Jihad – Al-Shia The al-Shia Scientific, Cultural, and Doctrinal Website Sun, 21 Dec 2025 13:46:21 +0000 en-US Jihad – Al-Shia 32 32 The Islamic Resistance and New Islamic Civilization The Islamic Revolution of Iran is the outcome of all the Islamic movements and uprisings that have emerged across the Islamic world over the past two centuries. One of its most important achievements has been the expansion of the “boundaries of the Islamic Resistance front” in confronting global arrogance. This article, by raising the most fundamental questions about the background, nature, necessity, dimensions, levels, and functions of resistance, seeks to explain “the role of Islamic Resistance in creating and expanding a new Islamic civilization”. It does so by outlining the pattern of its developments within the experience of the Islamic Republic of Iran at four levels: theory, document, practice, and strategy. The present text aims to demonstrate the following combined hypothesis: Every civilization is preceded by a spiritual transformation appropriate to it, and resistance provides the environment for the emergence and growth of the spiritual changes needed for Islamic civilization. Indeed, resistance plays a significant role in expanding and strengthening these changes, and is fundamentally involved in shaping the “otherness” that defines civilizational identity. The Nature and Essence of Islamic Resistance The following issues are among the most important theoretical discussions concerning the nature and essence of resistance: Resistance: Divergence or Convergence? Any element that creates division or promotes isolation will have an anti-civilizational effect. Islamic countries constitute the geographical units of Islamic civilization, and therefore any factor that disrupts their bond will undoubtedly delay the realization of a new Islamic civilization. Islamic Resistance is susceptible to creating division and isolated units in two ways. First, its realization requires bearing costs and enduring hardships. This not only causes some countries to fall behind the path of resistance and sever their ties with resistance-oriented nations, but due to the Islamic nature of resistance, may also cause those who fall behind to be labeled as “non-Islamic”. This, in turn, prepares a psychological basis for their alignment with the opposing bloc against the Islamic Resistance. Second, the pure Islamic nature of resistance inherently sidelines those governments and political leaders in the Islamic world who have little affinity with such purity. As a result, resistance stands in opposition to them just as it does to the open enemies of Islam. Clearly, these two factors generate a certain degree of division within the Islamic world. Given this reality, can Islamic Resistance still be regarded as a capacity for realizing and sustaining a new Islamic civilization? Undoubtedly, all major undertakings, precisely because they are major, lack the participation of all their potential contributors and are achieved only with the cooperation of some. Just as the “graduate education project”, due to the effort it requires, does not receive the active participation of all those who need it, yet scholars and designers of knowledge have never doubted its rationality. The project of resistance is no exception. In other words, phenomena such as revolution, education, and resistance are not evaluated based on those who fail to join them, but rather on those who participate in them and the outcomes and consequences they produce. Moreover, today’s global interconnectedness prevents any complete severing of ties even with opposing countries. More importantly, the spirit of resistance is “not obeying,” not “not interacting”. Post-revolutionary Iran is the clearest example among the countries of the Islamic Resistance front. Despite relentless efforts, false propaganda, and baseless claims by arrogant powers about Iran’s supposed international isolation, its increasing internal strength and growing external influence have become significant enough to turn it into the most serious nightmare for its adversaries. Resistance as a Social Identity Human beings are social creatures, and their identity is fluid, constantly forming and changing, because the human world is shaped by human wills and is influenced by active and creative divine deposits. Therefore, the realization of resistance, like any other social phenomenon, requires social infrastructures that typically develop over a relatively long period. For example, the emergence of Ayatollah Khomeini as a symbol of Islamic Resistance against global arrogance in the past century was the product of a long history involving dozens of Islamic awakening movements. Without such a history and movements in another place, one should not expect the emergence of another “Khomeini”. On this basis, one can accept the correctness of Rached Ghannouchi’s claim that comparing himself to Imam Khomeini would be incorrect, for Tunisia’s historical background differs significantly from that of Iran. Additionally, because factors such as publicity, reputation, and legal status play a determining role in the social domain, even strong ideological foundations of resistance cannot become a social movement unless they enjoy adequate social acceptance. The Relationship Between Islamic Resistance and Related Religious Concepts When adapting Islamic concepts to various human cultures, the discussion becomes sociological. An example of this is the transformation of the phrase “legal jihad” into the concept of “civil resistance”. Yet nearly all scholars who have spoken or written about Islamic jihad have understood jihad in the Quran and traditions as a form of “hard and manifest struggle”. [1] Some jurists, without making any distinction, have used the term “fiqh of defensive jihad” interchangeably with “fiqh of resistance”. [2] This means that all the rulings of defensive jihad can be applied to the Resistance front. However, replacing the concept of jihad entirely and permanently with the concept of resistance would diminish or restrict many of the capacities found within this religious term. The Relationship Between Islamic Resistance and Related Religious Currents A theoretical reflection on the concept and instance of Islamic Resistance and clarifying its relationship with other related Islamic concepts, is necessary because it distinguishes its conceptual and theoretical boundaries from alternative or distorted models of Islam. Takfiri Currents Islamic Resistance differs from Takfiri movements in two fundamental ways. First, Takfiri movements follow a negational approach aimed at excluding others, whereas Islamic Resistance adopts an affirmative approach focused on affirming and establishing its own identity. Second and more importantly, the nature and language of resistance are such that they can convey their rationality through dialogue and even persuade their opponents. The Liberal Current The liberal current seeks, with a conciliatory approach, to showcase the compassionate face of Islam in order to distance itself from accusations of Takfiri violence. However, the main function of the liberal current is to blur or remove internal boundaries, whereas the main function of Islamic Resistance is to clarify the boundaries between the in-group and the out-group. Since boundaries (by definition) mark the separation between one identity and what lies outside it, the identity-based nature of resistance, and the anti-identity nature of the liberal current, can easily be confi