Hawzah News Agency- Speaking at a ceremony honoring the theological contributions of the late senior cleric, Hojatoleslam Mohammad Taqi Sobhani said Grand Ayatollah Safi Golpaygani was among the rare figures whose scholarly life significantly enriched the modern era and reflected the major intellectual, social, and epistemological transformations of his time.
The event was held at the library of the late Grand Ayatollah Boroujerdi and attended by clerics, scholars, and seminary researchers.
Sobhani stressed that a careful study of Ayatollah Safi Golpaygani’s personality, academic trajectory, and multifaceted intellectual dimensions not only sheds light on past developments and prevailing schools of thought, but also opens a clear horizon for the future of Islamic seminaries and religious thought.
The senior cleric criticized what he described as insufficient efforts to properly honor and institutionalize the legacy of prominent scholarly figures, saying that the stature of Grand Ayatollah Safi Golpaygani had not been adequately commemorated. “Had such a figure belonged to other cultures or civilizations, systematic planning would have been undertaken to present his scholarly identity and reproduce his ideas in a way that would benefit future generations,” he said.
Sobhani noted that the late scholar possessed multiple and diverse dimensions, arguing that a comprehensive examination of his personality requires a range of academic specializations. For this reason, he said, it would be neither realistic nor methodologically sound to attempt to address all aspects of his legacy in a single, limited forum.
He explained that the Seminary’s Scientific Association of Islamic Theology therefore decided to focus specifically on Ayatollah Safi Golpaygani’s theological, epistemological, and intellectual efforts, with the aim of systematically reintroducing and safeguarding this dimension of his legacy.
Referring to the late cleric’s extensive body of work, Sobhani said a significant portion of Ayatollah Safi Golpaygani’s writings is available to researchers in both written form and through academic software. However, he warned that a major weakness in seminary research is superficial or inattentive engagement with such works, an approach that prevents a deep understanding of the scholar’s methodology and intellectual framework.
The head of the International Imamate Foundation further emphasized that the late grand ayatollah maintained a strong and active presence in both theoretical and practical arenas, a feature he described as a key strength of his scholarly character.
“Ayatollah Safi Golpaygani was not merely a jurist,” Sobhani said. “He was also a theologian, a hadith scholar, and a thinker well-versed in a wide spectrum of Islamic sciences. Throughout his life, he never distanced himself from learning, critical inquiry, or intellectual engagement.”
He added that the late scholar did not confine himself to abstract theorizing, but actively engaged with social realities inside and outside Iran. According to Sobhani, Ayatollah Safi Golpaygani confronted competing intellectual currents directly, responding to them with rigorous scholarly arguments and consistently seeking to guide public thought.
Sobhani concluded by highlighting the distinctive nature of Ayatollah Safi Golpaygani’s theological approach, saying that the combination of intellectual depth, methodological diversity, and social engagement produced a theological persona that, in several respects, diverged sharply from prevailing models among contemporary theologians.
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