He was Bahá'u'lláh's youngest half-brother and was raised by Him because their father, Mírzá Buzurg died two years after his birth. He was greatly devoted to Bahá'u'lláh. He and his family settled on lands in the Jordan valley on the eastern shore of the Sea of Galilee. These lands were later exchanged for land that now comprises a part part of the site at Bahji. He had died in 1887. [SoG112; SE124; MGW45; RoB1p16; DoH31, 207, 228]

He had been buried on land that had been in the possession of Mirza Muhammad-Quli's family on the eastern shore of the Sea of Galilee, at a place called Nuqayb. He and his family lived there and farmed the land for many years and on his passing, at the instruction of 'Abdu'l-Bahá, his remains were buried there, as were subsequently those of members of his family.

In 1937 Kibbutz Ein Gev was established just to the north of the farm, and the two groups of settlers lived as amicable neighbors until the war of 1948 forced the family to leave the land which, lying on the troubled frontier of the new State of Israel, was expropriated by the Government. The grandchildren of Mirza Muhammad-Quli gave their rights in the land to the Faith which was received in exchange the much needed land in Bahji. Thus the little cemetery passed out of Bahá'í hands.

In 1972 the Bahá'ís made plans to embellish the site and maintaining it as a place of historic significance for the Faith. However, plans had already been made for the extension of the plantings of the kibbutz and the eventual development of the land in a way that would not permit the permanent reestablishment of the cemetery in that place. Another plot of land in the immediate neighborhood, but slightly farther from the shore of the Lake on the slope of Tel Susita, was officially designated a Bahá'í cemetery and given over to the Bahá'í Community. The work of fencing it and planting suitable shrubs and trees was then put in hand and preparations were made to reinter the precious remains of this family.

The ceremony was attended by Hands of the Cause Amatu'l-Baha Ruhiyyih Khanum and 'Ali-Akbar Furutan, members of the Universal House of Justice and of the International Teaching Center, and a large gathering of World Center friends as well as representatives of the Israeli authorities and of Kibbutz Ein Gev. Mrs. Husniyyih Bahá'í, the granddaughter of Mirza Muhammad-Quli, who was pioneering in St. Lucia in the West Indies, accompanied by members of her family, had been especially invited to attend the ceremony in honour of her illustrious forebear. [Mess63-86p698-99]

Egyptian security services have exploited the decree to orchestrate six major crackdowns on the Bahá'í community , in 1965, 1967, 1970, 1972,1985 and 2001. The authorities arrested a total of 236 Egyptian Bahá'ís in these crackdowns, on grounds that they had violated the decree or on charges of "contempt of religion" On the few occasions on which arrests were followed by prosecutions, none of the defendants were ever found guilty of violating Law 263/1960 or any other law." from "IV. Egypt's Baha'is and the Policy of Erasure" in Prohibited Identities: State Interference with Religious Freedom by Human Rights Watch.