Please join us for the special Laylatul-Qadr and Martyrdom of Imam Ali (AS) event. The program includes an English lecture by Dr. Hamid Mavani, a Farsi lecture by Dr. Mostafa Daneshgar, Maghreb and Isha Prayers, Iftar, Dua Jawshan Kabir, Azadari, and a special Laytul Qadr ceremony (Ahaya).
Parts of the program including the lectures and duas will be live-streamed via YouTube live stream.
The night of Ramadan 20th is significant to Shia Muslims because Imam Ali ibn Abi Talib (AS) was martyred on Ramadan 21, 40 AH (January 28, 661 CE) due to the injuries he sustained in his assassination by Ibn Muljam two days earlier during his morning prayer at the Great Mosque of Kufah in Iraq. Imam Ali (AS) was the cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).
Biographies
Dr. Hamid Mavani is an Associate Professor of Islamic Studies at Bayan Claremont Islamic Graduate School/Chicago Theological Seminary (CTS). His expertise in Islamic Studies stems from academic training at universities and specialized theological training at the traditional seminaries in the Muslim world. His primary interests include Islamic legal theory, women and Shi‘i law, Islamic theology and political thought, Islam and secularity, intra-Muslim discourse, and environmental ethics. He is the author of a book published by Routledge in June 2013 titled, Religious Authority and Political Thought in Twelver Shi‘ism: From Ali to Post-Khomeini and is co-author with Dr. Ahmad Kazemi Moussavi on a work in progress on Islamic legal theory, to be published by IIIT. Dr. Mavani’s scholarship also includes translations of Islamic texts from Arabic and Persian into English. In this regard, he finished translating from Persian a ground-breaking work by Ayatollah Mohsen Kadivar on Islam, apostasy, and blasphemy (under contract with the Edinburgh University Press).
Dr. Mostafa Daneshgar was born in Iran in 1981 and started his studies on Shiite theology and Shiite jurisprudence in 1997. He continued these studies while also attending the School of Engineering. Mostafa Daneshgar earned his Bachelor of Science degree in Industrial Engineering from Iran in 2003, then immigrated to Syria where he continued his religious studies at the Seminary of Zanabia at Damascus.
In September 2010, he immigrated to the United States and continued his studies and cultural activities. Mostafa attended the School of Engineering at Wayne State University and graduated with his Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering. He received his Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Wayne State University.
Mr. Daneshgar has written more than 200 articles and speeches about Islam, Shiite, and relations between religions, specifically Shiite, as well as cultural and social challenges in Persian, Arabic, and English.
