…should a Soul in the “End that knoweth no end” be made
manifest, and arise to proclaim and uphold a Cause which in “the Beginning that
hath no beginning” another Soul had proclaimed and upheld, it can be truly
declared of Him Who is the Last and of Him Who was the First that they are one
and the same, inasmuch as both are the Exponents of one and the same Cause. For
this reason, hath the Point of the Bayán—may the life of all else but Him be
His sacrifice!—likened the Manifestations of God unto the sun which, though it
rise from the “Beginning that hath no beginning” until the “End that knoweth no
end,” is none the less the same sun. Now, wert thou to say, that this sun is
the former sun, thou speakest the truth; and if thou sayest that this sun is
the “return” of that sun, thou also speakest the truth. Likewise, from this
statement it is made evident that the term “last” is applicable to the “first,”
and the term “first” applicable to the “last;” inasmuch as both the “first” and
the “last” have risen to proclaim one and the same Faith.
- Baha’u’llah (‘The
Kitab-i-Iqan’)
