Of course...

Of course, it must be noted that a discussion under the title, “The Political Philosophy of Islam” can be so extensive that it cannot be covered even in a hundred sessions. As such, considering our time constraint and the sessions taken into account, we have no option but to choose topics for discussion which are needed by society and in connection with which questions and doubts have been raised.

Since the topic “The Political Philosophy of Islam” consists of three terms, each of them could be studied and examined separately. “Political philosophy” has numerous equivalent terms such as “the philosophy of political science” and “political philosophy vis-à-vis political science”.

However, in brief, what we mean by “political philosophy” in these discussions is the elucidation of the Islamic theory on government and politics that is based on specific principles, and the Islamic philosophy of the Islamic government can only be explained and justified according to these principles.

Islam and Political Theorizing Once we say that Islam has a particular point of view about politics and governance founded on principles acceptable to Islam, this question is posed: Must religion have a particular viewpoint about politics and government for which Islam has to present a political theory? This is the same serious and known question which has been posed for centuries in various countries and societies.

In our country this question has also been raised since the time of the Constitutional Movement[^2] onward and many discussions have been conducted along with it. Of course, the statements of the late Imam ( ‘a ) and the famous slogan of the late Martyr Mudarris[^3]—“Our religion is our politics and our politics is our religion”—played a role in fortifying our political thought, and this question has already been answered for our people.

However, to elucidate the political theory of Islam and the manner of involvement of religion in politics requires in-depth study and discussion. In Western culture, religion is not comprehensive in nature; it is defined in a manner that does not encompass the domain of sociopolitical issues; it only bespeaks of the relationship between man and God, and depicts the personal and individual communion of the former with the latter.

Accordingly, sociopolitical and international issues, state-people relationship and international relations are beyond the domain of the relationship between man and God, and are therefore alien to religion.