“One thing I have learned in a long life: that all our science, measured against reality, is primitive and childlike – and yet it is the most precious thing we have.”’
He didn’t explain the quotation, but told them about the theory of relativity, or at least as much of it as he himself understood. ‘Let’s suppose we have a plane that can fly 300,000 kilometres a second and that it’s parked up on the roof of the mosque, waiting for passengers. Let’s also suppose that we divide the passengers into two groups: one with boys and one with girls between the ages of twelve and fifteen. The girls are asked to stay here in the mosque and the boys are sent up to the roof as passengers.
‘The pilot revs the engines, the plane takes off and the boys are hurled into space. Don’t forget that the plane is flying at the speed of light. Listen carefully now. The boys fly for three hours, then come back and land on the roof of the mosque. According to their watches they’ve been in the air for three hours. The boys get out of the plane, walk down the stairs and go into the prayer room. They pull back the curtain between the men’s and women’s section and can’t believe their eyes. The girls have turned into old women, into toothless hags!’
His listeners stared at each other in puzzlement and disbelief. How could the girls have aged so much in the three hours the boys were gone?
‘Relativity,’ Khalkhal explained. ‘The relative speed of light. A different logic applies when you travel at the speed of light. That’s why I chose that quotation. Traces of God are everywhere. Power upon power, light upon light.’
Meanwhile, Khalkhal’s fame had spread throughout the city. He was especially popular with the young people, and the women doted on him.
Even though he was married, he was surrounded by veiled women who slipped him love letters as he strode through the mosque’s dark corridors. He tucked the letters into his robe without so much as a backward glance.
‘You’re a handsome imam,’ said one woman, when she chanced upon him alone in the corridor.
‘I want to fly into space in Einstein’s aeroplane with you,’ said another in passing.
‘You smell so good. Where do you buy your cologne?’ asked a young woman from out of the darkness, making sure to keep her face concealed.
‘You look so handsome when you wear your turban at an angle,’ whispered another.
The curtain separating the men’s and women’s sections ran down the entire length of the prayer room. The pulpit was on a platform between the two. The young women usually sat in the first few rows so they could get a better look at Khalkhal. He revelled in their attention.
Khalkhal waited patiently for the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad, when he would be able to make his true feelings known. According to custom, that’s when issues of vital importance were discussed. It was no coincidence that much of the protest in the holy city of Qom had taken place on the Prophet’s birthday. Everyone was curious to know what Khalkhal was going to say on that day.
Khalkhal entered the prayer room on the Prophet’s birthday escorted by Aqa Jaan and Shahbal. He sat down in his chair and, after a brief silence, began to recite the melodious Earthquake surah:
Edha zolzelati alarzo zelzaalaha . . .
When the earth is shaken to its foundations,
And people are like scattered moths,
And the mountains are like carded wool,
You will ask: what is wrong with it?
On that day it will declare its tidings.
The tone of Khalkhal’s voice had changed. His words sounded more powerful than ever.
The mosque was filled to overflowing and everyone was listening intently to his words. ‘Imam Alsaberi has left us,’ Khalkhal said, ‘but the mosque has remained. One day all of us will pass away, but the mosque will remain.
‘Is that true? Will the mosque be here for ever? No, not even the mosque will be here for ever. Imams come and go, mosques come and go, but the voice remains.’
The men exchanged puzzled glances. Aqa Jaan and Shahbal looked at each other: ‘The voice remains? What does that mean?’
But Khalkhal was right, Aqa Jaan thought. Alsaberi had been forgotten and none of his words had remained, because he’d had nothing to say. Alsaberi’s father had been different. He’d been a remarkable imam who’d given fiery speeches, a man who wanted to make things happen, to change things. A man who dared to call a spade a spade. During his time as imam, he’d had the city in the palm of his hand. With one small gesture he’d been able to stir the bazaar to action. Alsaberi’s father had been dead for decades, but his voice remained. His voice lived on in the city’s memory.
He’d once preached a fiery sermon on the Prophet’s birthday against Reza Khan, the father of the present shah. Reza Khan had outlawed chadors and had ordered his soldiers to stop any veiled woman they saw on the streets and take her down to the police station. Alsaberi’s father had been arrested and banished to the city of Kashan. After that the secret police had boarded up the doors of the mosque.
Aqa Jaan remembered the arrest as though it had been yesterday. Several military vehicles had pulled up to the mosque, and armed soldiers had leapt out. Then an officer arrived in a jeep. Tucking his baton under his arm, he got out and strode into the prayer room with his shoes on, intending to arrest the elderly imam and haul him off to jail.
Aqa Jaan, then a young man who had only just been put in charge of the mosque, calmly went up to the officer and said, ‘If you leave the mosque now, the imam will come out by himself and go with you quietly. If you don’t, I’m afraid you’ll have a riot on your hands. Consider yourself warned.’
He said it so clearly and firmly that there was no room for doubt. The officer looked at the worshippers, who had formed a circle around the imam. He got the message. ‘Bring me the imam,’ he said, poking his baton in Aqa Jaan’s chest. ‘I’ll wait outside.’ He stalked out of the prayer room and waited by the gate.
Aqa Jaan, his head held high, escorted the imam to the jeep, followed by dozens of worshippers. The officer waited for the imam to get in, then he himself slid behind the wheel.
Meanwhile, the soldiers ordered everyone to leave the mosque and proceeded to board up the doors.
Not until three years later, when the British forced Reza Khan to leave the country and go into exile in Egypt, did the mosque open its doors again.
Aqa Jaan smiled and waited anxiously to hear what Khalkhal would say next. But Khalkhal sat there in silence, staring at his audience. Suddenly he uttered a single word, totally unconnected to what he had been talking about before: ‘America!’
It was as if he’d hurled a rock into the hushed audience. There were gasps on both sides of the curtain, because it was forbidden to talk about America in the mosque. The word itself was fraught with political overtones. The ayatollahs didn’t see America as the rest of the world did. America was evil. America was the enemy of Islam.
The young shah had been about to flee the country – thereby ending 2,500 years of monarchy – when a CIA-backed coup had restored him to his throne. Since then the ayatollahs had referred
