n its pale, was
accompanied by an enormous extension in the volume and the circulation of
its literature, an extension that sharply contrasted with those initial
measures undertaken for the publication of the few editions of
Baha'u'llah's writing issued during the concluding years of His ministry.
The range of Baha'i literature, confined during half a century, in the
days of the Bab and of Baha'u'llah, to the two languages in which their
teachings were originally revealed, and subsequently extended, in the
lifetime of 'Abdu'l-Baha, to include editions published in the English,
the French, the German, the Turkish, the Russian and Burmese languages,
was steadily enlarged after His passing, through a vast multiplication in
the number of books, treatises, pamphlets and leaflets, printed and
circulated in no less than twenty-nine additional languages. In Spanish
and in Portuguese; in the three Scandinavian languages, in Finnish and in
Icelandic; in Dutch, Italian, Czech, Polish, Hungarian, Rumanian, Serbian,
Bulgarian, Greek and Albanian; in Hebrew and in Esperanto, in Armenian, in
Kurdish and in Amharic; in Chinese and in Japanese; as well as in five
Indian languages, namely Urdu, Gujrati, Bengali, Hindi, and Sindhi, books,
mostly through the initiative of individual Baha'is, and partly through
the intermediary of Baha'i assemblies, were published, widely distributed,
and placed in private as well as public libraries in both the East and the
West. The literature of the Faith, moreover, is being translated at
present into Latvian, Lithuanian, Ukrainian, Tamil, Mahratti, Pushtoo,
Telegu, Kinarese, Singhalese, Malyalan, Oriya, Punjabi and Rajasthani.

No less remarkable has been the range of the literature produced and
placed at the disposal of the general public in every continent of the
globe, and carried by resolute and indefatigable pioneers to the
furthermost ends of the earth, an enterprise in which the members of the
American Baha'i community have again distinguished themselves. The
publication of an English edition comprising selected passages from the
more important and hitherto untranslated writings of Baha'u'llah, as well
as of an English version of His "Epistle to the Son of the Wolf," and of a
compilation, in the same language, of Prayers and Meditations revealed by
His pen; the translation and publication of His "Hidden Words" in eight,
of His "Kitab-i-Iqan" in seven, and of 'Abdu'l-Baha's "Some Answered
Questions