The gaze of the loving-kindness of God—exalted and glorified
is He—hath everlastingly been directed towards His beloved friends; verily He
is the One Who knoweth and remembereth. 
O friend! In the Bayán We directed everyone in this Most
Great Revelation to see with his own eyes and hear with his own ears. However
when the horizon of the world was illumined with the resplendent light of this
Revelation, many people forgot this divine commandment, lost sight of this
heavenly exhortation and immersed themselves in the vain imaginings which their
minds had devised. Indeed the face of the sun of justice and fairness is hidden
behind the clouds of idle fancy which the foolish ones have conceived.
Therefore it is not to be wondered at that the movements of the birds of
darkness attract attention. Through the potency of the Name of the
Best-Beloved, invite thou the receptive souls unto God’s holy court, that
perchance they may not remain deprived of the heavenly Fountain of living
water. He is in truth the Gracious, the Forgiving.
It behoveth every king to be as bountiful as the sun, which
fostereth the growth of all beings, and giveth to each its due, whose benefits
are not inherent in itself, but are ordained by Him Who is the Most Powerful,
the Almighty. The King should be as generous, as liberal in his mercy as the
clouds, the outpourings of whose bounty are showered upon every land, by the
behest of Him Who is the Supreme Ordainer, the All-Knowing.
Blessed is the wayfarer who hath recognized the Desired One,
and the seeker who hath heeded the Call of Him Who is the intended Aim of all
mankind, and the learned one who hath believed in God, the Help in Peril, the
Self-Subsisting.
By the righteousness of God! The world’s horizon is
resplendent with the light of the Most Great Luminary, yet the generality of
mankind perceive it not. Verily He Who is the Sovereign Truth moveth before the
eyes of all men. Unto this beareth witness the One Who is proclaiming in the
midmost heart of the world, ‘In truth no God is there but Me, Omnipotent over
all things, whether of the past or of the future.’
I swear by the Most Great Lord! Wert thou to be told in what
place I dwell, the first person to have mercy on Me would be thyself. In the
heart of a mountain is a fortress [Mákú] ... the inmates of which are confined
to two guards and four dogs. Picture, then, My plight... I swear by the truth
of God! Were he who hath been willing to treat Me in such a manner to know Who
it is Whom he hath so treated, he, verily, would never in his life be happy.
Nay—I, verily, acquaint thee with the truth of the matter—it is as if he hath
imprisoned all the Prophets, and all the men of truth and all the chosen
ones...
O My Servant! Free thyself from the fetters of this world,
and loose thy soul from the prison of self. Seize thy chance, for it will come
to thee no more.
I know not the path ye have chosen and which ye tread, O
congregation of My ill-wishers! We summon you to God, We remind you of His Day,
We announce unto you tidings of your reunion with Him, We draw you nigh unto
His court, and send down upon you tokens of His wondrous wisdom, and yet lo,
behold how ye reject Us, how ye condemn Us, through the things which your lying
mouths have uttered, as an infidel, how ye devise your devices against Us! And
when We manifest unto you what God hath, through His bountiful favor, bestowed
upon Us, ye say, “It is but plain magic.” The same words were spoken by the
generations that were before you and were what you are, did ye but perceive it.
Ye have thereby deprived yourselves of the bounty of God and of His grace, and
shall never obtain them till the day when God will have judged between Us and
you, and He, verily, is the best of Judges.
One must step forth and raise aloft the banner of earnest
striving. By God! Wert thou to hearken unto the heavenly words of this
evanescent Servant that have been raised in this mystic Tablet, thou wouldst
assuredly take to the desert of self-surrender, turn aside from thine own heart
and soul, and cast thy head at the feet of the Friend. How high is the soaring
flight of the phoenix of love, and how low the requisite measure of our
yearning! Strive but a little to soar, that, by the grace of Him Who is the
eternal King, thou mayest ascend from the dust-heap of utter non-existence unto
the loftiest heights of ancient glory. Give wings to thy celestial spirit and
lend strength to thy mystic soul, that haply it may take flight in the
atmosphere of divine nearness and attain the ultimate and invisible goal.
By the righteousness of Him Who, in this day, crieth within
the inmost heart of all created things, ‘God, there is none other God besides
Me!’ If any man were to arise to defend, in his writings, the Cause of God
against its assailants, such a man, however inconsiderable his share, shall be
so honored in the world to come that the Concourse on high would envy his
glory. No pen can depict the loftiness of his station, neither can any tongue
describe its splendor.
Ponder in thine [1] heart. Did ye, notwithstanding your
behavior and the things your hands have wrought, succeed in quenching the fire
of God or in putting out the light of His Revelation—a light that hath
enveloped with its brightness them that are immersed in the billowing oceans of
immortality, and hath attracted the souls of such as truly believe in and
uphold His unity? Know ye not that the Hand of God is over your hands, that His
irrevocable Decree transcendeth all your devices, that He is supreme over His
servants, that He is equal to His Purpose, that He doth what He wisheth, that
He shall not be asked of whatever He willeth, that He ordaineth what He
pleaseth, that He is the Most Powerful, the Almighty? If ye believe this to be
the truth, wherefore, then, will ye not cease from troubling and be at peace
with yourselves?
As to thy question regarding the soul: Know thou that among
the people there are numerous treatises and manifold views as to its stations.
Among these are the soul of the kingdom, the soul of the dominion, the
celestial soul, the divine soul, the sanctified soul, as well as the benevolent
soul, the contented soul, the soul pleasing unto God, the inspired soul, the
irascible soul, and the concupiscent soul. Every group hath its own
pronouncements concerning the soul and We are disinclined to dwell upon the
sayings of the past. Verily, with thy Lord is the knowledge of the former and
latter generations. ….
Erelong will God raise up from among the kings one who will
aid His loved ones. He, verily,
encompasseth all things. He will instill in the hearts the love of His loved
ones. This, indeed, is irrevocably decreed by One Who is the Almighty, the
Beneficent.
…thou shouldst urge all the believers to show forth kindness
and mercy and to overlook certain shortcomings among them, that differences may
be dispelled; true harmony be established; and the censure and reproach, the
hatred and dissension, seen among the peoples of former times may not arise
anew.
I swear by God! Whoso faileth to obey the commandments of
God can in no wise be numbered among His loved ones, for among the conditions
of His love is to follow His commandments and observe His prohibitions.
Rememberest thou [1] not God’s warning uttered in times
past, that thou mayest be of them that heed His warning? He said, and He,
verily, speaketh the truth: “From it (earth) have We created you, and unto it
will We return you, and out of it will We bring you forth a second time.” This
is what God ordained unto all them that dwell on earth, be they high or low. It
behoveth not, therefore, him who was created from dust, who will return unto
it, and will again be brought forth out of it, to swell with pride before God,
and before His loved ones, to proudly scorn them, and be filled with disdainful
arrogance. Nay, rather it behoveth thee and those like thee to submit
yourselves to them Who are the Manifestations of the unity of God, and to defer
humbly to the faithful, who have forsaken their all for the sake of God, and
have detached themselves from the things which engross men’s attention, and
lead them astray from the path of God, the All-Glorious, the All-Praised. Thus
do We send down upon you that which shall profit you and profit them that have
placed their whole trust and confidence in their Lord.
I swear by God! So great are the things ordained for the
steadfast that were they, so much as the eye of a needle, to be disclosed, all
who are in heaven and on earth would be dumbfounded, except such as God, the
Lord of all worlds, hath willed to exempt.
Thou art the One, O my God, to Whom every name is abashed to
be related, and in Whose presence all things shrink for shame from being
mentioned. From eternity Thou hast dwelt in those transcendent heights that are
exalted above all mention and description. How great are Thy sovereignty and
Thy power and how mighty Thy grandeur!—this, though all things acknowledge that
Thou art entirely sanctified from, and immeasurably exalted above, all but
Thine own Self. Thou has subdued the entire world through a single Word that
hath been related to the kingdom of Thine utterance and from which the
fragrance of the robe of Thy Command hath been wafted.
By God! This is the Day whereon from the murmur of the
waters can be heard: “No God is there but Him, the Help in Peril, the
Self-Subsisting”, and from the whispering of whose breezes can be heard: “No
God is there but Him, the Almighty, the Best-Beloved”, and from the rustling of
whose trees can be heard: “No God is there but Him, the Most Powerful, the
Ever-Giving, the All-Glorious, the All-Loving”, and beyond them, from the
Tongue of Grandeur can be heard: “This is the Day of the appearance of Him Who
is manifest yet hidden, Who is visible yet concealed. Hasten unto Him, O ye who
are the daysprings of the divine names, and draw nigh unto Him, O ye who dwell
in the kingdom of creation, with hearts that have been purified from
superstitions and vain imaginings and sanctified from the idle talk of men!”
Praise be unto Thee, O Thou Who art the Lord of the world
and the Ruler of the nations! I testify that Thou hast from eternity been
sanctified above the mention of all created things and exalted beyond the
loftiest descriptions of Thy creatures. Whensoever Thy devoted servants sought
to ascend unto the station of Thy recognition, the hosts of Thy knowledge
barred their way; and whensoever Thy near ones desired to gain admittance to
the heaven of Thy nearness, the overpowering majesty of Thine utterance kept
them back. We bear witness that the loftiest of the divine names are but
servants at Thy door, and that their most glorious manifestations bow down
before Thy countenance and are humbled in Thy presence. Thou art, in truth, He
Who can neither be described in letters, nor evoked by words, nor even
contained within the hidden meanings they conceal. For these are all
circumscribed by the inherent limitations of speech which characterize all the
utterances of the peoples of the world.