The black-hearted scoundrel who befooled and manipulated this vain and flaccid man [Mirza Yahyá] with consummate skill and unyielding persistence was a certain Siyyid Muhammad, a native of Isfahán, notorious for his inordinate ambition, his blind obstinacy and uncontrollable jealousy. To him Bahá’u’lláh had later referred in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas as the one who had “led astray” Mírzá Yahyá, and stigmatized him, in one of His Tablets, as the “source of envy and the quintessence of mischief,” while ‘Abdu’l‑Bahá had described the relationship existing between these two as that of “the sucking child” to the “much-prized breast” of its mother. Forced to abandon his studies in the madrisiy-i-Sadr of Isfahán, this Siyyid had migrated, in shame and remorse, to Karbilá, had there joined the ranks of the Báb’s followers, and shown, after His martyrdom, signs of vacillation which exposed the shallowness of his faith and the fundamental weakness of his convictions. Bahá’u’lláh’s first visit to Karbilá and the marks of undisguised reverence, love and admiration shown Him by some of the most distinguished among the former disciples and companions of Siyyid Káẓim, had aroused in this calculating and unscrupulous schemer an envy, and bred in his soul an animosity, which the forbearance and patience shown him by Bahá’u’lláh had served only to inflame. His deluded helpers, willing tools of his diabolical designs, were the not inconsiderable number of Bábís who, baffled, disillusioned and leaderless, were already predisposed to be beguiled by him into pursuing a path diametrically opposed to the tenets and counsels of a departed Leader.
- Shoghi Effendi (‘God Passes By’)
