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"The earth is but one country, and mankind its citizens."
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"The earth is but one country, and mankind its citizens."
By Ali-Akbar Furutan · 1986 · George Ronald
Modern era (1957–present) · in copyright
Beloved collection of short stories. Use as inspiration; cite carefully; avoid extended verbatim.
About Ali-Akbar Furutan
Persian Bahá'í, educator, and Hand of the Cause appointed by Shoghi Effendi in 1951. Served the Faith on five continents; his short stories are among the most widely-loved retellings in Bahá'í literature.
1905–2003 · Hand of the Cause
Featured figures
“This child never cries. He is so unlike other babies who cry”
“This dream indicates that the Child shall be the founder of a”
“great Cause. He will be victorious over all.”
“Even as a child He sought justice — and would not give a verdict”
“until He had heard the other side.”
Stories Told by 'Abdu'l-Bahá
Primary SourceVarious Compilers · 2000
Mahmúd's Diary: The Diary of Mírzá Maḥmúd-i-Zarqání
Primary SourceMírzá Maḥmúd-i-Zarqání · 1998
bahaistories.com archive
Secondary RetellingVarious · 2024
The Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh (4 volumes)
Secondary RetellingAdib Taherzadeh · 1974
The Priceless Pearl
Secondary RetellingRúhíyyih Khánum · 1969
Mahmúd's Diary: The Diary of Mírzá Maḥmúd-i-Zarqání
Secondary RetellingMírzá Maḥmúd-i-Zarqání · 1998
In *Stories of Bahá'u'lláh* Mr. Furutan preserves the household recollection of the small house in Baghdád where Bahá'u'lláh lived in the 1850s — and the standing instruction He had given the family that no one who came to the door, of any creed or condition, was ever to be sent away without food.
Among the household recollections Mr. Furutan preserves in *Stories of Bahá'u'lláh* is the simple memory of how Bahá'u'lláh, in His own house, would set aside His writing to receive the children — would ask after their small concerns, would laugh at their jokes, and would send them away with blessings they remembered to the end of their lives.
In *Stories of Bahá'u'lláh* the Hand of the Cause Mr. 'Alí-Akbar Furútan preserves two early memories of the Blessed Beauty's childhood: His unusual composure as an infant, who almost never cried, and a prophetic dream He described at age five or six in which He stood unharmed amid attacking sea creatures and birds — interpreted by a noted dream-reader as a foreshadowing of His future Cause.
Among the childhood stories Hand of the Cause Furutan gathered into his *Stories of Bahá'u'lláh* is the recollection of how the young Mírzá Ḥusayn -‘Alí — long before His Declaration — would refuse to settle a quarrel among His playmates without first hearing both sides, and how the household began to recognize a quiet authority in the boy.
In *Stories of Bahá'u'lláh* Mr. Furutan preserves the household memory of how Bahá'u'lláh, during the years in Bahjí, would step out into the small garden each afternoon with a handful of grain in His hand for the wild pigeons of the plain — and the gentleness of a creature who, in His own words, *did not wish to disappoint* the birds.
Mr. Furutan, in *Stories of Bahá'u'lláh,* preserves the recollection of Shaykh Maḥmúd-i-‘Arrábí — the Sunní mufti of ‘Akká who, having sworn to kill Bahá'u'lláh as a heretic upon His arrival, came to His door, was received, and walked out a servant of the Cause for the rest of his life.
In *Stories of Bahá'u'lláh* Furutan preserves the story of the executioner of the Síyáh-Chál who, through the months of the imprisonment, came to admire Bahá'u'lláh — and who, after each Bábí was led out to the gallows, would return to the pit to report to Bahá'u'lláh how the friend had died.
In *Stories of Bahá'u'lláh* Furutan preserves the practice that sustained Bahá'u'lláh's fellow Bábí prisoners in the Síyáh-Chál pit in 1852: each evening, the prisoners would divide into two rows and chant antiphonally — one row, *God is sufficient unto me,* and the other replying, *In Him let the trusting trust* — until the chant rose, in the dark, to fill the dungeon's vault.
Among the recollections of Bahá'u'lláh's boyhood Mr. Furutan preserves in *Stories of Bahá'u'lláh* is the dream the child once had of a great moving spectacle in the sky — birds, fish, a green sea — that He told to His father the next morning, and whose meaning the household began only later to suspect.
A short story preserved by Hand of the Cause Furutan in *Stories of Bahá'u'lláh*: an aged believer who set out on foot from Persia to attain the presence of Bahá'u'lláh in 'Akká, and the welcome that met him at the door when he arrived, exhausted, decades younger in his soul.
Among the 'Akká stories Mr. Furutan preserves in *Stories of Bahá'u'lláh* is the recollection of a prison guard, originally hostile, who came over time to weep in the stone corridor when he heard the voices of the Holy Family — and who one day, in open contradiction of his orders, fell at Bahá'u'lláh's feet.
In *Stories of Bahá'u'lláh* Mr. Furutan recalls the circumstances in which the Tablet of Aḥmad — recited by Bahá'ís throughout the world in seasons of difficulty — was revealed for a single Persian believer who had become discouraged in his journey, and the consolation it carried back to him on the road.
Mr. Furutan preserves, in *Stories of Bahá'u'lláh,* the family recollection of an evening in the snowbound forests of Núr when the young Mírzá Ḥusayn-ʿAlí walked alone into the storm to visit a sick villager — and the household that, the next morning, found Him sitting calmly by the cottage fire as if the journey had been an errand of an ordinary noon.
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