Nader Shah, Social Legitimacy and Riots

Even though seizing power in Iran’s history was mainly through force and conquest and dynasties had authoritarian nature, they had to obtain political legitimacy to continue their ruling. Nader՚s low level originality and his attempts to make blood connections with royal families was in contrast with Divine Glory ideas that was widespread among people. To obtain religious legitimacy, he adopted religious tolerance and suggested the theory of five groups of Islam in order to obtain the support of followers and Sunni and Shiite and solve discord with neighbor countries. But the riots of supporters of Safavid dynasty and attacks and hostility of Ottoman Empire led to failure of his attempts and increase of non-Shiite soldiers in his army.At first, the arrogant ministers, governors and commanders of army didn’t tolerate the power of a low level person like Nader. But his emergence and seizure of power made public proud. But because Safavid dynasty and Shiite were interwoven in minds of people, they rejected competent Nader as a king. This rejection led to decline of Nader’s humanitarian spirit.