Table of Contents

• BAHĀDOR KHAN

  cross-reference

  See ABŪ ḠĀZĪ.

• BAHĀDOR SHAH I, II

  cross-reference

  See MUGHALS.

• BAHĀʾI TABRIZI

  Tahsin Yazici

  (1874-1925), AḤMAD, Persian calligrapher and poet.

• BAHAISM

  Multiple Authors

  or Bahai faith, a religion founded in the nineteenth century by Bahāʾ-Allāh that grew out of the Iranian messianic movement of Babism and developed into a world religion with internationalist and pacifist emphases.

• BAHAISM ii. Bahai Calendar and Festivals

  A. Banani

  The Bahai year consists of 19 months of 19 days each, i.e., 361 days, with the addition of four intercalary days between the 18th and the 19th months in order to adjust the calendar to the solar year. The Bāb named the months after the attributes of God.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• BAHAISM iii. Bahai and Babi Schisms

  D. M. MacEoin

  Although it never developed much beyond the stage of a sectarian movement within Shiʿite Islam, Babism experienced a number of minor but interesting divisions, particularly in its early phase.

• BAHAISM iv. The Bahai Communities

  P. Smith

  Bahai expansion beyond the Middle East and the Iranian diaspora only began after the passing of Bahāʾ-Allāh (1892) and the succession of his son, ʿAbd-al-Bahāʾ (1844-1921), as leader. In the 1890s, an active community developed in North America, Americans in turn establishing Bahai groups in England, France, Germany, Hawaii, and Japan.

  This Article Has Images/Tables.

• BAHAISM v. The Bahai Community in Iran

  V. Rafati

  With the Declaration of the Bāb in 1844, followed by his being accepted as the promised Qāʾem (the Hidden Imam) by a handful of early believers, the first Babi community was born in the city of Shiraz.

• BAHAISM vi. The Bahai Community of Ashkhabad

  V. Rafati

  Attracted by religious freedom and economic opportunities unavailable to them in Iran, Iranian Bahais began to settle in Ashkhabad around 1884; the community prospered and reached its peak during the period 1917-28.

• BAHAISM vii. Bahai Persecutions

  D. M. MacEoin

  Bahai persecutions were a pattern of continuing discriminatory measures against adherents and institutions of the Bahai religion, punctuated by outbreaks of both random and organized violence.

• BAHAISM viii. Bahai Shrines

  J. Walbridge

  Of the Bahai sites of pilgrimage and visitation, the most important are the tombs of Bahāʾ-Allāh and the Bāb in Israel and the houses of the Bāb and Bahāʾ-Allāh in Shiraz and Baghdad.

• BAHAISM xiv. Nineteen Day Feast

  Moojan Momen

  a gathering of the Bahai community every nineteen days that has devotional, administrative, and social aspects and is the core of community life.

• BAHAISM i. The Faith

  J. Cole

  Bahaism as a religion had as its background two earlier and much different movements in nineteenth-century Shiʿite Shaikhism (following Shaikh Aḥmad Aḥsāʾī) and Babism.

• BAHAISM xii. Bahai Literature

  D. M. MacEoin

  This article is concerned primarily with poetry and belles lettres rather than apologetic, didactic, historiographical, liturgical, or scriptural materials.

• BAHAISM ix. Bahai Temples

  V. Rafati and F. Sahba

  Although the faith originated in Iran, no Bahai temple was ever built in that country, due to local antagonism. However,  since the time of Bahāʾ-Allāh, the Bahais of Iran have gathered in private Bahai homes to pray and to read the writings of the faith.

• BAHAISM x. Bahai Schools

  V. Rafati

  The Bahai schools were a series of government-recognized educational institutions conducted on Bahai principles from 1897 until 1929 in Ashkhabad and until 1934 in Iran.

• BAHAISM xi. Bahai Conventions

  M. Momen

  The first Bahai convention in the world was probably the meeting convened by the Chicago Spiritual Assembly on 26 November 1907 for the purpose of choosing a site for the House of Worship that was to be built.

• BAHAISM xiii. Bahai Pioneers

  Moojan Momen

  “Pioneer” (in English) and mohājer (in Persian) are terms used in Bahai literature to designate those who leave their homes to settle in another locality with the intention of spreading the Bahai faith or supporting existing Bahai communities.

• BAHĀʾĪYA ḴĀNOM

  M. Momen

  (1846-1932), eldest daughter of Bahāʾ-Allāh, considered by Bahais as the “outstanding heroine of the Bahai Dispensation.”

• BAHĀR (1)

  Ḡ.-Ḥ. Yūsofī

  a Persian literary, scientific, political, and social-affairs monthly, 1910-11, 1921-22. Bahār represented a departure from traditional Persian journalism; readers found its willingness to discuss contemporary literature and literary criticism a refreshing change.