Abstract
The Islamic Republic of Iran is unsecular and follows religious interpretations from Shia Islam in deciding the laws of the land. In recent decades, the strengthening of civil society in the country has shaped various political debates on human rights among secular intellectuals and reflected in the discourse of some religious figures as well. While the regime has officially adopted the Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam (CDHRI) since 1990, different views on the Islamic human rights and its social implications still exist among the conservative and reformist Shia clergy within the country. This paper examines the view of an influential conservative pro-regime clergy, Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi, who has been concerned about the Western interpretation of human rights and engaged in its theorization based on his interpretation of Shia Islam. He has criticized the theoretical and philosophical foundations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and its each single item and has also proposed his own version of the Islamic Declaration of Human Rights and Obligations. While Islamic fundamentalists have no concrete theoretical support for their negative view of the Western conceptions regarding human rights, Mesbah Yazdi’s approach is based on a reading of Shia theology and Sadraean ontology. He engages in a dialogue with the Western ideologies and rejects UDHR after philosophical and theological reasoning. His stance can be viewed as a reflection of the unsecular political Shia Islam as the main characteristic of the conservative faction within the Islamic Republic of Iran which results in serious policy and social implications on the rights of the people living in the country.
References
Afrug, E. 2006. “Tabyin-e Falsafi-ye Enghelab-e Eslami bar Asas-e Hekmat-e Mota’aliyeh” (Philosophical Explanation of Islamic Revolution Based on Transcendent Wisdom). Peghahe Hauwzeh 217.Search in Google Scholar
Bakhshizadeh, M. 2018. Changing Gender Norms in Islam Between Reason and Revelation. Opladen, Farming-ton Hills: Budrich University Press.10.3224/86388735Search in Google Scholar
Baqerzadeh, M. R. 2008. “Mabaniy-e hoquq-e bashar dare Islam az manzar-e Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi” (Foundations of Human Rights in Islam According to Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi). Hokumat-e Islami 47 (1): 39–80.Search in Google Scholar
Bayat, A. 2009. “Islamism and Empire: The Incongruous Nature of Islamist Anti-Imperialism.” Socialist Register 44.Search in Google Scholar
Burke, R. 2011. Decolonization and the Evolution of International Human Rights. Philadelphia: Pennsylvania University of Pennsylvania Press.Search in Google Scholar
Buzari Nezhad, Y. 2012. “Mulla Sadra va estemrar-e vilayat dar zamin” (Mulla Sadra and the Continuity of Vilayat on Earth). Investigations on Ethics (Pazhuhesh Nameh-ye Akhlaq) 4 (14): 57–78.Search in Google Scholar
Ebadi, S. 2003. Tarikhcheh va asnad-e hoquq-e bashar dare Iran (The history and Documents of Human Rights in Iran). Tehran: Women Studies.Search in Google Scholar
Ehsan Bakhsh, P. 2000. “Ostad Mesbah va dah nokteh dar bab-e teoriy-e khoshunat va terorizm.” Ketab-e Naqd 14 (15): 340–9.Search in Google Scholar
Fazili, Y. Y. 2010. “Between Mullahs’ Robes and Absolutism: Conservatism in Iran.” SAIS Review of International Affairs 30 (1): 39–55, https://doi.org/10.1353/sais.0.0066.Search in Google Scholar
Fazlinejad, P. 2012. Az liberalism-e radical ta amal garayi-ye secular (From Radical Liberalism to the Practical Secularism). Tehran, Iran: Fars News. Also available at https://www.farsnews.com/news/13910127000016 (accessed April 15, 2018).Search in Google Scholar
Goudarzi, M. R., and A. Najafinejad. 2018. “Contemporary Traditionalists and Reformists Iranian Jurists and the Subject of Human Rights.” Muslim World Journal of Human Rights 15 (1): 29–58, https://doi.org/10.1515/mwjhr-2017-0023.Search in Google Scholar
Hashemi, N., and E. Qureshi. 2019. “Human Rights.” In The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Islamic World. Oxford Islamic Studies Online. Also available at http://www.oxfordislamicstudies.com/article/opr/t236/e0325 (accessed January 23, 2019).Search in Google Scholar
Jafari, M. T. 2017. Universal Human Rights: A Comparative Research, Translated by Beytollah Naderlo. Tehran: Allameh Jafari Institute.Search in Google Scholar
Javadi Amoli, A. 1996. Falsafey-e hoquqe bashar (Philosophy of Human Rights). Qom: Asra.Search in Google Scholar
Javadi Amoli, A. 2014. Manzelat-e aql dar hendese-ye ma’refat-e dini (Reason’s Place in the Geometry of Religious Knowledge). Qom: Asra.Search in Google Scholar
Kamal, M. 2016. Mulla Sadra’s transcendent philosophy. London and New York.10.4324/9781315596211Search in Google Scholar
Larijani, M. J. 2002. “Khatte qermez-e azadi” (Red Line of Freedom). Andisheh-ye Hawzah 37: 33–57.Search in Google Scholar
M. Y., and R. A. 2015. “The Legal Logic of the Master-Signifier in Pseudo-Freedom of Expression: A Self-Guarantee for the Reformist Modes of Self-Expression in Islamic Republic of Iran.” Muslim World Journal of Human Rights 12 (1): 25–51. https://doi.org/10.1515/mwjhr-2014-0001.Search in Google Scholar
Mansur Nezhad, M. 2003. “Kand-o kavi dar nazariyyate Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi: Sazegari-ye Islam va demokrasi” (A Study of the Ideas of Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi: Consistency of Islam and Democracy). Zharfna 28: 263–79.Search in Google Scholar
Mas’ud, K. 2007. “Muslim Perspectives on Global Ethics.” In Sullivan, William, Kymlicka, Will (Eds.), The Globalization of Ethics: Religious and Secular Perspectives. Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511498701.006Search in Google Scholar
Mayer, A. E. 1996. “Islamic Rights or Human Rights: an Iranian Dilemma.” Iranian Studies 29 (3–4): 269–96, https://doi.org/10.1080/00210869608701851.Search in Google Scholar
Mesbah Yazdi, M. T. 2002. Dīn va Azadī (Religion and Freedom). Qom: Imam Khomeini Institute.Search in Google Scholar
Mesbah Yazdi, M. T. 2004. Maārefe Qorāni (Quranic Teachings). Qom: Imam Khomeini Institute.Search in Google Scholar
Mesbah Yazdi, M. T. 2007. The Most of Immorality Comes from the University, Tehran, Iran: Etemad Newspaper, P.A1, No.1435. Also available at http://www.magiran.com/npview.asp?ID=1438423 (accessed July 7, 2019).Search in Google Scholar
Mesbah Yazdi, M. T. 2009a. Naqahī gozarā be hūqūqe bashar az didgāhe eslam (A short treatise on Human Rights in Islam), edited by Abd al-Hakim Salimi. Qom: Imam Khomeini Institute.Search in Google Scholar
Mesbah Yazdi, M. T. 2009b. Nazariyeye hūqūqiye eslām (Legal theory of Islam), edited by Mahdi Qaderi. Qom: Imam Khomeini Institute.Search in Google Scholar
Mesbah Yazdi, M. T. 2009c. “Eta’at az Rae’ise jomhur hamchn eta’at az khodast” (Obeying the President Would be the Same as Obeying God). Aftab-e Yazd Newspaper, 13 August 2009, 2702.Search in Google Scholar
Mesbah Yazdi, M. T. 2012a. Nazariyeye huquqiye eslam (Legal theory of Islam). Qom: Imam Khomeini Institute.Search in Google Scholar
Mesbah Yazdi, M. T. 2012b. Nazariyeye siyāsiye eslām (Political theory of Islam). Qom: Imam Khomeini Institute.Search in Google Scholar
Mesbah Yazdi, M. T. 2012c. Citizenship Rights, if it Means Equality of the Muslim and Bahai is Contrary to Islam. Also available at http://dinonline.com/doc/news/fa/3412 (accessed March 3, 2019).Search in Google Scholar
Mesbah Yazdi, M. T. 2014. Mesbah Yazdi’s Assertions about Public Vote. Also available at http://namehnews.ir/fa/news/133090 (accessed May 8, 2018).Search in Google Scholar
Mullerat, R. 2010. International Corporate Social Responsibility: The Role of Corporations in the Economic Order of the 21st Century. Netherlands: Kluwer Law International BV.Search in Google Scholar
Olayemi, A. A. M., A. Hamzah Alabi, and A. Hidayah Buang. 2015. “Islamic Human Rights Law: A Critical Evaluation of UIDHR & CDHRI In Context of UDHR.” Journal of Islam, Law and Judiciary 1(3): 27–36.Search in Google Scholar
Osanloo, A. 2009. The Politics of Women’s Rights in Iran. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.10.1515/9781400833160Search in Google Scholar
Rahnema, A. 2011. Superstition as ideology in Iranian politics: From Majlesi to Ahmadinejad. Vol. 35. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511793424Search in Google Scholar
Rajaee, F. 2010. Islamism and Modernism: The Changing Discourse in Iran. Austin, Texas: University of Texas Press.Search in Google Scholar
Rashad, A. A. 1998. “Gofteman-e no Sadrayi” (Neo-Sadraean Discourse), Makan-e Qabasat 10–11: 52–63.Search in Google Scholar
Saleh, N. S. S. N. 2012. “A Conceptual Analysis of ‘Rights’ In the International and Islamic Human Rights Instruments.” American International Journal of Contemporary Research 2 (4): 155–64.Search in Google Scholar
© 2020 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston