The Persian Seven Proofs.
Mss. texts and translation
The Persian Dalā’il-i sab`ah of Sayyid `Alī Muhammad, the Bāb (1819-1850 CE).
Stephen N. Lambden UC Merced.
In Progress 2009-10 - being updted 2018.
Translated and annotated from the Azalī semi-critical edition (Tehran, c. 1966?) with reference to diverse other mss. Stephen Lambden.
Neither the precise dating nor the identity of the addressee of the Persian Dalā’il-i sab`ah of the Bāb as far as I am aware known. A Shaykhi recepient has been presupposed by some.
[0]
بسم الله الافرد الافرد
الحمد لله الذی لا اله الا هو الافرد الافرد و انما البهاء من الله علی من يظهره الله ثم ادلائه لم يزل و لا يزال
[0]
In the Name of God, the most Unique, the Most Unique (al-afrad al-afrad).
[1]
Praised be to God, no God is there except Him,
The Most Unique, the Most Unique (al-afrad al-afrad).
[2] Now the Glory-Beauty from God (al-bahā’ min Allāh) be upon `Him Whom God shall make manifest’ (man yuẓhiru-hu Allāh), then [upon] His unending and everlasting Proofs (dalā’il).
[I]
و بعد لوح مسطور را مشاهده نموده . هرگاه خواسته شود بتفصيل ذكر ادله در اثبات ظهور گردد الواح اكوانيه و امكانيه نتواند تحمل نمود ولی سازج كلام و جوهر مرام
[1] The [contents of your] written communication [lit. `tablet’] (lawḥ-i masṭūr) were evident. Were the particulars of the testimonies in demonstration of the [reality of the] Divine theophany (ẓuhūr) [of the Bāb] to be made known, the very Tablets of the substance of created Being (alwāḥ-i akwāniyyih) would prove incapable of sustaining them. [2] Yet,
. آنكه شبهه نبوده ونيست كه خداوند لم يزل باستقلال استجلال ذات مقدس خود بوده .و لا يزال باستمناع استرفاع كنه مقدس خود خواهد بود . نشناخته است اورا هيچ شيئ حق شناختن . و ستايش ننموده او را هيچ شيئ حق ستايش نمودن . مقدس بوده از كل اسمإ و منزه بوده از كل امثال . و كل باو معروف ميگردد . و او اجل از آنست كه معروف بغير گردد . و از برای خلق او اولی نبوده و آخری
In his c. 1848 Pesian Dala'il-i sab`a (The Seven Proofs), the Bab pays considerable attention to the fulfillment of Islamic eschatological expectations. At one point he interprets the sign of the rising of the "sun in the west" in the course of a consideration of the reality of bada, of God changing his mind or instituting a new decree or plan :
"And secondly, [it should be understood that ] God is able to practise bada (alter His earlier decree) for this is [certainly] a thing confirmed, a Reality (haqq). which has often occured ... Note, for example, the "rising of the sun from the west (tulu`-i shams az maghrib. This does not refer to this [physical] sun. Nay rather! The intention is the rising up of the Sun of Reality (shams-i haqiqat), from its own setting point, its western locale (az mahall-i ghurub). So observe that the rising of the [Muhammedan] Sun of Reality (shams-i haqiqat) was in Mecca and that the circumstance of the [subsequent] dawning forth of that "Sun" was in the land of Fa' (= the Persian province of fars where Shiraz, the birthplace of the Bab and locale of his 1260/1844 declaration, is located). Thus its terminus (muntaha) was of western orientation (ghurub) relative to its first rising (Bab Dala'il-i Sab`a. XX rans. Lambden).
