Lawh-i-Ahmad (Tablets to Ahmad)

BH02022 (Arabic)

He is the Sovereign, the All-Knowing, the All-Wise.

This is the Leaf of Paradise, singing upon the branches of the Lote-Tree of everlasting life
with melodies of holy and graceful sanctity. It proclaims glad tidings to the sincere of drawing near to God, to the ones who affirm oneness of entering a noble court of nearness, and it announces to those who have detached themselves this message which has been set forth from the Message of God, the Sovereign, the Mighty, the Incomparable. It guides the lovers to the seat of holiness, then onward to this radiant scene.

Say: This is indeed the Greatest Scene, inscribed in the tablets of the Messengers. Through it truth is distinguished from falsehood, and every matter of wisdom is set apart.

Say: It is the Tree of the Spirit that has borne fruit through the fruits of God, the Most High, the All-Powerful, the All-Great.

O Ahmad, bear witness that He is God—there is no God but Him, the Sovereign, the All-Encompassing, the Mighty, the All-Powerful. And the One whom He sent forth with the name of ’Alí is the Truth from God, and indeed we are all among those who act by His command.

Say: O people, follow the ordinances of God that were prescribed in the Bayán by One who is Mighty and Wise.

Say: He is the Sovereign of the Messengers, and His Book is the Mother of the Book, if you are among those who know.

Thus does the Dove remind you in this prison, and there is nothing upon Him but clear proclamation. Whoever wishes—let them turn away from this counsel, and whoever wishes—let them take a path toward their Lord.

Say: O people, if you deny these signs, then by what proof did you formerly believe in God? Bring it forth, O assembly of the false. No—by Him in whose hand is my soul! They will never have the power, they will never be able, even if some of them were to support one another.

O Ahmad, do not forget My favor in My absence. Then remember My days in your days, then My anguish and My exile in this far-off prison. Be steadfast in My love, so that your heart will never be turned aside, even if it is struck by the swords of enemies and all who are in the heavens and the earth seek to restrain you.

Be like a flame of fire to My enemies, and like the Kawthar of abidingness to My loved ones, and do not be among those who doubt. And if sorrow touches you in My path, or humiliation befalls you for the sake of My name, do not be shaken. Rather, place your trust in God, your Lord and the Lord of your former fathers.

For people walk in the paths of illusion, and they have no sight by which to know God with their eyes,
nor hearing by which to hear His melodies with their ears. Thus have We made them witnesses, if you are among those who bear witness. In this way conjectures have intervened between them and their hearts,
and have barred them from the paths of God, the Most High, the All-Great.

And be firmly assured within yourself that whoever turns away from this Beauty has indeed turned away from the Messengers before Him, and has acted arrogantly toward God from pre-eternity to everlasting eternity.

Therefore, O Ahmad, safeguard this Tablet, then read it in your days, and do not be among those who are merely patient. For God has decreed for its reader the reward of a hundred martyrs, and then the worship of both worlds. Thus have We bestowed upon you a favor from Our presence and a mercy from Our own nearness, that you may be among the thankful.

By God! Whoever is in hardship or sorrow and recites this Tablet with manifest sincerity, God will lift their sorrow, remove their affliction, and relieve their distress. He is indeed the All-Merciful, the Most Compassionate. And praise belongs to God, the Lord of all worlds.

Then, on Our behalf, remind everyone who dwells in the City of God, the Sovereign, the Mighty, the Beautiful— those who have believed in God and in the One whom God will raise on the Day of Resurrection, and who have been walking upon the paths of truth among those who journey rightly.

BH00249 (Persian)

In the name of our Lord, the Most Exalted, the All-Highest

These are the wondrous counsels of God, spoken in the language of power from the hidden place of His majesty and the seat of the holiness of His exaltation. So listen with the ear of the soul, and do not deprive or forbid yourselves from attending to the counsels of the Beloved.

O believing wayfarer, quench the thirst and burning of heedlessness from the sacred fountain of grace, and turn the dark night of remoteness into the radiant dawn of nearness. Do not destroy the everlasting home of love through the injustice of fleeting desire, and do not veil the beauty of the spiritual youth with the dark veils of the lower self. Adopt pure God-consciousness, and do not occupy your thoughts with anything other than God.

Do not block the clear spring of the illumined heart with the debris of greed and caprice, and do not prevent the flowing of the heart’s running fountain. Cling to truth, and hold fast to the cord of His grace. For apart from Him, no one can lead another from poverty to wealth, nor deliver anyone from the abasement of the self.

O servants, if you were to become aware of the seas of the hidden riches of His oneness, you would become free and independent of both the world and all that is within it. Kindle the fire of longing within your souls, so that you may attain the lofty and impregnable goal, which is the station of nearness and meeting with the Beloved.

O Ahmad, do not deprive yourself of the hidden, surging, and tumultuous seas, and do not remain cut off from the clear and straight path. Illuminate your sight, and make it radiant with the shining light, so that you may enter the blessed and holy Sinai, which is the place of splendor and the dawning of divine glory, and be illumined by the manifestations of endless lights, and hear—without interruption—the soul-quickening call, “Look, and you shall see Me,” from the horizon of the all-merciful divine utterance. The Beauty of the Unseen has appeared in the temple of manifestation.

O Ahmad, a breath from the fragrance of My sacred spiritual garden has blown upon the world of being, and all created things have been adorned with the ornament of the holy, self-subsisting One. A sprinkling from the roaring ocean of My grace has been bestowed upon all peoples, and all have been made intoxicated with this sacred wine of the primordial covenant, drawn from utter nonexistence into the arena of abiding existence.

O Ahmad, purify and sanctify your sight, that you may behold the manifestations of infinite lights from every direction, and cleanse your hearing from the stain of imitation, that you may hear the melodies of the nightingale of unity and oneness from the eternal branches of the human reality.

O Ahmad, the eye is My trust—do not darken it with the dust of the lower self and desire. The ear is the manifestation of My generosity—do not prevent it from attending to the all-embracing Word by turning toward selfish cravings. The heart is My treasury—do not surrender its hidden pearls to the thieving ego and treacherous passion. The hand is the sign of My grace—do not deprive it of taking hold of the hidden and preserved Tablets.

Say: O servants, the outpouring of My boundless mercy descends and flows from the heaven of My beginningless generosity like a pouring rain. With sanctified sight, purified hearing, and complete steadfastness, hasten toward this divine mercy and this all-merciful grace.

Say: O My servants, do not bind yourselves or become imitators through the limiting of the self and the imitation of desire. For imitation is like a mirage on a barren plain in a valley of destruction: it has never quenched the thirsty, nor will it ever do so. Turn your eyes away from the fleeting mirage and enter into My clear, flowing, everlasting water without peer. Distinguish and set apart the pearl of divine power from the manufactured pearl, for the manufactured one perishes and vanishes upon meeting transient water, while the pearl of power becomes radiant and illumined upon meeting pure and limpid water. Therefore exert great effort and resolute striving, so that you may obtain the pearl of the sanctity of the Self-Subsisting One without gesture or intermediary. That pearl is the recognition of the Manifestation of My own Self; it has been and will be, and has ever lived, remained alive, and endured through the water of My grace.

O My servants, the Ancient Beauty proclaims: hasten from the shadow of desire, remoteness, and heedlessness to the shadow of abidingness, nearness, and mercy. Become like yielding earth, so that the fragrant, multicolored, sanctified flowers of My recognition may grow from the soil of existence. Become like a blazing fire, so that you may burn away the thick veils and give life and endurance to chilled and veiled bodies through the heat of divine love. Become like a subtle breeze, so that you may enter the hidden place of the sanctity of My guardianship.

O My servants, come forth from the illusory and conjectural city by the power of trust, and enter the firm and well-founded city of certitude. And in all circumstances, do not despair of the all-embracing mercy and the all-encompassing care, for I brought all the forms of existing things from utter nonbeing into the realm of being solely through generosity and grace. Without request I bestowed My care, without asking I granted response, and without capacity or preparedness I lavished the utmost bounty of existence.

All of you are the trees of My sacred Garden of Ridván, which I planted with My own hand of mercy in the blessed land, nurtured with My rain of unfading compassion, and protected from worldly events and earthly dangers by guardian angels. So do not neglect your Planter, Protector, and Nurturer, and do not prefer or place before Him anything other than Him, lest barren and poisonous winds pass over you and deprive you all of wondrous leaves, heavenly fruits, lofty branches, and tender boughs. Hear the words of My wisdom from the tongue of My former Manifestation, when I said to the Son of Mary that no owner of a garden leaves a withered tree standing in an enduring garden; rather, he surely cuts it down and casts it into the fire, for dry wood is fitting and deserving of fire.

Therefore, O trees of My sacred Garden of Ridván, protect yourselves—by My care—from the poisons of corrupt selves and from barren winds, which are association with the polytheists and the heedless, so that the trees of existence may not be deprived of the holy breezes and intimate spirits through the bounty of the Adored One, and may ever remain fresh and verdant in the sacred Garden of the One.

O servants, do not demolish the foundations of the fortress of certitude in the presence of the All-Glorious through the blows of illusion and conjecture, for conjecture has never sufficed, nor has it ever guided a soul to the straight path.

O servants, you have imagined the outstretched, extended, and exalted hand of My sovereign power to be shackled, and you have deemed My descending, ever-preceding, unbroken mercy to be cut off, and you have supposed the lofty and exalted clouds of My generosity and grace to be restrained and no longer pouring forth. Have the wonders of the power of My unique sovereignty vanished, or has the penetration of My will and the encompassing reach of My purpose been barred from the worlds?

If you have not thought this, then why have you prevented the appearance of the Beauty of the might of My sacred oneness, and forbidden the Manifestation of the Essence of transcendent glory from appearing in the holy heaven of abidingness? If you were to open the eye of justice, you would behold all the realities of created things intoxicated by this new and wondrous wine, and you would find all the atoms of existence shining and illumined by the radiance of its lights. So wretched indeed is what you have imagined, and evil indeed is what you imagine.

O servants, return to your origin, rise up from the heedlessness of the self and desire, and set your course toward the Sinai of the spirit, in this sacred station of concealment and manifestation. Do not alter the blessed, all-embracing, primal Word, and do not turn aside from the abode of exalted sanctity and the holiness of pure detachment.

Say: O heedless servants, although the wonders of My mercy encompass all realms of the unseen and the seen, and the manifestations of My generosity and grace have outstripped all the atoms of contingent existence, yet the lashes of My chastisement are exceedingly severe, and the manifestation of My wrath is utterly mighty. Hear My compassionate counsels with an ear sanctified from pride and desire, and behold My wondrous Cause with the eye of inner and outer perception.

Do not deprive yourselves of the waves of the ocean of My mercy, before which all the infinite seas are but a single drop, and do not bar yourselves from My sacred, sweet, and flowing fountain. By My hidden Essence I swear: if you possessed even the least particle of awareness, you would hasten breast to breast toward the Sinai of the spirit, enter with your own eyes into My clear, illumined, holy spring, hear the call of the Holy Spirit from the speaking Lote-Tree within the radiant heart, and not remain heedless.

O Ahmad, step forth from the fetters of imitation into the sacred garden of detachment and the paradise of the might of oneness. Say: O servants, do not shut with the hand of injustice and aversion the gate of My mercy which I have opened before the faces of the peoples of heaven and earth, and do not cut down the exalted Lote-Tree of My care through tyranny and oppression.

Truly I declare: the heart is the treasury of My precious and inaccessible jewels—do not make it the place of perishing shards of the lowly world. The breast is the place where the ears of My love are made to grow—do not pollute it with the dark dust of hostility. Clothe yourselves with My attributes, so that you may be worthy to enter the kingdom of My might and pass into My sacred dominion. All things are My clear Book and My firm, upright pages—behold the wonders of My innate wisdom with a pure and sanctified eye and a luminous, purified heart.

O My servants, whatever I have revealed of consummate wisdom and goodly, all-embracing words in the sacred Tablets of oneness has as its purpose the elevation of receptive souls to the heavens of the might of oneness; otherwise, My beauty is sanctified beyond the gaze of the knowing, and My majesty is purified beyond the comprehension of the mature.

Consider the radiant, luminous, shining sun: if all servants, whether seeing or blind, were to engage in the utmost exaggeration in praise, or expend their utmost effort beneath that limit, these two stations of affirmation and denial, attraction and aversion, praise and blame—all remain confined to the bounded realms and return to those who incline or turn away, and so they have been and will be.
The sun, however, in its own station, shines and will shine with perfect light and the bestowal of its effulgence and radiance, without change or alteration.

Likewise, observe a shining lamp in the dark night that is lit before you: does anything of the wondrous lofty praises or the collective blameworthy traits mentioned about it add anything to its light or diminish its radiance? No—by Him in whose hand is my soul. Rather, in both states mentioned, it bestows light in the same manner, and this praise and blame return to the speakers and will do so, as is plainly witnessed.

Therefore, O servants, do not deprive yourselves of the sanctified, radiant, self-subsisting Lamp that is kindled and shining in the niche of the might of the Lord. Kindle the lamp of divine love with the oil of guidance in the niche of steadfastness within your radiant breast, and guard it—by the glass of trust and detachment from all else but God—from the blowing breaths of the idolaters.

O servants, the likeness of the appearance of My sacred oneness is like a sea in whose depths and core countless delicate, luminous pearls lie concealed beyond reckoning. Every seeker must surely gird the waist of effort and search and come to the shore of that sea, so that, according to the measure of their seeking and striving, they may take the portion decreed in the hidden, irrevocable Tablets. Now if someone does not set foot upon its sacred shore and does not rise to seek it, will anything of that sea or its pearls be diminished, or will any deficiency come upon it? How wretched is what you have imagined within yourselves, and how evil is what you imagine.

O servants, by God, the True One: that greatest, deep, surging sea is exceedingly near—indeed, nearer than the jugular vein. In an instant you will reach and attain the self-subsisting outpouring, the divine bounty, the merciful existence, and the generosity of the most glorious Might.

O servants, if you were to become aware of the wonders of My generosity and grace which I have entrusted within your very selves, you would surely become detached from all directions, discern the knowledge of your own self—which is the knowledge of Me—and behold yourselves independent of all besides Me. You would see the surging ocean of My care and the overflowing depths of My generosity within yourselves, outwardly and inwardly, manifest and evident like the rising sun through the most glorious Name.

Do not squander this most impregnable and most holy station for the desires of conjecture and caprice, the fabrications of illusion and blindness. Your likeness is that of a bird which, with lofty wings, in perfect vitality and fragrance, flies with utmost assurance in the pleasant airs of the All-Glorious—then, imagining a grain, inclines toward water and clay, soils itself completely in mud and dust through greed, and afterward, when it seeks to ascend, finds itself powerless and overcome. For wings stained with water and clay are not able to fly, nor will they ever be. At that moment, that bird of the exalted heaven finds itself dwelling upon the perishing earth. Therefore, O servants, do not soil your wings with the clay of heedlessness and conjecture, or the dust of rancor and hatred, lest you be deprived of flight in the heavens of the sanctity of recognition.

O servants, I have brought forth the pearls of the shell of the ocean of the Self-Subsisting One from the treasury of divine knowledge and wisdom through godly power and spiritual might. I have gathered the maidens of the chambers of concealment and veiling within the manifestations of these firm words, opened by the hand of omnipotence the sealed vessels of the musk of oneness, and bestowed their hidden sacred fragrances upon all contingent beings. Now, despite all these lofty, encompassing outpourings and these radiant, shining bestowals, if you hold yourselves back, the blame will return to your own selves, and so it has been and will be.

O people of the Bayán, today you have recognized the purpose of your creation and being, for you are the jewels of the lofty divine mountains and the pearls of the seas of the grace of oneness. All else that is seen in the heavens and the earth is gathered under your shadow and, through you, sustained and made to enjoy its portion. For example, consider the cultivated land in its place of growth: the purpose of the farmer in watering is the watering of his own crop, yet many hard and solid stones within it are, incidentally, also moistened and given drink. Thus, the intent of the descent of the overflowing grace is the fields of His loved ones, which are the place where the plants of knowledge and wisdom grow; while others—among enemies and the heedless, who are like abandoned stones of the land—are, only incidentally, sustained and watered by the tricklings of grace and the drops of the cloud.

O people of the Bayán, despite all these lofty ranks and exalted stations, do not be heedless of yourselves, do not withdraw from the Truth, and do not neglect watchfulness over the Cause of God in any circumstance. Strive not to measure the words of God by anything else.

O servants, if you possess sight, enter the city of the seeing; if you are people of hearing, step into the city of the hearers; and if you possess heart, take up residence in the fortress of the certain, so that you may not be veiled from beholding the lights of the Most Glorious Beauty in these darkened days.
For this year is the year of the great sifting and the supreme trial.

O servants, inscribe the counsels of the Spirit upon the tablet of your breast with the pen of submission and the ink of assent and certitude, and at every moment turn your attention to them, lest you neglect even a single letter of them. With utmost earnestness, turn toward the Truth and turn away from all else, for this is the root of My Cause, grown from the divine Tree.

O servants, there is nothing within this heart but the manifestations of the lights of the dawn of abidingness, and it speaks nothing except the pure truth from your Lord. Therefore do not follow the self, do not break the covenant of God, and do not violate the pact. With complete steadfastness, turn toward Him with heart, soul, and tongue, and do not be among the senseless. The world is a spectacle without reality, a nothingness adorned in the form of being. Do not bind your heart to it, do not sever yourselves from your Lord, and do not be among the heedless. I speak in truth: the likeness of the world is like a mirage that appears as water—those who thirst strive intensely in pursuit of it, and when they reach it, they remain without share or portion. Or it is like the image of a beloved emptied of soul and spirit: when the lover reaches it, they find that it neither nourishes nor satisfies, and gain nothing but increased weariness and regret.

O servants, if in these visible days and in the present world some matters occur contrary to what is pleasing from the realm of divine decree, do not be distressed, for joyful, merciful days will come and sacred spiritual worlds will appear. For you, in all these days and worlds, a portion has been allotted, a mode of life determined, and a sustenance decreed—you will surely reach all of them and attain them.
If you exchange the perishing garment for the abiding robe and enter the station of the Most Glorious Paradise, which is the dwelling of the everlasting souls of sacred might. All things bear witness to your being, if you emerge from the dark dust of nonexistence. Do not be distressed by the hardship of a few days, and do not grieve over the ruin of the outward body in the path of the Beloved, for after every ruin a rebuilding is intended, and within every hardship a comfort and ease lies hidden.

O servants, seek the sweet, flowing fountain of the Self-Subsisting One from the pure and sacred spring, and take the lofty fruits of the garden of oneness from the divinely planted Lote-Tree. For in a barren and dried valley one does not obtain the pleasant Tasnīm of submission or the sacred Kawthar of honor,
nor is a delicate and noble fruit to be expected from a withered tree.

O seekers of the spiritual wine, the radiant sacred Beauty, in the holy Paran of the Self-Subsisting One, proclaims from the spiritual Tree, without veil, “You shall never see Me.” Do not deprive the eye of the heart and soul; hasten to the place where the splendor of the lights of His beauty appears.

Thus does the Tongue of God counsel you, that perhaps you may set your course toward the direction of the spirit.