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Of a more serious nature, and productive of still greater repercussions, was the unlawful seizure by the Shi'ahs of Iraq, at about the same time that the keys of the Tomb of Baha'u'llah were wrested by the Covenant- breakers from its keeper, of yet another Baha'i Shrine, the House occupied by Baha'u'llah for well nigh the whole period of His exile in Iraq, which had been acquired by Him, and later had been ordained as a center of pilgrimage, and had continued in the unbroken and undisputed possession of His followers ever since His departure from Baghdad. This crisis, originating about a year prior to Abdu'l- Baha's ascension, and precipitated by the measures which, after the change of regime in Iraq, had, according to His instructions, been taken for the reconstruction of that House, acquired as it developed a steadily widening measure of publicity. It became the object of the consideration of successive tribunals, first of the local Shi'ah Ja'fariyyih court in Baghdad, second of the Peace court, then the court of First Instance, then of the court of Appeal in Iraq, and finally of the League of Nations, the greatest international body yet come into existence, and empowered to exercise supervision and control over all Mandated Territories. Though as yet unresolved through a combination of causes, religious as well as political, it has already remarkably fulfilled Baha'u'llah's own prediction, and will, in its own appointed time, as the means for its solution are providentially created, fulfill the high destiny ordained for it by Him in His Tablets. Long before its seizure by fanatical enemies, who had no conceivable claim to it whatever, He had prophesied that "it shall be so abased in the days to come as to cause tears to flow from every discerning eye."
(356:2)
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