Representation of the West in Discourse of Revived Islam

Imam Khomeini led the Islamic Revolution of Iran, which left widespread impacts on the Islamic Middle East and the World of Islam. In the discourse of revived Islam, whose formation he helped and within whose framework he spoke, West is represented and in fact otherized in a unique method and its essential differences with the East and Islam are specified. Attempts have been made in the present paper to describe the way of representation of the West by studying the viewpoints of Imam Khomeini and Ayatollah Motahari. In this discourse, attention to the West and its otherization is replaced with self-improvement and self-knowledge, particularly in the viewpoints of Imam Khomeini. He is not seeking a dialogue with the political and epistemological theory of the West, rather he is after conceptualization of the idea of self-improvement.