Geography and History of Iran
From Bahaikipedia
Iran as an identifiable entity has existed for many centuries. Geographically it consists of high mountains stretching across the north and west with a high plateau occupying the center of the country. The center and east of this plateau is a desert, but with irrigation the west and south of the plateau can be farmed.
The empires of the Medes and Persians were among the greatest of the ancient world. Although those empires were swept away, Iran as a cultural entity remained. The boundary that marks the western edge of present-day Iran forms one of the most significant and enduring cultural boundaries of the world. The ancient civilizations that occupied Mesopotamia, Syria, Egypt, and North Africa were almost obliterated by the Arab Islamic invasion and that whole area came under Arab cultural domination. Iran, however, although it was among the first countries to fall to the advancing Arab armies, never completely lost its culture and language. Centuries later, the Iranian culture re-established itself and the Persian language re-emerged, now much influenced by Arabic, to become the dominant language of the eastern Islamic world (as far afield as Tajikistan and eastern India, Persian was the lingua franca of the eastern Islamic world until the advent of the British armies). The northern and western boundaries of Iran have, however, been under pressure from invading Turkish tribes and have contracted since ancient times.
Iran reached another peak of influence and culture during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries under the Safavid monarchs. It was they who established Shí`í Islam as the state religion of Iran. By the end of the seventeenth century, however, signs of a decline were clearly evident. This decline became a steep fall during the next century worsened by civil war and invasions.
The Qájár dynasty succeeded in establishing its rule over Iran at the end of the eighteenth century. While the Safavids had legitimized their rule by claiming descent from the Imáms, the Qájárs, who were a Turkic tribe, could not take that path. They were forced therefore to try to gain the favor of the Shí`í `ulamá in order to obtain their assistance in buttressing their legitimacy and authority. Under the second shah of this dynasty, Fath-`Alí Sháh, a number of threads began to come together that were eventually to result in the emergence of the Bábí and Bahá'í movements. The first of these was the teaching of Shaykh Ahmad al-Ahsá'í (q.v.). His most radical teaching, and the one that eventually led to his being declared an infidel by some of the Shí`í `ulamá, was the idea that many of the teachings of Islam, such as the resurrection, did not refer to a physical reality but to a spiritual one. Shaykh Ahmad was succeeded in the leadership of what was to become known as the Shaykhí movement (see "Shaykhism") by Sayyid Kázim Rashtí (q.v.), whose classes the Báb attended briefly. During Fath-`Alí Sháh's reign there appears to have been a general heightening of millennialist expectation. The Shí`í teachings hold that the twelfth in the line of Imáms who succeeded the Prophet Muhammad did not die but will re-appear shortly before the Day of Judgment. Numerous individuals appear to have predicted that this was about to happen (see Amanat 89-105).
Against this background of heightened expectation, it is not suprising that the Báb's claim, originating as it did in A.H. 1260/A.D. 1844 exactly a thousand years after the occultation of the Twelfth Imám, created a stir as it gradually became known throughout Iran. The Báb's followers travelled throughout Iran and Iraq spreading the news of his coming and of his claims. Many thousands, especially from among the Shaykhís, accepted the claim, and the Bábí following grew in most parts of Iran.
[edit] Special Note
This article was written for possible inclusion in A Short Encyclopedia of the Baha'i Faith, an ongoing project of the United States National Spiritual Assembly. These drafts have not been edited and will not appear in the encyclopedia in their present form. Hence they should not be considered representative of the project.
