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Mullá ʻAlíy-i-Bastámí
Mullá ʻAlí-i-Bastámí (died 1846) was the second Letter of the Living in the Bábí movement. He is also probably the first and one of the best known martyrs of the early Bábí period. Biography Early life He was born near the small city of Bastam in northwestern Persia during the reign of the Qajar dynasty. He married in his youth and had at least one child. As a young man he gained a reputation for his interest in religion, and studied as a Mullah in the shrine city of Mashhad. In Mashhad he became familiar with local clerics who were associated with the millenarian Shaykhí denomination of Shia Islam and was attracted to Shaykhí doctrine. Eventually he moved to Karbala in the Ottoman Empire, and studied under Siyyid Kazim Rashti, then the leader of Shaykhism, for at least seven years. Conversion to Bábism Shaykhís expected the imminent arrival of the Qa'im or Mahdi, and after the death of Siyyid Kazim in January 1844, Bastámí led a group of Shaykhís who, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Letters Of The Living
The Letters of the Living () was a title provided by the Báb to the first eighteen disciples of the Bábí Religion. In some understandings the Báb places himself at the head of this list (as the first letter). In this article, the former notation will be used except when specifically said otherwise. Mystical meaning The Báb named the first eighteen believers in his mission as the ''Letters of the Living'' (''Ḥurúfu'l-ḥayy'' in Arabic). One of the Báb's titles was the "Primal Point" (''nuqti-yi-úlá''). As Baháʼí scholar Moojan Momen explains: The Eighteen 'Letters of the Living' manifested themselves in the last, i.e. the Muhammadan Manifestation in the persons of the Fourteen Holy Souls (i.e. the Prophet himself, his daughter Fatima, and the Twelve Imams of whom the first, 'Ali, was her husband, and the remainder of her descendants) and the Four Gates (or Bábs) who successively acted as channels of communication between the Twelfth Imam, or Imam Mahdi, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
