Hostname: page-component-7b9c58cd5d-nzzs5 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-03-16T22:22:46.503Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Linda S. Walbridge . The Thread of Muʿawiya: The Making of a Marjaʿ Taqlid. Bloomington, IN: Ramsay Press, 2014. xix + 146 pages, foreword, glossary, bibliography, index. Paper US$16.95 ISBN 978-0-6159-5756-2.

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 October 2015

Katherine Talley*
Affiliation:
Virginia Tech
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Type
Briefly Noted
Copyright
Copyright © Middle East Studies Association of North America, Inc. 2015 

In this book, anthropologist Linda S. Walbridge examines the process through which a Shiʿi religious cleric becomes recognized as a marjaʿ taqlid (grand ayatollah), the highest authority on religious law under the Qurʾan, the Prophets, and the imams. Based on multiple interviews with Shiʿa clerics, the book offers readers a look into the complex political world inhabited by only a handful of scholars in the predominantly Shiʿi cities of Iraq and Iran. Each chapter is devoted to a different marjaʿ taqlid, with an exploration of his rise to the position, his various responsibilities (e.g., managing funds generated by religious taxes), and his various contributions to the community. Walbridge concludes with a discussion of the possible future of the position of grand ayatollah in both the Middle East and the Western world.