The Rise of Baha
2. Baha’s Education
2.2 Exercising Dictation
To camouflage his exercises to acquire eloquence of dictation and rapidity of utterance, in his Risala-i of A.H 1286 (1869), Baha states that what was “destroyed by him in the Shatt-al-Arab” in Baghdad were “verses sent down from the firmaments of volition, as pure eyes to contemplate them were far and few between.”
In his epistle to the son of the world, written by him “about one year before his death in 1892,” Shoghi Effendi’s translation, PP. 21-22, Baha contradicts himself, resuscitates his verses of the Baghdad period, which had already fallen to the lot of the fish that gambolled in the Shat-al-Arab, and speaks of them as follows:
“And when this wronged one went forth out of his prison, we journeyed …. to Iraq. After our arrival, we revealed, as copious rain, by the aid of god and His divine grace and mercy verses, and sent them to various parts of the world. We exhorted all men and particularly this people, through our wise counsels and loving admonitions, and forbade them to engage in sedition, quarrels, disputes and conflict.”
Unfortunately Baha’s account of his “verses” stated to have been “sent to various parts of the world” is belied by his Kitab-i-Iqan, Shoghi Effendi’s translation, P.249-250, in which Baha complains that “a number of people” had raised the standards of discord” and had “leagued themselves in opposition to this servant … although I never exalted myself over anyone in any matter, nor did I seek to precedence over anyone in any matter.” Baha then stresses that “the woes and sufferings which have overtaken me at the hands of the enemies and the people of the Book fade into utter nothingness when compared with that which has befallen me at the hands of the Friends {i.e. BÁBis],” in consequence of which, in the early days of the arrival of this servant into this land [i.e. Baghdad] … I elected to emigrate” and Baha betook himself to Suleymaniyya.
[The compiler has corrected Shoghi Effendi’s rendering to make it agree with the original text appearing in Prof. Browne’s Persian introduction to Mirza Jani’s Nuqta-al-Kaf, P. 36].
Unfortunately Baha’s account of his “verses” stated to have been sent to various parts of the world” is also belied of his own son Mirza Muhammad Ali, who, in his will and testament [see chapter 11], states that Baha had a “private manifestation” in Iraq” and that it was after his “general manifestation” in Edirne that “verses were sent down.”
Baha’s scribbling-notes to acquire eloquence of dictation and rapidity of utterance point to Baha’s knowledge acquired by study, to eliminate traces of which Baha had to destroy.
It is indeed unfortunate that Baha should seek to foist these defunct absurdities of his exercise-books as “scriptures revealed from Heaven.”
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.