Word: ayatullah
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Cabinet's pilgrimage was further proof, if any were needed, that the real seat of power in Iran is not in Tehran but at an Islamic academy called the Madresseh Faizieh in the holy city of Qum. There the berobed Ayatullah Khomeini, now 79, receives a steady stream of visitors, ranging from government officials to impoverished peasants seeking his blessing and aid. But Khomeini did not really create the Iranian revolution, the revolution created him. That is the conclusion of Senior Correspondent James Bell, who first reported on Iranian politics for TIME in 1951. Traveling widely in Europe...
When asked to define the essential character of the Ayatullah Khomeini, a family friend recalls the scene at the drowning of Khomeini's infant daughter in Qum some 35 years ago. Khomeini's wife was tearing her hair in despair. When the friend arrived, the bearded savant was praying quietly over the body of the youngest of his six children. "I looked into his face and could see no trace of disturbance," says the friend today. "I knew he loved this child very deeply. Yet he showed no emotion, no sorrow, no excitement." After a while Khomeini said...
...remains an enigma. He is known as a "practicing mystic." His detachment, some feel, may explain how he is able to order or tolerate the abrupt trials and swift executions of so many people who have, in his words, "done Satan's work." One longtime acquaintance of the Ayatullah speaks of the "rage and anger he feels toward men in authority," possibly stemming from the efforts of the Pahlavi dynasty to curtail the power and prerogatives of the clergy for the past 40 years. Friends insist that in private the Ayatullah has a keen sense of humor...
...wives, but family friends insist he has been married only once. Khomeini has said "One wife is enough," though he did not say whether he meant simply one at a time. In any case, Khomeini is known to have had six children. His wife is younger than the Ayatullah by several years. "I run the inside and he runs the outside, but we always consult," she has said...
...soon as classes were over, the instruction really began," recalls one former student and colleague, Ayatullah Mohammed Javad Bahonar. "The discussions would go on for hours. He was never pleased unless you could stand up to him. He demanded research and curiosity. He wanted you to ask, to probe, to argue. The two issues he emphasized were the necessity for Islam and Iran to be independent of both Eastern and Western colonialism and the need to get the clergy put of the mold of an academic straitjacket. He said the clergy had a responsibility for humanity not only in Iran...