A Babi Pamphlet

by W. A. Rice

Notes This document is a review of a 118 booklet sent to E.G. Browne. Rice does not identify the author except to say he is a prominent teacher. However, I have found the following information:

1. Shoghi Effendi’s identification of Mírzá Yaḥyá with the “son of perdition” of II Thess. 2:3 ff agrees with that of the Bahá’í poet and writer Mírzá ‘Alí ‘Ashraf of Láhíján known as ‘Andalíb. He had met the orientalist E.G. Browne in Yazd (Iran) in 1888 whom he not only encouraged to visit Bahá’u’lláh at ‘Akká but for whom he wrote a Persian tract shortly before Bahá’u’lláh’s passing in 1892. In this apologetic work ‘Andalíb applies a large number of Biblical texts to the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh and thinks it obvious that II Thess. 2:3 ff refers to the evils of Mírzá Yaḥyá. He wondered how Christian missionaries (whom he incidentally thought were the false prophets mentioned in Matt. 24:24) could fail to discern this specific prophetic allusion. Was not the evil Yaḥyá, the “man of sin”, destroyed by the “breath” (= creative word of God/Bahá’u’lláh) of his half-brother’s mouth? (refer II Thess. 2:8). So both ‘Andalíb and Shoghi Effendi maintained.
   (Antichrist-Dajjál, Lambden, BSB 1:3:7)


2. ‘Andalíb’s epistle to the great orientalist E.G. Browne (1862-1926) has, as far as I am aware, never been published; it is not clear whether Browne ever received it or whether the MSS has survived. My source of information is W.A. Rice’s article, "A Babi Pamphlet" in the Church Missionary Intelligencer (August 1902), pp. 565-573 which contains an excellent summary of ‘Andalíb’s epistle. Cf. H. Balyuzi, The Báb (Oxford 1973), p. 235, fn. 15 [My thanks to Dr. Moojan Momen for supplying me with a copy of Rice’s article].
   (Antichrist-Dajjál, Lambden, fn. 155, BSB 1:3:7)

I retained spellings as they appeared in the article. The journal edition can be found at archive.org. [B. Lyons, 2020]