British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, Volume 39, Issue 3, (2012), pages 328-346

Islam and Modernism: the Iranian Revolution of 1906, (London: I B Tauris, 1989); Janet Afary, The Iranian Constitutional Revolution, 1906-1911: Grassroots Democracy, Social Democracy & the Origins of Feminism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996); Mangol Bayat, Iran's First Revolution: Shi‘ism and the Constitutional Revolution of 1905-1909 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991). In Persian, there have been a number of offerings. Those of particular interest include: Masha'ullah Ajudani, Mashrutih-yi Irani (Tehran: Nashr Akhtaran, 1382/2003) and Husayn Abadiyan, Buhran-i Mashrutiyat dar Iran (Tehran: Mu'assisih Motali‘at va Pazhuhish-ha Siyasi, 1383/2004). I am grateful to Dr Houshang Chehabi, Dr Peter Smith, Sen McGlinn, Ismael Velasco and Peter Terry for their helpful comments on this paper.

2 Afary, Iranian Constitutional Revolution, pp. 47-8, 197-9; for more on Shaykh al-Ra'is, see Juan Cole, 'Autobiography and Silence: The Early Career of Shaykh al-Ra'īs Qājār', in Christoph Bürgel and Isabel Schayani (eds.), Iran im 19.Jahrhundert und die Entstehung der Baha'i Religion (Hildesheim: George Olms, 1998), pp. 91-126 and idem, 'The Provincial Politics of Heresy and Reform in Qajar Iran: Shaykh al-Rais in Shiraz, 1895-1902', Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East, vol. 22, nos. 1-2 (2002), pp. 119-26. For more on Tayirih Khanum, see Tayirih, 'Namih-ha va Nivishtih-ha va Ash‘ar', Nimih-ye Digar, 2nd series, no. 3 (Winter 1375/1996), pp. 146-195. The most detailed study of the Baha'is in the period of the Constitutional Revolution is Mina Yazdani, Awza‘-yi Ijtima‘i-yi Iran dar Ahd Qajar az Khilal Athar Mubarakih-yi Baha'i (Hamilton, Ont.: Association for Baha'i Studies in Persian, 2003), pp. 255-316. Juan Cole, Modernity and Millennium: the genesis of the Baha'i Faith in the Nineteenth-Century Middle East (New York: Columbia University Press, 1998) deals mainly with an earlier period and has little about the Constitutional Revolution. See also Kavian Milani, 'Baha'i discourses on the Constitutional Revolution', in Dominic Parviz Brookshaw and Seena B. Fazel (eds.), The Baha'is of Iran, (London: Routledge, 2008), pp. 141-155

3 Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, pp. 68-9.

4 Martin, Islam and Modernism, p. 22; Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, p. 54.

5 See, for example, Homa Katouzian, The Political Economy of Modern Iran: Despotism and Pseudo-modernism, 1926–1979 (London: Macmillan, 1981), p. 70n; Afary, Iranian Constitutional Revolution, p. 47; and Hamid Dabashi, ‘The End of Islamic Ideology’, Social Research, 67(2) (2000), pp. 475–518.

6 For an example of a book that remains completely silent on Azalis and Baha'is, see Ajudani, Mashrutih-yi Irani; for an example of a book that creates and perpetuates erroneous material, see Abadiyan, Buhran-i Mashrutiyyat, see esp. pp. 208-228.

7 Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, p. 211.

8 Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, pp. 186-7.

9 In Sari, for example, Shaykh Ghulam-Ali Mujtahid and in Barfurush, Shaykh Salman Sayf al-Islam, both opposed the Constitution and persecuted the Baha'is. See Moojan Momen, ‘The Baha'is and the Constitutional Revolution: The Case of Sari, Mazandaran, 1906–1913’, Iranian Studies, 41(3) (2008), pp. 343–363; Mohammad Ali Kazembeyki, Society, Politics and Economics in Māzandarān, Iran, 1848–1914 (London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2003), pp. 174–175; Asadullah Fazil Mazandarani, Tarikh Zuhur al-Haqq (Tehran: Mu'assisih Melli Matbu‘at Amri, 132 B.E./1975), vol. 8, part 2, pp. 822–824. Other conservative ‘ulama’ who came out against the Constitution and attacked the Baha'is included Mulla Qurban-Ali in Zanjan, Haji Mirza Husayn in Nishapur, Haji Aqa Muhsin in Irak (Sultanabad), Mirza Hasan Mujtahid in Tabriz and Sayyid Kazim Yazdi in Najaf. See Mahdi Ansari, Shaykh Fazlullah Nuri va Mashrutiyyat (Tehran: Amir Kabir, 1369/1990), p. 193; Mahdi Malikzadih, Tarikh Inqilab Mashrutiyyat Iran (Tehran: Kitabkhanih Suqrat, 1328/1949) (7 vols), vol. 3, pp. 29–31. The interchange of correspondence and telegrams between the senior ‘ulama’ of Mazandaran and the Shah and Nuri in Tehran contains several references to the Babis and Baha'is through the use of such terms as ‘maẓhab-i bāṭilih’ and ‘tā'ifih-yi ḍālih’. See Isma‘il Mahjuri, Tarikh-i Mazandaran (Sari: Athar, 1345/1966), vol. 2, pp. 235–242, esp. 236 and 238.

10 Ibrahim Safa'i, Rahbaran Mashrutih, vol. 1 (Tehran : Intisharat Javidan, 1362/1983), pp. 322-3; Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, p. 111.

11 Muhammad Mahdi Sharif Kashani, Vaqi‘at Ittefaqiyyih dar Ruzigar (3 vols., Tehran: Nashr Tarikh Iran, 1362/1983), vol. 1, p. 64; Nazim al-Islam Kirmani, Tarikh Bidari Iraniyan (3 vols in 1, [Tehran]: Bunyad Farhang Iran, 1346/1967), vol. 1, p.188.

12 Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, p. 132, 236.

13 Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, p. 151.

14 Albert Wratislaw, A Consul in the East (Edinburgh: Blackwood, 1924), p. 246; this story is confirmed in Safa'i (Rahbaran Mashrutih, vol. 1, p. 393n.), who expresses surprise that a very orthodox and pious Shi‘i like Sattar Khan could have been considered a Babi.

15 Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, pp. 232, 240.

16 Safa'i, Rahbaran Mashrutih, vol. 1, p. 198.

17 Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, see esp. pp. 53-75, 110, 120, 152, 205. Although Bayat has given a detailed description of the role of the Azalis in the Constitutional Revolution, the full impact of her work is somewhat diluted by the fact that she often refers to these individuals as 'religious dissidents' rather than as Azalis.

18 Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, pp. 22, 54.

19 ‘Alaqihband, Tarikh Mashrutiyyat (manuscript in Afnan Library), pp. 43, 428-9; ‘Alaqihband attributes this idea particularly to Hamid al-Mulk, an Azali who was killed fighting Na'ib Husayn Kashani in about 1910.

20 [Shaykh Ahmad Ruhi and Mirza Aqa Khan Kirmani], Hasht Bihisht ([Tehran], n.d.), p. 161.

21 Nazim al-Islam Kirmani, Tarikh-i Bidari-yi Iraniyan, vol. 3 ([Tehran]: Bunyad Farhang Iran, 1346/1967), p. 243; Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, p. 128.

22 Mangol Bayat, Mysticism and Dissent: Socioreligious thought in Qajar Iran (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1982), pp. 140-42, 157-61; Hasan M. Balyuzi, Edward Granville Browne and the Bahā'ī Faith (Oxford: George Ronald, 1970), pp. 18-28

23 See for example Yahya Dowlatabadi, Hayat-i Yahya, vol. 1 (Tehran: Ibn Sina, 1st edition, n.d.), pp. 315-8, containing accusations about the Baha'is being backed by the Russians and English that Yahya Dawlatabadi must have known were false.

24 See for example Malkam Khan, Kitabchih-yi Ghaybi, in Majmu‘ih-yi Athar-i Mirza Malkam Khan (Tehran: Kitabkhanih-yi Danish, 1327/1948), pp. 15-16. See also Shaul Bakhash, Iran: Monarchy, Bureacracy & Reform under the Qajars: 1858-1896 (Oxford: Middle East Centre, 1978), pp. 7-11, 96-98.

25 Baha’u’llah, Kitab-i-Aqdas, (Haifa: Baha'i World Centre, 1992), v. 93, p. 54.

26 In the Lawh@-i Dunyā, see Baha'u'llah, Tablets of Bahā'u'llāh revealed after the Kitāb-i-Aqdas (Haifa: Baha'i World Centre, 1978), p. 93.

27 Risalih Madaniyyih (2nd ed., Bombay, 1892 with the title: Kitab-i Asrar-i Ghaybiyyih li Asbab a1-Madaniyyah), pp. 30-31; trans. by Marzieh Gail as Secret of Divine Civilisation (Wilmette, Ill.: Bahā'ī Publishing Trust, 1957), p. 24.

28 [‘Abdu'l-Baha], A Traveller's Narrative written to illustrate the Episode of the Báb (ed. and trans. Edward G. Browne, 2 vols., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1891), vol. 1, p. 193 (trans. vol. 2, p. 158); see also Juan Cole, Modernity, pp. 36-8.

29 For a more detailed discussion of these concepts in the writings of Baha'u'llah and ‘Abdu'l-Baha, see Moojan Momen, 'The Baha'i Influence on the Reform Movements of the Islamic World in the 1860s and 1870s' Baha'i Studies Bulletin, vol. 2, no. 2 (Sept 1983), pp. 47-65 and Juan R. I. Cole, Modernity, esp. pp. 45-6, 81-91, 131-2, 163-87.

30 Guity Nashat, The Origins of Modern Reform in Iran, 1870-80 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1982), pp. 162-3.

31 Nikki Keddie, Sayyid Jamal al-Din 'al-Afghani' (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972), pp. 20-22.

32 Da'irat al-Ma‘arif (Beirut, 1881), Vol. 5, s.v. 'Babis'; see also Keddie, Afghani, p. 20n.

33 See Baha'u'llah's reference to this in Lawh@-i Donyā, Tablets of Baha'u'llah, p. 95.

34 His opposition is confirmed by Baha'u'llah in Lawh@-i Donyā (Tablets of Baha'u'llah, pp. 94-5). There is some evidence of Afghani having been influenced by Baha'i teachings in the fact that he is said to have considered Islam, Judaism and Christianity to be in perfect agreement, see Elie Kedourie, Afghani and ‘Abduh (London: Cass, 1966), p. 15.

35 Hasan M. Balyuzi, Baha'u'llah, King of Glory (Oxford: George Ronald, 1980), pp. 151-153.

36 Ernest Renan, Oeuvres Completes, vol. 10 (ed. H. Paichari, Paris, n.d.), p. 453. In 1891, Rukn al-Dawlih, then governor of Khurasan, reported that Mirza Malkam Khan had travelled to Akka and met with Baha'u'llah and that they were planning something together; Ibrahim Safa'i, Panjah Namih-yi Tarikhi (Tehran: Intisharat Babak, 2535 Shahanshahi/1976), pp. 120-21. This report would appear false in that it is unlikely that a person as prominent as Malkam Khan could have done this without some report of it appearing in Baha'i sources. It is also inherently unlikely as for the whole of this year, Malkam Khan was single-handedly producing the Qanun newspaper in London monthly and he could scarcely have done this and also undertaken a journey to Akka; see Hamid Algar, Mirza Malkum Khan (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973), p. 192. A little further on in the report Rukn al-Dawlih amends his initial statement to say that either Malkam Khan himself went or he sent 'someone like himself'. It may be that this report is a reference to the visit to Akka of Mirza Aqa Khan Kirmani (Balyuzi, Baha'u'llah, p. 385, 394-5) who was in close touch with Malkam Khan (Hamid Algar, Mirza Malkum Khan, pp. 212-227; Ajudani, Mashrutih, pp. 329-30).

37 See Haji Mirza Haydar ‘Ali, trans. in Balyuzi, Baha'u'llah, pp. 441-4.

38 Shaykh Kazim Samandar, Tarikh Samandar (Tehran: Mu’assisih Milli Matbu‘at Amri, 131 B.E./1974), pp. 268–270.

39 On election of councils, see Siyavash Sefidvash, Yar Dirin (Tehran: Mu'assisih Milli Matbu‘at Amri, 132 B.E./1976), p. 55.

40 Moojan Momen, 'The Baha'i Schools in Iran', in Brookshaw and Fazel, The Baha'is of Iran, pp. 94-121.

41 Moojan Momen, 'The Role of Women in the Iranian Baha'i Community' in Robert Gleave (ed.), Religion and Society in Qajar Iran (London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2005), pp. 346-69).

42 ‘Azizullah Sulaymani, Masabih-i Hidayat (9 vols., Tehran: Mu'assisih Milli Matbu‘at Amri, 104-32 B.E./1947-1976), vol. 9, pp. 409-11. Although the text may appear to imply this committee was set up after the return of Qudsiyyih Ashraf from USA in 1919, there are several clear indications in the text that the committee was in fact set up before her departure in 1911. There is for example reference to the Tarbiyat school for girls having just been established (which occurred in 1909).

43 Iqbal Yaghma'i, Shahid Rah-i Azadi: Sayyid Jamal Va‘iz Isfahani (Tehran: Tus, 2537 Shahanshahi/1977), p. 283.

44 Asghar Mahdavi and Iraj Afshar, Documents Inedit concernant Seyyed Jamāl-al-Din Afghānī (Tehran: Danishgah Tehran, 1342/1963) document 86, photograph 57, letter dated 15 Ramadan 1301/29 June 1884.

45 Bible Society Monthly Reporter, April 1887, 55-6, cited in Moojan Momen, 'Early Relations between Christian Missionaries and the Bahā'ī Faith' in Moojan Momen (ed.), Studies in Bābī and Bahā'ī History, vol. 1 (Los Angeles: Kalimat Press, 1982, pp. 49-82), p. 66.

46 Napier Malcom, Five Years in a Persian Town (London: John Murray, 1908), pp. 61, 87.

47 Browne in Introduction to Myron H. Phelps, The Master in ‘Akkā (Los Angeles: Kalimāt Press, 1985), p. xiv.

48 Arthur Hardinge, A Diplomat in the East (London: Jonathan Cape, 1928), p. 298.

49 George N. Curzon, Persia and the Persian Question (2 vols., 2nd imp., London: Frank Cass, 1966), vol. 1, p. 499.

50 T. Greenfield, Die Verfassung von persischen Staates (Berlin: Franz Vahlen, 1904) p. 31, based on an article by H. Arakelian published in Tiflis in 1898.

51 Vol. 2, p. 74; see also the statement by Valentine Chirol that Baha'is number 1.5 million or 20 per cent of the population of Iran; The Middle Eastern Question (London: John Murray, 1903), p. 123.

52 Thus for example in December 1905 - January 1906, when a large number of ‘ulama’, merchants and others took sanctuary (bast) in the shrine of Shah ‘Abdul-‘Azim, their demands crystallised around the call for an ‘adalat-khanih (a house of justice). Various suggestions have been made as to the origins of this word and why it suddenly sprang forth at this time (see discussion in Martin, Islam and Modernism, pp. 76-80). It is entirely possible, however, given the fact that many Baha'is were contributing to the debate as to the nature of the reforms being sought, that the name came from the House of Justice (bayt al-‘adl) that is called for in the Kitab Aqdas of Baha'u'llah (v. 30) and which the Baha'is were engaged in establishing in many cities of Iran at this very time. Some of the confusion over what exactly was meant by the ‘adalat-khanih, whether it was to be a court of appeal or an elected body, may be due to the fact that the Baha'i houses of justice were both.

53 Nazim ul-Islam Kirmani, Tarikh Bidari, vol. 1, pp. 29-30.

54 Baha’u’llah, Kitab-i-Aqdas, (Haifa: Baha'i World Centre, 1992), v. 93, p. 54.

55 ‘Abdul-Husayn Avarih [Ayati], al-Kawakib al-Durriyyah (3 vols. in 2, Cairo: al-Sa‘adah, 1923), vol. 1, pp. 163-4; ‘Alaqihband, in one place (Tarikh, p. 58), states that it was a rawzih-khan who did this in the Madrassih Marvi after the crowd had repaired there from the Maydan Tupkhanih; on p. 203 however ‘Alaqihband attributes this action to Nuri, Sayyid ‘Ali Yazdi and others in both the Maydan Tupkhanih and Madrassih Marvi.

56 Habibullah Afnan, Tarikh Amri Shiraz (photocopy of the manuscript provided by the son of the author), pp. 537-41. Further examples can be given, for example, the conversation in a Tehran coffee shop translated above from Yaghma'i, Sayyid Jamal, p. 283. The two episodes in Tehran and Shiraz need not have been coincidences. There had been a meeting in Tehran of supporters of the shah to decide strategies in the summer of 1907 and Nuri was frequently writing to these supporters of the shah with advice on actions to take, see note 9 above.

57 Baha'u'llah, Tablets, p. 222.

58 Mazandarani, Zuhur al-Haqq, vol. 8, part 2, pp. 920-21.

59 Asadullah Fadil Mazandarani, Asrar al-Athar (5 vols., Tehran: Mu'assisih Milli Matbu‘at Amri, 124-129 B.E./1967-1972) vol. 2, pp. 190-1; idem, Amr va Khalq (repr., 4 vols. In 2, Langenhain, Germany: Bahā’ī-Verlag, 1986), vol. 3, p. 346; Browne, Press and Poetry of Modern Persia (repr. Los Angeles: Kalimat, 1983), pp. 66-7.

60 Ni‘matullah Dhuka'i-Bayda'i, Tadhkirih-ye Shu'ara Baha'i Qarn Avval Badi‘ (4 vols., Tehran: Mu'assisih Milli Matbu‘at Amri, 122-27 B.E./1965-70), vol. 1, pp. 315-23. According to this source, although Khavari tried to conceal being a Baha'i, it became well-known in Kashan and even his anti-Baha'i son referred to this from the pulpit.

61 Asadullah Fazil Mazandarani, Tarikh Zuhur al-Haqq vol. 5 (mss in Afnan Library), p. 365n; vol. 6 (mss. in Afnan Library), p. 192; vol. 8, part 1, (Tehran: Mu'assisih Milli Matbu‘at Amri, 131 B.E./1974), p. 136; Browne, Press and Poetry, pp. 121-2.

62 Tayirih, 'Namih-ha'.

63 The only notable Baha'i supporter of the royalist cause was Muhammad Husayn Mirza Mu'ayyad al-Saltanih (later Mu'yyad al-Dawlih) who was a Qajar prince and became head of the royal cabinet under Muhammad ‘Ali Shah; Mazandarani, Zuhur al-Haqq, vol. 8, part 2, p. 832; ‘Azizullah Sulaymani, Masabih-i Hidayat, vol. 2, pp. 266-71. A number of other Baha'is such as ‘Azizullah and Valiyullah Varqa were closely associated with Muhammad ‘Ali Shah's court but they had positioned themselves there on ‘Abdu'l-Baha's instructions so that they could act as intermediaries for ‘Abdu'l-Baha's communications with the shah.

64 Momen, ‘The Baha'is and the Constitutional Revolution’.

65 Revue du Monde Musulman, vol. 1, no. 2 (December 1906), p. 199 (trans. Ismael Velasco).

66 Revue du Monde Musulmane, vol. 1, no. 1 (November 1906) pp. 115-6.

67 Bernard Temple, 'Persia and the Regeneration of Islam', Journal of the Royal Society of Arts, vol. 58 (27 May 1910), pp. 652-5.

68 Marzieh Gail, Arches of the Years (Oxford: George Ronald, 1991), p. 31; Afnan, Tarikh Shiraz, p. 556, seems to indicate a similar date.

69 Sulaymani, Masabih Hidayat, vol. 4, pp. 555-6; Edward G. Browne, Persian Revolution (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1910), pp. 427-9.

70 Browne, Persian Revolution, pp. 424-5.

71 Browne, Persian Revolution, pp. 426, 427-9; Sulaymani, Masabih-i Hidayat, vol. 4, p. 555; ‘Abdu'l-Baha, Makatib-i ‘Abdu'l-Baha, vol. 5 (Tehran: Mu'assisih Milli Matbu‘at Amri, 132 B.E./1975), p. 173; although this last is a letter of ‘Abdu'l-Baha written in 1908 or 1909, he refers to this appeal being made in the early days of the Revolution ('dar badāyat-i inqilāq'); see also Yazdani, Iran dar Ahd Qajar, pp. 258-9, 267.

72 Sulaymani, Masabih-i Hidayat, vol. 4, pp. 553-6; Yazdani, Iran dar Ahd Qajar, p. 291.

73 ‘Abdu'l-Baha, Makatib ‘Abdu'l-Baha, vol. 2 (Cairo: Kurdistan al-‘Ilmiyya, 1330/1911), p. 263; Yazdani, Iran dar Ahd Qajar, p. 300.

74 See for example his statements to the American Baha'is in Tablets of ‘Abdu'l-Baha, vol. 2, (Chicago: Bahai Publishing Society, 1915), pp. 342-3 and his talk recorded in Star of the West vol. 4 (13 July 1913), p. 122.

75 Abbas Milani, The Persian Sphinx: Amir Abbas Hoveyda and the riddle of the Iranian Revolution (London: Tauris 2000), p. 43.

76 Marzieh Gail, Summon Up Remembrance (Oxford: George Ronald, 1987), p. 100; Moojan Momen, The Bābī and Bahā'ī Religions, 1844-1944: Some Contemporary Western Accounts (Oxford: George Ronald, 1980), pp. 375, 515.

77 Balyuzi, Baha'u'llah , pp. 300-309; Muhammad ‘Ali Faizi, Hayat-i Hazrat-i ‘Abdu'l-Baha (Langenhain: Bahā'ī-Verlag, 1986), p. 175.

78 Afary, Revolution, p. 263.

79 See ‘Abdu'l-Baha's comments on this in ‘Abdul-Hamid Ishraq-Khavari, Ma'idih-yi Asmani (9 vols., Tehran: Mu'assisih Milli Matbu‘at Amri, 121-29 B.E./1964-1972) vol. 5, pp. 224-225. See also Browne, Persian Revolution, pp. 427-8 .

80 ‘Alaqihband, Tarikh, p. 356; Browne, Persian Revolution, pp. 428.

81 ‘Alaqihband, Tarikh, p. 417; Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, p. 152.

82 Browne, Persian Revolution, pp. 424-5; that this individual was Zahir us-Sultan can be seen from Browne comments on him on pp. 204, 208n. I am grateful to Dr John Gurney for confirming that this is also his assessment of this matter.

83 Mazandarani, Zuhur al-Haqq, vol. 8, part 2, p. 838.

84 Ishraq-Khavari, Ma'idih, vol. 5, pp. 224-225.

85 Muhammad Shafi‘ Rawhani-Nayrizi, Lama‘at al-Anwar (2 vols. in 1, Bundoora, Vic., Australia: Century Press, 2002), pp. 292-353; Muhammad ‘Ali Faizi, Nayriz-i Mishkbiz (Tehran: Mu'assisih Milli Matbu‘at Amri, 130 B.E./1973), pp. 142-62.

86 Mahdi Bamdad, Tarikh Rijal Iran (6 vols. Tehran: Zavvar, 1347/1968-1351/1972), vol. 2, pp. 284-5, 287.

87 Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, pp. 112, 123; Afari, Revolution, pp. 49-50.

88 ‘Alaqihband, Tarikh, p. 443. This writer additionally accuses Bihbihani of receiving money from the Russian Embassy; ‘Alaqihband, Tarikh, p. 444.

89 Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, pp. 109-111. The reactionary Amin al-Sultan was cajoled into supporting the reformists with his very considerable financial and political resources in the hope that he could unseat the Prime Minister ‘Ayn al-Dawlih and regain power (Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, pp. 112-3). Other examples of such rivalries being used to lever people into the reformist camp are given in Bayat, Iran's First Revolution, p. 112. It was Azalis, such as the Dawlatabadis, Malik al-Mutakallimin, Jamal ad-Din Va‘iz and Nazim al-Islam, who were the main agents for putting together this coalition; Bayat, Revolution 70, 180, 221.

90 Nazim ul-Islam Kirmani, Tarikh Bidari, vol. 2, pp. 224.

91 Ahmad Kasravi, Tarikh Mashrutih-yi Iran (4th ed., Tehran: Amir Kabir, n.d.), pp. 289-90. There were some of the ‘ulama’, such as Khurasani and Mazandarani in Najaf and Tabataba'i in Tehran who felt that the best way to deal with the Baha'i threat was to have a modernist movement arise within Iran among Muslims and thus neutralise the attractions of the Baha'i Faith (cf. Afari, Revolution, p. 29), but most, such as Shaykh Kazim Yazdi in Najaf and Shaykh Fazlullah Nuri in Tehran, feared that the Constitutionalist movement was in fact a covert way for the Baha'is to spread their ideas among Iranian Muslims and so both Constitutionalism and the Baha'is should be opposed.

92 Accounts of these episodes can be found in Momen, Bābī and Bahā'ī Religions, pp. 373-404.

93 Nazim al- Islam Kirmani, Tarikh Bidari, p. 400.

94 Mohammad Tavakoli-Targhi, "Baha'i-sitizi va Islam-gara'i", Iran Namih, 19:1-2 (2001), pp. 79-124, translated as "Anti-Baha’ism and Islamism in Iran", in Brookshaw and Fazel, The Baha'is of Iran, pp. 200-31.

95 Mohammad Tavakoli-Targhi, "Refashioning Iran: Language and Culture during the Constitutional Revolution", Iranian Studies, vol. 23 (1990) p. 93.

96 For a comparison of the treatment of the Baha'is in Iran with other examples of the progress towards a genocide, see Moojan Momen, 'The Baha'i community of Iran: a case of "suspended genocide"?' Journal of Genocide Research, vol. 7 (2005), pp. 221–241.