The Síyáh-Chál: suffering and renewal

Once during the imprisonment of the Blessed Beauty, I was very insistent to be taken to see Him. Eventually, I was sent to the prison, accompanied by a servant. After the guards had directed us to the place of His confinement, the servant lifted me to his shoulders and carried me. I could see that a steep incline led to a darkened area. We began to descend two flights of stairs which led from a small doorway, but soon our eyes could discern nothing. In the midst of the staircase the Blessed Voice suddenly reached our ears: 'Do not bring Him'. So we returned and waited for the prisoners to be led into the yard.

Suddenly, they brought the Blessed Beauty, Who was chained to others. And what a terrible chain! Because of its galling weight He could scarcely move. For me it was a sad and heart-rending moment. The tribulations of the Blessed Beauty are beyond description and the tongue cannot recount them.

All those who were struck down by the storm that raged during that memorable year in Tihran were Our fellow-prisoners in the Siyah-Chal, where We were confined. We were all huddled together in one cell, our feet in stocks, and around our necks fastened the most galling of chains. The air we breathed was laden with the foulest impurities, while the floor on which we sat was covered with filth and infested with vermin. No ray of light was allowed to penetrate that pestilential dungeon or to warm its icy-coldness.

When Baha'u'llah was thrown into the dungeon, there were many other believers arrested and imprisoned at the same time. The Baha'is had arranged themselves in two rows, one opposite the other. Their feet were shackled, their hands manacled, their necks chained. The prison being an underground room, it was so pitch dark that they could not see each other's face.

They took the friends of God to that prison and would not allow them to shave their heads. There was no bath whatsoever, and their hair grew long. The point is to understand what an affliction it was that the Blessed Beauty endured for four months in that prison. At noon each day, they would take the prisoners outside for an hour, then bring them back down and lock the door.

[One day the Blessed Beauty was relating accounts of the Siyah-Chal prison, saying:]

"The chain around My neck was most painful, but worse and more severe than that was when they would bind both thumbs together behind the back. The hardship of this was far more intense than the chain. The royal guards were watching over Us, but the executioners showed kindness, and one of them brought Me a cup of tea and a cluster of grapes. Since I was in chains and My hands were bound behind Me, I was unable to partake of them.

The available source contains an omission or incomplete wording; sentence boundaries need review.

At the time when all the inhabitants of Teheran had arisen against this Cause and the Blessed Perfection was arrested and thrown into a prison I was a very young child. The jail wherein Baha'u'llah was imprisoned was a dark and gloomy cell, underground, and had no aperture, and no window save a small door.

From Neyaveran to Teheran that pure spirit, who was brought up on a bed of down, was forced to run, with bare head and bare feet, under chains and fetters, and, in a dark and narrow subterranean prison, he was placed with murderers, thieves, criminals, malefactors; at every moment a new torture was inflicted upon him and at every moment his martyrdom was expected by all.

When this Wronged One was beneath chains and fetters in the Land of Ta, two days passed during which nothing touched His lips and He possessed not a single coin. At that time He was the Most Affluent of all the world - one whose wealth was attained from the utmost degree of poverty, and who was not saddened or ashamed by abasement and worldly disgrace in the path of the Lord of all being.

Then I heard the blessed voice saying, "Take him away." When I heard his voice I tried to see the Blessesd Beauty, but because of the great darkness I could not. … I saw Baha'u'llah's neck in chains, and another, both chained to the same links, a link about his neck and another about the person who was chained with him. The weight of the chain was so excessive that his neck was bent; he walked with great difficulty, and he was in a very sad condition. His clothes were tattered and battered; even the hat on his head was torn.

A heavy chain was placed about His [Baha'u'llah's] neck by which He was chained to five other Babis; these fetters were locked together by strong, very heavy, bolts and screws. His clothes were torn to pieces, also His headdress. In this terrible condition He was kept for four months.

They seized the body of Baha'u'llah and imprisoned him in Teheran where the ulema met and summoned him to appear before them in the mosque that they might question him and refute his statements. … They became enraged and put him to the torture of the bastinado, inflicting sixty strokes. They condemned him to death and ordered the executioner to come with his instruments of torture to martyr their majestic prisoner. The governor, fearful lest the people should arise to vindicate Baha'u'llah, caused an opening to be made in the wall of the mosque through which Baha'u'llah was taken by night to the governor's house and after a time the order came to liberate him.

Look back, then, and call to mind the days when We were in the prison of the land of Ta---four months in that place---in a captivity the like of which no eye hath ever beheld: laden with fetters and chains.

Day and night, while confined in that dungeon, We meditated upon the deeds, the condition, and the conduct of the Babis, wondering what could have led a people so high-minded, so noble, and of such intelligence, to perpetrate such an audacious and outrageous act against the person of His Majesty. This Wronged One, thereupon, decided to arise, after His release from prison, and undertake, with the utmost vigor, the task of regenerating this people.

One night, in a dream, these exalted words were heard on every side: "Verily, We shall render Thee victorious by Thyself and by Thy Pen. Grieve Thou not for that which hath befallen Thee, neither be Thou afraid, for Thou art in safety. Erelong will God raise up the treasures of the earth -- men who will aid Thee through Thyself and through Thy Name, wherewith God hath revived the hearts of such as have recognized Him."

… During the days I lay in the prison of Tihran, though the galling weight of the chains and the stench-filled air allowed Me but little sleep, still in those infrequent moments of slumber I felt as if something flowed from the crown of My head over My breast, even as a mighty torrent that precipitateth itself upon the earth from the summit of a lofty mountain. Every limb of My body would, as a result, be set afire. At such moments My tongue recited what no man could bear to hear.