If It Be Your Wish O People To Know

Sources: Gleanings From The Writings Of Baha'u'llah

If it be your wish, O people, to know God and to discover the greatness of

His might, look, then, upon Me with Mine own eyes, and not with the eyes

of any one besides Me. Ye will, otherwise, be never capable of recognizing

Me, though ye ponder My Cause as long as My Kingdom endureth, and meditate

upon all created things throughout the eternity of God, the Sovereign Lord

of all, the Omnipotent, the Ever-Abiding, the All-Wise. Thus h ve We

manifested the truth of Our Revelation, that haply the people may be

roused from their heedlessness, and be of them that understand.



Behold the low estate of these men who know full well how I have offered

up Mine own Self and My kindred in the path of God and for the

preservation of their faith in Him, who are well aware how Mine enemies

have compassed Me about, in the days when the hearts of men feared and

trembled, the days when they hid themselves from the eyes of the loved

ones of God and of His enemies, and were busied in ensuring their own

security and peace.



We eventually succeeded in manifesting the Cause of God, and exalted it to

so eminent a position that all the people, except those who cherished

ill-will in their hearts against this Youth and joined partners with the

Almighty, acknowledged the sovereignty of God and His mighty dominion. And

yet, notwithstanding this Revelation whose influence hath pervaded all

created things, and despite the brightness of this Light, the like of

which none of them hath ever beheld, witness how the people of the Bayan

have denied and contended with Me. Some have turned away from the Path of

God, rejected the authority of Him in Whom they had believed, and acted

insolently towards God, the Most Powerful, the Supreme Protector, the Most

Exalted, the Most Great. Others hesitated and halted in His Path, and

regarded the Cause of the Creator, in its inmost truth, as invalid unless

substantiated by the approval of him who was created through the operation

of My Will. Thus have their works come to naught, and yet they failed to

perceive it. Among them is he who sought to measure God with the measure

of his own self, and was so misled by the names of God as to rise up

against Me, who condemned Me as one that deserved to be put to death, and

who imputed to Me the very offenses of which he himself was guilty.



Wherefore, do I plead My grief and My sorrow to Him Who created Me and

entrusted Me with His Message. Unto Him do I render thanks and praise for

the things He hath ordained, for My loneliness, and the anguish I suffer

at the hands of these men who have strayed so far from Him. I have

patiently sustained, and will continue to sustain, the tribulation that

touched Me, and will put My whole trust and confidence in God. Him will I

supplicate saying: Guide Thy servants, O My Lord, unto the court of Thy

favor and bounty, and suffer them not to be deprived of the wonders of Thy

grace and of Thy manifold blessings. For they know not what Thou hast

ordained for them by virtue of Thy mercy that encompasseth the whole of

creation. Outwardly, O Lord, they are weak and helpless; inwardly they are

but orphans. Thou art the All-Bountiful, the Munificent, the Most Exalted,

the Most Great. Cast not, O My God, the fury of Thy wrath upon them, and

cause them to tarry until such time when the wonders of Thy mercy will

have been made manifest, that haply they may return unto Thee, and ask

forgiveness of Thee for the things they have committed against Thee.

Verily, Thou art the Forgiving, the All-Merciful.