An novel new online trend is proving popular on the social media site Instagram.
Imams of Instagram has been highlighted by the BBC as featuring imams engaged in every day life in Iran – shooting hoops with schoolgirls, posing with Christmas trees to wish seasons greetings to Christians and making cups of tea.
The page's official name is @TalabehToday from the Arabic word that means "seeker of knowledge". It has grown rapidly to more than 13,300 followers. According to the BBC, a Talabeh is a seminary student who pursues religious studies and who is supposed to adopt a simple devotional lifestyle.
The account was started by a young student, Masoud Zareian, who is training to be an imam, with the aim of improving the image of Muslim clergy in Iran and showing how, in spite of many preconceptions in the West, they are highly relevant to modern life.
It is not just in the West but also in Iran that the clerics, who rose to prominence after the 1979 revolution, have faced criticism for a public face which is often one of unbridled ultra-conservatism.
Instagram was chosen for the account because of its popularity across all sections of society, and also because Twitter and Facebook are banned in Iran.
Zareian said the page reflects "a true and real picture of the social life of the clergymen of today's Iran". In an interview with a local newspaper, he added: "Many people have a wrong perception about us. I believe if we try to portray the spiritual leaders as innocent like angels, it will look a bit unreal to people. A cleric is just an ordinary person."
Pictures, most of which have received hundreds of "likes", are captioned with anecdotes about eminent religious scholars and ayatollahs.
