Haeri died in 1937. Replacing such an important scholar was
a difficult challenge. Not until 1944 was his successor installed,
another highly regarded teacher named Ayatollah Muhammad
Husayn Borujerdi. The school and city grew to even greater
prominence during Borujerdi’s fifteen years of leadership.
Khomeini himself played no small role in the success of
the Madreseh Faizieh at Qom. He taught at the school for
three decades, until the early 1960s. An excellent instructor,
he developed a large following of students who remembered
and respected him long after they heard his lectures. Charisma
seemed an odd trait for an individual of such a cold nature. As
one historian described, “He was a forbidding man who never
offered more than a smile in public to express his pleasure in
anybody or anything.” Yet, Khomeini was considered “one of
the most intelligent teachers in Qom.”^9
He had come to believe that strict adherence to Qur’anic
teachings was of utmost importance in life. This, he insisted to
his students, required concentrated self-control. Khomeini
believed everything was either good or evil. He disdained all
forms of what he considered distractions from pure thinking.
Distractions, to him, included not only such indulgences as
alcoholic drink—forbidden in Islamic countries—but even
music. Music, he claimed, merely serves to numb one’s thoughts.
Therefore, it must be grouped among the evil things of life.
Although many non-Shiites, especially Westerners, scoff at
such strictness, his students respected him because he appeared
to practice what he preached. Khomeini as a young man adopted
a simple lifestyle and followed it into his old age. For example,
he preferred to sleep on a blanket, called a doshak, on the floor.
This personal custom dated to his years as a student at Qom,
when he was obliged to find sleeping space in the mosque
because he could not afford lodging elsewhere.
Khomeini frequently voiced the Muslim principle that people
who were well-to-do should assist the poor. He held that govern-
ments should take care of their underprivileged citizens—and he
believed the Pahlavi government of Iran was doing far too little.24 AYATOLLAH RUHOLLAH KHOMEINI
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