What is The Purpose Of People Like the Ayatollah Khomeini? Do they Have Authority To Add To The Quran?

Answer 1

They can't add to it, but they can interpret the Hell out of it.

Answer 2

I am not Muslim so I am speaking from outside Islam.

My understanding is that it is a central point in Islam that the Quran is the literal, direct, complete, and final revelation of God to us humans, and hence the text is immutable and cannot be added to or taken away from.

The body of supplementary material called the "ahadith" (but "hadiths" is better in English) is quite important in the interpretation of the Quran and in resolving many questions about living. This body of material coalesced a long time ago and is not textually immutable but the materials in it are ranked in their authoritativeness and any new materials would not be very authoritative at all.

Finally, some schools of Islam assert that interpretation of laws jelled a while ago and no significant new interpretation is possible. The name for interpretation of laws is "ijtihad" and I have read that in Sunni Islam (the majority of Muslims) the "gate of ijtihad" is regarded has having been closed for 500 years or so. However, I've read that in Shia Islam (the majority in Iraq and Iran) it is not believed that the "gate of ijtihad" has closed.

(One note: I had heard that an al-Qaeda edition of the Quran modified it by adding things. I later read that what the al-Qaeda edition did was to include some supplementary material ("glosses" and notes) but did not alter the Quranic text.)

So my conclusion, which I submit humbly and not as an expert in these areas, is that Islam regards the text of the Quran as complete and immutable and the explanatory "hadiths" as being ranked in such a way as to preclude non-trivial additions. Sunni Islam regards legal interpretation to have been complete some centuries ago, and that Shia Islam allows ijtihad. These are general statements and probably need to be made more precise, with some exceptions added. In the "sources" area below I include a link to a legal journal article on ijtihad, and a wikipedia article on ijtihad. Links in the latter article probably lead to good articles on the larger topic.

Answer 3

As a politician or as the leader of a governing party, he's automatically hit with a conflict of interest.

Power often attracts corruption and abuse. That is unfortunately a commonality that has been observed since the dawn of civilization and in all races and cultures.

Hint: probably has something to do with human nature... lol

Answer 4

This would be a great question for Salman Rushdie.

Answer 5

no... the are just on a power trip