The Great Being

One of the friends asked:

Does Baha’u'llah use “the Great Being” elsewhere [Other than in the Lawh-e Maqsud, where it is the refrain]?
Is there any philosophical, metaphysical or religious background for this term, which has an almost “indigenous” ring to it?

The term “The Great Being” as a name of God is in Persian Hazrat-e mawjud. It could be translated His Holiness, Existence, or “the Lord of the existent.”

It is used several times in Baha’u'llah’s later Persian writings: once in Epistle to the Son of the Wolf and 6 times in Gleanings, fifteen times in Tablets after the Aqdas (with some overlaps with Gleanings), particularly in the Lawh-e Maqsud, and also here:

http://reference.bahai.org/fa/t/b/I/i-36.html#pg36

which says:
“O people of God: fix your gaze on that which the Great Being has purposed, ..”

In Shiah Islam today, it is a title of the Imams, of ‘Ali, of the Lord of the Age: I read it then in the sense “Lord of the existent.” But when Shoghi Effendi translates it, he reads it as referring to the Lord of Existence as such – that is, the logos, God acting in creation.

Share this page:

Short link : http://wp.me/PcgF5-1qM