THE TABLETS OF THE BĀB

TO THE

LETTERS OF THE LIVING

حرُوفاَت الحَيٍّ

Translation in Progress 2006

 Photographs of these alwāḥ (Tablets) of  the Bāb in his own handwriting and sealed with his seal with the inscription,(= عَبْدُه الذِكْر `Abdu-hu al-Dhikr', `His Servant, the Remembrance' CHECK) are printed in Shoghi Effendi's  re-creation ("translation"  of Pt.I) of the Tarikh-i Zarandi , entitled The Dawn-Breakers (1st ed. 1932). The `Tablet to the First Letter of the Living' is translated in `Selections From he Writings of the Bab (Haifa: BWC., 1976 [82]), pp.9-10 and that to man yuẓhiru-hu Allāh (`Him whom God shall make manifest') understood by Baha'is to refer to Baha'-Allah on pp. XX. These Tablets do not appear to date from the earliest years of the Bab's six year prophetic mission (mid. 1844-mid.1850 CE), to the the time when he first dispatched the 'Letters of the Living' on their mission of proclamation... It is hoped to fully translate these texts once their original Arabic has been tentatively established. In this latter respect I am grateful for the direct and indirect help of Dr. Muhammad Afnan.

The `Letters of the Living' and their numerical order are here given as they are listed in  Muhammad Nabil-i Zarandī [Shoghi Effendi], The Dawn-Breakers, though other sources offer alternative, names, identifications or  order of `Letters of the Living'.

TEXT  AND TRANSLATIONS

[1]

Tablet to the First Letter of the Living, a devout Shaykhī 

Mullā Ḥusayn Bushrū'ī  (d. [Ṭabarsī] 1265 /1849)

entitled, Bāb al-Bāb (the Gate of the Gate)

trans. SWB:9-10

[2]

Tablet to the Second Letter of the Living

Muhammad Ḥasan Bushrū'ī

(brother of [1] above d. [Ṭabarsī] 1265 /1849)

[3]

Tablet to the Third letter of the Living

Mullā Muhammad Bāqir (nephew of [1] d. [Ṭabarsī] 1265 /1849)

[4]

Tablet to the Fourth Letter of the Living

Mullā `Alī Basṭamī  (d. Istanbul c.1846?)

[5]

Tablet to the Fifth Letter of the Living

Mullā  Khudā-Bakhsh Qūchānī  ( d. xxxx)

[alternatively known as Mullā 'Alī Rāzī] 

[6]

Tablet to the Sixth Letter of the Living

Mulla  Ḥasan Bajistānī (d. XXXX)

[7]

Tablet to the Seventh Letter of the Living

Siyyid Ḥusayn Yazdī (d. 1852)

also known as `Azīz ("Mighty"),  an amanuensis (kātib) of the Bāb.

[8]

Tablet to the Eighth Letter of the Living

Mīrzā Muhammad Rawdih-Khān Yazdī

( d. xxxx)

[9]

Tablet to the Ninth Letter of the Living

the Indian Shaykhī

Shaykh Sa'īd [-i Hindī] al-Multānī

( d. India,18XX?)

[10]

Tablet to the Tenth Letter of the Living

Mullā  Maḥūmud Khū'ī ( d.            )

[11]

Tablet to the Eleventh Letter of the Living

Mulla  Jalīl Urūmī  ( d. [Ṭabarsī] 1265 /1849)

[12]

Tablet to the Twelfth Letter of the Living

Mullā  Aḥmad Ibdāl Marāghī'ī ( d. [Ṭabarsī] 1265 /1849)

[13]

Tablet to the Thirteenth Letter of the Living

Mullā  Muhammad Baqīr Tabrīzī ( d. Istanbul c. 1881)

[14]

Tablet to the Fourteenth Letter of the Living

Mullā Yūsif Ardibilī  ( d. [Ṭabarsī] 1265 /1849)

[15]

Tablet to the Fifteenth Letter of the Living

Mīrzā Hādī ( d. [Ṭabarsī] 1265 /1849?)

son of the Mujtahid Ḥajjī Mīrzā `Abd al-Vahhāb Qazvīnī

(brother of No. 16 above )   

[16]

Tablet to the Sixteenth Letter of the Living

Mīrzā Muhammad `Alī Qazvīnī ( d. [Ṭabarsī] 1265 /1849)

son of the Mujtahid Ḥajjī Mīrzā `Abd al-Vahhāb Qazvīnī

(brother in law of Ṭāhirih and brother of [15] above)

[17]

Tablet to the Seventeenth Letter of the Living

the daughter of

Fāṭima Baraghānī = Umm Salama

=  Ṭāhirih = Qurrat al-`Ayn ( d. 1852)

[18]

Tablet to the Eighteenth Letter of the Living

Mullā  Muhammad `Alī Bārfurūshī, Quddūs ("The Most Holy")

( d. Bārfurūsh, 23rd Jamād II 1265/ May 16th,1849)

[19]

Tablet to the Nineteenth Letter of the Living , apparently

Sayyid `Ali Muhammad Shirazi, the Bāb Himself (d. 1852)

[20]

Tablets to the Twentieth Letter of the Living,

man yuẓhiru-hu-Allāh, The messianic figure "Him whom God shall make manifest"

for Bahā'īs

Mirza Ḥusayn `Alī Nūrī, Bahā'-Allāh   

( b. Tehran1817- d. Acre, Palestine 1892)