# The Qur'an and the Baha'i Faith

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> Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Todd Lawson, The Qur'an and the Baha'i Faith, bahai-library.com.
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> 
> Chapter 7
> 
> The Qur’an and the Baha’i Faith
> 
> Todd Lawson, University of Toronto
> 
> And if all the trees on earth were pens, and the sea were ink, with seven
> more seas yet added to it, the words of God would not be exhausted: for,
> verily, God is almighty, wise.
> (Q 31:27, Asad)
> 
> T
> he Baha’i faith was born in Iran and for this reason it trails many
> Iranian clouds of glory. One of these is the high degree to which
> Islam and the Qur’an have had a great impact on the form and
> contents of the Baha’i revelation and the Baha’i religion. The Baha’i writings
> are steeped in the Qur’an and, to a lesser degree, also steeped in hadith – a
> topic not pursued here. Qur’anic quotations in Baha’i scripture are indi-
> cated in published works and manuscripts. However, Qur’anic diction and
> vocabulary is such a pervasive element of the Baha’i writings that it would
> be impossible to indicate every instance of influence or presence. The Qur’an
> has had, down the centuries, an unparalleled influence on Muslim culture in
> general and, from the earliest times, on Irano-Islamic culture in general, and
> an even more intense impact upon specifically religious works, whether
> mystical, philosophical, theological, or poetic, written by Iranians in both
> Persian and Arabic.1 The Qur’anic content of the Baha’i writings is a source
> Lewis, ‘Persian Literature and the Qur’an.’
> THE QUR’AN AND THE BAHA’I FAITH              157
> 
> of pride and inspiration among Baha’is as it obviously was among the central
> founding figures of the Baha’i faith: The Bab (d. 1850), Baha’ullah (d. 1892),
> Abdulbaha’ (d. 1921) and Shoghi Effendi (d. 1957). Although, as long ago
> as 1938, Shoghi Effendi had instructed the Baha’i community to study the
> Qur’an thoroughly, it has not yet been completely and systematically tracked
> and indexed throughout all Baha’i publications, even though some steps in
> this direction have been made. One of the biggest factors in this compara-
> tively slow progress has to do with the pervasiveness of the Qur’an through-
> out the Baha’i writings, the numerous different contexts and functions
> involved and, perhaps, most definitively, the truly vast literary terrain
> involved. The literary output of the founding figures mentioned above, in
> addition to a vast secondary literature in hundreds of languages, constitutes
> a textual base for such a study that is daunting in every way. Much of the
> Baha’i corpus has been published, but much more remains in manuscript
> form. However, it is possible to gauge the importance of the Qur’an in Baha’i
> scripture by taking account of its influence and presence in the two earliest
> major compositions of the Bab. As we will see in what follows, these two
> works are in fact tafsirs, or Qur’an commentaries. One of these is considered
> the inaugural work of the Baha’i era.
> From one point of view, the depth of the Qur’anic roots of the Baha’i
> faith is perfectly natural and unsurprising for, despite laughable attempts
> to cast the Babi and Baha’i religions as tools of foreign intervention and
> manipulation (British, Russian, American), no compelling evidence has
> been bought to bear to counter the clear and quite reasonable assumption
> that the Baha’i faith is an indigenous Islamicate development. In the course
> of its genesis it relied solely on the inner resources of Islamic intellectual
> and religious culture to configure its own distinctive religious identity.
> Obviously, the nineteenth century was a time of intense and burgeoning
> globalism, and this also figured in the process. But the Bab – an Arabic
> word meaning ‘gate’ or ‘door,’ and the title by which a sayyid from the Iranian
> merchant class, Ali Muhammad Shirazi, has come to be most widely
> known – and Baha’ullah – an Arabic title meaning ‘the glory or splendor of
> God’ and the honorific of Mirza Husayn Ali Nuri – both engaged with the
> Qur’an at the deepest levels of their writing. They adduced it as proof of
> their respective visions and claims, they commented upon it in both
> 158       COMMUNITIES OF THE QUR’A N
> 
> traditional and modernist modes, and they clearly considered it an inviol-
> able and sacred record of divine revelation.
> Abdulbaha’, the son of Baha’ullah, also clearly knew the Qur’an very
> well and quoted it frequently in his talks and writings, as did Shoghi
> Effendi.2 The Universal House of Justice, the administrative and spiritual
> authority for Baha’is today, also engages the Qur’an in its various commu-
> nications and publications. The basic doctrinal position is that the Prophet
> Muhammad, the Qur’an and Islam represent essential, holy communica-
> tion from God to humanity and that the Qur’an, apart from Baha’i sacred
> writings, represents the only fully authentic scripture to which humanity
> might turn. As mentioned above, Shoghi Effendi unambiguously instructed
> the Baha’is to study it with the aid of sources that are fair and unbiased,
> and to deepen their understanding of the similarities and differences
> between Islam and the Baha’i faith:
> 
> [The Baha’is] must strive to obtain, from sources that are authorita-
> tive and unbiased, a sound knowledge of the history and tenets of
> Islam – the source and background of their Faith – and approach
> reverently and with a mind purged from preconceived ideas the
> study of the Qur’an which, apart from the sacred scriptures of the
> Babi and Baha’i Revelations, constitutes the only Book which can be
> regarded as an absolutely authenticated Repository of the Word of
> God.3
> 
> It may be speculated that the young Baha’i community of the West had
> been at least partly attracted to the Baha’i message, either wittingly or
> unwittingly, by its significant and compelling Qur’anic content. This
> content gave that message a distinctive voice and doctrinal shape and
> caused it to distinguish itself as a new religion in the West, where, for
> example, what might be thought the Islamicate ‘epic of humanity’ was being
> 
> While Shoghi Effendi was still a baby, his grandfather Abdulbaha’, the head of the Baha’i faith
> at the time, arranged for weekly visits from a local Qur’an reciter to chant to the future Guardian
> of the Cause of God. Rabbani, Priceless Pearl, p. 9.
> Shoghi Effendi, Advent of Divine Justice, p. 49.
> THE QUR’AN AND THE BAHA’I FAITH                     159
> 
> heard with new ears.4 It is possible that Shoghi Effendi, in making the
> study of the Qur’an obligatory for the Baha’is, wanted them to come to
> terms with this fact, to study the genetic, umbilical relation between the
> Qur’an and the Baha’i scripture in order for them to be able to distinguish,
> precisely, what was Islamic from what was Baha’i.
> The distinguishing watchword of the Baha’i message, from the begin-
> ning, has been: One God, One Religion and One Humanity. To a Muslim,
> such a statement is unremarkable and unexceptionable. However, during
> the last decades of the nineteenth century and the first few decades of the
> twentieth, in the major centers of Europe and North America where this
> Baha’i message was being actively promulgated, it was received as a refresh-
> ing and much-needed religious orientation for the new, burgeoning and
> quite heady modernity that was rapidly transforming the planet into a
> global village. To those who became followers of the religion of Baha’ullah,
> this watchword had the metaphysical heft of a perfectly timed divine inter-
> vention which some saw as a metaphor for the return of Christ and others
> saw, less figuratively, as simply the return of Christ in the person of
> Baha’ullah or, in some cases, his son Abdulbaha’. Other Baha’i teachings
> promoted at this time, especially by Abdulbaha’ during his travels to
> Europe and North America during the pre-World War I years, 1911–13,
> were: the abolition of war, including ‘holy war’; the equality of men and
> women; the independent investigation of truth, and the condemnation of
> taqlid – ‘blind imitation’ in matters of religion; the abolition of the clergy;
> the establishment of a universal auxiliary language; that religious truth is
> not absolute but relative; that there have been messengers from God since
> the beginning of creation and there will always be messengers from God;
> the purpose of divine revelation is the promotion of an ‘ever-advancing
> civilization’; the centrality of consultation (shura) for problem-solving;
> compulsory education; and, the harmony of science and religion. All these
> ideas and principles (and many others) were presented by Abdulbaha’ as
> spiritually mandated religious law about which there could be no
> 
> Recent scholarship on the early growth of the Baha’i community in the West, from the last
> decade of the nineteenth century onward, tends to support this. See Osborn, Religion and
> Relevance; Stockman, ʻAbduʼl-Baha in America; Stockman, Thornton Chase. On the Islamic ‘epic
> of humanity,’ see Lawson, Qur’an, Epic and Apocalypse, pp. 1–26.
> 160        COMMUNITIES OF THE QUR’A N
> 
> disagreement. Thus, unity of belief and practice was also a key teaching of
> the Baha’i faith, and continues to be so. Disagreement among the Baha’is
> has always been forbidden, and so we see another example of how the
> Islamic doctrine of tawhid has truly irradiated and given a distinct identity
> to the Baha’i faith. Those who became Baha’is did so, and those who
> continue to become Baha’is do so, because they are convinced that God
> had spoken to humanity once again through Baha’ullah and because they
> see in such a God-given spiritual regime great potential for healing the ills
> that beset humanity.
> Those familiar with the Qur’an, Islam and the history of Islamic
> thought (especially theology, philosophy and mysticism) will immediately
> see the many connections and derivations from Islam these principles indi-
> cate. And, in many cases, such as the equality of the sexes and the impor-
> tance of consultation, many could immediately cite specific Qur’anic verses
> which first suggested such religious verities. One could say that the Qur’an
> provides much of the DNA and molecular structure of the Baha’i vision
> and to fully understand the Baha’i reception of the Qur’an therefore
> requires tools and methods that are in some ways analogous to those
> recently developed for use in physics, biology and even archeology. The
> suggestion here is that the Baha’i faith presents itself as both problem and
> tool in such an investigation.
> The connection between the Qur’an and the Baha’i faith is literary (for
> lack of a better word) and so it is a living one. There can be no question of
> arriving at some immovable, permanent conclusion for the question
> because the question itself is in motion. The Qur’anic molecules are Suras,
> Ayas, words and ideas connected to other concepts that shape culture and
> behavior and are in turn shaped by culture and usage. Ultimately, the Baha’i
> faith represents a striking example of how it is possible to be a community
> of the Qur’an and not be Muslim – in short, it demonstrates how the
> Qur’an is the property of humanity.5
> The Baha’i faith came to be in two major phases: the first was the Babi
> phase (1844–63); the second, the Baha’i phase (from 1863). In both phases
> the engagement with the Qur’an was key. In the Babi phase the first two
> 
> On the Qur’an as the property of humanity, see Buck, ‘Discovering.’
> THE QUR’AN AND THE BAHA’I FAITH                    161
> 
> major works of the Bab were Qur’an commentaries, the second of which is
> considered the first work of the Baha’i era or dispensation. In the Baha’i
> phase, the first major doctrinal work by Baha’ullah, the Kitab-i Iqan, was a
> Qur’an commentary in the sense that the author explained various Qur’an
> verses that spoke of Judgment Day, the Hour and the Afterlife. In this
> work, written in both Persian and Arabic, Baha’ullah also explained numer-
> ous prophetic, messianic or apocalyptic hadiths and also engaged in some
> Bible interpretation. Whether from the point of view of Qur’anic exegesis
> or from the point of view of hadith commentary, the purpose was two-fold.
> First, it was to demonstrate to the reader that the Qur’an and hadith had
> fully predicted the appearance (zuhur) of the Bab, his proclamation (da‘wa),
> claims and the activities of his followers. The second purpose of the book
> was to establish the credentials of Baha’ullah, then a follower of the Bab, in
> preparation for his eventual claims to be a divine manifestation (mazhar-i
> ilahi).6 This book, known in English as The Book of Certitude, has been
> translated into countless languages and it is primary scripture for the global
> Baha’i community. One scholar has called it the world’s most widely read
> non-Muslim Qur’an commentary.
> Both in principle and in practice, The Book of Certitude helped crystal-
> lize Baha’i identity and lent considerable impetus to its missionary expan-
> sion. By virtue of its diffusion in 205 or more sovereign and non-sovereign
> countries and territories, the Kitab-i Iqan emerges as the most influential
> work of Qur’anic exegesis outside of the Muslim world. Though the Qur’an
> is not, strictly speaking, part of the Baha’i scriptural corpus, the importance
> of this fact of non-Muslim Qur’anic exegesis may be instanced in the paral-
> lel diffusion of Jewish scriptures (the so-called Old Testament) at the
> hands of Christian missionaries. What began as a Babi text has ended up
> to be the principal doctrinal work of a nascent world religion.7
> What Christopher Buck says here about the relationship between the
> Qur’an and what has been described as Baha’ullah’s most important doctri-
> nal work could – with some necessary adjustment and nuance – apply to
> the entire corpus of all his published works. These works may be thought
> 
> Buck, Symbol and Secret, esp. pp. 257–74 on the ‘messianic secret’ the text conceals.
> Buck, ‘Kitab-i-Iqan.’
> 162      COMMUNITIES OF THE QUR’A N
> 
> to culminate, at least theologically and doctrinally, with his book of laws,
> al-Kitab al-Aqdas / Kitab-i Aqdas: The Most Holy Book, composed in the
> prison city of Akka (Acco), Ottoman Palestine, 1873. As mentioned,
> research on the second phase of the Baha’i reception of the Qur’an is in the
> early stages, but already it is obvious that it holds much promise for a
> deeper understanding of the relation between the Baha’i faith and its
> parent, Islam. This has become quite clear in Buck’s pioneering and innova-
> tive book referred to above and the work of others, such as Franklin D.
> Lewis, whose lucid and deeply informed discussion of this and related
> problems in several academic articles is essential reading for the question at
> hand.8
> The role the Qur’an played in the birth of the Baha’i faith during the
> first phase of its development is noteworthy for several reasons. This phase
> is represented by the two earliest extended written works by the Bab: the
> Tafsir surat al-baqara (hereafter Baqara) and the Tafsir surat yusuf, also
> known widely as the Qayyum al-asma’ (hereafter QA). The QA has been
> characterized by Baha’ullah as the most important book of the new dispen-
> sation, and the greatest . . . of all books.’9 Shoghi Effendi described it as
> having been universally regarded ‘the Qur’an of the Babis’ during the Bab’s
> lifetime.10 Some insight into the relationship between the Qur’an and
> Baha’i scripture is to be gained by observing here the interesting literary
> phenomenon of a commentary acquiring primary importance over the
> object of the commentary.11
> The Bab was born in 1817 in Shiraz into a sayyid family of merchants.
> His childhood is marked by an extraordinary interest in the religious life,
> the reading of the Qur’an, his devotion to prayer and to the sacred exam-
> ples of the lives of those he refers to as The Family of God (Al allah): the
> Prophet Muhammad, his daughter Fatima and the remaining members of
> the group known in Persian as the Fourteen Pure Ones (chehardeh ma‘sum),
> 
> Beginning with Lewis, ‘Scripture as Literature.’
> Bahaʼullah, Kitab-i mustatab-i Iqan, p. 180. ‘In His Book, which He hath entitled ‘“Qayyumu’l-
> Asma’’ – the first, the greatest and mightiest of all books – He prophesied His own martyrdom,’
> Bahaʼullah, Kitáb-I-Íqán, 231.
> Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, p. 23.
> Lawson, ‘Interpretation as Revelation.’
> THE QUR’AN AND THE BAHA’I FAITH                         163
> 
> the Twelve Imams recognized by Ithna-‘ashari Shi‘ism. His formal educa-
> tion was minimal, but as an extraordinarily pious young man he was
> attracted to a recent development in Iranian intellectual circles known
> widely as the Shaykhi school.12
> The Bab, who studied briefly in Karbala with the second leader of this
> school, Sayyid Kazem Rashti, wrote an astonishing number of works in
> both Persian and Arabic. His literary activity dates from at least his teen-
> age years and carried on until his tragic death in 1850 when he was killed
> in front of a firing squad by the combined order of equally inimical state
> and religious officials, at the age of thirty. He wrote prayers, letters,
> responses to questions, books of spiritual meditation and instruction,
> books of law for the new dispensation, commentaries on prayers, Qur’an
> and hadith.13 Emblematically for the general question of this discussion, it
> is the composition of a Qur’an commentary that officially marks the begin-
> ning of the Babi zuhur or dispensation and the Baha’i era. The commentary
> was on the twelfth Sura of the Qur’an, the Sura on Joseph referred to above
> by its distinctive title, Qayyum al-asma’ (QA). Before describing this work
> in detail, it will be important to discuss briefly the writings of the Bab
> which were composed prior to this epoch-making commentary, what has
> been referred to by Baha’ullah as ‘the first, the mightiest and the greatest of
> books.’
> We do not know exactly how many works the Bab wrote before he
> composed the QA, which he began on the evening of May 22, 1844/5
> Jumada al-Awwal, 1260. Two works stand out because they are datable
> from internal information. The older of these two, ‘The Epistle on Spiritual
> Wayfaring’ (Risalat al-suluk) is a relatively brief presentation of the crucial
> elements of living a godly life. It contains numerous quotations from the
> Qur’an in support of its main argument and also numerous hadiths, largely
> 
> In fact, this is a term of odium theologicum coined by their opponents. The school itself prefers
> Kashfiyya as a designation. Kashf is a Qur’anic term that means disclosure and is meant to
> convey a method of knowing that combines reason and suprarational modes. One may translate
> it as ‘the Intuitionists.’ The derisive intent of the term Shaykhiyya depends upon the mistrust of
> Sufism and its shaykhs in the immediate milieu and implicitly charges that the Imam has been
> replaced by a mere shaykh by the ‘Shaykhyis.’ Nonetheless, scholars continue to refer to the
> Shaykhis, the Shaykhiyya and so on instead of the Kashfiyya.
> MacEoin, Sources for Early Babi Doctrine.
> 164      COMMUNITIES OF THE QUR’A N
> 
> from the Shia-akhbar corpus. Thus, the various speakers of the text are:
> God, through the Qur’an, the Prophet and the imams, through the hadith,
> and the Bab, as author of the brief epistle. Another voice is also referred to
> and possibly evoked in the process – that of the aforementioned Sayyid
> Kazim Rashti. The author, the Bab, counsels his reader to look to the writ-
> ings of his ‘dear teacher’ for a more complete discussion of the matters at
> hand.14
> In the next work, Baqara, the method is quite traditional.15 And its
> traditional structure, form and content will stand out in marked contrast
> later when we describe the Bab’s next major work, the QA, a work that
> could not be more different from the standard works of tafsir. Baqara
> represents a distinctively Shia version of the category known as tafsir
> bi’l-ma’thur.16
> Three central themes of the work have been identified: (1) religious
> authority – walaya; (2) divine self-manifestation – tajjali; (3) resurrection
> and the Day of Judgment – qiyama. Each of these themes is discussed in
> the tafsir by seizing upon key Qur’anic terms. Frequently, the explications
> of the Qur’an are ranged over a series of hierarchies, both ontological and
> sacerdotal – if one may use such a word. The hierarchies may consist of
> seven, four or three stages in most cases, with a few exceptions. Not every
> verse produces a commentary that contains a hierarchy, but virtually every
> verse is read to speak to walaya in some way or another. The work also
> preserves a certain degree of Shia/Sunni communalism, a feature that is
> largely absent from the second work of interest here – the QA. A central
> concern in both works, however, is the covenant, the Day of Alastu, and its
> renewal. Even though the locus classicus for this important Islamic teaching
> is not encountered until Q 7:172, the Bab makes sure here in his tafsir
> on Sura two that the reader never loses sight of its essential and non-
> negotiable importance.
> 
> L awson, ‘The Bab’s Epistle.’
> What follows is a brief, very general summary of this important pre-advent work by the Bab.
> For a more complete discussion of this unpublished Arabic work, including a description of the
> manuscripts, see Todd Lawson, Intimacy and Ecstasy in Tafsir: The Earliest Qur’an Commentary
> of Sayyid ‘Ali Muhammad Shirazi, the Bab (1819–1950), Leiden: Brill, in press.
> Lawson, ‘Akhbari Shi‘i Approaches to Tafsir.’
> THE QUR’AN AND THE BAHA’I FAITH               165
> 
> In support of the Bab’s own words, which carry something of the
> expressive style of the Shaykhi school, he quotes numerous hadiths or
> Akhbar which are seen to bear directly upon the Qur’anic verse at hand.
> Occasionally, he provides the isnad, but more frequently he does not.
> However, a thorough study of the tafsir discloses that virtually all of the
> traditions adduced in it are found in widely known books of tafsir, espe-
> cially those composed in Safavid times, or in other standard works of
> Shi‘ism. Some hadiths, such as those found in the works of Rajab Bursi
> (1411), became a cause for later condemnation by critics on the charge of
> ‘extremism’ (ghuluw). This charge was also leveled at the founders of the
> Shaykhi school on similar grounds.
> The key Qur’anic term walaya is as good a place as any to begin to
> understand such condemnation. It is a word uniquely suited to the reli-
> gious (spiritual and administrative) program of Twelver Shi‘ism. It stands
> for loyalty to the original covenant, which the Bab says was re-enacted on
> the Day of al-Ghadir when Ali was appointed mawla of the Muslim
> community by Muhammad. It is also useful in articulating the nature of
> the relation between the individual or common believer and the imam, as
> well as the relation of the imam to God. And, as the Qur’an itself says, it
> also characterizes to a very high degree the basic relation between God and
> humanity: God is the wali of the believers par excellence. Walaya has a
> simultaneously rich and restricted semantic field. It stands for allegiance
> and loyalty; it is glossed as ‘love,’ pure and simple, in Shia works. It denotes,
> moreover, intimacy and mutual yearning in the playing out of the more
> purely devotional and mystical aspects of the religion. The mutuality of the
> word is of great significance because it guarantees that the true religious or
> devotional attitude depends upon acknowledging love from a higher source
> and returning the same love in gratitude and yearning. One of the basic
> meanings of the term is also ‘friendship’ and this, again, highlights and
> emphasizes the mutuality inherent in the religious duty indicated in the
> term walaya. This religious duty, furthermore, helps to limit the structure
> of sanctity and prophetic intimacy it houses.
> A Qur’anic trope that is very much at home in the Babi and later Baha’i
> scripture is the poetic use of water to stand for divine love, knowledge,
> mercy and revelation. In Baqara, the Bab loses no opportunity to speak
> 166       COMMUNITIES OF THE QUR’A N
> 
> about the inestimable value of walaya by identifying it with water through
> a series of images expressive of life-giving, restorative and overwhelming
> qualities. The word has simultaneously consoling, nurturing, purifying and
> protective connotations.17 Thus, according to the Bab, walaya is spiritual
> water; it circulates through the cosmos the way water circulates through
> ‘heaven and earth.’ The other two themes most frequently encountered
> require some mention, however limited, to form a picture of this work
> which may be thought a harbinger for what would ultimately be recog-
> nized as the Baha’i faith. In turn, the Baha’i faith may be thought to
> continue a distinctive exegetical conversation on the meaning of such key
> Qur’anic lexical items as walaya, tajalli, qiyama and ‘ahd/mithaq
> (covenant).
> The Babi reception or reading of the Qur’an is apocalyptic and eschato-
> logical. In this, the Qur’anically derived term tajalli plays a dramatic role.
> The term is frequently translated as ‘divine self-manifestation,’ but consid-
> ering its etymology, usage and attendant philological richness, this is a
> fairly bland rendering. It leaves unstated and unremarked the all-important
> notion of divine glory that the term obviously carries in its original Qur’anic
> context in Surat al-A‘raf, Q 7:143, as is captured in the Yusuf Ali transla-
> tion (slightly revised):
> 
> When Moses came to the place appointed by Us, and his Lord
> addressed him, he said: ‘O my Lord! Show (Thyself ) to me, That I
> may look upon Thee.’ God said, ‘By no means canst thou see Me
> (direct); but look upon the mount; if it abide in its place, then shalt
> thou see Me.’ When his Lord manifested His glory on the Mount,
> He made it as dust, and Moses fell down in a swoon. When he recov-
> ered his senses he said: ‘Glory be to Thee! To Thee I turn in repent-
> ance, and I am the first to believe.’
> 
> If we consider the spectrum of Qur’anic usages of the triliteral root J-L-L
> (cf. Q 7:143, 187; 55:67–8; 91:3; 92:2), we note that it combines the ideas
> 
> Lawson, Intimacy. On water and walaya, see Lawson, ‘Friendship.’ On walaya in general, see
> Hermann L andolt, ‘Walayah’; Amir-Moezzi, ‘Notes’; Dakake, Charismatic Community.
> THE QUR’AN AND THE BAHA’I FAITH                         167
> 
> of luminosity, brightness, greatness, strength, beauty and power, as in the
> divine name al-Jalal. Thus, we might even be so bold as to translate the
> above verse as: ‘When the Lord caused His glory to overwhelm the moun-
> tain.’ We dwell on this idea because it is an important element in the specific
> religiosity of Shi‘ism, in the religion of the Bab more pertinently, and
> perhaps most obviously in the tonality of the religious ethos of the Baha’i
> faith, whose founder, after all, is called, the Glory of God, even though a
> different, and as it happens non-Qur’anic word is used in the Arabic title
> Baha’ullah.18 It also helps us to understand the nature of the Babi/Baha’i
> apocalypse, especially when we bear in mind that among the several distin-
> guishing characteristics of the genre of apocalypse isolated by contempo-
> rary scholarship, glory, whether as event or object of contemplation, is a
> standard feature and as such may be traced as a significant motif in the
> Qur’an itself.19
> The imminence of qiyama (a frequent Qur’anic word), or perhaps even
> its presence, was conjured in this tafsir through the use – whether conscious
> or not – of the venerable exegetical tool known as typological figuration.
> This is the process whereby current or recent events are seen as the repeti-
> tion of ancient sacred history in which, for example, spiritual or political
> and cultural heroes are seen to reappear, along with their friends and
> supporters on the one hand, and their enemies on the other.20 Indeed, in a
> work composed later in his short life, the Persian Bayan, the Bab explicitly
> states that his earliest followers, the sodality of eighteen persons known as
> the Letters of the Living (huruf al-hayy) were actually the return (ruju‘) of
> the Fourteen Immaculate Ones mentioned above and the four Gates
> (abwab) or Deputies (nuwab) who collectively formed a link between the
> hidden imam and his community during the period known as the Lesser
> 
> Other frequent markers of glory as light in Baha’i writings, near-synonyms of tajalli, are
> derived from these roots: L-M-‘, L-W-H, N-W-R, SH-R-Q.
> Lawson, Qur’an, pp. 19, 27, 37–41. ‘Glory – Herrlichkeit – theology’ is also a central feature of
> contemporary Roman Catholic thought through the influential work of Hans Urs von Balthasar
> (d. 1988). A comparative study of the ‘sacramental value’ of glory in the two traditions, Islam
> and Christianity, might disclose previously unsuspected channels of communication, mutual
> understanding and commonality.
> Typological figuration, long recognized as an important factor in biblical interpretation,
> begins with the Qur’an for Islam. See Lawson, Qur’an, esp. chs. 3 and 4.
> 168      COMMUNITIES OF THE QUR’A N
> 
> Occultation from (874–941).21 Here we see a kind of Shia variation on
> the well-known Sufi institution of the ‘substitutes’ (abdal). Thus does the
> spiritual reality of the original friends of God (awliya’ullah) recur through-
> out history in subsequent generations in worthy individuals who are then
> enabled to carry on the promulgation (tabligh) of the cause of God (amr
> allah).22
> 
> THE TAFSIR SURAT YUSUF, KNOWN
> AS THE QAYYUM ALASMA’ QA
> 
> To call the QA a ‘swerve’ may be something of an understatement; but in
> the present context it is at least accurate. It may be that the spiritual visions
> and encounters experienced by the Bab around this time account for the
> profound shift. This is especially the case with the powerful vision said to
> have occurred in April 1844 that may have diverted his attention from
> completing the full tafsir he had been contemplating, leaving us with
> Baqara as fragmentary evidence of an original desire to write a commen-
> tary on the entire Qur’an. This is one swerve. Another swerve, and a more
> significant one, is indicated by the way in which this later work simultane-
> ously maintains and breaks with the tradition of tafsir, most specifically
> Shia tafsir. It should be noted, however, that even though this work nomi-
> nally concerns the twelfth Sura, it actually represents a commentary on the
> entire Qur’an due to its innovative structure.23
> The overwhelming import of this work, which must be thought of as
> disguised in tafsir, is to call attention to a new cycle of history. Accordingly,
> the long-awaited resurrection (qiyama) was now at hand, and this book
> represents the ‘True Qur’an’ expected to be in the possession of the Qa’im
> upon his return (ruju‘). It focuses on the Qur’anic Sura on the biblical
> patriarch Joseph, and is divided into 111 Suras, each with 42 verses, the
> abjad value of the word bala, ‘Indeed!’ which was the response of humanity
> 
> MacEoin, Messiah, p. 171.
> On the Sufi phenomenon, see Chodkiewicz, Seal of the Saints.
> For details, see Lawson, Gnostic, pp. 4, 6 and 39.
> THE QUR’AN AND THE BAHA’I FAITH                    169
> 
> to the question posed by God on the Day of the Covenant, before the crea-
> tion of the universe: ‘Am I not your Lord?’ The most frequent exegetical
> device encountered is paraphrase and the typological figuration introduced
> in the earlier commentary. The overall effect, the composition being entirely
> in rhymed prose (saj‘), is somewhat hypnotic and calls to mind dhikr
> sessions with the added overlay of a definite, non-negotiable – if at times
> bewilderingly multivocal – messianic discourse of mission and summons.24
> The following excerpt is from chapter 108 of QA.25 It is written as a
> commentary on Q 12:109. As in the other 110 Suras of the Bab’s compos-
> ition, it is structured according to four sections. First is the opening and title
> of the Sura, the Qur’an verse as lemma for this Sura of the commentary
> introduced with the standard basmala. The second part is the actual compo-
> sition, which is almost always introduced with a distinctive set of discon-
> nected letters as the first verse. Some of these disconnected letters – as in
> the present case – spell a word when joined (here ‘Muhammad’), while
> others are more along the lines of the Qur’anic exemplar.26 The third section
> of the Sura includes this second verse of the Bab’s versified commentary. It
> continues for the majority of the verses and represents the main substance
> of a given Sura. The final or fourth section is usually marked by a reiteration
> of the lemma, only this time paraphrased to emphasize the main message of
> the third section. In this example, however, such reiteration and paraphrase
> of the lemma is sparse. We have attempted to distinguish the Bab’s words
> from words of the Qur’an by casting the latter in small caps.
> 
> The Sura of the Servant
> in the name of god the merciful the compassionate
> nor did we send before thee [as messengers] any but men
> whom we did inspire – men living in human habitations. do
> they not travel through the earth and see what was the end
> of those before them? but the home of the hereafter is best,
> for those who do right, will ye not then understand?
> 
> Ibid.
> The following is excerpted and adapted from Lawson, ‘Súrat al-’Abd.’ The opening Qur’an
> translation is that of Yusuf Ali.
> A chart of these disconnected letters is in Lawson, Qur’an, pp. 144–5.
> 170      COMMUNITIES OF THE QUR’A N
> 
> Verse 1
> Mim Ha Mim Dal
> 
> Verse 2
> O People of the throne!27 Listen to the call28 of your Lord, the
> merciful,29 He who there is no god except him (huwa),30 from the
> tongue of the remembrance,31 this youth (al-fata),32 son of the Sublime
> (al-‘aliy)33, the Arab to whom [God has] in the mother book34 testified.35
> 
> Verse 3
> Then listen36 to what is being revealed to you from your
> lord:37 verily verily i am god38 of whom there is no god but
> him.39 nothing is like unto him40 while He is God, Lofty (‘aliyan)
> Great (kabiran).41
> 
> Verse 4
> O People of the Earth! hearken42 to the call43 of the birds44 upon
> the trees45 leafy and perfumed46 with the camphor47 of Manifestation
> Q 27:2 and passim.
> Cf. Q 19:3.
> Q 20:90.
> Q 2:163 and passim.
> Q 15:9 passim.
> Cf. Q 21:60.
> Q 2:255 and passim. A frequent instance of paronomasia in QA associating the Bab with ‘Ali
> and God which derives from a cognate theme in Ithna-’ashari Shi‘ism.
> Q 3:7; 13:9; 43:4.
> Cf. Q 17:78.
> Q 20:13.
> Q 33:2
> Q 28:30: inní aná ’lláh is frequent in QA. It suggests that the Bab is claiming revelation.
> Q 2:163 and passim.
> Q 42:11. See Lawson, ‘Súrat al-’Abd,’ p. 137 for the identification of the hadith evoked here.
> Q 4:34.
> Q 2:93 and passim.
> Cf. Q 19:3.
> Cf. Q 27:16 and passim.
> Cf. Q 7:19; 24:35; 28:30.
> Cf. Q 6:59; 7:22; 20:12.
> Cf. Q 76:5.
> THE QUR’AN AND THE BAHA’I FAITH                         171
> 
> (kafur al-zuhur) describing this young man (ghulam)48 descended from
> the Arabs, from muhammad,49 from ‘Ali, from Fatima, from Mekka, from
> Medina, from Batha’,50 from ‘Iraq with what the merciful51 has mani-
> fested (tajalla)52 upon their leaves, namely that he is the sublime
> (al-‘aliy)53 and he is God, mighty,54 praised.55
> 
> Verse 36
> O People of the Cloud! listen56 to my call from the lamp57 in this
> whitened lamp,58 this is the glass59 in this reddened glass60 who was
> spoken to (mantuqan) in truth by the sea of the Earth of Saffron61 in the
> house of the gate.62
> 
> Verse 37
> verily verily i am god,63 he whom there is no god except
> him.64 indeed, i have established the heavens and the earth
> around this Word65 through a single letter like it. So obey My Word.
> for verily verily i am the truth. There is no god except Me, the
> Exalted (al-‘aliy)66 who am by God the comprehender of all the worlds.67
> 
> Q 12:19.
> Q 3:144; 33:40; 47:2; 48:29.
> Name of the hollow or center of Mecca where the Ka’ba is located.
> Q 1:1 and passim.
> Q 7:143.
> Q 2:255 and passim.
> Q 48:19.
> Q 4:131.
> Q 2:93 and passim.
> Q 24:35.
> Q 24:35.
> Q 24:35.
> Q 24:35.
> Ard al-za‘farán, a spiritual realm referred to by, for example, Ibn Arabi in his major work the
> Kitáb futúhát al-Makkiyya. For further details, see Lawson, Intimacy.
> Cf. Q 2:58; 4:154; 5:23; 7:161; 9:25.
> Q 28:30.
> Q 59:22, 23 and passim.
> Cf. Q 3:39 and passim.
> Q 16:2; 20:14; 21:25. For variations in the mss. here, see Lawson, ‘Súrat al-’Abd,’ p. 144.
> Cf. Q 4:108 and 126.
> 172      COMMUNITIES OF THE QUR’A N
> 
> Verse 38
> and listen68 to this Most Mighty interpretation69 from the
> tongue70 of this man made great, he whom I have brought up in My
> presence. no human desire touched him71 in Reality. Verily, he is the
> Truth72 upon the Truth.73 And his significance, by the law of fire,74 has
> been fully recorded in the mother book.75
> 
> Verse 39
> And Say, by the Truth, we have sent before you no men [as
> messengers] except we inspired them; be ye the people of that
> blessed township,76 and conceal yourselves in the earth of the heart
> (fu’ad) in order to help him. Know that for those who deny him (mushrikin
> bihi),77 they will suffer the dire punishment of the Hereafter78 over the
> Fire79 in the Fire,80 and this has been written81 with Fire.82
> 
> Verse 40
> And He is God, over all created things a Witness.83
> 
> Verse 41
> And verily, God is Comprehender of all the worlds.84
> 
> Q 7:204; 22:73.
> Ta’wil, cf. Q 3:7; 12:6 and passim.
> Cf. Q 20:27.
> Cf. Q 3:47; 3:174; 19:20; 24:35.
> Q 2:91 and passim.
> Q 27:79.
> Cf. Q 27:8; 2:24 and passim.
> Q 3:7; 13:39; 43:4.
> Cf. Q 12:109.
> Q 9:7 and passim.
> Q 11:103 and passim.
> Cf. Q 27:8; 2:24 and passim.
> Cf. Q 27:8; 2:24 and passim.
> Cf. Q 7:157.
> Cf. Q 27:8; 2:24 and passim.
> Q 4:33; 33:55.
> Cf. Q 4:108, 126.
> THE QUR’AN AND THE BAHA’I FAITH           173
> 
> Verse 42
> And verily thou art, through God, self sufficient, able to dispense
> with all the worlds.85
> 
> With this excerpt, we gain some appreciation of the manner in which the
> Bab mined the apocalyptic substrate in the rich metaphorical, figurative
> and tropic terrain of the Qur’an. He did this in order to generate, through
> metalepsis, a new scripture – a new apocalypse. Many of these tropes and
> metaphors, similes and allegories became symbols of the returned imam,
> and his retinue whose task was, among other things, to usher in the Day of
> Judgment. The symbolism and structure of this composition bespeaks a
> singular literary accomplishment in which the primordial Day of the
> Covenant and the Day of Judgment are understood to be joined in a single
> gesture of revelation as simultaneous events.
> 
> A NONMUSLIM COMMUNITY OF THE QUR’AN
> 
> The Baha’i reception of the Qur’an disturbs the traditional, and some
> would say comforting ‘us and them,’ paradigm so common to much of post-
> Qur’anic Islamicate discourse, despite clear attempts on the part of the
> Prophet, the Qur’an and countless creative Muslim exponents to vitiate
> this age-old and deleterious tendency afflicting humanity. Indeed, the
> Qur’anic pronouncement in Q 7:172 would seem to trump all past, present
> and future attempts, and such othering. This is the much referred to and
> beloved controlling myth or metaphor of primordial unity in which all
> future generations of the Children of Adam – a Qur’anic synonymn for
> humanity – were brought forth from the loins of Adam and presented
> with the ultimate question from God, in whose divine and peaceful pres-
> ence this same humanity was now gathered: ‘Am I not your Lord?’ The
> gathering immediately responded in unison with the strongest possible
> affirmation: ‘Yes indeed!’ In addition to this primordial and eschataologi-
> cally charged event, during which both consciousness and history are born,
> 
> Cf. Q 3:97; 29:6.
> 174        COMMUNITIES OF THE QUR’A N
> 
> there are numerous other Qur’anic passages which insist upon the unity of
> humanity, the oneness of God and the oneness of what we, writing in
> English, are inclined to call ‘religion.’ These three unities have characterized
> what may be thought of as the Baha’i da‘wa from its very inception. They
> remain, moreover, a prominent watchword in Baha’i self-identity, ethos
> and doctrine. Unity is the central ideational sacrament in the Baha’i faith,
> just as it is in Islam.
> The Baha’i faith may be seen, then, as a non-Muslim community of the
> Qur’an. I venture to say that this is a unique identity found nowhere else
> on the planet but in the Baha’i community. Such uniqueness demands crit-
> ical analysis and patient study. The anomaly has been explained in the
> Baha’i writings by comparing the relation of the Baha’i faith to Islam with
> a model provided by a specific understanding of the relationship between
> Christianity and Judaism. As with many communities of the Qur’an before
> them, the Babi/Baha’i reading of the Qur’an depends upon a figurative
> reading of the Qur’an. (One may well ask, can there be any other kind?)
> The result here, as with other communities, is an innovative and creative
> application of the Qur’an to specific concerns in a specific historical and
> cultural context. From the literary angle, this may be referred to as meta-
> lepsis in that the resulting reading carries the focus far beyond accepted
> boundaries by, for example, using existing metaphors in ever-new figurative
> constructions and transforming the habitual hermeneutic circle into a
> spiral. It seems that the guardian of the Baha’i faith, Shoghi Effendi, was
> referring to the effects of this metaleptic process in the introduction to his
> history of the first century of the Baha’i faith:
> 
> I shall seek to represent and correlate, in however cursory a manner,
> those momentous happenings which have insensibly, relentlessly,
> and under the very eyes of successive generations, perverse, indiffer-
> ent or hostile, transformed a heterodox and seemingly negligible
> offshoot of the Shaykhi school of the Ithna’ashariyyah sect of Shia
> Islam into a world religion.86
> 
> Shoghi Effendi Rabbani, God Passes By, p. xii.
> THE QUR’AN AND THE BAHA’I FAITH                        175
> 
> With the above examination of the place of the Qur’an in the Baha’i faith
> we have a clearer idea of the earliest stages of such a process and we see that
> the Qur’an plays a major role in it. Much work remains to be done to
> acquire a complete understanding of the Qur’an in the Baha’i faith. For
> example, one of the more interesting ways in which the faith venerates and
> promulgates the Qur’an is in prayer. Prayer comprises an enormous amount
> of Baha’i literature. This would appear to be a relatively untouched area of
> inquiry. The Baha’i celebration of the Qur’an as a non- or post-Islamic reli-
> gious gesture says, among other things, that the Qur’an belongs to human-
> ity. Perhaps, as the Baha’i community progresses in carrying out Shoghi
> Effendi’s instruction to thoroughly study the Qur’an, the community itself
> will become more and more aware of its debt to the Islamic revelation and
> therefore be more and more able to seriously consider in which ways it is
> and is not an Islamic religion.
> 
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> — *The Qur'an and the Baha'i Faith (Used by permission of the curator)*