Chapter 81. After the Seal: Babism, the Baha’i Faith, Ahmadiyya, Black American Islam, and Keshe’s ‘True Koran’

Qur’an 33:40 calls Muhammad khatam an-nabiyyin, the “seal of the prophets”. Most Muslims read the verse as closing revelation. Every movement in this chapter reopened that question in some way: by announcing a “gate” to a hidden Imam, a new manifestation of God, a subordinate prophet, a black God in America, or, in Mehran Keshe’s teaching, the end of all religions with the “birth of Mitra”. Mainstream Islam regards these movements as heterodox, and several have been persecuted. The chapter sets out what the library’s sources report about each and then compares how they handle finality, the awaited Mahdi or Messiah, and the older Iranian substrate of Zarathustra and Mithra.

From the Shaykhi school to the Bab

Norman McClelland traces Babism to Shii esotericism: “A native of Shiraz, Iran, Mirza Ali Muhammad became a follower of Shaykh Ahmad Ahsai, who was strongly influenced by the cult of angels, which in turn had a strong influence on Mirza”. He adds that Bahaism was founded by Baha’u’llah “after much effort to divorce itself from the militancy of Babism, and to shed itself of the influences of both Shiite Islam and the cult of angels” [McClelland, Encyclopedia of Reincarnation and Karma, #66947, “Babism”]. Issitt and Main describe the result in neutral terms: “The Baha’i faith arose out of Babism, a monotheistic cult built around the teachings of the Bab (Siyyid Ali Muhammad Shirazi) in Iran”. Baha’i “developed out of the Shia branch of Islam in the 19th century” and today “has more than 6 million adherents around the world” [Issitt & Main, Hidden Religion, #66220, “Baha’i: Origins and Evolution”, p. 107]. The Bab’s declaration of 1844 marks the start of the Baha’i calendar. Adolf Novak, a Christian critic of new sects writing for Romanian readers, writes that “the Baha’i era began with the year of the Bab’s revelation, that is 1844” (Epoca Baha’i a început cu anul destăinuirii lui Bab, adică 1844) [Novak, Şapte secte, #9384].

Sylvia Browne tells the story of the Bab’s death. In her account the Bab, imprisoned at the Iranian prime minister’s instigation, wrote the Bayan in 1848. In 1850 he was suspended before a firing squad in Tabriz: “In what the Baha’i regard as a great miracle of their faith, not a single bullet struck the Bab, and he actually seemed to vanish into thin air”. She draws this account from Shoghi Effendi’s God Passes By [Browne, End of Days, #42246]. She also quotes Baha’u’llah’s vision in prison: “I beheld a Maiden—the embodiment of the remembrance of the name of My Lord—suspended in the air before Me” [Browne, #42246].

Baha’u’llah and the Baha’i world faith

“Before he died in 1892, Baha’u’llah had created the Baha’i Faith based on the teachings of the Bab”. Browne summarises its theology of progressive revelation: Baha’is believe in one God “who sent such divine teachers and prophets as Buddha, Abraham, Jesus, Moses, Krishna, Zarathustra, and Muhammad—in addition to the Bab and Baha’u’llah—to educate humankind” toward “an ever-advancing civilization” [Browne, #42246]. Zarathustra’s place on this list ties the faith back to the Iranian origins examined in the opening Parts of this study.

Novak lists the faith’s distinctive features. “The revelations of Baha’u’llah comprise more than a hundred books” and propose “a new concept for world society: a world parliament”. The number nine “plays an important role”, and the houses of worship are rotundas “with nine entrances”, where no sermon is preached and only the scriptures of the various religions are read, near Chicago, in Panama City, Kampala, Frankfurt, Sydney and New Delhi. The year has 19 months of 19 days and begins on 21 March “according to the Persian tradition”. The tombs of the Bab, Baha’u’llah and Abdul-Baha, “veritable mausolea, are in Haifa and Akko (Israel)” [Novak, #9384]. Sacred Places of the World calls the Shrine of the Bab “one of Haifa’s most prominent landmarks” and “the Faith’s second holiest Shrine”, and adds that the Shrine of Baha’u’llah at Bahji near Akka is “the holiest place on earth for Baha’is and the point toward which they turn in prayer each day” [Sacred Places of the World, #48913].

Persecution is a political fact running through the faith’s whole history. According to the reference shelf, “thousands of Bábís were killed” under the Qajars. In 1955 the Pahlavi state backed a clerical anti-Baha’i campaign. After 1979 persecution “has become an official and systematic policy of the Islamic Republic”, codified in a 25 February 1991 memorandum, issued at Khamenei’s request, directing that Baha’is’ “progress and development are blocked”. Iranian authorities “have executed or forcibly disappeared hundreds of Baháʼís and have arrested, detained, prosecuted, or imprisoned thousands” [Wikipedia: Persecution of Baháʼís].

Ahmadiyya: a prophet under the seal

McClelland defines Ahmadiyya as “the messianic sect founded in 1889 by Mirza Ghulam Ahmed Qadiyani (1835-1908) in the Punjab”. His entry lists the founder’s identifications, which reach “Maitreya, and even … the (Judeo-Christian) Messiah”, and notes that the identification with Jesus “was facilitated by Ahmed belief that the tomb of one Yuz-Assaf in the Kashmiri city of Srinagar was really the tomb of Jesus” [McClelland, #66947, “Ahmadiyya”]. Nabeel Qureshi, raised Ahmadi before he converted to Christianity, explains the dispute from the inside. Ahmad claimed “that he was a subordinate prophet under Muhammad”, and “most Muslims argue that 33:40 precludes any prophethood after Muhammad, thereby making Mirza Ghulam Ahmad a false prophet and his followers non-Muslim”. Ahmad’s defence was that he was no new prophet at all: “Jews are waiting for Elijah, Hindus are waiting for Krishna, Buddhists are waiting for Buddha, and Christians are waiting for Jesus … the world was waiting for the return of Jesus, but Ahmad was he” [Qureshi, Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus, #68882, Part 1]. Qureshi also describes the Ahmadi “swoon theory”: Jesus survived the cross and was taken down by Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus. He contrasts it with the majority Muslim “substitution theory” [Qureshi, #68882, Part 2].

Black American Islam: the Nation and the Five Percent

The Nation of Islam (NOI) appears in the library mainly through its own polemical publications, which are treated here as primary evidence of its ideology. The “Historical Research Department” trilogy The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews opens: “Throughout the history of the practice, Jews have been involved in the purchase and sale of human beings”. Volume 2 is titled How Jews Gained Control of the Black American Economy [Nation of Islam, The Secret Relationship vol. 1, #51694; vol. 2, #51695; see also #51696]. The texts show how the NOI tied religious separatism to an economic and racial politics directed against a named people.

Michael Muhammad Knight traces the Five Percenters to Clarence 13X of the NOI’s Harlem mosque. The NOI’s catechism of “Supreme Wisdom Lessons” defines the five percent as “the poor, righteous Teachers … [who] Teach that the Living God is the Son of man, the supreme being, the (black man) of Asia”. The Five Percenters took that literally: “the black man is God—all black men, without any sort of religiously ordered hierarchy”. Knight points out the consequence for prophecy: “I have never heard of a Five Percenter named Muhammad; if the black man is God, why would he follow a prophet?” Through rap artists such as the Wu-Tang Clan and Busta Rhymes, the movement shaped hip hop [Knight, The Five Percenters, #68129]. These movements are treated further in the Parts on new religious movements.

Keshe: the birth of Mitra and the end of religions

Keshe takes the post-prophetic argument to its end point. KSW 412 (23 December 2021) opens with “the birthday of Mitra where all the religions then changed names … branches of the branches, but the totality stays Mitra”. He calls Christmas a “replication” of the Mitra story. On 21 December 2021, he says, “the Promised One, the Promised Day, has arrived … the thousand year waiting in darkness has come to an end”. He declares: “We celebrate the birth of Mitra, .. the return of Messiah, .. the return of Methi” [Keshe, KSW 412, #378124, sections 0-1]. He then announces the dissolution of the faiths: “We see the end of Islam as a religion, but as a path of correct conduct, the true writing in Koran. We see the end of Christianity … We have already abolished the Judaism”, and “very soon … man will not remember a name for any religion” [Keshe, KSW 412, #378124, sections 3-4]. He interprets the Iranian relief of “Mitra – King – Ahura Mazda” as showing that royal power comes “from Creator as a light – through Mitra” [Keshe, KSW 412, #378124].

The Keshe material is consistently anti-clerical. “Need no charlatans in the name of Ayatollahs, Mullahs, Priests, Rabbis and the rest”, he says, and asks: “do you need a Prophet to understand the work of this planet?” [Keshe, KSW 629, #378341, section 0]. “There shall be no churches and no mosques, no temples in the U[niverse]”, because “the temple of the Creator has to be in the STM” (Soul of the Man) [Keshe, KSW 303, #378015]. “Mankind has to understand that the time for intermediaries is over. … Messiah has come, and he’s amongst us as a Soul of every individual” [Keshe, KSW 460, #378172]. He explains religious wonders as technology. Christ, Buddha “and the others understood the work of the transfer and transmutation, but they hid it under the name of religion”, and Islam’s “black seed” and Christianity’s “holy water” are hidden instances of it [Keshe, KSW 453, #378165].

His position on the Baha’is is unusual. Asked whether his ideas resemble Baha’u’llah’s, he answers in KSW 354: “I do not agree with none of what the Bahai faith stands for today … they have broken the agreement with the Creator, to the benefit of them”. He also says: “this is what happened with me and the Bahai faith, I walked away, as the misconduct is beyond imagination, in the name and cover of religion”. He speaks of the path as one “I set it up to be”, a phrasing that implies a personal role in its founding [Keshe, KSW 354, #378066, section 12]. Where the reference shelf records the community as victims of state persecution, Keshe accuses its present leadership of greed and misconduct.

Comparison: finality, Mahdi and the Iranian substrate

Key points

• McClelland derives Babism from Shaykh Ahmad Ahsai’s school, “strongly influenced by the cult of angels”. Issitt and Main call Babism “a monotheistic cult” from which the six-million-strong Baha’i faith grew [#66947; #66220].
• Browne relays the Baha’i account that no bullet struck the Bab in 1850, and lists Zarathustra among the Baha’i manifestations of God [#42246].
• Novak describes the cult of nine, the 1844 era, Baha’u’llah’s hundred-plus books, the world-parliament idea and the Haifa-Akko shrines [#9384; #48913].
• Persecution of Baha’is in Iran became official policy after 1979, set out in the 1991 memorandum [Wikipedia: Persecution of Baháʼís].
• Ahmadiyya (1889) claimed a subordinate prophethood. Mainstream Muslims reject it under 33:40, and Ahmadis hold that Jesus survived the cross and is buried in Srinagar [#66947; #68882].
• The NOI’s Secret Relationship volumes are primary evidence of its racial-economic politics. The Five Percenters made “the black man is God” a theology without prophets [#51694; #51695; #68129].
• Keshe declares that the old religions ended with the “birth of Mitra” on 21 December 2021. Islam survives only as “a path of correct conduct, the true writing in Koran”, and clergy are “charlatans” [#378124; #378341; #378172].
• Keshe rejects today’s Baha’i faith for misconduct, against the reference shelf’s record of it as a persecuted minority [#378066; Wikipedia].