Table of Contents
The Sifter of Wheat
“Knowledge is the most grievous veil between man and his Creator” 10ACT3 , because that which is the means to gaining insight, understanding and getting closer to God, becomes the very thing that blocks the path to those ends. The means to the end becomes an end in itself. Throughout the story of the Dawn-Breakers we will see that this is one of the most dangerous obstacles of the Bridge, especially for the learned clergy who get caught up in their own learning and pride. And it also becomes the cause of the fall of those who are influenced and mindlessly follow such outwardly learned but spiritually blind clergy.
And this was epitomized by what transpired in Isfáhán, the very first city in which Mullá Husayn, as instructed by the Báb, raised the call of the appearance of the Qá’im. While the learned clergy of the city turned away, it was an uneducated sifter of wheat [in Fársí gandum-pák-kun who became “the first to embrace the Cause of the Báb in that city”.11ACT3 As soon as he heard the Call of the Báb through Mullá Husayn, he unreservedly accepted it. He immediately put himself into service of Mullá Husayn and became an ardent champion of the new Cause until the end of his life. His name was Muhammad Ja’far but because of his spiritual insight, in spite of his lack of education, he became known as Mullá Muhammad Ja’far , the gandum-pák-kun [Sifter of Wheat] of Isfáhán. A few years later, when he heard about the siege of the Bábís at the fort of Shaykh Tabarsí , he immediately arose and set out, his sieve in hand, for the fort of Shaykh Tabarsí. “Why leave so hurriedly?” his friends asked him, as they saw him running in a state of intense excitement through the bazaars of Isfáhán. “I have risen,” he replied, “to join the glorious company of the defenders of the fort of Shaykh Tabarsí! With this sieve which I carry with me, I intend to sift the people in every city through which I pass. Whomsoever I find ready to espouse the Cause I have embraced, I will ask to join me and hasten forthwith to the field of martyrdom.” 12ACT3 He got to the fort of Shaykh Tabarsí and became one of the many who laid down their lives at that historic event. We will tell that story in a later Act.
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