The Ascension of Baha’u'llah
The alarm jangled me awake at 3 a.m. and I rolled out of bed. Erica groaned and pulled the covers over her head.
By 3.20 a.m. we had joined other members of our Baha’i community in a simple, but intense, commemoration of the anniversary of the Ascension of Baha’u'llah. We shared the passages from God Passes By that describe Baha’u'llah’s ascension, the reading of His Will and Testament, and that emphasize the importance of the Covenant as the axis of the oneness of humankind. We recited tablets and prayers.
At 4 a.m. (3 a.m. by the sun) we stood, faced the Qiblih, and one of our community recited, with great feeling, the Tablet of Visitation of Baha’u'llah.
As I heard the words of the Tablet, an echo of the overwhelming sadness that ‘Abdu’l-Baha, the Holy Family and all the believers felt at that moment of separation from the One they loved more than their own lives, consumed me. In my mind, I was in the Shrine of Baha’u'llah, laying my forehead on the Sacred Threshold. I was in the upper room that Baha’u'llah had occupied in the Mansion of Bahji.
I struggled with an intense desire to prostrate myself on Bijan and Elahe’s floor. My heart knew this was what I had to do, but my social censor told me it would look foolish, it would be embarrassing, it would not be appropriate. As the reader recited the closing words of the Tablet of Visitation we all remained standing, silent, facing the direction of the Qiblih. I felt tears begin to seep out from under my eyelids and roll down my cheeks.
“Is there any remover of difficulties save God?” A voice behind me began to recite the Bab’s simple prayer. Then another. Then someone recited the “Remover of Difficulties” in Arabic. And again we stood, silent, unwilling to return to the mundane life that lay beyond the walls of the house we were in and outside these blessed and sacred moments. Finally I accepted the invitation of my heart and prostrated myself, knowing that, although my head rested physically on Elahe’s carpet, in spirit my forehead touched the Sacred Threshold.
As we sat down again, the sky was lightening in the early dawn and the birds sang out their chorus of a new day.
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4 comments
Nice testimony Barney. Very well done.
Thanks, Phillipe.
I recall one occasion during a public commemoration of the Birth of Baha’u'llah, when I was similarly moved to prostrate myself. It was a brief uneasy moment of self-consciousness which was relieved and forgotten when I gave in to my spirit. Ever since, when I say these lines of prayer, “how my spirit hath been stirred up within my limbs and members, in its longing to worship Thee, and in its yearning to remember Thee and extol Thee” - I remember that evening and that feeling.
Thank you for sharing your Holy Day in such an eloquent manner, Barney.
I lived one year and an half in Holliest Land. I remmebered the Shrines and read some Tablets into them, too.
Thanks a lot for share with us.
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