Political Personality and Thought of Kashef al-Ghata

Allameh Sheikh Muhammad Hossein Kashef al-Ghata, a prominent scholar of his time, was unique in sociopolitical dimension. The subject of this article is recognition of his personality and political thought. One of the ways of recognizing Kashef al-Ghata’s personality and thoughts is studying his position in the opinion of his contemporary scholars, and another way is reviewing his works. The two mentioned ways, briefly described in this article, will show only some part of his political personality and thoughts. His different outlook and approach to politics as compared with the current attitude of the time is focused on in the present study. In Kashef al-Ghata’s viewpoint, religion and politics are inextricably linked, and power and government, as the most important issue in political sciences, have different philosophies with this category in the world of politics. According to his view “justice” is the philosophy of government and it enjoys a “transreligional” and “transnational” value through which the oppressed people reach their rights and security in society is guaranteed. He believes that nothing is there to promote a government but the justice, and nothing is there to overthrow a government but the injustice.