Customer Reviews

The Shi'is of Iraq

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The author takes you straight to the subject and sinks deep into details that are rarely found in other books published in the English language. Excellent research with knowledge of culture and tradition that associates with this highly sensitive area. The most important argument made is that Shi'is of Iraq became a majority in the mid 19th century due to the active role of the seminaries in Najaf and Karabala spreading Shiisim Islam among the recently settled Arab tribes.

In this book Nakash paints a picture of change and how it has affected the mid to southern part of Iraq. Iraqi Arabs in the late nineteenth century began to convert to Shiism en masse. However, in contrast to the Iranian system, where Shiism had been a state religion got five hundred years, Iraqi Shia stayed cloistered in their seminaries in Najaf and Karbela

This major difference between Iraqi and Iranian Shia, a question too many prognosticators who likely don't know the difference between Sunni and Shiite but claim to know what is going on in the middle east today. The people who claim to be experts on cable news likely won't read this book, but it would be a step in the right direction.

This book is also for serious scholars, because Nakash goes through great detail the history of corpse traffic, the history of relations between the urban centers such as Baghdad, and Southern Iraq, largely poor with only a few cities.

While a bit cumbersome to get through, the writer may have had thought that his audience would only be academics, but in this environment this book should be widely read by as wide an audience aas possible.

I highly recommend this book

I came across this book in a public library when I wanted to know more about the Iraq war events. I have read it. I have found it a well researched and informative piece of good scholarly work. Recently a friend of mine wanted to know more about the people of Iraq. I could not find a better readable reference on a significant part of the Iraqi society. Therefore I proceeded to buying a copy to present it as a gift to this friend. Recommended

I strongly recommend this book for anyone interested in either Iraqi history or Shia Islam. It is the best book I've seen on the topic - a general history of the development of Shia Iraq. (For those more specifically interested in historical background on Shia Iraq clerics, see Meir Litvak's "Shi'i Scholars of Iraq in the 19th Century," another excellent book for which I have written an Amazon review).

The book is divided into four primary sections. The first section deals with the formation of the community. This includes the conversion of the tribes, the shrine cities (mainly Najaf and Karbala), and relations with Iran, the Ottomans and the British. Part two deals with the relationship of the Shia to the Iraqi state, especially in the 20th century, starting with the challenge of adjusting to the modern state and the struggle for equal representation, and then moving on to the darkness that descended with the coming of the Baath Party in the 1960s. Part three is something of a reversion, in the sense that it breaks up the chronological structure of the book and delves into the religious culture of the Shia, including the commemoration rituals, pilgrimage and its impact on the shrine cities, and the corpse traffic, which is almost morbid to read about at times. Surely there is nowhere in the world with more graves per capita than Najaf (excluding mass graves of course; I'm talking about formal burials here). The fourth section somewhat returns to the chronological sequence, discussing the decline of Iraqi Shia financial and educational institutions throughout the 20th century.

If I have a criticism of this book, it would be the chapter structure. Nakash would be well-advised in a future edition to move the third section back closer to the beginning of the book, start with topical chapters and then do the chronological history. Some of the material from the cultural chapters could then be integrated where appropriate into the historical account.

(I have the edition which came out in paperback in 1996, but I can see from the Table of Contents provided by Amazon that the new edition just changed the cover; the contents seem identical. The cover is more attractive.)

This book certainly provides considerable information about the Shi'a in Iraq. It also in the background shows the political fight between the ruling nations in the region, Ottomans, Persians and later the British. Most interestingly, you can see the political power games Muctehids played throughout the years to secure their positions and how they have changed sides depending on circumstances. As a religious person I had to take some of the statements about the intentions of the Muchtehids with reservation for further study. There were some statements such as Turkey during their own independence war was trying to occupy Iraq which is news to me but I you learn something everyday. It is very detailed. For someone who is not very familiar with the Iraq's political landscape may get lost in the sea of names and numbers but that also make the book verifible. It basically gives the impression that Shi'is of Iraq do not have a strong identity and has been used by political figures in one way or other also reminds me the Azerbaijanis in Persia, different race same sect, where do you stand.

The title suggests that the much-needed survey of Iraq's Shi`i population is finally at hand. But Nakash's topic is far more specialized, and ultimately more valuable: an historical inquiry into roughly a hundred years' history of the Iraqi Shi`is, from the mid-nineteenth century to 1958. The author reaches two main conclusions, both surprising to an outsider. First, the Iraqi Shi`is are not an antique community, but are "by and large recent converts to Shi`ism, a result of a development which took place mainly during the nineteenth century as the bulk of Iraq's Arab nomadic tribes settled down and took up agriculture." Second, though they belong to the same branch of Twelver Shi`ism as the Shi`a of Iran, they constitute an entirely separate community, with its own structure and outlook. "The diverging development of Shi`i Islam in Iraq and Iran in the twentieth century reflected the essentially different characters of Shi`i religion and society in the two countries." Applying these insights to the Kuwait war, Nakash argues by prompting the failed uprising of March 1991, Iraqi defeat furthered the long-term decline of Shi`is in Iraqi society. He expects this event to shape the consciousness of Iraqi Shi`is for many years to come, though he shies away from predicting just how it will affect future Sunni-Shi`i relations.

Middle East Quarterly, September 1994