O ye loved ones of God! See how the Exalted One —may the
souls of all on earth be a ransom for Him—for this high purpose made His
blessed heart the target for affliction’s spears; and because the real intent
of the Ancient Beauty—for Him may the souls of the Concourse on high be offered
up—was to win this same supernal goal, the Exalted One bared His holy breast
for a target to a myriad bullets fired by the people of malice and hate, and
with utter meekness died the martyr’s death. On the dust of this pathway the
holy blood of thousands upon thousands of sacred souls gushed out, and many a
time the blessed body of a loyal lover of God was hanged to the gallows tree.
- ‘Abdu’l-Baha (‘Selections from the Writings of ‘Abdu’l-Baha’)
