# Mihdi, Mirza

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> Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Shahriar Razavi, Mihdi, Mirza, bahai-library.com.
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> 
> Mihdí, Mírzá (1848–70)
> Son of Bahá’u’lláh, who entitled him "the Purest Branch" (Ghusnu’lláhu’l-Athar);
> younger brother of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and Bahíyyih Khánum.
> 
> ARTICLE OUTLINE:                                      LIFE
> Life                                             Mírzá Mihdí was the youngest of three surviving
> Death and Burial                                 children of Bahá’u’lláh and His wife Ásíyih
> Station                                          Khánum, who is generally known by the title
> Reinterment                                      Navváb (Highness). Mírzá Mihdí was born in 1848
> in the family’s rented house near the Shemiran
> ARTICLE RESOURCES:
> Gate (Darvázih Shimrán) in northern Tehran. He
> Notes                                            was named after Mihdí, Bahá’u’lláh’s elder full
> Other Sources and Related Reading                brother, who was dear to Him and who had
> recently died. In later years Bahá’u’lláh gave Mírzá
> Mihdí the title "the Purest Branch."
> 
> Mírzá Mihdí was four years old when Bahá’u’lláh was imprisoned with a number of other Bábís in the
> Siyáh-Chál (Black Pit) dungeon in Tehran in August 1852 and the family’s possessions were plundered
> and seized. Four months later, Bahá’u’lláh was released and then banished for life from Iran. He chose
> to go to Baghdad, the capital of the Ottoman province of Iraq. On 12 January 1853 He and His family
> left Tehran on the first stage of their exile. Mírzá Mihdí, who was unwell at the time and unfit to
> undertake three months of hard travel across the Iranian Plateau and the Zagros Mountains in severe
> winter weather, had to be left behind in the care of relatives. 1 He was not reunited with his parents
> until 1860, after Bahá’u’lláh’s return from the mountains of Sulaymaniyah, where He lived in seclusion
> for two years. Mírzá Mihdí, then twelve, joined his parents in Baghdad, and the family remained there
> for another three years, until April 1863.
> 
> Mírzá Mihdí accompanied Bahá’u’lláh in His successive exiles to
> Istanbul, Edirne, and, finally, to the penal colony of Acre in
> Ottoman Palestine (See: Bahá’í World Center.Early
> Development). The band of exiles—numbering close to seventy—
> arrived in Acre on 31 August 1868. They were confined to the
> prison barracks under harsh conditions, enduring the rigors of
> malnutrition, disease, and lack of potable water. They also
> suffered extreme isolation; the strict terms of their
> imprisonment limited contact among themselves and with the
> local population. For the first time since Bahá’u’lláh’s banishment
> from Iran in 1853, He was totally inaccessible to those who
> sought His presence. Followers who made the arduous journey
> from Iran often had to return without having seen Him. Some,
> standing beyond the moat that encircles the city and looking at
> the barracks from a great distance, were able to catch "a
> fleeting glimpse" of His face in the window of His cell. If they
> managed to enter the prison city, they were able at best to
> catch sight of Him among the crowds at the public bath, where
> Mírzá Mihdí and ‘Abdu’l- Bahá were brothers. Haifa,
> the prisoners were taken weekly to bathe.2                            Israel. © Bahá’í International Community. Bahá’í
> Media bank
> Despite his youth, Mírzá Mihdí was accustomed to hardship and
> was recognized as "a pillar of strength" among the exiles during the difficult period after their departure
> from Baghdad.3 He resembled ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in appearance and character and was noted for his piety,
> gentleness, dignity, courtesy, and patience. Throughout his brief adult life, Mírzá Mihdí was Bahá’u’lláh’s
> companion and served as one of His secretaries, recording the sacred texts (tablets) that He revealed.
> Many such manuscripts in Mírzá Mihdí’s excellent handwriting are extant.
> 
> DEATH AND BURIAL
> One summer evening in 1870, while pacing on the prison rooftop, as was his custom, Mírzá Mihdí was
> so deep in prayer and meditation that he failed to note a familiar hazard. He plunged through an open
> skylight to the floor below, falling on a wooden crate that pierced his chest and caused severe bleeding.
> An Italian physician was called to the prison, but Mírzá Mihdí died the next day, 23 June. During the
> hours when he lay dying, he expressed to Bahá’u’lláh a final wish: that his death might be accepted as
> a sacrifice so that the restrictions of confinement might be eased, allowing the followers of Bahá’u’lláh
> who sought to visit Him the opportunity to attain His presence.
> 
> While ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, grief-stricken, kept watch outside a tent pitched in the prison courtyard, Mírzá
> Mihdí’s body was washed, shrouded, and prepared for interment by Shaykh Mahmúd ‘Arrábí, a
> prominent resident of Acre who had become a follower of Bahá’u’lláh. Lacking the means to buy a
> coffin, Bahá’u’lláh obtained the money by having a rug from His own room sold. Mírzá Mihdí’s coffin,
> escorted by fortress guards, was carried beyond the city walls and buried in an Arab cemetery adjacent
> to the shrine of Nabí Sálih, traditionally considered the burial place of a prophet mentioned in the
> Qur’an.
> 
> Around the time of Mírzá Mihdí’s burial, an earthquake shook the
> region—strong enough to be felt thirty-five kilometers (21.8
> miles) away in Nazareth, where it was noted by the Bahá’í
> historian Nabíl, who was staying there at the time. Bahá’u’lláh
> refers to the earthquake in a passage addressed to His dead
> son, stating, "When thou wast laid to rest in the earth, the
> earth itself trembled in its longing to meet thee." 4
> 
> Four months after Mírzá Mihdí’s death, his dying wish—that the
> way be cleared for those seeking to visit his father—was
> realized. The exiles were released from the barracks and allowed
> to take up residence in the town of Acre, where it was possible
> for them to receive visitors.
> 
> The loss of Mírzá Mihdí was a source of intense anguish for
> Bahá’u’lláh and His family. One of their companions recalled
> hearing Bahá’u’lláh lament "Mihdí! O Mihdí!" as His son’s life
> ebbed away.5 On the day of Mírzá Mihdí’s death, Bahá’u’lláh
> wrote: "Glorified art Thou, O Lord, my God! . . . Thou seest me
> in the hands of Mine enemies, and My son blood-stained before
> Thy face, O Thou in Whose hands is the kingdom of all names. I
> have, O my Lord, offered up that which Thou hast given Me,
> that Thy servants may be quickened and all that dwell on earth
> The skylight of the prison area, now restored, where   be united."6 Bahá’u’lláh is reported to have comforted a grieving
> Mírzá Mihdí fell. Acre, 2004. Photographer: Nancy      and disconsolate Navváb by repeating the assurance that God
> Wong. © Bahá’í International Community. Bahá’í
> Media Bank                                             had accepted their son as His ransom.7
> STATION
> Shoghi Effendi states that Bahá’u’lláh exalted the death of Mírzá Mihdí "to the rank of those great acts
> of atonement associated with Abraham’s intended sacrifice of His son, with the crucifixion of Jesus
> Christ and the martyrdom of the Imám Husayn." 8
> 
> Bahá’u’lláh referred to Mírzá Mihdí on the day of his death as
> "he that was created by the light of Bahá" and described his
> dying "at a time when he lay imprisoned at the hands of his
> enemies" as a "martyrdom." In the same tablet, Bahá’u’lláh
> extols Mírzá Mihdí’s station: "Happy art thou in that thou hast
> been faithful to the Covenant of God and His Testament, until
> Thou didst sacrifice thyself before the face of thy Lord, the
> Almighty, the Unconstrained. Thou, in truth, hast been wronged,
> and to this testifieth the Beauty of Him, the Self-Subsisting.
> Thou didst, in the first days of thy life, bear that which hath
> caused all things to groan, and made every pillar to tremble.
> Happy is the one that remembereth thee, and draweth nigh,
> through thee, unto God, the Creator of the Morn." 9
> 
> In another tablet, Bahá’u’lláh states: "Blessed art thou, . . . and
> blessed he that turneth unto thee, and visiteth thy grave, and
> draweth nigh, through thee, unto God, the Lord of all that was
> and shall be . . . I testify that thou didst return in meekness
> unto thine abode. Great is thy blessedness and the blessedness        Mírzá Mihdí, Akká, Israel. © Bahá’í International
> Community. Bahá’í Media Bank
> of them that hold fast unto the hem of thy outspread robe . . .
> Thou art, verily, the trust of God and His treasure in this land. Erelong will God reveal through thee
> that which He hath desired." 10
> 
> REINTERMENT
> In December 1939—despite obstacles caused by the outbreak of World War II, local instability, riots,
> and the opposition of adversaries—Shoghi Effendi succeeded in transferring the remains of Mírzá Mihdí
> and Navváb from two different Muslim cemeteries in Acre to Mount Carmel in Haifa. On 24 December
> 1939 the coffins lay in state in the Shrine of the Báb. The following day, they were buried in the
> monument gardens near the Shrine of the Báb, alongside the resting place of Bahíyyih Khánum, Mírzá
> Mihdí’s sister, who died in Haifa in 1932.
> 
> Shoghi Effendi himself was among the bearers who carried the coffins of his great-grandmother and
> granduncle from the Shrine of the Báb to their final resting places, easing each into place in turn and
> scattering flowers upon them. After the tombs were sealed, Shoghi Effendi recited prayers that
> Bahá’u’lláh had revealed to be read at their grave sites.
> 
> Of the significance of the reinterments Shoghi Effendi writes:
> 
> The conjunction of these three resting-places, under the shadow of the Báb’s own
> Tomb, embosomed in the heart of Carmel, facing the snow-white city across the bay
> of ‘Akká [Acre], the Qiblih of the Bahá’í world, set in a garden of exquisite beauty,
> reinforces, if we would correctly estimate its significance, the spiritual potencies of a
> spot, designated by Bahá’u’lláh Himself the seat of God’s throne. It marks, too, a
> further milestone in the road leading eventually to the establishment of that
> permanent world Administrative Center of the future Bahá’í Commonwealth, destined
> never to be separated from, and to function in the proximity of, the Spiritual Center
> of that Faith, in a land already revered and held sacred alike by the adherents of
> three of the world’s outstanding religious systems. 11
> 
> Further, Shoghi Effendi identifies the precincts of these three
> resting places as the "focal center" of the administrative
> institutions at the Bahá’í World Center: "the conjunction of the
> resting-place of the Greatest Holy Leaf with those of her brother
> and mother incalculably reinforces the spiritual potencies of that
> consecrated Spot which . . . is destined to evolve into the focal
> center of those world-shaking, world-embracing, world-directing
> administrative institutions, ordained by Bahá’u’lláh and
> anticipated by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. . . ."12
> 
> Author: Shahriar Razavi
> 
> © 2009 National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States.
> Terms of Use.
> Resting places of The Purest Branch (Mírzá Mihdí) and
> Navváb, the wife of Bahá'u'lláh, in the Monument
> Gardens on Mount Carmel. Haifa, Israel. 1990s. ©
> Bahá’í International Community. Bahá’í Media Bank
> 
> Notes:
> 1. Various accounts indicate that Mírzá Mihdí was left in Tehran in the care of his maternal grandmother
> (see David S. Ruhe, Robe of Light: The Persian Years of the Supreme Prophet Bahá’u’lláh, 1817–1853
> [Oxford: George Ronald, 1994] 165); his maternal great-grandmother (See Lady [Sara Louisa] Blomfield,
> The Chosen Highway [1940; Oxford: George Ronald, 2007] 45); his paternal aunt, Hadrat-i-Ukht, identified
> as Sárih Khánum by H. M. Balyuzi (Bahá’u’lláh: The King of Glory, 2nd rev. ed. [Oxford: George Ronald,
> 1991] 13) (See Zikrullah Khadem, "The Purest Branch and the New Order," Payám-i-Bahá’í 79 (June
> 1986): 11); and "relatives" (See H. M. Balyuzi, Bahá’u’lláh: The King of Glory 102). The Research
> Department of the Universal House of Justice, which has no definitive information on the topic, suggests
> that it is possible that more than one relative may have cared for Mírzá Mihdí over the seven years before
> he rejoined his parents in Baghdad.
> 2. Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, new ed. (Wilmette, IL, USA: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1974, 2004
> printing) 187.
> 3. H. M. Balyuzi, Bahá’u’lláh: The King of Glory 314.
> 4. Bahá’u’lláh quoted in Shoghi Effendi, This Decisive Hour: Messages from Shoghi Effendi to the North
> American Bahá’ís, 1932–1946 (Wilmette, IL, USA: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 2002) 64.12: 47.
> 5. Bahá’u’lláh quoted in Balyuzi, Bahá’u’lláh: The King of Glory 311.
> 6. Bahá’u’lláh quoted in Shoghi Effendi, This Decisive Hour 64.11: 47.
> 7. "Transfer of the Remains of the Brother and Mother of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to Mt. Carmel," The Bahá’í World,
> vol. 8: 1938–40 (Wilmette, IL, USA: Bahá’í Publishing Committee, 1942) 256.
> 8. Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By 188.
> 9. Bahá’u’lláh quoted in Shoghi Effendi, This Decisive Hour 64.9–10: 46–47.
> 10. Bahá’u’lláh quoted in Shoghi Effendi, This Decisive Hour 64.12: 47.
> 11. Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By 348.
> 12. Shoghi Effendi, This Decisive Hour 64.6: 46 (also in "Transfer of the Remains" 245).
> 
> Understanding the Citations
> Citing Bahá’í Encyclopedia Project Articles
> Other Sources and Related Reading:
> See Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By 188–89; Adib Taherzadeh, The Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh, vol. 3: ‘Akká,
> The Early Years, 1868–77 (Oxford: George Ronald, 1983) 204–16; David S. Ruhe, Robe of Light 165;
> David S. Ruhe, Door of Hope: The Bahá’í Faith in the Holy Land, 2nd rev. ed. (Oxford: George Ronald,
> 2001) 31–33, 159–62. The main source of information regarding the death and reinterment of Mírzá Mihdí
> is "Transfer of the Remains of the Brother and Mother of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to Mt. Carmel" in The Bahá’í World,
> vol. 8: 245–58, which includes communications from Shoghi Effendi and a personal account by his wife,
> Rúhíyyih Khánum. See also Rúhíyyih Rabbani, The Priceless Pearl, 2nd ed. (Oakham, U.K.: Bahá’í
> Publishing, 2000) 259–63. Additional information is found in "The Centenary of the Passing of Mírzá Mihdí,"
> in The Bahá’í World, vol. 15: 1968–73 (Haifa: Bahá’í World Centre, 1976) 158–63. For the message from
> the Universal House of Justice regarding the commemoration of the centenary of the passing of Mírzá Mihdí,
> see Universal House of Justice, Messages from the Universal House of Justice, 1963–1986: The Third Epoch
> of the Formative Age (Wilmette, IL, USA: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1996) 80: 168–69.
> Persian sources include Zikrullah Khadem, "The Purest Branch and the New Order," Payám-i-Bahá’í 79
> (June 1986): 11–15, and 80–81 (July–Aug. 1986): 13–17; and Riyád Qadímí, Jamál-i-Abhá (The Glorious
> Beauty) (New Delhi: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1986) 112–15.
> Information in response to the editors’ queries concerning Mírzá Mihdí’s early life was provided by the
> Research Department of the Universal House of Justice, "Year of Mírzá Mihdí’s birth and the identity of the
> relative who cared for him after Bahá’u’lláh’s exile to Baghdád," memorandum to the Universal House of
> Justice, 8 May 2003.
> 
> Understanding the Citations
> Citing Bahá’í Encyclopedia Project Articles
>
> — *Mihdi, Mirza (Used by permission of the curator)*