Fazlullah Nouri

Sheikh Fazlollah bin Abbas Mazindarani (Persian: فضل‌الله بن عباس مازندرانی; 24 December 1843 – 31 July 1909), also known as Fazlollah Nouri (Persian: فضل‌الله نوری), was a prominent Twelver Shia cleric and influential political figure during the Persian Constitutional Revolution (1905–1911). Initially a supporter of constitutionalism, he later turned against the movement following a shift in royal leadership from a pro-constitutional to an anti-constitutional Shah. Nouri ultimately aligned himself with the monarchy's opposition to constitutional reforms and was executed by the constitutionalist government in 1909, having been convicted of "sowing corruption and sedition on earth."

Since the Islamic revolution, he is celebrated for defending Sharia law and Islam against so-called agents of the West, and portrayed in school textbooks as a martyr for Islam and the motherland by the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Among historians, he is noted for initially supporting the constitutionalist movement but reversing himself later when it was no longer politically expedient, for being "responsible for the murder of leading constitutionalists" by inciting mobs and issuing fatwas declaring parliamentary leaders "apostates", "atheists," "secret masons" and koffar al-harbi (warlike pagans) whose blood ought to be shed by the faithful, and for having taken money from and given support to foreign interests in Iran. (contrary to the Islamic Republic's mythology of him opposing foreigners encroaching on Iran's culture, economy and society)

Nouri was a financially successful court official responsible for collected religious funds, for conducting marriages and contracts, including the wills of wealthy men. Under the monarch Mozaffar ad-Din Shah Qajar, who accepted demands for democratic reforms and agreed to surrender political powers to the parliament, he sided with the Iranian Constitutional Revolution. However, Nouri turned against the revolution after al-Din's death and his successor, Muhammad Ali Shah Qajar moved to close the parliament and return to the country to absolute monarchy. He joined the Shah in a vigorous propaganda campaign against the modern parliamentary system, arguing that the elected parliament (majles) should serve only as a forum for consultation, while laws ought to derive exclusively from Sharia.