Power pg. 84-88
“They took Mulla Rida into the prison yard and most brutally flogged his bare back. However, in spite of old age and the rigours of prison life, he remained steadfast as a rock throughout the ordeal. He neither budged nor did he raise the faintest cry, nor did his face bear the slightest expression of agony. It seemed as if he had momentarily lost his sense of feeling. All the friends were profoundly shocked and shaken at the sight of his suffering and soon after the torturing, I hurriedly went over to offer my sympathy and to dress his wounds. Mulla Rida, greatly surprised at my behaviour, shouted triumphantly: “O, Siyyid Asadu’llah! Do you really think I am hurt? At the time of flogging I felt like a drunken elephant and never felt the slightest pain. I was in the presence of Bahá’u’lláh, talking to him.”’
“Among the non-Bahá’í prisoners who witnessed this harrowing scene there was a distinguished man by the name of Ghulam-Rida Khan, whose heart was deeply touched and transformed at the sight of the superhuman endurance manifested by the victim, and the interest and surprise thus aroused led him to investigate. His search for truth was soon rewarded by confirmation and he eventually became a devoted believer. When released from prison, this same man was asked how he happened to become a Bahá’í. ‘I received my light from the floggings,’ he said and added, ‘If instead hundreds of verses from the Qur’án had been recited to me or a thousand reasons adduced to convince me of the truth of this Message, none would have influenced me as did the unruffled calm which the old, stout-hearted Mulla Rida evinced under torture.”
-The Revelation of Baha’u’llah p. 88
Even though Mulla Rida was most likely being literal when he said he was elsewhere communing with Baha’u’llah and that is why he felt no pain, I was amused by the idea that maybe we could all detach from any hardship and avoid giving the issue power. I wonder if that would work in any possible scenario and if so, what kind of wisdom could be derived from it, instead of pain.
