Táhirih : A Portrait in Poetry
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The Journal of Bahá'í Studies 10, 1-10Abstract: Most accounts of Táhirih have been either adulatory or hagiographic, vituperative and condemnatory, or facile and distortive. She has been depicted either as a saintly martyr, a cunning vixen,. or a fiery feminist. If the truly heroic dimensions of her life and of her character are to be appreciated, she must be viewed as she saw herself and within the context of her own culture. It is her poetry that both reveals the layers of her complex motivations, and makes her accessible. The aim of this essay is to allow her own voice, through her poems, to speak for herself, her time, and her motivations.
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Most accounts of Táhirih have been either adulatory or hagiographic, vituperative and condemnatory, or facile and distortive. She has been depicted either as a saintly martyr, a cunning vixen,. or a fiery feminist. If the truly heroic dimensions of her life and of her character are to be appreciated, she must be viewed as she saw herself and within the context of her own culture. It is her poetry that both reveals the layers of her complex motivations, and makes her accessible. The aim of this essay is to allow her own voice, through her poems, to speak for herself, her time, and her motivations.