“Consider the manifold favours vouchsafed by the ...”
Consider the manifold favours vouchsafed by the Promised One, and the effusions of His bounty which have pervaded the concourse of the followers of Islám to enable them to attain unto salvation. Indeed observe how He Who representeth the origin of creation, He Who is the Exponent of the verse, ‘I, in very truth, am God’, identified Himself as the Gate [Báb] for the advent of the promised Qá’im, a descendant of Muḥammad, and in His first Book enjoined the observance of the laws of the Qur’án, so that the people might not be seized with perturbation by reason of a new Book and a new Revelation and might regard His Faith as similar to their own, perchance they would not turn away from the Truth and ignore the thing for which they had been called into being.
“Let Me set forth some rational arguments for thee. If ...”
Let Me set forth some rational arguments for thee. If someone desireth to embrace the Faith of Islám today, would the testimony of God prove conclusive for him? If thou dost contend that it would not, then how is it that God will chastise him after death, and that, while he lives, the verdict of ‘non-believer’ is passed upon him? If thou affirmest that the testimony is conclusive, how wouldst thou prove this? If thy assertion is based on hearsay, then mere words are unacceptable as a binding testimony; but if thou deemest the Qur’án as the testimony, this would be a weighty and evident proof.
Now consider the Revelation of the Bayán. If the followers of the Qur’án had applied to themselves proofs similar to those which they advance for the non-believers in Islám, not a single soul would have remained deprived of the Truth, and on the Day of Resurrection everyone would have attained salvation.
Should a Christian contend, ‘How can I deem the Qur’án a testimony while I am unable to understand it?’ such a contention would not be acceptable. Likewise the people of the Qur’án disdainfully observe, ‘We are unable to comprehend the eloquence of the verses in the Bayán, how can we regard it as a testimony?’ Whoever uttereth such words, say unto him, ‘O thou untutored one! By what proof hast thou embraced the Religion of Islám? Is it the Prophet on whom thou hast never set eyes? Is it the miracles which thou hast never witnessed? If thou hast accepted Islám unwittingly, wherefore hast thou done so? But if thou hast embraced the Faith by recognizing the Qur’án as the testimony, because thou hast heard the learned and the faithful express their powerlessness before it, or if thou hast, upon hearing the divine verses and by virtue of thy spontaneous love for the True Word of God, responded in a spirit of utter humility and lowliness—a spirit which is one of the mightiest signs of true love and understanding—then such proofs have been and will ever be regarded as sound.’