Bahá'u'lláh's Tablet to the Czar

*A retelling based on **The Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh**, Vol. 3, by Adib Taherzadeh, with details from Shoghi Effendi's **God Passes By**. Quotations from the Tablet follow the translation in **The Summons of the Lord of Hosts**.*

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Among the Tablets that Bahá'u'lláh addressed to the rulers of the world from 'Akká was one to the Czar of Russia, Alexander II. Adib Taherzadeh notes that it was revealed in Arabic; Shoghi Effendi records that Bahá'u'lláh wrote it "as He lay a prisoner in the barracks."

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The Tablet opens: "O Czar of Russia!

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Incline thine ear unto the voice of God, the King, the Holy, and turn thou unto Paradise." In it Bahá'u'lláh proclaims His station and identifies Himself as the Heavenly Father: "He Who is the Father is come, and the Son, in the holy vale, crieth out: 'Here am I, here am I, O Lord, My God!'" He warns the Czar, "Beware lest thy sovereignty withhold thee from Him Who is the Supreme Sovereign," and gives him a charge: "Arise thou amongst men in the name of this all-compelling Cause, and summon, then, the nations unto God, the Exalted, the Great."

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The Tablet also recalls a debt. In 1852 Bahá'u'lláh had been held in chains in the Síyáh-Chál, the underground dungeon of Ṭihrán. Shoghi Effendi records that the Russian Minister, Prince Dolgorouki, "left no stone unturned to establish the innocence of Bahá'u'lláh," and counts his intervention among the causes of His release. When Náṣiri'd-Dín Sháh then ordered Bahá'u'lláh to leave Persia, the Minister offered to take Him under the protection of his government and to help Him move to Russia. Bahá'u'lláh declined, and chose Baghdád, in Turkish territory.

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Years later He wrote to the Czar: "Whilst I lay chained and fettered in the prison, one of thy ministers extended Me his aid. Wherefore hath God ordained for thee a station which the knowledge of none can comprehend except His knowledge. Beware lest thou barter away this sublime station."

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One more passage in the Tablet is personal: "We, verily, have heard the thing for which thou didst supplicate thy Lord, whilst secretly communing with Him. Wherefore, the breeze of My loving-kindness wafted forth, and the sea of My mercy surged, and We answered thee in truth." Bahá'u'lláh did not say what the Czar had prayed for. Taherzadeh relates that a Russian consul in Astarábád later asked a Bahá'í, Áqá Muḥammad-Raḥím of Iṣfahán, what the passage meant. He suggested that the Czar had prayed for victory over the Ottomans, and Taherzadeh connects the passage with the Russo-Turkish war of 1877–78.

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"The exhortations of Bahá'u'lláh fell on deaf ears," Taherzadeh writes. Alexander II reigned until 1881, when he was assassinated, and in 1917 his dynasty was extinguished.

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*This is a retelling. For the fuller account, see **The Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh**, Vol. 3, by Adib Taherzadeh.*

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