COMPARISONS between Jesus, Muhammad,
the Bab and Baha’u’llah
1. Christ’s life is told with many
miracles; it seems the people of that day needed these kind of stories. On some
occasions He discouraged people He healed from telling others what happened.
Baha’u’llah also counselled His followers not to recount what they considered
to be miracles. Among the greatest miracles associated with Christ are the
Virgin Birth and His Resurrection. At the time He appeared it is true that all
the kings claimed to be the son of some god. It follows that the one true God
would “call their bluff” and demonstrate the genuine Son. Yet, while the Qur’an
and Baha’i Scripture verify that Christ took His existence through the Holy
Spirit and had no human father, (and in the case of the Baha’I Scriptures,
Christ, the Spirit of God, is sometimes referred to as the Son), they deny that
God ever had a son in the human sense. ‘Abdu’l-Baha said: “The honor and greatness of Christ is not due to the fact that He did
not have a human father, but to His perfections, bounties and divine glory. If
the greatness of Christ is His being fatherless, then Adam is greater than
Christ, for He had neither father nor mother.” (Some Answered Question #18)
The implication is that God is not precluded from causing a greater Revelation
of the Logos, the promised Revelation, to come through a Man born of two
parents. -Compiler)
Elsewhere, ‘Abdu’l-Baha said: “The resurrection of the
Manifestations of God is not of the body. All that pertains to Them—all Their
states and conditions, all that They do, found, teach, interpret, illustrate,
and instruct—is of a mystical and spiritual character and does not belong to
the realm of materiality. Such is the case of Christ’s coming from heaven. It
has been explicitly stated in numerous passages of the Gospel that the Son of
man came down from heaven, or is in heaven, or will go up to heaven. Thus in
John 6:38 it is said: “For I came down
from heaven”, and in John 6:42 it is recorded: “And they said, Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and
mother we know? how is it then that he saith, I came down from heaven?”,
and in John 3:13 it is stated: “And no
man hath ascended up to heaven, but He that came down from heaven, even the Son
of man which is in heaven.”
Consider how it is said that the Son of man is in heaven, even though at that
time Christ was dwelling upon the earth. Consider likewise that it explicitly
says that Christ came from heaven, although He came from the womb of Mary and
His body was born of her. It is therefore clear that the assertion that the Son
of man came down from heaven has a mystical rather than a literal meaning, and
is a spiritual rather than a material event. The meaning is that though in
appearance Christ was born of the womb of Mary, yet in reality He came from
heaven, the seat of the Sun of Truth that shines in the divine realm of the
supernal Kingdom.
And since it is established that Christ came from the
spiritual heaven of the divine Kingdom, His disappearance into the earth for
three days must also have a mystical rather than a literal meaning. In the same
manner, His resurrection from the bosom of the earth is a mystical matter and
expresses a spiritual rather than a material condition. And His ascension to
heaven, likewise, is spiritual and not material in nature. Aside from this, it
has been established by science that the material heaven is a limitless space,
void and empty, wherein countless stars and planets move.
We explain,
therefore, the meaning of Christ’s resurrection in the following way: After the
martyrdom of Christ, the Apostles were perplexed and dismayed. The reality of
Christ, which consists in His teachings, His bounties, His perfections, and His
spiritual power, was hidden and concealed for two or three days after His
martyrdom, and had no outward appearance or manifestation—indeed, it was as
though it were entirely lost. For those who truly believed were few in number,
and even those few were perplexed and dismayed. The Cause of Christ was thus as
a lifeless body. After three days the Apostles became firm and steadfast, arose
to aid the Cause of Christ, resolved to promote the divine teachings and
practice their Lord’s admonitions, and endeavored to serve Him. Then did the
reality of Christ become resplendent, His grace shine forth, His religion find
new life, and His teachings and admonitions become manifest and visible. In
other words, the Cause of Christ, which was like unto a lifeless body, was
quickened to life and surrounded by the grace of the Holy Spirit. Such is the
meaning of the resurrection of Christ, and this was a true resurrection. But as
the clergy did not grasp the meaning of the Gospels and did not comprehend this
mystery, it has been claimed that religion is opposed to science, for among
other things the ascension of Christ in a physical body to the material heavens
is contrary to the mathematical sciences. But when the truth of this matter is
clarified and this symbol is explained, it is in no way contradicted by science
but rather affirmed by both science and reason…Now, just as He came the first time in appearance from the womb but in
reality from heaven, so will He come the second time in appearance from the
womb but in reality from heaven. The conditions that have been recorded in the
Gospel for the second coming of Christ are indeed the same as had been specified
for His first coming, as was explained before. (Some Answered
Questions #23 & 26)
It may be
added here that the principle concern for Christians is the salvation of their
own souls. For Baha’is, it is the salvation of the body politic of nations,
that the bio-sphere itself will be preserved. Shoghi Effendi, it is reported,
has explained:
“... the object of life to a Bahá’í is to promote the oneness of mankind. The
whole object of our lives is bound up with the lives of all human beings; not a
personal salvation we are seeking, but a universal one. Our aim is to produce a
world civilization which will in turn react on the character of the individual.
It is, in a way, the inverse of Christianity, which started with the individual
unit and through it reached out to the conglomerate life of men. The pursuit of
such an objective requires a transformation in the individual's order of moral
priorities that is as revolutionary as any other aspect of the modern
condition. The human virtue to which Bahá’u’lláh assigns the highest place is
justice.” (Baha'i World Volumes, Volume 15, p. 776)
2. The
ministry of the “Son” was three years. The ministry of Muhammad, 23 years. The
ministries of the Bab and Baha’u’llah together totaled about fifty lunar years.
Jesus consented to be baptized by John in the Jordan. The Revelation Event for
Baha’u’llah transpired in a gloomy dungeon in Persia. -Compiler
The people among whom
He (Baha’u’llah) appeared were the most decadent race in
the civilized world, grossly ignorant, savage, cruel, steeped in prejudice,
servile in their submission to an almost deified hierarchy, recalling in their
abjectness the Israelites of Egypt in the days of Moses, in their fanaticism
the Jews in the days of Jesus, and in their perversity the idolators of Arabia
in the days of Muhammad. The arch-enemy who repudiated His claim, challenged
His authority, persecuted His Cause, succeeded in almost quenching His light,
and who eventually became disintegrated under the impact of His Revelation was
the Shí’ah priesthood. Fiercely fanatic, unspeakably corrupt, enjoying
unlimited ascendancy over the masses, jealous of their position, and
irreconcilably opposed to all liberal ideas, the members of this caste had for
one thousand years invoked the name of the Hidden Imám, their breasts had
glowed with the expectation of His advent, their pulpits had rung with the
praises of His world-embracing dominion, their lips were still devoutly and
perpetually murmuring prayers for the hastening of His coming. (Shoghi Effendi,
God Passes By, p.4)
Wrapped in its stygian gloom, breathing its
fetid air, numbed by its humid and icy atmosphere, His feet in stocks, His neck
weighed down by a mighty chain, surrounded by criminals and miscreants of the
worst order, oppressed by the consciousness of the terrible blot that had
stained the fair name of His beloved Faith, painfully aware of the dire
distress that had overtaken its champions, and of the grave dangers that faced
the remnant of its followers--at so critical an hour and under such appalling
circumstances the "Most Great Spirit," as designated by Himself, and
symbolized in the Zoroastrian, the Mosaic, the Christian, and Muhammadan
Dispensations by the Sacred Fire, the Burning Bush, the Dove and the Angel
Gabriel respectively, descended upon, and revealed itself, personated by a
"Maiden," to the agonized soul of Bahá'u'lláh. (Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, p.101)
Islám, at once the progenitor and persecutor
of the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh, is, if we read aright the signs of the times, only
beginning to sustain the impact of this invincible and triumphant Faith. We
need only recall the nineteen hundred years of abject misery and dispersion
which they, who only for the short space of three years persecuted the Son of
God, have had to endure, and are still enduring. We may well ask ourselves,
with mingled feelings of dread and awe, how severe must be the tribulations of
those who, during no less than fifty years, have, “at every moment tormented
with a fresh torment” Him Who is the Father, and who have, in addition, made
His Herald—Himself a Manifestation of God—to quaff, in such tragic
circumstances, the cup of martyrdom. (Shoghi
Effendi, The Promised Day is Come)
3. Christ only moved
around Judea and northern Israel, unmarried (despite the legends that He wed
the Magdalene, or went to India). The Bab sailed from Persia to Jeddah and
proclaimed His Mission on Pilgrimage. Baha’u’llah travelled from Tihran
(ancient Rhages/Rayy) to Iraq (Assyria), Turkey, Alexandria and Palestine. The duration of His ministry and His
movements were foretold in Micah 7:11-15. Also,
Jesus sought out His 12 disciples; but the
Báb waited until all 18 Letters of the
Living came to Him voluntarily,
I send you prophets,
wise men and scribes, some of them you will kill and crucify, some of them you
will scourge in your synagogues (or mosques), and persecute from city to city. Matthew 23:34
This enforced and
hurried departure of Bahá’u’lláh from His native land, accompanied by some of
His relatives, recalls in some of its aspects, the precipitate flight of the
Holy Family into Egypt; the sudden migration of Muhammad, soon after His
assumption of the prophetic office, from Mecca to Medina; the exodus of Moses,
His brother and His followers from the land of their birth, in response to the
Divine summons, and above all the banishment of Abraham from Ur of the Chaldees
to the Promised Land—a banishment which, in the multitudinous benefits it
conferred upon so many divers peoples, faiths and nations, constitutes the nearest
historical approach to the incalculable blessings destined to be vouchsafed, in
this day, and in future ages, to the whole human race, in direct consequence of
the exile suffered by Him Whose Cause is the flower and fruit of all previous
Revelations. (Shoghi
Effendi, God Passes By, p.107)
In the odes He
revealed, whilst wrapped in His devotions during those days of utter seclusion,
(in the mountains of
Kurdistan) and in the prayers and
soliloquies which, in verse and prose, both in Arabic and Persian, poured from
His sorrow-laden soul, many of which He was wont to chant aloud to Himself, at
dawn and during the watches of the night, He lauded the names and attributes of
His Creator, extolled the glories and mysteries of His own Revelation, sang the
praises of that Maiden that personified the Spirit of God within Him, dwelt on
His loneliness and His past and future tribulations, expatiated upon the
blindness of His generation, the perfidy of His friends and the perversity of
His enemies, affirmed His determination to arise and, if needs be, offer up His
life for the vindication of His Cause, stressed those essential pre-requisites
which every seeker after Truth must possess, and recalled, in anticipation of
the lot that was to be His, the tragedy of the Imám Husayn in Kárbilá, the
plight of Muhammad in Mecca, the sufferings of Jesus at the hands of the Jews,
the trials of Moses inflicted by Pharaoh and his people and the ordeal of
Joseph as He languished in a pit by reason of the treachery of His brothers.
(Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, p.121)
Neither the tragic
martyrdom of the Báb nor the ignominious attempt on the life of the sovereign,
nor its bloody aftermath, nor Bahá’u’lláh’s humiliating banishment from His
native land, nor even His two-year withdrawal to Kurdistán, devastating though
they were in their consequences, could compare in gravity with this first major
internal convulsion which seized a newly rearisen community, and which
threatened to cause an irreparable breach in the ranks of its members. More
odious than the unrelenting hostility which Abú-Jahl, the uncle of Muhammad,
had exhibited, more shameful than the betrayal of Jesus Christ by His disciple,
Judas Iscariot, more perfidious than the conduct of the sons of Jacob towards
Joseph their brother, more abhorrent than the deed committed by one of the sons
of Noah, more infamous than even the criminal act perpetrated by Cain against
Abel, the monstrous behavior of Mírzá Yahyá, one of the half-brothers of
Bahá’u’lláh, the nominee of the Báb, and recognized chief of the Bábí
community, brought in its wake a period of travail which left its mark on the
fortunes of the Faith for no less than half a century. (Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By,
p.163)
A banishment that had,
at first, brought Him to the immediate vicinity of the strongholds of Shí’ih
orthodoxy and into contact with its outstanding exponents, and which, at a
later period, had carried Him to the capital of the Ottoman empire, and led Him
to address His epoch-making pronouncements to the Sultán, to his ministers and
to the ecclesiastical leaders of Sunní Islám, had now been instrumental in
landing Him upon the shores of the Holy Land—the Land promised by God to
Abraham, sanctified by the Revelation of Moses, honored by the lives and labors
of the Hebrew patriarchs, judges, kings and prophets, revered as the cradle of
Christianity, and as the place where Zoroaster, according to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s
testimony, had “held converse with some of the Prophets of Israel,” and
associated by Islám with the Apostle’s night-journey, through the seven
heavens, to the throne of the Almighty. Within the confines of this holy and
enviable country, “the nest of all the Prophets of God,” “the Vale of God’s
unsearchable Decree, the snow-white Spot, the Land of unfading splendor” was
the Exile of Baghdád, of Constantinople and Adrianople condemned to
spend no less than a third of the allotted span of His life, and over half of
the total period of His Mission. (Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, p.183
4. there is no comparison with the Bible and the
Qur'an OR the million Verses that came down without study, research, or editing
from the Bab and Baha'u'llah, who wrote or dictated as fast as the secretary
could take it down. The Qur'an existed in the Prophets lifetime, and was
memorized by many. It is much more original and authentic that the four Gospels
we have left from the original 50.
Now consider that Muhammad was 40 when he began his 23 year mission; and the Bab was 25 when he began a mission that was only 6 years long before He was murdered. He could reveal the equivalent of the Qur'an in 2-5 days. The Gospel, except for Revelation, was a collection of letters and oral traditions. There are 23,145 verses in the Old Testament and 7,957 verses in the New Testament. This gives a total of 31,102 verses. In the Qur’an there are 6,236 verses, giving a new total of only 37,338 verses. At one point the Bab said He had revealed 500,000 verses, and Baha’u’llah said that He had revealed as many as the Bab; therefore the Bab and Baha’u’llah wrote or dictated at least a million (1,000,000) new divine Verses, from "innate and untaught" knowledge, in nearly a hundred volumes, with astonishing rapidity. The originals are kept in climate-control vaults for protection and translation, in the Holy Land. There is no comparison with any previous Scriptures, great as they were. The Lord of Hosts, under severe persecution for 40 years, exile and imprisonment, revealing "well nigh" a hundred volumes of un-researched and unedited Verses of such beauty and power as to test the faith of every soul on the planet.
Now consider that Muhammad was 40 when he began his 23 year mission; and the Bab was 25 when he began a mission that was only 6 years long before He was murdered. He could reveal the equivalent of the Qur'an in 2-5 days. The Gospel, except for Revelation, was a collection of letters and oral traditions. There are 23,145 verses in the Old Testament and 7,957 verses in the New Testament. This gives a total of 31,102 verses. In the Qur’an there are 6,236 verses, giving a new total of only 37,338 verses. At one point the Bab said He had revealed 500,000 verses, and Baha’u’llah said that He had revealed as many as the Bab; therefore the Bab and Baha’u’llah wrote or dictated at least a million (1,000,000) new divine Verses, from "innate and untaught" knowledge, in nearly a hundred volumes, with astonishing rapidity. The originals are kept in climate-control vaults for protection and translation, in the Holy Land. There is no comparison with any previous Scriptures, great as they were. The Lord of Hosts, under severe persecution for 40 years, exile and imprisonment, revealing "well nigh" a hundred volumes of un-researched and unedited Verses of such beauty and power as to test the faith of every soul on the planet.
"Well nigh a hundred volumes
of luminous verses and perspicuous words have already been sent down from the
heaven of the will of Him Who is the Revealer of signs, and are available unto
all." (Baha'u'llah,
Epistle to the Son of the Wolf, p. 114)
“Now, following His manifestation,
although He hath, up to the present, revealed no less than five hundred
thousand verses on different subjects, behold what calumnies are uttered, so
unseemly that the pen is stricken with shame at the mention of them.” (Selections from the Writings of the Báb, p.
96)
“Say: The verses We have revealed
are as numerous as those which, in the preceding Revelation, were sent down
upon the Báb. Let him that doubteth the words which the Spirit of God hath
spoken seek the court of Our presence and hear Our divinely-revealed verses, and
be an eye-witness of the clear proof of Our claim.” (Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh,
p. 259)
Hazhir John Moghaddam I did some quick back of envelope calculations about 5
years ago and came up with 10-Million words revealed by Bahaullah. Or average
of 600 words per Tablet. For comparison the Quran has 77,000 words. And the
Bible in total is 800-thousand words. Or Bahá’u’llah revealed 10 times the
volume of the entire Bible, which was written by at least 40 authors over 2000
years, Bahá’u’lláh did it in 40 years. The Bab could reveal 80,000 words in one
day.
As of 1 Oct 2010...we have well over
18,000 unique works from Baha’u’llah comprising over six million words, with
15,000 authenticated. For the Bab over 2,000 unique works comprising almost
five million words, not yet authenticated. For Abdu'l-Baha, over 30,000 unique
works comprising over 5 million words with over 27,000 authenticated. For
Shoghi Effendi, well over 34,000 unique works comprising over 5 million words
with over 33,000 authenticated. The Kitab-i-Iqan was revealed during two
sessions over two days. The Kitab-i-Badi was revealed in three days.
Depite of this torrent of the water of the Word, which Ezekiel describes as the
“sound of many waters” –Christians deny the validity of any of it, even though
it verifies the Mission of Christ, which is a proof from 1 John 4 for testing
the spirits. Even though an “everlasting Gospel” is promised in Rev. 14:6, they
refuse to give it credibility, and thereby become indistinguishable from
atheists.
Jesus IS the "Author of the Gospel" even if He did not write
it all. In those days memorization of the bits of history and prophecy and His
parables was the ancient practice. We know that He could read, because He did
so in Luke 4:16-30. He may have written tracts for His followers to use (just
my idea), but the spirit of His teachings was remembered and eventually written
down. Moses is the Author of the Pentateuch, in the same way. The scrolls may
have existed in His own lifetime, but were collated about the time of Solomon.
The Qur'an was also memorized, surah by surah. Some even memorized the entire
Book. It was found there were tiny grammatical variations, all manuscripts were
gathered and one version was chosen and the rest destroyed. In this Day of
Baha'u'llah we have the original Texts He wrote or dictated and approved in the
Archives in Israel.-marko
And if thou dwellest in the land of
testimony, content thyself with that which He, Himself, hath revealed: "Is
it not enough for them that We have sent down unto Thee the Book?" (Qur'án
29:51) This is the testimony which He, Himself, hath ordained; greater proof
than this there is none, nor ever will be: "This proof is His Word; His own
Self, the testimony of His truth." (Baha'u'llah, The Kitab-i-Iqan, p. 91)
In the Persian Bayan, the Bab says: “There is no doubt that the Almighty hath sent down these verses unto Him [the
Báb], even as He sent down unto the
Apostle of God. Indeed no less than a hundred thousand verses similar to these
have already been disseminated among the people, not to mention His epistles,
His prayers or His learned and philosophical treatises. He revealeth no less
than a thousand verses within the space of five hours. He reciteth verses at a
speed consonant with the capacity of His amanuensis to set them down. Thus, it
may well be considered that if from the inception of this Revelation until now
He had been left unhindered, how vast then would have been the volume of
writings disseminated from His pen”. (The Bab, SWB #3:7)
“So great is the
celestial might and power which God hath revealed in Him that if it were His
will and no break should intervene He could, within the space of five days and
nights, reveal the equivalent of the Qur’an which was sent down in twenty-three
years. Ponder and reflect.” (The Bab, SWB 4:3)
“In this dispensation,
God, the Knowing, has bestowed his verses and explanations upon the Point of
the Bayan, and made him the exalted Proof for all things. Should all that are
on earth gather together, they would be unable to produce a single verse like
the verses which God has caused to flow from his tongue. Everyone possessed of
spirit who considers with the eye of certitude will see that these verses are
not within the capacity of a human being, but are, on the contrary,
attributable solely to God, the One, the Single, He Who causes them to flow
upon the tongue of anyone He pleases. He has never caused such verses to flow,
nor will He ever make them flow, from anyone but the Point of the Divine Will,
for He it is Who has dispatched every Messenger and sent down every holy book”.
http://www.h-net.org/~bahai/trans/bayan/bay2-1.htm
Now, following His
manifestation, although He hath, up to the present, revealed no less than five
hundred thousand verses on different subjects, behold what calumnies are
uttered, so unseemly that the pen is stricken with shame at the mention of them. (The Bab, SWB #3:25)
Say: The verses We have
revealed are as numerous as those which, in the preceding Revelation, were sent
down upon the Bab.
(Baha’u’llah, GWB CXXI) [Therefore, totaling the two, there are a million
verses, at least!)
So tremendous is the
outpouring of Divine grace in this Dispensation that if mortal hands could be
swift enough to record them, within the space of a single day and night there
would stream verses of such number as to be equivalent to the whole of the
Persian Bayan.
(Baha’u’llah, quoted in The Dispensation of Baha’u’llah, p.18)
Finally, previous the
covenants cannot be compared to the written documents, in which Baha'u'llah
appoints 'Abdu'l-Baha as His successor. A document specifically appointing
Peter as successor did not exist; and lack of a document appointing 'Ali, after
the death of Muhammad was what cut Islam into Shi'ih and Sunni.
5. THE
COVENANTS Christ appointed no successor to protect
Christianity against schisms. "For
the Day of God is none other but His own Self, Who hath appeared with the power
of truth. This is the Day that shall not be followed by night, nor shall it be
bounded by any praise, would that ye might understand!" (Baha'u'llah, The Summons of the
Lord of Hosts, p. 33)
"The fundamental reason why the unity of the Church of Christ was
irretrievably shattered, and its influence was in the course of time
undermined, was that the Edifice which the Fathers of the Church reared after
the passing of His First Apostle was an Edifice that rested in no wise upon the
explicit directions of Christ Himself." (Shoghi Efendi, WOB p.20-21)
Written
entirely in His own hand; unsealed, on the ninth day after His ascension in the
presence of nine witnesses chosen from amongst His companions and members of
His Family; read subsequently, on the afternoon of that same day, before a
large company assembled in His Most Holy Tomb, including His sons, some of the
Báb's kinsmen, pilgrims and resident believers, this unique and epoch-making
Document, designated by Bahá'u'lláh as His "Most Great Tablet," and
alluded to by Him as the "Crimson Book" in His "Epistle to the
Son of the Wolf," can find no parallel in the Scriptures of any previous
Dispensation, not excluding that of the Báb Himself. For nowhere in the books
pertaining to any of the world's religious systems, not even among the writings
of the Author of the Bábí Revelation, do we find any single document
establishing a Covenant endowed with an authority comparable to the Covenant
which Bahá'u'lláh had Himself instituted.
"So firm and mighty is this Covenant," He Who is its appointed Center has affirmed, "that from the beginning of time until
the present day no religious Dispensation hath produced its like."
"It is indubitably clear," He, furthermore, has stated, "that the pivot of the oneness of
mankind is nothing else but the power of the Covenant." "Know
thou," He has written, "that
the 'Sure Handle' mentioned from the foundation of the world in the Books, the
Tablets and the Scriptures of old is naught else but the Covenant and the
Testament." (Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, p. 238)
“In former cycles no
distinct Covenant had been made in writing by the Supreme Pen; no distinct
personage had been appointed to be the Standard differentiating falsehood from
truth, so that whatsoever he was to say was to stand as truth and that which [sic]
he repudiated was to be known as falsehood. At most, His Holiness Jesus Christ
gave only an intimation, a symbol, and that was but an indication of the
solidity of Peter’s faith. When he mentioned his faith, His Holiness said,
‘Thou art Peter’ – which means rock – ‘and upon this rock will I build my
church.’ This was a sanction of Peter’s faith; it was not indicative of his
(Peter) being the expounder of the Book, but was a confirmation of Peter’s
faith. But in this Dispensation of the Blessed Beauty (Baha’u’llah) among its
distinctions is that He did not leave people in perplexity. He entered into a
covenant and testament with the people. He appointed a Center of the Covenant.
He wrote with His own pen and revealed it in the Kitab-i-Aqdas, the Book of Laws,
the Book of the Covenant, appointing him (Abdul-Baha) the Expounder of the
Book. You must ask him (Abdu’l-Baha) regarding the meanings of the texts of the
verses. Whatsoever he says is correct. Outside of this, in numerous Tablets He
(Baha’u’llah) has explicitly recorded it, with clear, sufficient, valid and
forceful statements. In the Tablet of The Branch He explicitly states:
“Whatsoever The Branch says is right, or correct; and every person must obey
The Branch with his life, with his heart, with his tongue. Without his will,
not a word shall anyone utter.” This is an explicit text of the Blessed Beauty.
So there is no rescue left for anybody. No soul shall, of himself, speak anything: Whatsoever his
(Abdul-Baha’s) tongue utters, whatsoever his pen records, that is correct;
according to the explicit text of Baha’u’llah in the Tablet of The Branch…” (Abdul
Baha, quoted in Star of the West, vol. XII, p.227) After 'Abdu'l-Baha, Shoghi
Effendi was appointed in the Will and Testament of the Master. He raised up the
National Assemblies , so that they could elect the first Universal House of
Justice at the end of the Ten Year Crusade, which Baha'u'llah promised would be
divinely guided.
6. There is no comparison between Christian martyrdoms and the
pogroms against the Babis and Baha'is in Persia. Steven was the first Christian
martyr after Christ, stoned, in the Book of Acts. But during the lifetime of
Baha'u'llah, around 20,000 believers were butchered by the torture-mongers of
Persia, in the most heinous and fiendish fashion. Many of these were during the
defensive battles, when the imperial troops sought to wipe out the Babi
strongholds around the country. In order to overcome them, the commanders swore
on the Qur'an that they would be allowed to go home, if they surrendered; and
to honor the Book they came out, only to be cut down by the deceivers, in an
orgy of blood-letting. When Baha'u'llah appeared, He said "It is better to be killed than to kill" and they
replaced their swords in their scabbards.
Iran still violates the Human Rights councils. “Doth not the testimony of these holy
souls, who have so gloriously risen to offer up their lives for their Beloved
that the whole world marveled at the manner of their sacrifice, suffice the
people of this Day?” (Baha’u’llah, Kitab-i-Iqan #249) Christ
was told to “come down off the cross’ and save himself (Mark 15:32) Not
only did the Bab “come down” but did it
in a mysterious manner. Such an Event was still
not enough to move the witnesses, let alone people removed by time.
(Compiler)
The passion of Jesus
Christ, and indeed His whole public ministry, alone offer a parallel to the
Mission and death of the Báb, a parallel which no student of comparative
religion can fail to perceive or ignore. In the youthfulness and meekness
of the Inaugurator of the Bábí Dispensation; in the extreme brevity and
turbulence of His public ministry; in the dramatic swiftness with which that
ministry moved towards its climax; in the apostolic order which He instituted,
and the primacy which He conferred on one of its members; in the boldness of
His challenge to the time-honored conventions, rites and laws which had been
woven into the fabric of the religion He Himself had been born into; in the
rôle which an officially recognized and firmly entrenched religious hierarchy
played as chief instigator of the outrages which He was made to suffer; in the
indignities heaped upon Him; in the suddenness of His arrest; in the
interrogation to which He was subjected; in the derision poured, and the
scourging inflicted, upon Him; in the public affront He sustained; and,
finally, in His ignominious suspension before the gaze of a hostile
multitude—in all these we cannot fail to discern a remarkable similarity to the
distinguishing features of the career of Jesus Christ. (Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, chap
4)
That which hath touched
this Wronged One is beyond compare or equal. We have borne it all with the
utmost willingness and resignation, so that the souls of men may be edified,
and the Word of God be exalted. While confined in the prison of the Land of Mím (Mázindarán), We were one day delivered intothe hands of the divines. Thou canst well
imagine what befell Us. (Bahá’u’lláh, ESW, 76-77) [In the mosque of Amul,
He was given the bastinado on the souls of His feet till they bled.]
Night and day hath this Wronged One been occupied in that
which would unite the hearts, and edify the souls of men. The events that have
happened in Persia during the early years have truly saddened the well-favored
and sincere ones. Each year witnessed a fresh massacre, pillage, plunder, and
shedding of blood. At one time there appeared in Zanján that which caused the greatest consternation; at another in
Nayríz, and at yet another in Tabarsí, and finally there occurred the
episode of the Land of Tá (Tihrán).
From that time onwards this Wronged One, assisted by the One True God--exalted
be His glory--acquainted this oppressed people with the things which beseemed
them. All have sanctified themselves from the things which they and others
possess, and have clung unto, and fixed their eyes upon that which pertaineth
unto God. (Baha’u’llah, Epistle to the Son of the Wolf)
It was through the grace of God and with the aid of seemly
words and praiseworthy deeds that the unsheathed swords of the Bábí community
were returned to their scabbards. Indeed through the power of good words, the
righteous have always succeeded in winning command over the meads of the hearts
of men. Say, 0 ye loved ones! Do not forsake prudence. (Baha’u’llah, Tablets
of Baha'u'llah, p. 85)
Briefly, in every city the evidences of a tyranny, beyond
like or equal, were unmistakably clear and manifest, and yet none arose in
self-defence! Call thou to mind his honor Badí, who was the bearer of the
Tablet to His Majesty the Sháh, and reflect how he laid down his life.
That knight, who spurred on his charger in the arena of renunciation, threw
down the precious crown of life for the sake of Him Who is the Incomparable
Friend. (Baha’u’llah, Epistle to the Son of the Wolf)
That which hath touched
this Wronged One is beyond compare or equal. We have borne it all with the
utmost willingness and resignation, so that the souls of men may be edified,
and the Word of God be exalted. (Baha’u’llah, ESW)
7. Jesus made no provision for a divine
economy. Eventually the seat of power in Rome was converted; but Baha’u’llah, as the “Everlasting Father” of
Isaiah 9:6, bore the new divine government, His New World Order “on his
shoulder” (Compiler)
“This Administrative
Order is fundamentally different from anything that any Prophet has previously
established, inasmuch as Bahá'u'lláh has Himself revealed its principles,
established its institutions, appointed the person to interpret His Word and
conferred the necessary authority on the body designed to supplement and apply
His legislative ordinances.
Therein lies the secret
of its strength, its fundamental distinction, and the guarantee against
disintegration and schism. Nowhere in the sacred
scriptures of any of the world's religious systems, nor even in the writings of
the Inaugurator of the Bábí Dispensation, do we find any provisions
establishing a covenant or providing for an administrative order that can
compare in scope and authority with those that lie at the very basis of the
Bahá'í Dispensation.” (Shoghi Effendi, The World Order of
Bahá'u'lláh, p. 145)
8. Not until 325AD did Constantine
legitimize Christianity. Already, after only 174 years (now 2017), the Baha’i
Covenant is established in every country on earth. “Knowledge will increase”
(Daniel 12). Ethnologists reported that the 1992 the Baha’i Congress in
Manhattan was the most diverse gathering of tribes, races and nations ever!
Baha’u’llah did this! The double crown of Sultanate and Caliphate was destroyed
by “Micha-EL” in Constantinople, three years after ‘Abdu’l-Baha died.
9. Whereas the Christian calendar is
named after a hodge-podge of Roman and Norse deities, the Bab created the new
divine Badí calendar magnifying the virtues
of Baha’u’llah as sacred attributes of God. “Proclaim the acceptable year of
the Lord” (Isaiah 61:2 & Luke 4:19)
10. While Noah saved certain creatures
in his Ark and Moses saved the tribes out of Egypt, Christ spoke about personal
salvation for everyone, whether Jew or Gentile. Now, Baha’u’llah’s Message goes
farther, based on the Revelations of the past, and deals with the safe
governance of the whole human race, all the nations, and the entire eco-system.
Nation building has come to an end. World unity is the goal.
11. Christ said “Do you think that I
have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but division” (Luke
12:51). In Luke 22:39 He said to "Buy a sword"; but in Matt. 26:52 He
said “put up the sword." The nations did not do this. It was promised,
however, that “the swords would be beaten into plowshares” (Isaiah 2:4). Islam
was driven by the sword and the Bábí defensive actions, during the Bab’s
absence in prison, were in line with their Muslim heritage.
But Baha’u’llah
abrogated military jihad on the first day of His Declaration in the
Suriy-i-Sabr, and counselled the kings to unite and establish the Lesser Peace,
a multi-lateral disarmament of the world, and then the Most Great Peace.
If we study historical record and review the pages of Holy
Writ, we will find that none of the Prophets of the past ever spread His
teachings or promulgated His Cause from a prison. But Bahá’u’lláh upheld the
banner of the Cause of God while He was in a dungeon, addressing the kings of
the earth from His prison cell, severely arraigning them for their oppression
of their subjects and their misuse of power… (‘Abdu’l-Baha, Promulgation of Universal Peace, 15 November,
1912, Home of Juliet Thompson)
12. Christ and Muhammad made no law
against slavery. There were perhaps ways for the manumission of slaves; but
Baha’u’llah formally forbad slavery in the Most Holy Book.
13. Women were
to remain subordinate to men in the Pauline letters. But Baha’u’llah says “Women
and men have been and will always be equal in the sight of God.” (quoted in
Universal House of Justice, no. 54)
“This is
peculiar to the teachings of Bahá'u'lláh, for all other religions have placed
man above woman." (Abdul
Baha, PUP, p. 455)
“The world of humanity has two wings -- one is
women and the other men. Not until both wings are equally developed can the
bird fly. Should one wing remain weak, flight is impossible. Not until the world of women becomes equal to the world
of men in the acquisition of virtues and perfections, can success and
prosperity be attained as they ought to be."
(Abdu'l-Baha, SWA, p. 302)
“The world in the past has been
ruled by force, and man has dominated over woman by reason of his more forceful
and aggressive qualities both of body and mind. But the balance is already
shifting; force is losing its dominance, and mental alertness, intuition, and
the spiritual qualities of love and service, in which woman is strong, are
gaining ascendancy. Hence the new age will be an age less masculine and more
permeated with the feminine ideals . . . an age in which the masculine and
feminine elements of civilization will be more evenly balanced.” (Abdul Baha, Star of the West 3 (April 28,
1912), no. 3, p. 4
The woman
has greater moral courage than the man; she has also special gifts which enable
her to govern in moments of danger and crisis. (‘Abdu’l-Bahá in London, p. 103)
Woman rears
the child and educates the youth to maturity. She will refuse to give her sons
for sacrifice upon the field of battle. In truth, she will be the greatest
factor in establishing universal peace and international arbitration.
Assuredly, woman will abolish warfare among mankind. (Abdul Baha, PUP, #32)
And let it
be known once more that until woman and man recognize and realize equality,
social and political progress here or anywhere will not be possible. (Abdul Baha, PUP #44)
The people
among whom He [Baha’u’llah] appeared were
the most decadent race in the civilized world, grossly ignorant, savage, cruel,
steeped in prejudice, servile in their submission to an almost deified
hierarchy, recalling in their abjectness the Israelites of Egypt in the days of
Moses, in their fanaticism the Jews in the days of Jesus, and in their
perversity the idolators of Arabia in the days of Muhammad. The arch-enemy who
repudiated His claim, challenged His authority, persecuted His Cause, succeeded
in almost quenching His light, and who eventually became disintegrated under
the impact of His Revelation was the Shí’ah priesthood. Fiercely
fanatic, unspeakably corrupt, enjoying unlimited ascendancy over the masses,
jealous of their position, and irreconcilably opposed to all liberal ideas, the
members of this caste had for one thousand years invoked the name of the Hidden
Imám, their breasts had glowed with the expectation of His advent, their
pulpits had rung with the praises of His world-embracing dominion, their lips
were still devoutly and perpetually murmuring prayers for the hastening of His
coming. (Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, p.4)
Wrapped in its stygian gloom,
breathing its fetid air, numbed by its humid and icy atmosphere, His feet in
stocks, His neck weighed down by a mighty chain, surrounded by criminals and
miscreants of the worst order, oppressed by the consciousness of the terrible
blot that had stained the fair name of His beloved Faith, painfully aware of
the dire distress that had overtaken its champions, and of the grave dangers
that faced the remnant of its followers--at so critical an hour and under such
appalling circumstances the "Most Great Spirit," as designated by
Himself, and symbolized in the Zoroastrian, the Mosaic, the Christian, and
Muhammadan Dispensations by the Sacred Fire, the Burning Bush, the Dove and the
Angel Gabriel respectively, descended upon, and revealed itself, personated by
a "Maiden," to the agonized soul of Bahá'u'lláh. (Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By,
p.101)
In the odes
He
[Baha’u’llah] revealed, whilst wrapped
in His devotions during those days of utter seclusion, and in the prayers and
soliloquies which, in verse and prose, both in Arabic and Persian, poured from
His sorrow-laden soul, many of which He was wont to chant aloud to Himself, at
dawn and during the watches of the night, He lauded the names and attributes of
His Creator, extolled the glories and mysteries of His own Revelation,
sang the praises of that Maiden that personified the Spirit of God within Him,
dwelt on His loneliness and His past and future tribulations, expatiated upon
the blindness of His generation, the perfidy of His friends and the perversity
of His enemies, affirmed His determination to arise and, if needs be, offer up
His life for the vindication of His Cause, stressed those essential
pre-requisites which every seeker after Truth must possess, and recalled, in
anticipation of the lot that was to be His, the tragedy of the Imam Husayn in
Karbila, the plight of Muhammad in Mecca, the sufferings of Jesus at the hands
of the Jews, the trials of Moses inflicted by Pharaoh and his people and the
ordeal of Joseph as He languished in a pit by reason of the treachery of His
brothers. (Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, p. 120)
This enforced
and hurried departure of Bahá'u'lláh from His native land, accompanied by some
of His relatives, recalls in some of its aspects, the precipitate flight of the
Holy Family into Egypt; the sudden migration of Muhammad, soon after His
assumption of the prophetic office, from Mecca to Medina; the exodus of Moses,
His brother and His followers from the land of their birth, in response to the
Divine summons, and above all the banishment of Abraham from Ur of the Chaldees
to the Promised Land -- a banishment which, in the multitudinous benefits it
conferred upon so many divers peoples, faiths and nations, constitutes the
nearest historical approach to the incalculable blessings destined to be
vouchsafed, in this day, and in future ages, to the whole human race, in direct
consequence of the exile suffered by Him Whose Cause is the flower and fruit of
all previous Revelations. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, after enumerating in His "Some
Answered Questions" the far-reaching consequences of Abraham's banishment,
significantly affirms that "since the exile of Abraham from Ur to Aleppo
in Syria produced this result, we must consider what will be the effect of the
exile of Bahá'u'lláh in His several removes from Tihran to Baghdad, from thence to
Constantinople, to Rumelia and to the Holy Land." (Shoghi Effendi, God Passes
By, p. 107)
More odious
than the unrelenting hostility which Abu-Jahl, the uncle of Muhammad, had
exhibited, more shameful than the betrayal of Jesus Christ by His disciple,
Judas Iscariot, more perfidious than the conduct of the sons of Jacob towards
Joseph their brother, more abhorrent than the deed committed by one of the sons
of Noah, more infamous than even the criminal act perpetrated by Cain against
Abel, the monstrous behavior of Mirza Yahya, one of the half-brothers of
Bahá'u'lláh, the nominee of the Báb, and recognized chief of the Bábí
community, brought in its wake a period of travail which left its mark on the
fortunes of the Faith for no less than half a century. This supreme crisis
Bahá'u'lláh Himself designated as the Ayyam-i-Shidad (Days of Stress), during
which "the most grievous veil" was torn asunder, and the "most
great separation" was irrevocably effected. (Shoghi Effendi, God Passes
By, p. 163)
An envy as
blind as that which had possessed the soul of Mirza Yahya, as deadly as that
which the superior excellence of Joseph had kindled in the hearts of his
brothers, as deep-seated as that which had blazed in the bosom of Cain and
prompted him to slay his brother Abel, had, for several years, prior to
Bahá'u'lláh's ascension, been smouldering in the recesses of Mirza
Muhammad-'Ali's heart and had been secretly inflamed by those unnumbered marks
of distinction, of admiration and favor accorded to 'Abdu'l-Bahá not only by
Bahá'u'lláh Himself, His companions and His followers, but by the vast number
of unbelievers who had come to recognize that innate greatness which
'Abdu'l-Bahá had manifested from childhood. (Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, p. 246)
The arrival
of Bahá'u'lláh in 'Akká marks the opening of the last phase of His forty-year
long ministry, the final stage, and indeed the climax, of the banishment in
which the whole of that ministry was spent. A banishment that had, at first,
brought Him to the immediate vicinity of the strongholds of Shí'ah orthodoxy
and into contact with its outstanding exponents, and which, at a later period,
had carried Him to the capital of the Ottoman empire, and led Him to address
His epoch-making pronouncements to the Sultan, to his ministers and to the
ecclesiastical leaders of Sunni Islam, had now been instrumental in landing Him
upon the shores of the Holy Land -- the Land promised by God to Abraham,
sanctified by the Revelation of Moses, honored by the lives and labors of the
Hebrew patriarchs, judges, kings and prophets, revered as the cradle of
Christianity, and as the place where Zoroaster, according to 'Abdu'l-Bahá's
testimony, had "held converse with some of the Prophets of Israel,"
and associated by Islam with the Apostle's night-journey, through the seven
heavens, to the throne of the Almighty. Within the confines of this holy and
enviable country, "the nest of all the Prophets of God," "the
Vale of God's unsearchable Decree, the snow-white Spot, the Land of unfading
splendor" was the Exile of Baghdad, of Constantinople and Adrianople
condemned to spend no less than a third of the allotted span of His life, and
over half of the total period of His Mission. (Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, p. 183)
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