The Bab and the Babi Community of Iran

Front Cover
Simon and Schuster, Nov 5, 2020 - Religion - 448 pages
In 1844, a young merchant from Shiraz called Sayyid ‘Ali-Muhammad declared himself the ‘gate’ (the Bab) to the Truth and, shortly afterwards, the initiator of a new prophetic cycle. His messianic call attracted a significant following across Iran and Iraq.

Regarded as a threat by state and religious authorities, the Babis were subject to intense persecution and the Bab himself was executed in 1850.

In this volume, leading scholars of Islam, Baha’i studies and Iranian history come together to examine the life and legacy of the Bab, from his childhood to the founding of the Baha’i faith and beyond. Among other subjects, they cover the Bab’s writings, his Qur’an commentaries, the societal conditions that underlay the Babi upheavals, the works of Babi martyr Tahirih Qurratu’l-‘Ayn, and Orientalist Edward Granville Browne’s encounters with Babi and Baha’i texts.
 

Contents

Biographies
The Bab Discontinues his Formal Education and Begins his Mercantile Work
The Babs Journey to the Sacred Shrine Cities of Iraq
After the Declaration of the Babs Cause
The Babs Return from Pilgrimage and the Events of Shiraz
The Trial of Tabriz
The Return to Chihriq Prison
Bibliography
Tafsir Works
Conclusions
Bibliography
A
The Nayrīz Upheavals of 1850 and 1853
The Tehran Episodes of 1850 and 1852
185051
THE BABISTATE CONFLICTS OF 184850

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF RELIGION AND SOCIETY
Dialectical Logic and Historical Consciousness
Conclusion
The Changing Economy
The Babi Artisans
Converts from the Government Ranks
An Assessment
LITERARY TRAJECTORIES
Esoterica the Abstruse Sciences of the Unseen ulūm alghayb
Personal Letters Scriptural Tablets Lawh pl Alwah
Devotional Writings of the
Hadith Commentary
Commentaries on Hadith Texts by the
Select Treatises Risala pl Rasail Epistles Şahifa pl Şuhuf and Other Scriptural Communications
Bibliography
THE QURÁN COMMENTARY OF THE BÁB
The Objectives of the Babis at Shaykh Tabarsi
May 1849May 1850
An Analysis of the Objectives of Vahid and the Babis in Nayriz
An Analysis of the Objectives of Hujjat and the Zanjani Babis
Bibliography
SOME OBSERVATIONS ABOUT
The Later Development of the Babi Movement
Some Further Observations on the Bahai Faiths Evolution from the Babi Movement
Conclusion
NOTES ON TWO SALIENT THEMES
Bibliography
BABIBAHAʼI BOOKS AND BELIEVERS IN E G BROWNES A YEAR AMONGST
Yazd
Conclusion
Copyright

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About the author (2020)

Fereydun Vahman is Professor Emeritus at Copenhagen University and former Iranian Studies Fellow at Yale University. He has taught and researched old Iranian religions and languages for more than forty years, and has published many books, in several languages, including 175 Years of Persecution: A History of the Babis & Baha’is of Iran, which is also published by Oneworld. He is the editor of the Religion and Society in Iran series, and co-founder and President of the Danish-Iranian Society.

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