Claimants to The Office of He Whom God Will Make Manifest
Baha's Claim
The Allegation of Subh-i-Azal's Serving As A Screen
Shoghi Effendi's Account
4. The Allegation of Subh-i-Azal's Serving As A Screen
Subh-i-Azal's serving as a screen behind which Baha sought shelter to work with impunity devoid of historical foundation.
4.7 Shoghi Effendi's Account
Disregarding the specific provisions of the Persian Bayan, governing the terms on which, and the circumstances under which, He-Whom-God-Will-Make-Manifest shall appear, and invoking in a rather ambiguous language Sir Abbas Effendi's version in the Traveller's Narrative, says Shoghi Effendi in god passes by of 1944:
(PP. 25-29) "A successor or vicegerent the BÂB never named, an interpreter of his teachings he refrained from appointing. So transparently clear were his references to the Promised One, so brief was to be his duration of his own dispensation, that neither the One, nor the other was deemed necessary. All he did was, according to the testimony of Abdul Baha (Sir Abbas Effendi) in ‘A traveller's Narrative', to nominate, on the advice of Baha and of another disciple, Mirza Yahya [Subh-i-Azal], who would get solely as a figure-head pending the manifestation of the Promised One, thus enabling Baha to promote, in relative security, the cause so dear to his heart."
Some references of Shoghi Effendi to Subh-i-Azal in god passes by:
(P.60) "His [i.e. the Primal Point's] nominee, a bewildered fugitive in the guise of a dervish"
(P. 90) "A titular head of a well-nigh disrupted community, a mere figurehead, timid in the extreme, good-natured yet susceptible to the slightest influence devoid of any qualities"
(P. 112) "Its central figure was no less a person than the nominee of the BÂB himself, the credulous and cowardly Mirza Yahya"
(P. 113) "His [i.e. the Primal Point's] nominee seeking a safe hiding place"
(P. 114) "Mirza Yahya who claimed to be the successor of the BÂB, and who prided himself on his high sounding titles of Mirrat-al-Azaliyya (everlasting Mirror), of Subh-i-Azal (Morning of Eternity), and of Ism-al-Azal (Name of Eternity)"
(P. 163) "The nominee of the BÂB, and recognized chief of the BÂBi community"
(P. 166-167) "The moment had now arrived (in Edirne) for him [i.e. Baha] to acquaint formally the one who was the nominee of the BÂB with the character of his mission"
(P. 170) "The most great idol"
(P. 233) "The Arch-Breaker of the covenant of the BÂB, Mirza Yahya …. Eking out a miserable existence in Cyprus, termed by the Turks ‘the island of Satan' "
(P. 404) "The BÂB's nominee …. The most great idol"
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