The Effects of Mystical Outlook on Society and Politics (the Relationship between Practice and Theory)

The purpose of the present study is to review why and in which ways mysticism affects politics. To this aim, a descriptive-analytic method was used to answer why knowledge and awareness of citizens do not often lead to practice and why the slogans and objectives intended by the leaders and politicians to guide the society toward prosperity and felicity are not actualized. In this research, it is attempted to show how mysticism can offer effective solutions in this regard. The mysticism referred to in this research is not monastic and in seclusion, but rather it is an extensive, deep, and religious cognition which distances from superficiality and ritualism and instead, pays attention to the core and base of religion. Awareness, thinking and contemplation, faith and avoidance of extremism are among factors which pave the way to mysticism. Therefore, providing freedom, leisure, and moral backgrounds of living are among some of the most important duties of politicians to reconcile mysticism and politics and remove the gap between theory and reality. According to different scholars’ views, some causes of the gap between theory and practice are attributed to factors such as prioritizing individual interests to public interests, separation of theoretical wisdom from practical wisdom, not letting knowledge penetrate into human soul, separation of knowledge by acquisition from knowledge by presence, ritual and superficial religion in the absence of mysticism, and lack of human dominance over his different faculties.