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Among the mullahs inside Iran, the most powerful is Ayatullah Sharietmadari, a revered Islamic scholar who condemns violence but strongly opposes the Shah on constitutional and religious grounds (see box). Parliament, claims Sharietmadari, too often violates the precepts of Islamic law to the detriment of Shi'ite sensibilities. Gambling, prostitution and pornography are all viewed as typical manifestations of modernism. The Shah's widespread curtailment of civil liberties, freedom of the press and political assembly are looked upon as only further evidence of his determination to deprive the Shi'ites of their power and to transform the nation into a secular state.
Sharietmadari's headquarters—and thus the heart of Iran's internal Islamic opposition—is Qum, a city of 300,000 that ranks with Najaf in Iraq as one of the world's greatest centers of Shi'ite learning. Located 75 miles south of Tehran, Qum is both a symbol and a model of the Iran that the mullahs yearn to preserve. No television aerials mar the pristine skyline; no public cinemas threaten to seduce the inquisitive; no bars or liquor stores offend the strict life of the observant. All women wear the chador and devote much of their lives to weaving fine Persian carpets. Thronging the streets are thousands of turbaned, black-robed mullahs whose entire lives are submerged in the study of theology with Qum's learned men.
But the mosques of Qum are not simply places of learning and prayer. They have also become centers for political action. Says one dissident lawyer: "We have not been allowed to form political parties. We have no newspapers of our own. But the religious leaders have a built-in communications system. They easily reach the masses through their weekly sermons in the mosques and their network of mullahs throughout the nation. That is why so many nonreligious elements cloak their opposition in the mantle of religion."
So pervasive is the network that some nonreligious Iranian dissidents have exploited the mullahs' movement for their own purposes. Some time ago, dissidents who could not otherwise have hoped to be effective signed up with Khomeini in Iraq under religious pretexts. A few then went to Lebanon for training by George Habash's radical Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Returning to Iran, they posed as clergymen, took code names, formed cells and provoked incidents of terrorism.
One who is dismayed by this infiltration is Abdul Reza Hejazi, Khomeini's associate in Tehran. Himself a mullah of considerable fame, Hejazi spent two years in prison for the crime of receiving a letter from Khomeini and answering it. He stresses that despite accusations to the contrary, the mullahs are not opposed to Western advances in science, medicine and education for Iran. "Islamic civilization and Western civilization can and should merge in order to create a better civilization for all. What we are against from the West is its colonialism in all its shapes and sizes."
After the mullahs, the most visible opposition to the Shah has come from the universities, where there is frequent agitation. Some students are Marxists who preach outright revolution. Many are Muslim activists, following the mullahs in their demands for an Islamic state. Vast numbers of others are caught up in the revolution of rising expectations; growing up in an atmosphere of increasing affluence, they are frustrated by the slow pace of economic and political change.
Up to now, Iranian students seem to have had more impact abroad than at home. This year 100,000 Iranians are studying in other countries—more than 37,000 in the U.S. alone—because there is no room for them at their own universities. Angered and articulate, they have formed a vocal vanguard against the Shah in almost every major city in the world, airing their opposition with slogans in the London subway or demonstrations in Los Angeles, Washington or New York City. Many wear masks when they demonstrate for fear that agents of SAVAK, the heavyhanded Iranian secret police, or authorities in other countries will gather incriminating data on them. Under the Iranian constitution, castigating the Shah, even abroad, is a crime punishable by three to ten years in prison.