Prayer for the seven Bahá’í leaders

Their names are worth knowing. They are in front, Behrouz Tavakkoli and Saeid Rezaie, and, standing, Fariba Kamalabadi, Vahid Tizfahm, Jamaloddin Khanjani, Afif Naeimi, and Mahvash Sabet. They were photographed several months before their arrest in the spring of 2008.

It is reported that the trial in Tehran of the seven Bahá’í leaders began on Tuesday, January 12th in Iran, or Monday evening Pacific Coast time in the United States. They have been in prison for two years because they are Bahá’ís. Here is a special prayer for the freedom of Bahá’ís who are imprisoned because of their religious beliefs. Bahá’u’lláh instructs that believers must detach themselves from all things and recite this Tablet nine times:

“He is, in truth, the Omnipotent, the Unconstrained!
    O Lord of Names and Fashioner of the Heavens!
Free Thy lovers from the prison of the enemy.
    Verily, Thou art the Sovereign Ordainer of Thine irrevocable decree,
He Who alone shineth resplendent on the horizon of creation.
    O Everlasting Root!  By the life of the All-Glorious,
deprive them not of hope, nay rather aid and assist them.
    Verily, Thou rulest as Thou pleasest and within Thy grasp lie the kingdoms of creation.
The fangs of Thine enemies have been whetted, ready to bite into the flesh of Thy lovers.
    Protect these companions,
O Thou Who rulest over all humankind and art the Judge on the Day of Judgment.”

          – Bahá’u’lláh