Statements of the Supreme Leader in Meeting with Commanders and Officials of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps

In the Name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful

Dear brothers, radiant youth, and high-ranking officials of the esteemed and sacred institution of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps; welcome. I hope that Almighty God will always encompass you with His guidance, success, and assistance, and make you more steadfast day by day in the path of the lofty goals of Islam.

These days coincide with the days that, according to one narration, are the days of the martyrdom of the revered Lady Fatimah al-Zahra (peace be upon her). These occasions, if viewed with consideration, are full of lessons. The reason we sometimes emphasize and insist on aligning our current events with these occasions—despite it not being a premeditated matter; it is coincidental that your gathering coincides with these days—is because our history, blessed by the events of the first two hundred and fifty years of Islam, is full of lessons and admonitions. If viewed with an eye for lessons and teachings, it is an inexhaustible treasury of knowledge, spirit, and lessons for a person who wants to move in the path of God—the same path that those great figures traversed.

In the case of Lady Fatimah al-Zahra (peace be upon her), there are very important points; however, one point that aligns with your situation as faithful and revolutionary youth is that all these honors, great deeds, and high, unattainable spiritual ranks of that noble human and unparalleled woman in the history of mankind, and the mistress of the women of the world, and all those patience, steadfastness, and timely recognition, and the profound words that were issued from her during these times—all these great events—occurred during the short youth of this great figure. Sometimes we present this issue as a subject for lamentation and say that this great figure was young, which becomes a subject of mourning and lamentation. Sometimes we consider it as a matter worthy of reflection and containing lessons, and we look at it with this perspective; then it gains special importance.

How can a person, in the short span of life, from the beginning of childhood until the time of martyrdom—which is commonly known that this great figure was eighteen years old, and some have said up to twenty-two and twenty-four years—acquire all this knowledge and all these high spiritual ranks! This indicates an extraordinary, superhuman upbringing.

At the time when all paths of comfort were closed to Muslims and the sacred existence of the Prophet of Islam (peace be upon him and his family) in the valley of Abu Talib; no living facilities, no comfort, no peace of mind; constant concern of enemy attacks, constant bad news, the cries of children from hunger, various discomforts that existed in that dry valley, and this group of Muslim families were forced to reside for three years—and what hardships they endured, and all these hardships also originated from each of these individuals, from small to large, and rested on the shoulders of the Prophet of Islam. Because he was the leader; because everyone relied on him, all the pains were brought to him, all the pressures he felt—in such a situation full of hardship and distress and discomfort resulting from the call in the path of God and patience in His path—incidentally, during these days, Abu Talib also passes away; Lady Khadijah al-Kubra also joins the divine pleasure and meeting with God in a short time, and the Prophet is utterly alone—Fatimah al-Zahra, this young girl—now according to different narrations, five years old, six years old, seven years old, ten years old—is the only one whom the Prophet, with all his greatness, relies on. She serves her noble father like a mother, which is related to the incident of 'Fatimah, the mother of her father.'

See this greatness! A young girl, in the hardest times of distress, rushes to the aid of the greatest of humans! It is no joke. It is the same element that, over time, during youth until fifteen, sixteen, eighteen years—finally until the end of a short life—experiences all these spiritual ranks and performs all these great deeds and leaves such an impact on the history of Shi'ism and Islam and becomes a shining sun that, as long as the world exists, the shining sun of the purest Zahra will shine. All these effects stem from the life and characteristics of a young person.

See what capacity youth has! See what enthusiasm, greatness, and capacity youth has! How can one traverse the highest spiritual ranks in youth!? Once again in our time, in the very fronts that you experienced, this happened. This is why Imam once said, 'Read these wills,' for this reason. Because I myself read the wills—and even now, whenever they come to my hand, I read them—I have understood why Imam said this point. Because in these wills, sometimes there are matters that contain a world of true and pure mysticism. That is, even mystics endowed with religious sciences and apparent sciences, who naturally have more potential for ascension and growth and are consequently purer—not a mystic traveler who lacks knowledge in religious sciences—what they feel, understand, and observe after, for example, forty, fifty years of struggle, at the age of seventy, eighty, a young person acquires through sincere sacrifice in a few months. It is a strange thing! See how divine grace flows abundantly towards sincere hearts!

My dear ones! Sincerity is very important; do not forget sincerity. Whatever you do, let it be with sincerity. Sincerity means not allowing any other motivation besides the divine motivation and the pleasure of the Lord and fulfilling the divine mission and responsibility to enter the work. This is the meaning of sincerity. This sincerity has a strange blessing; it has a natural effect. One of its effects is that suddenly a terrestrial and celestial journey is created for prepared souls, and in a short period, this eighteen-year-old, twenty-year-old traverses and speaks words that when one looks at these words, one understands that these are not the words of an ordinary person. It is not possible for someone who does not see something to speak about it so clearly.

During the eight years or more, in these battlefronts, springs of knowledge, insight, and radiance opened in the hearts of these youths; they saw things, understood things, traversed ranks, ascended, and reached things that if any traveler who is knowledgeable and aware were told that if you worship and work sincerely and strive for twenty, thirty years, you will reach this point, they would go with enthusiasm and zeal. These are due to the sincere sacrificial sincerity in youth. This youth is such a precious gem and such a jewel; appreciate it.

Appreciate this youth, for purity, radiance, knowledge, conduct, ascension, and becoming divine and all these things are easily attained in youth. Just like worldly achievements that are easier to attain in youth than in old age, spiritual ranks are the same. Appreciate youth and employ it sincerely and honestly in this right path that you are moving in.

The Guard Corps is a very valuable institution. I do not want to speak about the Guard Corps after all the things that Imam Khomeini (may his soul be sanctified) said about it and what we have humbly expressed, but know that the Guard Corps is very important. The Guard Corps has a spiritual and revolutionary status; it is the offspring and child of the revolution; it is nurtured in the bosom of the revolution and has a right over the revolution; yet the relationship is reciprocal. The Guard Corps is an armed force; however, it relies on spirituality, knowledge, a sense of duty, and without allowing worldly and material motivations. These are very important.

You see political analysts and those whom you know in the world, they sit and sometimes when they are supposed to talk about the Guard Corps, they speak with such exaggerated language. Of course, it is not an exaggeration; their viewers and readers and speakers perceive it as exaggerated. We who see it up close know that what they say is part of the reality; that is, in places where there is no eye to see spirituality and they are unable to see spiritual values, yet the greatness of the Guard Corps is understood and some of this greatness is observed. This is because the brilliance of this institution and its duties and the tasks it has undertaken are numerous. Do not underestimate these and do not take them lightly.

Preserving this sacred institution is very valuable, and preserving it is also by each of you maintaining yourself on this straight path you are on, with vigilance and piety and abstinence; 'Fear God.' My dear ones! 'Fear God.' Piety also means constantly watching your movements, actions, behavior, and speech and not letting yourself go. This vigilance has many blessings. It is this vigilance that keeps a person on the straight path of God. Through piety, everything is attained. This is a Quranic matter; something that if analysts familiar with these issues sit and study it, all of it can be explained with rational arguments. Not that we want to present a matter, for example, of the unseen just like that; it is truly explainable. These have sometimes been explained in their place, and I am not in a position to explain it now.

Piety is the means by which an individual or a society succeeds in any field they enter. 'And the end is for the pious'; the end of this great historical and global journey belongs to the pious. The hereafter also belongs to the pious. The end of this world also belongs to the pious. If Imam had not been pious, he could not have displayed that character and personality throughout this struggle that would become the axis for such a great movement and lead to this point. His piety brought him here. His piety preserved him.

If in a system, the officials of the system are pious, corruption does not find its way into that system. If in a battlefield, the officials and commanders are pious—that is, this constant vigilance over oneself—it ensures that no harm occurs. Not that if the forces are unequal, the enemy will not advance—yes, they will—but this piety ensures that in times of inequality, you do what a person would do in times of equality. That is, if you do not neglect, no inappropriate action will occur, and what should be done at that time will be done, no harm will occur.

Piety—this great factor—is effective in all fields of life. You see how much the Quran talks about piety. It is not all for when you die and go to the other world, God will reward you; no, piety manages the life of this realm. The proper management of life in this realm is what builds that realm. Lack of piety causes a person to become heedless. Heedlessness throws a person to the ground.

The Commander of the Faithful compares piety to a noble, obedient horse at one's disposal, which its owner rides and guides, and the horse, without any concern, takes its owner to where it should go. Then he compares error, which is the opposite of piety, to a rebellious, unruly, and rough horse that when its owner rides it, it takes the reins from him and takes him to a place he does not want and does not intend to go; for example, it throws him to the ground.

Piety also has an effect on life matters. In this great institution and in this sacred Guard Corps—which according to Imam (may God be pleased with him) is the army of the Imam of the Age and the army of Islam—try to revive piety in all corners; piety in individual action, piety in collective action, piety in work, piety in organization, piety in politics—where it is appropriate—piety in your individual action, in relation to God, in relation to people, in relation to public funds, and in relation to work. If this happens, from all that has been arranged as the program of the revolution and the Islamic Republic system from the beginning until now, and also from what Imam Khomeini (may his soul be sanctified) has outlined and all of us, the Iranian nation, have accepted, to the chagrin of the enemy, not a needle's width will be deviated, and those programs will be carried out exactly.

Do not think that because the apparent life of Imam (may God be pleased with him) has ended, the programs have changed and the situation has become different. Some uninformed and unaware or malicious people try to create distance with various expressions. That is, they try to show that one period was the period of Imam and it ended; another period is the current period! That is, they divide the periods. No; people come and go; officials come and go and change; personalities change; but the line and path of the revolution is one path: the straight line and the straight path; the same one that the revolution outlined from the first day in all major global issues.

Thanks be to God, the officials and statesmen and those who have taken the reins of affairs are all believers, committed, and passionate about the same path that was traversed by the leadership of Imam Khomeini (may his soul be sanctified); it has been traversed since his passing until today; it will be traversed after this as well, God willing, until the end. By the blessing of piety, you will succeed in all these. What today empowers and strengthens all the active factors of this sacred system is piety.

The ill-will and sick-heartedness of our enemies direct accusations at the Islamic Republic, or they make assumptions. They cut and sew themselves: Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons! Iran is pursuing chemical weapons! The Americans have repeated these words so much that they have lost their value and credibility! They never had credibility from the beginning; but because they have repeated them so much, all ears are tired of hearing these repetitive words. They have nothing else to say; but to be able to draw some public attention to their international movements within their own country and cover up their various failures in the Palestinian issue and other places, they are forced to mention the name of the Islamic Republic and the Islamic Revolution and say something every now and then! They have repeated it so much that all these words have become discredited and repulsive.

They make accusations; but the power of the Islamic Republic is not in ballistic and intercontinental missiles and long-range and nuclear missiles. If these were the source of true power, those who have had these weapons for years should have realized all their desires in the world today; why can't they realize them? Why has America, contrary to its own will, failed in most global issues it has intervened in? Why couldn't they do what they wanted in the Palestinian issue—betray the Palestinian nation? Why did they fail? Why couldn't they eliminate the Islamic awakening that they fear so much in Islamic countries and suppress it? Why couldn't they stop the Islamic Republic from its divine growth and halt it? Why couldn't they, despite all the propaganda they have and all the money they spend, ruin the reputation of the Islamic Republic in the world? Why even now, if our country's officials and president travel to any Islamic country, will the nations welcome and express interest in a way that they will not do for any official from another country? Why do the nations love the Islamic Republic and its officials so much, and the American regime, despite all the expenses it has incurred and the propaganda it has carried out, has not been able to eliminate this love? Why do they fail? If nuclear bombs and nuclear missiles and various modern and ultra-modern weapons and long-range aircraft and other military equipment were sufficient for success and true power, today America should have realized all its objectives. Why can't it realize them? It is evident that in the world of creation, in the world of nature, in the creation of God and in the nature that God has created, these are not the effective factors; therefore, material powers, no matter what they do, are ultimately unsuccessful; 'So plot your plot and strive your effort.'

See how Zainab al-Kubra (peace be upon her), the daughter of the same Fatimah al-Zahra (peace be upon her), tells the most powerful rulers of her time, when she is a captive in the hands of that oppressive and bloodthirsty ruler: Do whatever you can, but you will not be able to remove us from the stage of history and erase our path so that humanity cannot walk this path. If material power could, they would have done it; they would have done it, these would have done it.

Today, the leaders of the occupying regime that has occupied the Islamic country of Palestine and their American supporters, who, in my opinion, support them very foolishly and unconditionally—after all, in the world of diplomacy and in the world of politics, state support for a state or for people has parallels; but for a state like America to be so at the service of the small and large goals of the Zionist state is truly a strange and astonishing scene!—their effort is to erase the name of Palestine from history and from the memory of the people, so that nothing called Palestine remains in people's minds. Have they been able to do this so far? Since the year when occupied Palestine was completely occupied in 1947, 1948 and the Zionist state came to power, until today, it has been exactly fifty years. Have they been able to do this in these fifty years? No. They will not be able to do it for another fifty years, for another hundred years. They will not be able to erase the name of Palestine. They themselves will be erased from the face of the earth and even from the memory of history; but Palestine and the Palestinian nation will remain. They have had a pleasant dream; they think that Palestine and the Palestinian nation will disappear. No; the Palestinian nation will remain, Palestine will remain, and the flag of Palestine will, by God's grace and the efforts of the Muslim youth of Palestine and Lebanon, be raised.

See how the youth of Palestine fight with faith; how these Lebanese youth fight; how this Hezbollah of Lebanon not only creates pride for Islamic resistance but also for Arab governments! This is due to the same spiritual force. There is something else, which is also the source of the power of the Islamic Republic, and that is piety, abstinence, reliance on God, persistently and sincerely and unconditionally following the path of God.

The path of God is a path full of followers. Throughout history, many have walked this path. Of course, it has difficulties; but it is not all difficulties. The path of God is the path of honor and dignity. If this path is correctly traversed, it is the path of human comfort. Nations, in the shadow of following the path of God, achieve welfare, security, peace, awareness, and knowledge. The misery of the people of the world is due to the path of God not being followed and due to the path of tyrants. In the news, they said there are twenty million orphaned or similar orphaned, miserable, displaced children and also hundreds of millions of hungry people in the world. It is the tyrants who cause humans to suffer such miseries. The path of God is the path of honor, dignity, comfort in life, and the good nurturing of pure souls. This is the path of God.

Of course, for this path to be established, men of truth and a group of people must impose some hardships on themselves. You commanders and brave guards are among those who must impose some of the hardships of this path on yourselves and stand with power. Of course, Almighty God will also help: 'And whoever fears God, He will make a way out for him'; hardship will not continue. When this path is continued with this precision, God willing, Almighty God will open the doors of relief, both for the nation, for all oppressed and downtrodden nations, and for those who struggle and work on this path.

We hope, God willing, that this new situation that has arisen in the Guard Corps will be a blessed situation for the Guard Corps and that everyone, God willing, will be able to perform their duties in the best possible way.

Peace be upon you and God's mercy and blessings