“O Spot that art situate on the shores of the two seas!” Bahá’u’lláh has thus apostrophized the Imperial City, in terms that call to mind the prophetic words addressed by Jesus Christ to Jerusalem, “The throne of tyranny hath, verily, been stablished upon thee, and the flame of hatred hath been kindled within thy bosom, in such wise that the Concourse on high, and they who circle around the Exalted Throne, have wailed and lamented. We behold in thee the foolish ruling over the wise, and darkness vaunting itself against the light. Thou art indeed filled with manifest pride. Hath thine outward splendor made thee vainglorious? By Him Who is the Lord of mankind! It shall soon perish, and thy daughters, and thy widows, and all the kindreds that dwell within thee shall lament. Thus informeth thee the All-Knowing, the All-Wise.”
Such was the fate that overtook both Shí’ih and Sunní Islám, in the two countries where they had planted their banners and reared their most powerful and far-famed institutions. Such was their fate in these two countries, in one of which Bahá’u’lláh died an exile, and in the other the Báb suffered a martyr’s death. Such was the fate of the self-styled Vicar of the Prophet of God, and of the favorite ministers of the still awaited Imám. “The people of the Qur’án,” Bahá’u’lláh testifies, “have risen against Us, and tormented Us with such a torment that the Holy Spirit lamented, and the thunder roared out, and the clouds wept over Us.... Muḥammad, the Apostle of God, bewaileth, in the all-highest Paradise, their acts.” “A day shall be witnessed by My people,” their own traditions condemn them, “whereon there will have remained of Islám naught but a name, and of the Qur’án naught but a mere appearance. The doctors of that age shall be the most evil the world hath ever seen. Mischief hath proceeded from them, and on them it will recoil.” And again: “Most of His enemies will be the divines. His bidding they will not obey, but will protest saying: ‘This is contrary to that which hath been handed down unto us by the Imáms of the Faith.’” And still again: “At that hour His malediction shall descend upon you, and your curse shall afflict you, and your religion shall remain an empty word on your tongues. And when these signs appear amongst you, anticipate the day when the red-hot wind will have swept over you, or the day when ye will have been disfigured, or when stones will have rained upon you.”
A Warning Unto All Nations
This horde of degraded priests, stigmatized by Bahá’u’lláh as “doctors of doubt,” as the “abject manifestations of the Prince of Darkness,” as “wolves” and “pharaohs,” as “focal centers of hellish fire,” as “voracious beasts preying upon the carrion of the souls of men,” and, as testified by their own traditions, as both the sources and victims of mischief, have joined the various swarms of sháh-zádihs, of emirs, and princelings of fallen dynasties—a witness and a warning unto all nations of what must, sooner or later, befall those wielders of earthly dominion, be it royal or ecclesiastic, who might dare to challenge or persecute the appointed Channels and Embodiments of Divine authority and power.
Islám, at once the progenitor and persecutor of the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh, is, if we read aright the signs of the times, only beginning to sustain the impact of this invincible and triumphant Faith. We need only recall the nineteen hundred years of abject misery and dispersion which they, who only for the short space of three years persecuted the Son of God, have had to endure, and are still enduring. We may well ask ourselves, with mingled feelings of dread and awe, how severe must be the tribulations of those who, during no less than fifty years, have, “at every moment tormented with a fresh torment” Him Who is the Father, and who have, in addition, made His Herald—Himself a Manifestation of God—to quaff, in such tragic circumstances, the cup of martyrdom.
I have, in the pages immediately preceding, quoted certain passages addressed collectively to the members of the ecclesiastical order, both Islamic and Christian, and have then recorded a number of specific addresses and references to Muslim divines, both Shí’ih and Sunní, after which I proceeded to describe the calamities that afflicted these Muḥammadan hierarchies, their heads, their members, their properties, their ceremonials, and institutions. Let us now consider the addresses specifically made to the members of the Christian clerical order who, for the most part, have ignored the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh, whilst a few among them have, as its Administrative Order gained in stature and spread its ramifications over Christian countries, arisen to check its progress, to belittle its influence, and obscure its purpose.