It would be better to follow in taqlid some of the dead...

It would be better to follow in taqlid some of the dead mujtahids like the Shaykh al­Ansari, who, on the admission of the now­living mujtahids themselves, was the most knowledgeable and learned. Basically, the 'secret' of ijtihad lies in applying general principles to new problems and changed circumstances. The real mujtahid is one who has mastered this 'secret', who has observed how things change, and subsequently how the rulings on them have changed.

For there is no skill in only thinking about things which are in the past and have already been thought about; or, at the most, changing an `ala l­aqwa into an `ala l­ahwat.[^39] or vice versa; there is no need to make a song and dance about any of this. Of course, ijtihad has many preconditions and prerequisites; a mujtahid must have acquired the various [preliminary] sciences.

It is necessary that he should have applied himself to the study of Arabic language and literature, to logic, to the study of usul (jurisprudence), even to the history of Islam and the fiqh of the other sects, so that he might become a true and thorough faqih.

No one can ordinarily lay claim to ijtihad just by reading a few books on Arabic grammar, or rhetoric and logic, then three or four of the set books for the intermediate stage, such as the "Fara'id", the "Makasib" or the "Kifaya"[^40], and then spending a few hours in the dars­i kharij.[^41] He does not then become qualified to sit with the "Wasa'il" and "Jawahir"[^42], in front of him and issue legal opinions.

He must be completely knowledgeable in exegesis and hadith, that is to say in the several thousands of hadith which appeared in the two and a half centuries from the time of the Prophet to the time of the Imam al­Hasan al­`Askari, and of the circumstances in which they appeared; he must also know Islamic history and the fiqh of other Islamic sects, and the narrators of traditions and their biographies and reliability. Ayatullah Burujirdi was a true faqih.

It is not my habit to mention people by name, and while he was alive I never mentioned him in my lectures. But now that he has died and there can be no ulterior motive, I can say that this man was truly a distinguished and outstanding faqih. He was conversant with, and proficient in, all these sciences, in exegesis, hadith, knowledge of the narrators of hadith, in the sciences of the evaluation of hadith (`ilm al-daraya), and in the fiqh of the other sects of Islam. Previous…