Iran`s Culture Ministry to commemorate Islamic scholar Jafar Shahidi

TEHRAN,Aug.28(MNA) -- The Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance plans to pay tribute to Persian language and literature scholar and prominent Islamic historian Jafar Shahidi (1918-2008) during a meeting in his birthplace of Borujerd next week. A number literati and scholars are scheduled to deliver speeches during the two-day meeting, which will open on September 2, Culture Minister Mohammad Hosseini said in a press conference on Sunday. The Culture Ministry has also established Allameh Jafar Shahidi Literary Awards, which will be presented to authors of works on Imam Ali (AS) and Nahj-ul-Balagha. Shahidi was a pupil of lexicographer Ali-Akbar Dehkhoda, who wrote the most comprehensive unabridged Persian dictionary. He was later become a director of the then Dehkhoda Dictionary Institute, which Dehkhoda had established in 1945 to complete the dictionary. He got a Ph.D. in Persian language and literature from the University of Tehran in 1961 and continued his studies at the Qom and Najaf seminaries, where he received permission to practice ijtihad, the use of reason to arrive at a knowledge of truth in religious matters. His most notable work is the fluent and eloquent translation of Imam Ali’s Nahj-ul-Balagha. He was also the author of “Analytical History of Islam”, which won Iran’s best book of the year award in 2006. Shahidi was also president of the International Center for the Teaching of the Persian Language. The Dehkhoda Dictionary Institute and the International Center for Persian Studies combined in 2007 to form a united institution for promotion of Persian literature and language. Shahidi presided over the institution, which is affiliated with the University of Tehran, until his death in January 2008. He also wrote “A Description to the Masnavi-e Manavi”, which is a comprehensive analysis of Persian poet and mystic Jalal ad-Din Rumi’s Masnavi-e Manavi.