Excerpt: We can find few thinkers in the Islamic world and Iran who have thought about the subject of human dignity as fundamentally as Shariati.
According to Contemporary Jurisprudence citing Mehr News Agency, Seyyed Javad Miri, faculty member of the Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies, stated regarding human dignity from a sociological perspective: One of the very beneficial methods in scientific and theoretical dialogues is that when we speak about a topic, we dissect that topic to see what meaning, application, and history it possesses. For example, to see whether this concept has always existed and possessed a precedent in theoretical dialogues and philosophical evolution throughout the history of theoretical reflections of various societies.
He added: For instance, when we speak about the subject of human dignity, we must see what position dignity occupied in Iranian thought. What position did dignity hold in the theoretical thought of philosophers and sages of the Islamic world? Or, for example, in Western philosophy, how did their thinkers and intellectuals interpret the concept of human dignity? In the perspective of the philosophers and sages of China and India, when humans are spoken of, what status do they attribute to them? Do they believe humans are separate from nature or not?! Or, for example, in Japanese thought, when humans are spoken of, they view the human as a being situated neither above nature nor outside nature, but between heaven and earth—a being whose humanity flourishes and bears fruit the closer it gets to its nature or the more it flourishes within its nature, rather than extracting itself from nature or suffering alienation.
He added: In modern thought, a line of thinking or idea emerges that, when speaking of humanity and seeking to calculate the degree and boundaries of human humanity, states that the greater a human’s power and ability to conquer nature, the more powerful that human is and the more flourished their humanity. This kind of perspective on humanity stands in opposition to the Shintoist perspective on humanity, because in other philosophical and human schools of thought, when they wish to speak about humanity, they do not regard the human as a being outside nature.
This Iranian researcher and author specified: We must know how humans are interpreted in the Hebraic and Christian traditions when they look at humanity. They view the human as a creation of God. In the Quran as well, when speaking about humans, it considers the human as God’s vicegerent and successor (khalifah). It regards the human as a being conceptualized within the system of creation whose boundaries God has determined. He said: One of the new discussions raised in the realm of thought, wisdom, and critical thinking is that when we speak of human dignity, it appears an event has occurred beneath human thoughts, because after the Enlightenment, a concept named the concept of human rights gradually takes shape. Prior to that, in the Christian, Islamic, Hebraic, and other philosophical traditions, the concept of human nature was raised, which in se recognized rights for humanity.
Miri continued: Gradually after the Enlightenment, this concept assumes meaning in broader dimensions, asserting that these are natural rights. How should it be understood in human society? That is, it stands opposite another explicit concept named sovereignty. When we speak about human rights or about human dignity as one of the dimensions of these rights, we do not want to consider this in a vacuum; rather, we want to interpret it within the context of human society, inside the concept of the nation-state, and specifically against the endless power of sovereignty. Responding to the question of how we should interpret it—whether humans in se possess rights or not—Miri stated: These discussions are raised in a certain manner in the Declaration of Human Rights, creating a new debate in modern philosophy. For example, when we speak of this concept in Iran, we must see whether these discussions have been raised in our philosophical and wisdom thought within the context of political philosophy or not. When we look at the Islamic world, we see these discussions are not unfamiliar, and thinkers in Iran and the world have entered these debates where the Church faltered—namely, the relationship between a modern concept called nation and citizenship rights, and the human being as a creature that is not merely celestial, but situated within a political unit named the nation-state.
He continued: Another point is, fundamentally, in the society we live in, toward what direction is its trend and orientation moving? In this trend, is the human moving toward reification (shay’-varegi), or conversely, toward liberation from that reification so that their human personality and primordial nature (fitrah) may flourish?
The faculty member of the Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies, stating that society does not mean merely political society but broader society in general, specified: In such a society, do individuals move toward reification and become emptied of personality, or do objects move toward individuals? That is, when a child is born and placed within the circle of relations of that society, do the educational, political, cultural, religious, jurisprudential systems and the aggregate of these systems, relations, and regulations lead that child toward reducing self-alienation and flourishing, or toward the opposite? If we want to critique the Islamic system regarding whether in its evolutionary course it has managed to create a space wherein human dignity is preserved, we must pose the question: To what extent has it managed to distance humans from reification and self-alienation?
The age of technology fundamentally empties human relations of humanity, and desirable systems are those that consciously create conditions wherein humans gradually reach flourishing. If we look from this perspective, fundamentally in the 21st century, a system can be considered desirable if self-awareness exists within it and is injected into the body of society through media and educational systems, rescuing humans from metamorphosis (maskh), and automatically granting humans the ability during metamorphosis to transform themselves through rebellion. If a system takes this power away from humans, it is not a desirable or reasonable system, and its spirit bears no proximity to religious governance.
Miri concluded by specifying: Religious governance is such that wisdom (hikmah) prevails within it, and this wisdom is co-resident and neighborly with will and freedom. Religious governance in its governmental status roots from religious wisdom, and God has manifested freedom within humans and created humans in such a way that they design relations in society enabling other humans as well to derive abundant benefit from their freedom and power of choice and utilize their inner capabilities. From this perspective, human dignity is one of the deeply critical and key discussions that we must study and inspect with greater precision, examining it within the context of political, cultural, and social society.
He stated: From this perspective, it is seen that both our jurists and sages, as well as our thinkers, have lagged far behind new and contemporary discussions; however, if we look from a historical perspective, coincidentally a series of discussions and concepts raised in Hebraic, Christian, Islamic, Iranian, Chinese, and Indian traditions shared a single root.
Referring to the fact that we can find common points in all traditions whose perspective on humans and their rights possesses almost fundamental similarities, this university professor stated: The fundamental transformation began when the modern era commenced—what we call the post-Enlightenment era—and it is here that the distances become somewhat tangible. It is from here that even in Iran during the Islamic Republic era, many issues and attitudes regarding how human dignities should be defined faced fundamental challenges; for example, what meaning does human dignity bear as citizenship rights within the system of the Islamic Republic or Wilayat al-Faqih? Can this human dignity accommodate the dimension of citizenship?
He added: For example, if a dispute arises between sovereignty and a citizen, how should the limits of interaction between sovereignty and citizen be defined? How should the legal system define disputes and variances with reference and perspective toward the concept of human dignities? If someone possessed a viewpoint from a human and intellectual perspective with religious, political, social, and cultural motives, does this individual possess the right to hold a job, and do they have the right, despite their intellectual difference, to possess rights and maintain their human dignity in the 21st century or not?! Stating that except for Dr. Ali Shariati, we can find few thinkers in the Islamic world or Iran who have thought fundamentally about these topics, he said: According to Shariati, if we wish to speak about humans or about an intellectual system, three very strong and fundamental philosophical and intellectual schools exist in the contemporary world, each of which managed to establish political systems on the global stage: one is the intellectual trend of liberal capitalism; another is the intellectual trend of socialism with its various intellectual branches; the third is the existentialist intellectual trend—though looking more precisely, more intellectual trends have been added to these, but those that managed to form legal and intellectual systems were essentially these few mentioned above, alongside which exists another system named the Islamic system.
Miri, in the continuation of his speech, referred to Shariati’s thoughts regarding human dignity, adding: Shariati defines two characteristics for humanity; he says first that the human is a rebellious being, and second that the human is a being possessing the right to choose. In order for us to understand human dignity or define this human dignity, we must examine it in connection with the two intrinsic elements of rebelliousness and choice-making—or, in the words of past scholars, the faculty of free will (quwwat al-ikhtiyar) that can choose the good