The Criteria for the Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist (With an Emphasis on the Ideas of Imam Khomeini)

Abstract

The purpose of the present study is to explain the criteria for the guardianship of the Islamic Jurist with an emphasis on the political ideas of Imam Khomeini. To this aim, descriptive analysis was used in this study to make an enquiry about the essence and arguments of the guardianship of the Islamic jurist, the jurists’ obligation to establish an Islamic state, the virtues and vices of the Islamic jurist’s political ethics, as well as the responsibility and authority of the Islamic jurist. Based on the triplet classification model in Islam and the framework of Imam Khomeini’s political ideology, the subject under study that is the guardianship of the Islamic jurist was classified into 3 aspects of political philosophy, political ethics, and political jurisprudence. In general, 33 criteria for different aspects of the guardianship of the Islamic jurist were extracted including 9 criteria about political philosophy, 15 criteria about political ethics, and 9 criteria about political jurisprudence. Furthermore, the results showed that there is a logical relationship between the 3 above-mentioned classified aspects, that is to say the imperfection and perfection of each aspect is effective on the others as well.

Keywords

• wilayat-e faqih (guardianship of the islamic jurist)
• political philosophy
• political ethics
• political jurisprudence
• imam khomeini
• islamic jurist (wali-e faqih)