Contemplation on Jurisprudence Principles and Necessities of Sheikh Fazlollah Nouri's Legitimate Constitutional Theory

Abstract

The victory of Constitutional Revolution during Muzaffareddin Shah Qajar is considered as one of the biggest political-religious developments in Iranian contemporary history during which the Shiite Ulema (clergymen) by their serious involvement in this movement and acceptance of its leadership created a modern era of various views about the constitutional political structure through using the huge legacy of the Shiite political jurisprudence. Meanwhile, a group of these Ulema by bringing up the issue of legitimate constitution tried to present a new reading of the Shiite political thinking concerning the criteria of the legitimacy or non-legitimacy of the constitutional system. Sheikh Fazlollah Nouri is considered one of the most leading religious figures whose jurisprudential thinking regarding the Iranian constitutional movement has been reviewed and analyzed in this article historically and jurisprudentially. The main point/question in the article is that why and under what religious and historical necessities a group of the Ulema, particularly Sheikh Fazlollah Nouri, stood against the constitutional system and started to bring up the plan of Legitimate Constitutional Theory? The findings of this study show that the Legitimate Constitutional Theory was formed as a result of the Shia jurisprudential necessities and the historical conditions of that period, and that based on the Nouri's viewpoint analyzed in his main works, he in the position of religious authority and religious jurist believed he was defending the bases of Islamic religion, while the sources of proconstitutionalists have considered Nouri's defense of Islam as the result of his support for autocracy.