Maneckji Limji Hataria

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Maneckji Limji Hataria (1813-1890), was a Parsi-Zoroastrian scholar and civil rights activist.

In 1854 Hataria was appointed emissary by the "Persian Zoroastrian Amelioration Fund", an organization founded in Bombay by Dinshaw Maneckji Petit with the aim of improving the conditions for the less fortunate co-religionists in Iran, who were being persecuted by the Qajar rulers.

In Yazd, Hataria established a Council of Zoroastrians, which succeeded in convincing a number of Iranian Zoroastrians to emigrate to India (where they are today known as Iranis). Hataria may also have been instrumental in obtaining a remission of the jizya poll tax for his co-religionists in 1882.

In 1854 Hataria met Bahá'u'lláh, the founder of the Bahá'í Faith, in Baghdad. Although he remained faithful to Zoroastrianism all his life, he became a lifelong admirer of the new religion.

Between 1876 and 1882 Mírzá Abu'l-Fadl, a well-known Bahá'í scholar, was his personal secretary, and acted as his intermediary with Bahá'u'lláh. During this period, at the request of Hataria, Bahá'u'lláh revealed two tablets in pure Persian, which have been published under the title Tabernacle of Unity.

[edit] External links

• The Martin Luther King of Zoroastrianism (The Struggle for Zoroastrian Civil Rights in Iran)
• Travels in Iran: A Parsi Mission to Iran (1865)
• Maneckji Limji Hataria in Iran