Twelver Shi’i Self-flagellation Rites in Contemporary SyriaMourning Sayyida Zaynab

Examines the flagellation practices of Twelver Shi'i refugees in Syria for the first time

• Draws on fieldwork conducted in Syria between 2004 and 2010
• Fills a gap in the literature on Shi’ism in modern Syria
• Provides an account of Twelver Shi’i community practices, which is made all the more unique, indispensable, and non-replicable by the decimation of this community after the 2011 Syrian Uprising
• Critiques long-entrenched arguments in Shi‘i studies
• Distinguishes itself from Islamic Studies texts on religious development by shifting focus away from disciplinary practices for becoming better Muslims, and instead toward ways Shi‘is relate to religious authorities in order to practice transgressive rituals, violence, and magic (to reinforce piety)

This book examines contested Muharram practices, as well as the institutions and authorities that promoted or condemned them until 2011, when most Shi‘is fled Syria.

For 40 years, the Syrian shrine town of Sayyida Zaynab was a place of miracles, where violence engendered healing. To experience miraculous healing, Shi‘is attended mourning gatherings, studied at seminaries, self-flagellated, and frequented spiritual healers. Supported by the political establishment, Shi‘i institutions arose to serve Iraqi refugees and Iranian pilgrims. Seminaries promoted various practices, some highly controversial. Wounded, traumatized, impoverished, and oppressed, asylum seekers from Iraq who performed flagellations sought salvation - a worldly restoration requiring saintly beneficence. In Syria, where Shi‘is were often asylum seekers from Iraq, daily concerns centred on the here and now, on survival, and on the bitterness they felt. They prayed for justice and retribution, as much as for physical and psychological healing.