The clergy are the guardians of ancient traditions and therefore, when faced with new phenomena, they do not easily accept them and initially view them with doubt and skepticism. They also initially approach the use of modern tools with hesitation, such as using a microphone and speaker for religious speeches, or using a water hose for showering instead of a traditional bath. When questioned about new tools, such as using a washing machine for cleaning impure clothes, whether it leads to purification or not, the initial response of the clergy was negative and they were hesitant to approve their use. It took some time for religious authorities to gradually recognize and accept these modern and new tools with hesitation and delay.

With the sudden spread and invasion of the COVID-19 virus and disease, the religious community faced new challenges and “multifaceted religious crises”. These crises can be broadly divided into two categories, either in the realm of “jurisprudence and sharia” or in the realm of “theology and theology”.

The crisis in ethical and religious life.

The first encounter of religious people with problems related to this virus, in facing their own biological existence, manifests itself in “jurisprudence”. The spread of this virus creates new conditions and issues among believers and the religious in dealing with personal religious matters, such as washing and shrouding the deceased, impurity and purification from alcohol and related substances, the ruling on fasting during the month of Ramadan in the time of the spread of the coronavirus. These issues fall within the realm of the religious believers’ personal biological existence and determining what is permissible and forbidden, impure and pure, obligatory and forbidden. Believers, alongside their personal biological existence, also face new crises in their collective religious existence and in relation to “rituals and collective ceremonies” such as Friday prayers, congregational prayers, and performing the rituals of Hajj during the month of Dhu al-Qa’dah. Although the suspension of some collective rituals, such as religious holidays and funerals, Friday prayers and

B- Crisis in faith and religious beliefs:
Another crisis that will advance with a gentler but more audacious slope is the confrontation of religious believers with their inner beliefs and their view of “God” and his role in relation to “human suffering” and the “power of God” in “faith and spiritual beliefs”. These challenges will not only arise in the realm of jurisprudence and religious laws, but also in the theoretical and theological domains.

The subject of this note is the first crisis, which is the crisis in the realm of “jurisprudence and sharia”. In a general view, in the face of religious rituals during the coronavirus crisis, we witness two different perspectives. In the “fundamentalist” perspective, religious gatherings are seen as being free from evil and religious places are considered sacred and places of healing for believers, so none of them were closed. But in contrast, the “rationalist” perspective called for following health and medical recommendations, and therefore if based on those recommendations, religious gatherings and places

First – Understanding the General Root of Crisis

In some of the sayings, a famous proverb in Arabic has been mentioned which says “Asking good questions is half of knowledge” (2). In other words, presenting a problem correctly and accurately contains half of the answer. It seems that one of the problems faced by religious people in dealing with widespread and contagious phenomena such as plague and cholera is the lack of understanding of the problem or a false understanding and interpretation of the problem.

In the past centuries, when faced with contagious diseases such as plague and cholera, the clergy had difficulty understanding the root and origin of the crisis. Believing in the influence of supernatural forces such as jinn and demons in the spread of contagious diseases led religious people to take a deviant path in fighting against them. Therefore, we can see that in the past, some mentally ill patients were interpreted as being possessed by jinn and exorcists would try to remove the jinn from them. In the later period, during the Qajar era,

Second- Increase in General Scientific-Health Information:

One of the reasons for the difference in the current behavior of clergy compared to their behavior in previous centuries is their relative awareness and general understanding of new sciences. Today, the clergy, like other segments of society, are generally aware of public health concepts.

In previous centuries, the clergy, like most other segments of society, lacked basic knowledge in this field. Concepts such as “quarantine,” “methods of disease transmission,” and “how diseases spread” were considered specialized concepts and were not familiar to the average and non-specialized segments of society. However, in modern times, these public health concepts have been simplified and are considered among the general knowledge and information that is accessible to everyone, and even the lower and less educated segments of society are familiar with them.

This general familiarity with the basic points of public health and the requirements of civic life also familiarizes the clergy with the requirements of civic life, like other segments of society. The responsibility of collective relationships in responsible civic life, such as

Third- Virtual Space and Information Exchange

The virtual space and the internet have played a fundamental and vital role in exchanging health information. In previous decades, religious communities, like other societies, had to refer to specialists or specialized books and libraries to become familiar with health concepts. If a religious scholar wanted to issue a fatwa (religious ruling) on the closure of religious ceremonies and rituals due to the spread of a contagious disease, they first had to become aware of the disease, its symptoms and signs, its spread, ways to prevent it, and how to create immunity. Access to this specialized or semi-specialized knowledge was not an easy task. But nowadays, with the abundance of information in the virtual space and easy access to this knowledge, religious scholars and communities can easily access this information.

For this reason, after the spread of COVID-19, it did not take long for religious scholars to agree to the closure of Friday prayers, congregations, and religious gatherings. Undoubtedly, the general and overall knowledge of religious citizens, scholars

Fourth- Possibility of accessing comparative and comparative information.
Virtual space and the internet have played a fundamental and vital role not only in the exchange of health information, but also in the comparative exchange of information about statistics of those affected, how the disease spreads to others, and various methods of prevention and quarantine in other countries.

This comparative and comparative exchange of information has not only been effective in improving the experiences of health officials in the country and improving their methods of dealing with the crisis, but also in raising awareness among religious communities and their spiritual leaders and legal authorities. In the past, many natural and celestial disasters were attributed to the sins of humanity, but now, when religious communities in infected areas compare themselves to other countries, they can more easily believe in objective and external results and critically review and reconsider their own abstract and mental judgments about the root causes of the spread of the disease and its effectiveness or ineffectiveness in specific places and communities.

In such a comparative study, the religious leaders of one religion have a picture of the challenges of other religions.

Fifth- In the rule of clergy.
One of the reasons for the immediate solidarity of the clergy with medical recommendations is their involvement in the management of the country. “Being in power of the clergy” not only increases their awareness of current events in the country, but also helps them to have a position of power and be a partner in the good and bad of governance, contributing to their solidarity with medical recommendations.

Access to Government Information:
Religious leaders, whether at a national level or within their own region, are familiar with the realities of society and the functions of life in the modern world. An Imam of a city, a custodian of an Imam’s shrine, or an Imamzadeh, cannot declare their region and Friday prayers as safe and free from harm based on certain news and traditions, as they are directly involved with the city and regional government officials and are considered part of the ruling authority. Therefore, the spread of this disease will also affect them and their associated institutions. This awareness of the news and, for example, the situation of patients and hospitals in the city, is not exclusive to official religious leaders, but nowadays, other religious leaders in their influential areas also have a relatively high position to be exposed to this practical knowledge. For this reason, the discourse of religious leaders must necessarily comply with the guidelines of health officials.

B- Instead of being in a position of power, he was in opposition.

Now, the clergy in Iran, not as a minority and opposition and marginalized, but as a part of the government, a passenger on this ship, and even to some extent its captain. If this same crisis had happened during the previous regime and the monarchy had decided to close religious ceremonies and shrines and mosques, without a doubt we would have seen more resistance from the clergy and believers against the closure of religious ceremonies and places. At that time, the clergy in the position of opposition could have used the “conspiracy theory” to interpret the closure of these ceremonies and places as a conspiracy by the Shah regime to weaken the religion of the people, but in the era of the Islamic government, the resistance of the clergy seems meaningless, because who are they resisting against now? And to whom can they attribute the closure of religious ceremonies and places as a conspiracy to weaken religion?

It is obvious that the clergy, especially the clergy with official and governmental positions in Iran, are not in the position of

Gathering:

By examining the reactions of official religious authorities in the face of the coronavirus crisis, we find that, aside from some exceptions, overall, clerics have had a more rational and wise approach to this crisis compared to similar crises in past centuries, and have advised the religious community, especially in regards to collective rituals, to adhere to health guidelines and relevant directives. This change in response to a widespread disaster was due to various reasons. The most important reason was the increase in public awareness in society, and as a result, the increase in awareness among the clergy. The possibility of quick and immediate exchange of information, especially in virtual spaces and social media, added to this awareness and solidarity. The increase in the public’s cultural level undoubtedly leads to the growth of the clergy’s and religious leaders’ cultural level, as they also have to raise their own level of awareness in order to maintain their ability to communicate with their audience. Therefore, it can be said that the level of solidarity among official religious authorities with

1- Footnotes:
1. In the fundamentalist perspective, there are two parallel currents, one claiming “Islamic medicine” and the other “political” current that looks at this phenomenon through a political lens. The majority of clerics from the “non-political” traditional current have joined the “rationalist” current with hesitation and slight delay, considering the health recommendations necessary. At the forefront of the “political fundamentalist” current, we can mention the initial positions of the leader of Iran, the Friday Imams of Qom and Mashhad. Although all three later revised their positions. See: Farshitian, Hassan, Corona and the Crisis of Religious Identity; From Jurisprudence to Theology, published on BBC Persian website on March 29, 2020.
2. R. K. Maniyat al-Murid, the Second Martyr, p. 258. This sentence has been mentioned in various hadiths with similar interpretations, which seems