Several years ago, I provisionally translated this substantial, and in many respects remarkable, supplication by Bahá’u’lláh.
Writings by Bahá’u’lláh
The Tablet of the Manifestation
Introduction In the following Tablet, Bahá’u’lláh describes the metaphysical reality of the Manifestation of God. As affirmed in the Bahá’í Writings, the Manifestations of God are those figures—such as Zoroaster, Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, and Bahá’u’lláh—who mediate between God and humanity, and reflect the attributes and perfections of the absolute and transcendent Deity in the contingent […]
The Tablet on the Simple Reality
In the first decade of the ‘Akká period, a believer known to us now only as Ḥusayn asked Bahá’u’lláh—on behalf of a disciple of the then-contemporary philosopher Mullá Hádí Sabzivárí (1797-1893)—for an interpretation of a famous dictum from the influential Persian philosopher Mullá Ṣadrá (1571-1636).
The Tablet of the Gems of Unity
The Tablet of the Gems of Unity concisely encapsulates, with remarkable force and concision, the essence of Bahá’í theology. In it, Bahá’u’lláh first establishes the existence of God by arguing in favor of the principle of causality, the ultimate contingency of the universe, and thus the constant dependence of the world on a Reality, being God, that is its necessarily existent and self-subsistent Creator and Sustainer.
Tablet on Avoiding the Disingenuous (Lawḥ-i-Ijtináb-i-Mudda‘ín)
Introduction The following Persian Tablet by Bahá’u’lláh describes how certain Bahá’ís, in His time, became disillusioned because of the immoral actions and divisive attitudes of some people who claimed to uphold His teachings. He counsels His followers to avoid those who are patently insincere in their claims to belief, and to understand that, since the […]
“O Nightingales” (Ay Bulbulán)
Introduction What follows is a provisional translation of a Persian poem by Bahá’u’lláh, “Ay Bulbulán” or “O Nightingales,” in which He describes His advent through the various classical motifs of Persian literature. As scholar Julio Savi notes, this poem is attributed to the period when Bahá’u’lláh was residing in Iraqi Kurdistan. Although Juan Cole had […]
Tablet on the Reason for Creation
In the following remarkable Tablet, Bahá’u’lláh grounds the moral imperative of universal love among human beings in their origin in a God through Whose primordial and eternal love all creation unfolded.
Supplications by Bahá’u’lláh
The following is a collection of two-hundred provisionally translated supplications revealed by Bahá’u’lláh in Arabic, which, insofar as I am aware, have not previously been rendered into English. Although the number of prayers included in this compilation be plentiful, it is still but a small measure of that which Bahá’u’lláh revealed throughout the span of His ministry. These supplications, whether gleaned from Tablets enunciating the central principles of His faith or treasured in the lines of a personal letter to a devoted disciple, one and all display His matchless command of vivid imagery and illustration, His adept skill in metaphor and His unswerving love and devotion to God.
Eulogy for the Prophet Muḥammad (Marthíyiy-i-Muḥammad)
Praise be to God Who sent down from the heaven of signification the bounties of exposition, and Who made the fruits of knowledge manifest from the Lote-Tree of eloquence.
Exalted, immeasurably exalted, is He Who uttered a word which He made—to each its own station—a speaking book; a cutting sword; a luminous light; and a wondrous garden; and all did He bid to draw nigh thereunto. Those who have recognized Him have attained unto salvation, whilst those who rejected Him are accounted among such as shall perish in a perspicuous book….
Tablet to the Sarvistán Bahá’ís (Lawḥ-i-Aḥibbáy-i-Sarvistán)
The Most Holy, the Most Great, the Transcendent
My beloved ones in Sarvistán,
Give ear to the call of the All-Merciful in the contingent realm, saying, None other god is there beside Him, the Almighty, the Beneficent. We have inhaled the fragrance of your love and have remembered you in this prison in which the Well-Beloved of the lands is captive. The people were awaiting My days, yet when We revealed Him Who is Mine own Self unto them, they disbelieved in Him, except those who had renounced the world and turned to God, the Lord of all men.