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FIRE INTO LIGHT
An Alternate Bábism/Islamic Reformation TL

As to those who have debarred themselves from the Revelation of God, they have indeed failed to understand the significance of a single letter of the Qur’án, nor have they obtained the slightest notion of the Faith of Islám, otherwise they would not have turned away from God, Who hath brought them into being, Who hath nurtured them, hath caused them to die and hath proffered life unto them, by clinging to what are but minor parts of the religion, thinking that they are doing righteous work for the sake of God.
--- the Báb, OTL

The hearts in our chests long for a world of rose gardens, a time without nations, when the myriad fires of hatred and ignorance are transformed by devotion into the purest light of love for all.

--- Táhirih, OTL


Excerpt: Understanding Reform Shi'ism Through the Writings of 'Ali Muhammad

It was the age of the great colonial empires, and the world of Shi'a Islam was gripped by a wave of zealous messianic expectation. Devout mu'minun were awaiting the return of the religious figure known as the Twelfth Imam, who remained in occultation for a thousand years according to tradition. The prophecies recorded in the Traditions, when the Hidden Imam reappeared he would arise, redeem the Muslim world by ushering in an age of light, and would signify the nearness of the Day of Judgment and the Resurrection. When in 1844, a mild and refined twenty-five-year-old merchant from Shiraz, Persia, declared that he had foreseen the coming of that legendary figure of Islamic prophecy, it sent a shock wave through Persian society. His name was 'Ali Muhammad Shirazi, and he took the title of Mujaddid like the great redeemers of Islam before him. Response to 'Ali and his teachings ranged from ecstatic embrace by those who became his followers, to cautious optimism from other Islamic reformers in the nation, to hostile and violent rejection by the government and clerical hierarchy. Determined to extirpate the newborn brand of Islam, the authorities launched a campaign of persecution against the modernist Muslims, which ultimately failed despite its brutality. Far from destroying the humanistic movement of 'Ali Muhammad and his many illustrious students, who included Jalal ad-Din al-Afghani, Mullá Husayn, and Fatima Baraghani amongst their number, the wave of revolution sparked by the unassuming young man would shake both Iran and the Islamic World as a whole to its core.

In fact, the Mujaddid had made a claim even more startling than that of being simply among those who divined the coming of the Mahdi. He also claimed to be the herald of a time after his own passing, when all the Ummah would be so Awakened to the truth of Islam's inner light free of traditionalist dogma, that the collective body of all Earth's Muslims together would make up the true promised messiah - Imam Mahdi reborn as every believer. This coming time he called "When God shall made manifest". The essence and purpose of the Mujaddid's own mission (as he would always stress) was to prepare the people for this second and greater Advent.


Qajar13_49_56.jpg
A photo of Qajar-era Tehran


...between the traditionalist rejection of modernity (including its post- modern modifications) on the one hand, and the atheist rejection of religion on the other, there has existed a third position within Islam - a modernist, eclectic interpretation of Islamic holy texts. This approach sought to safeguard the sacredness of tradition while imposing upon it a modern form. But modernist Islam prior to the day of the Mujaddid failed to question certain fun-damental assumptions, and thus its ideology essentially consisted of superficial revisions and borrowings from the West imposed over the same traditionalistic bases without a thorough reexamination of their underlying cultural and religious concepts. Not surprisingly, the modernist approach had been relatively unpersuasive and ineffectual in the Muslim world until the Mujaddid's Reformation.

Against a background of intellectual and political impasse within Islam, the historic significance and revolutionary import of the writings of both the Mujaddid and his disciples stand out. For there was indeed a radical reform movement in Islam-so radical in its transformation of Islamic concepts and categories that still in the eyes of some conservative radicals, it ceased to be perceived as a part of Islam at all. But the movement initiated by 'Ali Muhammad was far more than an Islamic Reformation. The Mujaddid engaged in a foundational reexamination of traditional conceptions of religion and religious identity, expounding a spiritual world view that was dynamic, historical, and oriented toward progress and communication. In the space of only a generation, one of the world's major faiths would undergo a shift unprecedented in scope and depth.



SUMMARY: Welcome to my first TL, everyone. I'm a Baha'i and I've occasionally seen TLs that feature the movement staying with the bounds of Islam. That's a really interesting TL idea, both theologically and politically, but sadly it's often left unexplained or unexpanded on. This is my attempt to make an earnest and accurate timeline of an Islamic Reformation that lights the tinderbox of Qajar Iran (what with its democrats, clerical reformists, traditionalists, peasant Mahdist preachers, Christians, Jews, and others) ablaze. I'm taking inspiration from folks like @Every Grass in Java, @Augenis and @Planet of Hats - though I lack their caliber of writing talent - it'll be a mix of narrative, history lesson, and theological analysis. I'm taking a lot of coursework, so updates will be slow, but I'm gonna power through and get this story out one way or another. Thanks for reading, yo.
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