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It is October 1844 AD. The Báb having received the letter from Mullá Husayn, which gave details of his teaching efforts and meeting with Bahá’u’lláh, sets out for His pilgrimage [called Hajj in Arabic] to the holy city of Mecca. [Hajj is always performed during a specific time period in the Islamic calendar year.] For this Hajj, the Báb takes two companions: Quddús and His faithful Ethiopian servant Mubárak . The first leg of the journey was by land from Shíráz to the port city of Búshihr. From there, the Báb and His two companions, joined the other pilgrims on a sailing vessel to go from Búshihr to Jeddah.
The sea trip took about two months and was very arduous with lack of amenities and stormy seas. The Báb refers to the hardships of this journey in His book of laws, the Persian Bayán and in fact prays that God may grant that the means of sea travel may improve quickly to reduce its hardships and dangers. But what moved the Báb was not physical comforts for Himself, but how the sea travel hardships, unclean conditions and dangers, made the voyagers yield to their lower instincts and treat each other poorly. 81ACT3 The Báb in the Bayán especially commended politeness and the most refined courtesy and kindness in all social relations. “Never sadden anyone, no matter whom, for no matter what,” He wrote. And during this sea journey, He witnessed the meanness of some humans when faced with difficult conditions. In the Bayán, the Báb writes about this journey:
It is thus that I myself saw, on the voyage to Mecca, a notable who was spending considerable sums of money but who hesitated to spend the price of a glass of water for his fellow traveler. This happened on the boat where the water was scarce, so scarce in fact, during the voyage from Búshihr to Muscat, which lasted twelve days with no opportunity to get water, that I had to content myself with sweet lemons.
I have seen [on the way to Mecca] acts of the vilest kind, in the eyes of God, which were sufficient to undo the good resulting from the pilgrimage. These were the quarrels among the pilgrims! Verily the House of God has no need for such people. 82ACT3
The sea journey was also stormy and unsafe. But whatever the behaviour of the other travellers, a fellow traveller observed this about the Báb and Quddús:
During the entire period of approximately two months, from the day we embarked at Búshihr to the day we landed at Jeddah, … whenever by day or
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