Is Iran changing? We might be on the eve of something of the sort.
Since the murder of Mahsa Amini in the summer of 2022, overt defiance of the compulsory veil has been increasing. After the recent war, several clips of women challenging this law have gone viral on social media; some of them are even seen dancing with men in public places. The previously predominantly black urban landscape is becoming increasingly colorful.
Public criticism of the authorities is also surging, with the regime’s top officials and various factions trading blows over domestic and foreign policy. President Masoud Pezeshkian has not shied away from saying that the people of his country, which is sanctioned more heavily than any other in the world, are "starving."
Of course, none of that should distract from the AFP report of independent UN investigators' condemnations of intensified repression in Iran, including executions, arrests, expulsions, and deportations of hundreds of Kurds, Arabs, and Afghans, as well as journalists and Bahai citizens, who are perpetually targeted with and without cause. However, the repression is now justified on national security concerns. It is driven by the conspiratorial consciousness of the regime and the "infiltrations" exposed by the recent war; other, "moral" and expressive, forms of repression seem to be receding.
Ali Khamenei’s decision to pay homage to Mirza Mohammad Hossein Naeini might be the most telling indication that things are changing in this theocratic "Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist" (Velayat-e Faqih) regime that follows Khomeini's reading of religious and political history. And the fact that the Supreme Leader has made very few public appearances since the war adds to the significance of his veneration of Naeini.
An article published in the Iranian newspaper "Arman-e Emrooz" (and translated and published by the pro-Iran Lebanese newspaper "Al-Akhbar") argues that Khamenei honoring Naeini and praising his legacy indicates that the regime may be conducting a serious reassessment of its political ideology to break with "religious despotism." Indeed, Naeini, alongside his mentor Mohammad Kazem Khorasani, spearheaded clerical support for the "Constitutional Revolution" of 1906, developing a theory that constitutional government would remain the best political system available until the Hidden Imam returns and his perfect system can be applied.
While Khomeini never showed any sympathy for the Constitutional Revolution and its icons, he did sympathize with the cleric considered it and Naeini’s most prominent opponent, Fazlollah Nouri. The constitutionalists saw the latter as a tool of the Qajars, specifically of Shah Mohammad Ali, who fiercely opposed any reform. They also labeled him “an agent of Russia,” which had partitioned Iran with Britain in 1907. As punishment for his denunciation of the constitutionalists and their revolution, as well as other actions and statements, like inciting mobs to kill them and loot their properties, the constitutionalists, before their revolution was defeated, had Nouri tried and executed.
In fact, it was the Khomeinist regime that, since 1979, has celebrated Nouri and sought to bring him back to life: naming an immense highway in Tehran and a massive mural after him, as well as presenting him as a historical leader who confronted the West, its heresies, and its transgressions, and who defended Islam and Sharia governance.
Mesbah Yazdi, a pillar of the Islamic regime and distinguished disciple of Khomeini, is known to have pushed particularly strongly for celebrating Nouri. After the revolution, Yazdi established the "Imam Khomeini Education and Research Institute," and he was appointed to the Assembly of Experts. While Yazdi was known for his influence on the regime’s political elites, particularly former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, he is also known for having said that "anyone who doesn't like the Islamic government can get a passport and leave the country."
Because Yazdi was among the most ideological of the ideological regime's figures, he was tasked with distinguishing good history from bad history; among his most significant contributions to deepening the country’s darkness was his revival of Muhammad-Baqir al-Majlisi and his teachings. The ideas of Majlisi, who lived in the 17th century and wrote the infamous book "Bihar al-Anwar", found themselves in high demand with the outbreak of the Iran-Iraq War and the resulting surge in demand for the salvation of miracles and divine intervention.
Since the Safavids had transformed Shiism into a "national" religion for Persia early on, using Islam as a means to assert an ostentatious marker of difference from the surrounding region, Majlisi was the one to firmly tie the Imams to the Iranian monarchy, through his affirmation of Hussein ibn Ali’s marriage to the daughter of Yazdegerd III, the last Sasanian king.
Accordingly, this highly ideological regime celebrating Naeini is not a minor development, nor is it compatible with continuing to celebrate his rival Nouri, or Majlisi. Either the former is celebrated or the other two are. However, such a development suggests that ideological turbulence has begun to rattle an ideological apparatus that had never been so lax or tepid. It deserves our sustained attention, as fears might be creeping in among some of Iran's rulers. The small lifeboats might accommodate the passengers, but there will not be any room for baggage.
