Abdullah Musawi Shirazi

He is not to be confused with Grand Ayatollah Mirza Hassan Shirazi of the Tobacco movement, and Ayatollah al-Udhma Muhammad Shirazi , who passed away in 2001. Born in Shiraz , Iran , he was sent into exile at the age of 15 with his father, Ayatollah Sayyed Muhammad Tahir al-Shirazi, for resisting the Qajar and British colonial rule in southern Iran. His father was also a nationally renowned cleric who was famous for his resistance against the British government. In 1914, he was sent to Najaf , Iraq , to study advanced Islamic Jurisprudence under the late Shaikh Na'ini. In 1935, during the famous Goharshad mosque uprising in the city of Mashad against the anti-religious policies of Reza Shah Pahlavi , he was sentenced to 4 years in prison. After his release, he returned to Najaf, and soon became one of the Marja of Taqleed of Shi'a there. (The Marja of Taqleed are clerics that have the authority to declare fatwas and decrees into all matters of Islamic jurisprudence. Only several exist at any given time.) He returned to Iran in 1975 , and joined the movement against the last Shah of Iran , Mohammad Reza Pahlavi , until his government was overthrown in 1979 . By then he had ascended to the rank of Grand Ayatollah, thus becoming one of the highest ranking clerics of the Shi'a faith. He died on 29 September , 1984 in Mashad at the age of 95. A few hundred thousand people participated in the funeral ceremony commemorating him, at the Shrine of Imam Reza .¹