Posted on 10/08/2006 9:01:29 AM PDT by Jet Jaguar
Supporters of a senior Shia Muslim cleric who has challenged Iran's clerical rulers have clashed with police in Tehran.
Police used teargas to disperse the crowd outside the home of Ayatollah Mohammad Kazemeini Boroujerdi in southern Tehran, newspapers said on Sunday.
Etemad-e Melli newspaper said an estimated 200 protesters formed a cordon around the house to call for the release of several of Boroujerdi's followers who they said had been detained.
Some newspapers said the crowd feared Boroujerdi himself might be arrested.
Seday-e Edalat reported that the crowd lit fires to stop police from approaching the house.
A picture showed police in riot gear lined up near a crowd of people in the street.
The Iranian authorities are wary of challenges, particularly from senior clerics, to the system of clerical rule that was established after the 1979 Islamic revolution by Ayatollah Khomeini.
Political religion
"We believe that our nation is tired of political religion and they want to return to traditional religion," Boroujerdi told Iran's labour news agency ILNA on Saturday.
He said he had written to Kofi Annan, the UN secretary-general; Javier Solana, the European Union foreign policy chief; Pope Benedict; and other leaders asking them "to make efforts to spread traditional religion", ILNA reported.
A senior police officer was quoted as saying Boroujerdi claimed to be a representative of the 12th Imam, who Shias believe has been hidden by God but will emerge as the ultimate saviour of mankind, and this prompted some people to make donations to him.
'Misinterpreting religion'
"This is misinterpreting religion and is sheer lies," the police officer was quoted by Seday-e Edalat as saying.
Iran has an elected president and parliament but final authority lies with the supreme leader, currently Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, according to velayat-e faqih, the system of rule by a religious legal scholar that was introduced by Khomeini.
The supreme leader is chosen by an assembly of elected clerics.
Some Shia clerics believe that religious leaders should not have a political role.
Then what in Allah's name is he doing in Islam?
Stupid cleric.
My friend, he is our one hope in Iran. The guy is for real, as was his father. That this article is dated today in the afternoon means he survived the government onslaught last night. Good for him.
I hope it means he made it, but I fear its just a rehash and that he's probably still under siege or worse.
Sisyphus.
Then what in Allah's name is he doing in Islam? Stupid cleric.
Although I completely agree that the World would be a much better place if all Muslims woke up tomorrow as Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, Druids or atheists, it is utopian to expect that 1.7 billion Muslims in the World are going to completely turn their back on Islam.
Just as Western Civilization has changed in the past 500 years from the time when the vast majority of Europeans were Christians fanatical enough to see nothing wrong with burning each other on the stake for not believing exactly the same thing to a Western Civilization where the majority of the population rarely sets foot inside a Church, Islam will never go away completely but can change into a relatively benign entity once the Muslim youth does not have radical Islam crammed down their throat by force.
The best we can hope for is that Islam slowly evolves into a religion of "cultural Muslims" that are as much Muslim as Ted Kennedy, John Kerry and Nancy Pelosi are Catholics.
I know several "ham sandwich and a beer" Muslims and they are fine people.
Having more Muslim clerics advocating for the separation of politics and religion is exactly what is needed.
"Just as Western Civilization has changed in the past 500 years."
Has everyone forgotten the Hundred Years War, the Thirty Years War, Henry VIII in England, and the Albigensian Heresy? All Christian religious wars. The Islamic societies are currently undergoing the same kind of division and warfare between Sunni and Shia, with Wahabism as an expecially strong factor. They are just several hundred years behind us, and apparently have learned nothing from our history. Oh well, those who do not learn the leasons of history are doomed to repeat them.
--Hundred Years War--
At the end, Joan of Arc was burned as a witch, so that part of it may apply to the list of Christian failings.
However, it wasn't a dominantly religious war, though the English & French rulers may have trieed to propagandize it as such. It was more about conflicting claims to disputed territories in France.
I know you're both right in your approaches. I was just early morning frustrated into thinking I was turning a couple of "smart" phrases.
Though P, bearing on your thoughts that...
...Christians fanatical enough to see nothing wrong with burning each other on the stake for not believing exactly the same thing to a Western Civilization where the majority of the population rarely sets foot inside a Church....
This is not so straightforward as many believe. I might suggest you take a look at Rodney Stark, For The Glory Of God in that many of these 'burnings at the stake' were predominantly rural, and were seldom carried out in urban European environments where the emphasis was prdominantly on confession, penance and forgiveness.
Best to you both. And, thanks.
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