My loving-kindness weepeth sore over you,
inasmuch as ye have failed to recognize the One upon Whom ye have been
calling in the daytime and in the night season, at even and at morn.
Advance, O people, with snow-white faces and radiant hearts, unto the
blest and crimson Spot, wherein the Tree beyond which there is no passing
is calling: 'Verily, there is none other God beside Me, the Omnipotent
Protector, the Self-Subsisting!' O ye leaders of religion in Persia! Who
is the man amongst you that can rival Me in vision or insight? Where is he
to be found that dareth to claim to be My equal in utterance or wisdom?
No, by My Lord, the All-Merciful! All on the earth shall pass away; and
this is the face of your Lord, the Almighty, the Well-Beloved. We have
decreed, O people, that the highest and last end of all learning be the
recognition of Him Who is the Object of all knowledge; and yet behold how
ye have allowed your learning to shut you out, as by a veil, from Him Who
is the Dayspring of this Light, through Whom every hidden thing hath been
revealed. Say: This, verily, is the heaven in which the Mother Book is
treasured, could ye but comprehend it. He it is Who hath caused the Rock
to shout, and the Burning Bush to lift up its voice upon the Mount rising
above the Holy Land, and proclaim: 'The Kingdom is God's, the sovereign
Lord of all, the All-Powerful, the Loving!' We have not entered any
school, nor read any of your dissertations. Incline your ears to the words
of this unlettered One, wherewith He summoneth you unto God, the
Ever-Abiding. Better is this for you than all the treasures of the earth,
could ye but comprehend it. Whoso interpreteth what hath been sent down
from the heaven of Revelation, and altereth its evident meaning, he,
verily, is of them that have perverted the Sublime Word of God, and is of
the lost ones in the Lucid Book."

Thereupon We heard the groaning of the true Faith, and said unto it:
"Wherefore, O true Faith, do I hear Thee cry out in the night season, and
groan in the daytime, and utter Thy lamentations at daybreak?" She made
reply: "O Prince of the world that standest revealed in the Most Great
Name! The heedless ones have hamstrung Thy white She-Camel, and caused Thy
Crimson Ark to founder, and wished to put out Thy Light, and to veil the
face of Thy Cause. Wherefore hath the voice of My lamentation been lifted
up, as well as the voice of the lamentation of all created things, and yet
the