The Night the Long Search Ended

A retelling for children, based on Nabíl's account in The Dawn-Breakers of the night of May 22–23, 1844.

Mullá Ḥusayn was a student of a teacher named Siyyid Káẓim. Before he died, Siyyid Káẓim told his students to leave their homes and search far and wide for the Promised One, whose coming was near. Mullá Ḥusayn set out from Karbilá, travelled to the port of Búshihr on the Persian Gulf, and from there went north to the city of Shíráz.

At the gate of Shíráz he told his brother and his nephew to go ahead to a mosque in the city and wait for him there. He hoped to join them for the evening prayer.

A few hours before sunset, while he was walking outside the city gate, a Youth with a radiant face and a green turban came toward him, smiling, and embraced him as if they had been lifelong friends. The Youth invited him to His home to rest after his journey. Mullá Ḥusayn asked to be excused, because his companions were waiting for him. The Youth answered, "Commit them to the care of God. He will surely protect and watch over them."

They came to the door of a modest house. As He crossed the threshold, the Youth said, "Enter therein in peace, secure."

Inside, the Youth poured water over His guest's hands so that he could wash off the dust of travel, gave him a refreshing drink, and made tea for him Himself. When Mullá Ḥusayn rose to leave, saying he had promised to meet his friends for the evening prayer, the Youth told him that God's will had decided otherwise and that he need not fear he had broken his promise. So Mullá Ḥusayn stayed, and the two prayed side by side.

About an hour after sunset the Youth asked him whom he was looking for. Mullá Ḥusayn listed the signs his teacher had given: the Promised One would be of pure lineage, a descendant of Fáṭimih, between twenty and thirty years old, of medium height, and His knowledge would be innate, not learned in schools. The Youth paused, and then said, "Behold, all these signs are manifest in Me!"

Mullá Ḥusayn had brought with him a treatise he had written about the most difficult teachings of Siyyid Káẓim and his teacher before him. He had decided that whoever could explain it might be the One he sought. He handed it to his Host. Within a few minutes the Youth had explained all its mysteries, and then spoke of truths Mullá Ḥusayn had never read in any book.

Then He took up His pen and began to write, very fast, without once stopping, chanting the verses softly as He wrote. It was the opening chapter of a commentary on the Súrih of Joseph in the Qur'án, the very commentary that Siyyid Káẓim had said the Promised One would write.

When Mullá Ḥusayn stood up to go, the Youth smiled, asked him to sit down, and said: "If you leave in such a state, whoever sees you will assuredly say: 'This poor youth has lost his mind.'"

At that moment the clock showed two hours and eleven minutes after sunset. The Youth said:

This night, this very hour will, in the days to come, be celebrated as one of the greatest and most significant of all festivals.

Mullá Ḥusayn stayed with Him, listening, until the call to morning prayer. Then the Youth said to him:

O thou who art the first to believe in Me! Verily I say, I am the Báb, the Gate of God, and thou art the Bábu’l-Báb, the gate of that Gate.

Mullá Ḥusayn later said that before that night he had felt weak and timid, but that afterwards he felt such courage that he could have stood alone against the whole world. Bahá'ís everywhere remember that night each year on the Declaration of the Báb, gathering at about two hours after sunset.

This is a retelling for children. For the fuller account, see "The Night of the Báb's Declaration".

Nabíl-i-A'ẓam. (1932). *The Dawn-Breakers: Nabíl's Narrative of the Early Days of the Bahá'í Revelation*. Bahá'í Publishing Trust. https://www.bahai.org/library/other-literature/historical/dawn-breakers/