The Báb has stated in the Persian Bayan:
“Verily, whatsoever hath been revealed by God about
attaining His presence or that of the Lord, is intended to be a reference to
none other than Him Whom God shall make manifest [Bahá’u’lláh] inasmuch as God
Himself cannot be seen.” (III, 7.)
“Whatsoever hath been mentioned in the Holy Books about
attainment unto His Presence, referreth to the Presence of Him Who appeareth in
His Manifestation; that is, He Who is the Point of Truth, Who is and hath been
the Primal Will. (ibid.)
“And those people whom thou seest calling upon God, and who,
between themselves and God, think of themselves as virtuous, are, one and all,
lost in the realms of their idle fancies and vain imaginings. They call upon
One Who is unknown to them. (The Báb, Kitáb-i-Panj-Sha'n)
And the Blessed Beauty has said:
“The essence of belief in Divine unity consisteth in
regarding Him Who is the Manifestation of God and Him Who is the invisible, the
inaccessible, the unknowable Essence as one and the same. By this is meant that
whatever pertaineth to the former, all His acts and doings, whatever He
ordaineth or forbiddeth, should be considered, in all their aspects, and under
all circumstances, and without any reservation, as identical with the Will of
God Himself. This is the loftiest station to which a true believer in the unity
of God can ever hope to attain. Blessed is the man that reacheth this station,
and is of them that are steadfast in their belief.” (Gleanings, LXXXIV.)
“... by 'attainment unto the divine Presence' is meant
attainment unto the presence of His Beauty in the person of His Manifestation.”
(Kitáb-i-Iqán)
“And if He, exalted be He, appeareth clothed in the raiment
of man, this is by virtue of His mercy, so that His servants may not flee from
Him, but may draw near unto Him, sit before the beauty of His Countenance,
listen to His matchless melody, and be enchanted by what will stream forth from
His tongue, and be revealed unto them from the heaven of His Will. (Rahíq-i-Makhtúm,
vol. 2, p. 159.)
'Abdu'l-Baha also states:
It is evident that if we attempt to conceive the reality of
the Divinity, that conception would be encompassed and our mind would be that
which encompasses it—and assuredly that which encompasses is greater than that
which is encompassed! Thus it follows that any reality that we might conceive
for the Divinity besides that of the holy Manifestations would be mere
delusion, as there is no means of approach to that divine Reality which is
entirely beyond the reach of the mind. And all that we might conceive is pure
imagination.
Consider then how the peoples of the world are circling
round their own vain imaginings and worshipping the idols of their own thoughts
and fancies, without the least awareness of doing so. They regard these vain
imaginings as that Reality which is sanctified above all understanding and
exalted beyond every allusion. They consider themselves to be the proponents of
the Divine Unity and all others as worshippers of idols, even though idols at
least enjoy a mineral existence, whereas the idols of human thoughts and
imaginations are sheer illusion and have not even the existence of stones.
“Take ye good heed, O people of insight!”[Qur’án 59:2] (‘Some Answered
Questions’, 2014 revised translation)
Ali-Akbar Furutan (‘The Story of My Heart’)
