Constantinople
The arrival of Baha'u'llah in the Najibiyyih Garden, subsequently
designated by His followers the Garden of Ridvan, signalizes the
commencement of what has come to be recognized as the holiest and most
significant of all Baha'i festivals, the festival commemorating the
Declaration of His Mission to His companions. So momentous a Declaration
may well be regarded both as the logical consummation of that
revolutionizing process which was initiated by Himself upon His return
from Sulaymaniyyih, and as a prelude to the final proclamation of that
same Mission to the world and its rulers from Adrianople.
Through that solemn act the "delay," of no less than a decade, divinely
interposed between the birth of Baha'u'llah's Revelation in the
Siyah-_Ch_al and its announcement to the Bab's disciples, was at long last
terminated. The "set time of concealment," during which as He Himself has
borne witness, the "signs and tokens of a divinely-appointed Revelation"
were being showered upon Him, was fulfilled. The "myriad veils of light,"
within which His glory had been wrapped, were, at that historic hour,
partially lifted, vouchsafing to mankind "an infinitesimal glimmer" of the
effulgence of His "peerless, His most sacred and exalted Countenance." The
"thousand two hundred and ninety days," fixed by Daniel in the last
chapter of His Book, as the duration of the "abomination that maketh
desolate" had now elapsed. The "hundred lunar years," destined to
immediately precede that blissful consummation (1335 days), announced by
Daniel in that same chapter, had commenced. The nineteen years,
constituting the first "Vahid," preordained in the Persian Bayan by the
pen of the Bab, had been completed. The Lord of the Kingdom, Jesus Christ
returned in the glory of the Father, was about to ascend His throne, and
assume the sceptre of a world-embracing, indestructible sovereignty. The
community of the Most Great Name, the "companions of the Crimson Colored
Ark," lauded in glowing terms in the Qayyumu'l-Asma, had visibly emerged.
The Bab's own prophecy regarding the "Ridvan," the scene of the unveiling
of Baha'u'llah's transcendent glory, had been literally fulfilled.
Undaunted by the prospect of the appalling adversities which, as predicted
by Himself, were soon to overtake Him; on the eve of a second banishment
which would be fraught with many hazards and perils, and would bring Him
still farther from His native land, the cradle of His Faith, to a country
alien in race, in language and in culture; acutely conscious of the
extension of the circle of His adversaries, among whom were soon to be
numbered a monarch more despotic than Nasiri'd-Din _Sh_ah, and ministers
no less unyielding in their hostility than either Haji Mirza Aqasi or the
Amir-Nizam; undeterred by the perpetual interruptions occasioned by the
influx of a host of visitors who thronged His tent, Baha'u'llah chose in
that critical and seemingly unpropitious hour to advance so challenging a
claim, to lay bare the mystery surrounding His person, and to assume, in
their plenitude, the power and the authority which were the exclusive
privileges of the One Whose advent the Bab had prophesied.
Already the shadow of that great oncoming event had fallen upon the colony
of exiles, who awaited expectantly its consummation. As the year "eighty"
steadily and inexorably approached, He Who had become the real leader of
that community increasingly experienced, and progressively communicated to
His future followers, the onrushing influences of its informing force. The
festive, the soul-entrancing odes which He revealed almost every day; the
Tablets, replete with hints, which streamed from His pen; the allusions
which, in private converse and public discourse, He made to the
approaching hour; the exaltation which in moments of joy and sadness alike
flooded His soul; the ecstasy which filled His lovers, already enraptured
by the multiplying evidences of His rising greatness and glory; the
perceptible change noted in His demeanor; and finally, His adoption of the
taj (tall felt head-dress), on the day of His departure from His Most Holy
House--all proclaimed unmistakably His imminent assumption of the prophetic
office and of His open leadership of the community of the Bab's followers.
"Many a night," writes Nabil, depicting the tumult that had seized the
hearts of Baha'u'llah's companions, in the days prior to the declaration
of His mission, "would Mirza Aqa Jan gather them together in his room,
close the door, light numerous camphorated candles, and chant aloud to
them the newly revealed odes and Tablets in his possession. Wholly
oblivious of this contingent world, completely immersed in the realms of
the spirit, forgetful of the necessity for food, sleep or drink, they
would suddenly discover that night had become day, and that the sun was
approaching its zenith."
Of the exact circumstances attending that epoch-making Declaration we,
alas, are but scantily informed. The words Baha'u'llah actually uttered on
that occasion, the manner of His Declaration, the reaction it produced,
its impact on Mirza Yahya, the identity of those who were privileged to
hear Him, are shrouded in an obscurity which future historians will find
it difficult to penetrate. The fragmentary description left to posterity
by His chronicler Nabil is one of the very few authentic records we
possess of the memorable days He spent in that garden. "Every day," Nabil
has related, "ere the hour of dawn, the gardeners would pick the roses
which lined the four avenues of the garden, and would pile them in the
center of the floor of His blessed tent. So great would be the heap that
when His companions gathered to drink their morning tea in His presence,
they would be unable to see each other across it. All these roses
Baha'u'llah would, with His own hands, entrust to those whom He dismissed
from His presence every morning to be delivered, on His behalf, to His
Arab and Persian friends in the city." "One night," he continues, "the
ninth night of the waxing moon, I happened to be one of those who watched
beside His blessed tent. As the hour of midnight approached, I saw Him
issue from His tent, pass by the places where some of His companions were
sleeping, and begin to pace up and down the moonlit, flower-bordered
avenues of the garden. So loud was the singing of the nightingales on
every side that only those who were near Him could hear distinctly His
voice. He continued to walk until, pausing in the midst of one of these
avenues, He observed: 'Consider these nightingales. So great is their love
for these roses, that sleepless from dusk till dawn, they warble their
melodies and commune with burning passion with the object of their
adoration. How then can those who claim to be afire with the rose-like
beauty of the Beloved choose to sleep?' For three successive nights I
watched and circled round His blessed tent. Every time I passed by the
couch whereon He lay, I would find Him wakeful, and every day, from morn
till eventide, I would see Him ceaselessly engaged in conversing with the
stream of visitors who kept flowing in from Ba_gh_dad. Not once could I
discover in the words He spoke any trace of dissimulation."
As to the significance of that Declaration let Baha'u'llah Himself reveal
to us its import. Acclaiming that historic occasion as the "Most Great
Festival," the "King of Festivals," the "Festival of God," He has, in His
Kitab-i-Aqdas, characterized it as the Day whereon "all created things
were immersed in the sea of purification," whilst in one of His specific
Tablets, He has referred to it as the Day whereon "the breezes of
forgiveness were wafted over the entire creation." "Rejoice, with
exceeding gladness, O people of Baha!", He, in another Tablet, has
written, "as ye call to remembrance the Day of supreme felicity, the Day
whereon the Tongue of the Ancient of Days hath spoken, as He departed from
His House proceeding to the Spot from which He shed upon the whole of
creation the splendors of His Name, the All-Merciful... Were We to reveal
the hidden secrets of that Day, all that dwell on earth and in the heavens
would swoon away and die, except such as will be preserved by God, the
Almighty, the All-Knowing, the All-Wise. Such is the inebriating effect of
the words of God upon the Revealer of His undoubted proofs that His pen
can move no longer." And again: "The Divine Springtime is come, O Most
Exalted Pen, for the Festival of the All-Merciful is fast approaching....
The Day-Star of Blissfulness shineth above the horizon of Our Name, the
Blissful, inasmuch as the Kingdom of the Name of God hath been adorned
with the ornament of the Name of Thy Lord, the Creator of the heavens....
Take heed lest anything deter Thee from extolling the greatness of this
Day--the Day whereon the Finger of Majesty and Power hath opened the seal
of the Wine of Reunion, and called all who are in the heavens and all who
are on earth.... This is the Day whereon the unseen world crieth out:
'Great is thy blessedness, O earth, for thou hast been made the footstool
of thy God, and been chosen as the seat of His mighty throne' ...Say ...
He it is Who hath laid bare before you the hidden and treasured Gem, were
ye to seek it. He it is who is the One Beloved of all things, whether of
the past or of the future." And yet again: "Arise, and proclaim unto the
entire creation the tidings that He who is the All-Merciful hath directed
His steps towards the Ridvan and entered it. Guide, then, the people unto
the Garden of Delight which God hath made the Throne of His Paradise...
Within this Paradise, and from the heights of its loftiest chambers, the
Maids of Heaven have cried out and shouted: 'Rejoice, ye dwellers of the
realms above, for the fingers of Him Who is the Ancient of Days are
ringing, in the name of the All-Glorious, the Most Great Bell, in the
midmost heart of the heavens. The hands of bounty have borne round the
cups of everlasting life. Approach, and quaff your fill.'" And finally:
"Forget the world of creation, O Pen, and turn Thou towards the face of
Thy Lord, the Lord of all names. Adorn, then, the world with the ornament
of the favors of Thy Lord, the King of everlasting days. For We perceive
the fragrance of the Day whereon He Who is the Desire of all nations hath
shed upon the kingdoms of the unseen and of the seen the splendors of the
light of His most excellent names, and enveloped them with the radiance of
the luminaries of His most gracious favors, favors which none can reckon
except Him Who is the Omnipotent Protector of the entire creation."
The departure of Baha'u'llah from the Garden of Ridvan, at noon, on the
14th of _Dh_i'l-Qadih 1279 A.H. (May 3, 1863), witnessed scenes of
tumultuous enthusiasm no less spectacular, and even more touching, than
those which greeted Him when leaving His Most Great House in Ba_gh_dad.
"The great tumult," wrote an eyewitness, "associated in our minds with the
Day of Gathering, the Day of Judgment, we beheld on that occasion.
Believers and unbelievers alike sobbed and lamented. The chiefs and
notables who had congregated were struck with wonder. Emotions were
stirred to such depths as no tongue can describe, nor could any observer
escape their contagion."
Mounted on His steed, a red roan stallion of the finest breed, the best
His lovers could purchase for Him, and leaving behind Him a bowing
multitude of fervent admirers, He rode forth on the first stage of a
journey that was to carry Him to the city of Constantinople. "Numerous
were the heads," Nabil himself a witness of that memorable scene,
recounts, "which, on every side, bowed to the dust at the feet of His
horse, and kissed its hoofs, and countless were those who pressed forward
to embrace His stirrups." "How great the number of those embodiments of
fidelity," testifies a fellow-traveler, "who, casting themselves before
that charger, preferred death to separation from their Beloved! Methinks,
that blessed steed trod upon the bodies of those pure-hearted souls." "He
(God) it was," Baha'u'llah Himself declares, "Who enabled Me to depart out
of the city (Ba_gh_dad), clothed with such majesty as none, except the
denier and the malicious, can fail to acknowledge." These marks of homage
and devotion continued to surround Him until He was installed in
Constantinople. Mirza Yahya, while hurrying on foot, by his own choice,
behind Baha'u'llah's carriage, on the day of His arrival in that city, was
overheard by Nabil to remark to Siyyid Muhammad: "Had I not chosen to hide
myself, had I revealed my identity, the honor accorded Him (Baha'u'llah)
on this day would have been mine too."
The same tokens of devotion shown Baha'u'llah at the time of His departure
from His House, and later from the Garden of Ridvan, were repeated when,
on the 20th of _Dh_i'l-Qadih (May 9, 1863), accompanied by members of His
family and twenty-six of His disciples, He left Firayjat, His first
stopping-place in the course of that journey. A caravan, consisting of
fifty mules, a mounted guard of ten soldiers with their officer, and seven
pairs of howdahs, each pair surmounted by four parasols, was formed, and
wended its way, by easy stages, and in the space of no less than a hundred
and ten days, across the uplands, and through the defiles, the woods,
valleys and pastures, comprising the picturesque scenery of eastern
Anatolia, to the port of Samsun, on the Black Sea. At times on horseback,
at times resting in the howdah reserved for His use, and which was
oftentimes surrounded by His companions, most of whom were on foot, He, by
virtue of the written order of Namiq Pa_sh_a, was accorded, as He traveled
northward, in the path of spring, an enthusiastic reception by the valis,
the mutisarrifs, the qa'im-maqams, the mudirs, the _sh_ay_kh_s, the muftis
and qadis, the government officials and notables belonging to the
districts through which He passed. In Karkuk, in Irbil, in Mosul, where He
tarried three days, in Nisibin, in Mardin, in Diyar-Bakr, where a halt of
a couple of days was made, in _Kh_arput, in Sivas, as well as in other
villages and hamlets, He would be met by a delegation immediately before
His arrival, and would be accompanied, for some distance, by a similar
delegation upon His departure. The festivities which, at some stations,
were held in His honor, the food the villagers prepared and brought for
His acceptance, the eagerness which time and again they exhibited in
providing the means for His comfort, recalled the reverence which the
people of Ba_gh_dad had shown Him on so many occasions.
"As we passed that morning through the town of Mardin," that same
fellow-traveler relates, "we were preceded by a mounted escort of
government soldiers, carrying their banners, and beating their drums in
welcome. The mutisarrif, together with officials and notables, accompanied
us, while men, women and children, crowding the housetops and filling the
streets, awaited our arrival. With dignity and pomp we traversed that
town, and resumed our journey, the mutisarrif and those with him escorting
us for a considerable distance." "According to the unanimous testimony of
those we met in the course of that journey," Nabil has recorded in his
narrative, "never before had they witnessed along this route, over which
governors and mu_sh_irs continually passed back and forth between
Constantinople and Ba_gh_dad, any one travel in such state, dispense such
hospitality to all, and accord to each so great a share of his bounty."
Sighting from His howdah the Black Sea, as He approached the port of
Samsun, Baha'u'llah, at the request of Mirza Aqa Jan, revealed a Tablet,
designated Lawh-i-Hawdaj (Tablet of the Howdah), which by such allusions
as the "Divine Touchstone," "the grievous and tormenting Mischief,"
reaffirmed and supplemented the dire predictions recorded in the recently
revealed Tablet of the Holy Mariner.
In Samsun the Chief Inspector of the entire province, extending from
Ba_gh_dad to Constantinople, accompanied by several pa_sh_as, called on
Him, showed Him the utmost respect, and was entertained by Him at
luncheon. But seven days after His arrival, He, as foreshadowed in the
Tablet of the Holy Mariner, was put on board a Turkish steamer and three
days later was disembarked, at noon, together with His fellow-exiles, at
the port of Constantinople, on the first of Rabi'u'l-Avval 1280 A.H.
(August 16, 1863). In two special carriages, which awaited Him at the
landing-stage He and His family drove to the house of _Sh_amsi Big, the
official who had been appointed by the government to entertain its guests,
and who lived in the vicinity of the _Kh_irqiy-i-_Sh_arif mosque. Later
they were transferred to the more commodious house of Visi Pa_sh_a, in the
neighborhood of the mosque of Sultan Muhammad.
With the arrival of Baha'u'llah at Constantinople, the capital of the
Ottoman Empire and seat of the Caliphate (acclaimed by the Muhammadans as
"the Dome of Islam," but stigmatized by Him as the spot whereon the
"throne of tyranny" had been established) the grimmest and most calamitous
and yet the most glorious chapter in the history of the first Baha'i
century may be said to have opened. A period in which untold privations
and unprecedented trials were mingled with the noblest spiritual triumphs
was now commencing. The day-star of Baha'u'llah's ministry was about to
reach its zenith. The most momentous years of the Heroic Age of His
Dispensation were at hand. The catastrophic process, foreshadowed as far
back as the year sixty by His Forerunner in the Qayyumu'l-Asma, was
beginning to be set in motion.
Exactly two decades earlier the Babi Revelation had been born in darkest
Persia, in the city of _Sh_iraz. Despite the cruel captivity to which its
Author had been subjected, the stupendous claims He had voiced had been
proclaimed by Him before a distinguished assemblage in Tabriz, the capital
of A_dh_irbayjan. In the hamlet of Bada_sh_t the Dispensation which His
Faith had ushered in had been fearlessly inaugurated by the champions of
His Cause. In the midst of the hopelessness and agony of the Siyah-_Ch_al
of Tihran, nine years later, that Revelation had, swiftly and mysteriously
been brought to sudden fruition. The process of rapid deterioration in the
fortunes of that Faith, which had gradually set in, and was alarmingly
accelerated during the years of Baha'u'llah's withdrawal to Kurdistan,
had, in a masterly fashion after His return from Sulaymaniyyih, been
arrested and reversed. The ethical, the moral and doctrinal foundations of
a nascent community had been subsequently, in the course of His sojourn in
Ba_gh_dad, unassailably established. And finally, in the Garden of Ridvan,
on the eve of His banishment to Constantinople, the ten-year delay,
ordained by an inscrutable Providence, had been terminated through the
Declaration of His Mission and the visible emergence of what was to become
the nucleus of a world-embracing Fellowship. What now remained to be
achieved was the proclamation, in the city of Adrianople, of that same
Mission to the world's secular and ecclesiastical leaders, to be followed,
in successive decades, by a further unfoldment, in the prison-fortress of
Akka, of the principles and precepts constituting the bedrock of that
Faith, by the formulation of the laws and ordinances designed to safeguard
its integrity, by the establishment, immediately after His ascension, of
the Covenant designed to preserve its unity and perpetuate its influence,
by the prodigious and world-wide extension of its activities, under the
guidance of 'Abdu'l-Baha, the Center of that Covenant, and lastly, by the
rise, in the Formative Age of that Faith, of its Administrative Order, the
harbinger of its Golden Age and future glory.
This historic Proclamation was made at a time when the Faith was in the
throes of a crisis of extreme violence, and it was in the main addressed
to the kings of the earth, and to the Christian and Muslim ecclesiastical
leaders who, by virtue of their immense prestige, ascendancy and
authority, assumed an appalling and inescapable responsibility for the
immediate destinies of their subjects and followers.
The initial phase of that Proclamation may be said to have opened in
Constantinople with the communication (the text of which we, alas, do not
possess) addressed by Baha'u'llah to Sultan 'Abdu'l-'Aziz himself, the
self-styled vicar of the Prophet of Islam and the absolute ruler of a
mighty empire. So potent, so august a personage was the first among the
sovereigns of the world to receive the Divine Summons, and the first among
Oriental monarchs to sustain the impact of God's retributive justice. The
occasion for this communication was provided by the infamous edict the
Sultan had promulgated, less than four months after the arrival of the
exiles in his capital, banishing them, suddenly and without any
justification whatsoever, in the depth of winter, and in the most
humiliating circumstances, to Adrianople, situated on the extremities of
his empire.
That fateful and ignominious decision, arrived at by the Sultan and his
chief ministers, 'Ali Pa_sh_a and Fu'ad Pa_sh_a, was in no small degree
attributable to the persistent intrigues of the Mu_sh_iru'd-Dawlih, Mirza
Husayn _Kh_an, the Persian Ambassador to the Sublime Porte, denounced by
Baha'u'llah as His "calumniator," who awaited the first opportunity to
strike at Him and the Cause of which He was now the avowed and recognized
leader. This Ambassador was pressed continually by his government to
persist in the policy of arousing against Baha'u'llah the hostility of the
Turkish authorities. He was encouraged by the refusal of Baha'u'llah to
follow the invariable practice of government guests, however highly
placed, of calling in person, upon their arrival at the capital, on the
_Sh_ay_kh_u'l-Islam, on the Sadr-i-'Azam, and on the Foreign
Minister--Baha'u'llah did not even return the calls paid Him by several
ministers, by Kamal Pa_sh_a and by a former Turkish envoy to the court of
Persia. He was not deterred by Baha'u'llah's upright and independent
attitude which contrasted so sharply with the mercenariness of the Persian
princes who were wont, on their arrival, to "solicit at every door such
allowances and gifts as they might obtain." He resented Baha'u'llah's
unwillingness to present Himself at the Persian Embassy, and to repay the
visit of its representative; and, being seconded, in his efforts, by his
accomplice, Haji Mirza Hasan-i-Safa, whom he instructed to circulate
unfounded reports about Him, he succeeded through his official influence,
as well as through his private intercourse with ecclesiastics, notables
and government officials, in representing Baha'u'llah as a proud and
arrogant person, Who regarded Himself as subject to no law, Who
entertained designs inimical to all established authority, and Whose
forwardness had precipitated the grave differences that had arisen between
Himself and the Persian Government. Nor was he the only one who indulged
in these nefarious schemes. Others, according to 'Abdu'l-Baha, "condemned
and vilified" the exiles, as "a mischief to all the world," as
"destructive of treaties and covenants," as "baleful to all lands" and as
"deserving of every chastisement and punishment."
No less a personage than the highly-respected brother-in-law of the
Sadr-i-'Azam was commissioned to apprize the Captive of the edict
pronounced against Him--an edict which evinced a virtual coalition of the
Turkish and Persian imperial governments against a common adversary, and
which in the end brought such tragic consequences upon the Sultanate, the
Caliphate and the Qajar dynasty. Refused an audience by Baha'u'llah that
envoy had to content himself with a presentation of his puerile
observations and trivial arguments to 'Abdu'l-Baha and Aqay-i-Kalim, who
were delegated to see him, and whom he informed that, after three days, he
would return to receive the answer to the order he had been bidden to
transmit.
That same day a Tablet, severely condemnatory in tone, was revealed by
Baha'u'llah, was entrusted by Him, in a sealed envelope, on the following
morning, to _Sh_amsi Big, who was instructed to deliver it into the hands
of 'Ali Pa_sh_a, and to say that it was sent down from God. "I know not
what that letter contained," _Sh_amsi Big subsequently informed
Aqay-i-Kalim, "for no sooner had the Grand Vizir perused it than he turned
the color of a corpse, and remarked: 'It is as if the King of Kings were
issuing his behest to his humblest vassal king and regulating his
conduct.' So grievous was his condition that I backed out of his
presence." "Whatever action," Baha'u'llah, commenting on the effect that
Tablet had produced, is reported to have stated, "the ministers of the
Sultan took against Us, after having become acquainted with its contents,
cannot be regarded as unjustifiable. The acts they committed before its
perusal, however, can have no justification."
That Tablet, according to Nabil, was of considerable length, opened with
words directed to the sovereign himself, severely censured his ministers,
exposed their immaturity and incompetence, and included passages in which
the ministers themselves were addressed, in which they were boldly
challenged, and sternly admonished not to pride themselves on their
worldly possessions, nor foolishly seek the riches of which time would
inexorably rob them.
Baha'u'llah was on the eve of His departure, which followed almost
immediately upon the promulgation of the edict of His banishment, when, in
a last and memorable interview with the aforementioned Haji Mirza
Hasan-i-Safa, He sent the following message to the Persian Ambassador:
"What did it profit thee, and such as are like thee, to slay, year after
year, so many of the oppressed, and to inflict upon them manifold
afflictions, when they have increased a hundredfold, and ye find
yourselves in complete bewilderment, knowing not how to relieve your minds
of this oppressive thought. ...His Cause transcends any and every plan ye
devise. Know this much: Were all the governments on earth to unite and
take My life and the lives of all who bear this Name, this Divine Fire
would never be quenched. His Cause will rather encompass all the kings of
the earth, nay all that hath been created from water and clay.... Whatever
may yet befall Us, great shall be our gain, and manifest the loss
wherewith they shall be afflicted."
Pursuant to the peremptory orders issued for the immediate departure of
the already twice banished exiles, Baha'u'llah, His family, and His
companions, some riding in wagons, others mounted on pack animals, with
their belongings piled in carts drawn by oxen, set out, accompanied by
Turkish officers, on a cold December morning, amidst the weeping of the
friends they were leaving behind, on their twelve-day journey, across a
bleak and windswept country, to a city characterized by Baha'u'llah as
"the place which none entereth except such as have rebelled against the
authority of the sovereign." "They expelled Us," is His own testimony in
the Suriy-i-Muluk, "from thy city (Constantinople) with an abasement with
which no abasement on earth can compare." "Neither My family, nor those
who accompanied Me," He further states, "had the necessary raiment to
protect them from the cold in that freezing weather." And again: "The eyes
of Our enemies wept over Us, and beyond them those of every discerning
person." "A banishment," laments Nabil, "endured with such meekness that
the pen sheddeth tears when recounting it, and the page is ashamed to bear
its description." "A cold of such intensity," that same chronicler
records, "prevailed that year, that nonagenarians could not recall its
like. In some regions, in both Turkey and Persia, animals succumbed to its
severity and perished in the snows. The upper reaches of the Euphrates, in
Ma'dan-Nuqrih, were covered with ice for several days--an unprecedented
phenomenon--while in Diyar-Bakr the river froze over for no less than forty
days." "To obtain water from the springs," one of the exiles of Adrianople
recounts, "a great fire had to be lighted in their immediate neighborhood,
and kept burning for a couple of hours before they thawed out."
Traveling through rain and storm, at times even making night marches, the
weary travelers, after brief halts at Ku_ch_ik-_Ch_akma_ch_ih,
Buyuk-_Ch_akma_ch_ih, Salvari, Birkas, and Baba-Iski, arrived at their
destination, on the first of Rajab 1280 A.H. (December 12, 1863), and were
lodged in the _Kh_an-i-'Arab, a two-story caravanserai, near the house of
'Izzat-Aqa. Three days later, Baha'u'llah and His family were consigned to
a house suitable only for summer habitation, in the Muradiyyih quarter,
near the Takyiy-i-Mawlavi, and were moved again, after a week, to another
house, in the vicinity of a mosque in that same neighborhood. About six
months later they transferred to more commodious quarters, known as the
house of Amru'llah (House of God's command) situated on the northern side
of the mosque of Sultan Salim.
Thus closes the opening scene of one of the most dramatic episodes in the
ministry of Baha'u'llah. The curtain now rises on what is admittedly the
most turbulent and critical period of the first Baha'i century--a period
that was destined to precede the most glorious phase of that ministry, the
proclamation of His Message to the world and its rulers.