Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Persian national assembly, 1821, from Arabic majlis "assembly," literally "session," from jalasa "he sat down."
Wiktionary
alt. 1 A council, assembly, or public meeting, in some Muslim countries or territories. 2 # The parliament of Iran. n. 1 A council, assembly, or public meeting, in some Muslim countries or territories. 2 # The parliament of Iran.
Wikipedia
(or Mejlis; , pl. ) is an Arabic term meaning "a place of sitting", used in the context of "council", to describe various types of special gatherings among common interest groups be it administrative, social or religious in countries with linguistic or cultural connections to Islamic countries. It shares its root with the verb meaning 'to sit,' (cf. British English ' sitting room'). The Majlis can refer to a legislature as well and is used in the name of legislative councils or assemblies in some of the states where Islamic culture dominates. The term Majlis is used to refer to a private place where guests are received and entertained. Among the Shia community the term Majlis is used as a verb meaning to the gathering who came to remember Ahl al-Bayt and in particular Husayn ibn Ali.
Usage examples of "majlis".
To begin a story one must choose a time when the door swings wide, and this came for me on a day late in the April of 1149 when Yusuf Ibn Mansur asked me to remain with him at the end of what we called the majlis, the gathering of officials that was held twice-monthly in the royal palace of Palermo.
The majlis itself has stayed in my memory because it was enlived by a quarrel.
I slept a little and woke to feelings of unease, something like foreboding, remembering, as I still lay reclined on my couch, the marks of division so evident at the majlis that morning, the antagonisms that stirred among us.
The palace was where he liked to hold his weekly majlis, or audience, in the desert sheik tradition.
The abandonment had not been complete enough to give the majlis hope that Moslem squatters could infiltrate the place.
No amputations were scheduled for this first majlis, and when they were resumedsparingly under Islamic law, the Vizier intended to have a physician standing by with a tourniquet and painkillers.
If the station deports them, I cannot be held responsible and my superiors will have to send reliable men to replace them, men who are not in the Ansar Majlis.
Debate had been raging in the newspapers and in the Iranian majlis, or parliament, about closing down this bottling plant, symbolizing as it did American cultural influence.