Tablets of Abdul-Baha Abbas

O thou who art firm in the Covenant!

Now I have found the opportunity to answer the petitions recently received and forward them to you in this mail.

Regarding the subject of Persia: Praise be to God! she became the East of the Sun of Truth in this age. The Light of Eternity dawned, the Everlasting Glory unveiled her countenance and the Reality of the Mercifulness became manifest. This is the prosperity of Persia. Undoubtedly she will progress day by day under the shade of the Blessed Tree until her illumination shall penetrate throughout the wide expanse of the earth.

Regarding the question of the establishment of the National Assembly: This National Assembly 1 will not bring any rapid results. Now some of the agitators are harboring evil intentions and do not let agreement and union be realized between the nations and the government. They are instigating the hopeless ones at every moment and sending them to the British Legation, while on the other hand they ask private assistance and protection 490 from the government so that they may procure wealth. Each and all of the clergy are thinking in this line.

However, we have nothing to do with these proceedings and counter-proceedings. We are commanded to quicken the souls, to train the characters, to illumine the realm of man, to guide all the inhabitants of the earth, to create concord and unity among all men and to lead the world of humanity to the Fountain of the Everlasting Glory. The reformation of one empire is not our aim; nay, rather we invoke from God that all the regions of the world be reformed and cultivated; the republic of men become the manifestors of the bounty of the most glorious Lord; the East and the West be brought nearer together; and that Turk and Tajik, Iran and America, India and Arabia, Japan and Persia, China and Germany; in brief, all the nations and peoples of the world become as one soul and one spirit, in order that strife and warfare be entirely removed and the rancor and hostility disappear so that all become as the waves of one ocean, the drops of one sea, the flowers of one rose-garden, the trees of one orchard, the grains of one harvest and the plants of one meadow.

Regarding the statement that hath been given out as the saying of His Majesty the Shah: This hath no connection whatever with the Bahais; nay, rather it hath meant the Babis. Mirza Yahya, the son of Mirza Hadi of Doulet Abad, and a few souls of Ezelis 2 who are living in Teheran and were at one time secret friends of Jamal-ed-Din of Afghan, have allied themselves with the party, which is working against the government, 491 and is engaged in the work of instigating and inciting the people. His Imperial Majesty did mean these souls, that is, the Babis, not the Bahais. But it is an established facts that the Bahais are the well-wishers of the nation and the government; are showing forth obedience and displaying good intentions; are not interfering in political matters; are engaged in the education and spiritualization of characters and are occupied with the training of the ignorant ones.

O thou who art firm in the Covenant! The general historical report about the Cause of God in that country, 3 that thou hast forwarded to Menshadi, 4 became very acceptable. Undoubtedly you must, every few months, write a report about the general conditions and attitudes of the Cause of God in America and forward it to Acca, so that we may send it to Persia to be printed and spread among the people.

O thou yearning servant of the Beauty of Abha! In the time that all the ulemas and sages, leaders, merchants and traders, nay, even the public itself from the highest to the lowest have taken refuge in the British Legation and began to complain and clamor that they are oppressed, His Royal Highness Shoa-Us-Saltanah, the son of the Shah, cried in the Assembly of Nobles: “These ulemas and Sheite leaders were always stigmatizing the Bahais, saying, ‘They are the ill-wishers of the government and the corruptors of nations!’ Now consider ye with the eye of justice! Sixty years have rolled by and the Bahais have been the object of the sword of affliction and the target of the arrows of oppression. Thousands of houses have been destroyed, 492 children became captives, women became prisoners, property was pillaged and not even a small children remained safe; yet, notwithstanding all of this, not one single Bahai took refuge under the flag of a foreign power! Now these Sheites, though they have always been treated with the utmost favor and benefit by the government, yet without the slightest reason they went under the protection of a foreign power and brought down such humiliation and dishonor upon the nation and the government! If they presented primarily their petitions to the government, their wishes would be complied with in a better and more effective way. This is the difference between the Sheites and the Bahais!”