Mohammad Ali Taheri

Mohammad Ali Taheri (; born 1956, in Kermanshah, Iran) is an alternative medicine practitioner who is the founder of Erfan-e-Halgheh, also called Interuniversal Mysticism, a version of Iranian mysticism Irfan. He is also the founder of the Erfan Halghe Cultural Institute.

Taheri has founded two pseudo-scientific complementary medicine treatments Faradarmani and Psymentology and, according to him, has been honored with doctorate degrees by alternative medicine universities for his research.

He is currently based in Canada after the grant of asylum by the Government of Canada.

Life Early years Mohammad Ali Taheri was born in 1956 in Kermanshah, Iran and received his primary education from his hometown. Later, they moved to Tehran for better opportunities.

Upon his return to Iran, he founded an engineering firm, Tiva Kian Engineering and Design Company, and designed small machines for use in mushroom production and flour factories. Therefore, he proposed two ways to heal exclusively based on a path of "self-understanding" called Faradarmani and Psymentology. It is part of Inter-universal Mysticism, a spiritual movement or school of thought, which he started about forty years ago to promote mental wellness and physical health. though new-age practices The movement became wildly popular in urban centers of Iran. At its peak, the movement had more than two million followers.

In 2010, he has to stop his teachings, when his popularity was at the peak, due to his arrest by the government.

Imprisonment, trial and release, 2010–2019 In 2009, a group linked to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) alarmed by his rising popularity and called it a threat to the national security. He was held in solitary confinement for 67 days.

Taheri was interrogated again in the summer of 2014 on charges of corruption on earth, and was eventually sentenced to death in court in May 2015. The UN high commissioner for Human Rights called this death sentence an “absolute outrage”. His sentence was annulled later the same year.

He was due to be released on February 7, 2016, after serving a full five-year sentence and paying the fine, but was prevented from being released on new charges being brought. In September 2017, this second sentence and related arrests of his followers was condemned by the US Department of State spokesperson Heather Nauert.

In August 2018, he was charged with corruption on earth for the third time by Judge Abolqasim Salavati in Branch 15 of the Revolutionary Court on a charge of five years' imprisonment; this charge should have been re-examined by the appeals court, but this never took place.

In September 2018, Taheri was charged again with apostasy. In a letter to Ahmad Shahid, a former UN human rights rapporteur for Iran, Taheri reported that he had been forced to fabricate confessions through psychological pressure and torture by IRGC interrogators.

Prisoner of conscience In October 2018, Vice-Chair of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, Gayle Conelly Manchin, adopted Mohammad Ali Taheri as a religious prisoner of conscience which is part of USCIRF's Religious Prisoners of Conscience Project.

Campaign to release Taheri In 2012, his mother left Iran and moved to Canada to start a campaign for the release of Taheri with help of human rights activists.

In August 2015, sit-ins were held by Taheri's students in Tehran and Qom and demanded to overturn his death sentence. Protests were also held in twenty cities around the world, including Edmonton, calling for his release from the prison.

In October 2016, more than thirty thousand people in Canada demanded the release of Mohammad Ali Taheri through petitions and mailboxes.

United Nation Human Rights condemned Taheri's imprisonment many times in its reports during his arrest period.

Release and exile Taheri, in a letter to the Iranian president on January 13, 2019, called for the removal of his Iranian citizenship in protest against injustice. After his release, he left Iran and sought and was subsequently granted asylum in Canada on March 8, 2020.

Family Taheri is married and the couple has two children. Taheri' mother, Ezat Taheri, and sister, Azardokht Taheri, are based in Canada.

He claims he has also received gold medals and certificates by alternative medicine institutes from Belgium, Romania, Russia, and South Korea for his work and research. Some of his books have also been published in Armenia.

His books are widely read in Iran. For example, his book, Ensan az Manzari Digar (Human from Another Outlook), which is considered the founding text of Erfan-e-Halgheh, became a best-seller in Iran and went into eight imprints, a total of 90,000 prints between 2007 and 2009.

Taheri, Mohammad Ali (2006). Cosmic mysticism (ring) (in Persian) Taheri, Mohammad Ali (2007). Man, from another perspective (in Persian) Taheri, Mohammad Ali (2010). The relationship between ethics and mysticism (in Persian) Taheri, Mohammad Ali (2011). Man and knowledge (in Persian)

Critics Having no scientific qualifications, writing in alternative or self published journals and presenting no serious scientific evidence for his theories have got him called a charlatan.

Having been condemned for illegal practice of medicine, fraud, and misrepresentation of academic credentials, his theories are regarded by the scientific and sceptic community as pseudo-science and his alternative medicine as dangerous.