> Who can say what this mean: "And cast him into the bottomless pit,
> and shut him up, and set a seal upon him"
> And who can say who is that beast, is it the Umayyad?
Dear Hasan,
That's what Abdu'l-Baha indicates:
"The beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall war against
them, and shall overcome them, and kill them": [1] this beast means
the Umayyads who attacked them from the pit of error, and who rose
against the religion of Muhammad and against the reality of Ali -- in
other words, the love of God.
[1 Cf. Rev. 11:7.]
(Abdu'l-Baha, Some Answered Questions, p. 51)
But I don't think the meaning is exclusive to that. Revelations, like
the Book of Daniel and the Book of Enoch or even the Tablet of the
Holy Mariner are using a certain well-known set of imagery to describe
what happens whenever a Manifestation appears. Most scholars would
suggest that the number of the Beast (666) was the numerical value of
the name of one of the Roman Emperors that was persecuting the early
Christians. Abdu'l-Baha indicated it refers to the year in which the
Umayyads were reigning. I think both things can be true.
warmest, Susan
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