Ma`rifat Farhangi Ejtemaei

The revolution of 35 AH, which culminated in the assassination of Uthman ibn Affan, constitutes one of the most complex and influential episodes in Islamic history. In the aftermath of this event, the Islamic world was afflicted by numerous crises and civil strifes. Taha Hussein, a student of Émile Durkheim and a prominent Egyptian modernist thinker, addressed this historical period in his works from a sociological perspective. Employing an analytical method, the present study first explicates the methodological foundations and reconstructs the explanatory dimensions of Hussein’s theory, and then proceeds to a critical examination of its methodological premises. The central question of the research is whether Hussein’s analysis, despite its sociological depth, is capable of providing a comprehensive explanation of this complex historical event. The findings indicate that due to several serious methodological and theoretical deficiencies, this approach fails to offer a complete account of the event. Although Hussein’s analysis is successful in identifying the background conditions and enabling causes, it proves inadequate in explaining the agentive causes and the conscious actions of historical actors on the basis of an Islamic worldview.