Baha’u’llah declares the absolute equality of the sexes

Baha’u’llah declares the absolute equality of the sexes... Why should woman be deprived of exercising the fullest opportunities offered by life? Whosoever serves humanity most is nearest God — for God is no respecter of gender.

- Abdu’l-Baha, Divine Philosophy, pp. 82-83.

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Two months before his death, Shoghi Effendi sent a cablegram announcing "Purification of Haram-i-Aqdas."

On September 6, 1957, two months before his death, Shoghi Effendi sent a cablegram announcing "Purification of Haram-i-Aqdas." This purification would be completed by the Universal House of Justice with the removal of the remains of Bahá'u'lláh's son Mirza Díyá'u'lláh, which had laid beside his father.

Purification of Haram-i-Aqdas
Announce to Hands and all National Assemblies that following the loss of the appeal to the Supreme Court, the Government expropriation order has been implemented, resulting in the complete evacuation of the remnant of Covenant-breakers and the transfer of all their belongings from the precincts of the Most Holy Shrine, and the purification, after six long decades, of the Haram-i-Aqdas from every trace of their contamination. Measures under way to effect transfer of title deeds of the evacuated property to the triumphant Bahá'í community.
--Shoghi
[Cablegram, September 6, 1957]

The "purification" is described in pages 248 and 249 of The Bahá'í World: Volume 13 (1954-1963)...

In April, 1957 Shoghi Effendi announced to the Bahá'í world that an expropriation order relating to the "entire property owned by Covenant-breakers within the Haram-i-Aqdas" had been issued by the Treasury Department of the Government of Israel and published in the Israel Official Gazette. Behinds this lay a hard and protracted struggle, waged in the Guardian's name by Leroy Ioas, Hand of the Cause in Haifa and Secretary-General of the International Bahá'í Council. An appeal against the appropriation order was made by the Covenant-breakers to Israel's Supreme Court, but on June 3, 1957 Shoghi Effendi cabled the triumphant news that the order had been upheld, "enabling the civil authorities to enforce the original decision and proceed with the eviction of the wretched remnants of the once redoubtable adversaries . . ." On September 6, 1957 a further cable announced their "complete evacuation . . . and the purification . . . of the Haram-i-Aqdas from every trace of their contamination." At long last the Qiblih of the Bahá'í world had been cleansed and the way opened to fulfill, in future decades, the Guardian's vision for the construction of a "stately and befitting Mausoleum designed to enshrine the holiest Dust the earth ever received into its bosom."
It had been Shoghi Effendi's wish to direct in person the razing of the buildings evacuated by the enemies of the Cause, but this was not to be, and it fell to the Hands of the Cause in Haifa to carry out this task. It was their first endeavour, and by December, 1957 no trace of the buildings was left. They then proceeded to enlarge the gardens of the Haram-i-Aqdas according to the Guardian's plan, covering the site of the buildings entirely, and raising the third terrace he had planned toward the east, above the two he himself had completed. To the east of the Mansion a long strip of garden was planted, comprising four thousand square metres, also part of the Guardian's plan.
The Hands succeeded, moreover, in effecting the Guardian's purpose to transfer the title deeds of this evacuated property "to the triumphant Bahá'í community." In a deed of sale from the State of Israel, thirteen separate titles for the Shrine of Bahá'u'lláh , the Mansion of Bahjí, and all the newly-acquired properties were transferred to the name of the Israel Branch of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá'ís of the United States.
Thus did the Sign of God on earth achieve ascendancy in his last hours, glorifying his ministry, and fulfilling one stage of his own promise for the World Centre of the Faith: "Resistlessly will this Divine institution flourish and expand, however fierce the animosity which its future enemies may evince, until the full measure of its splendour will have been disclosed before the eyes of all mankind."

It should be noted that in this text Shoghi Effendi is called "the Sign of God on earth," which is what the term "Ayatollah" means.
Also, the "thirteen separate titles" include some property that a November 12, 1952 cablegram sent by Shoghi Effendi announced as "acquisition of vitally-needed property" of the Mansion of Bahji and the area around it from "the Development Authority of the State of Israel...The exchange of said property, including land and houses, was made possible by the precipitate flight of the former Arab owners."
The "purification" would continue under the Universal House of Justice, who on November 11, 1965 sent a cable announcing the "removal from immediate precincts (of the) holy shrine (of) Bahá'u'lláh remains (of) Mirza Díyá'u'lláh."

26 Purification of the Most Holy Shrine of Bahá'u'lláh, the Qiblih of the Bahá'í World 11 NOVEMBER 1965
To all National Spiritual Assemblies
26.1 ANNOUNCE BAHA'I WORLD REMOVAL FROM IMMEDIATE PRECINCTS HOLY SHRINE BAHA'U'LLAH REMAINS MIRZA DIYA'U'LLAH YOUNGER BROTHER MIRZA MUHAMMAD ALI HIS ACCOMPLICE IN EFFORTS SUBVERT FOUNDATIONS COVENANT GOD SOON AFTER ASCENSION BAHA'U'LLAH. THIS FINAL STEP IN PROCESS PURIFICATION SACRED INTERNATIONAL ENDOWMENTS FAITH IN BAHJI FROM PAST CONTAMINATION WAS PROVIDENTIALLY UNDERTAKEN UPON REQUEST FAMILY OLD COVENANT BREAKERS A PROCESS WHOSE INITIAL STAGE WAS FULFILLED BY ABDU'L-BAHA WHICH GATHERED MOMENTUM EARLY YEARS BELOVED GUARDIAN'S MINISTRY THROUGH EVACUATION MANSION ATTAINED CLIMAX THROUGH PURIFICATION HARAM-I-AQDAS AND NOW CONSUMMATED THROUGH CLEANSING INNER SANCTUARY MOST HALLOWED SHRINE QIBLIH Bahá'í WORLD PRESAGING EVENTUAL CONSTRUCTION BEFITTING MAUSOLEUM AS ANTICIPATED BELOVED SIGN GOD ON EARTH.
UNIVERSAL HOUSE OF JUSTICE

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Covenant-Breaking in Chile

Since our last letter to you, news has reached us of the activities of the supporters of Mason Remey in Latin America. A cablegram was received from the National Spiritual Assembly of Chile informing us that Fabienne Guillon, long-time member of the Chilean and Regional Assembly, and the other members of the Local Assembly of Loncoche, Chile, had accepted the claims of Remey...

...We must all redouble our vigilance and intensify our efforts to combat the spread of their evil influence wherever we find it.

We are preparing a letter to all National Spiritual Assemblies on this subject, and the significance of that June 4, 1957 cable of Shoghi Effendi. We are sending a special letter to Latin America including the above, but also giving them some background to share with the friends on the significance of Covenant-breaking so they will be better able to resist their insidious efforts.

https://bahai-library.com/uhj_ministry_custodians&chapter=6#371

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UHJ asking funds from Baha'is

It is impossible at this stage to give an accurate estimate of the cost of these projects. All that we can now say is that in the immediate future two objectives have to be met: to accumulate rapidly a reserve of fifty million dollars on which plans for the construction can realistically begin to be implemented, and to provide an income of between twenty and twenty-five million dollars for the Bahá’í International Fund for each of the next ten years. As the work proceeds, contracts are signed and costs can be accurately determined, further information will be announced.

The great work of constructing the terraces, landscaping their surroundings, and erecting the remaining buildings of the Arc will bring into being a vastly augmented World Center structure which will be capable of meeting the challenges of coming centuries and of the tremendous growth of the Bahá’í community which the beloved Guardian has told us to expect.

(THE UNIVERSAL HOUSE OF JUSTICE, 31 August 1987)

https://www.bahai.org/library/authoritative-texts/the-universal-house-of-justice/messages/19870831_001/1#842030855

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Mashriqu'l-Adhkar in Samoa was built at a cost of $6,500,000 !!!

On September 1, 1984, the Mashriqu'l-Adhkar in Samoa was dedicated. Built at a cost of $6,500,000, it was one of the achievements of the Seven Year Plan.

https://bahai-library.com/pdf/r/rabbani_achievements_seven-year_plan.pdf#page=2

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Concerning Hindu prophecies of the coming of Baha'u'llah

"Concerning Hindu prophecies of the coming of Bahá'u'lláh and the relationship of the Hindu and Bahá'í Faiths, nothing authentic and specific is available at the World Centre, apart from the Guardian's statement in God Passes By that 'To Him the Bhagavad-Gita of the Hindus had referred as the "Most Great Spirit," the "Tenth Avatar", the "Immaculate Manifestation of the Krishna"', (p. 95); and a brief reference to Bahá'u'lláh as 'to the Hindus the reincarnation of Krishna . . .' (p. 94). Bahá'í teachings on progressive revelation do, of course, bear on the relationship of these Faiths. In a letter written on behalf of the beloved Guardian it is also written that 'We cannot be sure of the authenticity of the scriptures of Buddha and Krishna . . . ' (November 25, 1950); and in reply to a question as to whether Brahma is 'to be considered as referring to absolute diety' and Krishna 'as the Prophet of the Hindu Religion', his secretary wrote '. . . such matters, as no reference occurs to them in the Teachings, are left for students of history and religion to resolve and clarify.' (April 14, 1941)"

(From a letter dated September 1, 1977 written on behalf of the Universal House of Justice to an individual believer)

https://bahai-library.com/compilation_scriptures_previous_dispensations

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The Hidden Words

The Hidden Words was written around 1857, after Bahá'u'lláh's two year study with Sufi sheikhs. Bahá'u'lláh had left Baghdad for the mountains of Kurdistan on April 10, 1854, and returned to Baghdad on March 19, 1856. He spent those two years using the name Darvish Muhammad-i-Irani studying with various Sufi sheikhs. His studies with the Sufis led to his writing the Four Valleys in 1857 and Seven Valleys in 1860. Both books are usually published together and their contents are largely based on the experiences he had as Darvish Muhammad-i-Irani. Similarly, the Kitáb-i-Íqán, written in 1861, contains many themes common to Sufi teaching. Finally, Bahá'í cosmology is largely a reflection of Sufi cosmology.

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Baha'u'llah's message is thus the only key...

It is through Him, Who is the sole Mouthpiece of God in this age, that spiritual realities and truths have been once more reinterpreted and revealed afresh to mankind. Bahá'u'lláh's message is thus the only key to a true understanding of the mysteries that envelop man's spiritual life.

(From a letter dated 1 September 1935 written on behalf of Shoghi Effendi to an individual believer)

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Taraz'u'llah Samandari

On September 2, 1968, Ṭaráẓu’lláh Samandarí, a Hand of the Cause of God, died. Born in Qazvin to a prominent Bahá'í family, he was the son of Kázim-i-Samandar, an Apostle of Bahá’u’lláh, and his grandmother had accompanied Ṭáhirih. In Acre, Ṭaráẓu’lláh Samandarí’s sister, Thurayyá Khánum, was married to Bahá’u’lláh’s younger son Mírzá Díyá’u’lláh, and she and her husband would eventually both be declared Covenant-breakers for their support of Mírzá Muhammad 'Alí in his conflict with 'Abdu'l-Bahá. After his death in 1898, Díyá'u'lláh was initially buried next to his father at the Shrine of Bahá'u'lláh at the Mansion of Bahjí. However, having been declared a Covenant-breaker, Díyá'u'lláh's remains were disinterred in a "process" of "purification" through "cleansing" the "inner sanctuary" of the "most hallowed shrine," the "Qiblih" of the "Bahá'í World."

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Indigenous North Americans and pre-Columbian Americans were savages...

Consider this Canadian country during the early history of Montreal when the land was in its wild, uncultivated and natural condition. The soil was unproductive, rocky and almost uninhabitable—vast forests stretching in every direction. What invisible power caused this great metropolis to spring up amid such savage and forbidding conditions? It was the human mind. Therefore, nature and the effect of nature’s laws were imperfect. The mind of man remedied and removed this imperfect condition, until now we behold a great city instead of a savage unbroken wilderness. Before the coming of Columbus America itself was a wild, uncultivated expanse of primeval forest, mountains and rivers—a very world of nature. Now it has become the world of man. It was dark, forbidding and savage; now it has become illumined with a great civilization and prosperity. Instead of forests, we behold productive farms, beautiful gardens and prolific orchards. Instead of thorns and useless vegetation, we find flowers, domestic animals and fields awaiting harvest. If the world of nature were perfect, the condition of this great country would have been left unchanged.

If a child is left in its natural state and deprived of education, there is no doubt that it will grow up in ignorance and illiteracy, its mental faculties dulled and dimmed; in fact, it will become like an animal. This is evident among the savages of central Africa, who are scarcely higher than the beast in mental development.

http://reference.bahai.org/en/t/ab/PUP/pup-101.html

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The savage tribes of central Africa

The savage tribes of central Africa are evidences of this. Left in their natural condition, they have sunk to the lowest depths and degrees of barbarism, dimly groping in a world of mental and moral obscurity. If we wish to illumine this dark plane of human existence, we must bring man forth from the hopeless captivity of nature, educate him and show him the pathway of light and knowledge, until, uplifted from his condition of ignorance, he becomes wise and knowing; no longer savage and revengeful, he becomes civilized and kind; once evil and sinister, he is endowed with the attributes of heaven. But left in his natural condition without education and training, it is certain that he will become more depraved and vicious than the animal, even to the extreme degree witnessed among African tribes who practice cannibalism. It is evident, therefore, that the world of nature is incomplete, imperfect until awakened and illumined by the light and stimulus of education.

- Abdul Baha

http://reference.bahai.org/en/t/ab/PUP/pup-101.html

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While Baha'i sources attribute Nabil's death to suicide, other sources claim he was murdered.

On September 3, 1892, a few months after Bahá'u'lláh's death, Nabíl-i-A’ẓam, the author of The Dawn-breakers, died. Parts of his body and clothing were found washed up on the coast in Acre. While Bahá'í sources attribute his death to suicide, other sources claim he was murdered.
Sources that allege Nabíl-i-A’ẓam was murdered base their claim on the allegation that he became a victim due to his support of Mírzá Muhammad `Alí in his conflict with 'Abdu'l-Bahá...

According to the memoirs of Baha’s son Mirza Badiullah surnamed the Most Luminous Branch (غصن انور) by Baha: One year after Baha’s death, Nabil visited Badiullah in Haifa. He was distressed. Nabil said to Badiullah: “I can no longer stay at Acre. The situation there has deteriorated. By dint of violence, abusive language and cursing, one has to act against his own faith, has to regard and hold the Most Mighty Branch [Ghusn-i Azam, i.e. Abdul Baha Abbas] superior in station to the Blessed Beauty [Janab-i Mubarak, i.e. Baha] has to write corrupted [versions of] all the holly writings and epistles, and has to vilify and excommunicate [Baha’s] sons, [Baha’s] words and [Baha’s] family [i.e. all the members of Baha’s household in opposition to Abdul Baha Abbas], failing which one is branded as covenant-breaker [Naqiz] or Vacillator [Mutezalzil, i.e. opposed to Abdul Baha Abbas and partisan of Muhammad Ali] and becomes the object of untold calumnies and falsehoods.” Nabil requested Badiullah to find him a suitable room at the foot of Mount Carmel. He went back to Acre to fetch his things. Nothing was heard of him for sometime. Later “limbs of his body and his clothing” were discovered near the see shores at Acre. These were collated together and buried. Abdul Baha Abbas “shed crocodile tears” during the burial service of Nabil, “although he was exceedingly annoyed with him.”

From the Encyclopædia Iranica article titled "NABIL-E AʿẒAM ZARANDI, MOLLĀ MOḤAMMAD"...

NABIL-E AʿẒAM ZARANDI, MOLLĀ MOḤAMMAD (ملّا محمد نبیل اعظم زرندی), Persian Bahai poet, teacher, and chronicler of Babi history (b. Zarand, 18 Ṣafar 1247/29 July 1831; d. ʿAkkā, Palestine, 10 Ṣafar 1310/3 September 1892).
Nabil converted to Babism around 1847 and in 1858 accepted the faith of Bahāʾ-Allāh. Born into a humble family in Zarand, he received traditional education in his childhood and worked as a shepherd in his youth, when he converted to Babism (Zarandi, p. 434). Later in his life, he studied the writings of the Bāb and became well versed in both Islamic and Bahai literature.
During his years as a Babi, Nabil traveled to Lorestan, Kermanshah, Tehran, and Khorasan; he met with the Babis and Babi leaders in those provinces to foster the Babi ideology and inspire the believers to arise, consolidate, and expand the new Babi communities. He also transcribed and distributed Babi literature among the rank and file of the society to promote the Babi faith. He was jailed in Sāva for four months because of his pro-Babi activities. In September 1854, he set out for Baghdad and Karbala, where he stayed until October 1856. During late 1856 to July 1858, he traveled to Hamadan, his hometown Zarand, and many major Babi communities in the capital province and returned to Baghdad on 19 July 1858 (Rafati, pp. 30-31).
Nabil was one of the Babi leaders who claimed to be the promised messianic figure according to the Bāb’s prophecies, but he withdrew his claim when he recognized Bahāʾ-Allāh’s status as the fulfillment of the Bāb’s predictions and the leader of the Babis (Taherzadeh, p. 202). Nabil became one of Bahāʾ-Allāh’s earliest followers, in 1858 in Baghdad.
Nabil’s life as a Bahai is summed up in his extensive travels throughout Iran, Iraq, Turkey, the Caucasus, Egypt, and Palestine. In his early travels as a Bahai, he met with the Babi communities to invite them to the Bahai faith; he attracted the Babi leaders to the recognition of Bahāʾ-Allāh as the fulfillment of the Bāb’s prophecies concerning the promised messianic figure and helped reinforce the belief of the new Bahais in the teachings and principles that were being advanced by Bahāʾ-Allāh. Through these activities, Nabil turned into an outstanding teacher, defender, and promulgator of the Bahai faith.
While Nabil was in Khorasan in spring 1866, at his suggestion, the greeting Allāho abhā (God is the most glorious) was adopted by the followers of Bahāʾ-Allāh, replacing the old salutation of Allāho Akbar (God is the greatest), which was common among the Babis (Shoghi Effendi, p. 176). This was a significant action that gave group identity to the Bahais and was a sign of their independence from the Babis and the Azalis, a Bābi faction that considered Mirzā Yaḥyā Ṣobḥ-e Azal (d. 1912) as the legitimate successor to the Bāb.
Nabil was the first Bahai to perform pilgrimage (ḥajj) to the house of the Bāb in Shiraz in fall 1866, in accordance with the rites prescribed in the Surat al-ḥajj revealed by Bahāʾ-Allāh. He also went to Baghdad and performed the pilgrimage to the House of Bahāʾ-Allāh in spring 1867, according to another sura witten by Bahāʾ-Allāh for that purpose (Rafati, p. 36). Nabil’s pilgrimage to those two houses marked the inception of pilgrimage laws ordained by Bahāʾ-Allāh later in his Ketāb-e aqdas (Shoghi Effendi, pp. 176-77).
Another historic mission undertaken by Nabil under Bahāʾ-Allāh’s instruction was his travel to Egypt to appeal to the officials for the release of several Bahais who had been imprisoned in Cairo at the instigation of their enemies (Shoghi Effendi, p. 178). Nabil’s mission resulted in his own imprisonment for two months in Cairo in spring 1868 and then in the Alexandria jail for a few more months. After being released, Nabil traveled to Cyprus and Beirut, and then he joined Bahāʾ-Allāh’s exiled community in Acre (ʿAkkā) in late October 1869. He spent much of the last two decades of his life in Acre and its surrounding areas.
After the passing of Bahāʾ-Allāh in 1892, Nabil was chosen by ʿAbd-al-Bahāʾ to prepare a text for recitation in his tomb (Shoghi Effendi, p. 222). Nabil selected four passages from Bahāʾ-Allāh’s own works and composed the text, which is known as the Ziārat-nāma (ʿAndalib 18/71, summer 1999, pp. 19-20). The impact of the passing of Bahāʾ-Allāh on Nabil was so great and inconsolable that he drowned himself in the sea at Acre circa 10 Ṣafar 1310/3 September 1892. He is buried in the Acre cemetery.
Nabil was the recipient of a number of Bahāʾ-Allāh’s best-known works, including Surat al-dam (1866), Surat al-ḥajj, for the house of the Bāb in Shiraz (1866), and Surat al-ḥajj, for the house of Bahāʾ-Allāh in Baghdad (1867).
When Shoghi Effendi (d. 1957) designated nineteen prominent early Bahais as the “Apostles [Ḥawāriyun] of Bahāʾ-Allāh,” Nabil was one of them (The Baháʾí World III, pp. 80-81). The title signifies the recognition of distinguished services that those nineteen loyal and devoted Persian Bahais have rendered to their faith.
Nabil’s works are in poetry and prose. He was a gifted, prolific poet, who devoted most of his poetry to the historical events in the Babi and Bahai faiths. His most famous poem in couplet form (maṯnawi) about the history of the Bahai faith was published as Maṯnawi-e Nabil Zarandi in Cairo in 1924 in 65 pages and reprinted in Langenhain in 1995. In this maṯnawi he describes major historical events from the early days of the Babi movement to the year 1869. His second maṯnawi, in 666 verses, deals with Bahāʾ-Allāh’s banishment from Edirne to Acre. Other historical poetry of Nabil consists of his maṯnawi titled “Maṯnawi-e weṣāl wa hejr” in 175 verses (pub. in Rafati, 2014, Chap. 6; Ḏokāʾi, p. 416) and his maṯnawi on the life of Āqā Moḥammad Nabil Akbar Qāʾeni in 303 verses (Ḵušahā-i az ḵarman-e adab wa honar 13, pp. 108-16). In addition to those maṯnawis, Nabil left behind a great collection of poetry in different forms, only a fraction of which has been published.
Nabil’s works in prose include a treatise on the Babi-Bahai calendar, a treatise on Bahai inheritance laws (Fāżel Māzandarāni, IV pp. 1, 214), and his account on the event of the passing of Bahāʾ-Allāh (Nabil Zarandi, Maṯnawi-e Nabil Zarandi, Langenhain, 1995, pp. 67-108). But Nabil’s most celebrated work is Maṭāleʿ al-anwār, an extensive historical narrative of the Babi faith, written in Acre in 1888-90, which was edited and translated into English by Shoghi Effendi as The Dawn-Breakers. The work was first published in the United States in 1932.
Maṭāleʿ al-anwār, the most authentic and the main primary source on the early history of the Babi movement in Iran, is regarded by the Bahais as the definitive account of the Bāb’s dispensation. The work has been translated into many languages, and it has played a major role in familiarizing the Bahais around the world with the historical background of their faith and helping them understand its link to the socio-religious climate of the Persian society in the early days of its development. The original Persian manuscript of Maṭāleʿ al-anwār, preserved at the International Bahai Archives in Haifa, comprises 1,014 pages of 22-24 lines.
Bibliography:
ʿAbd-al-Bahāʾ, Memorials of the Faithful, tr. and annotated Marzieh Gail, Wilmette, 1971, pp. 32-36.
Abu’l-Qāsem Afnān, Ḵušahā-i az ḵarman-e adab wa honar 7, 1996, pp. 58-75.
Bahāʾ-Allāh, Āṯār-e qalam-e aʿlā, Tehran, 1996, IV, pp. 59-67, 75-99.
The Baháʾí World: A Biennial International Record III, New York, 1928-30.
H. M. Balyuzi, Baháulláh the King of Glory, Oxford, 1991 (see index).
Idem, Materials for the Study of the Babí Religion, Cambridge, 1918, pp. 351-57. Neʿmat-Allāh Ḏokāʾi Bayżāʾi, Taḏkera-ye šoʿarā-ye qarn-e awwal-e Bahāʾi,” 4 vols., Tehran, 1970-73, III, pp. 410-35.
ʿAbd-al-Ḥamid Ešrāq Ḵāvari, Tasbiḥ wa taḥlil, Tehran, 1973, pp. 77-90.
Fāżel Māzandarāni, Amr wa ḵalq, Langenhain, 1986.
Hušang Goharriz, Ḥawāriyun-e Ḥażrat-e Bahāʾ-Allāh, New Delhi, 2001, pp. 176-91.
Ḵušahā-i az ḵarman-e adab wa honar 7, 1996, pp. 293-98.
Moojan Momen, “The Apostles of Bahāʾ-Āllāh” in H. M. Balyuzi, Eminent Baháís in the Time of Baháulláh: With Some Historical Background, Oxford, 1985.
Mollā Moḥammad Nabil Zarandi, Maṭāleʿ al-anwār: Tāriḵ-e Nabil Zarandi, ed. and tr. Shoghi Effendi, as The Dawn-Breakers: Nabíl’s Narrative of the Early Days of the Baháʾí Revelation, Wilmette, 1974, pp. 433-45.
Ṣadri Nawwābzāda Ardakāni, “Maṭāleb-i dr bāra-ye tāriḵ-e- Nabil Zarandi,” Moṭālaʿa-ye maʿāref-e Bahāʾi, Tehran, 1977.
Payām-e Bahāʾi, no. 126, May 1990, pp. 13-16.
Vahid Rafati, “Nabíl-e-Aʿẓam Zarandí,” Ḵušahā-i az ḵarman-e adab wa Honar 7, 1996, pp. 29-57. Idem, “Tāriḵ-e Nabil Zarandi,” ibid, pp. 76-87. Idem, “Maṯnawi-e Nabil-e Aʿẓam
Zarandi: Dar šarḥ-e ḥālāt-e Janāb Āqā Moḥammad Nabil Akbar Qāʾeni,” Ḵušahā-i az ḵarman-e adab wa honar 13, 2002, pp. 107-19. Idem, ed., Yād-nāma-ye Ešrāq Ḵāvari / Remembrance of Ishráq Khávarí, Madrid, 2014.
Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, Wilmette, 1999.
Adib Taherzadeh, The Revelation of Bahaullah, Oxford, 1974, pp. 202-6.
(Vahid Rafati)
Originally Published: June 29, 2016
Last Updated: June 29, 2016
Cite this entry:
Vahid Rafati, “NABIL-E AʿẒAM ZARANDI, MOLLĀ MOḤAMMAD,” Encyclopædia Iranica, online edition, 2016, available at http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/nabil-zarandi

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The UHJ wrote the NSA of the US that believers do not need "copyright clearance before they may quote from the Sacred Texts"

"The Universal House of Justice has been concerned of late to note an apparently growing impression among Spiritual Assemblies and individual believers in many parts of the world, that they must obtain copyright clearance before they may quote from the Sacred Texts of the Faith in any publication. It has now instructed us to make it clear that the Spiritual Assemblies and individual believers are free to quote in their publications from any of the Writings of the three Central Figures of the Faith or from the writings of the beloved Guardian, whether in the original language or in translation, without obtaining clearance from the copyright holder, unless the copyright holder in the case of a translation is an individual or is a non-Bahá'í institution. It is recognized that this ruling may endanger copyrights, but we feel that this is a risk that must be taken.

"The ruling is made to ensure that the Sacred Scriptures of our Faith and the writings of the beloved Guardian may be freely used by the believers; it does not change the existing requirements for individual believers to submit their works on the Faith for review before publication, neither does it relieve Spiritual Assemblies of their responsibility to protect the dignity of the Faith and uphold the proper standard of reverence in the use of its Sacred Scriptures. Thus, if any Assembly sees that one of the friends is making use of any of the Holy Texts in an unbefitting manner, it should remonstrate with him and, if necessary, require him to stop doing so."

(From a letter written on behalf of the Universal House of Justice to the National Spiritual Assembly of the United States, September 4, 1981)

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UHJ : Babi martyrs not 20,000 but 2,000 to 3,000

On September 4, 2005, the Universal House of Justice wrote a letter "concerning the source of a statement about 20,000 [Babi] martyrs" given that "Some historians think the number of early Babi/Bahá'í martyrs was not 20,000, as 'Abdu'l-Bahá and Shoghi Effendi mentioned numerous times, but 2,000 to 3,000."

https://bahai-library.com/uhj_mazandarani_number_martyrs

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Shoghi Effendi died having violated Baha'u'llah's command

On September 4, 1982, the Universal House of Justice wrote a National Spiritual Assembly reminding that "In the 'Kitab-i-Aqdas' Bahá'u'lláh has stated: 'It is incumbent upon everyone to write his testament." When Shoghi Effendi died in London at the age of 60 from the Asian flu in London where he was shopping for furniture and ornaments for the International Archives building, he did not have a will.

1. Every Bahá'í is Encouraged to Make a Will and Testament

"In the 'Kitab-i-Aqdas' Bahá'u'lláh has stated: 'It is incumbent upon everyone to write his testament. It behooveth him to adorn its heading with the Most Great Name, to testify therein to the oneness of God as manifested in the Day-Spring of His revelation and to set forth such good deeds as he may wish to be realized, that these may stand as his testimony in the worlds of Revelation and of Creation and be as a treasure stored up with his Lord, the Protector, the Trusted One.'"
(From a letter written on behalf of the Universal House of Justice to a National Spiritual Assembly, September 4, 1982)

Shoghi Effendi died having violated Bahá'u'lláh's command in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas that "Unto everyone hath been enjoined the writing of a will." Having no children of his own and having declared every living male descendant of Bahá'u'lláh a Covenant-breaker, Shoghi Effendi left no eligible candidates for the office of Guardian, posing a serious problem given his assertion that "In this Dispensation, divine guidance flows on to us in this world after the Prophet’s ascension, through first the Master, and then the Guardians." He had furthermore stated in The World Order of Bahá’u’lláh that

Divorced from the institution of the Guardianship the World Order of Bahá’u’lláh would be mutilated and permanently deprived of that hereditary principle which, as ‘Abdu’l-Bahá has written, has been invariably upheld by the Law of God. “In all the Divine Dispensations,” He states, in a Tablet addressed to a follower of the Faith in Persia, “the eldest son hath been given extraordinary distinctions. Even the station of prophethood hath been his birthright.” Without such an institution the integrity of the Faith would be imperiled, and the stability of the entire fabric would be gravely endangered. Its prestige would suffer, the means required to enable it to take a long, an uninterrupted view over a series of generations would be completely lacking, and the necessary guidance to define the sphere of the legislative action of its elected representatives would be totally withdrawn.

It is worth reading and reflecting on how Shoghi Effendi describes in God Passes By the misfortunes, illnesses, and deaths of those individuals he had declared Covenant-breakers...

Mohammad Ali Bahai's brother, Mírzá Ḍíya’u’lláh, died prematurely; Mírzá Áqá Ján, his dupe, followed that same brother, three years later, to the grave; and Mírzá Badí’u’lláh, his chief accomplice, betrayed his cause, published a signed denunciation of his evil acts, but rejoined him again, only to be alienated from him in consequence of the scandalous behavior of his own daughter. Mírzá Muḥammad-‘Alí’s half-sister, Furúghíyyih, died of cancer, whilst her husband, Siyyid ‘Alí, passed away from a heart attack before his sons could reach him, the eldest being subsequently stricken in the prime of life, by the same malady. Muḥammad-Javád-i-Qazvíní, a notorious Covenant-breaker, perished miserably. Shu‘á’u’lláh who, as witnessed by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in His Will, had counted on the murder of the Center of the Covenant, and who had been despatched to the United States by his father to join forces with Ibráhím Khayru’lláh, returned crestfallen and empty-handed from his inglorious mission. Jamál-i-Burújirdí, Mírzá Muḥammad-‘Alí’s ablest lieutenant in Persia, fell a prey to a fatal and loathsome disease; Siyyid Mihdíy-i-Dahájí, who, betraying ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, joined the Covenant-breakers, died in obscurity and poverty, followed by his wife and his two sons; Mírzá Ḥusayn-‘Alíy-i-Jahrúmí, Mírzá Ḥusayn-i-Shírázíy-i-Khurṭúmí and Ḥájí Muḥammad-Ḥusayn-i-Káshání, who represented the arch-breaker of the Covenant in Persia, India and Egypt, failed utterly in their missions; whilst the greedy and conceited Ibráhím-i-Khayru’lláh, who had chosen to uphold the banner of his rebellion in America for no less than twenty years, and who had the temerity to denounce, in writing, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, His “false teachings, His misrepresentations of Bahaism, His dissimulation,” and to stigmatize His visit to America as “a death-blow” to the “Cause of God,” met his death soon after he had uttered these denunciations, utterly abandoned and despised by the entire body of the members of a community, whose founders he himself had converted to the Faith, and in the very land that bore witness to the multiplying evidences of the established ascendancy of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Whose authority he had, in his later years, vowed to uproot.
As to those who had openly espoused the cause of this arch-breaker of Bahá’u’lláh’s Covenant Mohammad Ali Bahai, or who had secretly sympathized with him, whilst outwardly supporting ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, some eventually repented and were forgiven; others became disillusioned and lost their faith entirely; a few apostatized, whilst the rest dwindled away, leaving him in the end, except for a handful of his relatives, alone and unsupported. Surviving ‘Abdu’l-Bahá by almost twenty years, he who had so audaciously affirmed to His face that he had no assurance he might outlive Him, lived long enough to witness the utter bankruptcy of his cause, leading meanwhile a wretched existence within the walls of a Mansion that had once housed a crowd of his supporters; was denied by the civil authorities, as a result of the crisis he had after ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s passing foolishly precipitated, the official custody of his Father’s Tomb; was compelled, a few years later, to vacate that same Mansion, which, through his flagrant neglect, had fallen into a dilapidated condition; was stricken with paralysis which crippled half his body; lay bedridden in pain for months before he died; and was buried according to Muslim rites, in the immediate vicinity of a local Muslim shrine, his grave remaining until the present day devoid of even a tombstone—a pitiful reminder of the hollowness of the claims he had advanced, of the depths of infamy to which he had sunk, and of the severity of the retribution his acts had so richly merited.

It should be noted, that because Bahá'í law forbids the "transport the body of the deceased a greater distance than one hour’s journey from the city", Shoghi Effendi was buried at the New Southgate Cemetery in London, far from the Bahá'í holy shrines in Israel. Not far from his grave in Southgate, however, rests Shoghi Effendi's niece Maliheh Afnan, the artist daughter of Ruhangiz Afnan, who Shoghi Effendi had declared a Covenant-breaker for marrying the son of Siyyid Ali Afnan, who 'Abdu'l-Bahá had declared a Covenant-breaker.

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