Paragraph 241

O brother, we should open our eyes, meditate upon His Word, and seek the sheltering shadow of the Manifestations of God, that perchance we may be warned by the unmistakable counsels of the Book, and give heed to the admonitions recorded in the holy Tablets; that we may not cavil at the Revealer of the verses, that we may resign ourselves wholly to His Cause, and embrace wholeheartedly His law, that haply we may enter the court of His mercy, and dwell upon the shore of His grace. He, verily, is merciful and forgiving towards His servants.

This paragraph is a bit of a transition to the last few quotes in this section focusing on the proofs from the Qur'an.

Up to this point, He has given us a series of verses warning us about those who ridicule the verses of God. This paragraph feels like it completes that warning.

What is His advice here? We should open our eyes and meditate upon the Word of God. We should seek the shelter of all the Manifestations of God. And then, hopefully, we might heed this warning.

Following all that, He warns us not to cavil, to avoid raising petty objections. Of course, it's interesting to note that He is not telling us to avoid raising serious objections, deep questions that we are unable to resolve. Those He seems to accept. But those are exactly the sorts of questions that the clergy never really raised with the Bab. Instead, they offered petty objections, such as questioning His conjugation of a verb.

After that, He tells us to resign ourselves to his Cause and follow His law. Recognition and obedience. The very first paragraph of the Kitab-i-Aqdas.

Again, He is not saying that we have to recognize the Bab here. We have to resign ourselves to God's Cause. We have to be obedient. Then, again with luck, we might actually be able to enter His court, and dwell upon that shore He has mentioned ever since the opening lines of this very book.

But it all begins with that opening of our eyes, and meditation upon the Word of God. This reminds us of the very beginning of the book where He tells us not to "regard the words and deeds of mortal men as a standard". It is the Word that should be our standard.

While we are meditating, we should be seeking that shelter of the Manifestations. They are our true haven, our source of security.

But let's also recognize that these very objections are an integral part of the time when a Manifestation appears. They are, as He says in paragraph 29, an "essential feature of every Revelation".

Given that they are there, and very real, we have a choice. Which side do we want to be on? If we cavil, then we know where we stand.

But if we are serious, and offer serious questions, such as the uncle did, then we still have a choice. Do we accept? Or do we reject?

We think that as long as we are of pure intent in our questions, we can always rest assured that God is "merciful and forgiving towards His servants." 

As we discussed this paragraph, we felt that it was a warning, but not the type of warning that says "Believe, or you're in trouble." The uncle already believes. He is a believer in Muhammad. He has found that "sheltering shadow".

No. The warning here is to be sincere. It is a warning to not belittle anyone. And it is a warning to only take the Word of God as our standard.

By concluding this section, before going on to offer two more more quotes in His defense of the Bab, with the reminder that God is "merciful and forgiving towards His servants", we see this as a reminder that He is not proselytizing. He is not condemning anyone for not recognizing. His warnings are for those who, as He said in paragraph 28, "have given way to idle fancy".

Paragraph 240

In like manner, thou observest in this day with what vile imputations they have assailed that Gem of Immortality, and what unspeakable transgressions they have heaped upon Him Who is the Source of purity. Although God hath throughout His Book and in His holy and immortal Tablet warned them that deny and repudiate the revealed verses, and hath announced His grace unto them that accept them, yet behold the unnumbered cavils they raised against those verses which have been sent down from the new heaven of God’s eternal holiness! This, notwithstanding the fact that no eye hath beheld so great an outpouring of bounty, nor hath any ear heard of such a revelation of loving-kindness. Such bounty and revelation have been made manifest, that the revealed verses seemed as vernal showers raining from the clouds of the mercy of the All-Bountiful. The Prophets “endowed with constancy,” whose loftiness and glory shine as the sun, were each honored with a Book which all have seen, and the verses of which have been duly ascertained. Whereas the verses which have rained from this Cloud of divine mercy have been so abundant that none hath yet been able to estimate their number. A score of volumes are now available. How many still remain beyond our reach! How many have been plundered and have fallen into the hands of the enemy, the fate of which none knoweth.

Continuing on with Baha'u'llah's commentary on the verse "As for those who believe not in the verses of God, or that they shall ever meet Him, these of My mercy shall despair, and these doth a grievous chastisement await", we now see how He connects these verses from the Qur'an directly to the Bab Himself.

He began this section of the proofs of His Mission by reminding us that true recognition will come from His Writings. That these should be the basis by which we decided whether or not we recognize. Now He is tying it all to His sufferings, too, contrasting that with the incredible outpouring of Revelation. Then He will talk about our response.

After this, He will explore two more quotes from the Qur'an, look at the transformation of His followers, followed by a glimpse at His life, before wrapping it all up with a few of the traditions and some final thoughts.

But let's go back to this paragraph, which begins with the reactions of the people. They have attacked the Bab, both verbally and physically. Yet, the reaction that Baha'u'llah shows us is that of abundance. It is as if those attacks mean nothing. They were warned, but they still attacked, and the result is that God is still abundant.

Look at the various metaphors He offers: "vernal showers raining from the clouds", "shine as the sun", "rained from this Cloud". They all speak of abundance.

When we re-read this paragraph, we discovered that it is not about the number of verses, which is merely a quantitative thing. No. Abundance is really the word we want, which is more about a mind-set. A perspective.

There are countless tales of millionaires and billionaires who keep striving to get more because they don't feel they have enough. That is the poverty mindset. Contrast that with those who have so little yet always find ways to give to charity. They know what it is like to starve, and so when they have a little extra, they understand their abundance. That is the mindset Baha'u'llah seems to want to cultivate within us.

He reminds us that every Manifestation was given a Book which they revealed to humanity. He doesn't have to tell us how precious each and every one of those Books was. We already know.

Then He points out that the Bab has given us a "score of volumes". Can we even begin to grasp what that means?

Of course, there are also the numerous volumes that have been lost, too. What an unspeakable tragedy that is. Can we even imagine what would have been lost had we been denied a Surih in the Qur'an, or a parable from Jesus?

When He refers to those that have been lost, there are a few different types. There is the famous story of the saddlebag, of course. In that story, the Bab was on His way to Mecca and was saying His prayers. At that time, someone snuck up and stole His saddlebag in which there were numerous Writings of His that were composed on the way. His servant, Mubarak, was about to chase the thief down when the Bab motioned him to let it be. After He finished His prayers, He said that Mubarak would have undoubtedly been able to catch the thief, but that this theft was decreed by God. He said that these stolen verses were destined to reach distant places through this thief.

Another way that the verses were lost were by the enemies of the faith seizing them and burning them. Barring some miracle, these are no doubt lost to us.

A third way is the many of the friends would wash the pages in water, obscuring the ink, if they were in fear of being caught.

Others have no doubt just been hidden for the time being.

No matter how they were lost, whether through theft, the enemies, or the friends themselves, we still have a truly remarkable amount of His Writings, especially when compared to all the sacred Text of the past.

"And if all the trees on earth", we read in the Qur'an, "were pens and the ocean ˹were ink˺, refilled by seven other oceans, the Words of Allah would not be exhausted."

When speaking of His own Writings, the Bab wrote, “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. But if all men were to observe the ordinances of God no sadness would befall that heavenly Tree.”

It is interesting to note that Baha'u'llah is not using the sheer volume of writings as a proof. Instead, He seems to be saying, "Here is the Ocean of Knowledge. Go explore it." And then He allows us to recognize its worth for ourselves.