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Simin Rouzgar

Despite its past significance as a major trade route on the Silk Road, the city of Qom has gained even greater importance by becoming the “religious capital” of Iran.

This city, during the years after the revolution in Bahman 57, and especially after its separation from the central province (1365) and Tehran (1375) and becoming a separate province with the same name, has rapidly pursued some urban development paths. Huge investments in the construction of modern buildings such as shopping malls, industrial and residential complexes, hospitals and medical centers, hotels and recreational parks, institutions and higher education centers – mostly in line with religious beliefs – have led to the transformation of this city into a metropolis or megacity, albeit unofficially. The opening of the first monorail in Iran in this province is also a contributing factor to this transformation.

Despite all the turmoil, Qom has boldly maintained its religious fabric. This very religiosity has caused the people of this city to have much more belief in certain religious beliefs such as “Istikhara” compared to other parts of the country, and in fact, Istikhara with the Quran (one of the types of Istikhara) is very prevalent there.

In the dictionary of Dehkhoda, “estekhareh” means seeking the best and asking for goodness from God. In religious terminology, it refers to entrusting the choice to God in a matter that a person hesitates and contemplates in carrying out. The reasons for “estekhareh” are numerous, ranging from doubts about marriage to a certain person or traveling to a place, starting a new business, choosing a field of study and university, or even seeking treatment or not seeking treatment for an illness by a doctor, and so on.

Usually, a person asks a religious scholar to hold the Quran and pray for their intention. However, some individuals may consider themselves less important and pray for their intention with the Quran on their own.

The most famous person in the field of fortune-telling in the past two decades is “Majid Jafaritabar”. His grandfather, Mohammad Sadoughi, was a well-known Shia cleric, a member of the Assembly of Experts and the Friday prayer leader of Yazd city. He was killed by opponents of the Iranian government in July 1982 and is referred to by official sources of the Islamic Republic as the “fourth martyr of the prayer niche”.

Majid Jafari Tabar, who also met with Hassan Rouhani, the 11th President of Iran, in his election campaign trip to Qom in April 2013, has been so well-known for his divinations since the early 1990s that not only the people of Qom, but also many believers in divination from other parts of the country and even abroad, knew him and wanted him to perform divinations for them. The range of these divinations became so extensive that more than 132 telephone lines were set up to broadcast the text of the divinations 24 hours a day for the visitors. In fact, due to the high number of visits and the heavy traffic on the telecommunication lines in Qom province, the officials asked him to either accept the intelligent network system (IN) or close down his office. Eventually, with the conditions that arose, his divination office became the first pilot of the IN system in Iran. (2).

One of the citizens living in Qom, who did not want their name to be mentioned, had repeatedly contacted Majid Jafari Tabar’s office for various reasons to seek guidance through istikhara. They said in a peaceful tone, “After facing certain issues and having doubts about whether to do something or not, either myself or other family members would contact their office and receive a code. At first, they would respond quickly, but recently there was a time when we had to wait for three days for a response. However, their istikhara was worth all the patience.”

He continued, “The most important thing we relied on for their fortune-telling was the time of my daughter’s marriage in 84. She had two suitors at the same time; the first was a very faithful and religious suitor from respectable families who did not have a good financial situation, and that young man did not have a high-paying job at the time he came to propose to our daughter, and the other was a well-established person who worked in his father’s shop in one of the most famous gold shops in the National Bazaar. He was also an only child and his family’s financial situation was very good… We were hesitant between these two and did not know which one was the more suitable option for our daughter’s marriage. But after Mr. Jafari Tabar performed fortune-telling for us and the answer was good, we gave a positive answer to the marriage of our daughter with the first person I mentioned to you, and now my daughter is happy in every aspect

The issues that led to writing this article were neither the majestic Ja’fari Tabar’s divinations nor the focus on the lifestyle of believers in divination; it was the issuance of a death sentence for him.

During the middle of last fall, in the city of Qom, rumors spread about the arrest of Majid Jafari Tabar due to financial charges and other allegations. Since there was no access to his wife, Mina Manaqeb, or some of his close relatives and students, and he was not willing to talk about it, this issue remained ambiguous and some local websites also denied it. However, since no responsible authority provided any information in this regard, the rumor spread to the point that he had been executed. Whether it was a rumor or reality, one question remained: why are the fortune tellers’ phones not being answered and their offices closed?

During the middle of last winter, despite Mohammad Jafar Montazeri, the head of the Special Court for Clergy, refraining from commenting on the matter in front of reporters from state media and stating, “We have no intention of publishing news related to the Special Court for Clergy,” finally Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei, the spokesperson for the Judiciary, told Ana, “A death sentence has been issued by the Special Court for Clergy for a well-known clergyman with the identity of ‘M.J.T.’.” In order to distance the issue from rumors and for the truth to come to light.

Mohseni had emphasized in that conversation that the issued verdict for this person was hasty and can be appealed, and according to the law, it is subject to review. In this news, he was accused of “having connections with enemies”.

In this regard, it has recently been announced by his relatives that Majid Jafari Tabar was arrested in July and his wife, Mina Managheb, was arrested in November of last year and is currently imprisoned in Langroud-Qom prison. He has been sentenced by the Special Court for Clergy to be stripped of his clerical status and executed three times on charges such as “apostasy”, “financial misconduct”, “connections with jinn”, “playing with followers’ minds”, and “connections with the Imam of the Time”. His wife, Fatemeh Managheb, has also been sentenced to death for “participation in the crime”. However, the three death sentences were issued under circumstances where, according to the new Islamic Penal Code, if a person commits multiple crimes, the judge can only issue the harshest punishment for one crime. In fact, according to the new law, issuing multiple punishments is prohibited.

Despite the resolution of some doubts, many questions remain unanswered for everyone, as it is unclear whether the answers to these questions will be revealed in the future due to the lack of transparency from officials or those close to them.

Sources.

For more information, refer to the book “Tariqehdar” by Abu al-Fadl, “Kandukavi” in divination and fortune-telling, published by Bustan Ketab Institute in 1386.

2- Persian Wikipedia.