pathway the holy blood of thousands upon thousands of sacred souls gushed
out, and many a time the blessed body of a loyal lover of God was hanged
to the gallows tree.

The Abha Beauty Himself--may the spirit of all existence be offered up for
His loved ones--bore all manner of ordeals, and willingly accepted for
Himself intense afflictions. No torment was there left that His sacred
form was not subjected to, no suffering that did not descend upon Him. How
many a night, when He was chained, did He go sleepless because of the
weight of His iron collar; how many a day the burning pain of the stocks
and fetters gave Him no moment's peace. From Niyavaran to Tihran they made
Him run--He, that embodied spirit, He Who had been accustomed to repose
against cushions of ornamented silk--chained, shoeless, His head bared; and
down under the earth, in the thick darkness of that narrow dungeon, they
shut Him up with murderers, rebels and thieves. Ever and again they
assailed Him with a new torment, and all were certain that from one moment
to the next He would suffer a martyr's death. After some time they
banished Him from His native land, and sent Him to countries alien and far
away. During many a year in 'Iraq, no moment passed but the arrow of a new
anguish struck His holy heart; with every breath a sword came down upon
that sacred body, and He could hope for no moment of security and rest.
From every side His enemies mounted their attack with unrelenting hate;
and singly and alone He withstood them all. After all these tribulations,
these body blows, they flung Him out of 'Iraq in the continent of Asia, to
the continent of Europe, and in that place of bitter exile, of wretched
hardships, to the wrongs that were heaped upon Him by the people of the
Qur'an were now added the virulent persecutions, the powerful attacks, the
plottings, the slanders, the continual hostilities, the hate and malice,
of the people of the Bayan. My pen is powerless to tell it all; but ye
have surely been informed of it. Then, after twenty-four years in this,
the Most Great Prison, in agony and sore affliction, His days drew to a
close.

To sum it up, the Ancient Beauty was ever, during His sojourn in this
transitory world, either a captive bound with chains, or living under a
sword, or subjected to extreme suffering and torment, or held in the Most
Great Prison. Because of His physical weakness, brought on by His
afflictions, His blessed body was worn