In the Shí’í tradition concerning this dispensation
it is recorded that knowledge is composed of twenty-seven letters and that the
divine messengers of the past from first to last have revealed but two letters;
however, when the promised Qá'im comes, He will appear with all twenty-seven.
Aside from the true meaning of this passage which pertains
to the power and might of the Cause of God, to the revelation of verses and
signs, to the solution of divine problems, to the disclosure of the mysteries
of the Holy Book and to the spread of knowledge -- each of which is a hundred
times greater in this mighty revelation than in any previous one -- materially,
too, all the learned men of this age agree that the advancements in knowledge,
the arts, industries and inventions of this century are equal to those of the
last fifty centuries, indeed, even greater than that. (Words of ‘Abdu’l-Baha,
June 12, 1912, New York; Mahmud’s Diary)
