View source for Mirza Abdul'Rahim Talibov Tabrizi

[[File:Mirza-Abdul-Rahim-Talibov-Tabrizi.jpg|thumb|180px|right|Mirzā Abdul'Rahim Tālibi Najar Tabrizi]]
'''Mirzā Abdul'Rahim Tālibi Najjār Tabrizi''' (1834, [[Tabriz]] &mdash; 1911, [[Temir-Khan-Shura]], named [[Buinaksk]] since 1922) ({{langx|fa|ميرزا عبدالرحیم طالبی نجار تبریزی}}), also known as '''Talibov''' (طالبوف), was an [[Iranian Azerbaijanis|Iranian Azerbaijani]]<ref>{{cite book |title=The Iranian constitutional revolution, 1906-1911: grassroots democracy |last=Afary |first=Janet |year=1996 |publisher=Columbia University Press |page=[https://archive.org/details/iranian_afa_1996_00_0104/page/40 40] |url=https://archive.org/details/iranian_afa_1996_00_0104 |url-access=registration |quote=''He read the works of Transcaucasian Azeri intellectual, Abd al-Rahim Talibov''}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |title=Coexisting and Conflicting Identities |first=Joanna |last=DeGroot |editor1-first=Ruth Roach |editor1-last=Pierson |editor2-first=Nupur |editor2-last=Chaudhuri |editor3-first=Beth |editor3-last=McAuley |year=1998 |publisher=Indiana University Press |trans-title=Nation, empire, colony: historicizing gender and race |isbn=978-0-253-21191-0 |page=145 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kO8yRHeDxVcC&pg=PA145 |quote=''...the Azeri-Iranian Talibov/Talibzadeh linked the threat of "our pure Shari'a" (i.e. Iranian Islamic tradition) to the dominance of foreigners over Iranians...''}}</ref> intellectual and social reformer. He was born in the [[Sorkhab (Tabriz)|Sorkhab]] district of Tabriz, [[Iran]]. Both his father, Abu-Tālib Najjār Tabrizi, and grandfather, Ali-Morad Najjār Tabrizi, were carpenters (whence the name ''Najjār''). No information concerning the maternal side of his family is available.
In 1851, Talibi emigrated to [[Tbilisi]] (Tiflis), the administrative capital of the [[Russian Empire|Russian]]  [[Caucasus]], and began a new life there (see [[Treaty of Gulistan]] and [[Treaty of Turkmenchay]]). According to one Iranian source, Talibi attended school in Tbilisi and studied modern sciences, however there is no independent evidence in support of this report. It has been suggested that Talibi may in fact never have received a formal education in Russia. In a letter written to an Iranian friend, he indicated that he produced his major works through relying on personal reading and self-discipline.
In Tbilisi, Talibi worked for an Iranian businessman, named Mohammad-Ali Khan, who had emigrated to [[Transcaucasia]] from the city of [[Kashan]]. Mohammad-Ali Khan was a contractor who had accumulated much of his wealth from obtaining concessions for construction of roads and bridges in Transcaucasia. After years of working for the wealthy compatriot, Talibi must have saved a sufficient amount of capital to start his own construction business. He also moved from Tbilisi to [[Temir-Khan-Shura]] ([[Buinaksk]], since 1922), the provincial capital of [[Dagestan]], where he bought a comfortable house, built a small private library and married a woman from [[Derbent]].
Talibi wrote all of his works after the age of fifty-five. He had by then attained a degree of financial security that enabled him to devote the next twenty-one years of his life to writing and translating from [[Russian language|Russian]] into [[Persian language|Persian]]. With the exception of his last two books, he published all of his works at his own expense. Of his last two books, the first, ''Īzāhāt dar Khosus-e Azādi'' (''Explanations Concerning Freedom''), was published in Tehran after the victory of the [[Iranian Constitutional Revolution]] of 1906, and the second, ''Siyāsat-e Tālibi'' (''Tālibian Politics''), was published posthumously in Tehran a few months after his death in 1911.
During his lifetime, two of Talibi's works, namely ''Ketāb-e Ahmad yā Safineh-ye Tālebi'' (''Ahmad's Book or the Talibian Vessel'') and ''Masālek'ol-Moh'senin'' (''The Ways of the Charitable''), achieved great eminence. ''Ketāb-e Ahmad'', which consists of two volumes, was inspired by [[Jean-Jacques Rousseau]]'s tract on education ''[[Emile, or On Education|Emile]]''.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Masroori |first=Cyrus |date=2014 |title=Ṭālebuf, ʿAbd-al-Raḥim |url=https://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/talebuf |access-date=July 22, 2023 |website=Encyclopædia Iranica}}</ref> The book is based on conversations between the author and his fictional seven-year-old son, Ahmad, whose searching and inquisitive mind compels his father to expand on a wide range of scientific, historical, political and religious topics. Their dialogue on these issues reveal Talibi's social reformism.
''The Ways of the Charitable'' involves four characters: Mustafa and Hossein who are engineers, a physician named Ahmed, and Muhammad who is a chemistry teacher. They are appointed by a fictional geographic administration of Iran to travel to [[Mount Damavand|Damavand]] mountain for scientific studies and measurement.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Masālek ol-Moḥsenīn (The Ways of the Charitable)|last=Talibov|first=Abdul Rahim|publisher=Sherkat-i Sahami|year=1968|location=Tehran|pages=57}}</ref> They encounter a number of spaces and characters on their way—from a mujtahid to a dervish to shoemaker—and these encounters attempt to demonstrate Iran’s problems. These problems are political, social, and scientific. Kings live in luxury while the country’s infrastructure is crumbling;<ref>{{Cite book|title=Ibid.|pages=69}}</ref> European cities enjoy wealth and application of sciences while Iranian cities lack them;<ref>{{Cite book|title=Ibid.|pages=71}}</ref> other nations unite with a spirit of reform and talk at lengths to make their nation a better place while Iranians are silent about their problems, alienated from one another, and set in archaic, ancestral ways;<ref>{{Cite book|title=Ibid.|pages=74}}</ref> the [[Qajar dynasty|Qajar]] ministries are mere imitations without any institutional foundation and government officials are not appointed based on merit; education too is in a poor condition and no books are written for the advancement of sound pedagogy.
==See also==
<!---♦♦♦ Please keep the list in alphabetical order  ♦♦♦--->
* [[Mirza Fatali Akhundzadeh]]
* [[Mohammad-Ali Jamalzadeh]]
* [[Mirza Aqa Khan Kermani]]
* [[Mirza Jahangir Khan]]
==References==
{{reflist}}
==Further reading==
* [[Ahmad Kasravi]], ''Tarikh-e Mashruteh-ye Iran'' (تاریخ مشروطهٔ ایران) (History of the Iranian Constitutional Revolution), in Persian, 951 p. (Negāh Publications, Tehran, 2003), {{ISBN|964-351-138-3}}. '''Note:''' This book is also available in two volumes, published by ''Amir Kabir Publications'' in 1984. ''Amir Kabir's'' 1961 edition is in one volume, 934 pages.
* Ahmad Kasravi, ''History of the Iranian Constitutional Revolution: Tarikh-e Mashrute-ye Iran'', Volume I, translated into English by Evan Siegel, 347 p. (Mazda Publications, Costa Mesa, California, 2006). {{ISBN|1-56859-197-7}}
* Mehrdad Kia, ''Nationalism, Modernism and Islam in the Writings of Talibov-i Tabrizi'', Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. '''30''', No. 2, pp.&nbsp;201–223 (1994)
* Mehrdad Kia, ''Pan-Islamism in Late Nineteenth-Century Iran'', Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. '''32''', No. 1, pp.&nbsp;30–52 (1996).
==External links==
* {{Commonscatinline}}
* {{cite encyclopedia | article = ṬĀLEBUF, ʿABD-AL-RAḤIM | last = Masroori | first = Cyrus | url = http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/talebuf | encyclopedia  = Encyclopaedia Iranica | year = 2014 }}
* ''Abdul'Rahim Talibov Tabrizi'', Azin-Dad (in Persian). [http://www.azindad.net/detail.asp?id=1096]
{{Persian Constitutional Revolution Persions}}
{{Authority control}}
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[[Category:People of the Persian Constitutional Revolution]]
[[Category:People from Tabriz]]
[[Category:Iranian revolutionaries]]
[[Category:Russian people of Iranian descent]]
[[Category:Iranian emigrants to the Russian Empire]]
[[Category:Translators from Russian]]
[[Category:1834 births]]
[[Category:1911 deaths]]