Mirza Muhammad Akhbari and the Murder of Tsitsianov (A Research on the Relationship between Fath Ali Shah Qajar and Mirza Mohammad Akhbari)

The competition between the Mujtahids and the Akhbaris to get closer to the political power and the relationship with Qajar Shah is a chapter in the history of the Shiite clergy in the first half of the 13thcentury. The most famous Akhbari scholar in the first 30 years of the 13th century waz Mirza MuhammadAkhbari who had a hard fight with Mujtahids and also got in touch with Fath-Ali Shah Qajar. One of the main reports about Fath Ali Shah's relationship with Mirza Mohammad Akhbari, which in many sources, is at the center of Mirza Mohammad's life narrative, is the story of his role in the murder of Pavel Dmitriyevich Tsitsianov (17054-1806) (commander of the Russian army in the Iran-Russia wars) or its prediction through occult sciences, spell or prayer. The main question of this article is the validity of the narration of Mirza Mohammad's role in the murder of Tsitsianov by examining the history of the narration of this report, identifying inconsistent and alternative narrations, and evaluating some details of the narration with other historical data. Investigating the story of Tsitsianov's murder is important from several points of view. First, this incident is at the center of most of the narratives about the relationship between the Shah and Mirza Mohammad Akhbari; Second This incident has found an important place in the representation of Mirza's personality and the Shah's relationship with Shiite scholars in historical sources and contemporary research, but it has not been carefully examined from a historical point of view. The findings of this research show that some of the important sources of history and biography of Mirza Mohammad Akhbari have not quoted this report or have given data inconsistent with all or part of the popular narrative. evidences also show that the Shah's good relationship with Mirza Muhammad is not only related to the Mirza's power in occult sciences, but Shah knew Mirza Muhammad as one of the reliable Shiite scholars and used him to criticize the opinions of the mujtahids