Understanding...

Understanding, sharing thoughts and actions, mutual responsibility and participating in the shared destiny of each other can be achieved if the parties know each other honestly and bravely and show themselves as they are. This will not be achieved in the world today except by knowing and at the same time respecting each other. The minimum result of such knowledge is that the parties will not have expectations from each other that are beyond their principles, capacities and limitations.

Unfortunately, this has been a problem that Muslims have always faced and are still facing. They should know who they are and who the other party is, what goals they follow and how they interpret them. They should know the way they have to cooperate in order to achieve them. * * * The book you are reading is an extension and elaboration of four lectures from fall 1987 in the hall of the Contemporary Arts Museum.

The purpose of the lectures at that time was to provide the main backgrounds of Shi‘ite and Sunni political thought, how they were formed, what factors influenced them, and how they have reacted and are reacting to the deep and rapid developments, pressures, and necessities of the contemporary period.

Finally, they were aimed at making it possible for the two parties to have a clearer picture of the other, to know the theological and jurisprudential limitations and obligations, the historical experiences and doctrinal structure of the other and their mutual expectations in coordination with these principles, foundations and capacities. Although this and the related discussions were warmly welcomed, putting them in writing was delayed. The four chapters of this book are based on the lectures.

If the book was to be compiled independently and without considering the lectures, the order of the outlining of the chapters would be different, putting many discussions in separate chapters. However, for certain reasons, the most important one of which was shortage of time and the extensiveness of the discussions and the variety of problems in the contemporary period, this was not accomplished. This also resulted in a large number of notes, some of which are lengthy.

I hereby apologize to the reader for this. Finally, I would like to express thanks to Ayatullah Ja‘far Subhani, head of Imam Sadiq ( ‘a ) Research Institute, whose facilities, especially the library, benefited me in the compilation of this book, and also Mr. Baha’uddin Khorramshahi, who was its editor. Mr.