Reza Zanjani

Who was Reza Zanjani?

Ayatollah Seyed Reza Zanjani was a Shia Iranian cleric who opposed first the autocracy of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and then theocracy that was established by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and his supporters following the Islamic Revolution.

Reza Zanjani was an Azeri from Zanjan Province in Northwest Iran. He was active in politics, supporting Prime Minister Mohammed Mosaddeq, and following Mossaddeq's overthrow in the 1953 coup invited nationalist and religious opposition groups to join the National Resistance Movement. In the years before the 1979 Islamic Revolution he is said to have "retained close contacts with the secular National Front as well as the religious-minded Freedom Movement of Iran." Along with Ayatollahs Golpayegani, Helani, and Mohammad Kazem Shariatmadari, he supported Constitutional monarchy for Iran, including the 1906 Constitution's original provisions for committee of Shi'a clerics to approve all legislation.

When the Islamic revolution established a constitution with a Shia jurist as supreme leader, Zanjani opposed it. In early 1981 he said of the Islamic Republic and its leader:

"The monopoly of judicial and theological decision-making established in Iran is contrary to Islam. The title of Guide and Supreme Guide are not Islamic. No comparison can there be between the Catholic Church with its hierarchy and structure, and the leadership of the Shi'ites. Any pretension of this sort is not Islamic."