The State of the TheocracyAfter 21 Years in PowerBy Whitney Mason

TEHRAN-The name had a magical effect on my guide. MohammedAskerbu hadapproached me as I was breakfasting on fresh nan bread with honey and tea on arooftop overlooking a deep green valley. I was in the steeply terraced village ofMasule, nestled in Iran’s Alborz mountains behind the Caspian Sea. With a fewwords of English he offered to take me on a hike, led me by the two-room househe shared with his parents who tried to sell me hand-knit socks and armedme with a scythe-tipped club to be used against wolves. For half an hour we hadbeen walking along a wooded slope toward a waterfall exchanging what littleinformation our language barrier would allow.

Then I had pronounced "Shariati". Askerbu stopped in his tracks and turnedaround toward me. "You know Shariati?" he said, glowering and jabbing his fin-ger at me at me. From his expression, I had no idea what the name meant to him.

"Yes, I know him," I said, raising my eyebrows and shrugging my shouldersto convey an air of innocent neutrality.

Suddenly a broad smile lit up his meaty, weathered face. "Shariati my friend,"he exclaimed, jerking his cocked thumb toward himself. "Shariati very good." Helooked down at his open palms, indicating that he’d read a lot of Shariati’s books,

The mosques ofEsfahan, the Florence ofPersia,embody 17-century Iran’s celebration of beauty.

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then pointed questioningly at me. I replied by puttingmy index finger and thumb together. "Mullahs" he said,referring to the religious scholars who rule Iran, makinga nasty face and gleefully pantomiming kicking them out.Through some miracle of non-verbal communication,Askerbu conveyed that he used to work at Masule’s postoffice before being fired for supporting Iran’s reformistpresident, Mohammad Khatami. He pointed back downthe trail toward the village. "Shariati my home," he said,nodding enthusiastically. Since I knew Shariati, he said,there was no question of my paying for his guiding; anyfriend of Shariati’s was a friend of his.

The truth was that I’d first heard ofAli Shariati just aweek before from a group of female university studentsin Tehran. The girls came from all over the country andwere staying at my two-star hotel near Tehran Univer-sity while attending a youth conference on social andpolitical issues and we managed to talk for a few min-utes away from the chaperones while 6ating breakfast inthe hotel tea room.

I said the conference must be fascinating. Staying ina hotel together was fun, they said, (which I already knewfrom hearing them laughing until late into the night), butthe conference itself was pretty dull. The problem wasthat they weren’t allowed to talk about the ideas and fig-ures they really cared about. "Ah," I said, pulling up mybackground reading. "You must mean AbdolkarimSoroush," [a popular philosopher whose defense of in,

dividual interpretation of religious truth has earned himthe moniker "the Martin Luther of Islam".]

They hadn’t been allowed to mention Soroush’sname, buthe wasn’t the one theyhad in mind. One young2

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woman leaned forward, looking at me intently. "Do youknow Ali Shariati?" she asked, while half a dozen youngfaces peering out of black sheets beamed adoringly; thewayAmerican girls might have 40 years ago about Elvis.

Ali Shariati, as I soon learned, was a French-educatedsociologist who had preached a blend of Iran’s Shiite Is-lam, liberation theology and modernism that had elec-trified Iranians in the late sixties and seventies.Though he was forced into exile and killed by theShah’s henchmen in London in 1977, from exchangesI had with Iranians all over the country, Shariatiseemed to be far and away the most popular religiousfigure in Iran today; if you want to know most Iranians’vision of Islam, it seems, you should look to the volumi-nous tracts Shariati wrote and speeches he gave. Andthat’s bad news for the mullahs, the Shiite scholars whorule Iran.

A leading exponent of Islamic humanism, Shariatiemphasized the distinction between the Shiism of ImamAli, the son-in-law and cousin of the ProphetMuhammad, whom Shiis consider God’s vice-regent onearth, and the Shiism of the Safavid dynasty who withtheir ascendance in 1502 made it Iran’s state religion. Ashistorian Nikki Keddie wrote: "Alid Shi’ism [accordingto Shariati] represents original Islam and is a movementof progress and revolution with no division between in-tellectuals and the people Islam in its progressive anddynamic phase. The Safavids, by making Shi’ism thestate religion, degraded it into an institution, mak-ing it a means of political enslavement and turningit from its original aim the search for justice andsacred duties... Shariati’s Safavid Shi’ism is also[Shah] Pahlavi Shi’ism, and today’s "Safavid" ulama

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[mullahs] are those who play games of power."1

In one essay, "Reflections of a Concerned MuslimOn the Plight of Oppressed People", Shariati writes:"Where should I go? Should I go to the Mobedans(priests of pre-Islamic Persia)? How could I return tothose temples which were built to enslave me? ShouldI join those who claim to be examples of our nationalfreedom but in essence are attempting to gain theirinhuman privileges of the past? The mosques are nobetter than those temples! [the pyramids, used here assymbols of authoritarianism.]

When I first arrived in Iran, I vaguely imaginedthat Iranians were divided between religious peoplewho supported the theocratic regime, and better-edu-cated, non-religious people who read the reformistnewspapers that have been closed down in droves overthe past year. I soon discovered that this is a false di-chotomy. It’s no accident that Shariati, the most popu-lar modernthinker in Iran, was someone whohad triedto reconcile Shiite tradition with modernity. Iranians’faith in Shiite Islam, centered on a line of savior fig-ures descended from ImamAli, is real, broad and deep.But it is not the religion that outsiders would infer fromlooking at Iran’s laws and institutions. Quite the con-trary: in many ways, Iranians’ faith is deeply hostiletoward both the reigning religious authorities and to-ward the Sunni Muslim world with which the gov-ernment often expresses fraternal solidarity.

Islam and Nationhood

The Safavids’ introduction of Shiism as Iran’s statereligion has left so deep a mark on Iranian society thattoday it’s difficult for many Iranians to conceive of theirnational identity apart from the religion. And yet Irani-ans are constantly reminded that their forebears weremonotheists who ruled half the known world at a timewhen the people who brought Islam to Iran, the Arabs,were worshipping idols and living off banditry. The re-sult is a schizophrenic combination of intense devotionto the Shiite version of the religion of the ProphetMohammad as revealed in Arabic and a visceral loath-ing for Arabs themselves.

I once made the error of referring to Iran’s pre-Is-lamic period as "Jahaliya", the period before Mohammedknown in Muslim history as the "time of ignorance"."Jahaliya is only for Arabs," a devout Iranian man toldme rather tersely. "We Persians had civilization beforeIslam." In Iran’s National Museum I saw a monolithcalled the Hamurabi Stone, inscribed with "all the lawsnecessary for a small community. The sign called it "the

Roots ofRevolution, Nikki R. Keddie, pgs 217,218.

Iran’s mullahs, who arefirst andforemost supposed to beexperts on Shiite Islamic law, enjoy both the power and

popularity of their secular American counterparts.

world’s first writing on human rights."3

Iran’s national epic, the Shahnameh or Book of Kings,calls Arabs "lizard-eaters". Iranian names come from ei-ther from Arabic or the Shahnameh, which although writ-ten in the 11th century recounts mostly the glories of pre-Islamic Iran. Very often Iranians with Arabic nameswould tell me they hated them, and ask me to call themby a Persian name. Many Iranians I met described theArab conquest of 642 as a tragedy that had ruined theirculture. And yet, when the Shah had tried to weaken thepower-religion by promoting a pre-Islamic nationalism,the effort was a bitter failure.

The spiritual heart of Iran’s pre-Islamic civilizationwas the monotheistic religion founded by the Iranianprophet Zoroaster some five centuries before Christ. Thegreatest concentration of Zoroastrians today canbe foundin the ancient oasis city of Yazd where, according to oneelderly Zoroastrian I talked to, there are about 10,000 Zo-roastrians left out of 140,000 Zoroastrians in all of Iran.

Reflections ofa Concerned Muslim On the Plight of Oppressed Peoples by Ati Shariati, pg. 8.The stone was carved in 1160 by order of a Babylonian king who moved his capital to what is now western Iran. The French

took the stone from Iran in 1901 and "returned" it before World War II. It was discovered to be a fake made of plastic whensome sophisticated antiquarian tried to stub out his cigarette on it and it burned. The original remains in the Louvre.Institute of Current World Affairs 3

Zoroastrian monuments: Until the coming ofIslam with the Arab conquest in theseventh century, Zoroastrianism was the state religion of Sassanid Persia. Unlike theArabs, who refer to the pre-Islamic period as "the time of ignorance," today’s Iranians

express enormous pride in their ancient history.

The temple known as "Chak Chak," built around adesert spring the Zoroastrians regard as sacred,

marks the last gasp ofIran’s pre-Islamic civilization.

In order to avoidcontaminating any of the

sacred elements offire, water orearth, Zoroastrians disposed oftheir dead by leaving them atop"towers ofsilence," like thesein Yazd, where birds would

pick their bones clean.

(There are more in northern India, where they’re knownas Parsis.) The number is shrinking because Zoroastri-ans don’t allow intermarriage, and since the Revolution,the government hasn’t allowed Muslim women to marryZoroastrian men. The principal Zoroastrian monumentin Yazd is a temple housing a fire that has been burningcontinuously for over 400 years. The elderly Zoroastri-ans explained that they don’t worship fire, as some igno-rantly accuse them of doing, but they regard light as asign of God and goodness, Zoroastrians pray facing natu-ral light, standing upright, because God Ahura Mazda4

is everywhere. Outside Yazd, two steep, cone-shapedmounds of reddish clay rise a couple hundred feet intothe air. They are called "towers of silence", and Zoroas-trians used to leave the corpses of their dead on the top,where they would be picked cleanby vultures and crowswithout contaminating any of the sacred elements ofearth, water or fire.

The most important Zoroastrian site in Iran today isa place northeast of Yazd that seems to have more to dowith national pride than religion. Known as Chak Chak,

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it is a shrine in the desert that memorializes the last gaspof Iranian independence before the country was overrunby the Arabs. To reach it my guide and driver and I droveour rattling Peykan sedan twenty kilometers north ofYazd, turned right into the Dasht-e Lut desert and droveanother 20 kilometers in the direction of Tabas, where 20years ago the American attempt to rescue the hostagesfrom the US embassy had ended in a fiery collision be-tween two helicopters. Another 20 kilometers past moun-tains blue-gray in the desert haze along an unpaved roadbrought us to our destination. About a 150 feet above uson a shelf of rock surrounded by the desolation of thedesert, a small complex of yellow brick buildings wasbuilt around a huge chenar tree. Two magnificent brassdoors adorned with reliefs of ancient Persian warriorsopened onto a cool sanctuary built around the tree andthe gurgling spring that feeds it, as well as a sacred flame.

Zoroastrians believe the tree was planted by NikhBanu, "GoodLady", theyoungestdaughterofthelastSassanidking, Yazdgerd III. According to the stor)5 after the Ar-abs invaded Persia in 636, Yazdgerd, whose kingdom wasalready weakened by an internal rebellion led by a proto-communist named Mazdak, moved his court to Yazd,which was as far away from the Arabs as possible. WhentheArabs finally caughtupwithhim, the royal family fled thecity in small groups. When Nikh Banu collapsed from ex-haustion in the mountains nearby she planted her walk-ing stick beside a spring and fell asleep. From that walk-ing stick Zoroastrians believe, grew the sacred tree.

What allows Iranians to cherish their faith while de-spising the conquest that first brought Islam to their coun-try is, of course, that Iranians are Shiite. Iranians believethat the: and not the Sunnis who represent 90 percent ofthe Islamic world, carry on the authentic Muslim tradi-tion as bequeathed by the Prophet Mohammad. Shia’spoint of departure from the Sunni is disagreement aboutthe succession of the leaders of Islam, the Khalifs, afterthe death of Mohammad. The majority of Muslims sup-ported candidates from Mecca’s leading family, theUmayyids, despite the fact that they had been late to ac-cept the new faith. But Shiis believe that the Prophet hadelected his son-in-law and cousin Ali to be his successorand most of the Shiis of Iran, known as "twelvers", be-lieve that God’s vice-regency on earth passed from Alithrough a succession of infallible men until the twelfthand last one disappeared under mysterious circtnnstancesin the ninth century. Sunnis consider the first four Khalifs"the rightly guided" ones who presided over the goldenage of Islam. Iranians believe Ali, who eventuallybecamethe third Khalif, should have succeeded Mohammad andthat Ali should have been succeeded by his male descen-dents. Shiis view thei other "rightly guided Khalifs" asevil usurpers. Abu L.o’Lo’, the man who murdered thesecond Khalif, ’Umar is buried in a large complex on theedge of Kashan that’s a popular pilgrimage site.

Iran’s most violent clash with the Arabs since theoriginal invasion was its eight-year war with Iraq, inInstitute of Current World Affairs

which about a million people were killed. In Iran it’sknown as "the imposed war" to emphasize that it .wasIraq that started it when it tried to take advantage of tur-moil during the Revolution to seize Iran’s main oil-pro-ducing region. Alluding to the fact that the Sassanid king-dom was already weakened by the proto-Marxist insur-rection, a veteran of the war who is also religioustold me it was the second time the Arabs had tried totake advantage of internal instability to conquer Iran. Saidthe veteran: "I fought to defend Persepolis," the awesomeruins of the city that was the religious center of the Per-sian dynasty of Cyrus and Darius before being sackedby Alexander the Great.

In Behesht-e Zahra, the enormous, sprawling cem-etery in south Tehran, I was shocked to come across amonument to some 400 Iranians who had been killedwhile making the hajj to Mecca. A sign at the monumentexplains that the pilgrims were shot by Saudi securityforces while marching in a peaceful "pro-unity" demon-stration. Such a demonstration hardly seemed objection-able, given that fostering brotherhood is the main pointof the hajj and all hajjis chant "Oh all Muslims, unity,unity!" But photos at the monument show the marcherscarrying signs with Khomeini’s picture which musthave been a most unwelcome incitement in reactionarySaudi Arabia. (Turkish hajjis have also told me that Ira-nians in Mecca and Medina hold themselves arrogantlyaloof from the other pilgrims.) At the edge of the raisedplaza covered in headstones, is Khomeini’s own verdicton the massacre: "Even if we forget about Qods (Jerusa-lem), even if we forgive Saddam and all our other en-emies, we will never forget or forgive the Saudis." De-spite the leader’s damnation, Iran’s governmenthas latelybeen improving relations with both Saudi Arabia andeven Iraq. Several moderate Iranians told me the rap-prochement made them sick.

The government also provides aid to another groupof Sunni Muslims towardwhommany Iranians have hardfeelings: the 1.5 million Afghan refugees settled in Iran,many of them since the Soviet invasion of their countrin 1979. I met Mozafar Daudi, a dazzlingly bright 23-year-old from Kabul in an internet caf6 in Yazd. Over a waterpipe at a tea house near the bazaar, he described his lotas a refugee. He is one of 11 kids. His father is a religiousfanatic. As a refugee, not only can he never become a citi-zen, he can’t get a driver’s license and wasn’t even al-lowed to play basketball on his high-school team. Norare the Afghans allowed to build Sunni mosques. Since1992, the refugees haven’t evenbeen documented. Whenan Afghan leader in exile is murdered by a hitman sentby the Taliban, the Iranian media describe it simply as an"Afghan-on-Afghan killing." In the five weeks I wasthere, I heard many Iranians make derisive remarks abouttheir Muslim brothers from the east. Once, when I’d de-scended a long staircase leading to an underground wa-ter channel, known as a qanat, someone turned out thelights, plunging me and several Italian tourists in dark-ness. "It must have been Afghan boys who did that," an

5

Iranian guide said apologetically. "Local boys are well-behaved."

The Cult of Martyrdom

My progress through Iran was measured in cups oftea drunk and graves visited; Iran often felt like a vastnecropolis where the ghosts of the country’s vaunted mil-lennia of history dominate not only the minds of the liv-ing but their real estate as well. Probably the densest con-centration of tombs in Iran is to be found in south Tehran,the maze of higgledy piggledy streets that during theRevolution was a bastion of support for the AyatollahKhomeini and the mullahs. The Tomb of Sheikh Sadoughis one of many housed in its own enclosed building, sur-rounded by graves of lesser mortals, many of which aresplattered rather gruesomely with red paint, signifyingthe violence of their deaths. People say that the Sheikhwas buried prematurely and woke up in his coffin. Hepromised God that if he could escape, he’d write a de-tailed commentary on an already existing translation ofthe Koran into Persian. Just then, a grave robber dug uphis coffin and liberated him and the Sheikh went on to

The picture above this doorway in the ancient villageofAbyaneh, where residents speak an archaicform ofPersian called Parthian Pahlavi, marks this as thehome ofone of the hundreds of thousands ofmartyrs

in Iran’s war with Iraq.

keep his promise by writing one of Iran’s most famousKoranic commentaries.

In the same cemetery lies the tomb of a championwrestler named Takhti, who was one of the most popu-lar martyrs of the struggle against the Shah. Iranians be-lieve he was murdered by the Shah’s brother, GholarnReza. At 37 the sporting hero had attended a public cer-emony with the royal and received a much bigger ova-tion than he. Takhti himself snubbed the prince. A coupleof weeks later the wrestler was dead. He was declared asuicide but because he was very religious and suicide isone of the worst sins in Islam, Iranians were sure hedbeen killed by the Shah’s secret police. A couple of kilo-meters away lies the biggest cemetery I’ve ever seen, theBehesht-e Zahra or-Zahra’s Paradise miles and milesof graves, thousands of them war martyrs’, marked byglass cases containing flowers and photos of the deceased.

Like the Russians across the Caspian, Iranians seemto pride themselves on being able to suffer more deeplyand nobly than anyone else. For the most important Shiiteholiday, Ashura, Iranians stage a passion play reenactingthe killing of Ali’s son Hossein by the Khalif Yazid, whois depicted as the incarnation of evil. I visited all the holi-est sites in the country the great shrines of Shiraz, Qomand Mashad and all of them are built around the tombsof the imam and his siblings. Besides these grand shrines,Iran is sprinkled with hundreds of "Imamzadeh," shrinesbuilt around the tombs ofmore distant relatives of imams.Highways, especially in Tehran, are lined withbillboardsand buildings covered with dramatic murals depictingthe ordeals and deaths of martyrs great and small. Thegreatest monument to the Revolution is the enor-mous tomb-mosque complex of Ayatollah Khomeini.The Martyrs’ Museum, a collection of photos, shortbiographies and personal effects of men killed in theservice of the Revolution, is the closest the Islamic Re-public has yet come to establishing a museum dedicatedto its own history. The youngest martyr in the museumwas a 14-year-old boy who strapped grenades to his bodyand threw himself under an Iraqi tank. AyatollahKhomeini himself exalted the young suicide as a para-gon.

So deeply embedded in Shiism is the ideal of self-sacrifice that the standard Persian phrase for "you’re wel-come", "ghorbane shomaa’, means "I sacrifice myself foryou." When I remarked to Iranians that I found this ex-

pression strangely melodramatic, they would assure methat it’s emptily perfunctory. Most Iranians, they said,were no more anxious to sacrifice themselves than any-one else especially now, 20 years after the Revolution.During the war with Iraq, all Iranian soldiers heading tothe front wore headbands proclaiming their readiness tobe martyrs (as over half a million were). But a popularfilm from the early 90s, "Leyla Is With Me", told a differ-ent story. The protagonist, a TV reporter, makes a greatshow of wanting to fight but is actually terrified of thewar. To his horror, he is assigned to cover a story at a rear

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This burnt out jeep, in Tehran’s Behesht-e Zahracemetery, commemorates Iran’s apocalyptic eight-yearwar with Iraq. The monument behind it recalls thehundreds ofIranians shot by Saudi securityforces

while performing the Hajj in Mecca.

base. Through a series of accidents he then finds himselfbeing dragged closer and closer to the front. At last hewinds up actually at the front and his tough-looking pro-ducer admits that he’s terrified himself and can only mar-vel at his colleague’s courage. All at once the anti-herofinds himself in a trench facing an Iraqi tank with noth-ing but a rocket-propelled grenade with which to defendhimself. Petrified, he fires blindly and destroys the tank.Back in Tehran he’s given a hero’s welcome and only we,the audience, know what a coward he really was. Thefilm was a great success; many Iranians, it seemed, couldrelate to it.

Popular Islam vs. Mullah Islam

In public men’s rooms in Iran there are never anyurinals. One day I asked my guide, who’d spent 5 yearsliving in the US, abodt this. "Of course," he said. "Ourreligion forbids us to Urinate standing up." According tohim, Iranian Muslim men believe their religion enjoinsthem to urinate while squatting and even stipulates that

they should rub their urethra three times in threedifferent places to ensure all the urine is out. "WeIranians never have urinary disorders," he saidproudly. (I doubt Mohammad can be blamed foranother peculiarity of Iranian toilets: they don’thave toilet paper. Instead they have a small articu-lated hose. Exactly how the whole process worksis something your correspondent never managedto figure out.)

It’s on this very personal level that most Mus-lims have experienced their faith throughout thecenturies. Historically; the strict, austere and legal-istic vision of Islam espoused by most of themullahs has never appealed to more than a smallminority of believers; their exercise of supreme po-litical authority is unprecedented. Many Iranian(and Turkish) Muslims have been more influencedby the various mystical practices collectively knownas Sufism, which are anathema to the orthodox re-ligious scholars. A complex and varied tradition,experts on Islamic history often say that it resistssuccinct description. But my guide offered an ex-

planation that struckme as very apposite: "Mullahsbelieve man belongs to God, Sufis that we are part ofGod."

In the green oasis of Mahan, on the desert high-way between Kerman and Bam, I stopped at theelaborate tomb complex of one of Iran’s most fa-mous Sufis, Shah Nematollah Vali. The colonnadedgarden was more crowded than any big citymosque I’d visited. As I approached the mosquewhere Nematollah Vali is buried, a young manstanding near the door handed me a cookie. It wasthe Sufi’s birthday, he explained, and also, bychance, the anniversary of his "wedding night"

with God, better known as death. Like other Sufis, hewould often subject himself to 40 days and nights ofmedi-tation, called Chelleh Neh-Shirn, during which he wouldeat just one date per day.

A guide at the tomb told me a teaching story thatemphasizes the Sufi belief that God is unknowable.- sodifferent from the conviction of many mullahs that theyare privy to all Allah’s intentions:

Shams of Tabriz, the spiritual mentor of the great Sufimystic Jelaluddin Rumi, could walk on water. Rumi askshim to teach him the trick. Shams tells Rumi he can too

he just has to follow him repeating "Oh Shams." Rumidoes so and it works. Then Rumi hears that Shams hasstarted repeating "Oh Ali." Rumi switches to saying "OhAli’, whereupon he immediately sinks. Shams turnsaround and smiles. "You don’t evenknowme completelyand you think you can know Aii?"

The following story, which I was told by a bazaari

"Shah" means "master" and in this context refers to Nematollah Vali as a master of mysticism.Institute of Current World Affairs

in Esfashan, illustrates the teasing, folksy side of Iranians’attitude toward authority:

Shah Abbas, the greatest Safavid ruler and thebuilder of much of Esfahan, would dress up as adervish and walk around his capital, observinghow his subjects felt and behaved. One night heheard music from a big, handsome house. Heknocked on the door and said, "You’re rich, I’m a

poor dervish, please help me." The people invitedhim in and Shah Abbas discovered that his hostwas a successful shopkeeper.

Shah Abbas asked him whether he’d ever consid-ered trying to save some mone rather than en-tertaining so lavishly.

"Why should I?" asked the shopkeeper.

Shah Abbas: "Because tomorrow your shop maybe closed by order of the Shah."

"Nah," said the shopkeeper, "the Shah’s a goodman, he’d never shut my shop for no reason."

"But what if?" pressed the disguised Shah.

"God is great- he’d show me another way to pro-vide for my family."

The next day ShahAbbas ordered the shop closed.That night he returned to the shopkeeper’s houseand, much to his surprise, found another partygoing on. Again the shopkeeper invited him in andshowed him perfect hospitality. He explained thathis shop was indeed shut by order of the Shah butthey’d managed to put aside a bit which they werenow spending on this party.

"What if the Shah takes everything you have left?"asks Shah Abbas.

"Ah, he would never do that," answered the shop-keeper.

"But what if?" repeated the Shah.

The shopkeeper said again that God is great andwould provide a way for him to carry on.

The next day Shah Abbas ordered the shop-keeper’s remaining property confiscated and thatnight returned againdisguised as a dervish. Onceagain he was invited in and asked the shopkeeperwhat he was going to do. He told ShahAbbas thathe’d go to the Shah and ask for a good job. The nextday he went to the court and was hired as theShah’s executioner. ThatnighttheShahagaindroppedby the man’s house and to his amazement foundyet another party in progress. He said to the man,

"I knowyou have a new job, but you haven’tbeenpaid yet, so how can you afford all this?"

The manexplained that he’d sold the official swordhe’d been given just that day.

"But what if the Shah orders you to execute some-one tomorrow?"

The man shrugs. The next day at court ShahAbbasordered him to execute someone. The former shop-keeper approached the Shah and said, "I know thatguy and can promise you he’s not so bad. Pleasespare him."

Shah Abbas ordered him to proceed with the ex-ecution.

The shopkeeper raised his hands to heaven. "DearGod, if this man is really guil, let his life be takenby my blade. But if he is innocent, please sparemy shah the sin of unjustly condemning him andturn my sword into wood." Whereupon the shop-keeper theatrically pulled out a wooden sword.Shah Abbas burst out laughing and returned allthe shopkeeper’s belongings.

Anticlericalism

To visit Iran today is to know what Barcelona musthave been like when it was the hotbed of Republicanismon the eve of Spain’s Civil War. Iranians told me theyhave felt safe criticizing the theocracy since the reform-ists’ overwhelming victory in last February’s parliamen-tary elections. Everywhere I went in Iran from thegreen mountains above the Caspian to the sun-bakedmud fortress of Bam on the road to Pakistan peoplewent out of their way tell me how much they despisedthe mullahs. A senior western diplomat told me "The re-gime is isolating itself". Tehranis confirmed this, sayingthat while in the old days you might at least see the Shahon the ski slopes, for instance, nowadays the seniormullahs inhabit a world completely separate from thatof the normal people.

The mullahs’ aloofness offends many Iranians’ keensense of social justice. While touring Bam, I ran across agroup of mullahs. From the solicitous attitude of theirguide, I guessed they were VIPs. When I’d left the for-tress and was about to climb into my humble Peykan,Iran’s homely national car, my driver pointed disgust-edly to the portal from which the mullahs were emerg-ing and walking toward a gleaming white Land Roverpulled up to the curb.

"When Imam Ali was Khalif," he said, "and his rela-tives would come to visit, he would refuse to use fuel tolight extra lamps, so concerned was he about abusing hisposition. WhenImam Hossein was struggling against theUmayyid usurpers, he could have had the number two

position in the empire if he had simplyacknowledged Yazid [his rival andkiller] as Khalif. But instead he chose aheavenly kingdom. Compared to theimams," he said disgustedly; "just lookat these mullahs in their fancy car!"

The lyrically elegant city of Esfahan,which I thought of as the Florence of theEast, is home to some of the most beau-tiful religious buildings in the Islamicworld. But the locals’ attitude towardthe mullahs who live and pray in themcould hardly have been more irreverent.One afternoon I was sharing a taxi witha young woman who was a graduatestudent in history and mentioned that Iwas heading to the city’s central plaza,now called Imam Square. "Call it’Shah’s Square,’ she commanded as shegot out.

When I was leaving the beautifuleighteenth-century Chahar BaghMadraseh, an Iranian tourist I’d been chatting with saidthe gatekeeper of the madraseh must be a mullah him-self. I asked how he could tell. "Because," he said, "hewouldn’t get off his hairy ass to talk to me." Locals latertold me that the Madraseh, or seminary; is known collo-quially as "the queer club." The popular suspicion thatthe insulated, all-male compounds supposedly devotedto religious study are actually the scene of illicit homo-sexual activity is not new. In the 14th Century; the re-nowned Esfahani poet Hafez who himselfhad attainedthe distinction of memorizing the entire Koran pennedthese lines:

Those preachers who in prayer-arch and pulpitimposingly parade,

When they to their chamber go- another kind ofact perform.

A problem, sir! Please ask the assembly’s learnedman:

Why do those who command us to repent soseldom themselves repentance make?

You might say they put no faith in the Day ofJudgment

Since when they act for the "Judge," they employall this deceit and fraud.

In Tehran, the longest road in the city, running some30 kilometers from the foothills of the Alborz in the af-fluent north to the city limits in the south is now namedVali Asr. The name has an interesting provenance. Before1979 it was called "Pal41avi Boulevard" after the reigningdynasty. After the! Revolution it was renamed

The reliefs ofPersepolis, the religious capital of the Achaemenian dynasty, showthe refined Persians who succumbed to the Greeks under Alexander the Great.

"Mossadegh", in honor of the popular prime ministerwho nationalized the oil industry and was deposed in acoup organized by the CIA. When mullahs took controlof the Revolution from the liberals of the National Front,they renamed the street "Kashani’, after a conservativemullah. But even in those days of revolutionary fervor,there were enough opponents of the theocrats that theKashani street signs were being continuously vandalized.Finally the government gave the street the name of the12 Imam, revered as the "Mahdi" or Messiah, whomIranian Shiis believe to be in "occultation" and destinedto return to the world to herald Judgment Day.

Tehran’s most popular football team is officiallycalled "Paroozi Victorious" in honor of the Revo-lution. But its thousands of adoring fans still call it by it’spre-Revolutionary and pre-Islamic name of"Persepolis."

One day I was touring the Green Palace, a horriblygaudy building that was home to Reza Shah, the lateShah’s father, who had founded the dynasty after com-manding a brigade of Cossacks. As I was looking at acase containing some of Reza Shah’s personal effects, anIranian visitor pointed at a pair of reading glasses. "Revo-lutionaries say Reza Shah couldn’t read a single line," hesaid to a female guide.

"We should beat the people who say that," she saidwith surprising savagery.

"Yes," agreed the visitor, "let’s see what future gen-

The Mantle of the Prophet, Roy Mottahedeh, pg. 180.There are other sects of Shiis who believe in different successions of imams, ending with either the fifth ("Fivers") or the

seventh ("Seveners’), who include the Ismailis.

erations write about them."

Wither the Revolution?

In any sort of democracy, ofcourse, such widespread contempt forthe ruling class would mean its dayswere numbered. But Iran, despite itsfreely elected parliament, is no de-mocracy. Command of the army, thepolice and Revolutionary Guardsand control of the courts in otherwords, the monopoly of violencethat Weber said defines the statebelongs to the unelected SupremeLeader of the Revolution, AyatollahAli Khameini.

Peaceful pro-democracy demon-strations are brokenup violently. In thepast year conservative mullahs haveshut down dozens of pro-reform news-papers, licensed by the Ministry ofCulture, which is under PresidentKhatami’s authority. The mullahsushered in the new millennium byconvicting six intellectuals of actingagainst the principles of the Revo-lution. Their offense had been to at-tend a conference in Berlin last win-ter, organized by the Green Party ofGerman Foreign Minister JoschkaFischer. A video of the conferencethat was aired on Iranian TVshowed a woman not just dancing,not just unveiled, but with her armsbared (!). For being associated withsuch smut, the intellectuals’ sentencesranged up to 10 years in prison and fiveyears’ exile for reformist journalistAkbar Ganji.

These donation boxes(above), ubiquitous and almost entirely unused, representthe officialface ofIran’s theocracy; at this platform (below) on stilts in a lagoon

off the Caspian Sea, I was offered a drink of illegal vodka.

A reformist mullah who attendedthe conference, Hasan Yousefi Eskevari, 51, had alreadybeen convicted of apostasy for daring to suggest that re-

ligious scholars should not wield supreme worldly au-

thority. He is not alone: during the Revolution manyprominent mullahs argued that secular power would cor-rupt their religious vocation. Today in the seminaries thatargument is being fortified by the growing recognitionthat theocratic rule is turning Iranians against themullahs.

But with all the physical power in the hands ofpower-loving mullahs, the question is: Who’s going to chal-lenge them and how? President Khatami, the greathope of reformers when he was elected with a 70percent majority in 1997, and now backed by an

equally reformist parliament, appears impotent. Astudent group at a prestigious medical school in

10

Shiraz recently drafted this protest to Khatami:

You enjoy the support of 20 million voters as wellas the harmony of the state-leadership. How couldyou say that you lack the authority?

If there are truly some persons who create ob-stacles against you behind the scenes, why are younot exposing them to the people?

Howwas it possible to imprison the students whowere injured during the attack on TehranUniversity’s dormitory, whereas their attackerswere charged with theft only?

In accordance with the law, the Majlis deputiesare free to express their views. How come they

WM-18

are being prosecuted for exercising this right?

How come the independent popular press, whichare the only link between the nation and the gov-ernment, are banned?

You are calling on the world to begin a dialogue;how come we are not even able to resolve ourproblems through talks and constructive criticismin an atmosphere of understanding and tran-quillity?

If the reformists’ cries were purely cerebral, themullahs might prevail against them indefinitely. But Ira-nians’ demands for change are fueled by religious fervorand the conviction that mullahs are not just corruptworldly despots, like the dynasties before the Revolu-tion; Iranians have traditionally accepted authoritarianrule in the view that they can’t expect any better of thisworld until the cleansing reappearance of the Mahdi. Butthe mullahs’ offense is incomparably worse than theShahs’: They are betraying the sacred tradition of Irani-ans’ beloved imams. And that, most Iranians seem toagree, is the ultimate apostasy. GI

This new Land Cruiser waits to pick up a group ofVIP mullahs who are touring the mud-walledfortresstown of Barn. Many Iranians are deeply offendedby the mullahs" aloofness and self-indulgence.

SDDC web pageInstitute of Current World Affairs

INSTITUTE OF CURRENT WORLD AFFAIRS

FELLOWS AND THEIR ACTIVITITES

Shelly Renae Browning (March 2001- 2003) AUSTRALIAA surgeon specializing in ars and hearing, Dr. Browning is studying theapproaches of traditional healers among the Aborigines of Australia. Shewon her B.S. in Chemistry at the University of the South, studied physician/patient relationships in :China and Australia on a Thomas J. WatsonFellowship and won hei: M.D. at Emory University in Atlanta. Before herICWA fellowship, she was a Fellow in Skull-Base Surgery in Montreal atMcGill University’s Department of Otolaryngology.

Wendy Call (May 2000 2002) MEXICOA "Healthy Societies" Fellow, Wendy is spending two years in Mexico’sIsthmus of Tehuantepec, immersed in contradictory trends: an attempt toindustrialize and "develop" land along a proposed Caribbean-to-Pacificcontainerized railway, and the desire of indigenous peoples to preservetheir way of life and some of Mexico’s last remaining old-growth forests.With a B.A. in Biology from Oberlin, Wendy has worked as a communicationscoordinator for Grassroots International and national campaign director forInfact, a corporate accountability organization.

Martha Farmelo (April 2001- 2003) ARGENTINAAGeorgetown graduate (major: psychology; minor, Spanish) with a Master’sin Public Affairs from the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton, Martha isthe Institute’s Suzanne Ecke McColl Fellow studying gender issues inArgentina. Married to an Argentine doctoral candidate and mother of a smallson, she will be focusing on both genders, which is immensely important ina land of Italo/Latino machismo. Martha has been involved with Latin Americaall her professional life, having worked with Catholic Relief Services andthe Inter-American Development Bank in Costa Rica, with Human RightsWatch in Ecuador and the Inter-American Foundation in El Salvador,Uruguay and at the UN World Conference on Women in Beijing.

Gregory Feifer (January 2000 2002) RUSSIAWith fluent Russian and a Master’s from Harvard, Gregory worked in Moscowas political editor for Agence France-Presse and the weekly Russia Journalin 1998-9. Greg sees Russia’s latest failures at economic and political reformas a continuation of failed attempts at Westernization that began with Peterthe Great failures that a long succession of behind-the-scenes eliteshave used to run Russia behind a mythic facade of "strong rulers" forcenturies. He plans to assess the continuation of these cultural underpinningsof Russian governance in the wake of the Gorbachev/Yeltsin succession.

Curt Gabrielson (December 2000 2002) EAST TIMORWith a Missouri farm background and an MIT degree in physics, Curt isspending two years in East Timor, watching the new nation create aneducation system of its own out of the ashes of the Indonesian system.Since finishing MIT in 1993, Curt has focused on delivering inexpensiveand culturally relevant hands-on science education to minority and low-income students. Based at the Teacher Institute of the Exploratorium inSan Francisco, he has worked with youth and teachers in Beijing, Tibet,and the Mexican agricultural town of Watsonville, California,

Peter Keller (March 2000 2002) CHILEPublic affairs officer at Redwood National Park and a park planner tYosemite National Park before his fellowship, Peter holds a B.S. inRecreation Resource Management from the University of Montana and aMasters in Environmental Law from.the Vermont Law School. As a JohnMiller Musser Memorial Forest & Society Fellow, he is spending two yearsin Chile and Argentina comparing the operations of parks and forest reservescontrolled by the Chilean and Argentine governments to those controlledby private persons and non-governmental organizations.

Leena Khan (April 2001-2003) PAKISTANA lawyer dealing with immigration and international-business law with afirm in the Washington, DC area, i_eena will study the status of womenunder the "islamization" of Pakistani law that began in the 1980s andcontinues to this day. Born in Pakistan and immersed in Persian and Urduliterature by her grandfather, she is a Muslim herself and holds a B.A. fromNorth Carolina State University and a J.D. from the University of San Diego.

Whitney Mason (January 1998-2000) TURKEYA freelance print and television journalist, Whit began his career byfounding a newspaper called The Siberian Review in Novosibirsk in1991, then worked as an editor of the Vladivostok News and wrote forAsiaweekmagazine in Hong Kong. In 1995 he switched to radio- andvideo-journalism, working in Bosnia and Korea for CBS. As an ICWAFellow, he is studying and writing about Turkey’s role as nexus betweenEast and West, and between traditional and secular Islam.

Jean Benoit Nadeau (December 1998-2000) FRANCEA French-Canadian journalist and playwright, Jean Benoit studieddrama at the National Theater School in Montreal, then received aB.A. from McGill University in Political Science and History. The holderof several Canadian magazine and investigative-journalism awards,he is spending his ICWA-fellowship years in France studying "theresistance of the French to the trend of economic and culturalglobalization ."

Author: Mason, WhitneyTitle: ICWA Letters-Europe/RussiaISSN: 1083-4273

Imprint: Institute of Current WorldAffairs, Hanover, NH

Material Type: SerialLanguage: EnglishFrequency: Monthly

Other Regions: Sub-Saharan Africa;East Asia; South Asia,Mideast/North Africa;The Americas

Institute Fellows are chosen on the basis of character, previ-ous experience and promise. They are young professionalsfunded to spend a minimum of two years carrying out self-designed programs of study and writing outside the UnitedStates. The Fellows are required to report their findings andexperiences from the field once a month. They can write onany subject, as formally or informally as they wish. The re-sult is a unique form of reporting, analysis and periodic as-sessment of international events and issues.