April 18, 2024

21 March 2009: The “centenary of...the interment by ‘Abdu’l‑Bahá of the sacred remains of the Báb in their permanent resting place on God’s holy mountain”: - “one of the principal objectives of His Ministry”

This Naw-Rúz marks the centenary of one of the outstanding events in the Apostolic Age of the Bahá’í Dispensation, the interment by ‘Abdu’lBahá of the sacred remains of the Báb in their permanent resting place on Gods holy mountain. In the words of AbdulBahá: The most joyful tidings is this, that the holy, the luminous body of the Báb after having for sixty years been transferred from place to place, by reason of the ascendancy of the enemy, and from fear of the malevolent, and having known neither rest nor tranquillity has, through the mercy of the Abhá Beauty, been ceremoniously deposited, on the day of Naw-Rúz, within the sacred casket, in the exalted Shrine on Mt. Carmel.”

In commemoration of that triumph of the Cause, the members of the Universal House of Justice, accompanied by the members of the International Teaching Centre, have today offered prayers of thanksgiving in the Shrine of the Báb on behalf of the worldwide Bahá’í community, expressing gratitude for the unfailing divine protection vouchsafed to the Cause of God. In their solemn contemplation, their hearts were stirred as they recalled the indelible image of the Master left to posterity when, on this day a hundred years ago, having with His own hands laid that peerless Trust in its final place of repose, He rested His head upon the edge of the blessed casket of the Báb, and “sobbing aloud, wept with such a weeping that all those who were present wept with Him”. They remembered, too, the manifold obstacles with which He had been confronted in constructing this sacred edifice and His unbounded relief at having accomplished one of the principal objectives of His Ministry. 

- The Universal House of Justice  (From a message dated 21 March 2009 to the Bahá’ís of the World; online Baha’i Reference Library of the Baha’i World Center)