The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh
Introduction
reached they are secure, certain, inalienable, eternal. The place which a man thus wins is ‘ancient’; it is a part of the system of the universe and was implied in man’s creation—he has at last come by effort to his own. It is in no wise material and therefore it is not subject to dissolution. It is, in the Prophet’s sense, real, and therefore permanent; and nothing that is not permanent is in the teaching of the
Hidden Words, worth an intelligent man’s pursuit.
Nor is the objective less definite because it is expressed and explained largely through figurative language.
‘Abdu’l-Bahá when asked why Messengers speak in this manner is reported to have replied that “the revelations of the prophets can never be adequately translated owing to the poverty and imperfection of our language. Their thought is so lofty that human minds do not grasp it. Hence the use of allegories. Parables make men ponder and pray for enlightenment that they may understand the hidden meaning. Search for truth deepens man’s capacity, clarifies his vision without engendering intellectual pride.”
With great power and in a hundred images of great beauty The
Hidden Words shows that this Sovereignty, Dominion, Reunion, Unity, Life, were part of the original creational Design of God; as in the Arabic verses,
3,
4,
9,
10,
11,
12,
13,
19,
32,
64,
65, and in the Persian verses
23,
27,
28,
29,
30,
34.
Telling what man is, and how he came to be, reveals that God, while still a hidden treasure, veiled in His immemorial being and in the ancient eternity of His essence, knew His love for man, and therefore He created man. Thus it was not directly His love but rather His knowledge of that love that moved God to His creative task. Which deep mystical truth finds a parallel in the direction (Arabic
10), “My love is in thee, know it”; and is more remotely reflected in the traditional ranking of the nine
iv