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Ayatullah Haajj Sayyid Ali Khamenei is the son of the
late Ayatullah Sayyid Jawad Husaini Khamenei. He was born in Mashad
on the 17th of July 1939, which coincides with the 28th
of Safar 1358 Hijri Qamari (lunar year). He was the second son
of his parents, born into the house of Sayyid Jawad who lived a very
simple life, like many of the scholars of his time, and it was from
him that the family learned to live in a humble manner.
Remembering his life in his father's home Ayatullah
Khamenei says:
“My father was a well known religious scholar who was
very pious and a bit of a recluse. We had a difficult life. I remember
that sometimes at night we didn't have anything in the house for
dinner. Nevertheless my mother would try to scrape something up and
that dinner would be bread- and-raisins.”
“My father's house - the one that I was born in and
lived until about the age of four or five - was about a sixty to
seventy square meter home located in the poor area of Mashad. The
house only had one room and a gloomy basement. Whenever a guest came
to see my father - his idea was that a religious scholar's home is a
place where people come to seek help - we had to go to the basement
until they left. Some years later a group of people who were very
inclined to and friendly with my father bought a small empty lot
beside our house so that he could build onto the house, and so we
ended up with a three room house.”
The Leader of the Islamic Revolution grew up poor but
religious, and as his father was a pious and sincere religious scholar he
was trained accordingly. At the age of four, along with his older brother
Sayyid Muhammad, he was sent to an old fashioned school (Maktab) to learn
the alphabets and Qur'an. Hence the two brothers were enrolled into a
newly established Islamic school named Dar al- Ta`leem Diyanat, where the
completed their primary studies.
During his time in high school he studied the book Jam e`
al- Muqaddamaat, whereupon he began his studies in Arabic grammar. Later,
after high school, he transferred to seminary studies and was taught
Arabic grammar and other primary seminary studies by his father and other
religious scholars of the time. Reflecting upon his reason for taking this
path - the path of a religious scholar, Ayatullah Khamenei said:
“The factor which inspired me to choose the enlightened
path of a religious scholar was my father; my mother also encouraged me
(to choose this path), as she was very fond of the idea.”
Ayatullah Khamenei studied books such as Jame` al-Muqaddamaat,
Suyuti, and Mughni in the Sulayman Khan Madrasah [religious school] and
the Nawwab Madrasah in addition to his father's supervision. He also
studied the book Mu`alim while attending those schools. Later he studied
Sharai` al-Islam and Sharh Lum`ah with his father, and a part of the
second book with the late Aqah Mirza Mudarris Yazdi. He studied Rasa'el
and Makasib with the late hajj Sheikh Hashim Qazwini and the remaining
intermediate level studies jurisprudence and its principles (fiqh and usul)
with his father. In this manner he finished the intermediate level of
studies in an unprecedented of and zealous fashion within five and a half
years. Moreover, his father the late Sayyid Jawad played an important role
in the progress of his son.
In the fields of Logic and philosophy, The Grand Leader of
the Islamic Revolution, Ayatullah Khamenei, begin his studies of the
Manzumah of Sabziwari under the late Ayatullah Mirza Jawad Aqah Tehrani
and later he completed that book under the late Sheikh Ridha Aysi.
At the age of eighteen, Ayatullah Khamenei began studying
the highest level - Darsi Kharij - of jurisprudence and its principles
under the late grand Marja` Ayatullah al-Uzma Milani in Mashhad. In 1957
with the intention of visiting the majestic holy places he left for Najaf.
Upon observing the situation in Najaf and attending the lessons Darsi
kharij of the late Sayyid Muhsin Hakim, Sayyid Mahmud Shahrudi, Mirza
Baqir Zanjani, Sayyid Yahya Yazdi, and Mirza Hasan Bujnurdi he decided to
remain in the Islamic seminary of Najaf; however, his father did not
accept this decision and thus after a short period he returned to Iran.
From 1958 until 1964 Ayatullah Khamenei continued his
higher level studies in jurisprudence, and philosophy in the Islamic
seminary of Qum. There he sat at the feet of grand teachers such as the
late Ayatullah al-Uzma Burujerdi, Imam Khomeini, Sheikh Murtadha Hae'ri
Yazdi, and `Allama Tabataba'i.
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