BB00265: Khutbah fi’l-Bakarih (hin julusihi ’ala’l-safinah al-saghirah)

Praise be to God, Who hath caused His servant to depart from the abiding city unto the small vessel, unto the constrained ark that moveth upon the waters, ere yet the white line had risen above the black horizon, and before the sun had ascended the heaven—within the space of three hours—on the ninth day after the first ten days of the Sacred Month, that he might go up unto the Ka’bah, the Sacred House of God; that the pilgrims in the Sacred Month might bear witness, in the Sacred Land, unto the truth of the House in the Holy City; and that all men might recognize, from those peerless verses sent down from the radiances of the King of the White Tree, the truth of origination from the Yellow Tree upon Mount Sinai.

God—there is none other God but He; His is the praise and the majesty. He—there is none other God but He—hath, through His bounty, set the signs of sovereignty in the paths by which they that are born anew ascend unto Him—signs of the Gate—lest any soul should say:

“Had God but shown me His signs, I would surely have been of the guided.”

Glorified be God, Who hath decreed for the pilgrims that go up unto the Sacred House the knowledge of the mystery of that House, that no soul might have power to turn away from the recognition of the Gate. By the Lord of earth and heaven! God hath ordained the pilgrimage to the House because, in the realm of countenances, the truth of love for the Gate hath been accepted as an obligation.

Glorified be God, Who hath made His signs manifest in the ordinances of His religion, and hath revealed the evidences of the path of His love upon the height of His greatness. He hath filled the verses of the Qur’an with firm and decisive proofs, as an obligation of recognizing the Gate. The tongues of the Friends of the All-Merciful have uttered this binding duty; and the traditions from the pure Family are so numerous that it is scarce possible to conceal them from such as praise God in the path of the religion of the All-Merciful.

Yet that Most Great Station was hidden from some among the possible beings, by reason of the very loftiness of its manifestation; and it was veiled from certain eyes through the greatness of its light—though, for any soul among created things, it were possible to make it plain by the shining covenant and the conclusive verses. For God is the Most High, the Possessor of bounty; His very Essence is exalted above that any one should be capable of taking the overflowing grace from His presence. Therefore did God send forth the Prophets and the chosen ones from among His servants—those who, for less than the twinkling of an eye, have not been heedless of the remembrance of their Lord—so that the servants might learn from them the ways of love in the paths of their journey unto God, their Master.

Upon this most firm proof have the people of true understanding reasoned: in wisdom it must needs be that for His Prophets and His chosen ones there should be gates, that men might receive wisdom from their Lords, and that unto every atom of existence might reach its portion of the Book—lest aught be deprived of its station, and all might take their share according to what God hath decreed for them; and that all, in the certainty of recognizing Him, might be bound to the word of magnification within the fourfold glorification.

By the Lord of earth and heaven! Were the veil to be lifted from the eyes of the inhabitants of the earth, they would behold the truth in mine own self as the very truth of certitude, and they would behold the fire in denial as the knowledge of certitude. What then of the truth! If men but knew with the knowledge of certitude, they would indeed behold Hell; yea, they would behold it with the eye of certitude. Then shall the people in the land of resurrection be questioned, in the truth of certitude, concerning the knowledge of Me.

They have perished—those who have perished—because they knew not the Imam of their age. And by that ancient line, they have perished—those who have perished—who knew not the Gate in their time. How great, then, is the severing honor, and how inviolable the unassailable line, for them that know the Truth by the Truth and His signs; for them that drink the sweet-flowing water of life from His words!

And I warn the people, by leave of my Lord, from within that constrained ark upon this heaving, billowing deep whose brackish waves are stirred: fear ye God, your true Maker, besides Whom there is none other God. There is no soul that hath known Me, but hath known his Imam; and there is no soul that hath been ignorant of Me, but hath been ignorant of his Imam. Even should a soul worship God in the most noble of places upon earth, between the Corner and the Station, so long as dominion endureth in the knowledge of the All-Merciful—yet without the recognition of the Gate—by the right of the Most High God, the Fire shall seize him, casting him upon his face into the Fire; and God shall accept no deed from him. For God willeth for His servants what He willeth, and to His command belongeth all. Verily God is independent of the deeds of the obedient.

Yet there is no soul that draweth nigh, in weakness, unto the Tree of disobedience, while knowing the right of the servants, but the All-Merciful forgiveth him. God hath promised, in truth, its forgiveness; for love of ʿAlí is a goodly deed wherewith no evil deed can harm, and God faileth not in His promise.

For this cause did the All-Merciful, in the workmanship of His wisdom, ordain the journey of the Gate on that ninth day after the first ten days of the Sacred Month—the going forth from the land unto the surface of this sea—that the planted ones among the people of truth might infer, from the completion of the letters of the Basmalah, the truth of His claim upon the earth; and that We might cause all the worlds to correspond thereto.

Glorified be God! He permitted the wind, at that hour, to fill the sails of the people of the ship and to raise them upon the station of moderation, that the pilgrims might praise God within that constrained ark upon the waters, at the meeting-place of assembly, through the measuring of this yellow thread from the Point of Baha; and that they might behold the bounty of God through the crimson vow. Yet most of the people know not.

Glorified be God, the Lord of the Throne, above what they ascribe! And praise be to God, the Lord of all worlds.