• 19 May: Mir Salah dispersed a mob sent against Hujjat by the Governor; the Governor sent to Ṭihrán for reinforcements; the town divided into two.
• 1, 13 and 16 June: Arrival of troop reinforce ments.
• 1 July: Capture of an important Bábi position.
• 25 July: Capture of an important Bábi’ position.
• 4 August: Fierce fighting ending in Bábi victory and recapture of lost positions.
• 17 August: General assault on Bábi positions repelled, but Bábi’s lost ground.
• 25 August: Arrival of ‘Aziz Khan-i-Mukri, commander-in-chief of 1ran’s army.
• 3 September: General assault ordered by ‘Aziz Khan repelled.
• 11 September: Arrival of troop reinforcements.
• early October: Bombardment and assault took several Bábi’ positions, leaving the Bábis confined to a small number of houses.
• mid-November: Arrival of further reinforcements.
• 29 December: Martyrdom of Hujjat.
• about 2 January 1851: General assault resulted in capture of remaining Bábi’ positions and killing of several hundred Bábi men and women. End of Zanjan upheaval.

The main events were:
• 27 May: Entry of Vahid into Nayriz; his address at the Jum‘ih mosque; the Governor made moves against him; Vahid ordered his companions to occupy the fort of Khájih..
• about 6 June: Arrival of Mihr-‘Ali Khan-i-Nuri with troops from Shiraz.
• about 8 June: Night sortie by Bábis routed troops.
• about 9 June: Prolonged fighting on this day led to many deaths on both sides.
• 17 June: Vahid, having received a promise of safety written on the Qur’án, left the fort for Mihr-‘Ali Khan’s camp.
• 21 June: The Bábis were, through treachery, induced to leave the fort, then set upon and killed.
• 24 June: The arrival in Shiraz of thirteen severed heads of Bábfs which were paraded through the town.
• 29 June: Martyrdom of Vahfd.
• 11 July: Mihr-‘Ali Khan arrived in Shiraz with Bábi’ prisoners and decapitated heads.

See The Story of Anis Zunuzi, a film by Houri Skuce.

She went to that garden with consummate dignity and composure. Everyone said that they were going to kill her, but she continued to cry out just as she had before, declaring, “I am that trumpet-call mentioned in the Gospel!” It was in this state that she was martyred in that garden and cast into a well. [Talk by Abdu’l-Baha Given in Budapest to the Turanian Society on 14 April 1913 (Provisional)

• October: Mirza Na‘im-i-Nuri, the new Governor, began to treat the Bábl’s harshly, arresting a large number of them and pillaging their property. In response the Bábis fled to the hills and took up defensive positions there.
• mid—October: Mirzá Na‘i’m’s troops launched major attack on the Bábl’ positions in the hills during the night but were thrown back in much confusion and with great loss of life.
• 31 October: Bábis asked to negotiate terms.
• early November: Bábis tricked into leaving their positions then attacked and over a hundred killed. Some 600 women prisoners, 80-180 male prisoners and the heads of some 180 martyrs were taken to Shiraz.

• Badí` asked Bahá'u'lláh for the honour of delivering the Tablet to the Sháh and Bahá'u'lláh bestowed it on him. [BKG297; RB3:182]
• The journey to Tehran took four months; he traveled alone. [BKG298]
• For the story of the journey see BKG297–300 and RB3:184.
• For the Tablet of Bahá'u'lláh to Badí` see BKG299 and RB3:175–176.
• Regarding the tablet to the Sháh

  “Bahá’u’lláh’s lengthiest epistle to any single sovereign” -- Lawḥ-i-Sulṭán, (the Tablet to Náṣiri’d-Dín Sháh) Of the various writings that make up the Súriy-i-Haykal, one requires particular mention. The Lawḥ-i-Sulṭán, the Tablet to Náṣiri’d-Dín Sháh, Bahá’u’lláh’s lengthiest epistle to any single sovereign, was revealed in the weeks immediately preceding His final banishment to ‘Akká. It was eventually delivered to the monarch by Badí‘, a youth of seventeen, who had entreated Bahá’u’lláh for the honour of rendering some service. His efforts won him the crown of martyrdom and immortalized his name. The Tablet contains the celebrated passage describing the circumstances in which the divine call was communicated to Bahá’u’lláh and the effect it produced. Here, too, we find His unequivocal offer to meet with the Muslim clergy, in the presence of the Sháh, and to provide whatever proofs of the new Revelation they might consider to be definitive, a test of spiritual integrity significantly failed by those who claimed to be the authoritative trustees of the message of the Qur’án. [The Universal House of Justice (Introduction to ‘The Summons of the Lord of Hosts’)]

• See Three Momentous Years in The Bahá'í World for the story of Badí.

• For further information on the Lawh-i-Dunyá see An Exposition of the Law˙-i-Dunyá (Tablet of the World) by James B. Thomas. iiiii

• 3 May: Agitation against Bahá’í’s following publication of photograph of the Bahá’í community; several Bahá’ís beaten.
• May: Mob disrupted a Bahá’í funeral, exhumed body and burned it.
• May: Renewed uproar in the town following the placing of a forged placard at the door of the local mujtahid, Haji Khumami.
• 17 May: Two leading Bahá’ís, Ibtihaju'l-Mulk and Mudabbiru’l-Mamalik, expelled from the town.

• Annie Boylan had been on pilgrimage in October of 1908. [WMSH60]

"an attack which, viewed in the perspective of history, will be acclaimed by future generations as a landmark not only in the Formative Period of the Faith but in the history of the first Bahá'í century. Indeed, the sequel to this assault may be said to have opened a new chapter in the evolution of the Faith itself, an evolution which, carrying it through the successive stages of repression, of emancipation, of recognition as an independent Revelation, and as a state religion, must lead to the establishment of the Bahá'í state and culminate in the emergence of the Bahá'í World Commonwealth. [GPB364]

"the presentation of a petition addressed by the national elected representatives of that community to the Egyptian Prime Minister, the Minister of the Interior and the Minister of Justice (supported by a similar communication addressed by the American National Spiritual Assembly to the Egyptian Government, see BW4p166), enclosing a copy of the judgment of the Court, and of their national Bahá'í constitution and by-laws, requesting them to recognize their Assembly as a body qualified to exercise the functions of an independent court and empowered to apply, in all matters affecting their personal status, the laws and ordinances revealed by the Author of their Faith--these stand out as the initial consequences of a historic pronouncement that must eventually lead to the establishment of that Faith on a basis of absolute equality with its sister religions in that land." [GPB367]

"it became a lever which the Egyptian Bahá'í community, followed later by its sister-communities, readily utilized for the purpose of asserting the independence of its Faith and of seeking for it the recognition of its government. Translated into several languages, circulated among Bahá'í communities in East and West, it gradually paved the way for the initiation of negotiations between the elected representatives of these communities and the civil authorities in Egypt, in the Holy Land, in Persia and even in the United States of America, for the purpose of securing the official recognition by these authorities of the Faith as an independent religion. " [GPB366]

Background Information

"It was in the village of Kawmu's-Sa`áyidih, in the district of Beba, of the province of Beni Suef in Upper Egypt, that, as a result of the religious fanaticism which the formation of a Bahá'í assembly had kindled in the breast of the headman of that village, and of the grave accusations made by him to both the District Police Officer and the Governor of the province--accusations which aroused the Muhammadans to such a pitch of excitement as to cause them to perpetrate shameful acts against their victims--that action was initiated by the notary of the village, in his capacity as a religious plaintiff authorized by the Ministry of Justice, against three Bahá'í residents of that village, demanding that their Muslim wives be divorced from them on the grounds that their husbands had abandoned Islám after their legal marriage as Muslims." [GPB364-365]

The wave of nationalism, so aggressive and so contagious in its effects, which has swept not only over Europe but over a large part of mankind is, indeed, the very negation of the gospel of peace and of brotherhood proclaimed by Bahá’u’lláh. The actual trend in the political world is, indeed, far from being in the direction of the Bahá’í teachings. The world is drawing nearer and nearer to a universal catastrophe which will mark the end of a bankrupt and of a fundamentally defective civilization. [LDG1p55]

• The National Spiritual Assembly of Germany and Austria was made responsible for opening Albania, Estonia, Finno—Karelia, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldavia (Moldova), Romania and White Russia (Belarus) and for consolidating Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, the Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic (S.F.S.R.), and Yugoslavia.
• The National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of lran was made responsible for opening Kirgizia (later named Kyrgyzstan), Mongolia, Tajikistan (Tadzhikistan) and Uzbekistan, and for consolidating Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, and Turkmenistan.
• The National Spiritual Assembly of the United States was responsible for opening Kazakhstan, Sakhalin, and the Ukraine. [BW20p196-197]

      The first phase, from 1941 through 1955, was a period characterized by physical danger, during which Bahá'ís were scapegoated in the interactions among the government, the clerics and the people, and experienced several bloody incidents, the culmination of which was the 1955 anti-Bahá'í campaign and its aftermaths.

      The second phase, from the late 1950s to around 1977, marked almost two decades of relative respite from physical attacks, during which Bahá'ís enjoyed more security than before, without ever being officially recognized as a religious community and while their existence as Bahá'ís was essentially ignored or denied.

      The last two years of the reign of the Shah comprised the third phase, the revival of a bloody period. [Towards a History of Iran’s Bahá'í Community During the Reign of Mohammad Reza Shah, 1941-1979 by Mina Yazdani]

In time, seven former members of the third National Spiritual Assembly were arrested and eventually executed by the government.

• Jahángír Hidáyatí, who had already attracted much hostile attention from the Islamic regime as a board member of the Bahá’í-run Nawnahálán Corporation, was arrested on June 30, 1983, and held in solitary confinement in Evin prison for eleven months, during which time he was repeatedly tortured in an effort to persuade him. to recant his faith on public television. He refused. Hidáyatí was executed on May 15, 1984. [BW19p205]
• Shápúr (Húshang) Markazí was arrested in September 1983. During the course of his imprisonment, torturers broke his ribs and damaged one eye so badly that it seriously impaired his vision. Their goal was reportedly to force him to admit to false charges implicating the Bahá’í institutions as a network involved in espionage and himself as a spy. He was executed on September 23, 1984.
• Ahmad Bashiri was arrested in July of 1983 for serving on several Local Spiritual Assemblies in different towns and eventually on the National Spiritual Assembly of Iran. He was severely tortured during his 15 months in prison and finally executed on November 1, 1984.
• Dr. Farhád Asdaqí was called to Tehran and asked to serve on the National Spiritual Assembly after the arrest of the second National Assembly. He did this until the third National Assembly was disbanded in September 1983. Dr. Asdaqí went into hiding in 1983 but was finally arrested in June 1984. He was executed on November 19, 1984 – after four months of imprisonment and torture.
• Farid Bihmardi was elected and served on the last National Spiritual Assembly of Iran. He was arrested in the streets of Tehran and was imprisoned a total of twenty-two months in Evin prison. During this period he was tortured and spent nearly 9 months in solitary confinement. He was never allowed visitors and was executed on June 10, 1986. It is believed that he was hung; however, since he was buried before his family was told of his execution, no proper examination was done to determine the cause of death. [BW20p385]
• Ardishír Akhtarí was arrested by four Revolutionary Guards from Zarbat Group at Evin on September 11, 1984 at his home. He spent over three years in prison before he was finally executed on September 28, 1987.
• Amír-Husayn Nádirí was also arrested on September 11, 1984. He was imprisoned at Evin and Gohardasht where he was tortured extensively. He was held in detention for over three years before being executed with Ardishír Akhtarí on September 28, 1987. [BW20p387 note 232; A Faith Denied: The Persecution of the Baha’is of Iran]

Since the 1920s when the Bahá'í administration was introduced in Iran they had made considerable progress.

1950     Local Spiritual Assemblies: 280        Localities: 712
1968     Local Spiritual Assemblies: 560        Localities: 1,541
1979     Local Spiritual Assemblies: 679        Localities: 1,699 

• "It (the commentary) was sent to the main daily Egyptian newspapers, all of which had published the Azhar statement under large headlines. It was also sent to some suitable senior officials, such as the Minister of Information and the Speaker of Parliament. To our knowledge no newspaper has published it. "
• "The accusations listed in the statement are mostly repetitions of previous allegations, except for its inference that the unanimous opposition of Muslims to the Bahá'í Faith is a proof of its error; an assertion implicitly invoking the tradition attributed to the Prophet Muhammad that the unanimity of the Muslim nation cannot be infallible. The importance of the statement consisted in its attempt to make the condemnation of the Bahá'í Faith a doctrinal assertion, and as a consequence, tremendous pressure was exerted by some religious deputies on the speaker of the Egyptian parliament to pass a bill which stipulated that conversion to the Bahá'í Faith was an act of apostasy punishable by death."

...the Government has recognized the Bahá'í community as a religious association with the right to spread the teachings of Bahá'u'lláh

In 2005 the Romanian Bahá'í community numbered some 7000, but in January 2007 a law was passed that had restrictive requirements for religious communities to be recognized, which Bahá'ís and other religions could not meet. Some of the restrictions include waiting twelve years from petitioning for recognition and to have over 22,000 members. [ROMANIA: Too much power for the state and recognised communities?]

• In 2002 Denis MacEoin published a review.
• See Journal of Bahá'í Studies Vol 10 No 3-4 for a review by Peter Terry.