Typology of the Readings and Approaches to Ashura from Constitutional Revolution to the victory of the Islamic Revolution (1906-1978)

The Ashura event has played a central role in identifying the rich Shiite heritage. Therefore, due to important of its political and religious status, it has always been the core of intellectual, political and social groups in different periods, including the constitutional and Pahlavi eras, and each of these different groups provided different readings of Imam Hussein’s uprising. The main issue of this research is the typology of Ashura readings from the constitution to the beginning of the Islamic Revolution. This descriptive-analytic study will explain the readings and their characteristics and the factors that cause the readings and reflection and its consequences. Differences in attitudes and different perceptions of Imam Hussein’s uprising should be explored in the specific complexity and multidimensionality of this uprising. In addition to the historical and hadith view of the events of Ashura in some articles and works of study in the constitutional and Pahlavi era, the emergence of political intellectual currents in these two periods has led to other readings in this field. Non-religious (secular), traditional, intellectual, eclectic, Qur’anic and revolutionary political revisionist currents were currents that each had their own readings and interpretations of Imam Hussein’s uprising.  These currents form the basis of their readings, emphasizing various foundations, including nationalism, antiquity, rationalism, superstition, religious reform, social analysis, and government formation. In some of the existing readings, in order to address the emotional, epic, and fatal aspects of Ashura, poor and fake content has entered the field of Ashura studies that requires pathology. The secular stream also believes in the sacred and material dimension of Ashura and rejects it without regard to the divine and spiritual uprising of Imam Hussein and has a passive view of Hussein’s doctrines. The reading of the formation of the government, in opposition to the imam’s maximal knowledge of the events on the way, led to political developments and to the position of the traditional class of thinkers who sought to read the testimony. Findings indicate that this period of historiography has evolved so that sources and studies of Ashura from the constitutional period to the beginning of the Islamic Revolution from historiography to the analysis of Ashura events. From analyzing historical events, they analyzed the details of the Ashura incident, such as the uprising and the motivation of Imam Hussein.