Paradise. We ought therefore to strengthen our belief by making it one of realization instead of one of imitation. So come, let us advance! In order to bring the twenty-nine degrees of faith that we have found, each as powerful as a mountain, to the blessed number of thirty-three, the number of litanies that follow upon prayer, and in order to see a third stopping-place in this realm of instruction, let us knock at the door of the dominical sustenance of the animate world and open it with the key of ‘In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate.’” Speaking thus he beseechingly knocked at the gate of this Third Stopping-Place, a compendium of wonders, and a spectacle of marvels.

Saying, “In the Name of God, the Opener,” he opened the gate. The Third Stopping-Place became visible to him. He entered and saw that it was illumined by four great and encompassing truths that demonstrated the Divine unity as brightly as the sun.

THE FIRST TRUTH: the Truth of Opening

That is, the opening up from a single simple substance of innumerable varied and separate forms, together, everywhere, in a single instant and by a single deed, through the manifestation of the Name of Opener.Yes, in the same way that God’s creative power has opened up innumerable beings like flowers in the garden of the cosmos, and endowed each with an orderly form and distinct identity, through the manifestation of the Name of Opener, so too, although in more miraculous fashion, he has given to the four hundred thousand species of animate beings in the garden of the earth each its symmetrical, adorned and distinct form.

He creates you in the wombs of your mothers, creation after creation in three darknesses. That is God, your Sustainer. His is the sovereignty; there is no god other than He. Where, then, will you turn?42

Nought is hidden from God, neither on earth nor in the heavens. He it is Who forms you in the wombs as He wills; there is no god but He, the Mighty, the Wise.43