Mehdi Haeri Yazdi

Mehdi Haeri Yazdi (born 1923 in Qom, Iran - death 1999 in Tehran, Iran) (Persian: مهدی حائری یزدی ; Arabic: المهدي الحائري اليزدي‎; al-Ḥa’irī̄ al-Yazdī̄) was a prominent Shia Islamic cleric in Iran and the first son of Sheikh Abdul Karim Haeri Yazdi, the founder of Qom seminary and teacher of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who became the leader of the Iranian Revolution and founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Background

Mehdi Haeri Yazdi himself was "one of Khomeini's prominent pupils" ^[1] but parted ways with Khomeini on several issues. He opposed Khomeini's theory of velayat-e faqih as justification for rule of the Islamic state by Islamic jurists,^[2][3] Khomeini's unwillingness to end the Iran–Iraq War,^[4] and believed Khomeini's fatwa against Salman Rushdie was "inconsistent with the principles of Islamic law, or Shari'a" and "against the interests of Muslim society."^[5] Haeri-Yazdi published his objection to the velayat-e faqih in his 1994 book "Hekmat va Hokumat". Despite the fact that it was published outside Iran (with Shadi Publishers, London), it has been widely distributed in the country.^[6]

In 1992 he published "The Principles of Epistemology in Islamic Philosophy : Knowledge by Presence". The book aimed to present Western scholars and philosophers a theme that he considered most important : knowledge by presence - knowledge that arises from immediate and intuitive awareness.

Works

(in Persian)

• Hekmat va Hokumat (London 1994)
• Kavushha-ye Aql-e Nazari
• Hiram-e Hasti

References and notes

1. ^ Iran: Rushdie Affair Continues To Cloud Tehran's Claims Of Rejecting Violence (Part 4)
2. ^ Distant Relations: Iran and Lebanon in the Last 500 Years By H. E. Chehabi
3. ^ 2/24/06 Perseverance and honor: Interview with Abbas Amir-Entezam
4. ^ Nasr, Vali, The Shia Revival, Norton, (2006), p.119-20
5. ^ RFERL, Iran: Rushdie Affair Continues To Cloud Tehran's Claims Of Rejecting Violence (Part 4), March 11, 2005
6. ^ For a discussion, see Farzin Vahdat “Mehdi Haeri Yazdi and the Discourse of Modernity” in Ramin Jahanbeglu (ed.), Iran, Lexington Books, 2004.

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Name	Haeri Yazdi, Mehdi
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Date of birth	1923
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Date of death	1999
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