Jamal ad-Din al-Afghani was a late nineteenth century Persian intellectual, widely remembered as an advocate of Pan-Islamism, Islamic Modernism, and as a great opponent of Western Imperialism. He agitated from India to Egypt to Russia to Qajar Iran to the Ottoman Empire for unity and opposition to imperialism. Raised a Shia, he didn't place a particular emphasis on theology. His pamphlets are linked to the Tobacco Revolt in Iran, which proved the weakness of the Shah, that Europe was not invincible, and set the stage for further resistance. Only in his late fifties, he died in 1897 of cancer under house arrest in Istanbul.
So say he never developed cancer, or else lasted longer. How might he affect further developments, both ideological and concrete, in the Muslim world? He reserved a particular deal of animosity for the British and the Qajars. What role might he play in an alt-Constitutional Revolution in Iran?
So say he never developed cancer, or else lasted longer. How might he affect further developments, both ideological and concrete, in the Muslim world? He reserved a particular deal of animosity for the British and the Qajars. What role might he play in an alt-Constitutional Revolution in Iran?