Jun

8

Let's move the focus from theology to money. The mullahs in Iran have an economic position similar to the reach and scope of the Catholic Church in pre-Reformation Europe. The various religious communities in Iran own a third of the real estate in the country; the thousands of churches, shrines and monasteries held roughly the same share of land.

Like the Church institutions in medieval Europe the 70,000 mosques, shrines, and religious schools in Iran pay no taxes and have their own armies. The situation in Europe was moderated by the pledge of celibacy of the clergy. Those outside the church could hope to have their children find places in the church much as Americans have, in the past, hoped to have their children become members of the academic and licensed professions (teaching, law, and medicine).

Martin Luther was able to appeal for a reformation because it was widely perceived that the church had failed to keep its part of the bargain that, instead of leaving places open to "outsiders", members of the church were reserving them for their own families and relatives. In Iran, at present, according to James Dunnigan, "the families of clergy have a monopoly on jobs and business decisions within the religious portion of the economy. All those assets are there to serve, first and foremost, the clergy and their families."

One can view the overthrow of the Shah as being the inverse of Henry VIII's disestablishment of the Catholic Church. In 1979 the clergy overturned the government's control and then seized the assets of the wealthy and, of course, the Jews and Baha'i — all in the name of the faith.


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