In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful
Their Most Eminences the learned scholars and the students of the blessed seminaries in Qum, Mashhad, Tehran, and other theological centers- may their graces last:
In this place of exile and away from home, I am more or less aware of and suffer from the lamentable situation in Iran and in particular that of the theological centers. I know what dreadful dreams the oppressor regime has seen for Islam, the Muslims, holy precepts of the Qur'an, and servants of the sacred religion. You, the `ulama' and the clergymen are `criminals' in their eyes. Your crime is that you serve the religion and the Qur'an, and oppose the domination of the aliens on the Islamic lands. Your crime is that you oppose the machinery of the tyrannical and despotic regime which plunders and loots. Your crime is your knowledge and your action in not submitting blindly before the aliens and their ignominious lackeys. This is also true of the intellectuals, the educated and the young generation, since they, too, are experiencing privations, sufferings and hardships.
The plan of imperialism is to wipe out Islam and the sacred precepts of the Holy Qur'an. The tyrannical regime is the enforcer of their nefarious objectives. The plan is to keep the country underdeveloped under the guise of reforms and to crush the universities and the seminaries under the guise of knowledge-lovers and Literacy Corps, and to trample on the sacred heavenly precepts in the name of Islam and to wipe out one after another the undisputable precepts of the Qur'an in the name of the sacred Islam. You need to render your military service, serve time in prison, and undergo persecutions, torments, insults, and exiles in order to pave the way for the agents and elements of Israel. The residents of the palaces should indulge in debauchery and frivolity in order to serve their masters to their satisfaction. They are required to remove the trouble-making section of the people, that is, the renowned scholars, the learned personalities and awakened youth, from their path and the preachers should swallow their words unless the regime's criminal deeds and acts of treachery are interpreted by them as acts of progress and advancement. There is a plot for the eradication and manipulation of the Constitution which stipulates the guarantee of the religion of Islam and its precepts.
The law that guarantees individual and social freedom must be abandoned and be replaced by bayonet, suffocation, and imprisonment. These are the castles that the puppet regime has built in the air or in their narrow minds- oblivious to the fact that they cannot gamble with a great nation and its emotions and feelings; oblivious to the fact that they cannot toy around with the power of God, the Exalted. I hereby assure you respectful clergymen and the nation of Iran that the regime will face defeat. Their predecessors were slapped on the face by Islam; they will experience it, too.
O respected young and old learned scholars and students! Be patient and resist; don't yield to oppression. These (people) are on the verge of annihilation and you live on. Bayonet cannot endure vis-a-vis the sentiments of a nation. Those blunt and fictitious swords will be sheathed. We have seen days of utmost darkness and most horrendous and mournful days under the reign of their predecessors. We have seen years of confrontation with the governments of suffocation and terror, with the governments of plunder and cruelty and lack of multi-faceted freedom; yet we resisted until they were gone. Now you, too, should resist until these people are also gone and face punishment for their misdeeds.
Do not surrender. Do not yield to their sham trials. Their plan is to make headway step by step. The more you retreat, the more they make advancement. They have girdled their loins to annihilate you. Don't ever presume that they will give up if you surrender or behave with politeness and submission. On the contrary, it is with your face of resistance and opposition and by expression of your beliefs and raising the slogans against their tyranny that they will retreat.
Let the free people and nations of the world be acquainted with the acts of oppression let loose by the government machinery and inform them about the state of oppression which the Muslim people of Iran are suffering from. Expose their crimes in all possible ways before the people of the world. Almighty God is on your side. Shake hands of unity and brotherhood with one another and stop trivial differences in order to survive and for God's precepts to last long.
The eminent grand maraji` and the distinguished `ulama', may their blessings last, should not consent to the annihilation of the religious schools under despised abjectness. Death with honor is better than life in abjectness and bondage. I pray to God, the Exalted, for the grandeur of Islam and the Muslims." Faint not nor grieve, for ye will overcome (them) if ye are (indeed) believers." «2» May God's peace, mercy and blessings be upon you. «3»
Rouhullah al-Mousawi al-Khomeini