Will, Knowledge, and Love as Explained in Bahá’u’lláh’s Four Valleys

Abstract

This article intends to explore some of the seemingly abstruse concepts exposited by Bahá’u’lláh in “The Four Valleys.” The first three Valleys are described as three aspects of the spiritual path to be trod by any human being, so that he/she may acquire knowledge of God, as realization of the self, through the use of his/her capacities of willing, knowing, and loving respectively. The fourth Valley is interpreted as describing the lofty and unattainable condition of the Manifestations of God, and as such, as offering a hint of the glory of the goal of perfection towards which human beings should strive, albeit assured that such a perfection will never be theirs.