāzgasht,” in Nāmvārah-yi Duktur Maḥmūd Afshār, ed. Iraj Afshar and Karim Isfahaniyan (Tehran, 1364 S./1985), 73-112Google Scholar. See also Hanaway, William, “Bāzgat-e adabi,” in Encyclopaedia lranica; Shafi'i Kadkani, “Persian Literature (Belles-Letters),” 166-74Google Scholar.

53. Salis, Mahdi Akhavan, Bid'at va badāyi'-i Nīmā Yūshīj (Tehran, 1357 S./1978), 22Google Scholar

54. Among such published texts were Firdawsi's Shāhnāmah (1785, 1811, 1829), the Divan of Hafiz (1791, 1826, 1828, 1831), Sa'di's Pandnāmah (1786), Būstān (1809, 1828), and Gulistān (1809, 1827,1830, 1833), Hatifi's Laylī va Majnūn(1788), Nizami's Sikandar nāmah (1812, 1827), Amir Khusraw's Layll va Majnūn (1811) and Akhlāq-i Jalālī (1810), Husayn Va'iz Kashifi's Anvār-i Suhayli (1804, 1805, 1813, 1823), Jami's Yūsuf va Zulaykhā (1809, 1821, 1829), Kaykhusraw Isfandyar's Dabistān-i maẓāhib (1809, 1818, 1860), Muhammad Husayn Tabrizi's Burhān-i qāṭi’ (1818, 1858“), and Dasātir (1811, 1818).

55. Purdavud, Ibrahim, “Dasātīr” in Burhān-i qāṭi', ed. Muhammad Mu'in (Tehran, 1362 S./1983), 1: lii-liiiGoogle Scholar.

56. “The Rev. A. Duff['s] … address to the General Assembly of the church of Scotland,” The Asiatic Journal and Monthly Register 18 (1836), “Asiatic Intelligence” section, 86-8.

57. Among the dictionaries edited and published in India were Baḥr-i ‘Ajam (1860, 1894), Bahār-i ‘Ajam (1861), Baḥr al-jawāhir fi lughat al-ṭib, Burhān-i qāṭi’ (1818), Chirāgh-i hidāyat,Dari gushā, Farhang-i Farrukhī (1829), Farhang-i Jahāng'īrī (1853, 1876), Farhang-i Rashīdi (1872), Farhang-i Ānandrāj (1882), Ghīyāṣ al-lughāt (1826), Haft qulzūm (1822), Kashf al-lughāt wa al-islilāḥāt, Khazīnat al-amṣāl, Khīyābān-i gulshan (1886), Lughāt-i Darī va Pahlavī (1818), Lughāt-i Fīrūzī, Madār al-afāżil, Majma’ al-Furs-i Surūrī, Mu ayyid al-fużalā’ (1884), Muṣṭalaḥāt al-shu'arā’ (1888), Nafā'is al-lughāt, nawādir al-maṣādir, Naṣīr al-lughāt, Shams al-lughāt (1806), Sirāj al-lughāt, Taḥqīq al-iṣṭilāḥāt. ṣurāḥ (1831), and Zubdat al-lughāt ma'rūf bih lughāt-i Surūrī.

58. Burḥan-i qāṭi', written in 1062/1652, became the locus of one of the most interesting and understudied lexicographic controversies in Persian. Asad Allah Ghalib (1797-1869), the celebrated Urdu poet, wrote a critical review of Burhān-i qāṭi’ in 1860 entitled Qāṭ i'-i burhān, and five years later added a new introduction to it and renamed the work Dirafsh-i Kāvyānī. Ghalib's harsh criticisms of the author of Burhān-i qāṭi’ led to a great literary controversy and the publication of many responses and rebuttals. Among the texts written against Ghalib were Mirza Rahim Bayg's Sāṭi'-i burhān (1860), Ahmad ‘Ali Shirazi's Mu'ayyid-i burhān (1863), Sa'adat ‘Ali's Muḥarriq-i qāṭi’ (1864), Amin al-Din Dihlavi's Qāṭi’ al-qāṭi’ (1865), and ‘Abd al-Samad Fada's Shamshīr-i tīztar (1868) and Tīgh-i tīztar (1868). These responses in turn prompted essays in both Persian and Urdu by Ghalib and his supporters, such as Najaf ‘Ali Khan's Rāfī'-i hażayān(1865), ‘Abd al-Karim's Su' ā lāt-i ‘Abd al-Karīm (1865), and Miyan Rad Khan's Laṭā'if-i ghaybī. On this controversy see Nazir Ahmad, Burhān-i qāṭi'

59. al-Mulk, Mirza Muhammad Khan Sinki Majd, Risālah-yi Majdīyah, bound with Bīst sāl ba'd az Amīr Kabīr, ed. ‘Ali Amini (Tehran, 1358 S./1979)Google Scholar.

60. Ghawsi, Muhammad ‘Ali, “Nādir Mirzā va tārīkh-i Tabrīz” Yādgār 5 (1965): 15-26Google Scholar.

61. Mirza ‘Ali Khan Amin al-Dawlah, Khāṭirāt-i sīyāsī-yi Mīrzā ‘Ali Khān Amīn al-Dawlah, ed. Hafiz Farmanfarmayan (Tehran, 1341 S./1962).

62. Farmanfarmayan's Introduction to Amin al-Dawlah, op. cit., 5.

63. On the simplification of Persian prose see Bahar, Sabk shināsī 3: 361; Ahsan, Shakoor, Modern Trends in the Persian Language (Islamabad: Iran-Pakistan Institute for Persian Studies, 1976), 34Google Scholar; ‘Abbas Zaryab Khu'i, “Sukhanī darbārah-yi munsha' āt-i Qā'im-maqām,” in Nāmvārah-yi Duktur Maḥmūd Afshār 3: 1433-55.

64. For studies of language reform and purism see Perry, John R., “Language Reform in Turkey and Iran,” IJMES 17 (1985): 295-30Google Scholar; Jazayery, M. A., “The Modernization of the Persian Vocabulary and Language Reform in Iran,” in Language Reform: History and Future, ed. I. Fodor and C. Hagége (Hamburge: Buske, 1983), 2: 241-68Google Scholar; Karimi-Hakkak, Ahmad, “Language Reform Movement and Its Language: The Case of Persian,” in The Politics of Language Purism, ed. Björn Jernudd and Michael Shapiro (Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 1989), 81-104Google Scholar.

65. For a collection of Yaghma's writings see Jandaqi, Abu al-Hasan Yaghma, Majmū'ah-yi āṣār-i Yaghmā Jandaqī: makātīb va munsha' āt, 2 vols. , ed. ‘Ali Al-i Davud (Tehran, 1362 S./1983)Google Scholar.

66. Yaghma, Kullīyāt-i Yaghmā Jandaqā (Tehran), 49; Yahya Aryanpur, Az Şabātā Nīmā, 114.

67. Yaghma, Majmū'ah-yi āṣ ār 2: 85; idem, Kullīyāt (Tehran, 1339 S./1960), 56.

68. For samples of the writing of the first three in pure Persian see respectively: Tabrizi's letter to Napoleon, in Farhad Mirza, Zanbīl (Tehran, 1345 S./1966), 26- 32; ibid., 364-79; Ḥadīqat al-shu'arā (Tehran, 1365 S./1986). For Tusirkani see Farāzistān. Bagishlu served in Constantinople as the chargé d'affaires and consul of Iran. He is the author of the controversial essays Alifbā-yi Bihrūzī and Pīrūz-i nigārishi Pārsī. For more details see Taqizadah, Hasan, “Luzūm-i ḥifż-i Farsi-yi faṣiḥ,” Yādgār 5.6 (Isfand 1326/Feb. 1948): 14Google Scholar. For a sample of Shahrukh Kirmani see Furūgh-i Mizdīsnī (Tehran, 1909).

69. al-Dawlah, ‘Ali Khan Amin, Khāṭirāt-i sīyāsī, 5Google Scholar.

70. Kirmani, Sah maktūb,265.

71. Hidayat, Riza Quli Khan, Farhang-i anjuman ārā-yi Nāṣirī(Tehran, 1288/1881), [2]Google Scholar.

72. At the end of this book there appears an essay on the problems of the scripts and suggestions for its reform.

73. For “grammar,” Mirza Habib used the concept of dastūr, instead of the more prevalent Arabic term naḥw. His writings on grammar are historically important for he tries to formulate the rules of Persian language without being constrained by the traditional categories of Arabic grammar.

74. Written as a textbook for the dār al-funūn, and published in 1316/1898.

75. Adamiyat, Firaydun, Andīshahā-yi Mīrzā Āqā Khān-i Kirmānī (Tehran, 1357 S./1978), 162, 274Google Scholar.

76. Kirmani, Āyinah-yi Sikandarī, 118.

77. On Bagishlu's views on reforming the Persian alphabet see his Alifbā-yi Bihrūzī, which is written in pure Persian.

78. Lewis, Bernard, The Emergence of Modern Turkey, 2nd ed. (London: Oxford University Press, 1969), 428Google Scholar.

79. Akhundzadah, Maqālāt, 187, 193.

80. Letter to Mirza Muhammad Rafi’ Sadr al-'Ulama, dated 18 Muharram 1129, ibid., 205.

81. For I'timad al-Saltanah's and Jalal al-Din Mirza's positions see respectively: I'timad al-Saltanah, Taṭbīq-i lughāt-i jughrāfīyā'ī (Tehran, 1311/1893), 68; Firaydun Adamiyat, Andīshahhā-yi Tālibuf-i Tabrīzī, 2nd ed. (Tehran, 1363 S./1984), 85.

82. “I'lām,” Irān: rūznāmah-yi sulṭ ānī 56.1 (31 March 1903): 3. Majlis-i ākādimī, a forerunner of Farhangislān (established in 1935), is not mentioned in any contemporary accounts of language reform in Iran. Such selective amnesia occurs in much of the literary history of Iranian modernism in which the Qajar period is depicted as ‘aṣr-i bikhabari (the age of unawareness).

83. For valuable studies of the Constitutionalist literature see Yahya Aryanpur, Az Şabā tā Nīmā, and Browne, Press and Poetry.

84. In orthodox Iranian political discourse, both Islamic and pre-Islamic, religion was viewed as the foundation of the state, and the state as the guardian of religion. According to a classic formulation, “State and religion are twin brothers. Whenever a disturbance breaks out in the country, religion suffers, too: heretics and evil-doers appear. Whenever religious affairs are in disorder, there is confusion in the country: evil-doers gain power and render the Ruler impotent and despondent; heresy grows rife and rebels make themselves felt” (al-Mulk, Nizam, The Book of Government or Rules for Kings, trans. Hubert Darke [London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1978], 60Google Scholar). On a pre-Islamic articulation of this view see The Letter of Tansar, trans. M. Boyce (Rome: Instituto Italiano peril Medio ed Estremo Oriente, 1968), 33-4.

85. Mohamad Tavakoli-Targhi, “Constitutionalist Imaginary [sic] in Iran and the Ideals of the French Revolution,” Iran Nameh 8.3 (Summer 1990): 421-2.

86. Qānūn 2 (Sha'ban 1308/22 March 1890), 3.

87. On the Shi'i ulama and constitutionalism see Hairi, Abdul-Hadi, Shī'īsm and Constitutionalism in Iran: A Study of the Role Played by the Persian Residents of Iraq in Iranian Politics (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1977)Google Scholar.

88. The changing grammar of Shi'i politics is quite evident in the discourse of the Islamic Republic of Iran in which traditional Islamic concepts have gained transparently secular usage.

89. For such articulations see Algar, Hamid, Mirza Malkum Khan: A Biographical Study in Iranian Modernism (Los Angeles and Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Natiq, Huma, “Rūznāmah-yi Qānūn: pīsh darāmad-i ḥukūmat-i Islāmī, 1890-1903,” Dabīrah 4 (Fall 1367 S./1988): 72-102Google Scholar.

90. For one such recent view see Bahram Choubine's “Pīshguftār” to Kirmani, Sah maktūb, 22-5.

91. Shirazi, Fursat, “Zindagānī-yi Furṣat,” in Divān-i Furṣat, ed. ‘Ali Zarrin Qalam (Tehran, 1337 S./1958), 16-25, 73Google Scholar; Kirmani, Āyinah-yi Sikandarī, 22.

92. It appears that the connotative transformation of the concept of andīshah from “fear” to “thinking” is related to the displacement of the politics of coercion with the politics of consensus.

93. Bahaikra Charch Dakani [a pseudonym], Shaykh va shūkh (unpublished manuscript in the library of Ayatullah Mar'ashi Najafi, #3747, Qum). This manuscript was kindly provided by Dr. Mahmud Mar'ashi, director of the Mar'ashi Foundation, Qum. For a valuable introduction to Shaykh va shiikh see Natiq, Huma, “Farang va Farang-ma' ābi va risālah-yi intiqādī-yi ‘ Shaykh va Shūkh,'” in Muṣībat-i vabā va balā-yi ḥūkumat (Tehran, 1358 S./1979), 103-29Google Scholar.

94. Millat, Khadim-i [a pseudonym], Muṣāḥibah-yi Islāmīyah-yi Islām, ākhānd, va hātif al-ghayb (Baku, 1321/1904)Google Scholar.

95. For the above-mentioned works, with the exception of Guftugū, see respectively: Malik, Rahim Rizazadah, Sūsmār al-Dawlah (Tehran, 1354 S./1975), 132-65Google Scholar; Khan, Mirza Malkum, "Rafīq va vazir," in Majmū'ah-yi āṣār, ed. Muhammad Muhit Tabataba'i (Tehran, 197?), 54-71Google Scholar; Talibuf, 'Abd al-Rahim, Āzādī va sīyāsat, ed. Iraj Afshar (Tehran, 1357 S./1978), 192-240Google Scholar; Fitrat Bukhara'i, Munāżirah-yi mudarris-i Bukhārā'i bā yak nafar Farangī dar Hindūstān (Istanbul, 1327/1909); Mirza Ghulam Husayn Nuri (Nayyir), Şuḥbat bā sar-i rafīqam va yā nālah-yi gharībānah-yi Nayyir (Tblisi, 1909); Choubine, Bahram, ed., Rawyā-yi ṣādiqah ([Paris], 198?)Google Scholar; anonymous, Mukālimah-yi sayyāh-i Irāni ba shakhṣ-i Hindi (n.L: Paradise Press, n.d.).

96. For a more elaborate study of the changing connotation of “millat” and the polarization of the political space see Mohamad Tavakoli-Targhi, The Formation of Two Revolutionary Discourses in Modern Iran: The Constitutional Revolution of 1905-1906 and the Islamic Revolution of 1978-1979 (Ph.D. dissertation. University of Chicago, 1988).

97. For a valuable analysis of the position of the Shi'i ulama during the Constitutional Revolution see Arjomand, , “The Ulama's Traditionalist Opposition to Parliamentarianism: 1907-1909,” Middle Eastern Studies 17 (1981): 174-90CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

98. For a chronicle of the struggles leading to the granting of the Constitution see Ervand Abrahamian, Iran Between Two Revolutions, 69-92; Bayat, Mangol, Iran's First Revolution: Shi'ism and the Constitutional Revolution of 1905-1906 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), 106-42Google Scholar. For the position of Muzaffar al-Din Shah on constitutionalism see “Mużaffar al-Din Shāh va mashrūṭīyat,” Armaghān 32 (1332 S./1953): 104-7.

99. Nazim al-Islam Kirmani, Tārīkh-i bīdārī1: 561.

100. On the class affiliations of the elected deputies to the First Majlis see Ittihadiyah, Mansurah, Paydāyish va taḥavvul-i aḥzāb-i sīyāsī-yi mashrūṭīyat: dawrah-yi avval va duvvum-i majlis-i shūra-yi millī (Tehran, 1361 S./1982), 101—18Google Scholar.

101. Kasravi, Tārīkh-i mashrūṭah-yi Irān, 120; Malikzadah, Tārīkh-i inqilāb-i mashrūṭīyat-i Irān (Tehran, 1363 S./1984), 2: 176; Bastani-Parizi, Talāsh-i āzādī,89.

102. Kasravi, Tārīkh-i mashrūṭah, 120.

103. The inauguration was initially supposed to be on 15 Sha'ban, but since it coincided with the birthday of the “Twelfth Shi'i Imam,” and since the constitutionalists wanted it to be an independent day, the Majlis was inaugurated on 18 Sha'ban 1324. In a message from the shah the inauguration of the Majlis was regarded as “the strengthening of the unity between the representatives of dawlat and millai” (Kashani, Vāqi' āt-i ittifāqīyah dar tārīkh 1: 106).

104. Dawlatabadi, Ḥayāt-i Yaḥyā 2: 84.

105. See Ashraf, Aḥmad, “Marātib-i ijtimā'ī dar dawrān-i Qājȧrīyah,” Kitāb-i ȧgāh 1 (Winter 1360 S./1981): 72-3Google Scholar.

106. According to article 26 of the supplement to the Constitutional Law, “All powers of the state are derived from the millat.“

107. On this point see Mustafa Rahimi, Qānūn-i asāsī va uṣūl-i dimukrāsī (Tehran, 1357 S./1978), 106-8.

108. Irān-i now 134 (16 February 1910).

109. Ibid.

110. Concerning the circumstances leading to the drafting of the Fundamental Laws see Nava'i, ‘Abd al-Husayn, “Qānūn-i asāsx012B; va mutammim-i ān chigūnah tadvīn shud?” Yādgār 4.5 (Bahman 1326/January 1947): 34-47Google Scholar.

111. Turkuman, Muhammad, Majmī'ah-'i az rasā'il, i'lāīyahhā, maktūbāt, … va rūznāmahhā-yi shaykh-i shahīd Fażl'allāh Nūrī (Tehran, 1362 S./1983), 1: 108Google Scholar. For an analysis of Nuri's political positions during this period see Adamiyat, Firaydun, “'Aqāyid ārā'-i Shaykh Fażl'allāh Nūrī,” Kitāb-i jum'ah 31 (28 Farvardin 1359/17 April 1980): 52-61Google Scholar. The same ideas were articulated in a gathering for the election of the Majlis deputies in the city of Yazd, a city with a large Zoroastrian population. One of the clerics present at the session pointed out: “We should not allow Zoroastrians to become dominant. I hear that one of the articles of the laws of the Majlis is equality. Zoroastrians must be kept wretched and held in contempt. According to reports, in other cities Zoroastrians ride horses, mules, and donkeys. They wear elegant and colorful clothes and hats. This behavior is against the shari'ah. The Zoroastrians, even if they are wealthy, can only wear milla cotton garments” (Ṣūrat-i majlis va nuṭqhā-yi ahālī-yi Yazd barāyi intikhābi vakx012B;l, shab-i 6 Ramażān 1325,” Şūr-i Isrāfīl 17 [14 Shavval 1325]: 4).

112. For the meaning of āzādī in classical Persian literature see ‘Ali Asghar Mudarris, “Fiṭrat va x0101;zādī,” in Muḥīṭ-i adab, ed. Habib Yaghma'i (Tehran, 1357 S./1978), 411-24. Concerning the meaning of āzādī in contemporary Persian literature see Isma'il Khu'i, Āzādī, ḥaqq va ‘adālat (Tehran, 2536 Shahanshahi/1977), 262-5.

113. Turkuman, Majmū'ah, 320.

114. Shaykh Fazl Allah Nuri, Lavāyih-i Āqā Shaykh Fażl'allāh Nūrī, ed. Huma Rizvani (Tehran, 1362 S./1983), 29.

115. Ibid., 62.

116. Ibid.

117. Nuri, Rasā'il, i'lāmīyahhā, maktūbāt, 107.

118. Said Arjomand, Amir, “The Ulama's Traditionalist Opposition to Parliamentarianism: 1907-1909,” Middle Eastern Studies 17 (1981): 179CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

119. On the prosecution and the charges against Shaykh Fazl Allah Nuri see “Muḥ ākamah va i'dām-i Ḥājj Shaykh Fażl'allāh-i mujtahid-i Nūrī” Kitāb-i jum'ah 35 (25 Urdibihisht 1359/15 May 1980): 137-45; Kashani, Muhammad Mahdi Sharif, Vāqi' āt-i ittifāqīyah dar rūzgār (Tehran, 1362 S./1983), 3: 375-8Google Scholar.