Tablet of the Sacred Night: Introduction
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see translation

	While it is customary for Bahá'ís to have community gatherings on the evening
 of May22 to celebrate the declaration of the Bab, it is clear that another complex of
individual and group means of celebrating that day was encouraged by Bahá'u'lláh. 
Surprisingly, these practices are especially associated with Bahá'í Sufis or dervishes
(daravish, `urafa'), and involve prayers specifically revealed for this occasion and
the custom of staying up most of the night of the 22nd, praying and chanting
remembrances (dhikr) of God.
	`Abdu'l-Hamid Ishraq-Khavari tells us in his survey of Bahá'u'lláh's Tablets,
Ganj-i Shayigan (Tehran: BPT, 124 B.E.), pp. 209-210, that the "Tablets of the
Sacred Night (Alwah Laylat al-Quds)" were revealed in `Akka by Bahá'u'lláh with
the intention that Bahá'í dervishes or Sufis should treat that night as a festival and
read these Tablets.  
	In his encyclopaedic work, Rahiq-i Makhtum, 2 vols. (Tehran: BPT,  ),
2:296, Ishraq-Khavari identifies the "Sacred Night" as none other than the night of
the Bab's declaration (bi`that), and reaffirms that Bahá'u'lláh said it was good to
stay up that night.	
	Of the Tablets of the Sacred Night, only one has, to my knowledge, been
printed,  (Bahá'u'lláh, "Lawh Laylat al-Quds," in A.H. Ishraq-Khavari, ed., Risalih-
'i Tasbih va Tahlil [New Delhi: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 1982], pp. 174-181).  The
affinities of this short Tablet (which is really an extended supplication to God) with
Sufi thought and practice, are evident.  The first paragraph refers to the sufferings
of the prophets, evoking the Egyptian Sufi mystic `Umar Ibn al-Farid's "Poem of
the Way," which likewise details the tribulations of God's messengers.  Human
beings are characterized as "poor," the word the Sufis humbly used to describe
themselves.  Attaining nearness (qurb) to God and even the divine Presence (liqa')
are mentioned as goals, and the language here is shared between Sufism and
Babism.  
	The Sufi practice of staying up late praying is referred to when Bahá'u'lláh
says, "I beseech Thee to look, O my Beloved, with Thy generous gaze,  upon these
persons, who are sleepless during this Night that Thou hast designated a festival
for Thy creatures, wherein Thou shonest forth by Thy Name, the All-Merciful,
upon the entire contingent world, and wherein the Beauty of Thy Divinity mounted
the Throne of Forgiveness."  In Sufism, such ceremonies were held on the "Laylat
al-Qadr," the Night of Power upon which Muhammad was believed to have
received the Qur'an from the angel Gabriel.  Bahá'u'lláh has moved such
observances to the equivalent night in the Babi-Bahá'í religion, the "Laylat al-
Quds" or Night of Holiness, when the Bab is believed to have revealed himself to
Mulla Husayn Bushru'i.
	The mystical path in Sufism is characterized by a strong emotional
component in worship.  Bahá'u'lláh evokes this aspect of that path when he calls
upon God to "endue their yearning with ardent passion."  Another goal of Sufism
is to attain a mystical knowledge (`irfan) of God.  Bahá'u'lláh in the beginning of
the Most Holy Book makes attainment of such mystical knowledge of God one of
two prerequisites for salvation.  In the Tablet of the Sacred Night, however, he
reminds the Sufis that God singled out His Messengers for the mystical knowledge
(`irfan) of His Self, a reference to the Bahá'í doctrine that the Manifestation of
God stands in the place of the Self of God in the lower realms of being.
	Sufis lay stress on achieving a powerful understanding of God's Unity
(tawhid), which is, again, a repeated theme of this Tablet.  Moreover, they employ
sometimes scandalous metaphors for the spiritual drunkenness they seek, and
Bahá'u'lláh here also evokes these literary themes when he says, "Yes, my Beloved: 
give them to drink of the cup of life from the hand of this Youth in this garden,"
representing himself as the wine-server or "saqi."  He speaks of the supererogatory
worship of the Sufis, urging that they "may make mention of Thee at eventide and
sunrise," though such practices are also urged of all Bahá'ís in the Most Holy
Book.
	Sufis tended to seek to focus all their concentration upon God, finding Him
in all things and using breathing and other meditation techniques to heighten their
awareness of the divine.  These practices are probably alluded to in the phrases,
"that they might not speak save with love for Thee nor draw a breath save with
devotion to Thee nor turn their faces toward any direction save the realm of Thy
compassion and  generosity, nor raise their hands save toward the heaven of Thy
glory and nobility, nor open their eyes save to the marvels of the effulgence of the
lights of Thy joy."  Continual awareness of God, in every word one speaks, in
every breath one takes, in every sight one sees, is an aspiration of mystics in many
traditions, not only Sufis but also the Greek hesychasts, for instance.
	Finally, Bahá'u'lláh refers toward the end of this Tablet to the Bahá'í ideals
of unity,  asking God to remove from the Bahá'í mystics gathered on the Sacred
Night every vestige of "contention" (ikhtilaf).  Their words, he says, should be
such as to guide others to the court of God's love.  The mystics in their devotions
should become "as one soul."  This mystical unity of worshippers mirrors the divine
Oneness (tawhid), reflecting in the sublunar realm an attribute of God Himself.  In
the translation I offer below of this Tablet, I have presented it visually as a prose 
poem or psalm,which I think comes closer to conveying the lyrical quality and 
resort to rhymedprose that characterizes much of it, and underlines that this is a text
 meant to bechanted.
	`Abdu'l-Bahá mentions a similar but distinct custom in Memorials of the
 Faithful (Wilmette: BPT, 1971), pp. 36-38, in his biography of Darvish Sidq-`Ali,
the Bahá'í Sufi and companion of Bahá'u'lláh.
While in the barracks, Bahá'u'lláh set apart a special night
and He dedicated it to Darvish Sidq-`Ali.  He wrote that
every year on that night the dervishes should bedeck a
meeting place, which should be in a flower garden, and
gather there to make mention of God.  He went on to say
that "dervish" does not denote those persons who wander
about, spending their nights and days in fighting and folly;
rather, He said, the term designates those who are
completely severed from all but God, who cleave to His
laws, are firm in His Faith, loyal to His Covenant, and
constant in worship (p. 38).
The date of this commemoration according to Fadil Mazandarani, Amr va Khalq is
2 Rajab of the Muslim calendar.
	The nineteenth century Iranian Bahá'í community was divided into orders,
as was Qajar society as a whole.  There were Bahá'ís of high civil rank associated
with the government, as officials and even provincial governors, known as the
*nawkar* class.  There were Bahá'í `ulama or Learned, who had a seminary
training and often continued to wear the robes and turban of the clergy.  There
were Bahá'í tujjar or great merchants, Bahá'í artisans, and Bahá'í peasants.  Among
these orders were the Bahá'í `urafa' or mystics.  These included eminent believers
such as Darvish Sidq-`Ali, Ahmad Yazdi (the recipient of the Tablet of Ahmad),
and Mishkin-Qalam (a member of the Ni`matu'llahi Sufi order).  The Tablets of the
Sacred Night and the practice of staying up that night and chanting prayers appear
to have concerned this order in particular, though obviously they were available to
all Bahá'ís.  Mystics in the Middle East were known for performing extra acts of
worship, such as "nawafil" or additional obligatory prayers beyond the five, and
the late-night observance of the Declaration of the Bab appears to fall into this
category of supererogatory acts of worship.
	These customs, ordained by Bahá'u'lláh, appear to have ceased in the
twentieth century Iranian community, but it is unclear upon what basis.  Certainly,
if Bahá'u'lláh ordained them, they cannot be abrogated.  Ishraq-Khavari in Ganj,
cited above, says that the practice of staying up all night to chant the Tablet of the
Sacred Night on the anniversary of the Declaration of the Bab was "discontinued."  He
does not, however, say who discontinued it or by what authority. Sociologically, one could
point to the decline of an order-based society and the rise of a class society in
Pahlavi Iran, such that statuses like Bahá'í  learned and mystics ceased to exist as
separate categories with distinctive customs and dress.  Sufism itself declined in
the Middle East as an organized movement, though some groups, such as the
upper-class Ni`matu'llahis, remained as a vigorous minority.  The process in the
1920s and 1930s whereby Shoghi Effendi attempted to wean Bahá'ís away from
dual membership in other religious bodies led to the end of any membership by
Bahá'ís in Sufi orders.  Nor do there appear to have been any special-interest
societies with a mystical tendency within the Bahá'í community, though individuals
with a strong orientation toward `Attar, Rumi, and Bahá'u'lláh's *Seven Valleys*
and other mystical works continued to exist.  (Such a special-interest society could
in principle be formed.)  There is to my knowledge no bar to Bahá'ís informally
gathering together to stay up late the night of 22 May in order to say this and other
prayers.
-- Tablet of the Sacred Night: Introduction (Used by permission of the curator)