Speech [Advantages of the monotheistic school over materialism; role of teacher and mother in society and rearing of children]

In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful

Of the advantages of the school of monotheism over all the ideologies that is present in the world is that monotheistic schools educate the people and bring them out of darkness and guide them toward light. All the schools that are non-monotheistic are materialist schools and these materialist schools either cause the people to return toward the world of darkness from the world of light and invite them to materialism and the material, and dissuade and deviate them from the world of light, or they invite them to that materialism and have nothing to do with afterlife. They are neutral vis-a-vis the world of light and the return of people to the world of light and in any case, both the schools whether the anti-monotheistic schools and whether those schools that have nothing to do with monotheism, are neutral vis-a-vis monotheism. What these do, the teachings and learning that they have are teachings and learning that are connected to the material and they plunge the people in materialism and darkness and deter them from monotheism and light.

Whereas monotheistic schools- at the top of which is Islam- at the same time that they involve materiality and are involved with material concerns, but the objective is to educate the people in such a way that materiality does not become a covering for their spirituality. They place materiality in the service of spirituality; to be at the service of spirituality; at the same time that they take materiality into perspective, they take into consideration the life of the world; at the same time, they draw the attention of the people to spirituality and deliver them from the darkness of material concerns. Focus on the material and materiality in a way that the whole focus should be on it is darkness; and draws people toward darkness; and to things that you observe their presence in all schools; they pull the people toward war, to bloodshed. Communism is an ideology of bloodshed, it is a school of repression; total repression takes charge over there; and there is bloodshed there such that the first thing that the leaders did when they took power was to slaughter thousands of people, rather hundreds of thousands of people. The materiality that is present in America and similar non-communist Western countries, all their conflicts and disputes are concerned with materiality, and they shed the blood of the people. Now, if you observe all over the world, these two schools and these two orders are involved and they shed the blood of the people. One group is involved in Afghanistan and in similar places, while the other group is somewhere else. Monotheistic schools are not like this. Monotheistic schools do not want to conquer lands, and do not wish to use violence against the people. They want to draw the people away from the darkness of the material and draw their attention to God. And thus to the extent that is possible, there is moderation, good conduct and invitation involved in non-materialist schools. To the extent possible, with appeals it makes the people to return to the world of light and is never planning to engage in war and disputes, except it feels that a conspiracy is involved. If they feel there is a conspiracy, then on the basis of the commandments of the Qur'an and the decrees of Islam, they take firm action. Till there is no feeling of conspiracy, they let everyone to be free and do as they please. When there is a feeling of conspiracy, they take stern action.

In our country, too, when this great victory was achieved by the respected women and men, everything was kept free: propagation was free; doctrines were kept free such that in the last few months approximately two-hundred different groups have asserted their presence! Even the communists who are corrupt and immoral have asserted their presence. But later on we find that their assertion is not only for publicity; it is not only because they want to promote their doctrine, rather the issue is one of conspiracy. To promote your doctrine is other than burning the harvests! It is other than pouring into the universities and preventing the students from doing their job; that it is other than pouring into the factories and causing work stoppages in these factories; it is other than opposing a referendum which is popular and of the people and concerns them and is in their interest and boycotting it and setting the ballot boxes on fire, or preventing the people from casting their vote at gunpoint; or to create disturbances in the rallies and injure a large number of our youth of whom about three-hundred were injured and most of whom were related to us. They themselves create disturbances. And now that they see it is close to the realization of the Council of Experts, now they have become desperate and want to create disturbances in every place. We have been patient until now and have shown revolutionary patience until now so that the people would know what they are; what are their objectives. They do not wish to promote their ideology; they do not wish to talk with logic; they want to suppress all the doctrines. They do this for repressing the religion of Islam; they are afraid of Islam; they are afraid of the tenets of Islam. They want that Islam should not exist in any form and thus, it is a plot. Now that it has become a conspiracy, we can no longer tolerate it to the end and accept the conspiracies. The question is the question of Islam and it concerns the interests of the Muslims. We cannot be negligent of the interests of the Muslims and Islam. Therefore, I declare that if they do such things again, we shall mobilize the whole nation; we shall mobilize all the Revolutionary Guards that are present; we shall mobilize all the women and men of Iran and get rid of them. They must return to the fold of the nation and if they have a doctrine- after they have reverted to the nation- they should speak on the basis of logic. They were asked to talk on the radio but they refused. They are defeated in their ideology; they are a bunch of miscreants; they have no religion; they are scoundrels. Therefore, we must put the scoundrels in their place and behave sternly with them; but I again gave them time to come back to their senses; to return to the fold of the nation and get along with the nation. This pertains to these issues.

But with regard to the teacher; the role of the teacher in society is the role of prophets. The prophets too were teachers of mankind. It is a very important and sensitive role and has a lot of responsibility. It is an important role which is that of education:" bringing out of darkness into light," those that" Allah is the Protecting Friend of those who believe. He bringeth them out of darkness into light." «1» This position is that of teachers. God, the Blessed and Exalted, gives this position to Himself that He is the guardian of the believers. He brings them out of darkness and guides them toward light. And the foremost teacher is God, the Blessed and Exalted, Who guides the people out of darkness by means of prophets and by means of revelations and invites them to luminosity; invites them to perfection; invites them to love; invites them to kindness; invites them to the stages of perfection that are unique to man. Following Him are the prophets that propagate the same divine school, and their job is to teach; they are teachers; they are the tutors of mankind. Their job is also to educate the people and train human beings to advance from the status of animals and reach the status of humanity. A human being has several positions, the first of which is this position and after several stages lower down, it is the same position of animalism; he becomes an animal just like other animals and far more dangerous. The danger posed by animals is not of the same magnitude as of humans. The amount of crimes that a human being inflicts on his own kind, no other animal- not even the predator animals- inflicts that amount of crime. This is what a human being is. His is the foremost position which after he goes through certain stages yet, he reaches the position of animalism. He becomes an animal that has no rein; it is an animal that if set free, is the most bloodthirsty of creatures.

Prophets have come to deliver the human being who has reached the stage where he poses a danger both to himself as well as to his fellow species, and to guide him toward light; guide him to the origins of light; free him from immoral behavior, that animal-like behavior and nature and to guide him to humane nature and humane behavior. Their job is to promote him from the position of animalism to the position of humanity; to subjugate materialism to the world of the unseen; to subjugate the world of nature to the world of divinity. And following them are the teachers of mankind to which you also- God willing, may you be successful- now belong to that faction.

Your job is to bring out the children and the infants from darkness to light. It is to teach and to train; humane teaching and training; an Islamic teaching and training. You should deliver them from immoral behavior. You should caution them from pursuing these wishes and aspirations by means of which they are corrupted. You should rear the children.

You teachers have a very honorable profession which is the same as that of Allah; the same as that of the prophets. And you have a very big responsibility that is the same as that of the prophets. Whereas prophets overcome their responsibilities by acting upon what they are commanded to do and what they are commissioned, we too must take action. If, God forbid, the children that are reared by you and taught by you are brought up contrary to humane-Islamic training, you are responsible. The responsibility is great. It is possible that an upright human being can train a universe while an unhealthy human being and a corrupt human being can corrupt a universe. Corruption and good begin from your rearing and your training and from the schools where you are teaching.

For women there is a more important subject. And that subject is the rearing of children. You should not be under the illusion that these people who always deny motherhood and parenthood and upbringing of children and treat the subject indifferently and sluggishly, and regard the subject as very inconsequential have a right motive. They want that a child that wants to be brought up well in the bosom be distanced from these bosoms. They want to send the child right from the beginning to the childcare centers under the care of others; that the children be reared under the care of strangers. They do not want them to come out human beings. Your laps are the laps that make human beings. They want that your children should not be at your side from this stage and not allow them to become human beings. Children that are taken away from the bosom of their mothers and sent to nurseries, they are with strangers and have not been loved by their mothers, they turn out to be disturbed and frustrated individuals. These frustrations are the source of most evils that are seen in mankind. These wars that occur are the frustrations that are rooted in the hearts of these blood-thirsty individuals. These robberies, these crimes, these treasons- these are mainly out of frustrations that are present in human beings. If they take away your children from you, because of not having been loved by the mother, they become disturbed and frustrated; they shall be driven to immorality. They were commissioned, that system was commissioned to drive our children to immorality; to prevent them right from the start to be reared in an atmosphere of love so that they became frustrated. Subsequently, under the supervision of the teachers whom they would themselves appoint, and thereafter in the universities that they themselves would establish, from the bottom right up to the top it was corruption-" drove them from light into darkness"- and they prevented a humane upbringing from taking place.

The lap of the mother is the greatest school for the rearing of the child. That which the child hears from the mother is other than what it hears from the teacher. The child can hear from the mother better than from the teacher. It is reared better in the lap of the mother than in the proximity of the father; than in the proximity of the teacher. To bring up human beings is a humane duty; it is a divine duty; it is a noble task.

Those that do not want upright human beings from being reared are afraid of upright human beings; these regimes are afraid of true human beings. In every regime if there is a true human being to be found, he will transform things. Rida Shah was afraid of Mudarris; as much as he was afraid of Mudarris, he was unafraid of the waylaying bandits! He was not afraid of the gun-toting bandits. He was afraid of Mudarris who was an obstacle to the shameful acts that he wanted to perform- and finally he caught hold of Mudarris and killed him. They were afraid of the clergy because a clergyman trains human beings; and they do not wish to see human beings brought up. For this reason they made the rearing of the child appear uninteresting to the mother to such an extent and indulged in so much propaganda that they were influenced by them. Those who believed them sent these beloved children to nurseries and separated them from their laps such that they were given a satanic rearing.

We have a duty to rear human beings. It is a human being that can thwart immorality; it is a human being that sympathizes at the condition of the oppressed; it is a human being that is saddened by the plight of the oppressed; it is the Noble Prophet who feels saddened at the plight of the oppressed; it is the Commander of the Faithful( `a )that feels tormented and chastised at the plight of the oppressed. All these regimes want to subjugate the oppressed and to exploit them. They do not want to do anything positive for the oppressed and have not done either. You saw that for fifty years- fifty plus years- we were witness to the situation and saw that they did nothing for the oppressed; still there are shanty towns around Tehran. And this government that does want to do something for them cannot do anything so soon. This government that also wants to serve the people is being thwarted by them. These strata are not allowing the government to concentrate on these issues considering the amount of disturbances it has created. Every day they create a new disturbance lest the government finds the time to perform some essential tasks; and they lose their base. We wanted that they should not make mischief; not to create trouble and we want that they should not drive our youth to immorality. And I hope that they do not succeed and come to their senses and revert to the nation and join human society.

May God grant all of you success. And I apologize to you for the inconvenience of having to come here in this hot weather and in this warm room. And I too am one of your servants, and I hope that God accepts this service from us. Peace be upon you all.