Paradise of Presence is a contemplative guide to the mystical writings of Baha’u’llah. Take a leisurely stroll through its chapters using the short descriptions below.
Introduction
The Introduction suggests that humanity’s long-anticipated, great spiritual awakening may have arrived in a form more intimate than imagined.
Chapter 1: Opening Up the Conversation
The reader is invited to step away from outer noise and enter the eternal expanse that hides inside Baha’u’llah’s striking imagery and words.
Chapter 2: A Commanding Panoramic View
Baha’u’llah’s writings reveal a wide, multidimensional vista, where physical, psychological, and eternal realms are held together in a single field of vision.
Chapter 3: The Story of the Divine Houri
The divine houri appears before Baha’u’llah as a figure of light, whose unveiling marks the moment when revelation touches history and the hidden world declares itself.
Chapter 4: Eavesdropping on Cosmic Conversatons
The reader listens in on the Word of God in its cosmic exchange—a current of melody and meaning shaping the architecture of existence.
Chapter 5: The Mirror of Divine Love
Between the unknowable and the known lies a world of reflection, where the divine attributes—wisdom, compassion, beauty—appear like sunlight in a flawless mirror.
Chapter 6: An Infinity-Mirrored Creation
Creation unfolds as an endless mirroring, where worlds within worlds reflect the one light in countless forms.
Chapter 7: Creation as Human Drama
Creation unfolds as sacred drama. Each age is lit by the arrival of a Manifestation of God, who appears as an ordinary stranger.
Chapter 8: The Tragedy of the Human Drama
The Manifestation of God arrives—radiant, unsettling—and is always met with resistance.
Chapter 9: Living in the Day of God
The Day of God begins not with disasters and spectacle, but with a veiled presence.
Chapter 10: Modernizing Biblical Narratives
The meaning of scripture is not sealed. Instead, ancient scenes are drawn forward, reframed as signs planted for this Day.
Chapter 11: The Concept of Meeting God
The meeting with God has already begun. The sacred encounter is not distant majesty, but a present voice.
Chapter 12: Human Connectivity to Spiritual Realms
Baha’u’llah describes the human being as a multi-dimensional creature, crowned by the the divine spirit at the core of selfhood.
Chapter 13: The Heart’s Scrying Eye of Insight
The human heart is revealed to be a layered organ of perception. Its sanctum houses vision, imagination, and the power to image spiritual reality.
Chapter 14: Gaining Spiritual Autonomy
Detachment is reframed as sacred individuation, a quiet act of reclaiming the heart as a dwelling for divine radiance.
Chapter 15: Settling Into Intimacy
The soul settles into its natural rhythm: a daily, reciprocal intimacy with Baha’u’llah.
Chapter 16: Conversations in Imagery
The soul steps beyond devotional rhythm into visionary immersion, where verses become portals and metaphors become maps.
Chapter 17: Praised Be My Lord, the Most High (Reading)
The reader enters the poem Praised be my Lord, the Most High as both pilgrim and participant, walking its brocade path verse by verse.