, as the doctor has an extremely funny way of telling people who oppose his views in the class they are 'excused' ••.. At the first lecture the people are requested not to talk over what they are told with outsiders. An air of mystery is over the whole affair and
17 infinitesimal things are most erroneously magnified and the way in which some matters are minimized in order t o maximize others is truly remarkable; I mean interpretations of the English Bible .... Public talks on reincarnation, evolution and Bible interpretation are given, but the Manifestation is not taught outside the classes or in some private way. A great deal is made of visions; they are seeming Acre, Abbas Effendi, to old man at Acre, that, we are told is Joshua. reincarnated, and others of the household. " The much-made of Eleventh lesson of Dr. Khairullah imparted the following account of Bahaullah's life to the American listeners: "In 1852-1853 the Incarnation of God (Baha) appeared. He left Tehran as an exile in 1852. He was of the family of kings. Went to Baghdad to River Chebar with 7000 prophets Ezkiel (43: 3). Here he manifested himself for five days as the Lord of Hosts, having been previously shaved by a. barber (Isaiah 7: 20) after which he veiled himself; Jesus Christ (Abbas Effendi) as a boy was with him. In 1863 the Sultan invited the Manifestation to visit
18 Constantinople. At this time there were thirty thousand believers. He appeared before the Sultan who asked for proof of his divinity. Baha asked the Sultan if he believed in Muhammad. The Sultan said that he did, and Baha asked for a sign. The Sultan replied that the Quran was a proof. Baha then wrote a book larger than the Quran in six hours as a sign of his own divinity." That a man of the knowledge and learning of Dr. Khairullah should make such wild statements in a Ieoture and the educa ted Americans of this age of light and rationalism should adopt a new faith on the basis of such fictitious stories, is incomprehensible and passes all understanding. Bahaullah was never admitted to the presence of the Sultan of Turkey. It is an historical untruth. The Holy Quran cannot even be recited in six hours, much less to write a hook bigger and larger than it in that time. And where is that miraculous book? It exists not among the known writings of Bahaullah. The poet has very rightly said ;"0, what a tangled web we weave, When first we practise to deceive." The Bah ai Creed, as shown in the foregoing pages, was a religio-political movement which provoked, on the one side, the wrath of the
19 Muslim Ulama who pronounced the sentence of heresy against them, and, on the other side, it aroused the Government of Persia to take necessary administrative action and incarcerate the Bab in the fort at Maku. It may be remarked in passing that the Bab had inculcated on his followers riotous and turbulent means for the achievement of their object. Wrote Abdul Baha in his Makoteeb, vol 2, page '266 :
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i. e. At the time of the appearance of the Most High Bab, the teaching of the Bayan, briefly, was that heads of the people should struck off, books and scriputres should be consigned to the flames, houses and buildings should be razed to the ground, and, with the exception of those who believe in the Bab, all others should Le ruthlessly massacred. The followers of the Bab held a Conference at Badasht in Khurasan, in 1264 A. H., under the guidance of Mirza Husain Ali, j\lulla Muhammad Ali, Mulla Husain of Bushraweh and Qurrat-ul-A'fu, to discuss and deliberate upon the further course of their action. It
20 was resolved that they should assemble at Maku, and liberate the Bab by force of arms; and in order to wreak their vengeance on the Muslim Ulama for their sentence of heresy, it should be declared that the Law of Islam had been abrogated. It was purely a retaliatory measure, this abrogation of the Law of Islam, and Bahaullah confessed it in clear and unambiguous terms:
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e. If the followers of Islam had not refused to acknow