Quddús

Jináb-i-Quddús (Arabic: قدوس)(c.1820–1849), is the title of Mullá Muḥammad ʻAlí-i-Bárfurúshi, who was the most prominent disciple of the Báb. He was the eighteenth and final Letter of the Living.

Biography

Early life and education

Quddús was born and raised in a village on the outskirts of the city of Babol (called Bárfurúsh at the time) in Mazandaran province. Different sources offer slightly different years for his birth, between 1815 and 1822. Nabíl-i-Zarandí's hagiographic history The Dawn-Breakers states that he was born in 1822, and this date is often reproduced by Bahá'í sources, while Abbas Amanat concludes that 1819 is the most likely date, based on the evidence of Quddús' own writings and statements made by other primary sources about his age at the time of his death in 1849.

His father, Aqa Muhammad Salih, was a small-scale, illiterate rice farmer; his mother—whose name is not recorded—was a descendant of Muhammad through his grandson Hasan, the second Imam of Shia Islam. His mother died when Quddús was still an infant. His father later remarried, and Quddús had a close relationship with his stepmother and his half-brothers by her. Neither his father or stepmother ever converted to Bábism or the Bahá'í Faith, but they received negative attention from local leaders because of their children's religious activities, and his stepmother developed close relationships with Baha'is in Qaem Shahr towards the end of her life. Quddús had two half-brothers—Mírzá Haydar and Aqa Muhammad-Sádiq and a sister—Maryam. All of his siblings converted to Bábism, and at least Muhammad-Sádiq later became a Bahá'í. His parents and Muhammad-Sádiq outlived him, while Haydar was executed during the battle of Shaykh Tabarsi, and Maryam died shortly after Quddús and Haydar.

Two views of the house of Quddús' father in Babol.

During his lifetime, Babol was one of many Iranian cities where the resident of neighborhoods and villages were segregated according to each households allegiance to one of two moieties, known as the Haydaris and Ne'matis. Quddus' household and relatives were aligned with the Ne'mati faction. While the divide between Ne'matis and Haydaris was not fundamentally a religious divide, many Ne'mati's in Babol at the time were adherents of the nascent Shia school of Shaykhism, while the Haydaris largely remained aligned with the dominant Usuli school. The family of Quddús were supporters of the local Shayki cleric Mullá Muhammad-Hamza Sharíʻat-madár, who employed Quddús as an attendant in his youth and likely arranged for him to receive a basic education from other members of the cleric's retinue.

Clerical education

Main Gate of the Imam Reza shrine complex in Mashhad, circa 1850, which housed the seminary of Mírzá Ja'far during Quddús' studies.

After receiving a basic education in the house of Sharíʻat-madár, Quddús was sent to the town of Sárí for a madrassa education. After a few years in Sárí, he was send to another madrassa in Mashad, where he became a member of a small group of Shaykhi students which included Mullá Husayn and a number of other future Bábís.

When he was eighteen, Quddús left for the Shia holy city of Karbala in Iraq, where he spent four years studying under Sayyid Kázim, then the leader of the Shaykhi denomination. While living in Iraq he out religious retreats at the shrine of the Atabat, and developed a particular devotion to the Imams. He returned to Babol circa 1843, now a fully trained and licensed mullá—a Shia legal scholar endorsed by a teacher, and able to issue judgements on matters of religious law.

Babol was disrupted by a conflict between Quddús childhood patron Sharī'atmadār and a cleric named Mulla Sa'id Barfurushi. Mulla Sa'id Burfurushi was called Sa'id al-Ulama. Sharī'atmadār represented the Nemati kinship group and the Shaykhi religious faction. The Sa'id al-Ulama represented the Haydaris and the Usuli school. Sharī'atmadār and Quddús were supported by large numbers of residents in Nemati areas. Quddús was described as charismatic and meticulously observant of religious rituals. The supporters of Sharī'atmadār and Quddús were largely peasants, while the Sa'id al-Ulama had a wealthier set of supporters.

He was described as a charismatic mullá (religious leader) with "affability, combined with dignity and bearing" and he became a notable person within his hometown. Mírzá Músá, who met him in 1846, said: "whoever was intimately associated with him was seized with an insatiable admiration for the charm of the youth".

Conversion to Bábism

In 1844, He met the Báb in Shiraz, and recognized him as the revelatory figure that he and other Shayki had been seeking after the death of Sayyid Kazim. Although there is some disagreement among early primary sources and later analysts as to the exact identity of the first nineteen converts to Bábism and the order in which they recognized Sayyid ʿAlí Muḥammad, there is widespread agreement that Mullá Muḥammad ʻAlí was the last member of the group to arrive and accept the Báb's prophetic claims. He arrived in Shiraz independently from any other group of Shayki seekers after traveling from Babol; he may have been passing through Shiraz on his way to complete an Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca, or may have heard about the Báb's declaration from a Shayki contact and set out to Shiraz with the intent of investigating the matter.

After all of the Letters of the Living had accepted the Báb, he directed each of them to travel to a different area of Persia or Iraq to evangelize on his behalf. Mullá Husayn was sent to Isfahan and Mullá 'Alí to Karbala. Quddús was selected to accompany the Báb on pilgrimage to Mecca, where they would announce the start of a new revelation in the holiest city in the Muslim world.

Accompanying the Báb on pilgrimage

After the eighteen Letters of the Living recognized him, the Báb and Quddús left on a pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina, the sacred cities of Islam, leaving Bushehr on the 19th of Ramadán (October, 1844), and arriving in Mecca on the first of Dhi'l-Hájjih (December 12, 1844). During this pilgrimage the Báb publicly claimed to be the Qa'im, openly challenged Mírzá Muhít-i-Kirmání, one of the most outstanding exponents of the Shaykhí school, and sent a letter conveyed by Quddús to the Sharif of Mecca—the Custodian of the Kaaba—proclaiming his mission. After their pilgrimage, the Báb and Quddús returned to Bushehr, where they last saw each other. Quddús' travel to Shiraz brought the Báb's claim to the attention of the governor, Husayn Khan, who tortured Quddús and summoned the Báb to Shiraz in June 1845.

Back in Búshihr (February–March, 1845), the Báb indicated to Quddús that they would never meet again:

"Yours will be the ineffable joy of quaffing the cup of martyrdom for His sake. I, too, shall tread the path of sacrifice, and will join you in the realm of eternity."

(quoted in The Dawn-Breakers, pg 143)

In Shiraz, Quddús experienced his first persecution as a Bábí, when he and Mullá Sádiq had their beards burned, then their noses pierced, and threaded with halters; "then, having been led through the streets in this disgraceful condition, they were expelled from the city." This incident also made the newspapers eventually echoing in the UK starting November 1, 1845, followed by the US, Australia, and New Zealand. Following his expulsion he travelled across Persia teaching of the new religion, and was one of three major figures in the Conference of Badasht (June–July 1848). One of the most important Babi leaders and regarded by his contemporaries as the exponent of the less radical, more conservative element within the Babi movement, Quddús ostensibly distanced himself from Tahirih's radicalism and break from Islam. However, this was in fact part of what Shoghi Effendi described as "a pre-conceived plan designed to mitigate the alarm and consternation which such a conference was sure to arouse" and, to the dismay of some Babi's and the appreciation of others, Quddús wholeheartedly embraced Tahirih's radicalism and the two departed Badasht together on the same camel.

Battle of Fort Tabarsi

Main article: Battle of Fort Tabarsi

From October 10, 1848 to May 10, 1849, the first major military confrontation took place between the Bábís and the local military, instigated by the Islamic clergy. A group of over 200 Bábís were initially attacked by mobs in Bárfurúsh, and fled to the nearby shrine of Shaykh Tabarsi, where they built a defensive fort and received escalating attacks, initially local raids, but later organized imperial regiments. Although the initial clash involved Mullá Husayn, Quddús became the commander of the Bábís upon his arrival at the fort on October 20th, 1848.

Over the months that followed, Baháʼí historians describe a number of miraculous events in which a small band of untrained soldiers bore the full brunt of government regiments several times their size, always coming out victorious (see God Passes By, chapter III; and The Dawn-Breakers, chapter XIX).> During the last month of the siege, the Bábís went without food or water, and survived by consuming shoe leather and ground bones. The battle became an embarrassment to the Persian authorities, and it was ended by the Prince Mihdí-Qulí Mírzá, who sent Quddús a copy of the Qurʼan. On the opening Surah he wrote:

"I swear by this most holy Book, by the righteousness of God who has revealed it, and the Mission of Him who was inspired with its verses, that I cherish no other purpose than to promote peace and friendliness between us. Come forth from your stronghold and rest assured that no hand will be stretched forth against you. You yourself and your companions, I solemnly declare, are under the sheltering protection of the Almighty, of Muhammad, His Prophet, and of Násiriʼd-Dín Sháh, our sovereign. I pledge my honour that no man, either in this army or in this neighbourhood, will ever attempt to assail you. The malediction of God, the omnipotent Avenger, rest upon me if in my heart I cherish any other desire than that which I have stated."

(The Dawn-Breakers, pg 399)

After leaving the fort, they were gathered in a tent and disarmed, and some taken away as prisoners. The army plundered and destroyed the fort, and then opened fire on the Bábís, killing them all.

Death

Quddús himself was escorted by the prince to Barfurúsh, where the local population was celebrating. The prince's plan was to take his prisoner to Tehran and give him to the Shah. However, the Saʼídu'l-ʻUlamá of Barfurúsh vowed to deny himself food and sleep until such a time as he could kill Quddús with his own hands. The prince arranged a meeting with Quddús and the ʻUlamá, and afterwards handed his prisoner over to them. On 16 May 1849 Quddús was handed over to an angry mob. Nabil records: "By the testimony of Baháʼu'lláh, that heroic youth, who was still on the threshold of his life, was subjected to such tortures and suffered such a death as even Jesus had not faced in the hour of His greatest agony." His body was torn apart and its pieces thrown into a fire. Some pieces were gathered by a friend and interred in a nearby place (see the Taríkh-i-Jadíd, p. 92).

At the time, the Báb was imprisoned in Chihríq, and was so grieved that he stopped writing or dictating for a period of six months.

About two years after the battle of Fort Tabarsi, Abbás-Qulí Khán (the sieging general) was heard describing the battle to a prince, comparing it to the Battle of Karbala, and himself to Shimr Ibn Thil-Jawshan, who slew Imam Husayn.

Legacy and religious significance

Writings

Quddús identified himself with Jesus in his writings, and the Bábis associated him with prophecies regarding the role of Christ in Islamic eschatology. During his youth in Babol, Quddús was rumoured to have been born out of wedlock, and may have emphasized an identification with Christ as a defense against these rumours.

Many of his writings focus on the corruption of the Ulama and their outdated nature in the time following the Báb's revelation. His writings make clear that his many thwarted attempts to engage the clerics in debate, the general dismissal of the Bábí movement by prominent theologians, the role of the mullas in whipping up violent opposition to the Bábís, and the extreme persecution and physical violence he himself had endured since 1844, had left him bitter and fiercely opposed to the entire class. Years of persecution led him to believe that violent self-defense was the only way that Bábís would be able to avoid being forced to recant, and by 1848 his writings include support for such action.

According to Moojan Momen and Todd Lawson, the writings of Quddús, "display a close similarity to that of the Báb in both form and content".

Bahá'í view

"Regarding the station of Quddus, he should by no means be considered having had the station of a Prophet. His station was no doubt a very exalted one, and far above that of any of the Letters of the Living, including the first Letter, Mulla Husayn. Quddus reflected more than any of the disciples of the Bab the light of His teaching."

(11 November 1936, written on behalf of Shoghi Effendi to an individual believer).

"It may be helpful to consider that in the Dispensation of the Bab, Quddus is referred to as the "Last Point", and the "Last Name of God", is identified, as pointed out in God Passes By, with one of the "Messengers charged with imposture" mentioned in the Qurʼan, and is one of the "two witnesses" into whom "the spirit of life from God" must enter, as attested by 'Abdu'l-Baha in Some Answered Questions, yet, despite these sublime stations, he is not regarded as an independent Manifestation of God."

(24 August 1975, written on behalf of the Universal House of Justice to an individual believer).

References

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