BB00155: Alfayn: Al-Khutbata’l-Makhtum bi-Ta’bir’n-num

In the Name of God, the Most Merciful, the Most Compassionate

Praise be unto God Who hath adorned the Tablets of the Book of Separation with the vesture of utterance, and clothed the robe of derivation with the embroidery of preordination—He Who did will, and decree, and ordain, and then did permit, did glorify, and did number what lieth within that Book; whereupon there gleamed forth what shineth resplendent in the temples of dawning, even as it shone from the morn of pre-eternity, through the first letter that followed upon the second, whereby the realms above the veils of mist were illumined, and the abysses beneath the dust of gloom were flooded with radiance from that Light which hath risen from the dawning-place of the Sun of timelessness upon the frames of souls and horizons.

Then did the Sun of the Risings rise and repose upon the horizon of realities beneath the Sinai-tree in the thicket of the Divine Realm. Thereafter the Sun of the Ascendings shone forth, mounting unto that which may ascend to the most subtle heights above the Tree of Glory in the forest of Dominion. Then was the Point of Severance sundered from the billow of conjunction through the mystery of separation, and mounted above the cloud of minuteness on the right of the Tree of Praise in the woodland of the Kingdom. Thence was derivation drawn from the Word of Dissension, as hypocrisy had decreed, and what had advanced turned back unto the ordinance of fulfilment on the left of the Tree of Decree in the grove of Humanity, until it was illumined from the Corner of the White Sign—flashing, shining, circling, revolving, enduring, and perpetuating; adorned with grace, unfolding with precision, dividing and gathering, speaking and causing speech, permitting and seeking leave, chanting within the reed of the First Tree in the land of Divinity.

And I now commemorate it, that the dwellers of Sinai may be thunderstruck, the full moons gasp in wonder, the unifiers be seized with awe, and the compassionate cry aloud; for verily it is, it is—oriental, eternal, lunar, everlasting, essential, self-subsistent, primal, divine, individual, lordly, existent, everlasting, delicate, celestial, merciful—she who hath sung and murmured, transcended and ascended, responded and re-responded, bestowed and received, arisen and stood firm, permitted and made free, proclaiming: “Verily we are of God, and unto God are we returning.”

Then was it illumined from the Corner of the Yellow Sign—glowing, blazing, glittering, shimmering, dividing and diversifying, cubing and becoming fourfold, turning and returning, manifesting and concealing, granting leave and seeking leave, ringing and resounding within the reed of the Second Tree from the First in the land of Power. I commemorate it that the eloquent may bow, the lofty be humbled, the philosophers flee, and the sophists weep; for it is, it is—unattainable, divine, severed, mighty, radiant, luminous in meaning, tremulous in splendor, sanctified in being, exalted in heaven, fragrant, pure, lordly—she who declared: “Verily we are of God, and unto Him are we devoted.”

Then was it sundered in majesty from the Corner of the Green Sign—shining and resplendent, soaring and aspiring, parting and separating, ringing and resonating, singing from the holy leaf of the Greatest Tree in the land of the Kingdom. I commemorate it that the breathers may breathe, the groaners lament, the mourners weep, the charitable bestow; for it is, it is—decreed, empyrean, primal, royal, final, divine, houri-like, paradise-born, heavenly, gardenal, pardisal, shining, archetypal, luminous, tented in light—she who rose and wept and took refuge and proclaimed:

“Verily we are of God, and unto our Lord are we resigned.”

Then was drawn forth what had been restrained, and extracted from the Corner of the Red Sign—flashing and glittering, trembling and quivering, radiant and blazing, rising and surging, dividing and balancing, contending and prevailing, producing her signs in majesty and confirming her tokens in sequence; murmuring and chanting from the Blessed Leaf of the First Tree in the land of Humanity, which hath borne the tokens of Divinity, embraced the stations of Power, displayed the meanings of the Kingdom, and perfected within itself the realities of the mortal realm.

I commemorate it, for verily it is—eternal, creative, everlasting, just, celestial, terrestrial, fiery, airy, watery, earthly, paradisal, effulgent, heavenly, majestic, beatific, beautiful, radiant, decreed, houri-like, lunar, pearly, solar. And if thou sayest it is divine and eternal, thou speakest truth; if thou sayest it is mighty and everlasting, thou hast spoken well; if thou sayest it is of the Kingdom and everlasting, thou hast spoken well; and if thou sayest it is the mortal cry, the Syrian roar, thou hast known and believed—for it is that which hath willed, determined, decreed, permitted, exalted, confirmed, transcended, abided, wept, divided, endured, borne, and stood firm; established upon the Throne and poised thereon; chanted as the birds of holiness warbled in the heaven of paradise; resonated as the hosts of the Sovereign of bees hummed in the shadows of the empyrean boughs; cried out as the cock of form proclaimed in the heaven of the All-Holy; and uttered words of many colors as the peacock of mist unfurled its plumes in the firmament of air, spreading them in the zone of heaven toward the light of the sun—where every flutter reveals a hue of the expanse, and every season manifests a ray of the splendor of Him Who is the Lord of origination and creation.

Glorified be God! It was as though, whenever He moved the wings of His flight, the souls of the pure in heart were drawn unto Him by the gleaming radiance of the colours of His splendour—even as particles of iron are drawn by the magnet to that tablet of polished steel.

And when there descended upon me that Breath wherein the Light of Dawn exhaled and shone forth, it made mention of the birth that had come to pass in the midst of Islam. Then breathed therein the Light of Justice and rose resplendent. His father, ere the Manifestation of that Day, had beheld in a dream that in his hand was a Book irradiated with brightness, wherein the verses of the Qur’an were set apart in blessed chapters that gleamed with the same light that had shone aforetime. It was as though that Book had been moved to utter the words:

“In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful. Ta Sin: the mention of the mercy of thy Lord—He, verily, is the All-Forgiving, the Most Merciful.”

Blessed then be God for this Child—He Who, in the constancy of His piety, was guided by the Ordainer of the spheres and illumined by His grace. For this is indeed a token of the three Names manifested within the souls, and of that primal Covenant whereby the first seed was made to speak, and, if God will, when his appointed day is reached, he shall again cause it to speak; and when God willeth, he shall himself be made to speak forth.

And his father hath named him “Asadu’llah”—the Lion of God—He through Whom the night grew dark, the day was illumined, and the sun of radiance rose resplendent. When the trial is lifted, God shall reveal in that Child what the letter Kaf conceals when the dawn breaketh and the morn breathes forth its fragrance. In the interpretation of what God caused His father to behold in the verses of the Qur’an lieth a mystery that shall be made manifest hereafter, and shall shine with the light of dawn.

Protect him, therefore, O Lord of the Daybreak—Thou Who hast cloven the firmaments and fashioned all creation! And if Thou dost ordain for him another arising, verily a light is his portion amid the darkness of this nether life. Guard him from the deeds of the hypocrites and the discordant, and from that in which men are engulfed—those for whom the thousand stood between the two bas, and by it all the letters were endowed with speech, filling the heavens and the earth and the horizons with the radiance of His light.

Then was leave given that he should fall silent until, when God willeth, he shall again shine forth. Shelter him, then, by that sacred verse of the Qur’an from all that breathes in the night and in the day, when the gloom draweth close—for God is the Light of the heavens and of the earth. The likeness of His Light is as a niche wherein is a lamp; the lamp enclosed in glass; the glass as it were a glittering star, kindled from a blessed tree, an olive neither of the east nor of the west, whose oil well-nigh shineth though no fire touch it—Light upon Light! God guideth unto His Light whomsoever He willeth; and God setteth forth parables for men, for God is Knower of all things.

Yea, the decree of that discourse gleamed from the risings of the Sun of Eternity, then shone forth, illumined, and was moved to speech within the ordinance of that Book—concerning what was asked by the two lords, and what had descended from the surging sea of destiny, radiant as before and newly effulgent. For that “thousand” and then another “thousand” are as the twelve hours of day and the flow of the Pen that inscribeth and dispenseth, until the mighty ones arise—the lofty intellectuals, the partisans of dissension and brilliance, the sages of discernment, and the seers of understanding.

In those two thousands [alfayn] was uttered the Light of Invention; it spake, it was inspired, it dawned resplendent. Verily we are God’s, and verily unto Him shall we return.