The ability of Iranians/Persians to adapt to change was, and still is, visible

The ability of Iranians/Persians to adapt to change was, and still is, visible in the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first centuries. In the nineteenth century, the new “religion” of Bahaism developed in Iran and was anathema to traditional Islam because of one of the classical principles of Islam that holds that their prophet Muhammad was the “Seal of the Prophets” (in Arabic: Khatim al-Anbiya)... As Bahaism succeeded, more and more people embraced this new religion. This again, is an example of the quintessential Iranian tactic of converting to the religion of the most powerful in order to protect Persian essence. When the Qajar rulers, however, defeated the Bahais, Iranians who had followed Bahaism began returning to Islam. This experience is deeply engrained in the Iranian Shi’ite religious psyche and is why today’s the Iranian Islamic Republic’s leaders so passionately loathe Bahaism....

Bahaism was indeed an existential threat to Iranian Shi’ite Islam when it was militarily powerful because of the malleability of Iranian culture. It is therefore not surprising that, today, a significant number of Iranians in the diaspora—most notably in the United States and the Netherlands—have left Islam and have converted to Christianity, the major religion of both countries.

(Identities in Crisis in Iran - Politics, Culture, and Religion Edited by Ronen A. Cohen, p 15)