نشریه تاریخ و فرهنگ
سال چهل و سوم شماره 1 (پیاپی 86، بهار و تابستان 1390)

The crisis of the religios legitimacy of Safavids close to the end of this dynasty’s governance triggered many uprisings and rebellions in different parts of their ruling domain. Sheikh Baha_al_Din Estiri was the leader of one of the most important uprisings in Khorasan. The sheikh, who has been frustrated with the Safavid court and government’s indifference regarding the Ozbacks’ attacks made on Khorasan, set up to Isfahan. His conscientious warnings were ignored in Isfahan and he was accused of sufism and unbelief. After returning to Khorasan and gathering his followers together, he took a stuggling measure that did not last long and the Safavid army crushed this movement. With due respect to the importance of the issue especially the evaluation of the social and religious status of Iran during Shah Sultan Hossein Safavi’s ruling, the objective here is to analyze Sheikh Baha_al_Din Estiiri’s insurrection. The main assumption of this study is that the “Estiri’s uprising testifies the religious and ethical weaknesses of SafavidLegitimacy”. The suppression of this famous rebellion annihilated the will of the protection of Safavid state among people. The suppression of this noble attempt and similar acts paved the way for Safavid collapse.

Local historiography in Iran, precedence of which can be traced back to the Iranian pre-Islamic era, saw a golden age of quantitative and qualitative growth under the Qajar dynasty.Hence,most of our country's cities and rigions possessed at least one local history.After examining some fifty printed works on local histories of the Qajarid period, it has been studied in the article the characteristics and causes of this literary movement and the components of this kind of historiography.A survey of the historygrapher's motives receives attention in this article too.

Futuwwha was one the influential factors in the moral, political and social life of Iranian and Islamic civilization and culture.The examination of the origins and roots of this important phenomenon helps us to know it better.There have been doubtlessly several factors,such as certain teachings of Islam and some of the historical, social and moral circumstances, in its development,but considering the similarities between the phenomenon and the sectarian,ritual and ideological survivals from the ancient ages of Iran, it can be convincing that we may trace its roots to the land's ancient background.Futuwwah as any other social phenomenon may have had other origins as well, but in this article, presenting five major reasons, we discuss that its origins can be found in the different manifestations of pre-Islamic Iranian civilization.

The phenomenon of Conversion to Islam in the territories conquered by the Muslim Arabs, is one of the ambiguous and controversial topics in the Studies of Islamic History. Major part of the social transformation of Copts in Islamic Egypt returns to their Conversion from Christianity to Islam. Gradual changing of the majority to a minority group under Muslim rule was a complex process, because Muslims not with Expulsion of the Copts but with their Conversion to Islam were to become the majority in this country. The Fatimid al-Hakim era, saw the Conversion of a large number of Coptic Christians to Islam. Coptic Conversion, in this period, in the political, social and religious pressures and constraints, were imposed by the caliph on the Coptic community. However, the process was not complete because, after the forced Conversion was removed many of the converts returned to their past religion,ie Christianity

Rawzah al- Shuhada, by Mulla Husayn Wa‘iz-i- kashifi (d. 910 A.H), is one of the most influential books on Karbala tragedy in recent centuries. Nevertheless, it has been criticized by the shi‘a scholars for spreading Spurious narratives among later works and public beliefes as well. The present article, discussing uncreditable narratives and falsifications in the work of Kashifi, intendes to investigate causes of its wide influence. The findings of the present study show that not all the unfounded narratives on the Karbala tragedies originated from Rawzah al- Shuhada since many of them are found in the earlier sources. Moreover, it was not the intention of Kashifi to write a history but to provide a simple comprehensive believabale report on the Karbala. These advantages, bringing acceptability for the work of Kashifi, made it the best available source for Shi‘a preachers and narrators of the tragedies of Karbala.

During the Pahlavid first period,ie after Reza Shah's ascencion to the throne,the modernization of all the pillars of state,including the juridical system was brought to government's attention.The government's approach in this process was keeping itself away from the religious legal system and inclining to secular structures.This approach aroused ulama's reaction,because they considered themselves custodians of jurisprudence.As a result,the government removed these scholars who opposed to the modern structures from juridical office.However, a few of them, despite their general disapproaval of the current juridical development, remained in the Department of Justice and continued to be effective.They contributed to the production and compilation of the legal code, required by the Department of Justice,and necessary civil laws according to the Islamic jurisprudence.