As president of the country, I had certain authority and facilities, but this humble elderly man and woman [my elderly parents] did not expect the least from me; they did not expect their son, for instance, to repair their house or exchange it for a better one because he was the president. My father lived in this modest home up until 1986 and my mother till the end of my presidency, but the house was not altered one bit towards becoming an improved living facility. This is a source of honor and pride for the Islamic Republic.
Of course, the nobleness of this act has nothing to do with me; it was these two magnanimous individuals who were indeed pious, in the real sense of the word, and had no interest in the apparent beauties of this world. They did not care where and how they lived. When my father passed away, his entire estate—apart from his books which were a separate collection—was sold for about 45,000 tomans [about 90 dollars at that time]. With that money one could not afford to buy something like a refrigerator or a stove; this is while he was a distinguished prayer leader in Mashhad and a well-known clergyman with plenty of admirers and enthusiasts!
This is how our forebears lived.
July 4, 1996
*Ayatollah Sayyid Jawad Hosseini Khamenei, the noble father of the Supreme Leader passed away at the age of 91, on July 06, 1986.
