Table of Contents
stuck to old literal interpretations and superstitious understanding of the Islamic scriptures. One historian records what happened at the end was this:
Then came the events of August 1852, which precipitated the enactment of the death sentence on Táhirih.
Táhirih prepares for her martyrdom
Nabíl records that persons with whom the wife of Kalántar was intimately connected have heard her relate the following:
One night … I was summoned to her [Táhirih’s] presence and found her fully adorned, dressed in a gown of snow-white silk. Her room was redolent with the choicest perfume. I expressed to her my surprise at so unusual a sight. “I am preparing to meet my Beloved,” she said, “and wish to free you from the cares and anxieties of my imprisonment.” I was much startled at first, and wept at the thought of separation from her. “Weep not”, she sought to reassure me. “The time of your lamentation is not yet come. I wish to share with you my last wishes, for the hour when I shall be arrested and condemned to suffer martyrdom is fast approaching. I would request you to allow your son to accompany me to the scene of my death and to ensure that the guards and executioner into whose hands I shall be delivered will not compel me to divest myself of this attire. It is also my wish that my body be thrown into a pit, and that that pit be filled with earth and stones. Three days after my death a woman will come and visit you, to whom you will give this package which I now deliver into your hands. My last request is that you permit no one henceforth to enter my chamber. From now until the time when I shall be summoned to leave this house, let no one be allowed to disturb my devotions. This day I intend to fast—a fast which I shall not break until I am brought face to face with my Beloved.” She bade me, with these words, lock the door of her chamber and not open it until the hour of her