Súriy-i-Ghuṣn

Tablet of the Branch

Read online at https://www.bahai.org/library/authoritative-texts/bahaullah/days-remembrance/6#107577136 or https://bahai-library.com/compilation_days_remembrance#sec29

Authoritative References and quotations from[edit]

God Passes By, p. 177
God Passes By, p. 242
World Order of Bahá'u'lláh, p. 135
Star of the West, vol. 4, issue 14, p. 236

Need to read[edit]

"Therefore, you must read the Tablets of Bahá'u'lláh. You must read the Tablet of the Branch and regard that which He has so clearly stated. Beware! Beware! lest anyone should speak from the authority of his own thoughts or create a new thing out of himself."

('Abdu'l-Bahá, Promulgation of Universal Peace, p. 323)

Previous "poorly translated" version[edit]

Online at https://bahai-library.com/compilations/bwf/bwf5.html#204 and a stand-alone copy of this latter version at https://bahai-library.com/bahaullah_surih_ghusn

Poor translation issues (for earlier translation)[edit]

Translations within the Tablet of the Branch may misleadingly give the impression that there is a "mystic unity" to Bahá'u'lláh and 'Abdu'l-Bahá (Reference from the prior Tablet printed on page 255 of Bahá'í Scriptures had given some this (false) impression)[edit]

"I feel it necessary, therefore, to state without any equivocation or hesitation that neither in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas nor in the Book of Bahá'u'lláh's Covenant, nor even in the Tablet of the Branch, nor in any other Tablet, whether revealed by Bahá'u'lláh or `Abdu'l-Bahá, is there any authority whatever for the opinion that inclines to uphold the so-called "mystic unity" of Bahá'u'lláh and `Abdu'l-Bahá, or to establish the identity of the latter with His Father or with any preceding Manifestation. This erroneous conception may, in part, be ascribed to an altogether extravagant interpretation of certain terms and passages in the Tablet of the Branch, to the introduction into its English translation of certain words that are either non-existent, misleading, or ambiguous in their connotation. It is, no doubt, chiefly based upon an altogether unjustified inference from the opening passages of a Tablet of Bahá'u'lláh, extracts of which, as reproduced in the Bahá'í Scriptures, immediately precede, but form no part of, the said Tablet of the Branch. It should be made clear to every one reading those extracts that by the phrase "the Tongue of the Ancient" no one else is meant but God, and that the term "the Greatest Name" is an obvious reference to Bahá'u'lláh, and that "the Covenant" referred to is not the specific Covenant of which Bahá'u'lláh is the immediate Author and `Abdu'l-Bahá the Center but that general Covenant which, as inculcated by the Bahá'í teaching, God Himself invariably establishes with mankind when He inaugurates a new Dispensation. "The Tongue" that "gives," as stated in those extracts, the "glad-tidings" is none other than the Voice of God referring to Bahá'u'lláh, and not Bahá'u'lláh referring to `Abdu'l-Bahá."

(Shoghi Effendi, World Order of Bahá'u'lláh, p. 137 (also published separately as Dispensation of Bahá'u'lláh))

The translation at the time of the Tablet of the Branch was poorly translated[edit]

"In connection with the "Kitáb-i-`Ahd", the Guardian thinks it preferable that it should be published in a separate booklet, and that the "Tablet of the Branch" and the "Lawh-i-Aqdas", both of which have been rather poorly translated from the original, should not be included in it."

(On behalf of the Guardian, Light of Divine Guidance, vol. I, p. 65)