Qom is considered holy by Shiʿa Islam, as it is the site of the shrine of Fatema Mæ'sume, sister of Imam `Ali ibn Musa Rida (Persian Imam Reza, 789-816 AD). The city is the largest center for Shiʿa scholarship in the world, and is a significant destination of pilgrimage.
Substantial sums of money in the form of alms and Islamic taxes flow into Qom to the ten marja-i taqlid or “Source of Imitation” that reside there.
In 1964-65, before his exile from Iran, the Ayatollah Khomeini led his opposition to the Pahlavi dynasty from Qom. After the Islamic revolution in 1979, Khomeini spent time in the city before and after moving to Tehran.
Qom is thus well known for its many religious seminaries and institutes that offer advanced religious studies, which made this city the largest center for Shia scholarship in the world. There are an estimated 50,000 seminarians in the city coming from 80 countries, including 6,000 from Pakistan alone. Qom has seminaries for women and some non-Shia students. Most of the seminaries teach their students modern social sciences and Western thought as well as traditional religious studies.
The death of Fātimah bint Mūsā, the sister of the eighth Imam of Shias Ali al-Ridha in the city in 201/816-17 proved to be of great importance for the later history of Qom. Fātimah bint Mūsā died while following her brother to Khorasan, a region in northern Iran. The place of her entombment developed from 256/869-70 into a building that was transformed over time into today’s magnificent and economically important sanctuary.
You see the shrine of Fãtimah in the last picture (internet) of this presentation. We were not allowed to visit it because the Muharram-month.
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