Iran: Province of Khamsih (Zanjan)
Exported from Holy-Writings.com on 2026-06-22 - 1 clipping

Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Moojan Momen, Iran: Province of Khamsih (Zanjan), bahai-library.com.
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

Iran: Province of Khamsih (Zanján)

Moojan Momen

1994

The province of Khamsih has as its provincial capital the town of
Zanján. It is on the road between Tehran and Tabriz and is an important
agricultural and mining area. The area is populated by a mixture of Ádharí
Turks and Persians, predominantly Shi`is.
Zanján had very strong Bábí populations from the
very earliest stages of Bábí history. As soon as news of
the Báb reached him, Mullá Muhammad-`Alí Hujjat-i-Zanjání
(see "Hujjat-i-Zanjání"), one of the leading religious figures
in Zanján, sent an emissary to Shiraz to investigate. As a result
of this Hujjat became a follower of the Báb and a large part of
the population of Zanján followed him.

The Zanján upheaval (q.v.) in 1850-51 was the largest and most
prolonged of the Bábí upheavals with over 2,OOO Bábís
participating. 5% of the participants at Shaykh Tabarsí
were from Zanján (Momen 164). A number of the villages around, such
as Ishtihárd and Abhar, had also small numbers of Bábís.

Shortly after Bahá'u'lláh put forward his claim, he sent
Nabíl Zarandí to Zanján to announce it there. A number
of prominent Bábís who had survived the upheaval of 1850-51
became Bahá'ís and, in particular, Mírzá Muhammad
`Alí Tabíb, Siyyid Ashraf, Áqá Naqd-`Alí
known as Abú Basír, and Hájí Ímán.
The first three of these were martyred in about 1283/1867. Some of the
Bábís also remained Azalís. Two of these went to live
with Azal in Cyprus (Browne 761).

A number of people in the village of Abhar became Bahá'ís
from about 1285/1868 onwards, through the conversion of the mujtahid of
the village, Mírzá `Abdu'r-Rahím (d. 1290/1873). The
latter's son, Mírzá `Adbu'l-`Atúf remained as religious
leader in the village while another son, Mírzá Muhammad Taqí,
Ibn-i-Abhar, became a prominent Bahá'í and was named a Hand
of the Cause by Bahá'u'lláh.

A few Bahá'ís from other parts of Iran came to this area.
The most well-known of these was Mírzá `Alí-Muhammad
Varqá (q.v.) who lived for a number of years in Zanján. Varqá,
his son Ruhu'lláh, Hájí Ímán and Mírzá
Husayn were arrested in the winter of 1895-6 and sent to Tihran where the
first two were eventually to meet their deaths.

Holy Places

The caravanserai where the Báb stayed; House
of Hujjat; Mosque of Hujjat.

Bibliography

A number of manuscript histories of the Bábí upheaval at
Zanján exist: Áqá Mírzá Husayn-i-Zanjání
wrote an account on the instructions of Bahá'u'lláh; Háshim
Fathí Khalkhálí; Áqá Naqd-`Alí
Zanjání; Rúhá Khánum `Attá'í;
and the account by Áqá `Abdu'l-Ahad translated and published
by E.G. Browne, "Personal Reminiscences of the Babi Insurrection at Zanján
in 1850", Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 29 (1897)
761-827. ZH 3:175-185; 6:319-344; 8a:263-266; M. Momen, "Social Basis of
the Bábí Upheavals in Iran (1848-53): a preliminary analysis",

International Journal of Middle East Studies vol. 15 (1983) 157-183.

METADATA

Views7974 views since posted 2010-08-10; last edit 2022-02-05 04:08 UTC;

previous at archive.org.../momen_encyclopedia_khamsih
Language
English
Permission
author
Share

Shortlink: bahai-library.com/3513
Citation: ris/3513

select Collection:
Archives
Articles
Articles-unpublished
Audio
Bibliographies
BIC
Biographies
Books
Chronologies
Compilations
Compilations-NSA
Compilations-personal
Documents
East-asia
Encyclopedia
Essays
Etc
Excerpts
Fiction
Glossaries
Guardian
Histories
Introductory
Letters
Maps
Music
Newspapers
NSA-documents
NSA-letters
Personal
Pilgrims
Poetry
Presentations
Resources
Reviews
Scripts
Software
Statistics
Study
Talks
Theses
Transcripts
Translations
UHJ-documents
UHJ-letters
Video
Visual
Writings

home

sitemap

series

chronology

search:
author

title

date

tags

adv. search
languages

inventory

bibliography

abbreviations

links

about

contact

RSS

new
-- Iran: Province of Khamsih (Zanjan) (Used by permission of the curator)