Martyrdom of the Báb

The story behind the day

The Martyrdom of the Báb remembers the execution of the Báb, the forerunner of Bahá'u'lláh, before a firing squad in a public square at Tabriz, in Iran, on 9 July 1850. In the Badíʿ calendar the day is 17 Raḥmat, which falls on 9 or 10 July. It is one of nine Bahá'í holy days on which work is suspended, and communities mark it with prayers and special programmes.^[1–6]

Origins

The Báb was soon arrested after his claim of 1844 and, in the Bahá'í telling, was banished from city to city and from prison to prison for the rest of his short life. In those years the movement around him was caught up in armed clashes, among them the siege of his followers at the shrine of Shaykh Tabarsi in 1848 and 1849. The accounts differ in emphasis: encyclopedias record that Bábís were responsible for some revolts against the Qajar government, while Bahá'í accounts describe the same period as one of persecution in which thousands were killed. A death sentence was passed in 1850. An Oxford dictionary records that the execution was carried out on government orders, and Bahá'í sources add that clergy signed a warrant on a charge of heresy. Most sources date it to 9 July; the Oxford dictionary gives 8 or 9 July.^[8–12]

What it marks

Bahá'ís call the Báb's death a martyrdom and honour it as the sacrifice of the herald whose mission opened the way for Bahá'u'lláh. The execution took place at noon. He was thirty years old, in the thirty-first year of his life by the count of Shoghi Effendi. The day stands with his Declaration in May and his Birth in the autumn as one of three holy days tied to his own life, and with the Ascension of Bahá'u'lláh as one of the two holy days that recall the deaths of the Báb and Bahá'u'lláh.^{[3, 13–17]}

How it came to be

After the execution, one encyclopedia says, the Báb's body was thrown into a ditch, and Shoghi Effendi places it at the edge of the city moat. His remains were later carried to the Holy Land and laid in a shrine on Mount Carmel in Haifa, where ʿAbdu'l-Bahá, the son and successor of Bahá'u'lláh, is also buried. The Shrine of the Báb is now his final resting place and, with the shrine of Bahá'u'lláh at Bahjí, a centre of Bahá'í pilgrimage.^{[7, 18–19]}

How it is kept

noon prayer, hush in a hall — Noon prayer, hush in a hallIllustration · AI-generated

Bahá'ís suspend work on the day, and communities commemorate it with prayers and special programmes held at noon, the hour of the execution. The Tablet of Visitation, a prayer for commemorating the Báb, is usually recited, and Nabíl's early narrative of his death is often read aloud, though neither is required. The date is carried in the Badíʿ calendar as 17 Raḥmat, and Gregorian listings place it on 9 or, in some years, 10 July.^[4–6]

Sources

Each statement above was checked against published sources; the verdict says whether it stood as written, was corrected or was hedged.