Introduction
Imam Khamenei, on the occasion of the 15th edition of the Imam Reza International Cultural and Artistic Festival in 2018 suggested to the organising team to include the culture of reading and studying in the national and international program..
Imam Ali and Imam Reza: the culture of reading and studying
Imam Khamenei’s suggestion was rooted in the culture of reading and studying created by Imam Ali (d.661) and continued by Imam Reza (d.818 CE). These two immaculate intellectuals wrote voluminously though separated by 157 years in death.
Imam Ali’s Nahj al-Balaghah and Imam Reza’s Argumentations are of imperishable value. Imam Reza Waqf (Astan Quds Razavi) holds documents containing 69000 pages, which are inscribed on UNESCO’s Memory of the World Register.
The origin of the culture of reading
The culture of reading has its deep origin in the very first opening command of The Holy Qur’an, which says Read or Iq’ra. In addition to the literal meaning of reading books it has a figurative meaning of reading and studying all possible phenomena on Earth and beyond – from macro- to micro-reality.
How Imam Khamenei animated reading!
The organisational scope of the Festival program
There were 100000 people deployed at 2400 centres in 77 countries to manage 140000 events with new creative aesthetic substance.
Promotion of Razavi Culture
The program included eight scientific, educational, and cultural MOUs with the International Asra Foundation, Shahid Muttahari University and Senior School, Astan Quds Razavi Research Foundation, and others to promote the unique Razavi Culture, based on the speeches, teachings, conduct, and life of Imam Reza. It was national and international in character with heart-to-heart intergenerational communication, including cyberspace. It involved many fields that included economics, education, culture, religion, sports, medicine, and social. It combined political, cultural, and social duties with commitment to revolutionary Islamic values. The program contained 40 items that included poetry, calligraphy, visual arts and more.
Publication, research, and seminars
It decided to publish an 8-volume collection on the lifestyle of Imam Reza, translated into 14 languages. It enhanced the work of the Research Council and supported eight doctoral dissertations on Imam Reza. It held cultural and artistic seminars in eight countries. It promoted the culture of book and reading related to the Razavi Culture. It partnered with public libraries in Iran.
This hyper-activity was inspired by Imam Khamenei’s suggestion, which animated reading and studying.
Knowledge acquisition and dissemination
The Quranic command to acquire knowledge makes it a necessity above the necessity of food. It explains why Imam Reza was frugal in his eating habit, with dhall-and-rice being his favourite meal and eating mutton, at least, once every forty days as preventative medicine (his self-prescription).
Famous Argumentations
Imam Reza’s Argumentations impacted on the non-Islamic scholars who engaged with him in such a discipline. The quest for knowledge of philosophy, science, and culture became ascendant. Argumentations became popular, at the core of which was truth conveyed with logical and graceful reasoning. He displayed mastery of the practical application of the laws of dialectics that rendered his rationality persuasive. His reputation as a scholar grew, in spite of hardships and hostilities.
Imam Khamenei and Razavi Culture
Imam Khamenei as a natural-born son of Mashhad City was, inescapably, a beneficiary of the Razavi Culture since the age of four years when he made the courageous and precocious commitment to memorise the Quran. That Culture grew into the development of his character.
Imam Reza and the translation movement
Imam Reza’s Argumentations reinforced the Islamic translation movement in the context that Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Indian, Islamic and other proximate civilizations were in competition for ideas. Muslim traders used part of income from global trading to purchase books and donate them.
There were mutually beneficial translations from and to various languages like Greek, Arabic, Farsi, Syriac, Hindi, Urdu, and Latin. Greek literature translated into Arabic found itself into English translation in Europe. The new foreign languages enabled Islam to spread its own civilization that functioned as a cohesive force. Ideas enjoyed greater freedom and democratisation. Islam’s culture of reading and studying increased in persuasiveness. There was an increase in cross-fertilising knowledge in various fields such as medicine, chemistry, engineering, architecture, logic, world cultures, and astronomy.
(Echo of Islam: Special Issue for Imam Reza: No. 260, July 2017)
After the Festival, books rolled on
Two months after the martyrdom of Imam Khamenei the Organization of Library, Museum and Documents Centre of Astan Quds Razavi continued their book donation activity. It was part of its mobile and telephone library service during the Ten-Day Karamat (Generosity) celebrations. It marks the birth anniversary of Imam Reza and that of his holy sister, Hazrat Masoumeh.
Book donation activity
Books of various kinds identified by scientific, cultural, and educational centres and their readers were donated as follows: 5000 to the Public Libraries Institution of Faridan in Isfahan Province; 2050 to Khatam al-Anbiya Mosque Library in Qamsar of Kashan; 2000 to Fadak Sabz Tous Quranic Institute; 2000 to the Razavi Pharmaceutical Services Institute: and 1000 to Samangan Province in Afghanistan.
Remembering 168 girl martyrs
In addition to the donation of 12050 books a project was launched to donate books to 168 schools in memory of the 168 girl martyrs of the Shahjareh Tayyabbeh School in Minab City. (Tasnim News Agency: 1 May 2026)
Commuting Iq’ra to posterity
Imam Khamenei’s simple suggestion to include the culture of reading and studying in the Festival program proved insightful in carrying forward Iq’ra to posterity.
The Imam’s belief was his very breath. His activities based on belief were the map-in-progress of his life – both intrinsic and extrinsic. His belief entailed life beyond sensory vision, hearing, smell, taste, and touch. It was heartfelt perception with deliberate reflection.
Living Razavi Culture
His belief as an inner emotion thirsted for outer expression with the people. He was as true and authentic as possible to the Razavi Culture that produced his pristine personality as a worthy son of the holy city of Mashhad.
He lived the full repertoire of Razavi Culture as institutionalised Islam to suit local geography, climate, history, and people. He enjoyed what he did – in war and peace – with devotion to duty. He was always learning and always teaching. Truthfulness, courteousness, and steadfastness characterised his personality.
The translation movement of mercy and wisdom that enriched Razavi Culture influenced Imam Khamenei to be a translator and spread the indestructible virus of reading and studying.
Imam Khamenei’s translations and books
The Imam translated four books from Arabic to Farsi. They included Sayyid Qutb’s The Future in Islamic Lands and An Indictment against Western Civilization. Qutb – though not an economist – developed one of the most advanced models of Islamic economics in his seminal book Social Justice in Islam.
It functioned as a strategy for the Muslim Brotherhood to overthrow colonialism, capitalism, and imperialism – only for the Muslim Brotherhood to abandon it after President Gemal Abdel Nasser hanged him for his revolutionary activities.
Translation is a highly specialised and intense expertise. It indicated the Imam’s ability to think in two languages simultaneously.
The Imam authored 17 books, which included an additional 9 volumes of Collections of Speeches and Messages.
Spreading viral ideology
Between 1972-1975 he held classes on the Quran, Islamic ideology, and Nahj al-Balaghah in three different mosques in Mashhad. He attracted thousands of revolutionary youth. His hand-written and typed lectures were mass-circulated in nearby and distant cities, in spite of dangerous fascist conditions. The Shah feared his ideas. In 1975 the secret police SAVAK broke into his home, confiscated all his books and notes, and arrested him for the sixth time. He was held in solitary confinement and tortured for many months at Tehran’s notorious Police-SAVAK Joint-Prison. Of his experience he said, ‘These conditions may be understood only by those who suffered them.’
Imam Khamenei’s love of books
implementing a true republican state
- No compromise on sovereignty – No modern colonialism –
The purpose of the series of articles on Imam Khamenei is to explain the development of his character as being immersed in the development of the history of Iran. The aim is simple truth from complex facts. It is the intersection of literary biography and scientific history.
By Haroon Aziz, South Africa
