Hassan Dehqani-Tafti

Hassan Barnaba Dehqani-Tafti (Hassan Barnābā Dehqānī-Taftī; May 14, 1920 – April 29, 2008) was the Anglican Bishop of Iran from 1961 until his retirement in 1990. Dehqani-Tafti was the first ethnic Persian to become a bishop of Iran since the Islamic conquest of Persia in the 7th century. (There had been ethnic Armenian and Assyrian bishops in Iran, but no ethnic Persian bishops up until the 20th century.) However, Dehqani-Tafti spent the last ten years of his episcopate in exile after the Iranian Revolution and an assassination attempt in October 1979, in which his wife, Margaret, was wounded. In May 1980, his 24-year-old son, Bahram, was murdered by Iranian government agents. Bahram is commemorated in the chapel at Monkton Combe School where he was a pupil from 1968 to 1973.

Hassan Barnaba Dehqani-Tafti was born in the small village of Taft, near the city of Yazd, in central Iran. His parents, who were Muslims, were poor. Dehqani-Tafti attended Stuart Memorial College in Isfahan, before moving on to Tehran University, where he trained to become a teacher. He converted to Christianity in Isfahan in 1938 and was soon seen a leader of the growing Christian youth group in the city.

He served as an officer in the Iranian Imperial Army from 1943 until 1945. His knowledge of English led him to become an interpreter for British officials in the Middle East. Following the end of World War II, Dehqani-Tafti worked under Anglican bishop William Thompson as a layman in the Diocese of Iran for two years.

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