Ayatollah Sayyid �Ali Khamene�i seemed to many, prior to the death of Ruhollah Khomeini, to be a cleric of the second rank, albeit a politician of the first rank. Until he was elevated to the position of Religious Leader in 1989, he was generally only accorded the rank of Hojatolislam, not that of Ayatollah; yet under the principle of velayat-e faqih set down by Khomeini, the vali faqih who has the power to overrule the state apparatus was generally conceived as being an ayatollah �ozma or Grand Ayatollah, or a collection of the most senior scholars. Indeed, one of the great but not always open debates in Iran in the past decade has revolved around Khamene�i�s qualifications.

As the concept of clerical rule was adumbrated by Khomeini, it based the right of the clerical establishment to intervene in state affairs on a daring expansion of the traditional Shi�ite concept of the marja�, the clerical scholar who is a source of tradition and religious rulings. Historically not even all the so-called �Grand Ayatollahs� have necessarily been accorded the title of marja�. The Constitution of the Islamic Republic was written with Khomeini in mind and said, in effect, that the job of religious leader should go to the one cleric who was acclaimed as the scholar of the age or, if there was no such person, to a collective body. But when Khomeini died, the job went to Khamene�i, who had been serving as President; and the Constitution was amended to provide for a single rahbar or leader, not the collective body originally envisioned for the post-Khomeini era.

 One of the most prominent critics of Khamene�i has been Ayatollah Hossein �Ali Montazeri, now under house arrest. Ironically, Montazeri was one of the figures who helped forge the concept of velayat-e faqih and install it in the constitution. Other critics of the leadership position have usually come from openly secularist or academic backgrounds; some, like �Abdolkarim Soroush, have managed to survive within the Iranian system. But while some of the more ambitious reformers have reportedly suggested doing away with the post and powers of the rahbar, President Khatami himself and most key figures in his government have always paid lip service, at least, to the constitution and the Islamic system. In return, Khamene�i has publicly supported the President and, on certain occasions, even given measured praise to the idea of gradual opening of the system.

In recent weeks, however, he has been more openly critical of some aspects of the reform agenda, and his intervention in the press case was a reminder that his opinion does very much still matter.

Khamene�i�s supporters address him as an ayatollah �ozma or Grand Ayatollah and consider him a marja�; and while critics may question whether he is a theological scholar of the first rank, no one can deny that the man has been a successful revolutionary, running underground cells in the Shah�s day, helping bring Khomeini to power and sustain the Islamic regime.

Khamane�i�s Career

Sayyid �Ali Khamene�i was born in the holy city of Mashhad in northeastern Iran on July 15, 1939. Though he and his parents were from Mashhad, the family has roots in Azerbaijan in northwestern Iran, and Khamene�i is understood to speak Azeri Turkish as well as Farsi. Khamene�i�s grandfather, Sayyid Hossein, was a prominent cleric in Azerbaijan, in Khyaban and Tabriz, and later migrated to the holy city of Najaf in Iraq.

Khamane�i is a sayyid, a descendant of the Prophet, and also the scion of a clerical family; his father Jawad Khamene�i was a hojatolislam, �who lived until the age of 93 and, after the revolution, was accorded the title of ayatollah. His mother was the daughter of another hojatolislam; an aunt was married to Sheikh Muhammad Khyabani, a cleric who died leading a revolt in Azerbaijan and is considered a martyr by the revolutionary generation.

Despite his family�s background, Khamene�i has said that he was raised in poor conditions because of the Second World War. At the age of five he began traditional Qur�anic school, and subsequently continued his religious education while also taking diplomas in state schools. While still in his teens he studied under Mashhad�s Grand Ayatollah Sayyid Milani, and other senior scholars. In 1958 he made a pilgrimage to the Shi�ite holy city of Najaf in Iraq, where he studied under several senior scholars, and the following year, 1949, he returned to Iran to study in Qom. There he studied under the late Grand Ayatollah Borujerdi and others, including Ruhollah Khomeini.

Khomeini was one of many influences recruiting Khamene�i into political activity. During Khomeini�s plans for the wave of clerical protests against the Shah in 1963, he sent Khamene�i from Qom to Mashhad to coordinate matters. Khamene�i gave a sermon during the first week of Muharram which was part of a general protest, and was soon arrested. He was briefly detained, but as his activities increased, he was imprisoned again, then released. He and other followers of Khomeini set up secret cells, and after some were discovered in 1966 Khamene�i and some others went underground. He reportedly spent nearly a year in a house, hiding out with �Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani, who later succeeded him as President.

Between the early 1960s and the 1979 revolution, Khamene�i was arrested at least six times, and is said to have spent a total of several years in jail, though in the intervening periods he was preaching, supporting Khomeini (now in exile in Iraq) and engaging in underground organizing activities.

Not even Khamene�i�s critics deny that he was a key player in the pro-Khomeini revolutionary  movement. Modern admirers tend to also note that he wrote a number of books on religious subjects, delivered many sermons and was also seeking to build a reputation as a cleric. But even Khamene�i�s official biographies tend to spend more time on his political activities than his scholarly ones.

In 1977 Khamene�i and other followers met in Mashhad and formed the League of �Ulama� Mujahidin, an early incarnation of the Khomeini organization. In that year Khamene�i was arrested again, and this time sentenced to three years� internal exile in Iranshahr, in the south. He reportedly continued his political activities there. By 1978, with massive demonstrations against the Shah spreading, Khamene�i quietly returned to Mashhad, apparently without the authorities taking notice.

As the revolution approached its climax, Khomeini � by then in Paris � named a Revolution Command Council inside Iran, which included both Rafsanjani and Khamene�i.

Khamene�i helped lead the revolution in the Mashhad area and helped set up the Committee for the Reception of the Imam, in charge of Khomeini�s triumphant return from exile. He was then named Head of the Information Bureau at the Office of the Imam.

He subsequently held a long series of posts in the early months of the revolution. As early as February 1, 1979 he became for a time Commander of the Revolution Guards Corps. He became Khomeini�s special envoy to the provinces of Sistan and Baluchistan. He was named the Revolution Command Council�s representative to the Defense Council and Deputy Minister of Defense, and in 1980 the Imam�s representative to the National Defense Council. (It needs to be remembered that revolutionary institutions were in considerable flux during the first year of the revolution.)

When Ayatollah Mahmud Talegani died in 1980, Khomeini named Khamene�i to the post of Friday Prayer Imam of Tehran, making his Friday sermons the most influential. He was elected to the first Islamic Majles in 1980 as a key figure in the Islamic Republican Party.

The year 1981 was a traumatic one. On June 27, there was an assassination attempt against Khamene�i while he was speaking in a mosque south of Tehran. He was wounded in the attempt. On June 28, a bomb exploded at the headquarters of the Islamic Republican Party, killing its leader, Ayatollah Mohammad Beheshti, and several Cabinet members. On August 29, another bombing killed the newly elected President, Mohammad �Ali Raja�i, and his Prime Minister, Javad Bahonar � the man in whose home Khamene�i had hidden while living underground. A second Presidential election had to be held in October of 1981, and Khamene�i was chosen President.

The bombings of the summer of 1981 were blamed on the People�s Mujahedin, the opposition group which later became closely associated with Iraq.

Khamene�i served as President from 1981 until the death of Imam Khomeini in 1989. During most of that time he was not seen as a prominent candidate to succeed the Imam. Ayatollah Hossein �Ali Montazeri, generally conceded to be an ayatollah �ozma, was Khomeini�s own, official choice as successor until the two fell out near the end of Khomeini�s life.

After that, however, Iranian official accounts claim that Khomeini began to speak of Khamene�i as his successor, insisting that he was qualified and that, when questioned on the succession, said �you will not face a blind alley as long as Ayatollah Khamene�i is amongst you. Why are you not aware of this?� Whatever the truth, when Khomeini died on June 3, 1989, the Council of Experts � constitutionally empowered to choose the leader � met the next day and, after a 20-hour meeting, chose Khamene�i by a reported vote of 60 out of 74 members present. (That election, which surprised most of the outside world, provided the subject for the Dossier in what was only The Estimate�s sixth issue, that of June 23, 1989: �Behind the Khamene�i Coup: �Moderates� Seize the Khomeini Succession�.

The issue of whether Khamene�i�s clerical background was sufficient to make him Khomeini�s successor has simmered beneath the surface since the time of his succession to the post. Under the principle of velayat-e faqih, rule by a Faqih or Islamic jurist, Khomeini was sometimes called the vali faqih, or ruling faqih; Khamene�i is usually  simply called Rahbar, or Leader. Khomeini was regularly addressed as Imam; although some of his enthusiastic followers address Khamene�i as Imam, this is merely the honorific given to any senior religious leader; with Khomeini it sometimes implied something more.

It has been argued that the whole principal of religious leadership, and of giving a single cleric virtual veto power over acts of an elected Parliament and President, was designed with the reputation and authority of Khomeini in mind, and that other clerics just do not fit the job. As mentioned at the beginning, initially the constitution envisioned the likelihood of a collective religious leadership if there was no widespread consensus on a single candidate; the constitution was later changed to provide for one Leader.

It has been argued, too, that Khamene�i�s lack of religious expertise is in part responsible for the doubts many have about the necessity for retaining his job. His supporters insist that he is indeed a marja� and a Grand Ayatollah, but there is no consensus on this among the senior ayatollahs at Qom and elsewhere.

One reason the job has weakened somewhat is that, up until his intervention with the Majles over the press bill on August 6, Khamene�i had refrained from using his powers to the fullest. Khomeini had no such reticence; he often overruled governments, fired officials, and of course famously issued a fatwa against Salman Rushdie. Khamene�i has generally let the Council of Guardians handle the task of blocking actions of the government or Majles, and let the Expediency Council (now headed by Rafsanjani) deal with quarrels between the Guardians and the Majles.

It is not entirely clear why Khamene�i acted personally, this time, on the press issue: perhaps to make the point clearly, perhaps (some have suggested) because Rafsanjani wanted to avoid involving the Expediency Council; perhaps to avoid a constitutional battle between a reform-minded Majles and the usually conservative Guardians. And perhaps merely to remind the reformers that he is still in position, still has his job, and has the authority to make such an intervention?