…as to the question of the Trinity, know, O advancer unto
God, that in each one of the cycles wherein the Lights have shone forth upon
the horizons (i.e., in each prophetic dispensation) and the Forgiving Lord hath
revealed Himself on Mount Paran (see Habbakkuk 3:3, etc.) or Mount Sinai, or
Mount Seir (see Ezekiel 35), there are necessarily three things: The Giver of
the Grace, and the Grace, and the Recipient of the Grace; the Source of the
Effulgence, and the Effulgence, and the Recipient of the Effulgence; the
Illuminator, and the Illumination, and the Illuminated. Look at the Mosaic
cycle: The Lord, and Moses, and the Fire (i.e., the burning bush), the
Intermediary; and in the Mohammedan cycle: The Lord, the Apostle (or Messenger,
Mohammed), and Gabriel (for, as the Mohammedans believe, Gabriel brought the
Revelation from God to Mohammed). Look at the sun and its rays and the heat
which results from its rays; the rays and the heart are but two effects of the
sun, but inseparable from it; yet the sun is one in its essence, unique in its
real identity, single in its attributes, neither is it possible that anything
should resemble it. Such is the essence of the Truth concerning the Unity, the
real doctrine of the Singularity, the undiluted reality as to the (Divine)
Sanctity.
- ‘Abdu’l-Baha (‘Tablets of ‘Abdu’l-Baha, vol. 1)
