This paper examines notions of millennialism and sovereignty in the writings of the followers of Āẕar Kayvān (d. 1618 CE), an eclectic religious thinker who moved with his followers from Shīrāz in Safavid Iran to Patna in Mughal India during the late sixteenth century. Kayvān and his followers held that with the coming of the lunar millennium, the period of the Arabo-Islamic rule was at its end and a new millennium of Persian-Zoroastrian dispensation was beginning. Declaring himself to be the 'Perfect Man' (insān-i kāmil) and rejecting formal adherence to Islam, Kayvān promulgated an idiosyncratic Zoroastrian identity which he referred to as the kīsh-i ābādī. Kayvān and his followers adopted archaic Persian names and constructed genealogies for themselves stretching into Iran's pre-Islamic past, while simultaneously distancing themselves from normative Zoroastrian communities in Iran and India, who, according to Kayvān, did not appreciate the true esoteric meaning of the teachings of Zarathustra. In this paper, I examine aspects of Kayvān's political theology, specifically astrological aspects of Kayvān's conception of sovereignty. Kayvān held that the royal court should be a microcosmic reflection of the celestial court, in which the king and his astrologer-viziers act as intercessors on behalf of the divine decrees of the planets. Further, I argue that though Kayvān's model of kingship was ultimately rejected by the successors to Shāh Tahmāsb for whom it was most likely intended, Kayvān had an important and previously unrecognized influence on the development of the Dīn-i Ilāhī in Mughal India, whereby Kayvān's manual on planetary worship was evidently used by Akbar's minister Abuʼl Fażl and his brother Fayżī. Finally, I raise the possibility that the inherent pluralism in Āẕar Kayvān's notion of āmīzish-i farhang ('The Mixing of Cultures') may have influenced Akbar's notion of ṣulh-i kull ('Universal Civility').

Sayyid Mir Muhammad Baqir Khatunabadi (d. 1715), the first rector and teacher of the Madrasa-yi Sultani, the biggest Shi‘ite madrasa in early modern times, gained unrivalled prominence at the court of Shah Sultan Husayn, the last effective Safavid ruler (d.1722). A number of scholars have commented on the first Safavid mulla-bashi’s influence on Shah Sultan Husayn, but little has been written on Khatunabadi himself. This paper investigates Muhammad Baqir Khatunabadi’s educational and intellectual formation and then links him to the socio-political role he played in the troubled milieu of early eighteenth-century Iran. It affords us a new perspective on the conditions of early modern Iran’s religious and scholarly community which was in disarray —religious scholars had lost their influence and respect among the elite and the public alike. I argue the office of mulla-bashi did not give Safavid clergy more power than the office of Shaykh al-Islamate and the first mulla-bashi was not as powerful and influential as Vladimir Minorsky and Saïd Amir Arjomand depict in their work. When Khatunabadi’s house was set on fire in the bread riot of 1715 and he was fatally wounded, his death went unpunished.

Between the beginning and end of the 11th/17th century, that part of the Maghrib known today as Morocco went through a series of profound political shifts, beginning with the death of the Sa’adian ruler Ahmad al-Mansur in 1603. Al-Mansur, who had expanded Sa’adian rule through West Africa as far south as Timbuktu, and who had maintained continuous diplomatic relations with both European powers and the Ottoman Empire, was the last ruler of his dynasty to enjoy uncontested rule over the Farthest Maghrib. Following his death, political control was disputed by his sons, and the first two thirds of the 17th century saw Morocco divided into a number of political spheres, including the corsair state of Rabat/Sale, populated in part by a large number of Moriscos who had settled there following their final expulsion from Spain in 1611. Morocco was only political re-united, and then as a much smaller geographical area, in 1668 with the rise of the Alawite dynasty, which continues to rule Morocco today. This paper will explore the broad outlines of intellectual activity in Morocco during this period of transition, beginning with the dissolution of the Sa’adian dynasty and ending with the beginning of the 19th century and the increase of European influence over the Alawites. Whereas Moroccan intellectual history during this period has often been glossed as a series of developments within Sufism, it will discuss the relationship between Sufism and the rational sciences, including logic, and philosophy in general, as well as in theology and law. Building on a discussion of the career and influence of the influential Sufi, logician, and theologian al-Hasan al-Yusi (d. 1691) — himself chiefly known in contemporary scholarship for his letter publicly reprimanding the second Alawite ruler, Moulay Ismail —I aim to offer an overview of the ways in which intellectual and political trends interacted in Morocco that will provide a productive comparison with events taken place within the various provinces of the Ottoman Empire.

Khaja Rashid al-Din Fazl Allah Hamadani entered the Ilkhanid court as a physician along with his family in early Ilkhanid period. By the time he became more prominent as a political and administrative figure (Vizir) and not as a physician. It seems that his outstanding position in Ilkhanid court overshadowed his primary expertise as a physician in historical sources and consequently in new scholarship. According to this assumption present paper focuses on Rashid al-Din's activities and concerns on medicine during his prominent political career. For that, besides sporadic information in historical sources, his letters, his endowment (vaqf-namah) and his scholarly works will be investigated to show that in spite of his hardly engagement in political affairs as a high rank administrator, he seriously was following his concerns and studies in medicine and had a notable role in this field in medieval Iran and even in the world history of medicine.