To the dismay of the Persian consular authorities who had
believed the Bábí “episode” to have run its course, the community of exiles
gradually became a respected and influential element in Iraq’s provincial
capital and the neighboring towns. Since several of the most important shrines
of Shi‘ih Islam were located in the area, a steady stream of Persian pilgrims
was also exposed, under the most favorable circumstances, to the renewal of
Bábí influence. Among dignitaries who called on Bahá’u’lláh in the simple house
He occupied were princes of the royal family. So enchanted by the experience
was one of them that he conceived the somewhat naive idea that by erecting a
duplicate of the building in the gardens of his own estate, he might recapture
something of the atmosphere of spiritual purity and detachment he had briefly
encountered. Another, more deeply moved by the experience of his visit,
expressed to friends the feeling that “were all the sorrows of the world to be
crowded into my heart they would, I feel, all vanish, when in the presence of
Bahá’u’lláh. It is as if I had entered Paradise…
(From ‘Baha’u’llah’; A
statement prepared by the Bahá'í International Community Office of Public
Information, at the request of the Universal House of Justice and published in
1992)
