The Scope of Political Jurisprudence from the Viewpoint of Ayatollah Khamenei

As an interdisciplinary trend between the two disciplines, i.e. jurisprudence and politics, political jurisprudence has long focused its attention on the issues in the realm of politics. However, after the triumph of the Islamic Revolution of Iran, political jurisprudence extended to include some new fields of study. As an erudite jurist, Ayatollah Khamenei has put forward a wide range of issues, questions and functions proportionate to the foundations, ends and growing expectations in relation to jurisprudence and political jurisprudence. Accordingly, on the one hand, the concept of political jurisprudence
is not restricted to that part of jurisprudence which is concerned with the political affairs, but it applies to an issue in practical jurisprudence that takes into consideration the way in which people should run their social affairs. This can be referred to as the jurisprudence of conducting political society. On the other hand, since jurisprudence, as defined by Ayatollah Khamenei, goes beyond mere understanding of [jurisprudential]precepts and extends to include knowledge of religion in such fields as beliefs, precepts and morality, he holds the view that political jurisprudence (as a part of jurisprudence) is not devoted to precepts and political conduct. Rather, it consists of precepts, political beliefs and political morality. According to Ayatollah Khamenei, due to the social conditions and requirements in the past, the political jurisprudence had a limited
scope within the community of the faithful, but after the triumph of the Islamic Revolution, it began to expand its scope to include political society and religious government. Likewise, the requirements of forming Islamic system makes it possible that the scope of jurisprudence goes beyond mere understanding of the legal precepts and develops into inferences of political theories and system-creating.