Súrih-yi-Vafá (Tablet to Vafá)

By Azadeh Mohandessi-Fares

First presented at the Irfan Colloquia Session #40
Bosch Bahá'í School: California, USA
May 23–26, 2002
(see list of papers from #40)

    Among the tablets revealed in Akká after the revelation of Kitáb-i-Aqdas is the tablet to Vafá known as Muhammad Husayn of Shiráz. The Tablet holds essential keys to a few important themes in the revelation of Bahá'u'lláh.

    These weighty subjects can be listed as:
    • The meaning of true fidelity (Vafa)

    • The meaning of Return and Resurrection

    • The Worlds of God

    • The meaning of Paradise and Hell

    • The meaning of Bahá'u'lláh's warning at the time of His departure from Iraq and its connection to a verse of Qur'án

    • The people of Bayán and their waywardness
    Since the revelations of the Manifestations of God have a divine thread that connects them to one another, the focus of this presentation is to explore, in particular the meaning of Return and Resurrection, as well as the meaning of paradise and hell in the revelations of Bahá'u'lláh, the Báb, and of Muhammad.

    In addition a view to the same themes of Return and Resurrection in such momentous writings of the Blessed Beauty as the Kitáb-i-Iqán, Book of Certitude, will be presented. The revelation of Kitáb-i-Iqán and that of Súrih-yi-Vafa is separated by the span of twenty-five years. A journey between these two sacred writings for those in search of a glimmer of understanding in regards to these themes seems most worthy.

this paper is not yet online