Khomeini's letter to Mikhail Gorbachev

Letter to Gorbachev

Ruhollah Khomeini wrote to Mikhail Gorbachev on 3 January 1989. On 7 January, Khomeini's representatives, Abdollah Javadi-Amoli, Mohammad-Javad Larijani, and Marzieh Hadidchi, went to Moscow to officially deliver the letter. Soviet officials met the Iranian delegation in the airport. Gorbachev then met with the Iranian representatives for approximately two hours, where an interpreter translated the letter for Mikhail Gorbachev and his colleagues. When some part of the letter was unclear, the interpreter asked the Iranian delegation to clarify. Gorbachev listened politely and took notes on its contents. The letter's contents were kept secret, and so Russian officials did not know it was an invitation to consider monotheism and Islam.

Content

In his letter, Khomeini congratulated Gorbachev for his bravery in dealing with the modern world, and his reconstruction of Soviet principles. He suggested Islam as an alternative to Communist ideology and recommended Muslim philosophers such as Ibn Arabi, Avicenna, and Farabi.

The letter included a prediction about the end of Marxism and the collapse of communism. Khomeini stated: "Mr. Gorbachev! It is clear to everybody that from now on communism will only have to be found in the museums of world political history, for Marxism cannot meet any of the real needs of mankind. Marxism is a materialistic ideology and materialism cannot bring humanity out of the crisis caused by a lack of belief in spirituality the prime affliction of the human society in the East and the west alike." Khomeini warned Gorbachev "against falling into the arms of Western capitalism."

Initial response

After hearing the text of the letter, Gorbachev thanked Ruhollah Khomeini for the letter and said: "I'll send an answer to this letter as soon as possible" and added "we'll deliver [Khomeini's letter] to the Soviet clergymen". Referring to Khomeini's invitation to Islam, he said: "we are approving the law of religious freedom in the Soviet Union, I have claimed before that despite having different ideologies we can have a peaceful relationship". Also, he smiled and said: "Imam Khomeini invited us to Islam; do we have to invite him to our school of thought?" Then he added: "this invitation is an interference in the internal issue of a country, because every country is free for selecting its school of thought".

After hearing Gorbachev's response, Ayatollah Amoli, the head of the Iranian representatives, thanked Gorbachev for his attention. He said: "...we appreciate the freedom of religion and hope an amicable condition for all people to live with each other as they have different schools of thought. But the issue of interfering should be clarified. You are free in Russia to do what you want and no one has right to interfere in this realm. The content of the letter did nothing with materialism and the territory of Russia; it was just related to your souls".

In February 1989, Eduard Shevardnadze, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Soviet Union, delivered Gorbachev's reply to Khomeini when he traveled to Iran.

Later reaction

In 1999, ten years after the letter was sent, Gorbachev regretted his ignoring Khomeini's letter which was sent three years before the collapse of the Soviet Union. In his interview with the IRIB News Agency in Moscow in 1999, on the anniversary of Khomeini's death, Gorbachev said: "I think Imam Khomeini’s message addressed all the ages throughout history." "When I received this message, I felt the person who wrote it was thoughtful and cared about the situation of the world. By studying the letter, I realized that he was someone who was worried about the world and wanted me to understand more about the Islamic revolution," he added.

Controversy at home

The letter became controversial with some orthodox clerics in the Iranian city of Qum who regarded the thoughts of Muslim mystics and philosophers to be heretical. In a letter to Khomeini they lamented why Khomeini needed to refer Gorbachev to "deviant," "heretical" and "Sunni" thinkers, arguing that the Quran was sufficient for supporting Islamic tenets.

Ali Khamenei's letter

Mohammad-Javad Larijani, a member of the Iranian delegation that transmitted Khomeini's letter, said: "...a message by Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei addressed to the Western youth complements a 1989 letter written by late Imam Khomeini to former Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev". He stated that Khomeini and Khamenei's letters (To the Youth in Europe and North America and To the Youth in Western Countries) invite people from the west to understand Islam.