Preserving the Tablets
Bahá'u'lláh Admonishes Care in Preservation of the Tablets[edit]
"...The people of God should do all that lieth within their power to protect and preserve the Tablets. In the Land of Ta whatever there was in the homes of the friends was taken and fell into the hands of the heedless. We have commanded all to safeguard that which hath proceeded from the Pen of the Most High. We ask God to aid them to act in accordance with His wish and desire, and to draw them nigh to Him. He, verily, is the Almighty, the Powerful."
"We have commanded all to observe wisdom, but from the friends we see heedlessness and negligence. They should guard the Tablets as they guard their eyes, nay with greater vigilance, if they be of them that comprehend."
"Truly, none must be careless in the matter of safeguarding the divine Tablets. In former times, when plans were laid to seize some of the friends, before all else it was the writings that fell into the hands of the enemy. This is not permissible. The friends should designate a strong, secure place for storing the divine verses so that they may not be exposed to the touch of unworthy hands, even though these verses are, and shall always be, such as 'none shall touch but the purified'[+F1 Quotation from the Qur'an, 79:56]"
- (Bahá'u'lláh, From three previously unpublished Tablets, The Importance of Collecting and Safeguarding the Bahá'í Writings, p. 1, October 1986, in Lights of Guidance, no. 326)
Tablets and Verses to be Gathered into the Archives[edit]
"In one of the Tablets, the Pen of the Most High, referring to this foundation,[+F2 The International Archives Building] which provides the best and surest, the soundest and most perfect means of collecting, safeguarding and classifying the scattered, but growing body, of Sacred Writings and relics, states: 'It is the concern of the True One to reveal, and the concern of men to spread what hath been revealed. He will, verily, promulgate His Cause by the hands of His scattering and well-favoured angels. Spiritual souls will assuredly emerge from behind the veil of divine protection who will gather together the tokens and verses of God and put them into the most excellent order. This is His sure and irrevocable decree.'"
- (Shoghi Effendi, 1954 Naw-Ruz Message to the Bahá'ís of the East, translated from the Persian: Ibid., p. 2, in Lights of Guidance, no. 327)
