et when the verses of God were revealed and His Lamp was
lighted, ye disbelieved in Him Whose very Pen hath fixed the destinies of
all things in the Preserved Tablet. Ye recite the sacred verses and yet
repudiate Him Who is their Source and Revealer. Thus hath God blinded your
eyes in requital for your deeds, would ye but understand. Day and night ye
transcribe the verses of God, and yet ye remain shut out, as by a veil,
from Him Who hath revealed them.

11 In this Day the Concourse on high beholdeth you in your evil doings and
shunneth your company, and yet ye perceive it not. They ask of one
another: "What words do these fools utter, and in what valley are they
wont to graze? Do they deny that whereunto their very souls testify, and
shut their eyes to that which they plainly behold?" I swear by God, O
people! They that inhabit the Cities of the Names of God are bewildered at
your actions, while ye roam, aimless and unconscious, in a parched and
barren land.

12 O Pen of the Most High! Hearken unto the Call of Thy Lord, raised from
the Divine Lote-Tree in the holy and luminous Spot, that the sweet accents
of Thy Lord, the All-Merciful, may fill Thy soul with joy and fervour, and
that the breezes that waft from My name, the Ever-Forgiving, may dispel
Thy cares and sorrows. Raise up, then, from this Temple, the temples of
the Oneness of God, that they may tell out, in the kingdom of creation,
the tidings of their Lord, the Most Exalted, the All-Glorious, and be of
them that are illumined by His light.

13 We, verily, have ordained this Temple to be the source of all existence
in the new creation, that all may know of a certainty My power to
accomplish that which I have purposed through My word "Be", and it is!
Beneath the shadow of every letter of this Temple We shall raise up a
people whose number none can reckon save God, the Help in Peril, the
Self-Subsisting. Erelong shall God bring forth from His Temple such souls
as will remain unswayed by the insinuations of the rebellious, and who
will quaff at all times of the cup that is life indeed. These, truly, are
of the blissful.

14 These are servants who abide beneath the shelter of the tender mercy of
their Lord, and who remain undeterred by those who seek to obstruct their
path. Upon their faces may be seen the brightness of the light of the
All-Merciful, and from their hearts may be heard the remembrance of Mine
all-glorious and inaccessible Name. Were they to unlo