The Bab Declares His Mission

In 1844, a young merchant in the Iranian city of Shiraz named Sayyid Ali Muhammad announced that he was the Bab, Arabic for "the Gate." The claim set off a religious movement that would shake Qajar Iran and later give rise to the Baha'i Faith, now a worldwide religion. Its significance lies both in the upheaval it caused in Persian society and in the new religious tradition that grew from it.

The background lay in Twelver Shia Islam, the dominant faith in Iran. Twelver Shias await the return of the Twelfth Imam, a messianic figure who they believe went into hiding in the ninth century and will return to establish justice. In the early 1840s, expectations of his appearance ran high in some circles. The Shaykhi school, founded by Shaykh Ahmad al-Ahsa'i and led after his death by Sayyid Kazim Rashti, taught that the believers should be alert for the Imam's coming. Ali Muhammad, born in Shiraz in 1819 or 1820 and raised by an uncle after his father's death, worked in trade and had some contact with Shaykhi teachers.

According to Babi and Baha'i sources, the declaration came in the evening of a day in May 1844, when Ali Muhammad spoke with a Shaykhi student named Mulla Husayn. The traditional account says he identified himself as the promised gate to divine knowledge. Because much of the detailed narrative comes from later believers, historians treat its particulars with some caution. Over the following years, the Bab's claims seem to have grown bolder, and he is generally understood to have presented himself as the bearer of a new revelation, not merely an intermediary. He wrote prolifically, most notably the Persian Bayan, which set out laws and teachings that departed from Islamic practice.

The movement spread rapidly and alarmed both the Shia clergy and the state. The Bab was arrested, imprisoned in remote fortresses in northwestern Iran, and examined by clerics in Tabriz. Meanwhile, Babi communities clashed violently with government forces in several places, including Mazandaran, Zanjan and Nayriz. In 1850 the Bab was executed by firing squad in Tabriz. After a failed attempt on the shah's life in 1852 by a few Babis, the government carried out a harsh crackdown that killed many followers and broke the movement's organization in Iran.

The Babi community survived in exile and underground. In 1863, Mirza Husayn Ali Nuri, known as Baha'u'llah, declared himself the figure whom the Bab had foretold, and most Babis eventually followed him, forming the Baha'i Faith. A smaller group, the Azalis, followed his half-brother. Today Baha'is regard the Bab as a divine messenger and herald of Baha'u'llah, and his shrine in Haifa is a major pilgrimage site.