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Dispatch → Account → Culture
The Shahiri Movement
Maulana Ali Constantin Shahir,
self proclaimed Mahdi and
leader of the Shahiris
Due to their participation in the Suvurnian Communist Insurgencies of the 70s, the Shahiri movement faced persecution at the hands of General Bestari Che Jaadallah. This cumulated with a ban on Sufism in general, as it was seen as affiliated with the communists. Following Shahir’s execution in 1974, the movement was led by Jelal Adeen bin Ahmad, but has slowly declined as anti-communist raids defeated the communist movement in Suvurnia. They are currently based in XXX, with an estimated 5,000 followers in Suvurnia.
Constantin Shahir
Constantin Shahir was born into a Suvurnian-French Catholic family and was raised as a catholic. While at university, however, he came into contact with leftist ideals and had trouble reconciling these new beliefs with what he saw as the materialism of the Catholic Church. He officially renounced faith in 1945, devoting himself to the communist movement. He was active in the “Red Ramadan” campaign, which was his first taste of Islam as a leftist religion. He began talking with several of his muslim comrades, in particular a woman named Zaynab Halki who introduced him to Shia Islam. Convinced that he had found a religion which balanced his morals and beliefs, Constantin said the shahada and took the name Ali. In the next years, he took part in the Battle of Rue Amiens and several other skirmishes, all the while delving deeper into Shia theology.
His break came during the October uprising. When the Suvurnian gendarmerie and troops from 
Dormill and Stiura defeated the Torangese Revolutionary Worker's Republic, they killed off the entire central committee of the Worker’s Party of Sanggar and much of the movement’s core cadres. In this power vacuum, Shahir was able to exert his influence and was elected as leader of the party in 1958. At first, his approach was highly orthodox and the Worker’s Party of Sanggar maintained standard communist ideology. He was involved in the planning of Ali Serang’s assassination, as well as the resulting uprisings, before toning down his action during the Union of Sanggar period which was seen by many to be a more left-wing and internationalist option. When the 
Samuderan revolution broke out, Shahir and his comrades began their own campaigns of violence and agitation in Suvurnia, resulting in General Bestari Che Jaadallah’s campaign against them.
Shahir, who by the late 60s had amassed a fanatical cult of personality, became more esoteric in his studies of Islam. In particular, he was enamoured by the Sufi teachings of Celalattin Rumi and of the Hurufis. He had a dream in which Muhammad spoke to him, telling him that he was the promised 12th Imam and calling for a revitalisation of the struggle. When he revealed this at the central committee meeting it was almost unanimously accepted, with much of the party accepting Islam.
The communist struggle then took a more esoteric twist. The group changed their name to the “Army of the Light of Truth” and began to speak of Capitalism as though it was Dajjal itself, which Shahir affirmed in speeches. Shahir himself wrote columns in many newspapers, making calls for revolution hidden within deeply religious language. Communist violence increased, and the religious aspect of the group began to spread into other Sufi groups and even converted many normal muslims. General Jaadallah reacted by persecuting Sufism entirely, shutting down tekkes and imprisoning many prominent sheikhs, including many innocent ones. By 1974, the JNH’s (Jaysh an-Nur al-Haqiqa - Army of the Light of Truth) strength had been broken. On the sixth of June, 1974, Shahir himself was captured by the Suvurnian military. After being convicted by a kangaroo court, he was beheaded publicly. With their leader dead, the JNH receded from public view and scaled down their activities. Despite this, there were still many who held that Shahir would soon return from the dead and lead the struggle, and so the movement has continued. It still keeps an influence on Sufism in Suvurnia, which is still illegal.
Beliefs
The beliefs of the Shahiri movement are highly heterodox and they have been declared as kufr by the National Ulema of Suvurnia and several other islamic bodies. On matters of fiqh, the Shahiris adopt a traditional Jafiri view of jurisprudence on most issues. However, their escatological views and views about the practice of Islamic finance, war, and God are highly unusual.
Maulana Ali Constantin Shahir declared himself the 12th Imam, the foretold Mahdi who will herald the final clash between the Muslims and the forces of Satan, follwoing a a dream in which Muhammad reportedly showed him visions of the capitalist world and its sinfulness, before handing him Zulfiqar and telling him that as the Mahdi it was his job to liberate the world from this curse. He justified his claim to being the Mahdi on Hadith which declare that the Mahdi will appear "after hearts become hard and the earth is filled with wickedness", which he said was the result of capitalism. Many of his proclamations mixed religious fervour with reformism and communist ideology. This was exemplified by his declaration that Dajjal, the Quranic antichrist, was a metaphor for the capitalist system and that it was all Muslims' duty to fight a holy war against it. He also declared that the hajj had been abrogated, as under the capitalist system it had become a home of idols again, and replaced with obligation to fight a jihad against the capitalist system. His other proclamations went against Islamic norms, banning the Hijab and calling for all women to abstain from sex with husbands who were not members of the movement. He claimed that the mosques and organised Salah had become a game of imitation and idolatry, declaring that they were an action of shirk and renouncing Salat as a pillar of Islam and replacing it with Dhikr, solitary remembrance of Allah.
