The Lawḥ-i Hirtik

The Lawḥ-i Hartīk (Tablet to Hardegg) of Bahā'u'llāh : An introduction to the scriptural Tablet addressed to Georg David Hardegg (1812-1879), one-time leader of the Protestant Christian Templelgesellschaft ("Temple Society").

Stephen Lambden

ABSTRACT

        The Lawḥ-i Hartik [Hirtik] (Tablet to Hardegg) of Bahā'u'llāh (d.1892 CE) is a brief, two or three page wholly Arabic scriptural Tablet composed around 1872 just prior to the finalization of the text of al-Kitāb al-aqdas (or in Persian) [Kitab-i aqdas] ("The Most Holy Book", c. 1873) with which it has a number of themes in common. It was written for and named after the one-time Haifa based leader of the German rooted, Protestant Christian Deutscher Tempel (German Temple) founded in SW Germany in 1861 by Christoph Hoffmann (1815-1885) later known as the Templelgesellschaft (`Temple Society', cf. 1 Peter 2:5). The Lawḥ-i Hartik was thus named after and written in response to a letter of Georg David Hardegg (1812-1879), the leader of the earliest (1869) Haifa Templar community whose father was an innkeeper and whose brother Ernest Hardegg became well-known as the American vice-consul at Jaffa.

        In 1858 Hardegg had traveled from Germany to Palestine with Christoph Hoffmann and Jospeh Bubeck (1795-1871) to consider the conditions for possible Templar settlements. They traveled to Haifa and settled there and elsewhere a decade or so later in 1869, the same year that Baha'u'llah entered the nearby Ottoman prison city of `Akkā' or Acre. In due course Templar communities were established in or near Jaffa (1869) and nearby Sarona (1871) and Jerusalem (1873). During WW II (in July 1941) over 660 interned Germans in Palestine (198 from Sarona) were deported to Tatura in Victoria, Australia in which continent Templar communities still exist and flourish. They have published important books about Templar history and remain active in historical and restorative projects in modern Israel. Around 1950 the last Templars left the "Holy Land" from Jerusalem. None of their leaders or community members appear to have joined the Bahā'ī religion.

        After the basmala, at the beginning of the Lawḥ-i Hartik, Baha'u'llah refers to a "sealed letter" which he, as "the Wronged One" (al-mazlum), received from Hardegg. He acknowledged his sincerity towards God and hoped that he might become aware of something concealed in an "Inscribed Tablet" (lawḥ mastur) and be enabled to hear the "cooing of the dove upon the branches". Hardegg is exhorted to contemplate the fact that Peter, the first to believe in Jesus, was enraptured by the "word of his lord" and came through this to deep faith. Hardegg should do the same and is addressed as "an informed mystic knower" (al-'ārif al-khabīr) and "an insightful religious leader" (al-ḥabr al-baṣīr). Having said this, Baha'u'llah, among other things, refers to certain of his exalted claims, including his messianic appearance as the expected "builder of the temple" (bani al-haykal). As the messianic "hour" had already come to pass, Baha'u'llah refers to Mount Carmel trembling "as if shaken by the breezes of the Lord" (nismat al-rabb). His advent could be heard by those spiritually attuned as "the cry from the Rock (al-sakhra)" for this locus of reality proclaims the long awaited eschatological parousia (presence).

Addressing Hardegg as a "beloved one" (al-habib) he exhorts him to behold the "mystery of reversal before the symbol of the ruler (sirr al-tankis li-ramz al-ra'is)" and indicates its eschatological interpretation. Such deep mystical issues are raised in the rest of the Lawḥ-i Hartik, including a mystical spelling out of the Greatest name of God (al-ism al-a`zam) as the word Bahā', and the New Testament and Islamic messianic title παράκλητος = Parakletos (traditionally "Comforter" see John 14:16 etc,) in its Christian-Arabic spelling as al-Mu`azzī ("Comforter"). Aspects of these textual matters and other issues of scriptural interpretation will be summed up in this presentation, along with some thoughts on the history of the Templar community in Palestine / Israel and elsewhere.