User:Pooya72/Ā'īn-i Islām

Ā'īn-i Islām (Persian: آئین اسلام; "The Religion of Islam") was the most popular weekly Islamic Persian periodical published in Tehran, Iran. It was founded by Nusratullah Nuriyani in 1944 and the journal was funded partially by his brother Morteza Nuriyani. The purpose of the magazine was to promote an understanding of Islam that was still bounded in tradition but also relevant to the modern era. The popularity of the journal was due to the fact that it engaged with the current issues of its time, such as political islam, the Baha'i faith, the role of women in society, the wearing of the hijab, and it included critical articles against the reformist writings of Ahmad Kasrav i and Ali Akbar Hakamizadeh. The journal included articles from prominent thinkers such as Mirza Khalili Kamarihi, Mohammad Baqir Kamarihi, Mahmood Taleqani, and Hajj Siraj Ansari, Mohammad Ali Khalili, Ataullah Shahabpoor, and Husseinali Rashid.

The political environment
Reza Shah's authoritarian rule stifled the open discussions in the public sphere. However, after the deposition of Reza Shah and the ascension of his son Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, due to political turmoil, a period of relative freedom began that lasted until the end of the Mossadeq era (1951-1953) that permitted the various social and political groups to produce publications. This made it possible for journals such as Ā'īn-i Islām to exist.

Intellectual zeitgest
This opening up of the public sphere led to a clash of various contested ideas in the public sphere. Many of these debates were centered on the political and economical issues, but there many issues that were brought to the fore by reformists such as Ahmad Kasravi, Ali Akbar Hakamizadeh, and Shariat Sengjali. A prevalent concern within Iran after its conflict with the colonial powers, was to the reason the country had been left behind economically and politically. This worry was captured in concepts such as inḥiṭāṭ (decline) and ʿaqab-māndiqī (backwardness). The reformists mentioned argued that the reason this decline was due to the irrational beliefs in the religious ideas of the people. Therefore these reformists had set out to reform Shi'i beliefs in order to rectify this perceived problem of backwardness.

The purpose behind the journal
Ā'īn-i Islām was published in order to combat these negative views of religion. The authors that contributed to the magazine believed that not only was Islam not responsible for the decline of Muslim civilization, but in fact, if Islam were to be applied as intended, it would lead to the flourishing of Islamic civilization.