Maid of Heaven

Maid of Heaven (Arabic: حورية‎‎, ḥúrí) refers to a vision that Bahá’u’lláh, founder of the Bahá'í Faith had of a maiden from God, through whom he received his mission as a Messenger of God.

In August 1852, during the height of the persecutions of the followers of the Báb, Bahá’u’lláh was arrested in Tehran with about 30 or more other Bábís. He was cast into the underground dungeon, nearby the court of the Sháh, known as the Síyáh-Chál. In October 1852, after two months had passed in the gloom and stench of the dungeon, Bahá’u’lláh had a vision of a heavenly Maiden. In his Súriy-i-Haykal (Tablet of the Temple) Bahá’u’lláh describes his vision as follows:

"While engulfed in tribulations I heard a most wondrous, a most sweet voice, calling above My head. Turning My face, I beheld a Maiden — the embodiment of the remembrance of the name of My Lord — suspended in the air before Me. So rejoiced was she in her very soul that her countenance shone with the ornament of the good-pleasure of God, and her cheeks glowed with the brightness of the All-Merciful. Betwixt Earth and Heaven she was raising a call which captivated the hearts and minds of men. She was imparting to both My inward and outer being tidings which rejoiced My soul, and the souls of God's honoured servants. Pointing with her finger unto My head, she addressed all who are in Heaven and all who are on Earth saying: "By God! This is the best beloved of the worlds, and yet ye comprehend not. This is the Beauty of God amongst you, and the power of His sovereignty within you, could ye but understand."

The Maid of Heaven appears in several tablets of Bahá’u’lláh’s: Tablet of the Maiden (Lawh-i-Ḥúrí), Tablet of the Deathless Youth (Lawh-i-Ghulámu’l-khuld), Tablet of the Holy Mariner (Lawh-i-Malláhu’l-quds) and The Tablet of the Vision (Lawh-i- Ru’yá). The first three of these were written in Baghdad.

Shoghi Effendi compares the Maid of Heaven with the Holy Spirit as manifested in the Burning Bush of Moses, the Dove to Jesus, the angel Gabriel to Muhammad. Further, Farshid Kazemi discusses links with the Zoroastrian Daena.

See also

• Bahá'í cosmology
• Angels in the Bahá'í Faith
• The Holy Spirit in the Bahá'í Faith
• Houri, the Islamic concept

Further reading

• Lambden, Stephen. (2001). Cherubim, Seraphim and Demythologization: Some aspects of Babi-Bahá'i angelology and the mala' al-a`la (Supreme Concourse). ‘Irfán Colloquium #36

External links

• Maid of Heaven - a compendium
• Baha'u'llah's "Tablet of the Maiden," trans. Juan Cole