The Rise of Baha
1. Baha’s Date of Birth
1.5 The Prophecy of Shaykh Ahmad of Ahsa
In the Kashf-al-Hiyal, Vol. I, 6th impression P.75, Awara refers to an Arabic epistle of Baha, couched in bombastic terms, to make his birthday. In the epistle Baha is quoted as saying:
“To-day is a day on which was born him who begetteh not and is not begotten.”
The text sums as follows:
الیوم یوم فیه ولد من لم یلد و
لم یولد.
The founder of the Shaykhi school of theory, from whose bosom the BÁBi movement arose, and, in great measure, desired its strength, was Shaykh Ahmad Zayn-al-Din of Ahsa, who was succeeded by his disciple Sayyid Kazim of Rasht. The latter nominated no successor.
In the Dawn-Breakers, Nabil’s Narrative, PP. 11-13, we are told that Shaykh Ahmad, having committed his disciples to the care of Sayyid Kazim left for Khurasan. There he tarried awhile, in the close vicinity of the holy shrine of the Imam Rida in Mashad…. The promised hour, he felt was fast approaching. From the direction of Nur, in the province of Mazandaran, he was able to perceive the first glimmerings that heralded the dawn of the promised dispensation. To him the Revelation of foreshadowed was at hand in these following traditional utterances:
“Ere long shall ye behold the countenance of your lord resplendent as the Moon in its fill glory. And yet, ye shall, fail to unite in acknowledging His truth and embracing His Faith’, and ‘One of the most mighty signs shall signalize the advent of the promised Hour is this: A woman shall give birth to One who shall be her lord.”
“Shaykh Ahmad therefore set his face towards Nur and proceeded to Tehran. He visited the Shah”. “In those days”, we are led to believe “there was born a child in an ancient and noble family of Nur [his name was Mirza Husayn Ali, footnote 3, ibid, P. 12], whose father was Mirza ‘Abbas, better known as Mirza Buzurg. That child was Bahaullah [i.e. Husayn Ali]. At the hour of dawn, on the second day of Muharram, in the year 1233 A.H. [November 12, 1817], the world unaware of its significance, witnessed the birth of Him who was destined to confer upon it such incalculable blessings.”
With the uncertainty surrounding Baha’s exact date of birth, it is strange indeed that Shaykh Ahmad should pick on Baha as alleged of all the children born on that particular Muharram 2.
Nabil’s account is not corroborated neither by Mirza Jani’s Nuqta-al-Kaf nor by the New-History, which is a corrupt version of the former, purposely, and deliberately tampered with to bring it into line with Baha’s later pretensions.
It is also strange indeed that such an account should proceed from one like Nabil who, fully aware of the “traditional utterances” and of the “Child” named Mirza Husayn Ali commonly called Baha, proceeded Baha in identical pretensions during the Baghdad period, and later withdrew his pretensions and truckled to Baha.
The histrionics staged Nabil are intended to link up by hook or by crook Baha’s pretensions with the Shaykhi school of theology, whose founder and successor were regarded by the Primal Point as the forerunners of his mission.
To read more about Baha's members of family, got to the main page, select 'Bahaism -> THe Rise of Baha' and navigate through the index.