Another victim of the frightful tortures inflicted by an
unyielding enemy was the high-minded, the influential and courageous Hájí
Sulaymán Khán. So greatly was he esteemed that the Amír-Nizám had felt, on a
previous occasion, constrained to ignore his connection with the Faith he had
embraced and to spare his life. The turmoil that convulsed Tihrán as a result
of the attempt on the life of the sovereign, however, precipitated his arrest
and brought about his martyrdom. The Sháh, having failed to induce him through
the Hájibu’d-Dawlih to recant, commanded that he be put to death in any way he
himself might choose. Nine holes, at his express wish, were made in his flesh,
in each of which a lighted candle was placed. As the executioner shrank from
performing this gruesome task, he attempted to snatch the knife from his hand
that he might himself plunge it into his own body. Fearing lest he should
attack him the executioner refused, and bade his men tie the victim’s hands
behind his back, whereupon the intrepid sufferer pleaded with them to pierce
two holes in his breast, two in his shoulders, one in the nape of his neck, and
four others in his back—a wish they complied with. Standing erect as an arrow,
his eyes glowing with stoic fortitude, unperturbed by the howling multitude or
the sight of his own blood streaming from his wounds, and preceded by minstrels
and drummers, he led the concourse that pressed round him to the final place of
his martyrdom. Every few steps he would interrupt his march to address the bewildered
bystanders in words in which he glorified the Báb and magnified the
significance of his own death. As his eyes beheld the candles flickering in
their bloody sockets, he would burst forth in exclamations of unrestrained
delight. Whenever one of them fell from his body he would with his own hand
pick it up, light it from the others, and replace it. “Why dost thou not
dance?” asked the executioner mockingly, “since thou findest death so
pleasant?” “Dance?” cried the sufferer, “In one hand the wine-cup, in one hand
the tresses of the Friend. Such a dance in the midst of the market-place is my
desire!” He was still in the bazaar when the flowing of a breeze, fanning the
flames of the candles now burning deep in his flesh, caused it to sizzle,
whereupon he burst forth addressing the flames that ate into his wounds: “You
have long lost your sting, O flames, and have been robbed of your power to pain
me. Make haste, for from your very tongues of fire I can hear the voice that
calls me to my Beloved.” In a blaze of light he walked as a conqueror might
have marched to the scene of his victory. At the foot of the gallows he once
again raised his voice in a final appeal to the multitude of onlookers. He then
prostrated himself in the direction of the shrine of the Imám-Zádih Hasan,
murmuring some words in Arabic. “My work is now finished,” he cried to the
executioner, “come and do yours.” Life still lingered in him as his body was
sawn into two halves, with the praise of his Beloved still fluttering from his
dying lips. The scorched and bloody remnants of his corpse were, as he himself
had requested, suspended on either side of the Gate of Naw, mute witnesses to
the unquenchable love which the Báb had kindled in the breasts of His
disciples.
- Shoghi Effendi (‘God Passes By’, chapter 5)
