Mir Damad, grandson of the highest ranking jurist and head of the religious establishment in Safavid Iran, Shaykh ‘Ali al-Karaki (d. 1534), was a scion of Persian nobility from Astarabad who were descendants of the Prophet. Trained as a jurist and philosopher in Mashhad and Isfahan, where he studied with leading students of Shaykh Zayn al-Din al-‘Amili (d. 1558) such as Shaykh Husayn b. ‘Abd al-Samad, as well as with leading philosophers of Shiraz such as Mir Fakhr al-Din al-Sammaki, he became a prominent figure at the Safavid court of Shah ‘Abbas I. His skill in philosophy led him to be dubbed the “Third Teacher” after Aristotle and Farabi. While his writings primarily concern jurisprudence and philosophical theology more than political thought, he was a major political figure. He defended the Safavid polity; trained students in philosophy, including the important figure of Safavid thought, Mulla Sadra Shirazi (1572–1640); and served as a prayer leader and jurist for the capital, Isfahan, most notably conducting the coronation of Shah Safi in 1629 and leading the prayer in Isfahan. On a visit to the Shi‘i shrine cities in Iraq with Shah Safi, he died in Najaf and was buried in the courtyard of the shrine.
His contributions to political thought and defense of the Safavid polity lie in three areas. First, he wrote glosses on major works in Shi‘i jurisprudence and tradition to bolster the official status of Shi‘i Islam in the empire and to further the Safavid project of reviving and disseminating Shi‘i teachings as the official theory underlying the empire. He therefore wrote marginalia and commentaries on the four main collections of Shi‘i hadiths as well as on al-Sahifa al-Sajjadiyya (The scroll of Sajjad), the famous collection of the supplications of the fourth imam, ‘Ali Zayn al-‘Abidin, that was widely disseminated and popularized in the period.
Second, in the field of jurisprudence, he wrote works on the necessity of establishing the Friday congregational prayers under the authority of the jurist and in the name of the just authority (al-sulṭān al-‘ādil), which was either the Hidden Imam or the jurist as his general representative. He also wrote works on legitimate claims to the rights for declaring jihad and on the need for the polity and religious establishment to assume the guardianship of those unable to take care of themselves. These works, which represent some of the strongest claims to clerical authority in the Safavid period, argue clearly for the legitimacy of the Safavids as rulers with divine favor and for the jurists as figures whose authority underpins the polity of which they are guardians.
Third, as a leading courtier, Mir Damad was also involved in official embassies and wrote correspondence for the shah defending the dynasty, and his elite mysticism favored the imperial conception of authority.
See also Mulla Sadra (ca. 1572–1640); Safavids (1501–1722); al-Tusi, Nasir al-Din (1201–74)
Further Reading
Rula Abisaab, Converting Persia: Religion and Power in the Safavid Empire, 2004; Saïd Amir Arjomand, The Shadow of God and the Hidden Imam: Religion, Political Order, and Societal Change in Shi‘ite Iran from the Beginning to 1890, 1984; Seyyed Hossein Nasr, “Spiritual Movements, Philosophy and Theology in the Safavid Period,” in The Cambridge History of Iran, edited by Peter Jackson and Laurence Lockhart, 1986; Andrew J. Newman, “Towards a Reconsideration of the ‘Esfahan School of Philosophy: Shaikh Bahā’ī and the Role of the Safawid ‘Ulamā’,”Studia Iranica 15, no. 2 (1986).
SAJJAD H. RIZVI