Shīʿī Ideas of Slavery: A Study of Iran in the Qājar Era Before and After the Constitutional Revolution

Abstract

The wave of struggle againstthe slave trade which began in eighteenth century Europe reached the Middle East and countries in Persian Gulf in the nineteenth century. In its efforts to end slave trade, Britain concluded treaties with Ottomans, sheikhs in Oman, and the king of Masqat. This concentrated the trade of enslaved Black people from Africa in Iran. The study of this period in Iran is important because Muḥammad Shāh, the then ruler in Iran, believed that since any order that bans the slave trade is against Islam, concluding any accord in this regard was beyond his control and was related to sharī ͑a. This Essay discusses and compares the opinions of Shīʿī scholars in the Qājar era, when the question of the abolition of slavery was first posed via British diplomatic channels, and subsequently during the Constitutional Revolution 1905 (Enghelāb-e Mashrūteh), to see if the introduction of Human Rights concepts at the time had any effect on fatwas about slave trade. This is done by the study of historical documents, including royal correspondence, exchange of letters among Shīʿī scholars, and scholarly fatwas. This Essay argues that jurisprudential opinions continued to regard slavery as permissible within the sharīʿa despite political and diplomatic pressures to abolish it and despite the importance of the principles of freedom and equality in the Constitutional era.