Analysis of the Guardian Council's Sharia Supervisory Process over Family-Related Legislation

Document Type : Scholarly Article

Authors

1 Professor, Department of Public Law, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran.

2 Associate Professor, Department of Public Law, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran

3 PhD candidate in Public Law, Alborz Campus, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran

10.30497/flj.2026.247347.2124

Abstract

The legislative system of the Islamic Republic of Iran, grounded in various constitutional principles, is recognized as a religious system. To uphold the ideal that all affairs are firmly based on Islamic law, the jurists of the Guardian Council have task to adopt that legislation passed by the Islamic Consultative Assembly aligns with the rulings of Shi'a Islam. A significant challenge in this context is the multiplicity of Fatwas among Shi'a jurists, because it is not clear exactly based on which Fatwa the Guardian Council adopts the laws with Sharia. According to the Guardian Council’s interpretative view, the criterion for Sharia compliance is the Fatwa of its own jurists; however, this approach has not always been consistently applied in practice. This study examines the performance of the Guardian Council in the field of family law to clarify which Fatwas have been used to confirm the Sharia compliance of legislation. The findings indicate that there is no clear or unified standard for selecting a reference Fatwa, and the Guardian Council’s jurists have relied on various fatwas in different cases. This research has been conducted by an analytical-descriptive method and by using library sources.

Keywords

Main Subjects

مقالۀ حاضر، از رسالۀ دکتری با عنوان اثر و جایگاه تعدد فتاوا در نظام قانونگذاری جمهوری اسلامی ایران، پردیس البرز دانشگاه تهران استخراج شده است. 

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Biannual Journal of Family Law And Jurisprudence
Volume 31, Issue 84
March 2026
Pages 157-194

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