You are well aware of what befell His [Muhammad’s] Faith in
the early days of His dispensation. What woeful sufferings did the hand of the
infidel and erring, the divines of that age and their associates, inflict upon
that spiritual Essence, that most pure and holy Being! How abundant the thorns
and briars which they have strewn over His path! It is evident that wretched
generation, in their wicked and satanic fancy, regarded every injury to that
immortal Being as a means to the attainment of an abiding felicity; inasmuch as
the recognized divines of that age… all treated Him as an impostor, and
pronounced Him a lunatic and a calumniator. Such sore accusations they brought against
Him that in recounting them God forbiddeth the ink to flow, Our pen to move, or
the page to bear them. These malicious imputations provoked the people to arise
and torment Him. And how fierce that torment if the divines of the age be its
chief instigators, if they denounce Him to their followers, cast Him out from
their midst, and declare Him a miscreant! Hath not the
same befallen this Servant, and been witnessed by all?
- Baha’u’llah (‘The Kitab-i-Iqan)
