# Introduction to the Kitáb-i-Iqán, An

*Exported from [Holy-Writings.com](https://www.holy-writings.com/) on 2026-06-19 — 1 clipping.*

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> Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Nasser Sabet, Introduction to the Kitáb-i-Iqán, An, bahai-library.com.
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> 
> Published in the Journal of Bahá’í Studies Vol. 3, number 4 (1991)
> © Association for Bahá’í Studies 1991
> 
> An Introduction to the Kitáb-i-Íqán1
> Nasser Sabet
> (1935—1991)
> Abstract
> This article discusses the importance, style, and contents of the Kitáb-i-Íqán (the Book of
> Certitude) by Bahá’u’lláh. The five major themes of the book—the True Seeker and the
> Conditions and Constraints of an Independent Investigation of Truth; Rebirth of Spirituality;
> Subjects Related to Christianity and Islam; the Bábí Dispensation; and the Process of
> Revelation—are then succinctly yet perceptively summarized.
> 
> Résumé
> Cet article traite de l’importance, du style, et du contenu du Kitáb-i-Íqán (Le Livre de la
> certitude) de Bahá’u’lláh. Ce livre peut se diviser en cinq thèmes principaux: le vrai chercheur et
> les conditions et les contraintes de la recherche indépendante de la vérité; la renaissance de la
> spiritualité; les sujets reliés au Christianisme et á l’Islam; la dispensation bábíe; et le processus
> de la révélation qui sont résumés de façon succincte mais perspicace.
> 
> Resumen
> Este estudio ventila la importancia, el estilo, y el contenido del Kitáb-i-Íqán (Libro de la
> Certidumbre) escrito por Bahá’u’lláh. Los cinco temas principales del libro, El Verdadero
> Buscador y las Condiciones y Restricciones de la Búsqueda Independiente de la Verdad; el
> Renacimiento de Ia Espiritualidad; Materias Relacionadas a la Cristiandad y el Islam; la
> Dispensación Bábí; y el Proceso de Revelación—se recapitulan con brevedad y acierto
> 
> T    he Works of Bahá’u’lláh, although comprising many tablets addressed to individuals,
> contain universal messages: universal in the sense that they have been and will be
> applicable to all times, conditions, and individuals. An extraordinary work of this type is his
> well-known Kitáb-i-Íqán (Book of Certitude) which, from the time of its revelation, has
> been a great source of inspiration for the most distinguished scholars of the Bahá’í Faith.
> 
> The Importance of the Kitáb-i-Íqán
> After the Kitáb-i-Áqdas, the Kitáb-i-Íqán is Bahá’u’lláh’s most important work and has a two-
> fold position in the Bahá’í Faith. First, the Báb had not completed the Persian Bayán and had
> prophesied that “He Whom God will make Manifest” would reveal the remaining chapters and
> would complete the text of the Persian Bayán. Second, an authentic explanation and
> interpretation of the symbolic and abstruse verses and terms of the Bible and the Qur’án were to
> be considered as a proof of the Manifestation of God in this age.
> 
> This paper was first presented at the Fifth Annual Conference of the Association for Bahá’í Studies, University of
> Ottawa, and is printed posthumously in tribute to Nasser Sabet.
> Style of the Book
> As indicated by Shoghi Effendi, the Kitáb-i-Íqán is a “model of Persian prose, of a style at once
> original, chaste and vigorous, and remarkably lucid, both cogent in argument and matchless in its
> irresistible eloquence …” (God Passes By 138–39). Shoghi Effendi himself did the miraculous
> and accurate translation of the Kitáb-i-Íqán—a translation giving those familiar with Persian and
> English an unsurpassed reference source of mystical and literary terms used in the vast literature
> of the Bahá’í Faith and past religious traditions. For its English readers, Shoghi Effendi’s
> translation is a priceless gift, for no other person would have been able to accomplish this
> difficult task so admirably.
> 
> Contents of the Book
> The Kitáb-i-Íqán consists of a flow of themes with a unique approach to many subjects. These
> themes, although independent in their nature, are interrelated. Thus, the book does not lend itself
> to a conventional table of contents. However, Bahá’u’lláh has divided the whole book into two
> chapters.
> For the purposes of this presentation, most of the themes elaborated in the Kitáb-i-Íqán have
> been classified into five headings:
> 
>    The True Seeker and the Conditions and Constraints of an Independent Investigation of
> Truth;
>    Rebirth of Spirituality;
>    Subjects Related to Christianity and Islam;
>    The Bábí Dispensation;
>    The Process of Revelation.
> 
> The True Seeker and the Conditions and Constraints
> of an Independent Investigation of Truth
> As with every other scientific endeavor in which analysis is carried out in an unbiased way under
> well-defined conditions, here too, to attain the “shores of the ocean of true understanding”
> (Kitáb-i-Íqán) true spiritual seekers must obtain certain prerequisites. These prerequisites are
> both exogenous and endogenous to the seeker’s nature. Body and soul must be completely
> detached from all internal and external influences in order to purify “their ears from idle talk,
> their minds from vain imaginings, their hearts from worldly affections, their eyes from that
> which perisheth” (Kitáb-i-Íqán 3). Furthermore, “they should put their trust in God, and, holding
> fast unto Him, follow in His way” (Kitáb-i-Íqán 3).
> If the seeker should consider the words of “mortal men as a standard for the true
> understanding and recognition of God and His Prophets” (Kitáb-i-Íqán 4), the seeker will be
> misled. Who might these mortals be? An analysis of history shows that these have always been
> the divines of the age. In this dispensation, humanity is reaching the stage of maturity, having
> passed the stage of childhood. Humankind should realize its nobility and its capacity to pass even
> beyond the realm of angels and progress to a station beyond imagination (an allusion to a poem
> by Molavi). This noble creature is, without doubt, capable of rejecting the role of the clergy in a
> new world order. Bahá’u’lláh states in irrefutable terms that humanity possesses every necessary
> qualification to act as mature and independent beings. Religious leaders have no role to play in
> this age of the maturity of humankind.
> Rebirth of Spirituality
> The period of the 1860s in which the Kitáb-i-Íqán was revealed was also a period of the rapid
> expansion of atheism. In this period, religious beliefs were strongly rejected. Religious leaders
> were incapable of finding answers to many questions that arose due to new discoveries in science
> and technology. In this chaotic period of human history, Bahá’u’lláh’s reiteration of religious
> beliefs and his scientific and logical approach in explaining religious beliefs represents the
> “rebirth of spirituality.”
> In the words of Shoghi Effendi, Bahá’u’lláh “proclaims unequivocally the existence and
> oneness of a personal God, unknowable, inaccessible, the source of all Revelation, eternal,
> omniscient, omnipresent and almighty” (God Passes By 139). He further emphasizes that the
> only way for humankind to know God is through his Manifestations. Namely, that humankind
> has always been and will always be barred from comprehending God except through the life and
> teachings of a prophet of God. This clear approach to God has no resemblance in the different
> philosophical lines of thought contained in the ontology of St. Anselm, the cosmology of St.
> Thomas Aquinas, the teleology of William Paley, nor the arguments formulated by Immanuel
> Kant. Nor is the concept of “Most holy outpouring” expressed by some Sufis acceptable to
> Bahá’u’lláh as a means of attaining “the divine presence.” Only the Manifestations of God, these
> divinely appointed beings, can reflect all the attributes of God. This resounding theme of the
> oneness and inaccessibility of God is further elaborated in other themes unique to the Bahá’í
> Dispensation: the “relativity of religious truth and the continuity of Divine Revelation,” the
> “unity of the Prophets, the universality of their Message, the identity of their fundamental
> teachings,” and “the sanctity of their scriptures” (God Passes By 139).
> 
> Subjects Related to Christianity and Islam
> In the Bible and the Qur’án, there are allegorical and symbolic verses that, despite numerous
> previous attempts to explain their meaning, have never been adequately interpreted. In the Bible,
> we read: “But as for you, Daniel, conceal these words and seal up the book until the end of time
> … go your way Daniel, for these words are concealed and sealed up until the end of time”
> (Daniel 12:4).
> The Qur’án itself distinguishes two types of verses within it: the didactic and the allegorical.
> In the Súrih of Al-i-‘Imrán it says: “ ‘the Book’ [Qur’án] … some of its verses are of themselves
> perspicuous others are symbolic … none knoweth the meaning thereof except God and those
> who are well grounded in knowledge” (Qur’án 3:5).2
> Both the Bible and the Qur’án are full of allegorical and symbolic terms. As mentioned in the
> Kitáb-i-Iqán:
> 
> the purpose underlying all these symbolic terms and abstruse allusions, which emanate from
> the Revealers of God’s holy Cause, bath been to test and prove the peoples of the world; that
> thereby the earth of the pure and illuminated hearts may be known from the perishable and
> barren soil. From time immemorial such hath been the way of God. (49)
> 
> - Most translators have rendered this passage as Rodwell did in 1909: “Yet none knoweth its interpretation but God.
> 
> And the stable in knowledge say, ‘We believe in it: it is all from our Lord” (386). However, the majority of the
> Shi’ah scholars concur with Bahá’u’lláh’s quotation: “None knoweth the meaning thereof except God and them that
> are well-grounded in knowledge” (Kitáb-i-Íqán 17).
> Some of the symbolic terms are as follows: return; resurrection; day of judgment; sun, moon,
> and stars; angels; clouds; earth; heaven; Mi‘ráj; death and life; trumpet; veils of glory; and city
> of God. Each of these terms will be elaborated upon later in this article.
> 
> The Bábí Dispensation
> The Kitáb-i-Iqán was revealed immediately prior to Bahá’u’lláh’s public declaration, in honor of
> Hájí Mírzá Siyyid Muḥammad, the Báb’s maternal uncle.3 As yet unconvinced, Hájí Mirzá
> Siyyid Muḥammad had questioned Bahá’u’lláh as to how the prophecies in the Shí’ah traditions
> could have been realized in his nephew. In response to this question, Bahá’u’lláh clarified the
> meanings behind the signs of the promised Qá’im. Many of these, signs, such as “sovereignty,”
> “judgment,” “resurrection,” and so on are symbolic terms. Thus, a vast portion of the book deals
> with the explanation of these terms and an analysis of related traditions. In the course of these
> explanations, Bahá’u’lláh irrefutably demonstrates “the validity, the sublimity and significance
> of the Báb’s Revelation …” (Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By 139). In fact, Bahá’u’lláh divides
> the Kitáb-i-Íqán into two parts, the first focusing on the explanation of symbolic terms and the
> second, on the sovereignty of the Báb.
> 
> The Process of Revelation
> Sometimes during the course of revelation, Bahá’u’lláh would suddenly diverge from the topic at
> hand and express his most intimate feelings about the process of revelation itself. Never before in
> the history of religion has anyone heard or read about the personal feelings of a Manifestation of
> God at the moment of inspiration:
> 
> Great God! When the stream of utterance reached this stage, We beheld, and lo! the sweet
> savours of God were being wafted from the day-spring of Revelation, and the morning breeze
> was blowing out of the Sheba of the Eternal. Its tidings rejoiced anew the heart, and imparted
> immeasurable gladness to the soul. It made all things new, and brought unnumbered and
> inestimable gifts from the unknowable Friend … At this hour, so liberal is the outpouring of
> Its grace that the holy Spirit itself is envious!...
> The universe is pregnant with these manifold bounties, awaiting the hour when the effects
> of Its unseen gifts will be made manifest us this world. … In the soil of whose heart will these
> holy seeds germinate? … Verily, I say, so fierce is the blaze of the Bush of love, burning in
> the Sinai of the heart, that the streaming waters of holy utterance can never quench its flame.
> (Kitáb-i-Íqán 59–61)
> 
> Conclusion
> To conclude this summary, I would like to quote Shoghi Effendi on the significance of the Kitáb-
> i-Íqán in Bahá’í literature:
> 
> Well may it be claimed that of all the books revealed by the Author of the Bahá’í Revelation,
> this Book alone, by sweeping away the age-long barriers that have so insurmountably
> 
> The Kitáb-i-Íqán was revealed in the two days and two nights prior to April 21, 1862.
> separated the great religions of the world, has laid down a broad and unassailable foundation
> for the complete and permanent reconciliation of their followers. (God Passes By 139)
> 
> Works Cited
> 
> Baha’u’lláh. Kitáb-i-Íqán (Book of Certitude). Trans. Shoghi Effendi. 2d ed. Wilmette, IL:
> Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1950.
> 
> New American Standard Bible. Study ed. Philadelphia: A. J. Holman, 1975.
> 
> Shoghi Effendi. God Passes By. Rev. ed. Wilmette: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1974.
>
> — *Introduction to the Kitáb-i-Iqán, An (Used by permission of the curator)*