Thread by @MarsinRA

I’m frequently asked what Muqtada Al-Sadr’s aspirations are as a “religious” leader in Iraq. Today, his statement hinted at the tensions surrounding his lack of religious credentials & his position as an inheritor of the Sadr family legacy.

His tweet announcing his withdrawal from politics came as a response to a statement from Grand Ayatollah Kathem Al-Haeri, a cleric whose followers include a large number of Sadrists & the academic successor to Muqtada’s father & was a student to his uncle, Mohammad Baqir Al-Sadr.

What’s interesting about Haeri’s statement is that he himself withdraws from his position (for health reasons) as a marjaa & says his office is closing & is no longer accepting religious taxes. He tells his followers to follow Khamanei, the Iranian supreme leader, instead.

What distinguishes Sadr from his father & from Haeri (& Khamanei for that matter) is that while he is the leader of a mass movement, rooted in religious identity, he is NOT a marjaa (a scholar learned enough to be a religious guide to followers, like Sistani for example).

His followers are then obliged to seek a cleric to follow on religious matters, a role which Haeri played after Sadr’s father’s death. Without Haeri, they will now need a new marjaa. Sadr cannot play this role. He himself followed Haeri & went to Iran to study with him briefly.

In addition, Haeri warns against the divisive rhetoric of those who claim the legacy of the two Sadrs (Mohammad Baqir Al-Sadr & Mohammad Sadiq Al-Sadr), but who do not have the religious authority & credentials, clearly meaning Muqtada Al-Sadr.

In response, Muqtada Al-Sadr tweets that although he has not reached the level of “ijtihad” (the ability to issue jurisprudence) he can still call for the promotion of good & prohibition of evil (something that lay people are obliged to do in Islam).

What does this mean? Haeri is attempting to strip Sadr of religious authority & to redirect Sadrists who follow him to follow Khamanei. I don’t think this will be a successful strategy for several reasons.

Haeri’s relationship with Muqtada has been strained since the mid 2000s & can’t cause more strife among the Sadrists than it has in the past. Most likely, this statement will turn the Sadrists against Haeri & show the generational division amongst them.

Muqtada Al-Sadr knows he is not qualified enough to be a marjaa, but how his followers will respond to his chastisement by a religious authority may herald a change in the nature of religious authority.