Iranian-Islamic Civilization | ||
Iranian-Islamic Civilization The main concern of all revolutionary figures during the last years of Imam’s fruitful life was the ituation after his demise. Everybody was worried who may substitute the great personality, thoughts and leadership of Imam and at what direction the train of Islamic Revolution may head? Surely the demise of the founder of the Islamic Revolution was a severe shock and catastrophic event. But what made this great damage and breathtaking punch on the heart of Iranian people to end with calmness and security, was the deeply thoughtful and really epoch-making election by the Leadership Experts Assembly at that sensitive juncture. Now after nearly 20 years what has proved clear is the thoughtful leadership, deep and all-ncompassing ideas, humble and patient personality along with piety, knowledge, certitude, and determination of the Leader who took the Islamic System through different events each of which could fail a stable political system. He opened clear horizons in front of the system of the Islamic Republic and reali-zation of ideals of Imam and the Revolution. The Leader posses a multifaceted and outstanding personality. He is a visionary jurisprudent informed about current events, an ethical prudent politician, capable manger and thoughtful scholar… The intellectual and creative aspects of the personality of the Leader have been most overshadowed by other aspects of his personality. In fact what hurts is that his scholarly personality and different aspects of his ideas are intentionally neglected by some persons or parties to sever their selfish or personal or party benefits; or are utilized in shallow slogans. There have been opportunities when the Leader proposed innovative plans which could be used to create universal and practical ideas but aforementioned approaches have prevented their realization and the opportunity has not been used effectively. It would be also fair to claim that some thoughts and characteristics of the Leader have not received proper attention while proper attention and their utilization could have provided new approaches for solution of challenges in our society. In addition to shallow sloganstricken utilization of his ideas,what clearly prevents the proper implementation of the ideas of the Leader is lack of systematic, precise and orderly approaches to his thoughts. The methodological weakness of the existing situation are presented here, while it is theduty of all researchers, scholars and advocates of the Islamic system and Revolution to develop proper methodology to research and study his thoughts. First, the ideas of the Leader should be studied inside an integrated framework including with meaningful connections. This is how the relative meaning of different concepts and their relations are clearly nderstood. If the ideas and concepts presented by him are not compared along with ideas, their depth and effectiveness would not be realized. It is within such framework that the concepts will complete each other. Some ideas or thoughts will explain or deepen others. Second, the ideas and thoughts of the Leader should be understood in the light of the nature of the Islamic Republic. We would not understand the ideas and thoughts of someone who tries to propose strategies and ideas needed for the development of the Islamic Republic unless we grasp the nature and content of this system. To understand the nature and content of the Islamic Republic we should bear in mind that such system was young and unprecedented and no example could be found for it, neither at the time of foundation nor in the past. This system which presents itself as the Islamic Republic, has been evolved from Islam and its great teachings, taking inspirations from the early Islam and the system founded by the Prophet (PBUH) and Imams and committed itself to these roots and foundations. On the other hand, in order to progress and develop in today’s world, it has utilized the achievements of contemporary civilization by considering the aspects of the new world and prerequisites of the time along with human developments in all conceptual and practical aspects. The ideas of the Leader as a criterion and foundation for the Islamic Republic clearly prove this allinclusiveness and multifaceted nature. His insistence on valueorientation and rationality along with moderation, his insistence on software movement, utilization of other ideas while rejecting imitation and considering innovation, or ejection of one-way principlism and asking the principlists to be progressive, rejecting reformism without fundamentals, and pointing to the fundamentals of the Islamic Revolution and system in reformism and insistence on religious democracy are all among ideas which are understood only through comprehending the nature of the Islamic Republic System. Third, the Leader has a deep and complete understanding of the ideas and thoughts of the late Imam and is fully determined to lead the Islamic Revolution on thepath of these ideas and ideals of the late Imam. Now what would we get through a systematic study of the ideas and thoughts of the Leader? Realistic Idealism The approach of the Leader to various subjects could be defined as “realistic idealism”. The Leader does not compromise pure Islamic and revolutionary ideals in any field and at the same time he moderately pursues all these ideals through strict conception of tangible realities. This understanding is crucial for conception of his ideas since unrealistic idealistic as well as non-idealistic realist ideas and practices threaten our country. If the idealists do not understand the realities, considering the solid and mostly unfavorable nature of the realities they may be trapped in irrational and radical approaches, meanwhile if by considering the realities the idealists turn to practical approach by forgetting the ideals, the result would be nothing but passiveness and acquiescence to realities through thinking and acting within the limited framework of these realities.
Pragmatism vs. Realistic Idealism Here the difference between being realist and being practical or pragmatist is important. Based on this conception the Leader is realist not pragmatist. Being pragmatist means acquiescence to realities, giving in to the current conditions, adopting a passive position and acting upon it. But realism includes a certain form of rationality. It means considering situational conditions in decisionmaking processes despite being bound by fundamental values at the same time, which may be put shortly as combining uncertain situations with certain fundamentals. The thinking of the Leader is best fit within this definition. If the Islamic Republic distances itself even a little from realistic idealism, it would be in trouble.
Iranian-Islamic Civilization The second result from systematic study of the thinking of the Leader would be conception of the Islamic Revolution as struggle to form the Iranian-Islamic civilization. In this view the purpose of the Islamic Revolution would be building a society in which material and spiritual life is based on piety as well as progress and the welfare of individual and collective life will be based on Iranian- Islamic identity. It is for this purpose that the Leader has always insisted on development while warning that this development should be based on a model of our own and not imitating other nations. The main concern of the Leader at this stage is national development but the development that is founded on our particular model evolved with our own society and fulfilling the wishes and demands of our people and nation. This shows the realistic idealism in his thinking on the one hand and his deep understanding of the concept of development on the other hand. There was a time when Western ideologists advised other nations to follow the Western model of development. They believed that only one model exists for development and that is only the Western model of development but after vast experience in the field of ideology, now many of these ideologists believe that every country should have its own model based on its values and demands. Utilizing successful experiences is definitely approved by the Leader while imitating other models is surely condemned: “What kind of development are we after? This is the key point in economic and other debates of the time. Some people try to just raise names like Chinese model, Japanese model and others to divert public attention from the main issues. The development model in the Islamic Republic depends on cultural, historical heritages and beliefs of this people and is a purely indigenous model peculiar to the Iranian nation. We should not imitate others, neither the World Bank, nor the International Monetary Fund, nor any leftist country, nor any rightist country nor any other country. The requisites are different in different places. Utilizing the experiences of others is different from following imposed and mostly outdated models. Sometime some approaches are proposed for cultural, economic and other fields which are taken from others: some western thinkers said so, some thinkers from somewhere said so. As if they are referring to a revealed text! Many of these approaches are outdated, thirty, forty, or even fifty years old; they have been experimented, later better approaches have been put forward; but now we want to utilize their outdated approaches in education, science, economic matters as well as planning and budgeting. No, this is not right. Experience and knowledge should be utilized but the model and approach of utilization must be totally local”. He believes that relying on local potentials and forces does not contradict utilization of others’ experiences in that field. “The real civilization for our nation is the Iranian civilization; the civilization that is ours; has evolved from our own potentials and combined and intermingled with our life conditions. The real solution is a local solution. We should plant our healthy seeds and take care of them to grow; should not imitate this or that; we should not try to speak in foreign languages and terms and borrow their old experiences. It does not mean that we should not utilize their scientific achievements. I fully believe that we should utilize all human scientific achievements. We do not close the windows. We should share the achievement of anybody who has done something good in the world.” What we need in utilization of others’ experiences besides indigenous development is promotion of self-confidence and hope for the future: “talents should be promoted. All people – those in science, technology, innovation, technical issues at all levels – should feel that the responsibility for development of the country is on their shoulders. We should build the country ourselves; nobody will build the country for us as it is demanded by us. We are those who build our own home based on our own demands”. Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf is a university Assistant Professor and the Mayor of Tehran. | ||
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