The Question Vaḥíd Kept to Himself

*A retelling based on **The Dawn-Breakers**, Nabíl's narrative of the early days of the Bahá'í Revelation (chapter 9), where Vaḥíd's own account of these meetings is preserved. The words in quotation marks are from that book.*

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Reports of the Báb's claim reached Muḥammad Sháh, and he wished to know the truth of them. He chose for the task Siyyid Yaḥyáy-i-Dárábí, later known as Vaḥíd, whom Nabíl calls "the most learned, the most eloquent, and the most influential of his subjects." At any gathering of divines he was the chief speaker.

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He was staying in Ṭihrán as the Sháh's guest when the Sháh asked him "to proceed to Shiraz, to enquire thoroughly into the episode of the Siyyid-i-Bab, and to inform us of the results of his investigations." He had long wanted to do this himself, and set out at once, working out on the road the questions he would put to the Báb.

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In Shíráz he met a friend from Khurásán, Mullá Shaykh 'Alí, called 'Aẓím, who advised him to be courteous in his conversations with the Báb. Their first meeting was in the house of the Báb's uncle, Ḥájí Mírzá Siyyid 'Alí. For about two hours Vaḥíd raised the most abstruse themes of Islamic metaphysics and the obscurest passages of the Qur'án. The Báb gave each question a brief, persuasive reply.

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Vaḥíd felt humbled, and afterwards told 'Aẓím: "I have in His presence expatiated unduly upon my own learning. He was able in a few words to answer my questions and to resolve my perplexities."

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At the second meeting Vaḥíd found that the questions he had meant to ask had gone from his memory. The Báb answered them anyway. "His words, His answers to questions which I had forgotten to ask, reawakened me," he said later. Yet he still wondered whether it might have been a coincidence.

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So he made a plan for the third meeting. "I resolved that in my third interview with the Bab I would in my inmost heart request Him to reveal for me a commentary on the Surih of Kawthar." He would not say it aloud. If the Báb revealed such a commentary unasked, he would accept His Cause.

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When he came into the Báb's presence he was seized by a fear he could not account for, and could not stay on his feet. The Báb rose, took his hand and seated him beside Him. "Seek from Me," He said, "whatever is your heart's desire. I will readily reveal it to you." Then, smiling: "Were I to reveal for you the commentary on the Surih of Kawthar, would you acknowledge that My words are born of the Spirit of God?" Vaḥíd wept.

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Early in the afternoon the Báb asked His uncle for His pen-case and some paper and began to write. "Verses streamed from His pen with a rapidity that was truly astounding," Vaḥíd recalled. He wrote until the approach of sunset, finished the whole commentary, and then read it aloud.

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> My heart leaped madly as I heard Him pour out, in accents of unutterable > sweetness, those treasures enshrined in that sublime commentary. I was so > entranced by its beauty that three times over I was on the verge of fainting.

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The Báb had a few drops of rose-water sprinkled on his face, and he was able to follow the reading to the end. Then, at the Báb's direction, Vaḥíd and Mullá 'Abdu'l-Karím spent three days and three nights transcribing the commentary and checking the copy. "Such was the state of certitude to which I had attained," Vaḥíd said, "that if all the powers of the earth were to be leagued against me they would be powerless to shake my confidence in the greatness of His Cause."

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The governor of Fárs, in whose house Vaḥíd had been staying, wrote to the Sháh that his guest had become a Bábí. Vaḥíd served the Cause for the rest of his life, and in 1850 he gave his life for it at Nayríz.

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*This is a retelling. For the full account in Vaḥíd's own words, see **The Dawn-Breakers**, chapter 9.*

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