Pars Today

Welcome to the program. This time we are going to discuss the issue of culture with references to the words and statements of the Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei.

Culture means the habits, traditions, customs and values of a nation or ethnicity. Culture molds and shapes the identity of a nation. Ayatollah Khamenei maintains that “Reforming of culture is more important than every other affair because this is the axis of all other affairs.”

He believes that culture is much more important than economy and politics since it precedes them. The Leader expects the officials to find ways for promotion of people’s culture and ethics. He likens culture to the air we breathe. He stresses, “Culture means the air that we inhale. You inhale the air inevitably want it or not. If this air is clean it will have effects in your body. If it is unclean it will have other effects. If poisonous air is injected somewhere the effect that is seen in the organs will be the result of the poison that is in this air. If the environment is narcotized by smoke or a narcotic when you inhale it your behavior will comply with what you have inhaled. Culture has such a feature. Do not underestimate culture. It is very important.”

No doubt, any evil act will have negative impact on the individuals of society and will lead to a cultural decadence. Corruption, fraudulent acts, sins and violation of law are like poisonous food that will have improper effect on the individuals and plunge human beings in its natural reactions. For instance, telling lies will destroy confidence. Betrayal of trusts will disturb social relations. Injustice will set the ground for other injustices. Abusing freedom will lead to dictatorship. Usurping the rights of the deprived will cause rancour and enmity and accumulation of enmities will shake the foundations of society. Emergence of carnal desires will push the society toward debauchery. In the view of the Leader, “If the cultural bases are to be reinforced the main condition is to consolidate the people’s faith in the religion and their own cultural legacies day by day and not weaken it.”

That promotion of faith will cause promotion of culture is a clear reality for a religious person is more committed to moralities. In his view lying, treason, breaking promises and many other improper conducts will distance the individual from God. Therefore, he abstains from sins and evil deeds to draw the divine satisfaction. That’s why Ayatollah Khamenei emphasizes on cultural promotion as a significant factor, saying, “Religion and faith are the support of all humane values.”

To promote religion and faith of a nation it is not enough to engage in superficial and transient activities. This requires adequate attention and expertise.

The Leader of the Islamic Revolution presents an interesting suggestion. He states, “Regarding the importance of the reality which is called the culture of society and considering that if we do not engineer and safeguard this set of cultural structure; various factors affecting culture have not sworn not to do anything since we do not do anything. No, they will have their impact and do their job. What is our duty as the officials of the Islamic Republic? One of our most important duties in the first place is the engineering of the country’s culture. It means to determine how the national culture, public culture and the great internal, developing and quality-inspiring move should be which is called culture and comes to existence inside human beings and society. What is the target culture? What are its defects and shortcomings? How should they be removed? What is the existing culture? Where are its hindrances and conflicts? A system is needed to depict these things and then, as a hand, protect this culture.”

In the cultural engineering, what is meant by the Leader is that the government must present a comprehensive plan for cultural promotion in its different dimensions. Ayatollah Khamenei stresses, “Among the things that the cultural officials of government should very much be engaged in and not leave a single minute is that they should give a ‘value orientation’ to the public culture of society and cultural tools and means. Because many efforts have been made so that the cultural currents and factors- art, literature, poetry, cinema and so on- move in the non-value direction. You must help and make your utmost effort to make the cultural moves of the country march in the direction of values.”

The Leader of the Islamic Revolution is of the opinion that in preparing the map of cultural engineering we should first see what we are going to do. He elaborates, “These setting of goals are very important. This shouldn’t be neglected. What do we want to do with people’s ethics and culture? Can we, as the Islamic government, abandon the cultural guidance of our own society? Definitely not, this is one of our duties. As much as we can we should open the path of people’s guidance and guide them.”

Clarifying the issue of guiding the people, the Leader says, “One of the tools of guidance of people is the IRIB and there are many other examples. One example is the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance. One example is the Ministry of Science. One example is the Ministry of Education. These are all guiding service establishments. How do we use them? We should move in a way that people are trained to be religious, act religiously, believe in religious principles, be practically committed. Our orientation should be this in all fields. Regarding the Ministry of Culture, there is the issue of book, the issue of visual arts, the issue of various audio and visual arts. In all of these orientations our direction must be this that people will move toward religion and God.”

Ayatollah Khamenei has proposed a set of priorities to the government. He has repeatedly said to the cultural officials, “One should not be content with superficial works. Pay attention to deeper works, more basic works, and the works that are the source of scores of other works. Once I gave a copy of those deep works to the president. As for culture it should be paid much attention not to help the aggressive culture. The aggressive culture is dangerous. If we cannot preserve the country’s public culture and the culture that guides the elites, people and various strata toward a goal against the enemy’s harm, it will be very difficult. Whatever you decide they will come and destroy it and it will be depicted otherwise.”    

RM/MG