BABISM. - A new religion, arisen in a Shiite Islamic milieu through the work of Sajjid 'Alī Mohammed of Širāz, called the Bāb. The word bāb (in Arabic "gate") signifies the gate that leads to the knowledge of divine truth and was already used to designate a determined grade in the hierarchy of cosmic intelligences, for example by the Cārmatis and by other extreme Shiite sects.
The Bāb, known among his followers rather by the appellation of Nuqtah "point" (Nuqta-i bajān = Point of the revelation, Nuqta-i ulā = First point), was born on 20 Oct. 1819 at Širāz, capital of the Persian province of Fārs. In 1844, on returning to Širāz from a pilgrimage to the Shiite sanctuary of Kerbelā, where he had absorbed the doctrines of the sect of the Šejhī (founded in Persia in the 18th century), he secretly declared his divine mission to a restricted number of persons, mostly ex-Šejhī. A Šejhī, Husejn of Bušrūjeh, became the first fervent adept of the Bāb, in whom he recognized the mystical successor of Sajjid Kāzim of Rešt, one of the founders of the Šejhī sect and dead a short time before.
When the Bāb returned from a pilgrimage to Mecca, the Bābī faith was for the first time proclaimed in public: riots arose from it and the Bāb's missionaries were arrested. While inquiries were being made about the new religion, cholera broke out at Širāz; the Bāb went (1846) to Isfahān where he was protected by the governor of the city: his successor, of different ideas, in 1847 had the Bāb conducted to the fortress of Mākū, in Persian Azerbaijan, where he remained a prisoner.
Meanwhile Husejn of Bušrūjeh continued his preaching, converting among others at Teherān the two brothers Mīrzā Yahjā Nūrī (called later Subh-i Azal) and Mīrzā Husejn 'Alī Nūrī, the future Bahā'ullāh (v. BAHĀISMO). A woman too, the beautiful and highly intelligent Qurrat al-'Ajn, of Qazwīn, converted to the new religion.
At Bedešt, in Horāsān, the first meeting of the Bāb's disciples took place (1848), and Islām was there openly abrogated in its exterior practices. Meanwhile the Bābī were fiercely persecuted throughout Persia; particularly notable was the massacre of Babists in the sanctuary of Šejh Tabarsī (1849) and at Zaṅgān (1850). After these disorders the Bāb was transported to Tabriz to be condemned to death. The Bāb, hung from a rope together with a disciple, was shot in the presence of a great crowd. The first volley had no other effect than that of breaking the ropes from which the Bāb was hanging, and he fell to the ground unharmed: the execution had to be repeated and only by pure chance did the Bāb fail to save himself (9 July 1850). The persecution against the Babists increased still further after the attempt against the shah Nāṣir ad-dīn (16 Aug. 1852), carried out, it seems, by a follower of the Bāb. The most celebrated adepts of the new religion had to leave Persia. Mīrzā Ḥusejn 'Alī (Bahā'ullāh) settled at Bagdad, and was then exiled to Adrianople: he declared himself the successor of the Bāb (v. BAHĀ'ISMO), while some Babists remained more faithful to the letter of the master's teachings and recognized as their head Mīrzā Jāhā Nūrī (Subh-i Azaf).
The Babist doctrine is a mixture of the doctrines of the Ismaili and Duodeciman Shiites with the addition of numerous more or less original theories. Babism affirms that human religious history is a succession of long cycles initiated respectively by Adam, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, Mohammed. While for Muslims Mohammed is the "seal of the prophets," for the Babists this continuous recurrence of cycles, ever more perfect, still continues (the Bāb often speaks in his works of a mysterious personage who will succeed him and whom he calls "He whom God will manifest"); the Bāb is precisely the initiator of a new prophetic cycle.
The Bāb himself composed numerous religious works, among which a book in Arabic prose, entitled Al-Bajān ("clear exposition"), which was composed at Bûsechr (Persian Gulf) in 1845, and another Bajān in the Persian language. The Koran is considered by the Babists as abrogated by the new sacred book. God is one and the Bāb is the mirror in which each one can contemplate God. The latter created the world by means of seven attributes called the "Letters of the Truth." A great part is in fact played in the Babist religion by cabalistic calculation: the number 19 has particular importance. In place of the Muslim sanctuaries, which should be destroyed, 19 temples should be erected. The year is of 19 months of 19 days each and the community is governed by a college of 19 persons.
The faithful are bound to pay to this college a kind of annual tax on capital. All penalties are abolished except the fine and the prohibition of cohabitation of husband and wife for a more or less long time. Freedom of commerce and of interest is admitted. It is obligatory to marry very young and divorce is discouraged. Divorced spouses may be reconciled up to 19 times. Widowers and widows must remarry as soon as possible. There exists no legal impurity, common prayers are abolished, women may show themselves without a veil. Begging is forbidden and travels are discouraged. Every day one must read 19 verses of the Bajān and mention the name of God 361 times. For Persia Babism meant a profound spiritual renewal and a rebirth of pure and sincere religiosity, which aroused the enthusiasm even of well-known European Orientalists such as, for example, Browne and Nicolas. The influence of Babism on the liberal and reformist movement that opened Persia to Western culture and progress was also notable.