The Youth Who Had Set His Heart Aflame: Shaykh Ḥasan-i-Zunúzí

A retelling drawn from Bahá'í Chronicles, which gathers the accounts of the heroes and heroines of the Faith, together with the words of Shaykh Ḥasan-i-Zunúzí preserved in Nabíl's Dawn-Breakers. Phrases in quotation marks are words preserved in those histories.

Some who recognised the Báb in 1844 had never set eyes on Him. Others recognised Him because, in a way they had not understood at the time, they already had. Shaykh Ḥasan-i-Zunúzí was one of these.

He had been a student at the feet of Shaykh Aḥmad-i-Aḥsá'í, the first of the two great heralds who spent their lives telling their disciples that the Promised One was near. After Shaykh Aḥmad's retirement, Shaykh Ḥasan became a devoted pupil of the second herald, Siyyid Káẓim, who laboured patiently to lift from his students the veils that might keep them from recognising the promised Qá'im when He came. Siyyid Káẓim gave them a list of the signs to watch for, and a warning that went with it: they must not mistake their own beloved teacher, or any familiar figure, for the Promised One Himself. Shaykh Ḥasan had felt such thoughts stir in him, and prayed earnestly to be freed of any idle fancy that might blind him to the Harbinger of the Most Great Light when the appointed hour arrived.

Then, one morning in 1841, in the holy city of Karbilá, Siyyid Káẓim invited him to come and meet "a highly distinguished Person." They walked the streets of the shrine-city together until they came to a house, and there, Shaykh Ḥasan later recounted, stood a Youth at the door, "as if expectant to receive us." He wore a green turban, and His countenance bore an expression of humility and kindliness that Shaykh Ḥasan said he could never describe. The Youth approached quietly, extended His arms toward Siyyid Káẓim, and embraced him with love. And Shaykh Ḥasan noticed at once a strange reversal: the affability and tenderness of the young Host stood in marked contrast to the profound reverence with which his own revered teacher, the most honoured divine in that city, behaved toward Him.

Three days later he was humbled again. He was present when that same Youth entered Siyyid Káẓim's school, and saw a ray of sunlight fall upon His lap, and watched his learned teacher fall silent and abashed before this venerable young Visitor. And more than once, in the days that followed, Shaykh Ḥasan came upon the Youth standing at the threshold of the shrine of the Imám Ḥusayn, lost in prayer, tears streaming down His face in utter devotion. Each time, an unaccountable force held him back from daring to address Him. He did not know the young Pilgrim's name. But the sight would not leave him.

Three years passed. Siyyid Káẓim died, having charged his disciples to scatter and seek. And then, from the distant city of Shíráz, came the Call: a Youth had arisen and proclaimed Himself to be the Báb, the Gate of God, the very Promised One the heralds had foretold. The moment Shaykh Ḥasan heard it, the memory he had carried for three years rose up before him with sudden, overwhelming force. He described it in words the histories preserve:

That Youth had set my heart aflame. The memory of that vision haunted me. My soul was wedded to His till the day when the call of a Youth from Shíráz, proclaiming Himself to be the Báb, reached my ears. The thought instantly flashed through my mind that such a person could be none other than that selfsame Youth whom I had seen in Karbilá, the Youth of my heart's desire.

He recognised in the Báb every one of the attributes his master had taught him to watch for, and he became His devoted disciple, travelling far to remain close to the newest Manifestation of God on earth. When, two years later, the clergy of Iṣfahán pronounced their death-warrant against the Báb, Shaykh Ḥasan was among the very few permitted to enter His presence. He would later serve as a trusted scribe of the Báb's holy Writings, faithfully carrying and preserving the Tablets revealed during the Báb's long captivity in the mountain fortresses of Ádhirbáyján.

His story belongs to the Day of the Declaration because of the strange and tender way recognition came to him. He had met the Sun before it rose — had stood, unknowing, beside the One for whom his whole life was a preparation, and had felt his heart set aflame by a face he could not name. When the Call finally came, he did not have to be persuaded. He had only to remember. And his story whispers to every soul that recognition is not always a stranger arriving; sometimes it is a long-loved face at last revealing its name.

This is a retelling. For the fuller account, see Bahá'í Chronicles and Nabíl's The Dawn-Breakers.

editors, B. C.. *Bahá'í Chronicles*. https://bahaichronicles.org/shaykh-hasan-i-zunuzi/