I seek refuge in God from the accursed Satan
In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful
The nation's unity of purpose, source of vigor and victory
Before saying a few words to the gentlemen, I must thank all the young people, the brothers and sisters who are outside the country and whom during this period I have put to much trouble, and also ask their forgiveness. I pray to Almighty God for your health, greatness and happiness. I hope that a suitable environment will be brought into being in Iran so that you can all return and serve your own people and your own country.
You all saw how, as a result of the Iranian nation's unity of purpose, the pillars of the palace of a power that liked to see itself as a superpower and was supported by all the superpowers- even unfortunately almost all the Islamic governments gave it their backing too- crumbled one after the other. You all saw what became of that Rastakhiz Party that they once praised to the skies. Both the Shah and his wicked agents once sang its praises loudly, blowing it all out of proportion, indeed the Shah himself went so far as to say that anyone who did not become a member was to leave the country; he was this uncompromising about it. But the nation of Iran stood up to this party-maker and to tanks, cannons and machine guns, and made this dictator think again about his party and decree it to be null and void.
Such treason he committed when he changed the Islamic calendar, «1» the calendar that recalled the most noble of histories, the most creative of histories: the history of Islam which awakened man and awakened the oppressed, which humbled the tyrants of those days and created human beings in the true sense of the word, developing all dimensions of man, that which pertains to the spiritual as well as that pertaining to his material life. And this man wanted to deprive Iran of this honor. He wanted to trample the roots of Islam underfoot and replace the Islamic calendar with the pagan imperial calendar. But you saw how all the sections of Iranian society rose up against it, and, through the efforts of the people of Iran, he was once again forced to back down. You saw that through your unity of purpose, this man, who eulogized himself so much and whom others eulogized, was forced to come before the nation to repent and ask the people's forgiveness. Granted he was trying to trick the people, but all the same he was forced to ask forgiveness.
People of Iran, you saw how your unity of purpose forced all the superpowers to retreat. In the beginning they supported him, each one having something to say, such as," We will interfere militarily";" Iran will be divided", and other such myths which they are always putting about. Yet you saw that even though all the superpowers were behind him and were supporting him he was forced to leave Iran and is now outside the country. It is unfortunate that he was able to escape the grasp of the Muslims and our youth. Nevertheless, in the near future he will be called on to return to Iran, God willing [The audience says "God willing"], and the treasure and money that he took from our nation, and which was transported out of Iran in his final days, will, please God, be taken from him ["God willing" from the audience], and he will receive the punishment he deserves for the deeds he has done and the oppression he has carried out, God willing.
Massacre, plundering, prison
However, as I have said before, we do not have the ability, that is, it is beyond man's ability to punish him properly for the crimes he has perpetrated. It is only within man's power to punish him for killing one person by taking his life. We cannot punish someone who, as you are witness, has killed on the scale he has.
He has committed mass murder on a grand scale and has thrown people into prison for long stretches of time. He took our youth into his prisons and gave old men back to us. Some of those whom I had met before they went into prison and with whom I had shaken hands, I found to be as strong as Hercules; today, however, after having spent fifteen years in his prisons, when I shake their hands it is the hands of ordinary men that grasp mine. Such suffering was brought upon our youth, our intelligentsia, our `ulama', our university people and merchants, such torment they were made to endure.
We cannot punish him sufficiently for all of this. He only has one life. If you attacked him together you could only take his one life. He has taken the lives of hundreds of the best sons and daughters of Islam, and now if you take the one life of a person who is connected more to foreigners than he is our nation, this cannot be adequate retribution. Suppose that he fell into your hands and you cut off his arms and feet and plucked out his eyes too, just suppose you did this, this would not compensate for what he has done either. That is why there is another world, so that adequate punishment can be meted out for such things. In the next life, it is possible that for every person he has murdered, he will be put to death only to be resurrected and then killed once more for the death of another of his victims. In return for the suffering he has put our youth through, he may have to spend an eternity in torment.
Gentlemen, someone cannot just come along and rule over these people for thirty-odd years in such an unjust and cruel manner, having his agents in every region of the land treat our women, children, our young and old people, our clergy and laymen in the way they did without being punished for it. God, the Blessed and Exalted, will not allow anyone to do such deeds and get away with being punished simply by having his money taken off him and being killed. There are those among our youth who were thrown into jail in their prime and lost fifteen years of their life as a result. If they were of the class of `ulama', they could have spent those years writing books and guiding people; if they were from the intelligentsia, they could have spent that time writing books and enlightening people; if they were from the medical profession they could have saved many people from death. All of these people whom they threw into prison consequently lost a big chunk of their lives, they could do nothing while in prison, they were stopped from doing anything. What is the nemesis for this? Will this be made right by killing Muhammad Rida? Will this compensate? He is nearly at the end of his life now, he has lived his high life and done his oppressing, so can we say that it is retribution enough for us to take his money away from him, from this person who has committed all these crimes? That is, of course, if we can lay our hands on his money.
We cannot possibly find all his wealth, for he is keeping it in a safe country, in one of these places which is safe for him and its own people but which we deem to be a traitor. Neither do we know in the treasury of which country the jewels that his father took with him when he left are presently being kept. At that time they were taken to England, we don't know where they are today. Be that as it may, even if you suppose that you can get back the jewels of this nation that it is said he filled his suitcases with and transported out of the country, along with the vast amounts of money which he transferred to banks abroad- the particulars of some of which have been divulged- will this compensate for these losses, for the nation's power which has been squandered the way it has? «2»
He made our universities such that they dissipated our human resources; would that were all they did, but they turned our human resources into inhuman resources. The purpose of these cinemas that were active during his reign and the centers of corruption that they brought into being was to draw our youth there and make them oblivious to vital issues that should have concerned them. These centers kept idle this human resource that should have been used in the service of our country, turning it into an inhuman resource. How can we punish him for these crimes? These are crimes for which man cannot mete out punishment. Recompense for these must come in the Hereafter. And you can be sure that recompense will be given [The audience says" God willing"]. It is written in the Qur'an that in the Hereafter, man will see the results of his deeds, however small:" Then anyone who has done an atom's weight of good, shall see it; and anyone who has done an atom's weight of evil, shall see it." «3» This is what the verse says and this is what will happen. In that world, these actions will be reflected in a suitable form and man will see them there. He will be punished for these deeds of his there. Do not be disheartened if you do not catch him, for even if you did, you could not punish him adequately. There will be requital for his crimes in the next life.
Monarchy contrary to the laws of reason
Everything that has happened hitherto and we are still only halfway, or even less, to our goals, has come about because of the nation's unity of purpose. Unity of purpose, the coming together of a nation for a purpose caused these pillars, which in their words reached the empyrean, to fall one by one; like melting ice, they loosened and disintegrated. Yet still we have a long way to go, this is just the beginning. Our aim is not simply his leaving; this is just one of our aims. The monarchical regime is one that we deem to be illegal. It was illegal from its inception, and went against the rational laws of humanity. Even if we suppose it was a proper national parliament- which we have never had in Iran- which conferred power to rule on one man and his descendants, one that was wholly representative of the people, we still have the right to say to this national parliament and the people of that era:" Very well, in your own time you had the right to determine your own destiny; but grandfather, what gave you the right to determine the destiny of us who were born two hundred years later? With what right and according to which law did you do this?" This is something any rational person would agree with- indeed, it is so sensible that even the Khan himself would agree with it- however, so many delusions are created among the people and so much misleading propaganda is put about that people come to accept such things.
It is said, and it is a correct assertion, that in any country, according to the law and rationale and based on human rights, the destiny of any person should lie in his own hands, the destiny of the nation should lie in its hands. Accordingly, at present, the nation of Iran should be able to determine its own destiny. Today, if the people of Iran want to appoint someone as their parliamentary representative or as their president, they have the right to do so. Now, let us suppose that we have decided unanimously to appoint a certain person to be president and that each district has chosen a parliamentary representative for itself, this is perfectly acceptable. Let's further assume that we have unanimously agreed to create a Constituent Assembly, once again this is acceptable; it follows then that this Constituent Assembly has the right to determine the destiny of the nation which exists at that time. It does not, however, have the right to determine the destiny of an Iranian nation that does not yet exist; the nation of Iran today does not comprise those people who have not yet been born and will be your descendants in a hundred years' time, they are at present inconsequential, I cannot determine their destiny for them. What right do any of us have to do such a thing? They are of another generation. Just because we are all Iranian and all Muslim, we cannot determine the destiny of a community that does not yet even exist! We cannot compel our descendants to recognize this man as `His Imperial Majesty'! What gives us the right to do such a thing? What business is it of ours? Monarchy is an irrational institution, it goes against human intelligence.
So even if the Constituent Assembly is a properly-elected, one-hundred-percent national assembly, it should have no influence on the lives of our descendants. Now if we look back in history- and I myself was witness to what happened, although you young people were not yet born- we see that the Constituent Assembly (which gave Rida Khan the power to rule) was formed at bayonet point! Votes were cast at the point of a bayonet! Nobody dared not to vote, they didn't even dare utter a word in protest. Of course, some did put their lives on the line and voiced their opposition, but the rest agreed either because of the bayonet that was hanging over their heads or because of their own greed, for some were offered much to give their consent.
So a Constituent Assembly was created at bayonet point through which that creature was imposed on us. Even if it was a correct procedure, it was still wrong. If it was right for the people of that time, it is not right for you who are not of that era. The referendum and the Constituent Assembly of that period should not have any say in your destiny.
Shah's order for coup d'etat and massacre
Indeed, today we went a step further. We not only rejected the decision of that period, we actually threw the Shah out of our country. He wanted to throw us out, he announced that whoever did not join his Rastakhiz Party had to leave the country. But praise be to God, you united and your unity of purpose meant that you did to him what he wanted to do to you: you threw him out. No one can bring him back now. If such a thing were possible, they would have kept him in power in the first place.[The audience laughs]. Keeping him in power is much easier than him leaving and then trying to bring him back. Of course, they are considering this. From what has been said, this scoundrel gave the command for a coup d'etat to be carried out while on board the plane that was taking him out of the country. [The audience laughs]. The plane was in the air and still he could not control his passion [The audience laughs], and from there- as was said- he ordered a coup d'etat, and his coup means beatings and killings! Nobody listened to him. Indeed, word has it that only recently an order was given to a garrison to carry out a coup in Hamedan, to bomb the city and create disturbances there.
Just today I received a letter telling me the same thing. Nobody listened however, and instead a hunger strike was staged. «4» At the moment, the garrison is completely in the hands of the people.
Self-sacrificing for spiritual cause
How did such a thing come about? It came about for two reasons, one because of the unity of purpose that has appeared in Iran, and the other because of that buttress which comprised Truth and rightness, that is God. You cried out for God and Islam shouting" We want Islam, we want freedom and independence." Of course, an Islamic government per se will give you the freedom and independence you seek, but you expressed your demands more fully, otherwise an Islamic government means freedom and independence. Because your coming together had this support, by the will of Almighty God you have been victorious up to now, and you will remain victorious if you safeguard these two aspects of your movement. Make sure that your uprising is for Truth:" I do admonish you to do one thing and that is to rise up for God" «5» not for your own carnal desires. If man rises up for his own personal desires and not for God, he will get nowhere, his uprising will eventually fail; something that is not for God will not endure. Strive to keep this movement of yours a divine one, one that is for God.
I do not believe that someone who struggles for the people does not have spiritual convictions. Those who believe in God, those who believe in punishment and reward reason that if they give their life, they will attain a higher form of life, if they give everything they have, God will give them even more back, so much more that no eye can see and no ear can hear. It is a logical fact that we give our `aba and receive a hundred in return, we sacrifice one life which is imprisoned in this body, and will be freed and in return we will be given a divine life, a life of freedom, a life which is comprehensive, which encompasses everything. We will be given a life in which everything is at our command, we need only say" be" and it will be, whatever we want to happen will happen, this is what we will get.
This is the reasoning of those who sacrifice their lives. As for those who do not have such convictions and struggle for the people, they are either extremely stupid or the whole thing is put on. I believe it is all put on and they are simply blinding others to the truth. They may say they are struggling for the people, for the masses, but one should ask them:" What will you gain if they kill you? Are you a person who would give his life for the masses without gaining anything?" Whatever man wants, he wants for himself, only a few can be found out of the whole human race that is not like this, you won't find an army of people like this. If there is no religious conviction involved, if the movement is not one for God, it will not last. God, the Blessed and Exalted, says that He admonishes us to do one thing, out of all admonitions, he says he has only one for us: to rise up for God. The admonisher is God the Blessed and Exalted, the conveyer of the admonition is the Messenger of God, may God's peace be upon him and his descendants, and the book in which it is recorded is the Qur'an, the scripture of God. He tells us to both rise up and to make our uprising for God. If you want your uprising to bear fruit, to be effective, and not to end in disunion and division, all of your endeavors must be directed at one point, a point beyond the natural realm, a point which is everlasting in everything, all of you must focus your attention on Him. When this is the case, then your uprising and your movement will be a secure and lasting Islamic movement, for its buttress is everlasting, and something whose buttress is permanent is itself permanent.
Emphasizing God's admonition
I have this admonition of God the Blessed and Exalted in the language of the Qur'an the meaning of which I will convey to you. This admonition communicates to us the importance of having unity of purpose and of our aims being one: God." Rise up for God." It won't work if one person is on one side and someone else on another. If in an uprising you see groups, parties and fronts being formed, know that it is not an uprising for God. If we all focus our attention on one point the call is for unity of purpose, for unity of belief. Unity of belief will bring about unity of purpose and unity of action." I do admonish you to do one thing." It is just one admonition, but it contains everything. Listen to this admonition and act upon it, your success lies in this admonition. It is God's admonition and it is only one. Whatever you imagine is in this one word. This is why the Qur'an is a miracle, for three or four words can administer all of man's affairs." I admonish you to do one thing and that is to rise up for God, it may be in pairs or it may be singly." If the uprising is for God, then everything gravitates to that divine power.
It is because your uprising has a divine nature that it has reached this stage where it has trampled all human forces under foot. That is to say, the fist has triumphed over tanks and guns, these tanks and guns which the Shah's regime brought into the country and filled Iran with. Our youth, our old people and our women stood up to these with clenched fists shouting that they no longer had any effect. And why do they no longer have any effect? Because the uprising is for God; is it possible to fight with God? This is a divine uprising, it is for God, and all those claims that the regime made have been thrown out.
Repairing devastations and ruins
Yet we are still only at the beginning. Do not think that we have achieved something, so now we can relax. No, the arising for God is now just the beginning. According to what those knowledgeable in divine matters say, rising up is the first stage on the path to God, it is the awakening. «6» We still have a long way to go. Gentlemen, we are the inheritors of a country everything of which this man has destroyed. You see ruination everywhere; he has destroyed all the manifestations of civilization and still he proclaimed that he had brought us a" great civilization". He destroyed our universities; he destroyed our agriculture; he has exhausted almost all of our oil reserves. He says we will have oil only for another twenty years or so, and at the rate he is giving it away, this will be the case! He has destroyed everything we had. He has destroyed our youth; indeed, the worst of all abominations, the worst crime of them all is his destruction of our human resources. It is the human being who can work and who is valuable. Without man, water and land are of no value. It is the human being who is valuable. He deprived Iran of this humanity; he destroyed that resource of ours which comprises the youth. Ask those young people who are presently in Germany receiving training in the field of atomic energy, they have told me that they are being kept at a certain low level beyond which they are not allowed to progress. You can ask them yourselves. They say their work is useless. These capable forces of ours are prevented from progressing; they are being suppressed and kept at a low level. He has laid waste to this country. Even if we are successful in getting rid of this corpse and the rest of them, it will still take us another ten to twenty years with the active help of all sectors of society to eliminate these shortcomings. It will take another ten to twenty years of effort if we want our agriculture to be returned to the state it was in before these acts of land sabotage [jocular: Land Reforms] were carried out. All the people must join hands together, the peasants, villagers and farmers must set to work, others must help them, one group of people or the government alone cannot do it.
The ideal government
What we want from a government today is for it to allow the whole nation to play an active role in it, not to be distant from it. The people and the government should assist one another, help one another. The government should not be like a stranger that the people are afraid of or that they can't communicate with. We want a ruler like Hadrat Amir (Imam `Ali), upon whom be peace. Of course, we can never find anyone like him, but we want someone who is remotely like him. During his reign, God forgive me for calling it a reign, I mean at the time of his caliphate, when the area of his authority was so vast that it included the Hijaz, Egypt, Iraq and Iran, he would leave his home to check up on this woman and that woman. According to historians, he once went to one woman's home and comforted her children he did things to make them laugh. This is something that no ordinary ruler would do; only an extraordinary one would do this. He made noises to make the children laugh and later explained that when he first arrived they were crying and he wanted them to be laughing when he left. This is the kind of ruler we want, not someone whose shadow we are afraid of. We want a ruler around whom people gather when he enters the mosque and takes his seat, one to whom they speak and air their grievances. We want a ruler who, when a Jew makes a claim against him in court and the judge sends for him, he attends court, the court of a judge he himself has appointed, and when the judge rules against him, he accepts that ruling graciously. «7» Could any of these governments summon this man to court for all the money he has stolen from the Pahlavi Foundation? «8» Could they even make this wretch render the Foundation's accounts? One has taken fifteen million dollars, another ten million, another five million, someone else thirty million, and they are all his relatives!
We want a government that is just, and the very least we expect of it is that it does not steal! We are not saying that we want our ruler to be someone, whom we follow in religious matters, although this should be the case, we simply want him to be someone who will not steal the nation's wealth, who will not take it then run.
Plunderers and remitters of foreign currency
If you study this list which covers a one to two month period- probably you have already done so- you will not be able to find the name of one religious person on it. Study it for yourselves; can you find the name of one of these sponging akhounds, as they call them, on it? Can you find the name of a mullah there at all? This that they say about the akhounds being spongers is just propaganda; they put it about because they wish to defame the akhounds, for it is the akhound who can give them a punch in the mouth. It is the akhound who through his pulpit and his prayer niche[ mihrab ]in the mosque can confront the cannons and tanks. They want to take this power away from you; they want to take Islam and the Qur'an away from you. They want to take it all away from you so you become a people far removed from God. They want to disarm you, so you will have neither God, the Imam, the Qur'an, nor the admonisher, and you have no pulpit, no prayer niche and no akhound. You will be left with nothing. And what is it they should do to take these things away from you? They need only continue doing the things they have been doing up until now. The propaganda that was put about against the clergymen at the time of that godless man was such that taxi drivers wouldn't even let clergymen into their cabs. One wretch of a driver said that he had made a pledge to God that he wouldn't let two groups of people into his cab, one the akhounds and the other prostitutes! This is the image that he (Rida Khan) created of the akhound. Why? Because he was afraid of the akhounds; there was one akhound in the Parliament who really gave Rida Khan hell. There was one Mudarris who repeatedly defeated him, and in the end he was taken away and murdered.
Unity of expression
Unity of expression and rising for God, are what have given you victory so far. Preserve this unity of purpose, stop dividing yourselves into this party and that front and drawing a distinction between the akhounds and the university people. God knows that this is to your detriment; it is a blow to each one of you. One comes abroad and sees different political fronts that argue among themselves, ignore such things, gentlemen. If you are Muslims, then as such you are required to ignore such things; if you are nationalists then nationalism demands that you ignore such matters; if you are wise, then wisdom too demands this. It is my belief that this is something created by foreigners to divide us. Don't become involved in such matters. Remain together: The hand of God is with the group. «9» Work together; you have brought your movement this far, now, take it to the end of the line. The end of the line is when the hands of foreigners have been severed from your land, and your country becomes yours, yours to administer, yours to do with as you please, if you want to sell oil you sell it, if not then you don't. Of course, we mean to sell our oil, but not on the same basis as this man did; he gave our oil to the Americans then built bases for them in return. With the money he received in exchange for the oil, he built bases for them! This is not a practice that will be continued.
Letting go of unity cause of defeat
Have unity of purpose, for if this stronghold is taken from you, you will face defeat. If these people in Iran who are all shouting together for freedom, who are all shouting for God, become divided and a group of them start shouting slogans other than for God, then know they will be defeated.
Such things will occur for he and his regime have been defeated and they will do whatever they can now to suppress the movement. They will create one group with one name and another with another name to delude the people and make this nation lose its spirit. I tell you to be strong, don't lose heart. When the superpowers cannot do a damn thing, these few children certainly can't do anything. «10» Be strong and firm in your stance. The power of the nation is one that no power on earth can confront. You have witnessed how you were able to throw out someone who enjoyed the support of all the superpowers. Our movement will continue as long as the hands of foreigners, whether of the left or right, remain in our country, and as long as there is life in our bodies we will shout out [The audience says "That's right"]. Gentlemen, push aside these divisions and disunity. I ask you all here and all the sections of society in Iran, I beseech you all to make common cause if you want to free your country from the clutches of foreigners. One person beats the drum for America, one for Russia, and one for China, this is all wrong. One is worse than the other! Why don't you do it for your own sake, you poor person? The country is yours, should you give it to someone else?! And in so doing can you still claim to be a nationalist or a Toudehi? «11» A Toudehi is someone who struggles for his own nation, not for China or some other country. Put a stop to this dissent; come together under the banner of Islam. If you want to get rid of all the powers, and you yourselves, through moral excellence, create an exemplary country whose morals are of the highest caliber, an exemplary country which oppresses no one, which does not covet the wealth of others, which does not put up with oppression nor gives its wealth away to others- for indeed our plan is neither to oppress nor to allow ourselves to suffer oppression, we mean neither to impose anything on the people nor to have anything imposed on us- then you should all be united and keep your movement for God. Make your aims sincerely for God and close ranks. I hope that God will assist you; He will, God willing ["God willing" from the audience].