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"The earth is but one country, and mankind its citizens."
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"The earth is but one country, and mankind its citizens."
Tehran, Iran
44 stories took place here — most often featuring Bahá'u'lláh, 'Abdu'l-Bahá and Ásíyih Khánum.
Tihrán (today: Tehran, Iran)
Stripped of His outer garments and in chains, Bahá’u’lláh was driven barefoot to the dungeon of Tihrán. When an old woman begged for a chance to throw her stone in His face, He told the guards not to deny her.
A Kirmán merchant who embraced the Faith through the Báb’s uncle, and a Zanján merchant whose brother had fought beside Mullá Ḥusayn, were among the Seven Martyrs of Tihrán, both eager to lay down their lives.
Ḥájí Mullá Ismá‘íl-i-Qumí, a disciple of Siyyid Káẓim named Sirru’l-Vujúd at Badasht, was kept from Ṭabarsí by illness and later met martyrdom in Tihrán, forgiving his executioner.
Mirza Qurban-‘Ali, a revered dervish of Barfurush who embraced the Cause through Mulla Husayn, was arrested in Tihran, boldly defended his faith before the Amir-Nizam, and was beheaded as the second of the Seven Martyrs.
Imprisoned in Tihrán with other disciples of the Báb, Muḥammad-Ḥusayn-i-Marághi’í would not say a word under torture; at the execution he embraced the body of the friend who had taught him the Faith and begged to be martyred at once.
Siyyid Husayn-i-Turshízí, a mujtahid trained in Najaf, was converted to the Báb's Cause by a merchant friend. Led out to die with the Seven Martyrs of Tihrán, he offered to prove its truth before the city's divines, but an officer stabbed him dead.
While Bahá'u'lláh was imprisoned in the Síyáh-Chál, His servant Isfandíyár, though hunted by a hundred officers, found the scattered family and refused to flee until he had paid every debt of the household.
When the Grand Vizier Hájí Mírzá Áqásí tries to take Bahá'u'lláh's village of Quch-Hisar by fraud, the estate passes to the Sháh's sister, and Bahá'u'lláh answers the minister's accusations about His generous hospitality.
In Tihrán, a student from Núr visits Mullá Husayn at midnight. Hearing of a son of Mírzá Buzurg who feeds the hungry, Mullá Husayn sends Him a scroll; Bahá'u'lláh reads from it and sends back a gift.
Bahá'u'lláh's family lives happily in Tihrán until the day He is arrested and cast into an underground prison, where He comes to know that God has given Him a mission for the whole world.
When Bahá'u'lláh was imprisoned, His faithful servant Isfandíyár, hunted by officers, stayed in Ṭihrán until he had paid every debt, and later obeyed Bahá'u'lláh by remaining loyal to the minister who had sheltered him.
A grandmother tells Sanam how, as a girl in Tihrán, she saw Bahá'u'lláh led through a hostile crowd, and heard Him tell His guards to let an old woman cast her stone.
The life of Mullá Ḥusayn, the first to believe in the Báb: his mission to Tihrán, his walk to the prison of Máh-Kú, the defense of Fort Shaykh Ṭabarsí, and his death in 1849.
Bahíyyih Khánum remembered the day in 1852 when a servant brought word that her father had been arrested, and the four months her mother spent in hiding with the children while He lay chained in the dungeon of Tihrán.
In the *Epistle to the Son of the Wolf*, Bahá'u'lláh briefly recalls the conditions of His four-month imprisonment in the Síyáh-Chál of Tihrán in 1852 — the underground dungeon in which the first intimations of His Revelation came to Him.
‘Abdu’l-Bahá recalls how a grave illness at the age of seven kept Him in Tehran while Bahá’u’lláh was imprisoned there, so that He was able to go with Him into exile in Iraq.
Recalling the days in Ṭihrán when Bahá’u’lláh was imprisoned and their home sacked, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá told how His mother gave Him flour to eat instead of bread, yet they were contented.
Bahíyyih Khánum recalls how, while Bahá'u'lláh was imprisoned in Ṭihrán in 1852, Mírzá Yúsif, a Russian subject, helped her mother send Him food and hid the family in two little rooms near the prison.
In 1852, after Bahá'u'lláh's imprisonment, His family was left without food. 'Abdu'l-Bahá later recalled being sent as a child to His aunt for a few coins, and being recognized as a Bábí and chased and stoned by children.
Bahíyyih Khánum, daughter of Bahá'u'lláh, describes the underground prison in Tihrán where her father lay chained for four months in 1852, and her mother's struggle to get food to Him.
Led barefoot from Shimírán to the Síyáh-Chál in 1852, Bahá'u'lláh was abused by the crowds. When an old woman begged to throw a stone at Him, He told His guards not to deny her.
Chained in the underground Síyáh-Chál of Tihrán among nearly 150 prisoners, Bahá’u’lláh taught His companions verses to chant each night, and those called to their deaths went forth with hope and joy.
Ibn-i-Abhar, one of the four Hands of the Cause named by Bahá'u'lláh, was told to seek answers through consultation, counselled by ‘Abdu'l-Bahá on trustworthiness, and sent to Yazd shortly before the upheaval of 1903.
For decades Ḥájí Abu’l-Ḥasan Ardikání carried the Ḥuqúqu’lláh and the believers’ letters to Bahá’u’lláh, met Him in the public bath at ‘Akká, became trustee of the Ḥuqúqu’lláh, and served on into the ministry of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá.
Mírzá Abu’l-Faḍl, head of a religious college in Tihrán, became a Bahá’í in 1876, was imprisoned three times, and taught the Faith in Turkmenistan, Egypt and America until his death in Cairo in 1914.
‘Abdu’l-Bahá remembers Mullá ‘Alí-Akbar, a learned seeker who found the Faith, was chained and jailed again and again in Ṭihrán yet kept safe, and after his death appeared to Him in a dream, saying he had been teaching the Faith.
Shaykh Salmán slipped out of arrest in Tihrán when a stranger mistook him for someone else. Every year afterwards he walked from Persia to Bahá'u'lláh, carrying the believers' letters and bringing back His Tablets.
Mírzá Abu'l-Faḍl boasted that he could write a better book than the Kitáb-i-Íqán, then found himself unable to write a simple letter. Years later, after praying with tears, he came to faith and found the book an ocean of knowledge.
In 1835 Bahá’u’lláh married Ásíyih Khánum. Known as the Father of the Poor and the Mother of Consolation, they cared for the needy while His father's fortunes collapsed and the family moved to a rented house in Tehrán.
Bahá'u'lláh intended His niece Shahr-Banu Khanum to marry His eldest Son, but relatives in Tihran prevented the match and forced her into another marriage, which left her in lasting grief.
Born at sunrise in Tihrán into a noble family, Bahá'u'lláh never went to school, yet as a youth He explained a question a famous scholar's students could not, and rode to Tihrán to stop an injustice against His father.
The youth Buzurg of Nayshábúr walks to 'Akká, is named Badí by Bahá'u'lláh, and carries His Tablet on foot to Násiri'd-Dín Sháh, giving his life rather than betray his fellow believers.
A life of Bahá'u'lláh for children: His boyhood in Tihrán, His refusal of His father's post, the Báb's letter brought by Mullá Ḥusayn, prison and exile, and His declaration in the Garden of Riḍván.
Bahíyyih Khánum recalls her mother Ásíyih Khánum's marriage to Bahá'u'lláh, her forty mules of wedding treasures, and their life of caring for the poor. The jewelled buttons were later exchanged for bread on the road to exile.
Esslemont's account of Bahá'u'lláh's birth in Tihrán on 12 November 1817, His wisdom and generosity as a youth, His refusal of His father's post in the Ministry, and His acceptance of the Báb's Cause in 1844.
Bahá’u’lláh was born in Tehran in 1817. As He grew, His father, Mirza Buzurg, marvelled at His wisdom, dreamed of Him swimming in a boundless ocean, and heard a soothsayer foretell that no one could stand in His way.
When Bahá'u'lláh was a child, His father, the Vazír Mírzá Buzurg, dreamed of Him swimming in a limitless ocean with a multitude of fishes clinging to His hair. A soothsayer said the ocean was the world of being.
Bahá'u'lláh was born at dawn in Tihrán on 12 November 1817. Shoghi Effendi traces His descent to Abraham, Zoroaster, the last Sasanian king and Jesse, and names the Promised One of each earlier faith whom He fulfils.
Bahíyyih Khánum remembered her mother, Ásíyih Khánum, who married Bahá'u'lláh in 1835: her wealth as a bride, her gentleness, and the care for the poor that led people to call her the Mother of Consolation.
Mírzá Ḥasan-i-Adíb, a celebrated scholar of Tehran, became a believer in 1889 and was named a Hand of the Cause by Bahá’u’lláh; he served the Tehran Assembly, taught Bahá’í youth and helped found the Tarbiyat School.
Mírzá ‘Abdu’lláh Faráhání, a master of Persian classical music and a believer in Tihrán, was encouraged by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to preserve the old melodies; he recorded them and was still teaching when he died in 1918.
Mírzá Asadu’lláh Fáḍil of Mázindarán, a scholar who became a Bahá’í in Tihrán, carried out a dangerous mission for ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in Najaf, taught across America, India and Persia, and wrote a nine-volume history of the Faith.
As a boy newly arrived in Tehran from Qum, the future Hand of the Cause Faizi enrolls at the Bahá'í Tarbiyat School and, following his friends, finds his way to a Friday Bahá'í class that shapes his whole life.