# Kitab-i-Panj Sha'n

*Exported from [Holy-Writings.com](https://www.holy-writings.com/) on 2026-06-18 — 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: John Walbridge, Kitab-i-Panj Sha'n, bahai-library.com.
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> 
> Kitab-i-Panj Sha'n
> 
> John Walbridge
> 
> Oxford: George Ronald, 1996
> 
> Among the last works of the Bab is a large book consisting of rhapsodies on
> various names of God rendered in the five literary styles into which he
> divided his writings and written in a strange style full of artificial
> constructions from Arabic roots. This work, the Panj Sha'n or "Five Modes,"
> and similar works of the Bab like the Kitabu'l-Asma', are not easily explicable
> to the contemporary mind. The following is a very preliminary examination of
> this odd work. It is based on a quick examination of the work and not a full
> reading of it. I have used the Azali edition published in Iran in the early
> 1960s. It should be noted that there is also a Persian Panj Sha'n, a much
> smaller book, that I have not seen. This is therefore all extremely
> preliminary, and I ask the indulgence of the reader.
> 
> Circumstances of its composition.
> 
> We know exactly when the Panj Sha'n was written: 19 March-4 April 1850. The
> day it was begun was both Naw-Ruz and 5 Jamal, the first day of the seventh
> Babi year and the sixth anniversary according to the lunar calendar of the
> Bab's declaration of his mission to Mull Husayn. That day and on each of the
> following sixteen days he wrote a passage in each of the five styles in
> commentary on a name of God. In the published Azali edition, four parts are
> missing, corresponding to the eighth, thirteen, fifteen, and sixteenth days,
> and the Azal scribe apologizes that one or two other parts are taken from
> manuscripts of lesser authority. Some, though not all, of the parts are
> dedicated to individual believers.
> 
> We know these particulars not from the text itself but from a document
> published at the end of the Azal edition. This is evidently the Bab's
> correspondence log for the period 19 March-20 June 1850. It consists of
> entries separated by horizontal lines. Each entry gives the name of God for
> that day (of which more later), the number of the day in the Babi month, the
> day of the week in the conventional Arabic name and the Babi name, and notes
> about what the Bab wrote on each day and what was dispatched to believers.
> The whole is firmly dated by a heading giving the opening date in both the
> lunar and Babi calendars. There are certain minor difficulties relating to the
> dating, but nothing that casts doubt on the authenticity of the document.
> 
> The notes on the Bab's writings are divided into three columns. The first is
> headed, "that which was sent down from God most high" contains a note of the
> general content of the Bab's writing that day. This gradually dwindles from a
> long paragraph on the first day to a few words or nothing later in the
> document. Beginning on the second day, the second column contains a briefs
> statement about the amount and type of writing on that day. For example on
> day 2, on which the Bab revealed a chapter in each of the five styles on the
> theme, "God is unique," we read, in commentary on the name 'unity' revealed in
> the five modes. That which flowed from the Pen of God was five sheets." The
> third column, "that which ascended unto God most high by the Primal Point,"
> seems to be notes concerning outgoing correspondence, with addressees
> indicated by abbreviations and numbers indicating the number of sheets. In
> some cases, the addressees can be identified, but not always.
> 
> The contents of the present book are clearly indicated by the entries for the
> month of Baha, the first month of the Babi year; and it was this that enabled
> the Azali scribe to compile his edition and put the chapters in their proper
> order. After 17 Baha there are no further entries indicating writing in this
> style, evidence that the book as we have it is largely complete.
> 
> The log continues for several more Babi months. Many days are blank except for
> the name of God for that day and the dates. Other days record the writing of
> talisman, prayers, etc. Mid-May saw a burst of correspondence, ending
> abruptly on 14 May. This presumably marks the departure of Sayyh3, the last
> Bab courier to leave Chihriq, who carried the Bab's remaining papers to Mulla
> `Abdu'l-Karim Qazvini. Though the latter part of the month saw considerable
> writing, it was mainly prayers and other such things not necessarily intended
> to be sent immediately to the believers. The last recorded revelation was 1
> Nr/3 June. The last ten days bear the same name of God, "God is most high"
> (Allah A`la). The log ends on Friday, 18 Nur/20 June 1850, apparently the day
> after the Bab reached Tabriz. Most likely Siyyid Husayn Yazdi carried the log
> with him to safety after the execution of the Bab. Presumably it then passed
> into Bahá'u'lláh's hands and was among the Babi manuscripts kept by Azal.
> 
> The historical interest of this document is clear, but its full use must await
> a more determined effort to decipher its cryptic notations.
> 
> The Style and
> Content of Panj Sha'n
> 
> The Panj Sha'n, as I have indicated, consists of 14 sets of passages in each
> of the five styles into which the Bab conventionally divided his revelation:
> 
> verses (ayat)
> 
> prayers (munajat)
> 
> sermons (Khutbih)
> 
> commentary (tafsir)
> 
> Persian (fars) Each day of the month, and presumably year, was assigned a name
> of God. These are all in the elative and are repeated twice:
> 
> al-a'lah al-a'lah
> 
> al-awhad al-awhad
> 
> al-a'had al-a'had
> 
> 4: al-ahy al-ahy
> 
> These are dedicated—sometimes—to particular believers,
> including Dayyan, Azal, Tahirih, Bahá'u'lláh, and—forlornly—the Bab's beloved
> uncle, Haji Mirza Siyyid `Ali, who had been killed a month earlier in Tehran and
> of whose death the Bab was never told. Others are more difficult to identify.
> 
> The book contains nothing that might reasonably be called an argument.
> Instead names of God and invocations are endlessly repeated and varied, often
> in ways unsanctioned by Arabic usage. Syntax is nearly as ideosyncratic.
> Thus, for example, the first page has Allah used as a superlative in the form
> a'lah, an infinitive ilhn, participles mu'talih, mu'lah, and so on. To the
> extent that the book has content, it is not in the form of an extended
> argument but in enraptured rhapsodies about particular themes. Thus the
> sermon on the first day rhapsodizes about the first day of Baha—Naw-Ruz—as the
> "day of God," the name given it by the Bab in the Bayan. It such respects it
> is similar to the Kitabu'l-Asma', written sometime earlier and also arranged on
> a calendrical basis.
> 
> Evaluation
> 
> The question now arises as to why the Bab might have wished to write such a
> book—and why many Babis chose to copy it and the Azalis publish it. As one of my
> Baha' teachers commented about the Kitabu'l- Asma', "After a while a modern person
> gets bored, put down the book, and reads something else." My tentative
> explanation is this:
> 
> In the Persian Bayan viii:14 the Bab commands his followers to recite 700
> verses of the Bayan every twenty-four hours. Bayan in the Bab's usage refers to
> his writings in general, not just to the Bayan proper. Each part of Panj Sha'n
> is about thirty pages long, roughly equalling the requisite 700 verses (a
> verse according to the Bab being forty letters or about a line). Now it also
> seems clear that the Bab envisioned the believer meditating on a different
> name of God each day. Lists are given in the Kitabu'l-Asma' and the
> correspondence log mentioned above (though the lists do not agree). Thus the
> believer, I infer, might fulfil his obligation by reciting one chapter of five
> parts from the Panj Sha'n each day.
> 
> With this the stylistic quirks of the book begin to make sense. The book is
> to be understood as a sort of Babi breviary, a work of devotions not of
> instruction. For this the Bab's style is appropriate. While his style in
> this work may be numbing in large doses, it is unquestionably hypnotic in
> smaller doses. Recited the Panj Sha'n is akin to Sufi dhikr, in which the
> same evocative words are repeated ceaselessly with in this case gradual
> variations. The aesthetic is thus rather modern in certain ways with its
> contempt for convention and rigorous formal rules. Perhaps we should see Panj
> Sha'n as a minimalist work or a sort of devotional Finnegans Wake.
>
> — *Kitab-i-Panj Sha'n (Used by permission of the curator)*