The ISLAMO-BIBLICAL MIGHTIEST NAME OF GOD  AND THE BĀBĪ-BAHĀ’Ī

INTERPRETATIONS OF THE AL-ISM AL-A`ẒAM .

IN PROGRESS  2008-9

       PART ONE

       This three part monograph will largely be an attempt to explore the history of concepts of God having an All-Powerful, Mighty or Greatest Name in the closely interrelated, major Abrahamic religions (primarily Judaism, Christianity and Islam) and the theological reinterpretations of this Mighty divine Name concept in the sacred scriptures of the Bābī and Bahā’ī religions. It will sometimes lead into little studied areas such as magic signs and symbols believed to have protective, talismanic and other significances. 

            Though biblical scholars have given some attention to the theology of the Names of God expressive of the divine grandeur and transcendence, relatively little attention has been given in modern times to the specific theological motif of the mightiest Name of God in Islamic and Bābī-Bahā'ī studies.

            Part II of this monograph will further attempt to sum up some linguistic, historical and theological aspects of the Arabic word bahā', a verbal-noun theologically viewed by Bahā'īs as the quintessence of the "Greatest Name" of God. It will be seen that considered alone the word bahā’ has a very wide range of meanings and a huge semantic field, aside from its well-known senses relating to beauty, radiant glory, splendour, light and brilliancy. As a Persian loan-word baha’ and its various derivates, again have a wide range of senses and a much expanded semantic field. 

 

 

The Mightiest or Greatest Name of God

Three Essays  and other Notes and Translations relating to the motif of eschatological divine splendor and the Mightiest or Greatest Name of God

IN PROGRESS AND REVISION  2009-10

(o)

Bibliographical Notes on the Islamic Concept of the Mightiest or Greatest Name of God.

 

(1)

الاسم الاعظم

Raḍī al-Dīn 'Alī ibn. Mūsā ibn Ṭāwūs al-Hasanī al-Ḥillī Ibn Tāwūs

 (d. 664/1226) on the Mightiest Name of God

 

Shaykh Aḥmad ibn Muhammad ibn Fahd al-Hillī (fl. 9th cent. AH /15th cent CE) on the Mightiest Name of God

 

ADD IMAGE

Taqi al-Din al-Kaf`ami (d. 900/1494-5) on the Mightiest Name of God

The Names of God and theories of His Mightiest Name (al-ism al-a`ẓam) with special reference to the Miṣbāḥ (Luminary) of Tāqī al-Dīn Kaf`amī (d. 900/1494-5) and Bābī-Bahā’ī theologies of the Eschatological Name.

 

الدر المنتظم في الاسم الأعظم

 "The Well-strung  Pearls on the Mightiest Name [of God]")

The Treatise of Jalāl a-Dīn `Abd al-Raḥman al-Suyūṭī (d. 911/1505) on the Mightiest Name of God

 

بهاء الدين محمد بن حسين عاملي

 Bahā' al-Dīn al-`Āmilī = Shaykh Bahā'ī

 Muḥammad ibn ʻIzz al-Dīn Ḥusayn ibn ʻAbd al-Ṣamad al-`Āmilī al-Jubā'ī, (b. 953-1030 AH = 1547-1621 CE) on the Mightiest Name of God.

See : http://www.hurqalya.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/BIBLIOGRAPHY-HYP/15-SAFAVID/Shaykh%20Baha'i.htm

 The son of Shaykh Ḥusayn ibn `Abd al-Ṣamad al-`Āmilī (919-984 AH = 1512-1576 CE) who was appointed Shaykh al-Islam at the then Safavid capital Qazvin by Shah Ṭahmasb (930-984 AH =1524-1576 CE). He was born near Baalbek on the 27th Dhu'l-Ḥijja 953 AH = 18th February 1547 CE and died Isfahan 12th Shawwāl 1030 AH = 29th August 1621 CE. A polymathic and widely travelled individual Shaykh Bahā'ī is viewed by some as the Islamic Mujaddid ("Renewer") of the 11th/17th century. The elder Majlisi, Muhammad Taqi Majlisi, described him as follows in his al-Rawdat (22:1),"[He is] al-Shaykh al-A`ẓam ("the Supreme Shaykh"), al-Wālid al-Mu`azzam ("the Venerated Father"), Imam al-`Allāmah ("the Imam of the Most Erudite"), Malik al-Fuḍalā' wa'l-Udabā' wa'l-Muḥaddithīn ("Commander of the Most Eminent Ones, the Cultured Persons and the Masters of Tradition"), Bahā' al-millat wa'l-Ḥaqq wa'l-Dīn ("the Splendor of the Religious Community and of the Real One [God] and of Religion")" (cited introduction to the Miftah al-Falah [1422/2001 ed], 4). Shaykh Baha'i was an accomplished theologian, philosopher, mathematician, Sufi inclined mystic, architect, grammarian and more besides. Bahā' al-Dīn al-`Āmilī was the one-time supremely powerful Shaykh al-Islām under Shāh `Abbās I (r. 996/1588- 1038/1629) at his then Safavid capital Isfahan. Shaykh Baha'i wrote a poem dar rumuz-i ism-i a`zam in which He claimed to disclose yet conceal something of the secret of the ism-i a`zam (see Lambden trans. below).

در رموز اسم اعظم  Dar rumūz-i ism-i a`ẓam ("On the Secrets of the Mightiest Name [of God]")