January 21. On this date in 1914, Mírzá Abu'l-Faḍl-i-Gulpáygání, noted Bahá’í scholar in the time of Bahá’u’lláh, died in Cairo, Egypt. One of the few Apostles of Bahá’u’lláh who never actually met Bahá’u’lláh, he chose the alias Abu'l-Fadl (progenitor of virtue) for himself. 'Abdu’l-Bahá wrote, referring to The Brilliant Proof, "Each one of you should have a copy. Read, memorize and reflect upon it."

 

January 21. On this date in 1914, Mírzá Abu'l-Faḍl-i-Gulpáygání, noted Bahá’í scholar in the time of Bahá’u’lláh, died in Cairo, Egypt. One of the few Apostles of Bahá’u’lláh who never actually met Bahá’u’lláh, he chose the alias Abu'l-Fadl (progenitor of virtue) for himself. 'Abdu’l-Bahá wrote, referring to The Brilliant Proof, "Each one of you should have a copy. Read, memorize and reflect upon it."

Mírzá Abu'l-Fadl was born in a village near Gulpaygan, Iran, sometime in the months of June or July 1844. In 1868 he left to Isfahan to study Islamic sciences at one of the religious colleges in the city. In October 1873, Mírzá Abu'l-Fadl moved to Tehran, where he had his first encounters with Bahá’ís in the beginning of 1876. Abu'l-Fadl, at one point, met an uneducated cloth-seller, named Aqa 'Abdu'l-Karim, with whom he would have discussions over difficult religious questions.

In the next several months, Abu'l-Fadl met with some of the leading Bahá’ís including Nabíl-i-Akbar, Mirza Isma'il Dhabih and Aqa Mirza Haydar 'Ali Ardistani. While he was at Mirza Isma'il Dhabih's house, he read two of Bahá’u’lláh's tablets, the Lawh-i-Ra'ís (Tablet of the Chief) and the Lawh-i-Fu'ád (Tablet of Fu'ad Pasha), which contain prophecies both of the fall of the Ottoman Sultan Abd-ul-Aziz and vizier 'Ali Páshá. He determined that if the events portrayed in those tablets came to pass, he would believe in Bahá’u’lláh, and a few months later, Mírzá Abu'l-Fadl accepted the Bahá’í Faith and became a Bahá’í on September 20, 1876.

Juan Cole describes these events in his "Lawh-i-Fu'ád: notes by Juan Cole"...

Speaking with the voice of God (using the royal "we"), Bahá'u'lláh predicts that Alí Páshá, then grand vizier, will be deposed (the verb is 'azala, which is used of deposing kings). He says, too, that God will "lay hold" (the verb is akhadha, to take, seize) of Sultán AbdulAzíz (he is called amiruhum, literally, "their prince" or "their commander"). Although Bahá'u'lláh was correct that neither of these powerful men had long at the top in 1869, his prophecy, if taken literally, actually reverses their true fates. Alí Páshá was never deposed, but rather died in office in 1871. It was Sultán AbdulAzízwho was deposed, in the Constitutional Revolution of spring, 1876, shortly after which he committed suicide. Obviously, if Bahá'u'lláh had merely meant to predict that eventually these two men would die, then the prophecy was not very remarkable. Rather, he seems to have believed that Alí Páshá would fall from the Sultán's favor, and that some dramatic event would overtake the Sultán.

As soon as he became a Bahá’í, Abu'l-Fadl began to teach the new religion to others, and when news spread of his conversion away from Islam, he was removed from the religious college. He found a new position as a teacher at a school for Zoroastrian children that was established by Mánikchi Sáhib, an Indian Parsi. During his time at the school, a number of Zoroastrians converted to the Bahá’í Faith including Ustad Javanmard and Mulla Bahram Akhtar-Khavari. He continued to teach the Bahá’í Faith during the next ten years that he spent in Tehran, and helped Mírzá Husyan Hamadani produce an account of the history of the Bábí and Bahá’í religions, the Tarikh-i-Jadid (The New History), which was commissioned by Mánikchi Sáhib. In Tehran, he was also imprisoned on three occasions. He was first imprisoned in December 1876 when it was found that he had converted to the Bahá’í Faith; he was released after five months. He was next imprisoned in 1882-83 for nineteen months, with fifty or so other Bahá’ís in Tehran, when the governor of the city, Kamran Mirza, ordered their arrests at the instigation of Sayyid Sadiq Sanglaji, a religious leader in the city. Then, in October 1885 he was imprisoned for another six months, once again, due to orders from Kamran Mirza.

After his 1882 imprisonment, he began extensive travels throughout the Persian Empire, especially after he received letters from Bahá’u’lláh in 1886 asking him to travel to teach the Bahá’í Faith. It was principally through his writings that the Bahá’í Faith was presented to the Jews of Iran in such a way as to bring a large number of them into accepting Bahá’u’lláh. During his travels in Iran he visited Kashan, Isfahan, Yazd and Tabriz. In 1888 and the three years thereafter he travelled to Ashgabat, Samarkand, and Bukhara. In Samarkand, his teaching efforts allowed for the conversion of the first Afghan to become Bahá’í outside of Afghanistan, Dr. 'Ata'u'llah Khan.

In 1894 Abu'l-Fadl spent ten months with ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in ‘Akká, then in 1894 went to Cairo, where he settled for several years. Abu'l-Fadl became friends with writers and magazine publishers, and many articles that he authored appeared in the Egyptian press. In 1896, when Nasiru'd-Din Shah was assassinated in Iran, an enemy of the Bahá’ís, Za'imu'd-Dawlih, used the rumour that the assassination had been performed by Bahá’ís, to cause a massacre of the Bahá’ís in Egypt. When Abu'l-Fadl, stood up in defence for the Bahá’ís and stated that he himself was a Bahá’í, his allegiance became public; then when his two books Fara'id and Al-Duraru'l-Bahiyyih were published in 1897-1900 the al-Azhar University decreed that Abu'l-Fadl was an infidel.

Between 1900 and 1904 he travelled to Paris and the United States, by request of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, where his talks and writings enabled the fledgling Bahá’í communities to gain confidence and a clear understanding of the religion. During his travels, he was accompanied by Ethel Jenner Rosenberg and Laura Clifford Barney, an American Bahá’í. In Paris, his talks were translated by Anton Haddad, and over thirty people became Bahá’ís. Then in the autumn of 1901 travelled to the United States, and specifically to Chicago, where the largest Bahá’í community was, and gave a large number of talks. Then in December 1901, Abu'l-Fadl travelled to Washington, D.C. and gave talks to both Bahá’ís and the general population. During this time, he also continuously worked on an introductory book on the Bahá’í Faith.

Abu'l-Fadl then travelled to the Green Acre Bahá’í School in Eliot, Maine where he stayed during the months of July and August of 1903 and lectured to a Bahá’í audience. In 1904, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá asked that Abu'l-Fadl return to the Middle East, and the Bahá’ís held a large farewell gathering for him in New York on November 29, 1904.

Mírzá Abu'l-Fadl lived most of his later years in Cairo until his death on January 21, 1914. During his final years, he also visited Beirut and Haifa. Abu'l-Fadl was in Egypt when ‘Abdu’l-Bahá visited Egypt in August 1910, and he stayed near ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in Alexandria in mid 1911. Near the end of 1912, Abu'l-Fadl started to become ill, and Aqa Muhammad-Taqi Isfahani was able to move Abu'l-Fadl to his house in Cairo, where he remained until his death on January 21, 1914.

After his death, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá gave a eulogy which can be found in Bahá’í Proofs. Moojon Momen, a Bahá’í historian, states that Abu'l-Fadl possessed a critical mind, and had a complete devotion to the Bahá’í Faith. Momen states that Abu'l-Fadl's writings "show a keen understanding of modern currents of thought remarkable in a man who only knew oriental languages." and was able to apply the Bahá’í teachings to a wide range of different issues.

Mírzá Abu'l-Fadl wrote on a wide range of Bahá’í subjects, including extensive amounts of material about the proofs of Bahá’u’lláh's mission. He was consistently praised by the central figures of the Bahá’í Faith and Shoghi Effendi. His papers and letters include a wide range of presentations of the Bahá’í Faith for those of Christian and Jewish backgrounds, and his concepts in the presentation of the Bahá’í Faith continue to be important today. After his death, his papers, including several unfinished works, were taken to Ashkhabad, where his nephew lived; many of these papers were, however, lost during the Russian Revolution.

‘Abdu’l-Bahá wrote, referring to The Brilliant Proof...

"His Honour Mírzá Abu'l-Fadl has written a treatise answering the criticisms of a London preacher. Each one of you should have a copy. Read, memorize and reflect upon it. Then, when accusations and criticisms are advanced by those unfavourable to the Cause, you will be well armed."

On March 24, 1943, the Universal House of Justice quoted Shoghi Effendi in the Reconciliation of Apparent Contradictions in the Bahá'í Writings that "In the past some of the friends were under the misapprehension that Mírzá Abu'l-Fadl taught that Abraham and Zoroaster were the same person."

He was very interested in your notes concerning Mírzá Abu'l-Fadl's teachings on Zoroaster and the information on the relationship between Bahá'u'lláh's family and the ancient kings of Persia. In the past some of the friends were under the misapprehension that Mírzá Abu'l-Fadl taught that Abraham and Zoroaster were the same person.

(24 March 1943)