Bahíyyih Khánum | Page 9

accepted and endured. Now is she
free; delivered from her chains of care and sorrow; safe from all the
suffering and pain, released from the ills of this nether world. She
rolled up and packed away the years of longing for her mighty Father,
and for Him, her loving and well-favoured Brother, and departed to her
abode in the midmost heart of the Heavens.
This heavenly being, during all the turmoil of her days, did not rest for
a moment, nor ever did she seek quiet and peace. From the beginning
of her life, from her very childhood, she tasted sorrow's cup; she drank
down the afflictions and calamities of the earliest years of the great
Cause of God. In the tumult of the Year of Hin,(35) as a result of the
sacking and plundering of her glorious Father's wealth and holdings,
she learned the bitterness of destitution and want. Then she shared the
imprisonment, the grief, the banishment of the Abhá Beauty, and in the
storm which broke out in 'Iráq--because of the plotting and the
treachery of the prime mover of mischief, the focal centre of hate--she
bore, with complete resignation and acquiescence, uncounted ordeals.
She forgot herself, did without her kin, turned aside from possessions,
struck off at one blow the bonds of every worldly concern; and then,
like a lovelorn moth, she circled day and night about the flame of the
matchless Beauty of her Lord.
In the heaven of severance, she shone like the Morning Star, fair and
bright, and through her character and all her ways, she shed upon kin
and stranger, upon the learned, and the lowly, the radiance of
Bahá'u'lláh's surpassing perfection. Because of the intense and

deep-seated sorrows and the manifold oppressive trials that assailed
her--never failing spring of grace that she was, essence of
loving-kindness--in the Land of Mystery(36) her lovely form was worn
away to a breath, to a shadow; and during the Most Great Convulsion,
which in the years of 'Stress' made every heart to quake, she stood as a
soaring pillar, immovable and fixed; and from the blasts of desolation
that rose and blew, that Leaf of the eternal Lote-Tree did not wither.
Rather did she redouble her efforts, urging herself on the more, to
servitude and sacrifice. In captivating hearts and winning over souls, in
destroying doubts and misgivings, she led the field. With the waters of
her countless mercies, she brought thorny hearts to a blossoming of
love from the All-Glorious, and with the influence of her pure
loving-kindness, transformed the implacable, the unyielding, into
impassioned lovers of the celestial Beauty's peerless Cause.
Yet another wound was inflicted on her injured heart by the aggressions
and violations of the evil-doers within the prison-fortress,(37) yet
another blow was struck at her afflicted being. And then her anguish
was increased by the passing of the Abhá Beauty, and the cruelty of the
disloyal added more fuel to the fires of her mourning. In the midst of
that storm of violation, the countenance of that rare treasure of the Lord
shone all the brighter, and throughout the Bahá'í community, her value
and high rank became clearly perceived. By the vehement onslaught of
the chief of violators against the sacred beliefs of the followers of the
Faith, she was neither frightened nor in despair.
In the days of the Commission of Investigation, she was a staunch and
trusted supporter of the peerless Branch of Bahá'u'lláh, and a
companion to Him beyond compare. At the time of His absence in the
western world, she was His competent deputy, His representative and
vicegerent, with none to equal her. In a Tablet from the pen of the
Centre of the Covenant, addressed to His consort, are these words
referring to His brilliant sister: 'To my honoured and distinguished
sister do thou convey the expression of my heartfelt, my intense
longing. Day and night she liveth in my remembrance. I dare make no
mention of the feelings which separation from her has aroused in my

heart, for whatever I should attempt to express in writing will assuredly
be effaced by the tears which such sentiments must bring to my eyes.'
After the ascension of 'Abdu'l-Bahá to the realm of the All-Glorious,
that Light of the Concourse on High enfolded me, helpless as I was, in
the embrace of her love, and with incomparable pity and tenderness,
persuaded, guided, and urged me on to the requirements of servitude.
The very elements of this frail being were leavened with her love,
refreshed by her companionship, sustained by her eternal spirit. Never
for a moment will her kindnesses, her favours, pass from my memory,
and as the months and the years go by, the effects of them on this
mourning heart will never be diminished.
O Liege Lady