- 1867-09-03 —
Bahá'u'lláh revealed the Kitáb-i-Badí', the Munájátháy-i-Síyám (Prayers for Fasting), the first Tablet to Napoleon III, the Lawh-i-Sultán written to Násiri'd-Dín Sháh, and the Súriy-i-Ra'ís. [BKG245; GBP172]
- The Súriy-i-Ra'ís was published in the Summons of the Lord of Hosts. See Wikipedia for a synopsis of this Tablet.
- See RB2:370–82 for details of the Kitáb-i-Badí'.
- Bahá'u'lláh revealed the Súriy-i-Ghusn (Tablet of the Branch) in which 'Abdu'l-Bahá's future station was foreshadowed. [BBD218; BKG250; GPB177; GWB39]
- See RB2:338–9 for a description of the Tablet.
- It was probably about this time that the first Lawh-i-Salmán was revealed for Shaykh Salmán. [RoB2p281-290; Uplifting Words ]
- 1868-00-00 —
During this period Bahá'u'lláh revealed a number of Tablets to rulers including the Lawh-i-Ra'ís to `Alí Páshá, His second Tablet to Napoleon III and Tablets to Czar Alexander II, Queen Victoria and Pope Pius IX. [BBD13]
The writings of Bahá'u'lláh during this period, as we survey the vast field which they embrace, seem to fall into three distinct categories. The first comprises those writings which constitute the sequel to the proclamation of His Mission in Adrianople. The second includes the laws and ordinances of His Dispensation, which, for the most part, have been recorded in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, His Most Holy Book. To the third must be assigned those Tablets which partly enunciate and partly reaffirm the fundamental tenets and principles underlying that Dispensation. [GPB205-206]
- See Wikipedia for a synopsis of Law-i-Ra'ís..
- The Súriy-i-Haykal (Súrih of the Temple) was also revealed in Adrianople, and later recast after His arrival in `Akká. In this version He incorporated His messages addressed to individual potentates -- Pope Pius IX, Napoleon III, Czar Alexander II, Queen Victoria, and Násiri'd-Dín Sháh. Bahá'u'lláh instructed it to be written in the form of a pentacle, symbolizing the human temple. See the Introduction Summons of the Lord of Hosts pgi.
- An Introduction to the Súratu'l-Haykal (Discourse of The Temple) by Mohamad Ghasem Bayat.
- President Grant of the United States was in office when Bahá'u'lláh addressed a Tablet to the `Rulers of America and the Presidents of the Republics therein'. Copied below is a list of other heads of state of the Americas who were contemporary with Bahá'u'lláh in 1872-1873 as compiled by Bahá'í scholar Peter Terry.
[BFA1:80N]
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, president of Argentina; John A. Macdonald,
prime minister of Canada; Federico Errázuriz Zanartu, president of Chile;
Eustorgio Salgar and Manuel Murillo Toro, presidents of Colombia; Tomás
Guardia Gutiérrez, president of Costa Rica; Buenaventura Báez, president of
the Dominican Republic; Gabriel García Moreno, president of Ecuador; Justo
Rufino Barrios, president of Guatemala; Nissage Saget, president of Haiti;
Benito Juárez and Sebastián Lerdo de Tejada, presidents of Mexico; José
Vicente Cuadra, president of Nicaragua; Francisco Solano López, president
of Paraguay; Manuel Pardo, president of Peru; Ulysses S. Grant, president of
the United States of America; Lorenzo Batlle y Grau and Tomás Gomensoro,
presidents of Uruguay; and Antonio Guzmán Blanco, president of Venezuela.
...some of the most celebrated passages of that Book (Kitáb-i-Aqdas) to the Chief Magistrates of the entire American continent, bidding them "bind with the hands of justice the broken," and "crush the oppressor" with the "rod of the commandments" of their Lord. Unlike the kings of the earth whom He had so boldly condemned in that same Book, unlike the European Sovereigns whom He had either rebuked, warned or denounced, such as the French Emperor, the most powerful monarch of his time, the Conqueror of that monarch, the Heir of the Holy Roman Empire, and the Caliph of Islám, the Rulers of America were not only spared the ominous and emphatic warnings which He uttered against the crowned heads of the world, but were called upon to bring their corrective and healing influence to bear upon the injustices perpetrated by the tyrannical and the ungodly. [MA91]
- 1870-07-19 —
Franco-Prussian War was a conflict between the Second French Empire of Napoleon III and the German states of the North German Confederation led by the Kingdom of Prussia. The conflict was caused by Prussian ambitions to extend German unification and French fears of the shift in the European balance of power that would result if the Prussians succeeded.
- See KA90 for Bahá'u'lláh's reference to this and KAN121 for `Abdu'l-Bahá's interpretation.
- 1870-09-01 —
Battle of Sedan. Napoleon III suffered defeat at the hands of Kaiser Wilhelm I. It resulted in the capture of Emperor Napoleon III and large numbers of his troops and for all intents and purposes decided the war in favour of Prussia and its allies, though fighting continued under a new French government. Napoleon went into exile in England, where he died in 1873.
- Bahá'u'lláh referred to this in KA86.
- 1873-02-00 —
Bahá'u'lláh completed the revelation of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas in the southeast corner room of the house of `Údí Khammár. [BBD132; BKG351; DH46; GPB213; RB3:275; SA248; BBS145]
- See A Description of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas by Shoghi Effendi.
- There is evidence to suggest that at least some of the work was written earlier as confirmed by the book's reference to the fall of Napoleon III in 1870 and there is further evidence to suggest that parts of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas were revealed as early as 1868. [SA16–17, 248]
- For the significance of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas see BKG351–3, BW15:87–91, GPB213–15 and RB3:275–399.
- For analyses of its significance, content and application, see RB3:275–399 and SA248–52.
- 1903-02-09 — Lua Getsinger made an attempt to take a message from 'Abdu'l-Bahá to Eugénie, former Empress of France but she refused to meet her just as her husband, Napoleon III, had rejected two messages from Bahá'u'lláh. [LGHC80-81]
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