Bahá'u'lláh and the New EraEsslemont, J. E. (John Ebenezer)
Religion
Bahá'u'lláh and the New Era
Esslemont, J. E. (John Ebenezer)
Bahai Faith; Bahá'u'lláh, 1817-1892
came not to send peace but a sword,” and as a matter of fact during the
whole of the Christian era wars and sectarian strifes have abounded.
The Glory of God
The title “Bahá’u’lláh” is the Arabic for “Glory of God,” and this very
title is frequently used by the Hebrew prophets for the Promised One Who
is to appear in the last days. Thus in the 40th chapter of Isaiah we
read:—
Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God. Speak ye
comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her warfare is
accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath received
of the Lord’s hand double for all her sins. The voice of him that
crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make
straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall
be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low; and the
crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain: And
the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see
it together. Isa. xl, 1–5.
Like the former prophecy, this has also been partly fulfilled in the
advent of Christ and His forerunner, John the Baptist; but only partly,
for in the days of Christ the warfare of Jerusalem was not accomplished;
many centuries of bitter trail and humiliation were yet in store for her.
With the advent of the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh, however, the more complete
fulfillment dawned for Jerusalem, and her prospects of a peaceful and
glorious future seem now to be reasonably assured.
Other prophecies speak of the Redeemer of Israel, the Glory of the Lord,
as coming to the Holy Land from the East, from the rising of the sun. Now
Bahá’u’lláh appeared in Persia, which is eastward from Palestine, towards
the rising of the sun, and He came to the Holy Land, where He spent the
last twenty-four years of His life. Had He come there as a free man,
people might have said that it was the trick of an impostor in order to
conform to the prophecies; but He came as an exile and prisoner. He was
sent there by the _Sh_áh of Persia and the Sulṭán of Turkey, who can
hardly be suspected of any design to furnish arguments in favor of
Bahá’u’lláh’s claim to be the “Glory of God” Whose coming the Prophets
foretold.
The Branch
In the prophecies of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Zechariah are several
references to a man called the Branch. These have often been taken by
Christians as applying to Christ, but are regarded by Bahá’ís as referring
especially to Bahá’u’lláh.
The longest Bible prophecy about the Branch is in the 11th chapter of
Isaiah:—
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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