Shaykhī vs. Imāmī Ulama on the Religious Interpretation of Modern Astronomy in the last years of Qajar Era: Zayn al-ʿĀbidīn Khān Kirmānī and Hibat al-Dīn Shahristānī

Muḥammad-Karim-Khān Kirmānnī, the leader of Shaykhists, was one of the opponents of modern astronomy in 19th century in Iran. Following him, his son, Zayn al-ʿĀbidīn-Khān Kirmānī wrote his Shams al-Jārīya (1926) in Persian to reject the new arguments for modern astronomy and also to show how the Islamic holy texts admit the old Ptolemaic astronomy. A major part of his book included some rejections of Hibat al-Dīn Shahristānī’s claims in Al-Islām wa al-Hayʾa (1910). Hibat al-Dīn in that book had argued for the consistency of Islamic holy texts and some of the elements of modern astronomy such as rejection of the solid celestial spheres, motion of the Earth, immobility of the Sun, and the shadow and the orbit of the Earth. Zayn al-ʿĀbidīn shows very well that Hibat al-Dīn’s interpretations of holy texts in favor of the modern astronomy are arbitrary and unreliable, however Zayn al-ʿĀbidīn’s own interpretations have the same problem.