JERUSALEM — The opposition movement in Iran now has a religious dimension:
The decision to defrock a dissident ayatollah – widely considered to wear the mantle of spiritual leader of the opposition – has pried open conflicts within the Islamic Republic’s religious core.
The Qom Theological Lecturers Association, a regime-aligned grouping of clerics, mandated Saturday that Ayatollah Yusuf Sanei’s edicts are no longer religiously binding. The ruling was furiously disputed by the rival Association of the Lecturers and Scholars of Qom Theological Seminary and the Association of Combatant Clerics.
“It’ll be tough work [defrocking Sanei],” says Nicola Pedde, director of the Rome-based Institute for Global Studies and a frequent visitor to Iran. “It’ll provoke a massive movement from the clerical side and, possibly, totally and completely religiously delegitimize the regime.”
In a recent post, I wrote that I would like to see the State of Israel bound — in some capacity — by Jewish law. Now, this recent event in Iran combined with a related incident here in the Holy City have caused me to doubt my earlier belief:
A woman who boarded a bus designated for religious passengers sprayed tear gas at an Orthodox man who demanded she move to the rear section last week in Ashdod.
The incident began on Friday, when an 18-year-old Orthodox man noticed the woman, 60, sitting at the front of the bus on a route on which men and women are segregated for purposes of religious modesty.
The man objected to the woman’s seating location, and asked her to move to the back, police said, but she refused to budge.
The exchange quickly escalated into a confrontation, police said.
It is quite easy — I must admit — to wish for a society or government run according to a particular religion. However, this might be an idealistic goal that is impossible in a world that is comprised of humans, with all their realistic faults and frailties.
A set of general beliefs, practices, and revelations, it could be argued, come from God. However, religion — the practical-and-worldly implementation of those beliefs and revelations — comes from humans. And humans are wont to disagree. Much of the history of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam is comprised of various sects, denominations, and movements interpreting the beliefs and revelations differently and even fighting violently over them.
In the Iranian example, the country is purportedly an Islamic state. But under whose Islam? For example, the Islam of the Sufi sect and that of Osama bin Laden are different, to say the least. Even if we disregard the obvious, political motivations of the government’s “defrocking” — I thought that was only a term in Roman Catholicism — of Sanei, it is still a realistic situation for a religious government to condemn its theological detractors. Since no one has a monopoly on Islam — or any other religion, for that matter — is it even possible to have a straight theocracy? Or is it merely politics by another name?
Now, for the Israeli example with the woman on the ultra-Orthodox bus. Supporters of a Jewish state run under Jewish law, of course, insist that the government or society function as Orthodox Judaism interprets religious law. But what most most people do not realize is that there is a wide spectrum of debate within Orthodox Judaism from left-wing modern Orthodox to right-wing modern Orthodox to modern ultra-Orthodox and traditional haredi.
Since I am most familiar with Judaism and Israel, I will give an example in this context. Orthodox Jewish law has much to say on “modest dress” for women, but there is a vast, gray area. The bare minimum is that women must have:
- Arms covered at least to the shoulders;
- Legs covered at least to the knees; and
- The upper-body completely covered from the waist to the base of the neckline.
Jews in the left-wing-modern-Orthodox camp believe that it is acceptable for women to wear pants since they cover down to the knees as well as T-shirts since they cover the bare minimum of the upper-body. However, Jews further to the right believe that pants and T-shirts are not modest because they still reveal the curves of the female body. Instead of pants, they encourage skirts that go at least to the knees; instead of T-shirts, they want loose-fitting tops that extend past the elbows. At the far-right end of the spectrum, the haredim (ultra-Orthodox Jews) mandate skirts that flow down to the ground and sleeves that go to the wrist. And almost all clothing must be black or a similarly-dark color because bright colors attract attention.
In the case of segregated buses, the issue is similarly complicated. Jewish law does not prohibit men and women from sitting next to each other on buses. In fact, an Orthodox friend of mine met his future wife by striking up a conversation with the women sitting next to him. However, the ultra-Orthodox take the principle of modesty — discouraging interaction between members of the opposite sex who are not married or related — to the furthest extreme possible. So, although they are not mandated to do so in Jewish law, they voluntarily separate themselves — on public bus lines funded by the government — anyway.
So, here is the point: If the State of Israel were ruled by Jewish law — whose law would it be? The modern Orthodox on the left? The modern Orthodox on the right? The ultra-Orthodox? What would a supposed “theocracy” actually entail? The only answer must be that the Judaism that rules at a given time would be the Judaism as interpreted by the political and religious authorities who are dominant at that time. And, in the end, that is not religion — it is politics by another name. Perhaps I need to retract my earlier post.
