In a Tablet addressed to a
Bahá’í in Mázindarán, in which He[‘Abdu’l-Baha] unfolds the meaning of a
misinterpreted statement attributed to Him regarding the rise of the Sun of
Truth in this century, He sets forth, briefly but conclusively, what should
remain for all time our true conception of the relationship between the two
Manifestations associated with the Bahá’í Dispensation. “In making such a
statement,” He explains, “I had in mind no one else except the Báb and
Bahá’u’lláh, the character of whose Revelations it had been my purpose to
elucidate. The Revelation of the Báb may be likened to the sun, its station
corresponding to the first sign of the Zodiac—the sign Aries—which the sun
enters at the Vernal Equinox. The station of Bahá’u’lláh’s Revelation, on the
other hand, is represented by the sign Leo, the sun’s mid-summer and highest
station. By this is meant that this holy Dispensation is illumined with the
light of the Sun of Truth shining from its most exalted station, and in the
plenitude of its resplendency, its heat and glory.”
(Shoghi Effendi, ‘The Dispensation of Baha’u’llah’)
