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AUTHOR: FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH

TITLE: The Baha’is in Iran: Twenty Years of Repression
SOURCE: Social Research v67 no2 p536-58 Summ 2000
The magazine publisher is the copyright holder of this article and it is reproduced with
permission. Further reproduction of this article in violation of the copyright is prohibited.
THE Islamic Republic of Iran proclaims Shi’i Islam as its state religion, and
recognizes only Judaism, Christianity, and Zoroastrianism as other true religions. The
three minority faiths are legitimized by the Constitution and accorded certain legal and
political rights. The Baha’is, however, Iran’s largest non-Muslim religious minority, are
not mentioned in the Constitution and have the status of unprotected infidels. Since the
onset of the Islamic revolution in the fall of 1978, more than 200 Baha’is, mostly
leaders of the community, have been put to death. Baha’i institutions have been
disbanded, community properties confiscated, holy places demolished, and cemeteries
desecrated. Baha’is have no civil rights. They cannot hold government jobs, enforce
legal contracts, practice law, collect pensions, attend institutions of higher learning, and
openly practice their faith.
The hostility of the Iranian clerical establishment that took over the government in
early 1979 was not a new phenomenon. It had roots in the nineteenth century when
the clerical class saw its spiritual monopoly threatened by the spread of the Babi
religion, the precursor of the Baha’i Faith. The Bab (Gate), founder of the movement,
claimed to be not only the return of the twelfth imam expected by the Shi’is but a
prophet and the herald of “him whom God shall manifest,” a messenger and bearer of
a new revelation. The Bab’s claim to prophethood could not be reconciled with the
traditional literalist interpretation of the Muslim belief that Muhammad was “the seal of
the prophets” and Islam the ultimate religion. After several years of imprisonment, the
Bab, who refused to recant, was publicly executed by a firing squad in June 1850 in
Tabriz. The Babis resisted attacks by government forces in several localities.
Thousands perished in the unequal struggles in Zanjan, Neyriz, and Mazandaran. In
1852 an unsuccessful attempt on the life of Naser ed-Din Shah by three Babis,
aggrieved and exasperated by the execution of their leader, precipitated a massacre
of scores of innocent men and women, among them the renowned poetess Tahereh.
Most of the Babi leaders were wiped out; the surviving adherents were dispirited and
disorganized. It seemed that the movement had been defeated, the old order restored,
and the spiritual monopoly of the Shi’i clergy reaffirmed.
One of the prominent Babis, Mirza Hoseyn Ali Nouri, later known as Baha’u’llah,
had been arrested in connection with the attempted assassination of the Shah. Despite
the fact that he was found not guilty of participation, he was nevertheless exiled to
Baghdad, where he proclaimed himself to be “him whom God shall manifest,” whose
advent had been prophesied by the Bab. Although Baha’u’llah, at the urging of the
Iranian ambassador, was removed by the Ottoman government from Baghdad first to
Constantinople, then to Adrionople, and finally to the pestilential fortress-city of Acre
(now Akko) on the shores of the Mediterranean, he gathered the Babi remnant and
founded the Baha’i Faith. Baha’u’llah’s emissaries traveled through Iran, rallying the
surviving Babis and spreading the new dispensation. The revitalized and growing
Babi-Baha’i community once again began to attract the attention of the clergy and the
government. Baha’u’llah commanded his followers that his teachings be spread only
through peaceful means, that his followers be loyal to the government and obey the
authorities. He taught that the purpose of his religion was the promotion of amity and
concord among all peoples, races, and religions, but that did not lessen the fear and
hatred of the more conservative elements dominant within the clerical establishment.
 FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH: The Baha’is in Iran: Twenty Years of Repression 2

By the end of the nineteenth century the Baha’is found themselves under constant
pressure from ecclesiastical and governmental authorities, and they were attacked on
theological and moral grounds. They were declared heretics because of their belief that
revelation was progressive and without end, meaning that the line of prophets
stretched from the legendary Adam into the most distant future. Under this assumption,
Muhammad was not the last prophet (as Islam claims) but rather one in a chain of
revealers of divine will, a chain that includes not only Jesus and the prophets of Israel,
but the founders of Hinduism, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, and other religions that Islam
does not recognize. The mullahs execrated Baha’i teachings on the equality of men
and women, the abolition of the notions of ritual impurity and dietary restrictions, the
rejection of the practice of taqlid (imitation of a chosen religious leader), and the
assertion of the freedom of the individual to investigate truth and adhere to a religion
of his choice. The absence of clergy in the Baha’i Faith and the governance of the
community by its freely and democratically elected representatives were other sources
of hostility the mullahs as a class harbored against the Baha’is.
Western influences flooded Iran in the twentieth century. While the masses
remained largely under clerical influence, the bureaucracy, the officers’ corps of the
newly created national army, and the intellectual elite began to lose interest in the
intricacies of the Sharia and in theological disputations. They welcomed Reza Shah’s
attempts at modernization, which included unveiling women, restricting turban wearing,
secularizing the educational system, and introducing Europeanized legal codes. The
clergy that had helped Reza Khan ascend the throne (out of fear of a republic such
as the one Mustafa Kemal Ataturk had established in Turkey) found itself marginalized
and with greatly diminished influence in public life. The mullahs perceived similarities
between some of the modernizing reforms and Baha’i teachings and linked their dislike
for these reforms, and for Reza Shah, with their old hatred of the Baha’is. They spread
rumors that the Shah himself was a Baha’i, and that Baha’is dominated the
government and were the principal force for subverting Islam.
The two Pahlavi shahs were ambivalent about the Baha’is. On the one hand, since
the Baha’i community included some of the best educated, most competent and loyal
Iranians, the shahs used them in the service of the government; on the other, they
resented Baha’i refusal to deify the monarchy. Moreover, they found it convenient in
moments of crisis to placate the clergy by allowing it to attack the Baha’is, even
permitting an occasional pogrom, provided it did not turn into a large-scale disturbance
that would endanger public order or unduly increase the power of the clergy. The
stronger the Pahlavi dictatorship grew, the more repressive it became toward the
Baha’is; it closed their schools, prohibited their publications, refused to recognize their
marriages, and turned them into second class citizens. To satisfy the more radically
anti-Baha’i ecclesiastical elements and to steer them away from opposition to the
monarchy, the government permitted and even encouraged the formation of the
Hojjatiyeh Society in 1953. The founder and leader, Sheykh Mahmud Zekrzadeh
Tavallai, better known as Shaykh Muhmud Halabi, was a fanatical enemy of the Baha’i
Faith, which he had studied as a seminarian and to which one of his best friends had
been converted (Tayyeb, 1982). The Hojjatiyeh Society was endorsed by leading
clerics such as Ayatollah Borujerdi and worked in close cooperation with the SAVAK,
the political police, and became the principal antagonist of the Baha’is. Its activities
included publication of anti-Baha’i pamphlets, denunciation of Baha’is to the authorities,
and the disruption of Baha’i gatherings by gangs of toughs. The Hojjatiyeh Society
would play an important role in the persecution of the Baha’is after the Islamic
revolution (Abedi, 38-40, n.d.).
Whereas earlier attacks on Baha’is had been of a theological nature, because of the
spread of nationalist sentiments among the educated elite, the mullahs added a new
 FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH: The Baha’is in Iran: Twenty Years of Repression 3

element to their rhetoric. To appeal to the changes in the mentality of the younger
members of the upper class, the mullahs now accused the Baha’is of being unpatriotic
or outright agents of foreign powers. In the 1930s there appeared a book which
purported to be the memoirs of Kniaz Dalqurki, presumably Prince Dmitrii Dolgorukov,
a one-time Russian minister in Tehran. The book describes how the minister had been
sent by the tsar to Iran to subvert Islam, making Iran vulnerable to Russian penetration
and eventual domination. The minister claims to have achieved his goal by influencing
a young Iranian to proclaim himself a prophet, thus creating the Babi movement, which
was nothing more than a Russian invention. No reputable scholar has ever doubted
that the so-called Dalqurki memoirs were counterfeit. Nevertheless, this illiterate
concoction found acceptance among a large segment of educated Iranians. In the last
twenty years Iranian representatives at the UN have on occasion referred to it as proof
that the Baha’i Faith is not a religion but a political movement serving foreign interests.
As enemies changed, so did the accusations. Baha’is have been alleged to serve the
Russian or British intelligence, the CIA, or Israel, depending on which country
happened to be in disfavor at the time the allegations were made.
As the Islamic revolution gathered momentum in late summer 1978, anti-Baha’i
ecclesiastical elements saw an opportunity to realize their goals of uprooting the Baha’i
Faith from Iran. They were undoubtedly encouraged by the position taken by Ayatollah
Khomeini who, in December 1978, while still in exile in France, expressed his views
in an interview with Professor James Cockroft of Rutgers University.
Question: “Will there be either religious or political freedom for the Baha’is under
an Islamic government?
Answer: “They are a political faction. They are harmful. They will not be accepted.
Question: “How about their freedom of religion — religious practice?
Answer: “No.” (Martin, 1984, 31)
In the chaotic conditions that followed the overthrow of the shah, the Baha’i
community was particularly vulnerable. In many parts of the country local clerical
leaders, many connected with the Hojjatiyeh Society, organized attacks on individual
Baha’is and seized Baha’i property. In a letter dated March 23, 1979, a clerical
organization called the Foundation of the Dispossessed claimed title to all Baha’i
properties, and turned over the house of the Bab, the holiest Baha’i shrine in Iran, to
the prominent mullah, Sheykh Sadeq Khalkhali (Martin, 1984, 43-44). Protests of
Baha’is from all over the world were of no avail. Appeals to the newly formed
government headed by Mehdi Bazargan, a respected individual with a reputation for
advocacy of human rights, were ignored in silence. In September, a mob led by
mullahs and officials of the Department of Religious Affairs demolished the shrine.
Throughout the country, properties belonging to the Baha’i community such as
hospitals, community centers, libraries, and even cemeteries were seized without any
legal basis or justification. Over the next several years a body of rules issued by
leading mojtaheds (mullahs authorized to pass legal judgments) ratified the
expropriation not only of all Baha’i community properties but in hundreds of cases the
confiscation of private property, including homes, shops, and agricultural land.
The assault on the Baha’i community took many forms, one of which was the denial
of employment that threatened to pauperize a large segment of the Baha’i population.
One after another national and local government departments began to fire Baha’i
employees without any attempt to conceal that the cause of dismissal was membership
in the “misguided sect.” Hundreds of documents show that ecclesiastical, judiciary, and
administrative bodies worked in concert to rid the civil service of every Baha’i whether
he or she was a school teacher, doctor, nurse, army officer, or college professor. Thus
a circular letter issued by the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, dated December 7,
1981, states, “In the name of God, The Most Exalted,”
 FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH: The Baha’is in Iran: Twenty Years of Repression 4

In accordance with paragraph 8 of article 29 of the human resources rehabilitation

policy for the ministries, governmental organizations and other government-affiliated
offices which was approved on 5/7/1360 [October 27, 1981] by the Consultative
Islamic Council, the punishment for membership in such misguided sects as are
recognized by all Muslims to be heretical to Islam, or in organizations whose
doctrine and constitution are founded on the rejection of divine religions, is
permanent dismissal from government employment. Moreover, by virtue of the
contents of article 58 of this policy, the aforementioned regulations are applicable
to all employees (including those who are liable by the employment of farming
laws, etc.) of governmental agencies, factories, banks, and companies, as well as
organizations similar to the governmental offices or associations thereof that are
either nationalized or confiscated by the government. The courts are therefore
bound to refrain from issuing verdicts in favor of such employees as dismissed in
accordance with the above specifications, and whose membership in the misguided
sects or organizations is proven. (Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, December
7, 1981)
This circular letter was the basis for the dismissal of thousands of government
employees. It was applied, and continues to be applied, as well by many private
businesses controlled by individuals hostile to or intimidated in regard to the Baha’is.
As late as 1994 the director of the Caryar Travel Agency dismissed a Baha’i employee;
With gratitude for your sincere services during the last ten years, we wish you
every success. Inasmuch as the personal data pertaining to the employees of this
company was requested through a recent questionnaire from the Ministry of
Islamic Guidance, and in light of the fact that you have refused to conceal your
belief and explicitly stated in this questionnaire that you are a Baha’i, your
employment is hereby terminated in accordance with circular letter number
1/20361, dated 16/9/1360 [December 7, 1981] from the Ministry of Labor and
Social Affairs. (Caryar Travel Agency to Mr. F.R., September 12, 1994)
The ruling announced in the Ministry’s circular letter has never been changed and
is in effect today.
Over 10,000 government employees lost their jobs in the three or four years
following the Islamic revolution, and none have received unemployment benefits.
Moreover, the government issued a bizarre ruling that the dismissed employees repay
all the salaries they had received during their years of service, and, in 1984, the
Attorney General began to issue summonses demanding repayment. Since most
Baha’is who had been government employees had no resources, it was impossible for
them to comply. Some were imprisoned, but the demand was quietly dropped.
Perhaps less absurd, but equally cruel, was the government’s cancellation of all
pensions to retired Baha’is. The military, the National Oil Company, universities, and
industrial enterprises informed their former employees that they were not entitled to
their pensions. Eleven years after the revolution, a Baha’i who applied for a pension
he should have been receiving for years from the Etteka Company (an enterprise
under the Ministry of Defense) was informed by the director that according to the
decision of state authorities, followers of the “Baha’i sect” were not entitled to pensions
and that, as he had clearly admitted to being a Baha’i, his pension could not be paid
(Ministry of National Defense and Support of the Armed Forces to Mr. B., January 20,
1990). A letter from the head of the Insurance and Retirement Corporation of the
Iranian Army informed another Baha’i that his pension could not be paid because of
his religion, but that should he deny being a Baha’i, it might be given him (Ministry of
Defense and Support of the Armed Forces to Mr. M., August 30, 1992). Such letters
are still being received by Baha’is who, hoping that the situation in the country has
improved, request the resumption of payments due to them.
 FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH: The Baha’is in Iran: Twenty Years of Repression 5

In addition to government employees, self-employed professionals were also

frequently prevented from earning a living. Baha’i lawyers were prohibited from
practicing their profession. The Board of the Lawyers Association of the Islamic
Republic of Iran investigated the case of a Baha’i attorney and decided that “In view
of the indictment of Mr. M.H. for membership in the misguided sect of Baha’ism,
according to section 4, parts A and B, of article 5 of the law of reform and
reorganization of the lawyers association, the aforementioned is permanently barred
from practicing law” (Ministry of Justice to Mr. M.H., verdict No. 74/2/31-129, May 21,
1995). Even Baha’i veterinarians were not exempt. Thus the National Veterinary
Organization wrote to the Director of the Inspection Group of the Ministry of Agriculture
that “according to the confidential letter (#3005 - 24/10/1365) from the Central Security
Department, it is in no way possible to issue a [work] permit to Mr. J.F. It should be
remembered that according to his request dated 11/8/1367 [November 2, 1988] he has
introduced as a religion the wayward Baha’i sect which is the agent of Zionists and the
[United] States, and he considers himself a Baha’i” (National Veterinary Organization
to the Director of the Inspection Group of the Ministry of Agriculture, October 31,
1989).
No less severe in its consequences has been the policy of excluding Baha’is from
institutions of higher learning. Immediately after the revolution all Baha’i faculty were
dismissed from Iranian universities. In the late 1980s Baha’i children were allowed in
primary and secondary schools, but universities were closed to Baha’i students. This
was a particularly heavy blow to a community that placed high value on education.
Barring Baha’is from higher education was part of a well thought out plan for the slow
strangulation of the Baha’i community. A secret memorandum “on the Baha’i question”
was prepared by the Supreme Revolutionary Cultural Council in 1991 at the request
of the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic, Ali Khamenei, and the then President
of Iran, Hashemi Rafsanjani. The memorandum spelled out, among other things,
measures for reducing the educational level of the Baha’i community. Paragraphs 1-3
of Section B read:
They can be enrolled in schools provided they have not identified themselves as
Baha’is.
Preferably, they should be enrolled in schools which have a strong and imposing
religious ideology.
They must be expelled, either in the admission process or during the course of
their studies, once it becomes known that they are Baha’is.
(Pohl, January 28, 1993)
This policy has been consistently applied and is still in force.
To provide at least some university level education to hundreds of eager men and
women, a group of former faculty members in 1987 organized a program of courses
in ten subject areas: applied chemistry, biology, dentistry, pharmacology, civil
engineering, computer science, psychology, law, literature, and accounting. No Baha’i
subjects were taught, thus avoiding the possibility of being accused of fostering the
Baha’i religion. (Stockman, 1999, 8) Classes were held in private homes, which also
housed books and laboratory equipment. Although the organization of this “open
university” was not illegal, participants had to act with caution so as not to draw undue
attention and antagonize the authorities. The university, which became known as the
Baha’i Institute of Higher Education (BIHE), grew to 900 students and 150 faculty
members by 1998. It had established informal connections with universities abroad and
maintained such high standards that a number of its alumni and alumnae went to
graduate schools in the United States. The BIHE was a unique example of the
determination of a repressed community not to permit itself to be deprived of
education.
 FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH: The Baha’is in Iran: Twenty Years of Repression 6

The authorities, of course, were aware of the existence of the BIHE but for a time
chose not to interfere with its operations, except on one occasion when the police
raided its office and confiscated the records of faculty and students. In September
1998, however, the government acted. Hundreds of agents descended upon 500
homes where BIHE classes were held. They took hundreds of thousands of dollars
worth of laboratory equipment, computers, and books. Thirty-six faculty members were
arrested. “The materials confiscated,” The New York Times reported on October 29,
1998, “were neither political nor religious, and the people arrested were not fighters or
organizers. They were lecturers in subjects like accounting and dentistry; the materials
seized were textbooks and laboratory equipment.” Most of the arrested teachers were
soon released but four were tried and sentenced to imprisonment. At their police
interrogation, Baha’i teachers were accused of disobeying the government ban on
Baha’i activity and ordered to sign a pledge that they would not resume teaching. All
the teachers refused, arguing that the order itself was illegal for there was no law in
Iran prohibiting teaching languages, economics, or any of the subjects that the BIHE
offered.
The wide publicity the BIHE case received all over the world inundated the office
of the Iranian Minister of Education with thousands of letters of protest from university
students, faculty, and administrators (among them the presidents of Yale, Harvard,
Stanford, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Duke). The government,
concerned for its reputation abroad, took no further action and the BIHE quietly
resumed its activities, though on a reduced scale. The entire episode once again
showed the determination of the Islamic regime to carry out its policy of depriving
young Baha’is of education as elaborated in the secret memorandum of 1991.
Of all the measures taken by the Islamic regime against the Baha’is, the cruelest
were the murders, executions, and disappearances of well over 200 Baha’is, mostly
leaders of the community. The strategy was plain. Destroy the head, and the body will
wither and die. Many mullahs and persons with clerical connections, whether in the
Hojjatiyeh Society or outside, had not taken into account the lessons of history and
believed their own propaganda that the Baha’i Faith was an artificial creation that
would collapse at the first blow. No sooner had the Islamic Republic been proclaimed
than “groups of Baha’is were dragged into mosques and threatened with starvation if
they did not renounce their beliefs and convert to Islam (Martin, 1984, 50-51). Neither
persuasion nor threats produced the desired results. In twenty years of relentless
persecution of some 400,000 Iranian Baha’is, only a few hundred recanted their faith,
and they were largely nominal Baha’is on the margins of their community.
In the summer of 1980, several members of the local spiritual assemblies (the
elective governing bodies of Baha’i communities) were executed in Tabriz, Rasht, and
Tehran. The representatives of the Baha’i community appealed to President Bani-Sadr
for help with the rapidly deteriorating situation but were not successful. On June 21,
Bani-Sadr’s own newspaper, Enqelab-e Eslami, published “a violent denunciation of the
Baha’i community by a close associate of Khomeini’s, the Ayatollah Sadduqi, in which
the latter claimed to possess documents proving that the Baha’is were plotting against
the revolution ‘in every city in Iran.’ Sadduqi called on the faithful to ‘hunt down the
Baha’is whom you know...and turn them over to the revolutionary courts.’” Such
inflammatory and sinister statements were made for several years thereafter. Thus in
February, 1983, a Shiraz judge, Hojjat-ol-Eslam Qazai, proclaimed:
The Iranian nation has arisen in accordance with Koranic teachings and by the will
of God has determined to establish the government of God on earth. Therefore,
it cannot tolerate the perverted Baha’is who are the instruments of Satan and
followers of the Devil and the super powers and their agents. It is absolutely
 FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH: The Baha’is in Iran: Twenty Years of Repression 7

certain that in the Islamic Republic of Iran there is no place whatsoever for Baha’is
or Baha’ism. Before it is too late the Baha’is should recant Baha’ism, which is
condemned by reason and logic. Otherwise, the day will come when the Islamic
nation will deal with the Baha’is in accordance with its religious obligation and
will...God willing, fulfil the prayer of Noah, mentioned in the Qur’an, ‘and Noah
said, Lord, leave not one single family of infidels on earth’ (Khabar-e Junub,
February 22, 1983).
On August 21, 1980, all nine members of the National Spiritual Assembly of the
Baha’is of Iran were arrested and never heard from again. The Attorney General
claimed that they had been involved with the Anglican Church in a CIA financed plot
to overthrow the Islamic regime. Subsequently these charges were dropped, and the
government declared that it knew nothing of the whereabouts of the members of the
National Spiritual Assembly. Months later Ayatollah Beheshti, the then Chief Justice,
announced that the accusations of the plot had been “‘fabricated’ by ‘an unbalanced
person’ who had forged the key documents. The exposure of this forgery was hailed
as a triumph of the system of law under the Islamic Republic. The Anglican detainees
were eventually released, but no further reference was made to the Baha’i prisoners”
(Martin, 1984, 51).
The government itself engaged in forgery and disinformation in a booklet, Baha’ism:
Its Origins and Its Role, distributed at the 36th session (1983) of the UN
Sub-Commission on the Protection of Minorities. The booklet repeated the tired
allegations that the Baha’i Faith had been created by western imperialists and had
served their interests. As evidence it cited a 1921 telegram of condolence to the Baha’i
community from King George V on the passing of the head of the faith, ‘Abdu’l-Baha.
It quoted reports of SAVAK spies, Hojjatiyeh members who had infiltrated the Baha’i
community, that prominent Baha’is claimed that the two Pahlavi shahs were Baha’is
and that Baha’is had made the first atom bomb. These items were the only evidence
provided. Not a single credible document was ever offered to substantiate the
outlandish charges. Neither were any incriminating documents linking the Baha’is with
espionage or any subversive activity ever produced in the dozens of trials of Baha’is
in Iran. Not one document implicating the Baha’is was found in the voluminous State
Department and CIA archives that fell into Iranian hands when the US Embassy in
Tehran was occupied by militants; although these were published in full by the Iranian
government.
Shortly after the disappearance of the members of their National Spiritual Assembly,
the Baha’is elected nine new members. Eight of the nine were arrested and executed.
One member, who happened to be absent, survived. The Baha’is, for the third time,
elected another nine members to the National Spiritual Assembly. All were arrested,
some were repeatedly tortured, and four were executed in 1984. By this time the
Assembly, in compliance with the order issued by the Prosecutor General, Seyyed
Hoseyn Musavi-Tabrizi, had disbanded. It must be noted that the Prosecutor’s
statement, made public after the Assembly had been dissolved, declared for the first
time that membership in Baha’i administrative institutions was a crime. The same
Musavi-Tabrizi had stated earlier that: “‘The Qur’an recognizes only the People of the
Book as religious communities. Others are pagans. Pagans must be eliminated.’ Under
Islamic law in Iran, ‘People of the Book’ includes only Muslims, Jews, Christians and,
by special dispensation, Zoroastrians” (Baha’i International Community, 1999, 27).
The largest number of executions took place in 1983 and 1984. Of these, the most
gruesome was the hanging of ten Baha’i women, among them a seventeen-year old
girl, Mona Mahmudnezhad, who was accused of teaching Baha’i children’s classes. As
was the usual practice of revolutionary clerical courts, Mona and her nine companions
 FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH: The Baha’is in Iran: Twenty Years of Repression 8

were given the choice of recantation or death. For several days the judge, Hojjat
ol-Eslam Qazai, cajoled and threatened the women to recant their faith and embrace
Islam. Not one recanted, and all ten were hanged (Roohizadegan, 1883). In many
cases executions were preceded by torture. Photographs of mutilated bodies are a
gruesome testimony to the treatment scores of Baha’is received at the hands of Iranian
judicial authorities.
Judicial decisions continued to be made and documents published, reaffirming that
killing a Baha’i was not a criminal act. Thus in 1993 Chief Magistrate Seyyed
Mohammad Ghazavi of Branch 4 of the Criminal Court of Shahr-e Rey ruled that the
two brothers who had been accused of kidnapping and murder of a Baha’i, Ruhollah
Ghedami, had indeed committed these acts. However, considering the
“pronouncements of Khomeini and other theologians to the effect that qisas (blood
retribution) applies only to the murder of a Muslim, the court ruled:
In this case, the victim, as admitted by all the blood relatives and plaintiffs and
residents of the neighborhood, was a member of the misguided and misguiding
Baha’i sect. Therefore the issue of retribution is null and void. And the right of
‘blood money’ [damages] does not apply. No money is due to other than protected
infidels, etc. Therefore, as to capital punishment and damages, the accused are
acquitted (Kazemzadeh, 1995, 12).
A few days later a court in Karaj found two Baha’is, Behnam Misaqi and Keyvan
Khalajabadi, guilty of communicating with the Baha’i World Center, holding meetings in
their homes, and engaging in other Baha’i activities.
The court quoted Ayatollah Khomeini’s pronouncement to the effect that Baha’is
were agents serving Western powers, which had for centuries been planning to destroy
Islam ‘by inventing fake religions such as Babism, Baha’ism, and Wahhabism,’ and in
the case of Baha’is ‘the privileges of the people of Dhimma [protected infidels] do not
apply.’ The court held that,
Thus, due to the religious laws and theological codes mentioned above, the above
cannot be considered among the Kuffar-i-Dhimmi and therefore the court
condemns them to death as Kuffar-i Harbi [unprotected infidels at war with Islam]
(Kazemzadeh, 1995, 13).
It might also be noted that the same judicial reasoning could be applied to Hindus,
Buddhists, and, certainly, to atheists.
In 1980 a total of 24 Baha’is were killed, by methods as severe as stoning and
burning. In 1981 the number doubled. Thirty-two more Baha’is were put to death in
1982, and one woman was lynched by a mob. In 1983, twenty-nine people were killed.
In 1984, thirty. Executions decreased dramatically in 1985 and 1986 when seven
Baha’is were put to death. Five more were killed in 1987, and three more in 1988. In
the next three years there were no executions, but in 1992 two more Baha’is were
killed. None were killed in 1993-94, but one person died in 1995. In 1996 there were
no deaths, but three were killed in 1997, and one in 1998. (Baha’i International
Community, 1999, 68-71.) Although the killings subsided, several Baha’is were
condemned to death in 1999 and are awaiting execution.
Within Iran, the mullahs, public statements, and press did not hesitate to proclaim
that Baha’is were outlaws deserving of death, and government offices in thousands of
instances officially stated that Baha’is were dismissed from their jobs strictly on the
basis of religion. Outside, however, Iranian representatives abroad consistently denied
that this was the case. At the United Nations they have fought against the mention of
Baha’is in resolutions on human rights in Iran, claiming that no person was ever tried,
imprisoned, or executed because of his or her beliefs. Iranian diplomats cited the
Iranian Constitution’s articles on religious freedom but persisted in denying that the
 FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH: The Baha’is in Iran: Twenty Years of Repression 9

Baha’i Faith was a religion, calling it a political subversive organization. In the capitals
of countries whose governments protested against the persecution, Iranian diplomats
took the same position. Replying to an inquiry by Bundestag member Ruprecht Polenz
concerning the fate of three condemned Baha’is, T. Shemirani, Counselor and Head of
the Legal Section of the Iranian Embassy in Bonn, wrote that in the Islamic Republic,
no one is detained or convicted because of his or her beliefs.
The freedom of belief including freedom to adopt the religion of one’s personal
choice has been recognized in the constitution, and no attacks on other faiths in
the name of religion is [sic.] authorized. The fact of belonging to the Baha’i
community does not entail loss of rights to which every Iranian citizen is entitled.
Shemirani further states that:
being a Baha’i in itself is not considered an offense and nobody is deprived of his
rights for holding a belief... Furthermore, in the criminal law of the Islamic Republic
there is no reference of apostasy as a crime.
Shemirani continues:
In addition to Baha’is, followers of other beliefs as Hindus, Buddhists, Sabe’iins
and Yazidis are living freely in the country. Even communists who deny existence
of the god and consider religion as sedative and stupefying of societies [sic] are
leading their normal life in the Islamic Republic of Iran.
To make sure that his words were not interpreted as recognizing the Baha’i Faith
as a religion, Shemirani adds:
Furthermore, not only have none [sic] of the 53 Islamic countries in the world
recognized Baha’ism as a religion, but also the Jurisprudence Committee of the
Organization of Islamic countries (OIC) has decisively rejected Baha’ism even as
a sect of Islam (Shemirani, February 4, 1997).
The claim that Baha’is were free to practice their religion and suffered no
discrimination is belied by a remarkable document, the memorandum on “the Baha’i
Question” prepared by the Iranian Supreme Revolutionary Cultural Council at the
request of the “Esteemed Leader” (Khamenei) and the President (Rafsanjani). The
memorandum conveyed to Khamenei by the head of his office, Dr. Seyyed Mohammad
Golpaygani, made proposals and recommendations concerning the treatment of the
Baha’is “in such a way that everyone will understand what should or should not be
done.” The “Summary of the Results of the Discussions and Recommendation” of the
Supreme Revolutionary Cultural Council mentioned that Baha’is should not be expelled
from the country, arrested, imprisoned or penalized “without reason” but nowhere
indicates what the reasons for expelling, arresting, or otherwise penalizing them could
be. Article 3 of paragraph A stated, “the Government’s dealing with them must be in
such a way that their progress and development be blocked.” Articles 1-3 of paragraph
B, which have been mentioned above, dealt with the exclusion of Baha’is from
institutions of higher learning. Article 5 called for Islamic propaganda institutions “to
counter the propaganda and religious activities of the Baha’is.” Article 6 stated that “a
plan must be devised to confront and destroy their cultural roots outside the country.”
Paragraph C dealt with the legal and social status of the Baha’is. They were to be
allowed to make “a modest livelihood,” to have ration booklets, passports, burial
certificates, and work permits, although in fact many Baha’is had been and are still
denied some or all of these. Article 3 of paragraph C proposed to “deny them
employment if they identify themselves as Baha’is.” Article 4 said, “deny them any
position of influence such as in the educational sector, etc.”
The document bore a note in Khamenei’s handwriting: “In the name of God! The
decision of the Supreme Revolutionary Cultural Council seems sufficient. I thank you
gentlemen for your attention and efforts. Ali Khamenei” (Pohl, 1993). Since its
 FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH: The Baha’is in Iran: Twenty Years of Repression 10

publication, the situation of individual Baha’is in Iran has somewhat improved Officials
have arbitrarily issued passports for foreign travel to some Baha’is, and refused them
to others. The number of Baha’is in prisons has been reduced to twelve, and five of
them are on death row as of March 2000. But the restrictions listed in the
memorandum that has been named “A Blueprint for the Destruction of a Religious
Community” are still in force. Thus one must assume that the Blueprint continues to
be normative for all government institutions that come into contact with the Baha’is.
Because they have no clergy, the Baha’is support their religious life with institutions
known as spiritual assemblies. These are both local and national and are
democratically elected annually by all believers twenty-one years of age or older.
Spiritual assemblies enroll new members, educate children, register marriages, maintain
charitable funds, publish Baha’i literature where allowed by law, adjudicate disputes,
and administer all Baha’i activities on the local or national levels. They were
established by the founder of the faith, Baha’u’llah, and their functions are
indispensable for the proper governance of any Baha’i community. By a decree of the
Prosecutor General of the Islamic Revolution, published on September 21, 1983 in
Keyhan, a Tehran daily, all spiritual assemblies and their ancillary institutions were
banned and membership in them made criminal. In a document whose eloquence was
heightened by the tragic fate of its authors, the National Spiritual Assembly of the
Baha’is of Iran refuted every allegation made against the community, explained the
nature of its beliefs and the activities of Baha’i institutions, demonstrated that the
Prosecutor’s decree had no basis in law, and recited the harrowing tale of murders,
executions, and oppression to which the Baha’is had been subjected in the preceding
four years.
Although the situation was hopeless, the statement concluded with the expression
of hope that the authorities, who knew “that the only ‘crime’ of which these innocent
ones are guilty is that of their beliefs”, would “bring to an end the persecutions, arrests,
torture, and imprisonment of Baha’is;” “guarantee the safety of their lives, their personal
property and belongings, and their honor;” “accord them freedom to choose their
residence and association...restore all the rights which have been taken away from
them in accordance with the groundless assertions of the Prosecutor of the Country.”
The statement further asked that Baha’is be given back their jobs, be permitted to
resume their education, have their cemeteries returned to them, and
...guarantee the freedom of Baha’is to perform their religious rites; to conduct
funerals and burials including the recitation of the Prayer for the Dead; to
solemnize Baha’i marriages and divorces, and to carry out all acts of worship and
laws and ordinances affecting personal status; because although Baha’is are
entirely obedient and subordinate to the Government in the administration of the
affairs which are in the jurisdiction of Baha’i organizations, in matters of
conscience and belief, and in accordance with their spiritual principles, they prefer
martyrdom to recantation or the abandoning of divine ordinances prescribed by
their faith.
The Assembly concluded by saying that “although the order of the Prosecutor of the
Islamic Revolution was unjust and unfair,” the Baha’is have accepted it. With this the
Assembly dissolved itself and all other elected Baha’i institutions. (Martin, 1984, 82-86)
From then on the Baha’is have run their community in an informal manner with groups
of individuals assuming responsibilities such as the organization of the Baha’i Institute
of Higher Education.
The election of Hojjat-ol-Eslam Mohammad Khatami to the presidency and the
subsequent relaxation of the clerical dictatorship have not radically altered the situation
of the Baha’is in Iran. While the treatment of individual Baha’is has to some extent
 FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH: The Baha’is in Iran: Twenty Years of Repression 11

improved, there has been no change in the status of the community. In the last two
years Baha’is have been granted passports for travel abroad much more easily than
had been the case since the early 1980s. In many instances, they have been issued
business licenses that were previously denied to them. Perhaps the most significant
silent concession to the Baha’is has been the recent modification in the rules for the
registration of marriages that omits references to religion, thus making it possible to
register Baha’i marriages and legitimize their children. It is noteworthy, however, that
no reformist within Iran has dared mention the need of granting the Baha’is their rights
as citizens and human beings. Even in the diaspora most Iranians studiously avoid any
discussion of the “Baha’i question,” although a number of Iranian intellectuals have
occasionally championed the rights of the Baha’is.
Provoked by the rhetoric of reform that stresses democracy and the will of the
people, the hard-liners among the clergy denounced those who placed the will of the
people above the judgment of the clergy. In an address to students at a theological
seminary in Qom, the prominent cleric Ayatollah Mohammad Taqi Mesbah-Yazdi made
the views of his fellow extremists clear.
In rejecting the slogan ‘Iran belongs to all Iranians,’ a phrase which is in the minds
of some who consider the Islamic Revolution as a means to fulfill the wishes of
society, [Ayatollah Yazdi] stated:
... Is it for people to set forth their wishes, even though these are contrary to
Islam? [Does it mean] Iran belongs to all Iranians and everyone is equal? Does
it mean that a Baha’i is equal with a religious authority [a mullah]? Today they are
trying to recognize the Baha’is with the slogan ‘Iran belongs to all Iranians.’ Is not
a Baha’i considered an Iranian? Don’t we have first and second class citizens?
Are people considered equal and, therefore, the citizens should also be considered
equal and of the same rank? Does it mean that a Baha’i can become a president
because he is a human being and an Iranian? Are these considered human
rights? Are we defending these kinds of human rights? Is this the purpose of our
Revolution? (Arya newspaper, Tehran, reprinted in Keyhan—London edition—No.
794, February 10, 2000)
The Ayatollah called for harsh treatment of those who violate Islamic standards set
by the clergy, and justified violence against those who do not conform to such
standards. In an atmosphere of confrontation between the proponents of change and
reform and the conservative defenders of the order established by the Islamic
revolution, violence is an ever-present danger. The Baha’is may very well become
victims of such violence, considering how they have historically been used as
scapegoats.
Deprived of its institutions, denied access to higher education, subjected to all forms
of discrimination, reduced to the status of “unprotected infidels at war with Islam,” and
having lost over 30,000 believers through emigration, the Baha’i community of Iran
survives. Its spiritual strength, the pressure of international public opinion, the actions
of the United Nations, protests of governments, and, last but not least, the sympathy
of a large number of Iranians, have made it impossible for the extremists to carry out
their plans for the eradication of the Baha’i community.
ADDED MATERIAL
Firuz Kazemzadeh, board member and former president of the World Federation of
Baha’i, is Professor Emeritus at Yale University. He is the author of “Central Asia’s
Foreign Relations: An Historical Survey” in The Legacy of History in Russia and the
New States of Eurasia (1994)