Investigating the Ups and Downs of Imami Shiite Political Interactions with Ghaznavid and Seljuk Governments in Iran

One of the important aspects of the different governments of Iran was their religious policy, which had a great impact on their government structure. The post-Islamic governments of Iran, mainly as the followers of the Abbasid caliph, besides considering the spiritual status of the caliphate, sought to gain prestige for themselves. The religious policy of the caliphs was to support the Sunnis. The Ghaznavid and Seljuk governments also naturally chose to support the Sunnis as a religious policy. The problem of this study is to explain the political actions and interactions of the Ghaznavid and Seljuk governments with the Imami Shias. Apparently the Ghaznavids had a method in the religious policy of post-Islamic Iranian governments by which they used religion as a pretext to achieve their goals. Subsequently, the Seljuks, as the followers of their method, of course, with more tolerance, followed the same procedure. On the one hand, they maintained their dominance within the territory by suppressing internal dissidents, known as bad religious people, and on the other hand, they sought to establish relations with the caliphate in order to obtain religious and political legitimacy from the Abbasid caliph. During the rule of the Ghaznavid and Seljuk Turks over Iran, the Shias enjoyed the religious ruling of Taqīyah (precautionary dissimulation) and secretly turned to cultural activities and influence in government institutions. These activities showed themselves during the Seljuk period. The presence of Shiite clerics and scholars in urban administrative positions, such as judgeship, clientage, and in national administrative positions, such as bureaus was canonized. One of the objectives of this paper, using a descriptive-analytical method, is to study how these two governments dealt with Imami Shias.