“Recite ye the verses of God every morn and eventide.” (Bahá’u’lláh, ‘The Kitáb-i-Aqdas’)

December 13

Morning

Beware lest aught that hath been revealed in the Bayán should keep you from your Lord, the Most Compassionate. God is My witness that the Bayán was sent down for no other purpose than to celebrate My praise, did ye but know! In it the pure in heart will find only the fragrance of My love, only My Name that overshadoweth all that seeth and is seen. Say: Turn ye, O people, unto that which hath proceeded from My Most Exalted Pen. Should ye inhale therefrom the fragrance of God, set not yourselves against Him, nor deny yourselves a portion of His gracious favour and His manifold bestowals. Thus doth your Lord admonish you; He, verily, is the Counsellor, the Omniscient. 

- Baha’u’llah (‘The Kitab-i-Aqdas’)

Evening

December 12

Morning

O thou who hast fixed thy gaze upon My countenance! Admonish men to fear God. By God! This fear is the chief commander of the army of thy Lord. Its hosts are a praiseworthy character and goodly deeds. Through it have the cities of men’s hearts been opened throughout the ages and centuries, and the standards of ascendancy and triumph raised above all other standards. 

- Baha’u’llah (‘Epistle to Son of the Wolf’)

Evening

December 11

Morning

Say: O people of God! Adorn your temples with the adornment of trustworthiness and piety. Help, then, your Lord with the hosts of goodly deeds and a praiseworthy character. We have forbidden you dissension and conflict in My Books, and My Scriptures, and My Scrolls, and My Tablets, and have wished thereby naught else save your exaltation and advancement. Unto this testify the heavens and the stars thereof, and the sun and the radiance thereof, and the trees and the leaves thereof, and the seas and the waves thereof, and the earth and the treasures thereof. We pray God to assist His loved ones, and aid them in that which beseemeth them in this blest, this mighty, and wondrous station. 

- Baha’u’llah (‘Epistle to the Son of the Wolf’)

Evening

December 10

Morning

The foundations of idle fancies have trembled, and the heaven of vain imaginings hath been cleft asunder, and yet the people are in doubt and in contention with Him. They have denied the testimony of God and His proof, after He came from the heaven of power with the kingdom of His signs. They have cast away what had been prescribed, and perpetrated what had been forbidden them in the Book. They have abandoned their God, and clung unto their desires. They truly have strayed and are in error. They read the verses and deny them. They behold the clear tokens and turn aside. They truly are lost in strange doubt. 

- Baha’u’llah (‘Epistle to the Son of the Wolf’)

Evening

December 9

Morning

The hope is cherished that ye may obtain true education in the shelter of the tree of His tender mercies and act in accordance with that which God desireth. Ye are all the leaves of one tree and the drops of one ocean. 

- Baha’u’llah (‘Tablets of Baha’u’llah revealed after the Kitab-i-Aqdas’)

Evening

December 8

Morning

Whither are gone the proud and their palaces? Gaze thou into their tombs, that thou mayest profit by this example, inasmuch as We made it a lesson unto every beholder. Were the breezes of Revelation to seize thee, thou wouldst flee the world, and turn unto the Kingdom, and wouldst expend all thou possessest, that thou mayest draw nigh unto this sublime Vision. 

- Baha'u'llah (Tablet to Napoleon III, Suriy-i-Haykal [Tablet of Temple]; ‘The Summons of the Lord of Hosts’)

Evening

December 7

Morning

O Czar of Russia!  Incline thine ear unto the voice of God, the King, the Holy, and turn thou unto Paradise, the Spot wherein abideth He Who, among the Concourse on high, beareth the most excellent titles, and Who, in the kingdom of creation, is called by the name of God, the Effulgent, the All-Glorious. 

- Baha'u'llah (Tablet to Czar Alexander II, Suriy-i-Haykal [Tablet of Temple]; ‘The Summons of the Lord of Hosts’)

Evening

December 6

Morning

We behold the generality of mankind worshipping names and exposing themselves, as thou dost witness, to dire perils in the mere hope of perpetuating their names, whilst every perceiving soul testifieth that after death one’s name shall avail him nothing except insofar as it beareth a relationship unto God, the Almighty, the All-Praised.  Thus have their vain imaginings taken hold of them in requital for that which their hands have wrought. 

- Baha'u'llah (Tablet to Napoleon III, Suriy-i-Haykal [Tablet of Temple]; ‘The Summons of the Lord of Hosts’)

Evening

December 5

Morning

Exultest thou over the treasures thou dost possess, knowing they shall perish?  Rejoicest thou in that thou rulest a span of earth, when the whole world, in the estimation of the people of Bahá, is worth as much as the black in the eye of a dead ant? Abandon it unto such as have set their affections upon it, and turn thou unto Him Who is the Desire of the world.  

- Baha'u'llah (Tablet to Napoleon III, Suriy-i-Haykal [Tablet of Temple]; ‘The Summons of the Lord of Hosts’)

Evening

December 4

Morning

Set forth that which ye possess. If it be favourably received, your end is attained; if not, to protest is vain. Leave that soul to himself and turn unto the Lord, the Protector, the Self-Subsisting. Be not the cause of grief, much less of discord and strife. 

- Baha’u’llah (‘Tablets of Baha’u’llah revealed after the Kitab-i-Aqdas’)

Evening

December 3

Morning

O people of Bahá! Ye are the dawning-places of the love of God and the daysprings of His loving-kindness. Defile not your tongues with the cursing and reviling of any soul, and guard your eyes against that which is not seemly. 

- Baha’u’llah (‘Tablets of Baha’u’llah revealed after the Kitab-i-Aqdas’)

Evening

December 2

Morning

O people of God! That which traineth the world is Justice, for it is upheld by two pillars, reward and punishment. These two pillars are the sources of life to the world. 

- Baha’u’llah (‘Tablets of Baha’u’llah revealed after the Kitab-i-Aqdas’)

Evening

He is a man of hearing who hath been led to hearken unto Thy [God’s] speech, and to draw nigh unto the billowing ocean of Thine utterances. 

- Baha’u’llah (‘Prayers and Meditations by Baha’u’llah’)

December 1

Morning

The men of God’s House of Justice have been charged with the affairs of the people. They, in truth, are the Trustees of God among His servants and the daysprings of authority in His countries. 

- Baha’u’llah (‘Tablets of Baha’u’llah revealed after the Kitab-i-Aqdas’)

Evening