Abbas Amanat

That was the thing, that there is something authentic that should be protected.

And therefore, a man in that kind of a garb and appearance

seemed as a source for return to this originality of their own culture, authenticity of their own culture.

And it perfectly...

took advantage of that, that is Khomeini, took advantage of it and the circle around him at the expense of everybody else, which he managed in the course of 1979 to 1989, which he passed away, he died in the 10 years during this period, managed to basically transform

the Iranian society to create institutions of the Islamic Republic and to acquire himself the position of the guardian jurist.

That was something completely new.

It didn't ever existed before.

As a matter of fact, as you might know, the model of government that a religious establishment takes over the states,

is unprecedented throughout the course of Iranian history, throughout the course of the Islamic history, I would say.

This is the first example and probably the only example of a regime that the religious establishment that has always, in the course of Iranian history, ever since, I would say, probably at least 16th century, if not earlier, has been always

separate from the state and always kind of collaborating with the state with a certain tensions in between the two of them.

There were two, basically as they would call themselves, the two pillars of stability in the society.

That situation changed.

For the first time, the religious establishment took over.

the power of the state.

And that's at the core of what we see today as a major issue for Iranian society, because these are basically that old balance between the religion and the state, which was kind of a de facto separation of the authorities of the two.

has been violated, and now you have in power a theocracy in effect, which of course only in its appearance is theocracy.

Deep down, in my opinion, it's a brutal fascist regime that stays in power, but it has the appearance of religion into it.

So this is really the story of the revolution.