The King in the Box

*A retelling based on Bahá'u'lláh's own account in the **Lawḥ-i-Ra'ís**, published in **The Summons of the Lord of Hosts**. The words in quotation marks are from that account.*

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When Bahá'u'lláh was still a child in Tihrán, His father arranged the marriage of one of His older brothers. As was the custom in that city, the festivities lasted seven days and seven nights. On the last day a puppet play, *Sháh Sultán Salím*, was presented before a gathering of princes, dignitaries and notables of the capital. Bahá'u'lláh watched from one of the upper rooms of the building.

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A tent was pitched in the courtyard. Little figures, each no more than a hand's span high, came out, cried that His Majesty was coming, and swept and sprinkled the ground. Then the king himself appeared, crowned and haughty, and seated himself upon his throne. Shots were fired and trumpets sounded; when the smoke cleared, ministers, princes and officers of state stood at attention around him. A captured thief was brought before the throne and beheaded.

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News came that a rebellion had broken out on the frontier, and the little king sent his regiments, with artillery, to put it down, while cannon boomed behind the tent. He regarded it all, He wrote, with great amazement.

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When the royal audience was over, the curtain was drawn. After some twenty minutes a man came out from behind the tent carrying a box under his arm. Bahá'u'lláh asked him what the box was, and what the display had been. "All this lavish display and these elaborate devices," the man replied, "the king, the princes, and the ministers, their pomp and glory, their might and power, everything you saw, are now contained within this box."

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Bahá'u'lláh never forgot it. Years later He wrote: "Ever since that day, all the trappings of the world have seemed in the eyes of this Youth akin to that same spectacle. They have never been, nor will they ever be, of any weight and consequence, be it to the extent of a grain of mustard seed."

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*This is a retelling. For the fuller account, see the Lawḥ-i-Ra'ís in **The Summons of the Lord of Hosts**.*

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