Letter and translation type-copied by Kathy Gilbert;
Proofread and submitted by Jonah Winters; February, 2002.
Web Edition re-formatted and prepared by Mehdi Wolf, July 2002
with permission of letter recipient.
[1] Brief Note: Text of this note and the authorized translation
is taken from a memorandum from the Research Department
in Haifa to the Universal House of Justice, dated December
31st, 1995, concerning the inquiry by an individual
believer. No source text for the prayer is known to
the present editor. The text of the memorandum has
been edited slightly for brevity: (MWs note).
The Research Department has studied the inquiry of Mr......
in an e-mail dated 17th November 1995 to the Universal
House of Justice. Mr. . . . requests information
concerning a prayer revealed by Baháulláh
in a Tablet to Mírzá Abul-Fadl
as it appears in Star of the West, vol. 14, no. 6 (September
1923), page 166.
Recently, the Research Department at the Baháí World Centre located the original of a Tablet from
Baháulláh to Mírzá
Abul-Fadl, the opening lines of which are
similar to those of the prayer in question. We provide
the authorized translation below.
In this Tablet, Baháulláh
gives no prescription for how the prayer is to be recited
or used.
In response to Mr. ....s query to the Research
Department at the National Baháí
Centre in Wilmette, we have been unable to locate an
original for the prayer which appears in the Star Of
The West, and are, therefore, unable to confirm its
authenticity.
---------
Say: O God, my God! Glory be to Thee for Thou has
guided me to the horizon of Thy Revelation and illumined
me with the splendours of the luminary of Thy bounty
and mercy, hast enabled me to utter Thy praise and
caused me to behold that which hath been revealed by
Thy Pen.
I beseech Thee, O Thou the Possessor of the kingdom
of names and Fashioner of earth and heaven, by the
rustling of the Divine Lote-Tree and by Thy sweet utterance
which hath attracted the inmost realities off all things,
to raise me up amidst Thy servants through Thy Name.
I am he who hath yearned in the daytime and the night
season to stand at the door of Thy bounty and be ready
before the seat of Thy justice. O my God! Drive not
away the one who hath clung to the cord of Thy nearness
and deprive not him who hath sought Thy most sublime
station, the summit of glory, and the supreme Object,
the Spot in which every atom calleth out with the most
clear accents, saying: The kingdoms of earth
and heaven, as well as glory and grandeur belong to
God, the Almighty, the Most Glorious, the Bestower
of gifts. ...
Say: Praise be to Thee, O Lord my God, for Thou
has guided me to the horizon of Thy Revelation and
has honoured me to be remembered though Thy Name.
I beseech Thee by the effulgences of the sun of Thy
bestowal and by the billows of the sea of Thy mercy
to grant that my utterance may be inspired by Thine
exalted Words, so as to attract the realities of all
created things. Thou art verily powerful, through
Thy glorious and wondrous Words, over what Thou willest.
Notes
[1] Persian name
for this prayer as per suggestion of Dr. Iraj Ayman,
in an e-mail message to Jonah Winters, February 2002.
(MWs note).