The Eternal Reoccuring Manifestation of the 14 Infallibles
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In the perspective of the Bayān the 12 Imāms (ع) are not merely historically situated humans who came and went -- and are now just merely figments of a symbolic/metaphoric religious narrative from the past without further tangible consequence in the present or future (which is what all the religions have ended up doing to their founders and holy figures while building oppressive institutions and rituals that had little to nothing to do with what these founders and holy figures originally stood for). Rather the Infallibles (ع) are Living Divine Archetypes already-always situated in the Divine Realm (lāhūt), present right here and right now, whose Lahūtī Reality is a Single Pre-Eternal Being (insān-e azalī) Who Theophanically Self-Discloses (tajallī) throughout spatiotemporal history in multiple loci of manifestation and so in multiple people whensoever It Wills. This is also the meaning of rajaʿa/return where the Bayān is concerned. As such, in this perspective, there can be a Muḥammad of the Age, an ʿAlī of the Age, a Fāṭima of the Age, a Ḥasan of the Age, a Ḥusayn of the Age, or even multiples of Them, and so on, that can reoccur again and again throughout the ages with the Day of Resurrection (yawm al-qīyāma) denoting each time Their true Manifestation occurs.
Obviously such a perspective is extremely threatening to the established religious orthodoxy of Islam (Sunni and Shiʿi alike) because it turns its existence in the form of turbans, rank, hierarchy, institutions and cherished hand-me-downs (which have all been turned into literal idols, i.e. taghouts) upside down. But this was what the original Bābī doctrine taught, i.e. that the Infallibles (ع) had returned to the life of the world and would continue to Return to the world throughout all eternity because time does not end nor divine guidance! Return is also not reincarnation but something along the lines of the eternal reoccurence of the same that is animate and conscious as a Divine fiat in all such reiterations.
Unfortunately, whenever there is the great Light, it will cast its shadow in the form of the great darkness, i.e. false claimants and the like (such as the founder of bahaism, for instance, or similar). The darkness can even attempt in wordly appearances to overshadow the Light itself. But as the Bible verse says, “the Light shineth in the darkness even though the darkness comprehendeth it not.” And, remember, there arose a false prophet in Arabia itself during the very lifetime of the Seal of Prophets (ص)! What the folk of the divine realities are called to do is to be the beacons for the great Light to both shed light on the True as well as the false first by realizing the True and becoming One with It (tawalla) and then by recognizing the false and shunning, condemning and struggling against it (tabarra), which itself is the manifestation of the reality of the tahlīl (lā ilāha illa allāh, there is no god but God). This is also the meaning of being a fātī /javanmard, a chivalrous knight of God.
However, since the Reality of the unknowable Godhead has always only been known through the human vehicles of Its Will and Command, and since the first thing the Godhead created in Pre-Eternity was the Muḥammadan Light; it is these 14 Iterations of the Pre-Eternal Muḥammadan Light that will keep coming back in multiple loci of manifestation, for They are the Forms of the Hidden Treasure desiring to be known!
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