Tablets of Abdul-Baha Abbas

is that this Heavenly Jerusalem has twelve doors through which the advancing souls enter into the City of God. These doors are the souls who are the stars of guidance and doors unto bounty and knowledge. “At the gates twelve angels stood.” By “angel” is meant the power of the confirmation of God; that the candle of the power of the divine confirmation shines forth and is illumined in those souls. That is to say, that each one of those souls will be confirmed by the mightiest power. Those twelve gates surround the whole universe. This signifies that all existence is under the shadow of those souls; also, that these doors are the foundation of the city of God, the divine Jerusalem; that upon each of these foundations the name of one of the Apostles of His Holiness the Spirit1 is written. That is to say, the manifestation of the perfections, glad-tidings, virtues and high attributes of that holy soul.

In brief, it is said that: “And he that talked with me had a golden rod to measure the city and the gates thereof and the walls thereof.” The purport is this, that certain souls guided (people) with a rod of the plant, that is, a reed wherewith he shepherded the sheep, like unto the rod of Moses; other trained (the people) with a rod of iron and drove them, as in the time of Mohammed (The scepter of Mohammed was the sword). In this Greatest Day the rod of the plant and the rod of iron are changed into a rod which is of pure gold and is from the endless treasuries of the Kingdom of God.