The commotion had assumed such proportions that the _Sh_áh, unable any
longer to ignore the situation, delegated the trusted Siyyid
Yaḥyáy-i-Darábí, surnamed Vahíd, one of the most erudite, eloquent and
influential of his subjects—a man who had committed to memory no less than
thirty thousand traditions—to investigate and report to him the true
situation. 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 Kaw_th_ar, comprising
no less than two thousand verses, so overpowered the delegate of the
_Sh_áh 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 _Sh_íráz, to induce Him to abandon His
ideas, and to conduct Him to Ṭihrán 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 Ḥusayn _Kh_án, who had been
Vahíd’s host during his stay in _Sh_íráz, was compelled to write to the
_Sh_áh and express the conviction that his Majesty’s illustrious delegate
had become a Bábí.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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