I have trusted in the Lord, the ruling God, exalted above the transcendence attributed to Him by humanity, and sought guidance to Him through His servant, the standing, guiding Imam. From the servant in His possession, subject to the obedience of the guiding and standing Imam for the exaltation of the religion of truth, confessing that he counts as nothing beside his ranks and falls short of their stations, weak and belonging to his Lord as a bondservant; he appeals to his Lord's generosity to answer his supplication, renew his service, and release him from his bondage.
To all who affirm tawḥīd, contentment, submission, and acknowledgement: those who accept the truth in the radiant valley, those of sincere intent who inhabit the luminous mountain, those who affirm the truth in al-Bayḍāʾ, and everyone in the regions and lands. And also to the small faction that has assembled for division, wickedness, and ugly deeds deserving condemnation and expulsion, that has met the Guardian's favors with ingratitude: the people of Cairo, the unfortunate valley, and Fusṭāṭ whose souls have inclined to deception, decline, and abasement; who walk the paths of the devils of the interregnum in dispute, negligence, opposition, and rebellion. Their basest appetites have enslaved them as the trial reaches its completion. The age of unveiling exposes their betrayal, covenant-breaking, and hypocrisy, and their return toward impure elements and the forms of the deniers. Satan has set a seal upon their hearts. They have even held the killing of the people of truth to be permissible, joining apostasy and hypocrisy to rebellion against God. When the period of respite is over, severe punishment will descend upon them.
Leave the honor of the guiding Call, rebellious deniers, you devils! Sink into the humiliation of disobedience, you mendacious deceivers. In a little while, wicked fools, you will see, and the two parties will know who is the one stripped of knowledge, driven back, and astray.
By God, a foolish, leprous intruder has struck his like, shrouding their insight, and has claimed deafness and blindness for those miserable peoples. He has filled his heart and the hearts of men like him with doubt and associationism, flowing like shed blood. May that wretched man's hands perish and theirs with him. Neither he nor they have benefited from the wisdom and knowledge they acquired. These things will testify against them for the abuse, slander, and unjust judgments they directed toward the people of truth. They accepted such treatment of the just Imam, exalted above ignorance and injustice, and beyond what false claimants invent when they distort religion.
Good tidings to the people of truth! This is congratulations on the separation of nations, honoring those who endure patiently, believe, accept, and attain certainty. It is a rebuke to the man whose reason has been taken from him, who after reaching a high station has fallen into a base and distant abode, and a warning to those who turn back from faithfulness to their promise and the truthful messenger and return to the most unfortunate element. They separate themselves from the people of purity and truth: Ibn al-Kurdī and his like among the nations, who neglected their souls, forgot guidance, accepted the ornaments of Satan, and followed falsehood because they doubted truth. They made their own desire their god.
Now then: praise and exaltation to the Lord al-Ḥākim, beyond the analysis of philosophers and theologians, beyond movement, the passage of time, the ordering of ages, and the appointed ends. He originated every movement and moving thing, exalted above the high and sacred stations, whose very inability to describe absolute divinity is disclosed to all worlds. No soul reaches the goal of tawḥīd or points to the meaning of sanctification and praise except through obeying the Qāʾim of Truth, the owner of religion and of promise and warning, accepting his commands and enduring prosperity, hardship, and severe distress in obedience. What falls outside the comprehension of intellect has no demonstrated meaning for those who attempt to speak about it; every emanation of a thing is intelligible only in relation to its origin.
Exalted is the Lord who has made the understanding of the worlds too narrow to encompass His essence, and who has appointed the standing Guardian to watch over nations and to call them to account for the secrets of their hearts and the deeds by which they have disobeyed Him. He rewards obedience and pure deeds and requites their opposites.
Will you not awaken, heedless people headed for destruction—and you, vigilant chosen ones! This address is directed to both parties: it is an awakening and an instruction for each of you according to the reality of his condition. The preacher has exhausted every excuse and conveyed admonitions and distinctions in precious words.
Where will the lying, deceitful small fry of the interregnum flee? Where will the impostor Pharaohs of past cycles go? How will the apostate opponents and obstinate dissidents escape when the flood of the sword and the blaze of burning have approached, when the time comes to destroy the ancient edifices of their vain beliefs, and their land trembles and sinks beneath the signs of their doctrines and schools of genuine doubt and associationism? The land of the oppressive, unjust deniers is consumed from its edges. Winds of divine displeasure strike them for violating religion's sanctity and openly following the impurity of the people of Taym in killing sincere Unitarians.
You wretched creatures whose forms stand before us but whose understanding and insight are absent, whose unlucky souls and doctrines have turned from truth: will you not consider the wisdom of the Creator in sending earthquakes to undermine the ancient House and calamities to destroy mosques, congregational places of worship, and churches? These are signs announcing the overturning of an era and the destruction of its religious laws.
Take warning, neglected creatures, and awaken from sleep, obstinate deniers. How long will you rise against truth and act tyrannically toward its friends? You revolve blindly upon the wheel of the Resurrection like beasts unaware of their motion. How long will you reject the signs of the Resurrection and call them false?
Do you maintain that the thunderbolts falling upon the curtains of the sacred rites and the Holy House, splitting the corner of your sanctuary and the Station, and the destruction of mosques, congregational buildings, and churches in Syria occurred without the command of the knowing Creator? If you say they took place outside His will, you strip Him of His power and deny what is plainly before you. If you admit that they occurred through His command and will, the case of those who summoned you to truth is established against you, for you rejected their proof and killed the obedient friends of the Lord. In this you have outdone the adherents of other religions, just as the impure people of Taym rejected the truth when they killed its trustworthy Caller and incurred the curse.
Where is your refuge or escape now? The appointed terror has drawn close; you have disobeyed the guide, cut the road of truth, killed its followers, and filled the way with fear. Stop wronging people, heedless souls destined for ruin. The reckoning of mankind has drawn near while they turn aside in heedlessness. No fresh reminder comes to them from their Lord but they listen to it in play. God's command has come; do not seek to hasten it. Glorified and exalted is He above what they associate with Him.
It is time for the earth to tremble, the sky to sway, the mountains to be scattered, and the great heights to boil. The trees of falsehood have borne fruit in the hearts of the nations; their perception is shrouded so that they can no longer discriminate, like grazing cattle. A crust has settled upon their reason, making them deaf and dumb. The harvest of the seeds sown by the Pharaohs is near: the cutting of the things planted by Iblīs in hearts, the uprooting of the accursed tree of Zaqqūm named in scripture, and the removal of the foul sign represented in Daniel's book as the structure of the impure, one-eyed Antichrist. It will be driven from the pleasant and pure place it has usurped into the ruinous, desolate, impure wilderness.
These are indications that the cycle of concealment has reached its completion and signs of the approaching revelation of the light of the standing master, the Imam. They expose the convictions of those whom Iblīs has mastered, who distorted religion for worldly purposes. The souls of the sincere will be distinguished by the substance of holiness, raised through their pure works beneath the canopy of religious wisdom, and will draw out the noble meanings of goodness through the bounty flowing to them from intellect. They ascend through degrees of perfection, rejoicing in certain knowledge. Light rises upon them after the darkness of natural oppression; they are adorned with the jewels of virtue and united with sacred lights. Their substances attain completion and training through intellectual knowledge, remaining in possession of the divine teachings.
When the stars of the cycle rise in flames and burning to abolish the beliefs of wrongdoers and expose the apostates among the people of Taym, the party of obedience, the chosen faithful, shall be distinguished from the party of error, the people of Satan, rebellion, disobedience, and apostasy. Then the signs of fulfillment will come forth and ascend in splendor.
The souls of those who act justly will be exalted by the integrity of their substance, made receptive to the influence of the overflowing, originated Intellect, and joined to permanence beyond dissolution, corruption, and decay. By their pure element and clarity they escape the stains of uncertainty and transitory defects. Through the true acceptance of intelligible forms, certainty, and just discipline, they become capable of receiving still greater grace and remain a stable substance to eternity, marked by spiritual excellences and distinguished from those who turn toward Satan, apostasy, and denial.
The others treated religion as a diversion for falsehood and a game of wrongdoing. God will expose them. They abandoned the obedience of the just and guiding Imam and cast off the covenant of tawḥīd. With their devilishness they accepted the authority of a leprous fool, styling him the god of promises. Through belief in absurdity and impossibility they returned to their impure elements and former stations in the age of distinction, so that their followers may see the shame, humiliation, and wickedness that come of placing themselves outside the bounds of truth. The deceiver who led them astray will be exposed by the decisive proof.
God will destroy them through their own actions. They oppressed the weak people of truth, inflicted temptations and trials upon Unitarians, and, by their lies and covenant-breaking, made possible the abuse and defamation of the faithful. Not one of those traitors has responded to the sayings of the virtuous; none has thought seriously of his own return and the days of judgment and justice. None has disciplined himself through repentance for falsehood and prohibited deeds or reflected upon the Guardian of religion and his judgment of the worlds. How could they, when they have kindled the fire of sedition against Unitarians throughout the cycles?
The evidence for my words lies in the conduct by which they have condemned themselves: even in the age of unveiling, they persist in obstinacy, pretension, rebellion, and disobedience. They give no thought to the day when whoever has claimed a rank without right, invented lies about the pure ranks, and forged falsehood about the Guardian will be exposed. No approach to Him is valid except obedience, submission, reverence, and acknowledgment.
Awaken, you structures doomed to impurity through killing the people of truth and its Callers. Your intellects and insight are emptied out; you have ignored investigation and reckoning, preferred mirages to the pure water of wisdom, and been deprived of the gracious draught. Open your eyes to the clear signs and reflect on how luminous proofs dissolve the bonds of devils and demons and cut the power of deceivers through the sharp swords of miracles.
The lights signaling the end of cycles of deceptive association have begun to shine, exposing their impure, invented beliefs to the nations. This is the unveiling of what had lain concealed beneath pretended divine doctrines, and the manifestation of the men who, though they once knew truth, departed from it and killed its guardians.
Be silent, miserable ones! Lights have flashed in glad tidings to the souls of the truthful. The heights of the blessed people on the right are radiant with the reality of the Manifestation. The sources of life's water flow from the stations of the masters and pour their noble substance over the souls prepared for the truth of religion. Through the might of volition and the perfection of true sovereignty the structures of pretenders and liars are destroyed. After their separation from natural matter the pure souls are united with noble intelligible spiritual beings, and the Active Intellect, the Imam of the Age, is shown in existence.
When the great tempest shakes the world and the thunderbolts of truth sound, the masters and the people of the lofty places will rise to avenge the faithful; the tribes of religion will stand to aid them, and the house of the wicked, the abode of the devils, will be surrounded.
Then the sun of all suns and moons will rise. The Imam of the worlds will appear in the cycles and epochs; his truthful utterance will be heard through the ages, his lights will glitter over the lands, and the sky of wisdom will pour down a shower of support in the meanings of exaltation and the stripping away of attributes. The branches of knowledge will bear the fruits of holiness and submission. The stations of the sincere will be raised through the signs of truth, and those of ignorant deniers will sink. The call will announce the resurrection and judgment of souls; truth and justice will rise with the standing, guiding Imam. Apostates and doubters will lose; they will be seized by their forelocks and feet. The buried girl will be asked concerning the burdens and offenses laid upon her, and for what sin she was killed. Matters will occur that neither ear has heard, nor eye seen, nor heart imagined, for those who hold fast to the exaltation of the Lord al-Ḥākim and submit to Him.
At that time the pure souls of those who know realities will perceive what was hidden. Their power, made manifest in the forms of truth, will reach the highest limits. They will receive likenesses of intelligible things through the Active Intellect, contemplate the noblest beings, and ascend to the highest stations and divine matters in accordance with their acquired knowledge.
Awaken at the call of this sincere guide, neglected little creatures who have rebelled. Open your hearts to understanding if they can still grasp truth. The nations have reached the times inscribed in their books. Their presentation, reckoning, and recompense are near. Yet they are like hollow wood, departing from the road of guidance and staggering drunkenly far from the straight path. They have left the obedience of the standing Guardian to follow the inventions of the pretended Pharaohs, fallen down the steps of abasement, and trampled wisdom beneath the feet of devils. They neither restrain themselves from openly violating the prohibitions nor desist from slander and wrongdoing.
They have soiled the signs of religion with filth and corruption and agreed upon covenant-breaking, doubt, disobedience, and blasphemy. They put off repentance in the belief that the present respite might last. But this age of trial, this greatest and most revealing interregnum, is the time when every soul's works are brought to completion and the worlds are distinguished.
Brothers, the times have passed. The destruction of Satan's party, once thought far away, approaches. Both parties among you have entered the arena of reward and punishment. Listen to the truthful servant, the least servant of the Guardian of the Age and of command.
Know that this is the time of which it was said during the former period of discipline: “He who holds fast to his religion will be like one grasping a burning coal.” The believer will flee with his religion from height to height, that is, from Caller to Caller. Which Caller can he now trust? The true Guardian of the Age. The saying did not refer to a lack of persons claiming to be Callers; it referred to the scarcity of the obedient and the multitude of rebels, traitors, and apostates.
By the possessor of mercy, I read among the well-known writings of truth that, when the Qāʾim appears, the first people he will kill will be those who profess allegiance to him before he turns to the other opponents among creation. Know the justice intended: these are men who profess him with their tongues while disobeying the commands against corruption that came through their religious superiors.
Now is the time when all stand on equal footing in seeking to come forward, while the one who stands over every soul according to what it has earned is the guiding Imam.
Know, brothers, that anyone in this region who claims to be a Caller sent by the servant in possession of his Lord has departed from his command and that of the Guardian of religion and has joined the wicked transgressors. Whoever makes that claim after being warned to refrain from speaking is numbered with the pretended Callers of the interregnum. None of them has authority to command obedience from any Responder.
This letter is my proof against you, and yours against me, before the Lord of the worlds and the Imam of the Unitarians. In this region the Callers are now equal with regard to silence and abstention from claims. No person has power to command or forbid another except in the work of reconciling Unitarians. No one has superiority to his brother except by the wisdom he has preserved, the obedience he has shown to the Guide of humanity, his noble conduct and gifts to faithful brethren, and his continued study of what is accepted and preserved on trustworthy authority. Continue to do good to your brothers and obey the one whom the Imam of your age has ordered you to obey.
Whoever among those claiming to be appointed Callers under my authority hears this instruction and joins the responding Unitarian brethren, regarding himself as no better than any of his brothers except through what he has acquired of wisdom and clear instruction for the salvation of his own soul, is a brother among the brethren. After he acknowledges sincere repentance, pardon may be sought for his earlier negligence and aggression. Whoever refuses this condition has departed from the authority of the Proof of the Guardian of the Age. While they persist in rebellion, all such men are gates of wrath and not gates of mercy. They have risen against the very authority from which their instruction and rank came. The Guardian entrusted them with wisdom, distinguished them by their outward service, and placed them in known localities to reform the community. Instead they mounted the beast of treachery, wickedness, and corruption, exposing the faithful through evil governance to abuse, slander, and the swords of enemies.
When the person they had been ordered to obey wrote forbidding them their wrongs, they turned against him with deceit and devilry and reviled him. The wretched covenant-breaker went to his coarse followers and incited them from his familiar store of poison. They conspired treacherously against the trustworthy shaykh with a pure soul, whom I had sent to discipline and admonish them, and killed him. They ordered others to draw up false written accounts to justify their abandonment of truth. One of them fled toward Syria to his companions in apostasy and persuaded them to aid him. They agreed in opposition and carved an idol of their own making to worship: a calf of flesh, fashioned after their desires, emitting a lowing sound by which they could deceive and mislead those who accepted their wickedness.
God witnesses that, despite what they show outwardly, they are divided against the Guardian of Truth and against one another. Their hearts differ even while they agree in falsehood. Each is an enemy to another and plots his own ruin while pretending to be a friend. They bear their own burdens and burdens added to them, increasing their apostasy through darkness of heart, ignorance of truth and its ordinances, imitation of the devil's tricks, and the spreading of his decorated delusions to deceive mankind.
These are the marks of whoever wanders from truth and persists in ingratitude: his secret condition is exposed. He continues in hypocrisy and obstinacy, invents breaches of covenant, and through ignorance loses the sight he once possessed.
Several years ago I warned you about this age while it was still possible to act, making the truth plain to everyone. I never ceased pressing this matter in private and in public. Whatever wisdom the Qāʾim of Truth, Guardian of the Age, gave me, I placed in epistles, explaining it with all the clarity possible to anyone who looks with justice. Already then, through His success, I understood what would become of some who had once appeared to serve but in this age would break their covenant and turn back after the proof had been presented, rejecting truth and becoming tyrants.
By the truth, whoever abandoned it during the past cycle of concealment and examination has less excuse in my eyes than the one who turns back in the cycle of unveiling after the proofs have been established. The two are indeed the same souls, returning in bodies of covenant-breaking, to be disclosed by their lies and calumnies on the day of judgment. The epistle called The Realities, concerning the discipline of all creatures, bears witness to this, and its copies have traveled throughout the lands.
In that epistle I said, among other things: Brothers, make use of this period of respite. Draw near to your Guardian through righteous works before the pages are folded, the pens dry, the gates of mercy close, speech is sealed, and the gates of wrath open against those who display obstinate opposition. These are the beginning of the signs that the witness-guardians will rise and that the great, guiding news will be revealed. I supplied sound and persuasive proofs. The messenger has only to deliver the clear message. I put my trust in the Guardian of Truth, and seek help through him.
I likewise wrote in Awakening and Good Tidings of the difference between one who rebelled against truth and grew tyrannical and one who turned away from wrongdoing and desisted. There I set out how the foundations of truth are raised through the movements of the religious elements, exposing the pretenders’ confusion between dense, naturally constituted bodies and the subtle meanings of souls. I also laid bare the false beliefs of impure souls, so that reward and punishment might be manifested and the proof established before all peoples through knowledge of themselves and of intelligible realities. These and other matters are recorded in the epistles of the servant in possession of his Lord, so that the signs may be disclosed. He and those who follow him shall testify against those who broke faith and abandoned justice when customary laws were overturned.
This letter is a warning to everyone who has sought and followed the path of truth. It establishes the case against everyone who hears and grasps its meaning. Know, brothers, that God has placed before you the proof of what your own eyes can see. He did not deprive you of people able to explain the course of the ages and the rise of the pretended Pharaohs within religion.
There must be an interval in which God tests the remaining people of truth to reveal whose intentions are sincere. Whoever follows a false pretender who usurps the Guardian's authority will find that truth destroys him and brings punishment upon him.
I am a weak servant, excused for fleeing the company of devils and escaping to the Guardian of the Age, appealing to him for refuge and for judgment against those who oppressed the people of truth and oppressed me. I place my confidence in him on the day of recompense, as the righteous servant Iamlīkhā fled the oppression of the unbelieving Jews and the Creator protected and rescued him. Amid my own weakness, restraint, and forbearance, I have established the proof as far as I was enabled; I fulfilled what was owed to the worthy and even acted generously toward those who rejected truth, stirred up troubles against its people, and turned their backs upon religion for falsehood.
O Lord, this small, weak, humble servant regards himself as nothing beside Your immense favor. He appeals to You, Owner of religion, to help him give thanks for the blessings bestowed upon him. Before You, Guardian of Truth, I disavow the wickedness and corruption introduced by the devils of the interregnum and the fabricated charges with which they have defiled religion and its people.
O Lord, I seek the power of Your authority against every guilty liar and accursed, erring devil who denies the day of presentation and accounting and the manifestation of the Master of the Ages. O Lord, I shelter beneath Your protection from their fraud, and take refuge from their tricks, as they have denied Your favors and lied about the ranks of Your religion and Your friends.
O Lord, separate me from them, for they persist in obstinacy and contention, in foolishness, arrogance, and transgression. Their spiritual disease is too severe for the medicine, their error too entrenched for healing. Neither the study of wisdom nor the preservation of knowledge has cured them. They have not learned from the signs of wisdom nor recoiled from the miracles of truth; they show no reverence for God and come to truth only to fight and harm its people.
O Lord, whoever among them follows me after hearing this letter, whether by speech or action, in order to investigate my news, discover where I stay or go, or pursue my traces, is disowned by the Originator of all and opposed to the God of heaven and earth and the one who judges souls for the crimes they have committed. May God's anger and curse fall upon him to the most distant reaches. You are the judge, my Lord, between him and me, and You wrong no one, not even the weight of an atom.
I entrust the people of faithfulness and truth to God, who knows the secrets of creation and grants victory, in spite of the deniers, to the standing, guiding Guardian of Truth. He suffices me and is the best helper of anyone who trusts in Him, does not abandon His obedience, and speaks with sincerity.
Completed, with praise to God, Possessor of grace and beneficence.