What Were They Looking At?, ESW 203-235

Well, it seems we’re back at the Ocean. And not only does Baha’u’llah tell us where we are to go, but evidently how to get there, too. The Crimson Ark.

But this whole passage rings a bell. Remember the first paragraph of the Kitab-i-Iqan? “No man shall attain the shores of the ocean of true understanding except he be detached from all that is in heaven and on earth.”

Baha'u'llah begins this section by telling Muhammad-Taqi to "seek thou the shore of the Most Great Ocean, and enter, then, the Crimson Ark".

They are both told to be detached, and then guided to the ocean. Now, however, Muhammad-Taqi is told to board the ship. I’m not really sure what to make of this, but it could be due to when these books were written. The Iqan was written just a year or so before Baha’u’llah’s declaration. This book was written just a year or so before His passing. The beginning of His Revelation, and the end of it. Either way, it’s a fascinating parallel.

From here Muhammad-Taqi is told to turn towards God, and the doors of the Kingdom will be opened before him. Once again we have eyes and ears. He will behold what eyes have never beheld and hear what ears have never heard.

We've seen those eyes and ears before. Way back near the beginning of this book Baha'u'llah was preparing Muhammad-Taqi to listen, and throughout the book He has repeatedly asked him to look, observe, ponder and judge fairly. Now, once again, He is being asked to see and hear. But this time Baha'u'llah begins pointing him towards some very specific things to look at.

First comes the Bab.

Baha'u'llah tells Muhammad-Taqi to listen to what His Forerunner said about Him. And there is a lot of it. The Bab speaks of the One to come after Him in extraordinary terms. He describes Himself as "the first servant to believe in Him and in His signs", speaks of attaining the Presence of God in the year nine, and points repeatedly towards the Revelation that is to follow His own.

And once again we find detachment. Baha'u'llah tells Muhammad-Taqi to recite these words "with a detached heart, and a dilated breast, and an utterly truthful tongue". That sounds rather familiar by now. It isn't enough merely to read the evidence. How we approach it matters. We can read something having already decided what we think about it, or we can make some effort to clear away our assumptions and see if we’ve missed anything.

But then Baha'u'llah turns his attention even further back. From the Bab He turns to the Gospel, then Joel, Jeremiah, David, Isaiah and Amos. One after another, voices from the past are brought forward, all of them looking towards a Day still to come. "Prepare to meet thy God." "Behold your God!" "Our God will come, and He will not be silent." Baha'u'llah asks Muhammad-Taqi to look at these passages and consider whether the Day they were describing might actually have arrived.

There is something almost dizzying about all this. We are looking back at people who were looking ahead. Isaiah and Amos are both looking towards things to come. Jesus speaks of things His followers cannot yet bear and says that more will be revealed later. The Qur’an says that this “Great Announcement” is what people are talking about. The Bab appears centuries later and spends much of His own Revelation pointing towards the One who will come after Him. And now Baha'u'llah is asking Muhammad-Taqi to look back at all of them and ask whether he can recognize what they were seeing.

Perhaps this is one of the difficulties with prophecy. It is easy to say you know what it means while its fulfilment is still safely in the distant future. We can believe that something wonderful is going to happen someday. The real difficulty comes when somebody says that someday is now.

Earlier in this book Baha’u’llah pointed out that people have always had trouble recognizing the Manifestations when They appeared. Just as in the Iqan, He reminds the reader that this is part of the pattern. But here He seems to approach that problem from another direction. Instead of looking primarily at the people who failed to recognize Them, He turns our attention towards the people who were looking forward to Their coming. What did they actually say? What were they actually looking for?

And so Baha'u'llah keeps returning to their words. He doesn't merely tell Muhammad-Taqi that the earlier scriptures support His claim. He puts the evidence in front of him. Look at what was said, and look at what has happened since.

At one point He turns from the old prophecies to His own writings. Jesus had said, "But ye cannot bear them now", speaking of things that would be revealed later. Baha'u'llah then points to the Kitab-i-Aqdas, the Tablets to the Kings and other writings in which events were announced before they happened. The movement is rather interesting. Don't merely look back thousands of years and try to decide what Isaiah or Amos meant. There are things written within your own lifetime that can be examined as well.

And then comes a phrase that seems to bring much of this together. Baha'u'llah quotes the Bab saying, "Recognize Him by His verses."

That certainly takes me back to the Iqan. Again and again in that book Baha'u'llah points to the verses themselves as evidence. The uncle of the Bab was trying to understand how he could recognize a new Messenger of God, and one of the answers was right there in front of him. Read what has been revealed. Consider it. Don't dismiss it because it doesn't fit what you expected.

Now Muhammad-Taqi is being asked to do the same thing.

There is another little twist in this that I find worth pondering. The Bab Himself is repeatedly pointing beyond His own Revelation. Even while establishing His own Dispensation, He is preparing His followers to recognize the One who will come after Him. Even the Bayan, the Book around which His community was being formed, keeps pointing beyond itself.

And maybe this brings us back to Muhammad-Taqi. He has spent much of his life studying the past. He knows the Qur'an. He knows the traditions. He knows the expectations surrounding the Promised One. But all that knowledge only becomes useful if it helps him recognize what those things were pointing towards.

What Is It For?, ESW 195-202

It is often difficult to see where Baha’u’llah moves on to another theme, because they often flow seamlessly from one to the next. We just read about the fear of God being “the fountain-head of all goodly deeds and virtues.” And now He talks about some of these virtues. Seamless.

Even more, though, He has just said that this fear is also “the commander of the hosts of justice”, and the standard that is flying above. He also mentions the Crimson Ark, so maybe this army is a naval force. Sailing on the Ocean of His Writings? Never mind. Let’s move on before we get lost in the analogy.

These next few paragraphs begin with trustworthiness and piety, goodly deeds and a praiseworthy character. Baha'u'llah tells the people to adorn themselves with these qualities, while once again warning them against dissension and conflict.

Then comes the fear of God, once again. Here He describes it as the "chief commander" of His army, while a praiseworthy character and goodly deeds are its hosts, similar to what we just saw. And then, in the next paragraph, He returns to trustworthiness again. That's a number of paragraphs in a row touching on these same themes. It certainly feels as if He wants us to notice them.

At first I thought this little section was simply about character development. And it is, at least in part. But as I kept reading, I began to wonder if there was something else going on. Baha'u'llah doesn't seem interested in these qualities merely because they make us better people. He immediately begins showing us what they are for. He says that all He has done is for the purpose of summoning people to that which will exalt them and draw them nearer to God. Then He turns towards the divines and the Shah and says that they, too, should cleave to whatever will exalt the nation. He speaks of enlightening the people, improving their condition and helping them acquire useful knowledge. These qualities are not there just for our own amusement. They are supposed to be doing something.

And then He tells a little story that, at first, seemed like a bit of a change of subject. Kamal Pasha once visited Baha'u'llah and mentioned that he had studied several languages. Now, normally I would think that was rather impressive. I mean, I’m struggling to learn French right now. I know what’s involved. Learning another language takes work. Learning several would seem like quite an accomplishment. But Baha'u'llah's response is somewhat different. He tells him, essentially, that he has wasted his life. Gulp.

But I don't think the point is that learning languages is bad, or even that Kamal Pasha shouldn't have done it. Instead, Baha'u'llah takes his gift and points it towards something larger. Rather than spending years learning all these different languages, why not help establish a single language that everyone can learn? Then other people won't have to spend their lives doing what Kamal Pasha has done. Suddenly the question isn't whether learning languages is good or bad. The question is what all that effort was for.

And Baha'u'llah doesn't stop with Kamal Pasha. He hopes Persia will take the lead in establishing such a language, and then turns again towards the Shah, asking him to exert himself so that the people will experience justice. What began with trustworthiness, piety and good character in an individual has expanded into the actions of the divines and the Shah, the welfare of a nation, and finally something that might benefit the entire world.

This made me go back and look at those opening qualities again. What is our character for? What is our learning for? What is our influence for? What is political power for? Even, perhaps, what is our time for? Baha'u'llah doesn't seem particularly interested in our simply possessing qualities or capacities. He keeps pointing towards what they produce. Trustworthiness contributes to the prosperity of the world. Learning can be used to reduce the burden on others. The divines can use their influence to help exalt the nation. The Shah can use his power to establish justice.

And then, towards the end of this section, "Happy are they who act". Not merely those who know, or those who possess admirable qualities, but those who act. Character, knowledge and capacity seem to find their purpose in what we actually do with them.

Check it Out, ESW 167-194

We begin this section with a series of traditions that I am not familiar with. I mean, I can see what they are saying, but I am not sure why Baha'u'llah has placed them here. They use some fairly extraordinary language about the Imams and other individuals, referring to them in ways that, taken literally, could sound very much like claims to Divinity.

And then I began to wonder if that was the point.

Muhammad-Taqi knows these traditions. He presumably knows how they are understood. He knows that language such as this doesn't mean that the unknowable Essence of God has somehow been contained within a person. And yet similar language used by Baha'u'llah has been one of the objections raised against Him.

It seems almost as though Baha'u'llah is saying, "You understand how to interpret these traditions, so now apply the same level of interpretation to what I say."

In other words, use the same standard.

We've seen this sort of argument before, especially in the Iqan. It isn't enough to have one way of understanding scripture when it supports what you already believe, and another when you're examining something you don't. If the same sort of language appears in both, then surely the same principles of interpretation should apply.

From there Baha'u'llah moves into the fulfilment of prophecy, and once again we find ourselves on familiar ground from the Iqan. The Divine Presence is a real thing. Muhammad-Taqi presumably believes that. But if you believe in the Divine Presence, then what happens when it actually occurs? You have to be willing to check it out.

This is one of the problems Baha'u'llah spends so much time addressing in the Iqan. People believe in the prophecies. They believe in the promised Day. They believe in the return. The difficulty comes when those promises are fulfilled in a way that doesn't match what they expected. Their belief in the prophecy itself can become the very thing that prevents them from recognizing its fulfilment.

And Baha'u'llah seems to be confronting Muhammad-Taqi with much the same problem here. The time of fulfilment is now. The Divine Presence isn't merely something to believe will happen someday. The implication is that it is happening now. Check it out.

Then He turns back towards Muhammad-Taqi himself. This is a man reputed to be learned, and Baha'u'llah reminds him of what a learned person should be doing. He should be encouraging people towards that which is praiseworthy. I could be wrong, but I suspect calling for bloodshed doesn't qualify.

And then the argument becomes even stronger. Baha'u'llah seems to tell him that he has a choice: recognize this Revelation or, if he applies the same standard consistently, deny the Prophets he already accepts.

That's quite a challenge.

But again, Baha'u'llah doesn't merely tell him what conclusion to reach. He keeps giving him things to investigate.

Look at what the Shi'ih leaders have done. None of them recognized the Bab. Instead, they put Him to death. Meditate on that and be fair. Look at the Shaykhis and see how they responded.

Then comes something I find particularly curious. Baha'u'llah tells Muhammad-Taqi to appoint someone to go and speak with Mirza Yahya.

Why?

I don't know.

It does make me wonder, though. My impression is that many of those who actually dealt with Mirza Yahya found him rather pathetic, and his arguments insubstantial and inconclusive. So perhaps there is something in the comparison itself. Go speak with him. Find out what he has to say. Then come and investigate Baha'u'llah.

I mean, this is just my own thinking. Nothing official, of course. But it does fit the pattern of, “Don't take My word for it. Check it out for yourself.”

And Baha'u'llah doesn't end the argument there. Instead, He gives Muhammad-Taqi more material to investigate.

He has just heard about Baha'is being arrested in Tihran. Yet the Baha'is have been commanded to support the government and refrain from sedition. At the same time, officials connected with the Persian Embassy in Constantinople have been trying to stir up opposition against them and spreading accusations about their behaviour.

And then Baha'u'llah does something that we've seen Him do before. He is fair.

He points out that the Ambassador himself wasn't present when some of these accusations were made. It would have been very easy to throw everyone together into the same group and condemn them all. After all, these are people actively working against Him. But Baha'u'llah doesn't seem willing to accuse someone of something for which He doesn't have the evidence.

Given how often He has told Muhammad-Taqi to judge fairly, that little detail stood out to me.

Then comes another accusation. Some Baha'is have been accused of stealing money. So Baha'u'llah gives Muhammad-Taqi passages showing how His followers are actually taught to regard gold and material wealth. Again, check it out.

Don't accept the accusation. Don't merely accept Baha'u'llah's denial, either. Look at what He actually teaches.

He talks again about the tribulations He has endured and says something that, by now, shouldn't surprise us. He wouldn't trade them away. In the path of God, these trials are "manifest glory and a supreme attainment". Then He returns to the Shah and once again asks that the matter be investigated. But Baha’u’llah asks if there is anyone who will actually be just.

Which raises another question. If all this evidence is available, why have the Shi'ih divines turned away?

Baha'u'llah has admonished them before. He has called upon them to reconsider. He has given them standards against which they can measure themselves. He even cites what He told them in the Aqdas. And once again He invites Muhammad-Taqi to come and see for himself, which seems to happen over and over throughout this Epistle.

Don't accept what people say about Mirza Yahya. Ask him.

Don't accept what people say about Baha'u'llah. Ask Him.

Don't accept the accusations against the Baha'is. Investigate them.

Don't reject Baha'u'llah's language because it sounds blasphemous. Compare it with the traditions you already accept.

Don't merely profess belief in the Divine Presence. Consider whether it might actually be before you.

And don't let being reputed to be learned substitute for learning.

That last one may be especially difficult.

The uncle of the Bab came to Baha'u'llah with questions. He knew there were things he didn't understand, and the Iqan was revealed in response to those questions. Muhammad-Taqi is in a very different position. He is reputed to be learned. People look to him for answers. And he has already decided what he thinks about Baha'u'llah and His followers.

Perhaps part of what Baha'u'llah is doing throughout this book is trying to get him back to the point where he is willing to ask a question.

Towards the end of this section we encounter those "perspicuous verses". This paragraph is so rich that a book has literally been written about it.

Baha'u'llah has repeatedly referred Muhammad-Taqi to what He has actually written, and now He gives him some of it. These are the teachings that people have cast aside. These are the standards His followers have been given. Once again, instead of asking Muhammad-Taqi to rely upon what other people say the Baha'is believe, He puts the words before him to read for himself.

And I think this may be what has struck me most about these paragraphs. Baha'u'llah doesn't seem afraid of investigation.

He doesn't say, "Don't read that." He doesn't say, "Don't talk to him." He doesn't ask Muhammad-Taqi to avoid evidence that might challenge His claims. He sends him towards it. Speak to Mirza Yahya. Look at the traditions. Examine the accusations. Read the teachings. Look at the history. Come to the Most Great Prison. See for yourself. What is it you are actually judging? Are you judging Baha'u'llah, or what other people have told you about Him? Are you judging the teachings, or the accusations made against those who follow them? Are you judging the evidence according to the same standards you apply to what you already believe, or changing those standards depending upon the conclusion you want to reach?

I don't think these are questions only for Muhammad-Taqi.

How much of what I'm certain about have I actually investigated for myself? How often have I accepted somebody else's description of an idea I oppose without bothering to see whether that description is fair? How often do I carefully interpret evidence that supports what I already believe, while taking the least charitable interpretation possible of evidence that challenges it?

I don't know.

But I suspect those are questions worth asking.

Maybe that's one of the problems with being certain that we already know. Once we have the answer, we stop checking.

And Baha'u'llah just keeps saying, in one way after another, check it out.

 

A Coda, ESW 161-166

Whoops.

In the last article I thought paragraph 160 was the end of a section. It certainly felt like one. After everything Baha'u'llah had said to Muhammad-Taqi, after repeatedly asking him to reconsider his actions, judge fairly and choose another path, He gave him a prayer. It felt like a natural place to stop.

And maybe it was, at least for the article. But after reading the next few paragraphs, I think 161 through 166 are really a sort of coda to what came before. They take some of those ideas and show us what they look like when put into practice. That's one of the things I enjoy about reading this book this way. I don't know where it's going. I make a guess, keep reading, and sometimes discover I was wrong. That's ok. Sometimes the mistake leads somewhere interesting.

Paragraph 161 begins with another accusation. This time it concerns one of Baha'u'llah's friends, who has been accused of taking some money. Baha'u'llah says the accusation is false, and then tells us what happened. But what struck me wasn't so much the accusation itself as His reaction to it.

We've just spent a lot of time looking at justice, especially at the repeated call for Muhammad-Taqi to judge fairly. Now we get a very practical example. Here is someone being falsely accused. What do you do?

Baha'u'llah doesn't lash out. He doesn't respond with another accusation. In the next paragraph He says that what is hidden in the hearts of people will eventually be disclosed, and ends with the observation that people don't discern between the trustworthy and the treacherous. Then He expresses the hope that the Shah will investigate the matter for himself rather than merely believing those making the accusations.

That last part feels familiar by now. Check it out, He seems to say.

Don't just believe what people are telling you. Investigate. Look at the evidence. Find out what actually happened. We've seen Baha'u'llah repeatedly ask Muhammad-Taqi to do exactly this with His own claims, and now He asks the Shah to do the same thing with an accusation against one of His friends.

And while all this is going on, Baha'u'llah describes Himself as calm and silent, detached from all save God.

This doesn't mean the injustice doesn't matter. He still wants the truth to be known. He still wants the Shah to investigate. The trustworthy and the treacherous still need to be distinguished from each other. Forgiveness doesn't somehow make justice unnecessary.

That was something we were talking about in the last article. Refusing to condemn a person doesn't mean ignoring what they have done. If a crime has been committed, justice still needs to prevail. If someone has been falsely accused, the truth still needs to be discovered. But the injustice done to us doesn't have to determine how we respond to it.

And then Baha'u'llah gives us an example of a very different response.

He tells the story of Haji Shaykh Muhammad-Ali, a believer who had been so deeply affected by the calumnies and trials surrounding Baha'u'llah that he reached a terrible point. Baha'u'llah had forbidden His followers from engaging in sedition, conflict and contention. For this man, disobedience to that command simply wasn't an option. But neither, apparently, could he continue to endure what was happening.

So he killed himself.

I don't think Baha'u'llah is holding up his suicide as an example to follow. Quite the opposite. After all, He prays for the man's forgiveness. The act itself was wrong.

But look at the contrast.

Baha'u'llah has shown us His own response to calumny. He remains calm. He trusts in God. He asks that the matter be investigated and the truth discovered. Then He shows us someone else pushed so far by these same sorts of attacks that he can no longer see a way forward. He will not retaliate. He will not disobey. And tragically, he seems to believe that the only remaining direction for the violence is towards himself.

That is a very different response from Baha'u'llah's.

And yet Baha'u'llah asks Muhammad-Taqi to ponder the influence of the Word of God.

I think that's the key to why this story is here. The suicide isn't the evidence. The degree to which this man had been transformed by the Word is. Even when pushed beyond what he could bear, turning against the people tormenting him was not an option he was willing to consider.

There is something else here, too. Baha'u'llah can recognize the man's devotion while still recognizing that what he did was wrong. He doesn't have to turn Haji Shaykh Muhammad-Ali into either a hero whose every action must therefore be praised, or a sinner whose terrible choice somehow wipes away everything else about him.

Funny. We were just talking about that.

In the last article I wandered off into thinking about our own divided society and the ease with which we reduce people to the worst thing we believe about them. Someone does something unjust, and before long the action becomes the person. We stop saying, "You did something unjust," and begin saying, "You are an unjust person."

Here is a man who made a terrible choice. Baha'u'llah doesn't pretend otherwise. But He still prays for him.

Maybe that's part of the coda, too.

The more I look at these six paragraphs, though, the more I think the larger question may be about what opposition produces in us.

The calumniators reveal something about themselves through their actions. They lie. They make accusations. They fail to distinguish between the trustworthy and the treacherous. Baha'u'llah reveals something through His response. He remains calm, asks that the truth be investigated, and leaves the matter in the hands of God. Haji Shaykh Muhammad-Ali reveals something else. The Word of God has affected him so profoundly that retaliation and disobedience are no longer choices he is willing to make, although tragically he still makes another choice that Baha'u'llah does not approve.

What does opposition produce in us?

That's not such an easy question.

It's easy enough to talk about our principles when nobody is challenging them. It's easy to talk about justice when we're not the ones being falsely accused. It's easy to talk about kindness and forbearance when the person standing opposite us isn't doing something we find truly horrible.

But what happens when they are?

Do their lies make us liars? Does their hatred make us hateful? Does their injustice make us unjust? Or can we insist upon the truth, insist upon justice, and still refuse to allow their actions to determine our own?

Perhaps that's another way of looking at the fruit of the Word of God.

We've seen that image again and again throughout this book. What does belief produce? What does knowledge produce? What does hatred produce? What does the Word of God produce in the life of someone who actually allows it to change them?

And perhaps these six paragraphs really do belong with the section we just finished. We simply stopped a little too soon.

That's ok.

We kept reading. We changed our minds. And somehow that seems rather appropriate after the last article.

You Can Still Choose, ESW 134-160

Whew. This has been quite the journey so far.

Before going any further, though, I probably need to remind you of something. If you're following along with these articles, I really hope you're reading the passages from the Epistle to the Son of the Wolf before reading my comments on them. What I'm writing here is only half of a conversation. Most of these observations are responses to what Baha'u'llah has just said, and without His half of the conversation I'm not sure mine will make much sense.

It might also be a good time for a quick recap, because I'm beginning to see something about this book that reminds me very much of the Iqan.

In the Iqan, Baha'u'llah was responding to the uncle’s questions. He had not recognized the station of his Nephew, but he wasn't actively persecuting Him, either. He was just uncertain. Baha'u'llah showed him the patterns of the past, helped him look at the evidence, and gradually brought him to the point where he had to make a choice.

Here the situation is very different. Muhammad-Taqi has already made his choice. He has actively opposed Baha'u'llah and persecuted His followers. And yet, strangely enough, Baha'u'llah seems to be using much the same basic argument.

Look at the past. See the pattern. Look at what happened to Moses, Jesus and Muhammad. Look at what people said about Them, and how They reacted. Now look at what is happening today. Look at the evidence before you. Judge fairly. And then choose.

The tone is quite different, as you would expect. The man receiving the Iqan was an undecided seeker. The man receiving this Epistle was an active enemy. But Baha'u'llah still seems to leave the door open. Muhammad-Taqi has made his choice, but he is being given the opportunity to make a different one.

Which brings us back to paragraph 134.

Baha'u'llah begins by telling him what it means to be truly learned. This is quite a thing to say to a man who is already regarded as one of the learned. He tells him to look at the signs before him and see what has happened to the Messengers of the past. There are all sorts of references here, some of which I recognized and some of which sent me looking things up. The hamstrung she-camel rang a bell, but I couldn't have told you much more than that. And then, amidst all these images, there is the tree again. If Muhammad-Taqi looks at the Divine Lote-Tree with fairness, Baha'u'llah says, he will see the marks of his own sword upon it. Whew. What a statement. What a thing to consider.

But that's not where He leaves him. Muhammad-Taqi was created to recognize and serve that very Tree.

That's quite a contrast. Here is what you have done, and here is what you could be doing instead.

From there we get more references to Moses and Sinai, more stories of the martyrs, and then the contrast with those who turned away out of fear. Baha'u'llah tells Muhammad-Taqi to investigate for himself. And then, remarkably, He calls upon this man who has been actively opposing the Faith to arise and serve it.

Baha'u'llah then turns to the Shah and speaks about stopping the persecutions. He talks about the role of the sovereign, the obligations of the people towards their rulers and the obligations of those rulers towards the people. Rulers and ministers should work together for the welfare and security of everyone. Muhammad-Taqi is told once again to look at the past, recognize the pattern and act accordingly. He is told how to behave. He is asked to judge Baha'u'llah fairly. Then He prays that God might help him open the door of justice, and then tells Muhammad-Taqi that he, too, should pray for God to help the people and remove the malice from their hearts.

He is even told to go read the Iqan.

After everything Muhammad-Taqi has done, Baha'u'llah is still giving him a way forward.

Towards the end of this section He reminds him that his fame will pass away. Look at the religious leaders of the past who opposed the Messengers of God. What became of them? And then Baha'u'llah gives him a prayer.

After all that, a prayer.

And somewhere in the middle of reading all this, my mind wandered to the world around me.

We live in a time that feels increasingly divided. As our society struggles towards greater equity and inclusiveness, changes that seem like long-overdue justice to one person can feel like genuine loss to another. If I have grown accustomed to an advantage, I may not even recognize it as an advantage. It may simply feel like the way things are supposed to be. When that begins to change, equality itself can feel like something is being taken away from me.

I think there is a real danger here, though, especially for those of us who believe we're working towards greater unity.

The easy contemporary analogy would be to divide society into two camps, identify the enlightened one and the backward one, and announce that Muhammad-Taqi represents the latter. But if we did that, I think we'd miss one of the most important things Baha'u'llah is doing.

Worse, we would be using division as a means of trying to create unity.

Our present divisions often seem to work in precisely the opposite direction from what Baha'u'llah is doing here. Once someone has been classified as belonging to the other camp, we stop imagining movement. We explain to them rather than speak with them. We say they're ignorant, hateful, woke, racist, fascist, communist, privileged, brainwashed, whatever word happens to belong to our particular vocabulary. Once the label has done its work, we don't have to wonder how that person might change. We certainly don't have to imagine what capacities they might contribute if they did.

But Baha'u'llah doesn't seem to do that with Muhammad-Taqi.

And let's remember who we're talking about here. This isn't someone who has merely expressed opinions with which Baha'u'llah disagrees. Muhammad-Taqi has actively persecuted the Baha'is. He has encouraged others to curse Baha'u'llah. He has called for bloodshed. Real people have suffered and died.

Baha'u'llah does not pretend otherwise. And yet He writes him a book.

He reasons with him. He shows him evidence. He challenges him. He tells him to look at history. He asks him to judge fairly. He condemns what needs condemning. But He also invites him to investigate. He calls upon him to serve. He prays for him and gives him prayers to say. He even seems to imagine a future in which this man who has helped persecute the Baha'is might use his influence to help them instead.

That last part is particularly important.

Baha'u'llah doesn't seem to be saying, You have learning and influence, therefore you need to be brought down. Quite the contrary. He keeps calling Muhammad-Taqi towards a higher expression of the very capacities he already possesses. Be truly learned. Use your influence to serve. Help end persecution. Open the door of justice. Become someone who helps rather than harms.

I've noticed elsewhere in the Writings that Baha’u’llah never seems to diminish our choices. He never brings down anyone or anything. For example, Baha'u'llah doesn't lower our understanding of Christ in order to make room for the other Manifestations. If someone says that Christ is God, the answer isn't necessarily to lower the station of Christ. Instead, our understanding of God can be raised beyond the idea that the unknowable Essence of God could somehow be contained within a physical person, while at the same time our understanding of the other Manifestations can be raised to that same station as Christ.

The movement is always upwards.

And perhaps there is something there for our present social divisions.

Someone who fears greater equity may hear, “You have too much and we're coming to take it from you.” But perhaps the better vision we should strive to convey is: “What you have is good. Why shouldn't everyone have it?” The problem isn't that you have dignity, security, opportunity or a voice. The problem is that these things have not been equally available to others.

The goal isn't to lower one group so that everyone suffers equally. It is to raise everyone.

Of course, this doesn't mean ignoring injustice. Refusing to condemn a person is not the same as refusing to condemn their actions. Nor does it mean shielding them from the consequences of those actions. If someone commits a crime, justice still applies. If someone abuses their power, society still needs to protect those being harmed. Seeing someone as capable of change doesn't require pretending that nothing happened.

Perhaps the distinction is between saying, “You have done something unjust”, and saying, “You are an unjust person and that is all you can ever be.”

The first leaves open the possibility of justice. The second doesn't leave much room for anything.

And this is where I find some hope in what Baha'u'llah is doing with Muhammad-Taqi. Not a lot, mind you. History tells us that Muhammad-Taqi didn't change. After all this, after the arguments and the evidence and the invitations and the prayers, he still made his choice. That's reality.

But he had the choice.

And I think that's important. Healing others doesn't mean that everyone will eventually agree with us if only we find the perfect argument. Some people won't change. Some injustices will still require intervention. Some crimes will still require consequences. Unity cannot depend upon pretending those realities don't exist.

But neither does unity require us to decide that another person is beyond hope.

In fact, perhaps deciding that they are beyond hope is one of the things that prevents unity in the first place.

I changed my mind back in paragraph 3 of this very book. Not about anything remotely comparable to what Muhammad-Taqi was being asked to reconsider, obviously, but I had formed an opinion about what Baha'u'llah was doing there, kept reading, and realized I was wrong. Even more recently I thought the stories of the martyrs were a change of subject, kept reading, and changed my mind.

People do that.

We see something we hadn't noticed. We learn something we didn't know. Someone asks a question we hadn't considered. We suddenly see an old problem from another angle. And sometimes we realize that something we were quite certain about was wrong.

If we want people to change, perhaps we need to leave them the space to change.

That doesn't mean softening the truth. Baha'u'llah certainly doesn't do that with Muhammad-Taqi. It doesn't mean overlooking injustice or abandoning its victims. It means continuing, somehow, to address the person who has acted unjustly as someone who is still capable of justice.

Muhammad-Taqi didn't choose that path. But Baha'u'llah left it open. And for now, maybe that's enough hope to begin with.

Consider These Days, ESW 106-133

“Consider the days in which He Who is the Ancient Beauty hath come in the Most Great Name...”

That immediately reminds me of the Iqan. Again and again in that book Baha'u'llah asks us to consider the past. Look at what happened to the Manifestations of God. Look at what people said about Them, how They were treated, who recognized Them and who didn't. And, of course, the point isn't merely to learn history. We look at the past so that perhaps we can recognize the same patterns when they occur again. Now, in the Epistle to the Son of the Wolf, Baha'u'llah asks Muhammad-Taqi to consider the present.

He begins with a very clear statement of His purpose. He has come so that “the world might be quickened, and all its peoples be united”. And what has been the response? People have risen against Him and accused Him of causing trouble. Baha'u'llah doesn't respond by trying to protect Himself. Instead He summarizes some of the trials He has endured and then has Muhammad-Taqi look to the past at Moses.

Why Moses? I wondered about that at first. Of all the Manifestations He could have chosen, why begin there? In the Iqan, it made sense to me that He focused the attention of the uncle of the Bab on Jesus, given the questions he had asked, but why Moses for Muhammad-Taqi? No idea. Baha'u'llah reminds him, though, of the accusation made against Moses and Aaron. Pharaoh and his people accused Them of trying to turn people away from the religion of their fathers and gain power for Themselves.

Just as with the uncle in the Iqan, Baha'u'llah doesn't ask Muhammad-Taqi to take His word for it. He tells him to read what was revealed in the Qur'an. Go back to a Book you already accept, He seems to say. Look at the accusations made against a Manifestation you already recognize, and then compare them with what is being said today. Baha'u'llah then makes the point explicit. Whenever a Manifestation appeared, many denied Him. Others turned away. Still others spread calumnies against Him. And what was the result? People were prevented from reaching “the river of the loving providence of Him Who is the King of all creation”. That was what was done in the past, and people who have never even met Baha'u'llah are now doing the same thing.

Then He returns to Moses, and points out something that has bothered people for a long time. Moses killed a man. Baha'u'llah doesn't try to hide that fact or explain it away. Moses Himself acknowledged what He had done, asked God for forgiveness, and was forgiven. I find that an extraordinary example to place before Muhammad-Taqi. Baha'u'llah has been asking him almost from the beginning of this Epistle to reconsider what he has done. He has reminded him that he told people to curse Baha'u'llah and decreed that the blood of the servants of God should be shed. And now He shows him Moses, a Manifestation of God whom Muhammad-Taqi already accepts, acknowledging an act, turning to God and asking for that same forgiveness. If Moses can do that, perhaps Muhammad-Taqi can, too. That may be one of the reasons why Moses was chosen for this example.

Then Baha'u'llah says something we've seen before: “He doeth what He willeth.” This may be one of the greatest challenges when it comes to recognizing a Manifestation of God. We want Them to behave according to our expectations. We want Them to fit within what we already understand. But if God truly does what He wills, then perhaps our expectations aren't a particularly reliable standard. But then Baha'u'llah does something interesting. He has just described how He never tried to protect Himself from all the trials that came upon Him. He speaks of those who were trying to sully His reputation and says that they “busied themselves about their own protection”. Baha'u'llah entrusted Himself to God. His opponents were busy protecting themselves. And they didn't merely spread stories about Him. They spread them about anyone who tried to visit Him.

So Baha'u'llah begins giving Muhammad-Taqi examples. When He went to the Sublime Porte, He says, the government treated Him well. Officials visited Him, yet He never asked them for anything. This was apparently unusual enough to be noticed, especially when compared with other Persians who went around trying to obtain whatever gifts and favours they could. And then comes another example of something we've been seeing throughout this book: fairness.

Baha'u'llah speaks of Husayn Khan. His actions caused Baha'u'llah great suffering and contributed to His eventual banishment to Akka. It would be very easy simply to cast him as an enemy, but Baha'u'llah doesn't. He acknowledges his sincerity and even commends his faithfulness “in the discharge of his duty”. That really stands out after what we just saw with the kings. Napoleon was rebuked. The Czar was encouraged. Victoria was praised. Baha'u'llah didn't judge them according to their titles or according to some simple division between friend and enemy. He looked at what they did. And here He does something similar with a man whose actions brought suffering upon Him. He can still acknowledge what is worthy of acknowledgement.

Then He turns to Mirza Yahya and Siyyid Muhammad, people whose actions brought Him tremendous trials, and once again His response surprises me. He prays for them. He asks God to guide them “to be just and fair-minded”. Justice, equity, fair-mindedness. Baha'u'llah has been asking Muhammad-Taqi for these qualities throughout the Epistle, and now He keeps demonstrating them in His own response to the people who have harmed Him. He says that His purpose has always been to “edify the souls of men” and help knowledge prevail over ignorance. He speaks of what He has done for the Shah, and of how those in authority have responded. Then He begins telling Muhammad-Taqi about the believers who suffered and died.

This initially felt to me like a new topic, but the current one hadn't been finished yet. So I kept reading. And as I went on I began to realize that these stories continued the theme of considering the present day. They are not just there to tell us about these great heroes, but to help Muhammad-Taqi understand what has been happening. In the Iqan, the stories of the past were there to help show the pattern that has always been there throughout history, and encourage the uncle to see that the same story was happening once again. Here, these stories feel different. I think they are there not only to contrast the behaviour of the martyrs, but to remind this religious man of the two sides that have always been there in history. And he can clearly see which side he has chosen, if he only looks with the eyes of justice.

As to these stories of the present day, there are a lot of them. The King of Martyrs and the Beloved of Martyrs. Other believers whose names and stories follow one after another. Some were imprisoned. Some were tortured. Some were killed. As I read through them, I truly wondered why they were all there. Hadn't He made His point with the first few? But then Baha'u'llah describes some of these people as having “quaffed their fill of the ocean of renunciation”. Near the beginning of the Epistle, Muhammad-Taqi was told to wash himself with the “waters of renunciation”. At the time it felt like an instruction, something he was being asked to do. Now Baha'u'llah shows him people who actually did it. Perhaps this is what renunciation looks like when it becomes a life rather than just a word.

These people were willing to surrender everything, and their deaths weren't merely examples of courage. Baha'u'llah asks Muhammad-Taqi to ponder what could possibly produce such a response: “Ponder thou upon the influence of the Word of God.” That seems particularly pointed when addressed to a religious scholar. Muhammad-Taqi knows words. He has studied scripture. He teaches religion. People listen to what he says. But here Baha'u'llah asks him to look at what the Word of God has actually done to people. What could cause someone to surrender wealth, security, reputation and even life itself? Once again we're back to fruit. What does knowledge produce? What does religion produce? What does leadership produce? And now, what does the Word of God produce?

Baha'u'llah tells Muhammad-Taqi to compare what happened in the past with what is happening now. In former times one person might have been slain for the sake of God. Now, He says, look at how many have offered their lives. “Judge fairly.”

He points to Balal, whose acts are remembered and honoured. But I have to be honest. Although I knew he was the first Muezzin, the first to be chosen to raise the call to prayer, I had no idea what else he had done. I didn't know about his sufferings for having converted to Islam, or the fact that he had been a slave. I didn't know that Abu-Bakr purchased him and freed him from slavery, which prompted me to wonder if Baha'u'llah was hinting that Muhammad-Taqi was a slave in his own way. And if so, who would purchase his freedom? I won't pretend to have an answer to that stray thought. Nor did I know that Balal was a stutterer, just as Moses was. Yet another connection to Moses. All of this from one who knew next to nothing about him. I can only wonder at what connections Muhammad-Taqi would have made.

Baha'u'llah then asks him to look at the people suffering in his own day. It is easy to honour courage centuries later. It is a lot more difficult to recognize it when the people displaying that courage are those very people you yourself have been persecuting.

Baha'u'llah then returns to His own sufferings. “That which hath touched this Wronged One is beyond compare or equal.” Yet He says He has been willing and resigned to bear it all for the sake of God. He recalls the Siyah-Chal and gives further examples of those who were killed. Then, in addressing the Shah, He asks him to judge what has happened with equity and justice. Even the victims themselves become part of the argument. Baha'u'llah describes people who, while suffering at the hands of their oppressors, interceded on behalf of those very people. Again the question: What produces that?

Then comes Akka, the place associated with so much of Baha'u'llah's own suffering, and another Tablet, this one revealed after the martyrdoms. Again and again He lays the evidence before Muhammad-Taqi and asks him to look at it. Eventually He returns to the comparison with the Manifestations of the past. What evidence, He asks, could people have produced against Jesus or Muhammad? Whatever evidence they might have offered against these Manifestations, comparable evidence is being offered now.

And this brings us back to where we began: “Consider these days.” It is easy for Muhammad-Taqi to look backwards and recognize Moses. He already knows Pharaoh was wrong. He can read the Qur'an and see that the accusations against Moses were false. He can honour Balal. He can recognize Muhammad. He can accept Jesus. But Baha'u'llah isn't asking him merely to judge the past correctly. He's asking him to recognize the same pattern while he is living through it.

Then the tone sharpens. “O thou who hast gone astray!” Muhammad-Taqi has never met Baha'u'llah. He hasn't associated with Him. He hasn't investigated His character personally. Yet he has condemned Him and encouraged others to do the same. How can that be fair or just? After all these pages about justice and equity, after the examples of Moses, the martyrs, government officials, enemies and friends, Baha'u'llah turns the standard directly towards the man reading the Epistle. If you have evidence for rejecting Me, produce it.

Perhaps that's why “Consider these days” is such an appropriate beginning for this section. Considering the past is relatively safe. We already know how the story ends. We know who Pharaoh was. We know who Moses was. We know who rejected Jesus and who persecuted Muhammad. The difficult part is considering the days in which we ourselves are living, because then we have to ask which side of the story we're on.

In Relation to Kings, ESW 68-105

We ended the last section with the kings. Baha'u'llah had been talking about people who possessed an almost unimaginable amount of earthly power at the time, and yet He described their sovereignty as something they should be willing to abandon. If they did continue to rule, it should be because they were willing to bear “the burden of dominion” in the service of God.

Now, immediately after this, we move from kings to God.

“Either thou or someone else hath said... the Babis believe in his (Baha'u'llah's) Divinity and Godhood.”

That's quite a jump. Baha'u'llah is being accused of being compared to God Himself. But His response is not at all what we might expect.

“Divinity, whenever I mention it,” He writes, “indicateth My complete and absolute self-effacement.”

That's an interesting answer to a charge of claiming Godhood. Muhammad-Taqi and others appear to be reading these statements as the greatest imaginable claim of self, while Baha'u'llah describes them in terms of the complete absence of self. He even says that in this station He has no control over His own welfare, His life or His resurrection.

Baha'u'llah has just taken kingship, something we generally associate with privilege and power, and turned it into a burden carried in service to God. Now He does something similar with the accusation of Divinity. What looks like the greatest possible claim to personal authority is described as “complete and absolute self-effacement”.

In the Iqan, Baha'u'llah explains the two stations of the Manifestations of God. In one station They speak with the voice of servitude, while in the other They speak with the Voice of God. Statements that can appear contradictory begin to make sense when we understand the station from which They are speaking. And here Baha'u'llah doesn't merely explain this to Muhammad-Taqi. He points him back towards his own religious tradition.

He begins with Moses and the Burning Bush. Moses heard the Word spoken from the Bush and accepted it. Then Baha'u'llah points to statements attributed to Muhammad and the Imams, all containing language that would be very difficult to understand if taken in a simple literal sense. These kinds of statements didn't suddenly appear with Baha'u'llah. They are already there in the tradition Muhammad-Taqi accepts.

And then there is a little passage that I'm not entirely sure what to do with. Baha'u'llah speaks of the person who has purified himself from “idle fancies and vain imaginings”, torn away the veils of doubt and turned towards the Most Great Prison. He describes the Word of God as shining like the sun among the books of men and says, “Happy the man that hath discovered it, and recognized it”. Perhaps this is simply the wonder that comes when those old statements suddenly begin to make sense. I don't know. But there does seem to be something joyful here, almost a sense of discovery after the difficulty of the preceding passages.

Then Baha'u'llah returns directly to the accusation. People, He says, “have failed to perceive Our purpose in the references We have made to Divinity and Godhood”. Once again He points to Muhammad, who spoke of the different relationships between the Messenger and God. And then Baha'u'llah asks a rather obvious question: if people are going to quote His statements about Divinity, why don't they quote the other things He has said?

“Aside from this,” He asks, “why is it that thou didst not mention those other stations which the Abha Pen hath disclosed?”

Ah. Cherry picking.

If you're going to quote Baha'u'llah saying something that sounds like a claim to Divinity, then surely you also have to deal with His statements affirming the unity and oneness of God. You have to deal with His prayers asking God to draw Him near and detach Him from everything else. You have to deal with Him saying that He is “abashed to claim for Himself any existence whatever, how much more those exalted grades of being!” It isn't enough to pull out one statement and build an accusation around it. You have to look at the rest of what He says and try to understand how the statements fit together.

Then Baha'u'llah gives us an image that brings the whole question of power back down to earth. Literally.

Everything that is the source of our “prosperity”, “wealth”, “might”, “exaltation”, “advancement and power” comes from the earth beneath our feet. The person who truly understands this, He says, is cleansed from “pride, arrogance, and vainglory”.

That's quite an image after all this talk about kings. However high you rise, however wealthy or powerful you become, you are still standing on the very thing from which your wealth and power ultimately come. And you're standing on it with your feet.

Then He looks at the body again. Baha'u'llah asks God to grant people “hearing ears, and sharp sight, and dilated breasts, and receptive hearts”. We've seen all of these before, and now they appear just as Baha'u'llah says that He never hesitated to proclaim His Cause.

This seems important in light of the accusation He has just answered. Baha'u'llah isn't saying that people misunderstood Him because He was coy about His station. He didn't hide it. He proclaimed it openly. The problem wasn't that He failed to speak clearly. The problem was that people didn't have the ears to hear what He was actually saying.

And one of the groups to whom He proclaimed it was to the rulers of the world.

The first example Baha'u'llah gives Muhammad-Taqi is Napoleon III. Apparently Napoleon had made some statement about Baha'u'llah, and a Tablet had been sent to him while Baha'u'llah was in Adrianople. Napoleon didn't reply. Later his minister wrote to Baha'u'llah offering assistance, but even that reveals a misunderstanding. The minister seems to have assumed that Baha'u'llah wanted material help.

After everything we've just read, that almost seems funny. Baha'u'llah has been explaining that He has no desire for leadership, that His references to Divinity indicate self-effacement, and that worldly sovereignty itself is something a king should be willing to abandon. And the minister thinks He wants something from Napoleon.

So Baha'u'llah shows Muhammad-Taqi what He actually said to him.

He certainly doesn't hide His station. “The Most Mighty Bell hath appeared.” Napoleon is told that “He Who is the Unconditioned is come”, and that if he were to incline his inner ear he would hear all created things proclaiming, “The Ancient of Days is come in His great glory!” There are the ears again, too. “Give ear, O King, unto the Voice that calleth from the Fire which burneth in this verdant Tree”.

Oh, and there is the Burning Bush again.

Only a few paragraphs earlier Baha'u'llah used the Burning Bush to help explain how language about Divinity can be understood. Now He uses precisely that language in addressing Napoleon. This isn't something He explains privately to Muhammad-Taqi while carefully avoiding it when speaking publicly to a king. He says it openly.

But look at what He asks Napoleon to do with his power. He tells him to arise and serve God. He tells him to help the Cause. He speaks of benefiting mankind. He reminds him that what he possesses will perish. Again and again, the power of the king is turned away from the king himself and towards service.

Then the tone changes.

Baha'u'llah recalls something Napoleon had said about the Crimean War, claiming that the cries of the oppressed had awakened him. Baha'u'llah tells him plainly that this wasn't true. “We tested thee, and found thee wanting.” Had Napoleon been sincere, Baha'u'llah says, he would not have ignored the Tablet sent to him.

Remember, this is a prisoner speaking to an emperor.

He doesn't merely criticise him. He warns him. “For what thou hast done, thy kingdom shall be thrown into confusion, and thine empire shall pass from thine hands”. His pomp will not endure. His possessions will pass away. The man who possesses enormous earthly power is being told by a prisoner that he is about to lose it.

But even here Baha'u'llah tells him to “arise, and make amends”. The rebuke isn't condemnation for the sake of condemnation. Napoleon is still being told what he can do to avoid this fate.

Eventually Baha'u'llah tells him that his subjects “are God's trust amongst you”. There's the purpose of kingship again. The people aren't possessions of the king. They're a trust. He is to watch over them, prevent wolves from becoming shepherds, turn towards the poor and desolate, and use his position in service.

Napoleon had power. Baha'u'llah looked at what he did with it and rebuked him.

Then He turns to the Czar of Russia, and the tone is noticeably different.

Baha'u'llah remembers that while He was “chained and fettered” in the prison of Tihran, one of the Czar's ministers offered Him assistance. He doesn't forget that. Instead He tells the Czar that because of this act God has ordained for him a station, and warns him not to “barter away this sublime station”.

That is quite different from the way He addresses Napoleon. There is still a warning, but it begins with acknowledgement. Something good was done under the Czar's authority, and Baha'u'llah recognises it.

Then He encourages him to go further. “Arise thou amongst men in the name of this all-compelling Cause, and summon, then, the nations unto God.” He asks him to listen, to recognise, and to act.

And once again Baha'u'llah speaks of His own condition. His body may be “beneath the swords” of His enemies, but His spirit is filled with a joy beyond anything the earth can offer. Even here, in an address to another of the most powerful rulers in the world, He isn't asking to be rescued from His suffering. He is asking the ruler to recognise what has appeared and use his own power accordingly.

Napoleon is rebuked. The Czar is encouraged.

And then we come to Queen Victoria.

Here Baha'u'llah does something else. He praises her.

He begins, as with the others, by proclaiming His station and calling upon her to listen. “O Queen in London! Incline thine ear unto the voice of thy Lord”. But then He mentions something she herself has actually done. He has heard that she has forbidden the trading of slaves, and says, “This, verily, is what God hath enjoined in this wondrous Revelation.” He even says that God has destined a reward for her because of it.

Then He praises another aspect of her rule. “We have also heard that thou hast entrusted the reins of counsel into the hands of the representatives of the people. Thou, indeed, hast done well”.

That phrase is wonderfully simple. “Thou, indeed, hast done well.”

Napoleon is an emperor. Alexander II is a Czar. Victoria is a Queen. Baha'u'llah isn't moved by the titles. He looks at what each ruler has done, and reacts to that.

Napoleon claimed concern for the oppressed, but Baha'u'llah tested that claim and “found thee wanting”. The Czar's minister helped Baha'u'llah when He was imprisoned, and Baha'u'llah remembers the act and encourages the Czar to build upon it. Victoria has acted against the slave trade and allowed representatives of the people a role in government, and Baha'u'llah praises her for it.

Rebuked. Encouraged. Praised.

I think that's the heart of these paragraphs for me, and why I find it useful to see them all as part of one section, one movement.

Baha'u'llah has spent a great deal of this Epistle telling Muhammad-Taqi about justice and equity. He has repeatedly asked him to be fair-minded. He has told him to look at the fruit produced by religion, knowledge and leadership. And now He shows him what that fairness looks like when He Himself considers the rulers of the world.

He doesn't condemn kings because they're kings. But He doesn't praise them, either, just because of their titles. He looks at what they do with the power they've been given.

And that makes me wonder again about Muhammad-Taqi, and why Baha’u’llah is addressing these passages to him.

He isn't a king, but he has power. People listen to him. His words influence what they think and what they do. Baha'u'llah has already reminded him of one way he has used that power: he told people to curse Baha'u'llah and decreed that the blood of the servants of God should be shed.

Now Muhammad-Taqi has been shown three rulers.

One used his power in a way that earned Baha'u'llah's rebuke. One was reminded of good that had been done and was encouraged to do more. And one was praised for her actions that benefited the people.

Perhaps the question Baha'u'llah has been asking the kings is also the question He has been asking Muhammad-Taqi all along. What are you doing with the power you've been given?