BĀBĪS

BĀBĪS . Bābīs are the followers of the teaching of Sayyid ʿAlī Muḥammad, known as the "Bāb." Immediately after the Bāb's demise, the name Bābīs was applied to these people for some years; since the 1860s those Bābīs who followed Bahāʾ Allāh, became known as the "people of Bahā" or as Bahāʾī. A minority group that follows Ṣubḥ-i Azal as a successor of the Bāb is known as Azalīs.

Sayyid ʿAlĪ MuḤammad, the BĀb

Born in Shiraz on October 20, 1819, ʿAlī Muḥammad was orphaned as a young boy and subsequently raised by a maternal uncle who, as is indicated by the title Sayyid, is believed to have been a descendant of Muḥammad. ʿAlī Muḥammad earned his early living as a merchant, traveling in Iran and Iraq for his business. In 1840–1841 he visited the famous Shīʿah shrines at Karbala, Iraq, where he came in contact with Sayyid Kāẓim Rastī, the leader of the Shaykhī movement. This movement originated with Shaykh Aḥmad al-Ahsāʾī (d. 1826), whose mystical and philosophical interpretation of Islam was based on the theosophical philosophy of Mullā Ṣadrā Shīrāzī and other Muslim Gnostics, but which was also a dissent from the orthodoxy of the ʿulamāʾ. After studying Shaykhī doctrines for about eight months, ʿAlī Muḥammad returned to Shiraz. In 1842 he married, and he had one son who died as an infant. ʿAlī Muḥammad's relationship with the Shaykhīs during the next two years is not entirely clear, but he was inclined to some of the Shaykhī teachings and also to chiliastic expectations in connection with the hidden (twelfth) imām of Shīʿī Islam.

After Sayyid Kāẓim Rastī's death in December 1843, some of the Shaykh's disciples were looking for the expected Mahdi, whose appearance had been predicted for the near future. One of these disciples, Mullā Ḥusayn of Bushrūyah, met with Sayyid ʿAlī Muḥammad in Shiraz on May 22, 1844. In this encounter Sayyid ʿAlī Muḥammad presented himself as the Bāb, the "gate" to the hidden imām. Mullā Ḥusayn accepted this claim and thus was the first to recognize the Bāb as his new spiritual leader. That same night the Bāb started composing his first major literary work, a long commentary in Arabic language on the sūrah of Yūsuf in the Qurʾān (Sūrah 12), the Qayyūm al-asmaʿ. Both Bābīs and Bahāʾīs consider this commentary the first revealed work of the Bāb, making it the starting point of a new era. Some of the Shaykhīs and Shīʿī Muslims soon made up an increasing number of disciples of the Bāb, and he designated the foremost eighteen of them as Ṣurūf al Ṣayy (letter of the living), among them Mullā Ḥusayn and Qurrat al-ʿAyn.

In September 1844 the Bāb began a pilgrimage to Mecca, and he returned to Shiraz in late spring of the following year. During his pilgrimage journey he maintained the conviction that other Muslims might join his "reforming" view of Shīʿī Islam, a conviction reflected both in some khuṭbah read during his pilgrimage journey and also in letters to Muḥammad Shāh. Judging from references in the Bayān, the Bāb's central book, the pilgrimage was not a positive experience because he learned that the majority of Muslims did not agree with his views. Back in Shiraz, he was imprisoned for four months. After his release he moved to Esfahan, but in early 1847 he again was put in jail, first at the fortress of Mākhū in Azerbaijan, from where he was transferred to the castle of Chirīq in April 1848. Shortly before this move to Chirīq, the Bāb sent a letter to Mullā Shaykh ʿAlī Turshīzī, presenting himself as the long-awaited twelfth Shīʿī imām. For Bāb's followers, foremost among them the Ḥurūf al-Ḥayy, this letter marked the clear decision to dissent from the sharīʿah.

The leading Bābīs met in July in Badasht, close to the Caspian Sea. The meeting was intended to discuss the consequences of the Bāb's declaration to be the returned imām and to make plans to free him from prison. Qurrat al-ʿAyn, well versed in Shīʿī and Shaykhī thinking and a leader of the meeting, fostered a radical position regarding a total and social break with Islam. In addition to unveiling her own position, she also motivated her fellow believers to separate from Muslims, if necessary by force. After the death of Muḥammad Shāh in September 1848, some radical Bābīs hoped for the opportunity to establish a "sacred Bābī state," leading to Bābī uprisings and a "Bābī jihād" for the next five years. The Bāb remained in prison, and in 1850 he was given a death sentence. He was executed on July 9, 1850.

From the BĀbĪs to the BahĀʾĪs

The first years after the Bāb's death can be seen as a period of persecution. The Bābīs were responsible for some revolts against the Qajār government that led to an attempt to assassinate Nāṣir al-Dīn Shāh in 1852. As a consequence severe persecution of the Bābīs was renewed, and all the Ḥurūf al-Ḥayy were put to death, including Qurrat al-ʿAyn in 1853. The main centers of these Bābī revolts and Muslim persecutions were Mazandaran, Nayriz, and Zanjan. Based on the Bāb's interpretation of jihād, Bābīs displayed great heroism, but they were forced to surrender to the Qajār troops.

The Bābī community was then led by Mīrzā Yaḥyā Nūrī, called Ṣubḥ-i Azal (Morning of Eternity), the half brother of Mīrzā Ḥusayn ʿAlī Nūrī, called Bahāʾ Allāh (Baháʾuʾlláh according to Bahāʾī orthography). Because Ṣubḥ-i Azal had stayed at Nur at the time of the attack on Nāṣir al-Dīn Shāh, he escaped imprisonment, whereas his half brother Bahāʾ Allāh was jailed in Tehran in the summer of 1852. After some months Bahāʾ Allāh was exiled to Baghdad, at that time part of the Ottoman Empire, rather than Qajār, arriving there on April 8, 1853. Some months earlier Ṣubḥ-i Azal had also settled there. During the early period in Baghdad, in the vicinity of Shīʿī and Shaykhī centers like Nadjaf and Karbala, the Bābīs looked to Ṣubḥ-i Azal as the leader of the community, but tensions between him and his half brother could not be hidden any longer. The main reason for these tensions might have been the quite different characters of the men. Ṣubḥ-i Azal seemed only partly aware of the needs of his community to survive, whereas Bahāʾ Allāh reorganized the community and strengthened it in the late 1860s. From a sociological point of view, therefore, Ṣubḥ-i Azal lost his influence on the Bābīs more and more, whereas Bahāʾ Allāh gained importance as a community leader. Since 1861 the Ottoman government had pressured the Bābī movement, which ended with the exiles of Bahāʾ Allāh and Ṣubḥ-i Azal via Istanbul to Edirne. Before leaving Baghdad, Bahāʾ Allāh, in the presence of some close followers, proclaimed himself a new prophet made manifest by God, thus theologically ending, according to the Bahāʾī interpretation, the Bābī movement as an independent religion. Even though Ṣubḥ-i Azal might have known about this, he was only informed about Bahāʾ Allāh's claim to be "the one whom God shall manifest" in the so-called surāt al-amr sent by Bahāʾ Allāh to his half brother on March 10, 1866. This date marks the definitive break between the Bābī and Bahāʾī groups.

While the majority sided with Bahāʾī Allāh, a minority followed Ṣubḥ-i Azal, joining him at his exile in Cyprus, where he had been since 1868. On April 20, 1912, Ṣubḥ-i Azal died on the island, and he was buried in Famagusta, according to Muslim practice. Thus it is safe to conclude that the Bābī community on Cyprus could not prosper any longer, whereas some followers of the Bāb still live in Iran as so-called Bābī-Azalīs. During the twentieth century they showed neither further theological development nor large-scale organization, but instead turned into a more static community, preserving the writings of the Bāb and Ṣubḥ-i Azal. Thus they mainly live as a hidden minority, passing on the religious heritage through family lines, often not distinguishable amid their Muslim surroundings. Most probably there are not more than one or two thousand Bābī-Azalīs residing in Iran.

BĀbĪ Doctrines

The main source for Bābī doctrine is the Bayān (Declaration), the holy book of this religion, written by the Bāb in Persian and Arabic during his imprisonment. Though based on monotheism like Islam, the eschatological thought is changed, as "the day to come" is no more a day in the far future. Rather, anyone who lives with God can enjoy the joy of paradise in a spiritual way even in the present. The universal eschatology will start with "the one whom God will manifest." According to Bābī teaching, no precise date is given for this eschatological event, whereas Bahāʾīs take it for granted that the Bāb indicated that this would happen in the near future after his demise. On the other hand, Bābī doctrines maintain their traditional bond to Shīʿī Islam, as is the case with taqīya, the possibility of hiding one's religious thoughts or convictions in times of crisis or danger. The idea of martyrdom and warlike jihād as a means to reach salvation also remain central in Bābī thought.

The Bayān also is the foundation of Bābī religious law, thus abrogating Islamic sharīʿah. Some of the famous religious laws concern the new direction of the qiblah, no longer the Kaʿbah in Mecca but the Bāb's house in Shiraz. Another change in religious ritual law is in connection with the cultic calendar, which divides the solar year into nineteen months with nineteen days each, and four additional days. According to the Iranian solar year, the Bābī year also begins at the spring solstice. Within the new calendar, the month of fasting became fixed at the last month of the Bābī year in March.

Generally speaking, these doctrines and practices have been fixed in the various writings of the Bāb and, to a minor degree, also in the writings of Ṣubḥ-i Azal, whose "Muʾtammim-i Bayān" features as the conclusion of the Bayān, thus focusing on Ṣubḥ-i Azal's claim (against Bahāʾ Allāh) that he is the real successor of the Bāb. Further writings by Ṣubḥ-i Azal can be seen as interpretations and elaborations of the Bāb's teachings, mainly written after the split between the Bābīs and the Bahāʾīs to uphold Bābī doctrine as a religious system of its own, thus focusing on eschatology and the question of the future divine prophet.

See Also

Bahāʾīs.

Bibliography

Primary Sources

ʿAbduʾl-Bahā. A Traveller's Narrative Written to Illustrate the Episode of the Bāb. Translated by Edward G. Browne. Cambridge, U.K., 1891; reprint, Amsterdam, 1975.

Bāb, ʿAlī Muḥammad Shīrāzī. Le Béyân Arabe. Translated by Alphonse L. M. Nicolas. Paris, 1905.

Bāb, ʿAlī Muḥammad Shīrāzī. Le Béyân Persan. Translated by Alphonse L. M. Nicolas. 4 vols. Paris, 1911–1914.

Bāb, ʿAlī Muḥammad. Selections from the Writings of the Bāb. Translated by Habib Taherzadeh. Haifa, Israel, 1976.

Husain, Hamadānī. The Tārihk-i-Jadīd; or, New History of Mīrza ʿAli Muhammad, the Bāb. Translated by Edward G. Browne. Cambridge, U.K., 1893; reprint, Amsterdam, 1975.

Nabīl-i-Aʿzam. The Dawn-Breakers: Nabīl's Narrative of the Early Days of the Bahāʾī Revelation. Edited and translated by Effendi Shoghi. Wilmette, Ill., 1999.

Studies

Amanat, Abbas. Resurrection and Renewal: The Making of the Babi Movement in Iran, 1844–1850. Ithaca, N.Y., and London, 1989. Study of the historical and sociological background of the early Bābī period.

Balyuzi, Hasan M. The Bāb. Oxford, 1973. Comprehensive biography of the Bāb.

Hutter, Manfred. "Prozesse der Identitätsfindung in der Frühgeschichte der Bahāʾī-Religion: Zwischen kontinuierlichem Bewahren und deutlicher Abgrenzung." In Kontinuität und Brüche in der Religionsgeschichte, edited by Michael Stausberg, pp. 424–435. Berlin, 2001. Study of the split between the Bābī and the Muslim communities in 1848 and between the Bābī and the Bahāʾī communities in 1863–1866 from the pattern of "identity."

MacEoin, Denis. "The Babi Concept of Holy War." Religion 12 (1982): 93–129.

MacEoin, Denis. The Sources for Early Bābi Doctrine and History: A Survey. Leiden, Netherlands, 1992. Important study of partly unpublished manuscripts for Bābī history.

Stümpel, Isabel. "Ṭāhira Qurrat al-ʿAin." In Iran im 19. Jahrhundert und die Entstehung der Bahāʾī Religion, edited by Johann Christoph Bürgel and Isabel Schayani, pp. 127–143. Hildesheim, Germany, 1998. Study of the history and personality of Qurrat al-ʿAyn, focusing on her role in the shaping of the Bābī community.

Manfred Hutter (2005)