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| Portrait of Muhammad Shah and his Vizier Haj Mirza Aghasi |
Broad-minded, highly imaginative, zealous by nature,
intimately associated with the court, he, in the course of three interviews,
was completely won over by the arguments and personality of the Báb. Their
first interview centered around the metaphysical teachings of Islám, the most
obscure passages of the Qur’án, and the traditions and prophecies of the Imáms.
In the course of the second interview Vahíd was astounded to find that the
questions which he had intended to submit for elucidation had been effaced from
his retentive memory, and yet, to his utter amazement, he discovered that the
Báb was answering the very questions he had forgotten. During the third
interview the circumstances attending the revelation of the Báb’s commentary on
the súrih of Kawthar, comprising no less than two thousand verses, so
overpowered the delegate of the Sháh that he, contenting himself with a mere
written report to the Court Chamberlain, arose forthwith to dedicate his entire
life and resources to the service of a Faith that was to requite him with the
crown of martyrdom during the Nayríz upheaval. He who had firmly resolved to
confute the arguments of an obscure siyyid of Shíráz, to induce Him to abandon
His ideas, and to conduct Him to Tihrán as an evidence of the ascendancy he had
achieved over Him, was made to feel, as he himself later acknowledged, as
“lowly as the dust beneath His feet.” Even Husayn Khán, [the Governor of Fars]
who had been Vahíd’s host during his stay in Shíráz, was compelled to write to
the Sháh and express the conviction that his Majesty’s illustrious delegate had
become a Bábí.
- Shoghi Effendi (‘God Passes By’)