|
Assisted by another believer, Haji Shah Muhammad buried the casket beneath the floor of the inner sanctuary of the shrine of Imam- Zadih Zayd, where it lay undetected until Mirza Asadu'llah- i- Isfahani was informed of its exact location through a chart forwarded to him by Baha'u'llah. Instructed by Baha'u'llah to conceal it elsewhere, he first removed the remains to his own house in Tihran, after which they were deposited in several other localities such as the house of Husayn- 'Aliy- i- Isfahani and that of Muhammad- Karim- i- 'Attar, where they remained hidden until the year 1316 (1899) A.H., when, in pursuance of directions issued by Abdu'l- Baha, this same Mirza Asadu'llah, together with a number of other believers, transported them by way of Isfahan, Kirmanshah, Baghdad and Damascus, to Beirut and thence by sea to Akka, arriving at their destination on the 19th of the month of Ramadan 1316 A.H. (January 31, 1899), fifty lunar years after the Bab's execution in Tabriz. (274:2) In the same year that this precious Trust reached the shores of the Holy Land and was delivered into the hands of Abdu'l- Baha, He, accompanied by Dr. Ibrahim Khayru'llah, whom He had already honored with the titles of "Baha's Peter," "The Second Columbus" and "Conqueror of America," drove to the recently purchased site which had been blessed and selected by Baha'u'llah on Mt. Carmel, and there laid, with His own hands, the foundation- stone of the edifice, the construction of which He, a few months later, was to commence. About that same time, the marble sarcophagus, designed to receive the body of the Bab, an offering of love from the Baha'is of Rangoon, had, at Abdu'l- Baha's suggestion, been completed and shipped to Haifa.
(274:3)
|