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Ruhollah Musavi Khomeini (17 May 1900 or 24 September 1902 – 3 June 1989) was an Iranian revolutionary, politician and religious leader. He was the founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran and the main leader of the Iranian revolution, which overthrew Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and served as the first supreme leader of Iran, the highest-ranking political and religious authority of the Islamic Republic until his death in 1989.

Born in Khomeyn, in what is now Iran's Markazi province, his father was murdered when Khomeini was two years old. He began studying the Quran and Arabic from a young age assisted by his relatives. Khomeini became a high ranking cleric in Twelver Shi'ism, an ayatollah, a marja' ("source of emulation"), a mujtahid or faqīh (an expert in fiqh), and author of more than 40 books. His opposition to the White Revolution resulted in his state-sponsored expulsion to Bursa in 1964. Nearly a year later, he moved to Najaf, where speeches he gave outlining his religiopolitical theory of Guardianship of the Jurist were compiled into Islamic Government.

Khomeini was Time magazine's Man of the Year in 1979 for his international influence and in the next decade was described as the "virtual face of Shia Islam in Western popular culture", where he was known for his support of the hostage takers during the Iran hostage crisis, his fatwa calling for the murder of British Indian novelist Salman Rushdie for Rushdie's description of Islamic prophet Muhammad in his novel The Satanic Verses, which Khomeini considered blasphemous, pursuing the overthrow of Saddam Hussein the Iran–Iraq War, and for referring to the United States as the "Great Satan" and Israel as the "Little Satan".

The subject of a pervasive cult of personality, Khomeini is officially known as Imam Khomeini inside Iran and by his supporters internationally. His state funeral was attended by up to 10 million people, or one fifth of Iran's population, one of the largest funerals and human gatherings in history. In Iran, he is legally considered "inviolable" -- insulting him is punishable with imprisonment; his gold-domed tomb in Tehran's Behesht-e Zahra cemetery has become a shrine for his adherents. His supporters view him as a champion of Islamic revival, independence, and anti-imperialism, and resistance to foreign influence in Iran. Critics have criticised him for anti-Western and anti-Semitic rhetoric, anti-democratic actions, and human rights violations including the 1988 execution of thousands of Iranian political prisoners, as well as for using child soldiers extensively during the Iran–Iraq War for human wave attacks.