Pilgrimage, commodities, and religious objectification: The making of transnational shiism between Iran and Syria

Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East

Volumn 27, Issue 1, 2007, Pages 109-125

  Pinto, Paulo G ^a  

^a FLUMINENSE FEDERAL UNIVERSITY   (Brazil)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

CULTURAL TRADITION; ISLAMISM; NATIONAL IDENTITY;

ASIA; EURASIA; IRAN; MIDDLE EAST; SYRIAN ARAB REPUBLIC;

EID: 34250028995     PISSN: 1089201X     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1215/1089201x-2006-047     Document Type: Article

References (62)

1. Victor Turner pointed to the links between pilgrimage and market systems, but he did not develop this idea further. See Victor Turner, Dramas, Fields, and Metaphors (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1974), 182-83, 222-23.
2. The pan-Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca (hajj) is paralleled by other pilgrimages with more regional or sectarian character, such as the Shi'i pilgrimages to Karbala, Mashhad, or Damascus.
3. Turner, Dramas, Fields, and Metaphors, 166-71.
4. Dale Eickelman and James Piscatori, Muslim Politics (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1996), 38.
5. For the devotional attachment of Sufis to the family of the Prophet in contemporary Egypt, see Valerie Hoffman-Ladd, "Devotion to the Prophet and His Family in Egyptian Sufism," International Journal of Middle East Studies 24 (1992): 615-37.
6. For contemporary Syria, see Paulo G. Pinto, "Mystical Bodies: Ritual, Experience, and the Embodiment of Sufism in Syria" (PhD diss., Boston University, 2002).
7. Yann Richard, Shi'ite Islam (Oxford: Blackwell, 1995), 15-22.
8. Hoffman-Ladd, "Devotion to the Prophet," 618-29;
9. Pinto, "Mystical Bodies," 101-9.
10. The battle of Karbala, which happened in AD 680, is a symbolic marker rather than a historical date of the religious divide between Sunni and Shi'i Islam. The Shi'is fully emerge as a sectarian community within Islam only in the ninth century and are divided into two branches: the "Seveners," who accept the line of succession of descendants of the Prophet until the sixth imam and are separated into several esoteric sects, such as the Isma'ilis, the Druzes, and the 'Alawis; and the "Twelvers," who accept the line of succession until the twelveth imam and have a main branch, known as la'fari, which developed a written tradition of theology and jurisprudence. The Ja'faris constitute the majority of the Shi'is in Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, and the Indian subcontinent. See Marshall Hodgson, "How Did the Early Shi'a Become Sectarian?" Journal of the American Oriental Society 75 (1955): 1-13;
11. Richard, Shi'ite Islam, 1-14;
12. Michael Fischer, Iran: From Religious Dispute to Revolution (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2003), 27-32.
13. Richard, Shi'ite Islam, 22-48.
14. For the drama of Karbala as a religious and cultural paradigm, see Kamran S. Aghaie, The Martyrs of Karbala: Shi'i Symbols and Rituals in Modern Iran (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2004), 3-14;
15. Fischer, Iran, 3-11.
16. Victor Turner highlighted three characteristics of dominant symbols: "(1) condensation; (2) unification of disparate meanings in a single symbolic formation; (3) polarization of meaning." See Turner, The Forest of Symbols (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1970), 30.
17. Roy Mottahedeh, The Mantle of the Prophet: Religion and Politics in Iran (London: Oneworld, 2000), 69-109;
18. Yitzhak Nakash, The Shi'is of Iraq (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994), 238-68.
19. The Baathist regimes of Iraq and Syria were opponents in their dispute over regional power. This political conflict prompted the Syrian regime to side with Iran during the Iran-Iraq war, as well as with the American-led coalition against Saddam Hussein in the Gulf war in 1991.
20. The 'Alawis are 15 percent of the Syrian population. They constitute a Shi'i sect that was organized around an esoteric interpretation of the Islamic doctrines and rituals. Since the early twentieth century, members of the 'Alawi religious elite have sought the doctrinal incorporation of their community into mainstream Ja'fari Shiism. This process of doctrinal rapprochement (taqrib) between the 'Alawi community and Ja'fari Shiism was fully achieved, at least on the level of public religious discourse, by the end of the twentieth century. Many Sunni Muslims consider the 'Alawis to be heretics, a theme that was politicized by the religious opposition to the Baathist regime in Syria. The inner core of the regime, including the current president of Syria, Bashar al-Asad, is composed of members of the 'Alawi sect. See Alain Chouet, "L'espace tribal des alaouites à l'épreuve du pouvoir: La désintegration par le politique" ("The 'Alawi Tribes Facing Power: Disintegration through Politics"), Monde Arabe: Maghreb-Machrek 147 (1995): 93-119;
21. and Sabrina Mervin, "Quelques jalons pour une histoire du rapprochement (taqrib) des alaouites vers le chiisme" ("Some Guidelines for the History of the Approach (taqrib) between the 'Alawis and Shiism"), in Islamstudien ohne Ende, Festschrift fur Werner Ende (Islamic Studies without End: Essays in Honor of Werner Ende), ed. Rainer Brunner, Monika Gronke, Jens Laut and Ulrich Rebstock (Würzburg: Ergon Verlag, 2002).
22. Myriam Ababsa, "Significations territoriales et appropriations conflictuelles des mausolées chiites de Raqqa (Syrie)" ("Spatial Meanings and Conflictuous Appropriations of the Shi'i Mausoleums in Raqqa [Syria]"), in Les pèlerinages au Maghreb et au moyen orient: Espaces publics, espaces du public (Pilgrimages in the Maghreb and the Middle East: Public Spaces, Spaces of the Public), ed. Sylvia Chiffoleau and Anna Madoeuf (Beirut: IFPO, 2005), 116.
23. Irene Calzoni, "Shiite Mausoleums in Syria with Particular Reference to Sayyida Zaynab's Mausoleum," in La Shi'a nell'impero ottomano (The Shi'is in the Ottoman Empire), ed. Blancamaria Scarcia Amoretti (Rome: Academia Nazionale dei Lincei, 1993), 199-201;
24. Eric Geoffroy, Le soufisme en Égypte et en Syrie sous les derniers Mamelouks et les premiers Ottomans: Orientations spirituelles et enjeux culturels (Sufism in Egypt and Syria under the Late Mameluks and the Early Ottomans: Spiritual Trends and Cultural Dynamics) (Damascus: IFEAD, 1995), 63-66.
25. Sabrina Mervin, "Sayyida Zaynab: Bainlieu de Damas ou nouvelle ville sainte chiite?" ("Sayyida Zaynab: Suburb of Damascus or New Shi'i Holy City?"), Cahiers d'etudes sur la Mediterranée orientale et le monde turco-iranien 22 (1996): 149-62.
26. Myriam Ababsa, "Les mausolées invisibles: Raqqa ville de pèlerinage chiite ou pôle étatique en Jazira syrienne?" ("The Invisible Mausoleums: Raqqa, Shi'i Pilgrimage City or State Center in the Syrian Jazira?"), Les Annales de Géographie 622 (2001), 647-63.
27. Ibid., 650.
28. The creation of a foundation for the administration of the mosque-mausoleum of Sayda Zaynab is an innovation in the framework of the religious policies of the Syrian state, as the mosques in Syria are administered by the Ministry of Awqaf (pious endowments; sing. waqf). See Annabelle Böttcher, "Le ministère des waqfs" ("The Ministry of Waqfs"), Monde Arabe: Maghreb-Machrek 158 (1997): 18-30.
29. This autonomous institution resembles the Astan-e Qods, the religious foundation that administers the property and income of the shrine of Imam Reza in Mashhad in Iran. See Fariba Adelkhakh, Being Modern in Iran (New York: Columbia University Press, 2000), 133-34.
30. See Sharika al-Sayda Zaynab lil-Siyaha wa al-Ziyara (The Sayda Zaynab Company for Tourism and Pilgrimage), Mashru' al-Majma' al-Funduqi (Project for the Hotel Complex) (Damascus: n.p., 1985).
31. The number of Iranian pilgrims in Syria was estimated at almost 200,000 for 1999 and projected at 216,000 for 2005. See Ababsa, "Significations territoriales," 113.
32. The rise of the mosque-mausoleum of Sayda Zaynab as a center for pilgrimage and religious learning from 1973 to 2003 paralleled the decline of Najaf and Karbala in both domains; see Nakash, Shi'is of Iraq, 247-68;
33. Mervin, "Sayyida Zaynab," 154. After the collapse of the Baathist regime in Iraq, Najaf and Karbala reappeared as major centers for Shi'i pilgrimage and learning, attracting millions of pilgrims and visitors. However, because of the persistence of violence and military conflicts in Iraq, their position as transnational pilgrimage centers is not stable yet.
34. Ervand Abrahamian, Khomeinism: Essays on the Islamic Republic (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), 13-59.
35. Events linking political Shiism and the Palestinian resistance to Israeli occupation also took place in the Shii mausoleums in Raqqa. See Ababsa, "Significations territoriales," 125-26.
36. Political uses of religious symbols and spaces also happen in Nabatiyya during the celebration of 'Ashura. See Augustus Richard Norton, "Ritual, Blood, and Shiite Identity: Ashura in Nabatiyya, Lebanon," Drama Review 49 (2005): 140-55.
37. Ababsa, "Les mausolées invisibles."
38. See the Web sites ziaraat.com/Damascus/Bibi-Sakina and ziaraat.com/ Damascus/Bab-e-Sagheer/Pictures for discussions about the identity and the "true" burial place of Sayda Ruqaya. For a similar discussion about Sayda Zaynab, see ziaraat.com/Damascus/Zindan-e-Shaam/ About and ziaraat.com/Damascus/BibiZainab. These pages are on the Web site ziaraat.com (accessed 21 January 2007), which is oriented toward the Shi'is in South Asia and in the South Asian diaspora. The texts about the pilgrimage shrines and the identity of the holy figures associated with them are not signed. They were probably written by Syed Rizwan R. Rizvi, the Webmaster and owner of the site.
39. When I visited the shrine of Yahiya's head in June 2006, I noticed a plaque that stated, "This is the shrine of the head of God's prophet Yahiya, peace be upon him" (Hada maqam ras nabi Allah Yahiya alaihi al-salam), which shows how the whole mosque was gradually reshaped as a pilgrimage sanctuary. This plaque, as well as others placed throughout the mosque, was accompanied by a dramatic increase in the number of Shi'i pilgrims performing their devotional rituals in the Umayad Mosque's main hall.
40. The importance of the circulation of knowledge or, in other terms, the political economy of meaning in the production of commodity value in the market is analyzed in Clifford Geertz, "Suq: The Bazaar Economy in Sefrou," in Meaning and Order in Moroccan Society, ed. Clifford Geertz, Hildred Geertz, and Lawrence Rosen (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979), 197-212;
41. and Arjun Appadurai, "Introduction: Commodities and the Politics of Value," in The Social Life of Things: Commodities in Cultural Perspective, ed. Arjun Appadurai (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 3-63.
42. Mary Douglas and Baron Isherwood show how objects mediate the relations between the individuals and the world and tell something about the social bonds that they materialize. See their The World of Goods: Towards an Anthropology of Consumption (New York: Basic Books, 1979).
43. Christopher Pinney defined this embodied form of evaluation of iconic religious commodities as "corpothetics." See his "Introduction: Public, Popular, and Other Cultures," in Pleasure and the Notion: The History, Politics, and Consumption of Public Culture in India, ed. Rachel Dwyer and Christopher Pinney (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 21.
44. Igor Kopytoff, "The Cultural Biography of Things: Commoditization as Process," in Appadurai, Social Life of Things, 64-91.
45. It is interesting to note how the dramatic character of Christian iconography and its well-succeeded process of commoditization became a model for the creation of this Shi'i iconography, with its strong emotional and commercial appeal.
46. This contrast was called to my attention in a conversation with a disciple of a Shadhili sheikh from Damascus while he was buying religious posters in a shop near the mausoleum of Sayda Zaynab.
47. Abrahamian, Khomeinism, 26-28;
48. Aghaie, Martyrs of Karbala, 101-5;
49. Fischer, Iran, 164-70.
50. Adelkhakh, Being Modern in Iran, 106-7;
51. Gregory Starrett, "The Political Economy of Religious Commodities in Cairo," American Anthropologist 97 (1995): 51-68.
52. The concepts of discipline and disciplinary practices were taken from Talal Asad, who defines them as the mechanisms through which "religious discourses regulate, inform, and construct religious selves" in his Genealogies of Religion: Discipline and Reasons of Power in Christianity and Islam (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993), 125.
53. Aghaie, Martyrs of Karbala, 131-53.
54. See Mervin, "Sayyida Zaynab."
55. Peter Van der Veer, Religious Nationalism: Hindus and Muslims in India (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994), 80-81.
56. The objectification of religious symbols in mass-produced images or objects opens the way to individualized forms of sacralization and devotion. See Woodman Taylor, "Agency and Affectivity of Paintings: The Lives of Chitrajis in Hindu Ritual Contexts," Material Religion: The Journal of Objects, Art, and Belief 1 (2005): 198-227.
57. Joann D'Alisera shows in her analysis of Sierra Leonean immigrants in the United States how the display of religious commodities produces "qualified identifying statements that aim to locate the individual in both his community and the larger society." See her "I Islam: Popular Religious Commodities, Sites of Inscription and Transnational Sierra Leonean Identity," Journal of Material Culture 6 (2001): 91-110.
58. Starrett, "Political Economy," 59.
59. Ababsa,"Significations territoriales," 121-24.
60. Robert Hefner, "Introduction: Society and Morality in the New Asian Capitalisms," in Market Cultures: Society and Morality in the New Asian Capitalisms, ed. Robert Hefner (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1998), 3-5.
61. Starrett, "Political Economy," 58-59.
62. Hefner, "Introduction: Society and Morality," 25.