ed the Qayyumu'l-Asma, whose
fundamental purpose was to forecast what the true Joseph (Baha'u'llah)
would, in a succeeding Dispensation, endure at the hands of one who was at
once His arch-enemy and blood brother. This work, comprising above nine
thousand three hundred verses, and divided into one hundred and eleven
chapters, each chapter a commentary on one verse of the above-mentioned
surih, opens with the Bab's clarion-call and dire warnings addressed to
the "concourse of kings and of the sons of kings;" forecasts the doom of
Muhammad _Sh_ah; commands his Grand Vizir, Haji Mirza Aqasi, to abdicate
his authority; admonishes the entire Muslim ecclesiastical order; cautions
more specifically the members of the _Sh_i'ah community; extols the
virtues, and anticipates the coming, of Baha'u'llah, the "Remnant of God,"
the "Most Great Master;" and proclaims, in unequivocal language, the
independence and universality of the Babi Revelation, unveils its import,
and affirms the inevitable triumph of its Author. It, moreover, directs
the "people of the West" to "issue forth from your cities and aid the
Cause of God;" warns the peoples of the earth of the "terrible, the most
grievous vengeance of God;" threatens the whole Islamic world with "the
Most Great Fire" were they to turn aside from the newly-revealed Law;
foreshadows the Author's martyrdom; eulogizes the high station ordained
for the people of Baha, the "Companions of the crimson-colored ruby Ark;"
prophesies the fading out and utter obliteration of some of the greatest
luminaries in the firmament of the Babi Dispensation; and even predicts
"afflictive torment," in both the "Day of Our Return" and in "the world
which is to come," for the usurpers of the Imamate, who "waged war against
Husayn (Imam Husayn) in the Land of the Euphrates."

It was this Book which the Babis universally regarded, during almost the
entire ministry of the Bab, as the Qur'an of the people of the Bayan;
whose first and most challenging chapter was revealed in the presence of
Mulla Husayn, on the night of its Author's Declaration; some of whose
pages were borne, by that same disciple, to Baha'u'llah, as the first
fruits of a Revelation which instantly won His enthusiastic allegiance;
whose entire text was translated into Persian by the brilliant and gifted
Tahirih; whose passages inflamed the hostility of Husayn _Kh_an and
precipitated the initial outbreak of persecution in _Sh_iraz; a single
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