[lbo-talk] Juan Cole: Description of Sistani's world view

Michael Pollak mpollak at panix.com
Sun Feb 15 15:52:18 PST 2004


http://www.juancole.com/2004_02_01_juancole_archive.html#107683179960541443

February 15, 2004

Speaking of Sistani, I received by email a fascinating account by a

participant of a recent joint visit to Sistani of Kurdish and Sunni

Arab clan leaders. I was given permission to quote from it by the

person who sent it to me, on condition that I guard the

confidentiality of the persons involved. I thought that as an educated

Sunni Arab impression of Sistani, the account has historical

significance.

Impressions of Sistani:

"He had a heavy (and I mean really heavy) Persian accent which he

didn't (and couldn't) hide. He used classical Arabic, but the

structure of his sentences was not perfect . . .

. . . he went on and on about Sunnis and Shia saying that these were

doctrines differing on how to interpret Islam and they were all decent

and good-intentioned. They were definitely no reason for bloody

strife. He talked about the ancient pillars of the sunni doctrine and

praised them all in detail and said how he respected them as men of

faith and as scholars. The difference between the Shia and Sunna, he

believed, was far less significant than the danger facing the Iraqi

nation at present. Well, personally that put him on my right side!

Then [one Kurdish chieftain] . . . sounded his fear that through

democracy the Shia would dominate Iraq and consequently the Kurds.

He said that he didn't believe there was much danger of that

happening. The Shia were not a single political entity. Some are

atheists, some are secular; even religious Shia did not all follow the

same leader.

He said that he firmly believed that the clergy should not interfere

with the running of people's lives, with government or with

administration. He had forbidden his followers from putting their

noses into the state's affairs. He said that clearly and categorically

(several times to stress the point!) . . .

Some of the other things he said (This is a rather loose

translation!):

"The most important thing at this time is unity. Division of the

people is treason! Even silence, in these turbulent times, is evil."

"Give my regards to your tribes and to the Sunna clergy and tell them

that Sistani "kisses their hands" and begs them to unite with all

Iraqis, Shia, Kurds, Christian, Turkmen. You just unite, and count on

me to stand up to the Americans! The worst that could happen is that I

die! That doesn't worry me!"

. . . He mentioned the "Arab Nation" so many times! He evidently

viewed himself as an Arab. Being born Persian did not affect the fact

that he was a Sayyed [descendant of the Prophet Muhammad]. He made

that perfectly clear . . .

He was extremely humble in his talk, his attire and his mannerisms.

He was much younger than I had thought; looked like early seventies

but quite agile and healthy-looking."

posted by Juan Cole at 2/15/2004 08:56:39 AM



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