Posted by (E) From the time of the Imamat of Hazrat Mawlana Ali (A.S.), the Imams of the Ismaili Muslims have ruled over territories and peoples in various areas of the world at different periods of history and, in accordance with the needs of the time, have given rules of conduct and constitution in conformity with the Islamic concepts of unity, brotherhood, justice, tolerance and goodwill.
The Constitution of the Shia Imami Ismaili Muslims
During the time of Prophet Muhammad, his residence in Medina served as his Seat of administration as well as a mosque. Prophet’s successor, Hazrat Ali (d. 661), the first Imam of the Shi’a and the fourth Caliph of the Ummah, transferred his Seat to Kufa, Iraq. During the Fatimid period (909-1171), the Seat of the Ismaili Imamat moved from Qayrawan (in modern-day Tunisia), to al-Mahdiyya, and then to al-Mansuriyya (also in Tunisia), cities founded by and named after Imams al-Mahdi (r.909-934) and al-Mansur (r.946-953) respectively. The Seat eventually moved to al-Qahira (now Cairo) in Egypt, a city founded by Mawlana Hazar Imam’s ancestor, Fatimid Caliph-Imam al-Mu’izz (r. 953-975). Historically, the seat of the Imamat was generally the Imam’s residence.
During the Alamut (1090-1256) and post-Alamut times, Imam resided in various towns in Persia including Anjundan, Kahak, Shahri Babak, which were also seats of administration and to where da’is, pirs, and representatives of the community travelled to meet the Imams.
Pir Sadr al-Din, in many of his compositions, refers to the Imam of the time (Imam Islamshah) residing at Alamut, for example, in the second verse of the Ginan Dhan dhan aajano daadalore:
Alamut gadh patan Delam deshji
Tiyan avtariya shah mankha veshiji, hetno mera.
“The Imam has descended in human garb at the foot of Alamut, the capital of the land of Daylam” (tr. Shafique Virani, The Ismailis in the Middle Ages, p 43).
Listen
Imam Hasan Ali Shah Aga Khan I (r. 1817-1881) established his residence to Bombay (now Mumbai). Imam Sultan Muhammad Shah Aga Khan III established his residences in Bombay, Cannes (France), and Geneva (Switzerland). Mawlana Hazar Imam established residences in Aiglemont and Geneva.
On June 3, 2015, Mawlana Hazar Imam signed an agreement to establish the Seat of Ismaili Imamat in Lisbon, the first institution of its kind in Ismaili history. (AKDN Press Release).
In his address to the Parliament of Portugal during the Diamond Jubilee commemoration, Mawlana Hazar Imam said:
“Through the centuries, the Seat of the Ismaili Imamat has been formally designated in one or more locations by the Imam-of-the-Time, depending on the requirements of the day. It has known many homes over the years – throughout the Arabian Peninsula, in the Middle East, in South Asia, and in North Africa. It moved to Cairo in the tenth century, when my ancestors founded that city. The decision to establish a new Seat here in Portugal, at the gracious invitation of your Government, is one that has been taken after much reflection and consultation. It represents a true milestone moment in the long history of the Imamat.”
Lisbon, Portugal, July 10, 2018
Speech
Video of Hazar Imam’s address
On July 11, 2018, Mawlana Hazar Imam officially designated the Henrique de Mendonça Palace located at Rua Marquês de Fronteira in Lisbon as the Seat of the Ismaili Imamat, and declared that it be known as the “Diwan of the Ismaili Imamat.”
Diwan
From the Arabic diwan and the Persian devan, the term was originally used to refer to a log book or a pension list of the finance department to award compensation to soldiers in Islamic societies. The term subsequently evolved to refer to a financial institution. In Mughal India, during the time of Akbar (1556–1605), the term was associated primarily with government finance, the chief finance minister being the diwan, with provincial dawawin under him. The term can also refer to chief treasury official, finance minister, or prime minister in some Indian states. Until the nineteenth century, Iranians used the term to refer to a central government in general. In the Ottoman Empire, the diwan referred to an imperial chancery headed by the grand vizier.
During Fatimid times, “the central administration was carried on through the diwan system, and the various diwans (ministries, departments or offices) were at times situated at the residence of the caliph or vizier. The first central organ in Fatimid Egypt, in which the entire government machinery seems to have been concentrated and which at some unknown date split into a number of departments, was the diwan al-majalis.” (Daftary, The Ismailis Their history and doctrines, p 224)
There were three main diwans through which the central administration of the Fatimids operated:
- diwan al-insha or al-rasa’il, the chancery of state, entrusted with issuing and handling the various official documents including the caliphal decrees and letters;
- the diwan al-jaysh wa’l-rawatib, the department of the army and salaries;
- diwan al-amwal, the department of finance.
The term diwan was subsequently extended to mean the audience chamber of important government officers, whose offices, furnished with mattresses and cushions along the walls, account for the extension of the meaning to sofa – a long, low, soft seat without a back or arms.
The diwan can also refer to a collection of poems by one author.
Sources:
Farhad Daftary, The Ismailis Their history and doctrines, Cambridge University Press, 1990
Shafique N. Virani, The Ismailis in the Middle Ages, Oxford University Press, 2007
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