Crimson Book, Part 1

Cracking the Crimson Book, Part One

By John Taylor; 28 December, 2005

My dictionary defines "crimson" as any of several hues of "deep
purplish reds;" it comes to Modern English from an Arabic word,
Qirmiz, borrowed by way of Spanish and Middle English. Physically this
color has unique properties that have been known for millennia.
Aristotle noticed that just as certain rare notes make an especially
harmonic sound, so among the colors of light, purple, scarlet and
crimson seem especially blessed and harmonious. Crimson, he observed,
is one of the few colors that can be seen in the obscurity of night,
when everything else is displayed as a monotone,

"In general, white in contrast with black creates a variety of
colours; like flame, for instance, through a medium of smoke. But by
day the sun obscures them, and, with the exception of crimson, the
colours are not seen at night because they are dark." (Meteorology)

Crimson is a characteristic color of sunset and sunrise, for it seems
that when light penetrates clouds, other sections of the spectrum are
blocked. This section of the spectrum seems to penetrate first and
last, hence "crimson skies" mean very early sunrise or late sunset.
Aristotle observed how artists consciously use this behavior of light
in their painting technique,

"...Black and White appear the one through the medium of the other,
giving an effect like that sometimes produced by painters overlaying a
less vivid upon a more vivid colour, as when they desire to represent
an object appearing under water or enveloped in a haze, and like that
produced by the sun, which in itself appears white, but takes a
crimson hue when beheld through a fog or a cloud of smoke." (On the
Senses)

Crimson is the color of berries on the bush, often of the lotus
flower, of wine, and of blood. In dreams and in literature, the
plucking of a crimson rose symbolizes a love consummated. Eat a grape,
a pomegranate or other fruit containing healthful, antioxidant
flavonoides, and hands and mouth are stained a light crimson. The
color is mentioned most often in Sikh scripture, always as a symbol of
love for God. Here its penetration as a dye is highlighted:

"Like the deep crimson color of the madder plant - such is the dye
which shall color you, when you dedicate your soul to the True One.
One who loves the True Lord is totally imbued with the Lord's Love,
like the deep crimson color of the poppy." (Shri Guru Granth Sahib,
Section 7 - Raag Gauree)

Probably for similar reasons the poppy was chosen for Remembrance Day
to remember the wasted lives of war, for crimson is the last light of
night as well as the first of morning. Crimson is also a universal
symbol of power and of love, or perhaps love power, the power of love.
Among the Ancient Greeks, a king wore purple and his female retainers
dressed in crimson robes; until recently peasants and the poor were
forbidden to wear royal colors in their clothing, on pain of death.
The Israelites hid their holy of holies behind a blue and crimson
veil, wrought with cherubim. In Ancient Rome a magistrate wore crimson
velvet as a badge of office, a symbol of stability and justice.
Isaiah, in his famous vision of the coming of the Lord of Hosts, saw
scarlet. He prophesied not only that the promised redeemer would be
dressed in scarlet, but that He would be questioned about why he wore
this color. The answer is fraught with baleful symbolic weight.

"Who is this that cometh from Edom, with crimsoned garments from
Bozrah? This that is glorious in his apparel, stately in the greatness
of his strength?' -- 'I that speak in victory, mighty to save.'
`Wherefore is Thine apparel red, and Thy garments like his that
treadeth in the winevat?' -- 'I have trodden the winepress alone, and
of the peoples there was no man with Me; yea, I trod them in Mine
anger, and trampled them in My fury; and their lifeblood is dashed
against My garments, and I have stained all My raiment. For the day of
vengeance that was in My heart, and My year of redemption are come."
(63:1-3)

This unforgettable image of wine and blood staining crimson the
clothing of the Promised Redeemer is refracted in several directions
by the Writings of the Bab. For instance, in the following He pictures
Himself as a gate standing in the midst of a sea of crimson elixir on
which float crimson arks crewed by "the people of Baha."

"Indeed God hath created everywhere around this Gate oceans of divine
elixir, tinged crimson with the essence of existence and vitalized
through the animating power of the desired fruit; and for them God
hath provided Arks of ruby, tender, crimson-coloured, wherein none
shall sail but the people of Baha, by the leave of God, the Most
Exalted; and verily He is the All-Glorious, the All-Wise." (The Bab,
Selections, 57-58)

In His early mystical Writing Baha'u'llah speaks in similar imagery
using this color, referring to a "...wayfarer who journeyeth unto God,
unto the Crimson Pillar in the snow-white path." (Baha'u'llah, The
Four Valleys, p. 58) In the final Arabic Hidden Word God points to the
highest possible station of a believer as one who writes on the tablet
of the spirit with "that crimson ink that hath been shed in My path."
(AHW71) This seems to reflect the fact that crimson light is the first
to penetrate mist and darkness. The fact that this age is entitled the
"Day of God" means that its denizens have in their face the utter and
absolute incomprehensibility of God. The Bab declares,

"The sign of His matchless Revelation as created by Him and imprinted
upon the realities of all beings, is none other but their
powerlessness to know Him. The light He hath shed upon all things is
none but the splendour of His Own Self." (Selections, 111)

This reasoning seems to be the precedent for the Via Negative proof of
deity that `Abdu'l-Baha offered in Some Answered Question and
elsewhere. The fact that human understanding falls so absurdly short
of understanding the Mover of the Universe is itself proof that He
must exist and that He must be All-Glorious. In 20th Century
linguistic theory, Noam Chomsky used a similar negative argument to
prove that behaviorism and stimulus response are inadequate to explain
language development in children. Chomsky called this phenomenon the
"poverty of the stimulus;" poverty of the stimulus means that even
those with mean minds and utterly deprived experience still pick up
sophisticated speech abilities, as if speech were an inherent property
of mind, not something that one may learn or not from a given
stimulus. The Master's negative proof of deity could be called, in
these terms, the poverty of ability. We cannot grasp it, so we throw
ourselves on the mercy of the court. Therefore, calling the believer
in this age symbolically the "people of the crimson ark" would seem to
indicate that they glimpse the colors that penetrate mist or cloud,
crimson. To believe in the Day of God is to see the Ark of the
Covenant, which means instant death. Only this is a spiritual death,
and that death is life. Scarlet light penetrates into a world of
inherent limitation and basically flawed understanding, and illumines
it. The Bab wrote:

"And when the appointed hour hath struck, do Thou, by the leave of
God, the All-Wise, reveal from the heights of the Most Lofty and
Mystic Mount a faint, an infinitesimal glimmer of Thy impenetrable
Mystery, that they who have recognized the radiance of the Sinaic
Splendour may faint away and die as they catch a lightning glimpse of
the fierce and crimson Light that envelops Thy Revelation. And God is,
in very truth, Thine unfailing Protector."

Crimson may be the color of blood, of flowers and wine, but such
symbols are in their turn symbols for service and servitude. In the
28th Chapter of the Qayyumu'l-Asma, the Bab declares His servitude to
certain unbelieving family members, possibly the cousins who in
Karbala later rose to the highest levels of the Shiih clergy.

"This Tree of Holiness, dyed crimson with the oil of servitude, hath
verily sprung forth out of your own soil in the midst of the Burning
Bush, yet ye comprehend nothing whatever thereof..." (The Bab,
Selections, 52)

Crimson light, then, is the last glow of evening, the first glimmering
of dawn for us creatures of the half light. It is a new age of
servitude. As soon as all recognize the poverty of both stimulus and
responder, every eye will see him. After that there can never again be
master or slave, only servants. The Day of God makes a servant the
highest, ultimate station attainable for any created being. The Day is
an age where, in the Bab's words, "all are His servants and all abide
by His bidding," that is, there will no longer be injustice, slavery
or exploitation, all will serve the one glorious light from God. Just
as the fictional city of Oz shone green in emerald light, the edifice
of Baha shines in the crimson hues of ruby, the purest of precious
stones. Declaring Himself to the people of the Earth, the Bab swore,

"By the righteousness of the One true God, I am the Maid of Heaven
begotten by the Spirit of Baha, abiding within the Mansion hewn out of
a mass of ruby, tender and vibrant; and in this mighty Paradise naught
have I ever witnessed save that which proclaimeth the Remembrance of
God by extolling the virtues of this Arabian Youth." (The Bab,
Selections, 54)

--
John Taylor

badijet@gmail.com