Skip to main content
Ruhollah Khomeini

Ruhollah Khomeini

1 8.8
Iranian religious and political leader who led the 1979 revolution and became Iran's supreme leader
  • proper noun
: Ruhollah Jomeini
  • Even the Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini—a Persian, not an Arab—appealed to Islam to mobilize Arabs behind his banner.
  • Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini

Examples

  • Far from emulating Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, they channeled Thomas Paine, calling for civil liberties, religious equality, and an end to Mubarak's dictatorship.

    Academic text (2011)
  • In the words of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the revolution's leader and the founding father of Iran's Islamic Republic:

    Academic text (2011)
  • In the words of Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of the Iranian Revolution, his teachings continue to influence Islamic thought today.

  • Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini became the supreme leader of Iran after the 1979 Revolution, transforming the nation into an Islamic Republic.

  • The influence of Ruhollah Khomeini on Iranian politics is evident in the policies enacted by the current leadership.

Synonyms

Khomeini
vsRuhollah Khomeini
21 7.8

Iranian religious and political leader who led the 1979 revolution and became Iran's Supreme Leader

offers more context about founding the Islamic republic and its creation
Ayatollah Khomeini
vsRuhollah Khomeini
10 8.0

An Iranian religious leader who led the 1979 revolution and became Supreme Leader of Iran

emphasizes both religious and political leadership rather than title alone
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini
vsRuhollah Khomeini
1 9.0

An Iranian religious leader who led the 1979 revolution and became the country's highest leader

is the same figure but described with the personal name only
Ruholla Khomeini
vsRuhollah Khomeini
1 7.9

An Iranian religious and political leader who founded the Islamic Republic after the 1979 revolution

uses the standard personal name spelling and highlights founding the republic

Surface Forms

Morphology

Ruhollah + Khomeini

This is a personal name made of proper nouns rather than compositional lexical items, so knowing the constituent forms (or their surface meanings) does not allow a learner to infer the biographical/political sense (Iranian revolutionary leader). Proper names function as referential labels and do not transparently encode the role or historical facts associated with the person, so the meaning is not derivable from the parts.

Etymology

The name Ruhollah Khomeini mixes a religious first name and a place-based last name. Ruhollah means 'spirit of God' and Khomeini shows he came from the town of Khomein, so his name points to both his religious role and where he was from.