Grounds and Manifestations of Convergence of Iranian Mawali and Subalterns with the Khawarij in the Battle against the Umayyad and Abbasid Caliphates

With the expansion of Arab conquests, on the one hand, the integrity of the Muslims was challenged by the emergence of opposition groups such as the Khawarij, and on the other hand, some Iranians moved towards a kind of confrontation of positions. Some castes like Mawali who were in a subordinate position, considered the emergence of political-religious sects such as Khawarij and Shia as a good opportunity to reach more suitable conditions. Using historical sources, the present descriptive-analytical study intends to answer the question of the factors effective in the convergence of the Iranian Mawali and subalterns with the Khawarij and also the role they played in the battles of the Khawarij against the Umayyad and Abbasid Caliphate. The findings of this research show that the full-scale confrontation between the Khawarij and the Caliphate in the early stages led to the lack of attention to their radical beliefs in order to bring together parts of the Iranian society. This was the interpretation of a kind of ideological transformation for the Khawarij, which depended on the distance from areas such as Kufa and Basra as well as passing of time. The rise of the Abbasids also played a role because they were considered as Sassanids with Tazi blood and their rise was accompanied by the weakening of the Arabism and the improvement of the status of Mawali.