Morning
These are the “clouds” that cause the heavens of the
knowledge and understanding of all that dwell on earth to be cloven asunder.
Even as He hath revealed: “On that day shall the heaven be cloven by the
clouds.” [Qur’án 25:25] Even as the clouds prevent the eyes of men from beholding the sun,
so do these things hinder the souls of men from recognizing the light of the
divine Luminary. To this beareth witness that which hath proceeded out of the
mouth of the unbelievers as revealed in the sacred Book: “And they have said:
‘What manner of apostle is this? He eateth food, and walketh the streets.
Unless an angel be sent down and take part in His warnings, we will not
believe.’” [Qur’án 25:7] Other Prophets, similarly, have been subject to poverty and
afflictions, to hunger, and to the ills and chances of this world. As these
holy Persons were subject to such needs and wants, the people were,
consequently, lost in the wilds of misgivings and doubts, and were afflicted
with bewilderment and perplexity. How, they wondered, could such a person be
sent down from God, assert His ascendancy over all the peoples and kindreds of
the earth, and claim Himself to be the goal of all creation,—even as He hath
said: “But for Thee, I would not have created all that are in heaven and on
earth,”—and yet be subject to such trivial things? You must undoubtedly have
been informed of the tribulations, the poverty, the ills, and the degradation
that have befallen every Prophet of God and His companions.
- Baha'u'llah ('The Kitab-i-Iqan')
Evening
… behold…how He hath sent down the Manifestation of His Cause with verses which naught in the heavens or on the earth can withstand! Such hath been the manner of their revelation that they have neither peer nor likeness in the world of being, as ye yourselves beheld and heard when once the Daystar of the world shone forth above the horizon of ‘Iráq with manifest dominion. All things attain their consummation in the divine verses, and these indeed are the verses of God, the Sovereign Lord, the Help in Peril, the All-Glorious, the Almighty. Beyond this, He hath been made manifest as the Bearer of a Cause whose sovereign might is acknowledged by all created things, and this none can deny save the sinners and the ungodly.
- Baha'u'llah (‘Suriy-i-Haykal, ‘The Summons
of the Lord of Hosts’)
