Since its establishment, the religious regime in Iran has never been able to establish a stable and harmonious relationship between the Shiite seminaries of Qom and Najaf. There is an Iranian concern which surfaces from time to time about the Najaf seminary maintaining its traditional position on velayat-e faqih, which is considered a new opinion in Shiite doctrine. That doctrine was set by the founder of the Iranian revolution, Ayatollah Khomeini, to give his absolute rule a religious basis.
Most of the spiritual references in Qom also do not believe in velayat-e faqih, which makes the Iranian regime apprehensive about the Qom seminary. The two sides also disagree about the methods of governance. The regime's response was to place a number of Qom spiritual references under house arrest and bar them from expressing their views and ideas or continuing their teaching and religious duties.
