Monthly Reflection: Jamal (Beauty) – A Tablet, a Love Letter, and a Love Story

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When I was a child, my mother described the annual Ridvan message as a love letter from the Universal House of Justice to the Baha’is of the world, and it’s a metaphor I’ve never forgotten.

I cherish many parts of this year’s message, particularly the encouraging and uplifting paragraph about not losing hope. The House of Justice writes:

“Beloved friends, however turbulent the times, we urge you not to be apprehensive or disheartened. Abdu’l-Baha counsels us all to rely on the bounties of God, and so to be ‘ever hopeful’, to be ‘firm’ in our hope, and to be ‘the cause of hope to the despairing soul’. When the world’s horizons darken, hope becomes a scarce and precious resource—but one with which the community of the Greatest Name has been richly blessed because of its conviction about the future of humanity and because of what it has learned from its own experience. Multitudes yearn for the hope you can bring to their hearts.”

I was also deeply moved by the description of the “ever-patient, ever-steadfast, ever-resilient” friends in the Cradle of the Faith as a “golden example of a community that has long sheltered the flame of hope”.

In the last Baha’i month, we touched on the suffering of the followers of Baha’u’llah in Iran when we interviewed Mary Darling and Clark Donnelly about the film they co-wrote called Cast Aside the Clouds. It’s a ground-breaking love story that takes place in Iran. Mary explained that even though the romance features a Baha’i protagonist, the film isn’t just for a Baha’i audience–it’s a story for everyone. When asked about the film and its relation to the ongoing persecution of the Baha’is in Iran, Mary told us:

“This is the story of Layla Khosravi, a young Baha’i woman who lives under constant surveillance and systemic erasure in Iran. Though her faith is persecuted in Iran, it is her source of strength. When she meets Dr. Sasan Naderi, a secular neurologist shaped by state ideology, their unexpected connection sparks a quiet reckoning. Their love grows in secret, strained by scrutiny and silence. Finally, when Layla is imprisoned for her beliefs, Sasan is forced to confront the injustice around him. Her courage reshapes his worldview and compels him to stand beside her. That’s all I will say because the rest is a spoiler. 

We wanted to write a story based on real facts from events happening in Iran right now, told as a love story that makes it very approachable and hearable, but also really devastating.” 

Currently premiering in New York City, Los Angeles and Chicago, I am eagerly following the film’s successes and I hope it becomes more widely available soon. (In the meantime, you can enjoy the entirety of our interview, and follow the film’s website for updates).

Continuing on the theme of love, this month we also shared a piece of poetry by Kevin Scow, an indigenous Baha’i, titled “Learning to Love” and we published a short video that lightly animates the words of Baha’u’llah’s Tablet of the Lover to the Beloved.

This wondrous tablet was revealed during His final years in Baghdad. In it, He anticipates the declaration of His prophetic mission, which took place in the Garden of Ridvan in April 1863, by portraying Himself as a mystic Rose appearing in the Garden of Paradise.

This Tablet, as well as others that refer to Baha’u’llah’s Declaration, can be found in the chapter on Ridvan in Days of Remembrance.

My favourite part of the Tablet is the paragraph where Baha’u’llah says:

Hear Me, ye mortal birds! In the Rose-Garden of changeless splendour a Flower hath begun to bloom, compared to which every other flower is but a thorn, and before the brightness of Whose glory the very essence of beauty must pale and wither. Arise, therefore, and, with the whole enthusiasm of your hearts, with all the eagerness of your souls, the full fervour of your will, and the concentrated efforts of your entire being, strive to attain the paradise of His presence, and endeavour to inhale the fragrance of the incorruptible Flower, to breathe the sweet savours of holiness, and to obtain a portion of this perfume of celestial glory. Whoso followeth this counsel will break his chains asunder, will taste the abandonment of enraptured love, will attain unto his heart’s desire, and will surrender his soul into the hands of his Beloved. Bursting through his cage, he will, even as the bird of the spirit, wing his flight to his holy and everlasting nest.

Wishing you much love this Festival of Ridvan!

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Sonjel Vreeland

In her innermost heart, Sonjel is a stay-at-home parent and a bookworm with a maxed out library card but professionally she is a museologist with a background in English Literature. She currently lives on Prince Edward Island, an isle in the shape of a smile on the eastern Canadian coast. Sonjel is a writer who loves to listen to jazz when she's driving at night.