Ayatullah Misbah Yazdi: Politics, Knowledge, and the Good Life

Misbah, who also has a high political profile,4 writes and speaks on matters of philosophy, politics, and culture, emphasizing concepts that are keys to the current debate on modernity in Iran.5 His opinion on these issues indicates a position at odds with what has come to be the central focus of modernity, i.e., individual autonomy, and its political derivative, the secular, democratic form of government. [...] the advocates of public religion were not passive recipients of the challenge and in turn tried both to defend their positions and to discredit secularism.7 Even though the paucity of fruitful dialogue between foundational Western seculars and fundamentalist Western Christians still persists,8 the lack of dialogue between the Western seculars and the adherents of fundamentalist Islamic politics is especially extreme.