The Reconciliation of Races and Religions

by T. K. Cheyne

Another attempt on the life of the much-loved Master was prevented, it is said, by the faithfulness of the bath-servant. 'One day while in the bath Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel remarked to the servant (who was a believer) that the Blessed Perfection had enemies and that in the bath he was much exposed…. Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel then asked him whether, if God should lay upon him the command to do this, he would obey it. The servant understood this question, coming from Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel, to be a suggestion of such a command, and was so petrified by it that he rushed screaming from the room. He first met Abbas Effendi and reported to him Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel's words…. Abbas Effendi, accordingly, accompanied him to my father, who listened to his story and then enjoined absolute silence upon him.' [Footnote: Phelps, pp. 38, 39.]

Such is the story as given by one who from her youthful age is likely to have remembered with precision. She adds that the occurrence 'was ignored by my father and brother,' and that 'our relations with Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel continued to be cordial.' How extremely fine this is! It may remind us of 'Father, forgive them,' and seems to justify the title given to Baha-'ullah by his followers, 'Blessed Perfection.'

The Ezelite historian, however, gives a different version of the story. [Footnote: TN, pp. 359, 360.] According to him, it was Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel whose life was threatened. 'It was arranged that Muḥammad Ali the barber should cut his throat while shaving him in the bath. On the approach of the barber, however, Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel divined his design, refused to allow him to come near, and, on leaving the bath, instantly took another lodging in Adrianople, and separated himself from Mirza Ḥuseyn 'Ali and his followers.'

Evidently there was great animosity between the parties, but, in spite of the Eight Paradises, it appears to me that the Ezelites were chiefly in fault. Who can believe that Baha-'ullah spread abroad his brother's offences? [Footnote: Ibid.] On the other hand, Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel and his advisers were capable of almost anything from poisoning and assassination to the forging of spurious letters. I do not mean to say that they were by any means the first persons in Persian history to venture on these abnormal actions.

It is again Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel who is responsible for the disturbance of the community.

It was represented—no doubt by this bitter foe—to the Turkish Government that Baha-'ullah and his followers were plotting against the existing order of things, and that when their efforts had been crowned with success, Baha-'ullah would be designated king. [Footnote: For another form of the story, see Phelps, Abbas Effendi, p. 46.] This may really have been a dream of the Ezelites (we must substitute Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel for Baha-'ullah); the Bahaites were of course horrified at the idea. But how should the Sultan discriminate? So the punishment fell on the innocent as well as the guilty, on the Bahaites as well as the Ezelites.

The punishment was the removal of Baha-'ullah and his party and Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel and his handful of followers, the former to Akka (Acre) on the coast of Syria, the latter to Famagusta in Cyprus. The Bahaites were put on board ship at Gallipoli. A full account is given by Abbas Effendi's sister of the preceding events. It gives one a most touching idea of the deep devotion attracted by the magnetic personalities of the Leader and his son.

I have used the expression 'Leader,' but in the course of his stay at Adrianople Baha-'ullah had risen to a much higher rank than that of 'Leader.' We have seen that at an earlier period of his exile Baha-'ullah had made known to five of his disciples that he was in very deed the personage whom the Bāb had enigmatically promised. At that time, however, Baha-'ullah had pledged those five disciples to secrecy. But now the reasons for concealment did not exist, and Baha-'ullah saw (in 1863) that the time had come for a public declaration. This is what is stated by Abbas Effendi's sister:— [Footnote: Phelps, pp. 44-46.]

'He then wrote a tablet, longer than any he had before written, [which] he directed to be read to every Bābī, but first of all to Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel. He assigned to one of his followers the duty of taking it to Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel, reading it to him, and returning with Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel's reply. When Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel had heard the tablet he did not attempt to refute it; on the contrary he accepted it, and said that it was true. But he went on to maintain that he himself was co-equal with the Blessed Perfection, [Footnote: See p. 128.] affirming that he had a vision on the previous night in which he had received this assurance.

'When this statement of Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel was reported to the Blessed Perfection, the latter directed that every Bābī should be informed of it at the time when he heard his own tablet read. This was done, and much uncertainty resulted among the believers. They generally applied to the Blessed Perfection for advice, which, however, he declined to give. At length he told them that he would seclude himself from them for four months, and that during this time they must decide the question for themselves. At the end of that period, all the Bābīs in Adrianople, with the exception of Ṣubḥ-i-Ezel and five or six others, came to the Blessed Perfection and declared that they accepted him as the Divine Manifestation whose coming the Bāb had foretold. The Bābīs of Persia, Syria, Egypt, and other countries also in due time accepted the Blessed Perfection with substantial unanimity.