A look inside the "heart of society" for Iraq's Shi'ites
For more than 1,000 years, the al-Hawza al-Ilmiyya south of Baghdad has been one of the hearts of Shi'ite Islamic scholarship, training the clerics who lead Shi'ite communities across the Muslim world.
Thousands of students, from teenage boys to university graduates, study Islam at its schools in the holy cities of Najaf and Kerbala.
Shi'ite clerics walk outside the Imam Hussein and Imam Abbas shrines.
A Shi'ite cleric buys vegetables at a market.
A Shi'ite cleric reads a book at a library in Najaf, south of Baghdad, Iraq, August 12, 2017.
Shi'ite clerics walk out of the shrine of Imam Ali.
A Shi'ite cleric takes off his shoes as he enters Ibn al-Fahd al-Heli school.
Al-sayed al-Yazdi school.
A Shi'ite cleric holds a turban at al-sayed al-Yazdi school.
Shi'ite clerics talk at al-sayed al-Yazdi school.
Shi'ite clerics study at al-sayed al-Yazdi school.
Star Jaber Al-Busaisi, 58, a teacher at Ibn al-Fahd al-Heli school run speaks to the principal of the school.
A Shi'ite cleric makes his call to prayer.
Shi'ite clerics are seen at Sadiq Hussaini Shirazi's office.
Students are seen at Ibn al-Fahd al-Heli school.
Mohamed Hassan Abdel Hadi Baqer, 25, a student at Ibn al-Fahd al-Heli school looks into a fridge at his home.
Mohamed Hassan Abdel Hadi Baqer eats with his children.
Story
"Hawza has a high rank at the heart of the society," Wael Noor Al-Deen Murtadha, a Shi'ite cleric and lecturer at the school, told Reuters.
"What is important about Hawza is that it reduces the moral degeneration and irregularities of life. It creates a culture among people aimed at reinforcing social relationships between different sects away from any discrimination."
