Fereydoun Hoveyda, "The Shah and the Ayatollah: Iranian Mythology and Islamic Revolution"
Publisher: Praeger Publishers | 2003 | ISBN 0275978583 | PDF | 136 pages | 10.3 MB
Twenty-two years after Ayatollah Khomeini's ascent to power in Iran many aspects of his 1979 Islamic revolution remain obscure if not baffling. For instance, in November 1978 an offer was made to him in his Paris exile to return to Iran with international guarantees of freedom of speech and action. He refused and demanded the departure of the Shah. Americans put pressure on the monarch to leave the country. Khomeini arrived in Tehran in early February 1979, and he immediately demanded the "return" of the Shah and his trial before an Islamic tribunal! No one could give a valid explanation of this "contradiction" in Khomeini's conduct and demands. Many other "mysteries" in the unfolding of the revolution and the policies of the Islamic republic which replaced the monarchy have gone unexplained up to now. Scholars and experts in the West have offered the usual explanations for the Islamic revolution-corruption, deepening gaps between the rich and the poor, rapid industrialization, sky-rocketing inflation, westernizing policies that offended traditions, lack of democratic institutions, authoritarian rule, and on and on. But such characteristics which exist in other Muslim countries, especially in the Arab world, fail to clairify the particularities of the Iranian revolution. Indeed, as Ambassador Hoveyda points out, Iran is not an Arab country. It has kept alive its ancient mythological heritage which is not Islamic. It is an Indo-European nation with a recorded history of three thousand years! To understand the real causes of the 1979 revolution one must refer to the deep-rooted "beliefs" of Iranians and to their very rich mythology.