Bibliography: #BIB24883

web link	bahai-library.com/bibliography/BIB24883
reference type	Journal Article
title	Juifs et Baha'ïs en Iran, 1844-1920
journal	Revue des études juives (Paris)
author	Faü, Jean-François
year	2004
date	janvier–juin 2004
issue	1-2
volume	163
notes	Iranian Judaism has gone through various fortunes during the successive Persian dynasties and non Persian governments (Arab from 642 A.D. until 1258 and Moghol from 1258 until 1336) which ruled Persia. Iranian Jews' social and religious situation in the 19th century was the result of four centuries of segregation caused by the Shi'ite imperial power. But such a lethargic community went through a wave of conversions to the Baha'i faith during the 1880s, an event of exceptional magnitude for Judaism. Indeed this mass phenomenon remains unique in the history of Oriental Judaism since the times of the false Messiah Sabbatai Tsevi in Turkey. This study analyses the different motivations which induced such a great number in the Iranian Jewish community to adopt the Baha'i faith. It also reveals the social and cultural representations which favored this conversion movement which was exclusively limited to Persian Jews. Faü posits three main reasons for the conversions: (1) The desperate economic situation of Jews in Iran spurred a migration of young people toward the cities where they were more likely to meet Jews who converted to the Bahá'í Faith; the author also makes the startling claim that an early Jewsish convert - Hakim Aqa Jan - preserved his social status by converting other Jews; Jews who had been forced to convert to Islam also became Bahá'ís; the absence of a quality rabbinate allowed the Bahá'ís to overpower the rabbis easily in argument. (2) The Bahís accorded an important place to Judaism in its theology, and Jews who became Bahá'ís "did not leave the synagogue; the author reports the Spiritual Assembly of Kashan opened a kosher butcher shop. (3) Since Jewish schools were inadequate, the Jewish converts to the Faith founded a series of schools to which Jews sent their children, who then became Bahá'ís; the rabbinate therefore called upon Western Jewish organizations to help them establish Jewish schools in Iran; but often the Jews who went through the westernizing ewish schools became Bahá'ís. Jewish conversions to the Bahí Faith slowed dramatically after 1925 because they began to feel an Iranian national identity and left behind their community identity.
language	French
keywords	CONVERSION; CONVERTS; JEWS; IRAN; 1844-1920
pages	257–271
Legal note	11.

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