Letters of The Living - Mystical Meaning

Mystical Meaning

The Báb named the first eighteen believers in his mission as the Letters of the Living (Ḥurúfu'l-ḥayy in Arabic). One of the Báb's titles was the "Primal Point" (nuqti-yi-úlá). The term "Point" refers to the belief that all created things have their origin in the Manifestation of God, just like how letters, the primary units of written language, have their origin in the spot where the pen touches the paper first. Each letter is different from the others, but they all have a common source and are the intermediary between the point and words and sentences. The title "Point" may also refer to the divine and worldly aspects of the Manifestation of God, similar to the geometric point, which is without specific dimension and connects the physical with the nonphysical world.

The term "Hayy" means The Living and is used as one of the names of God in Islamic and Bábí scriptures.

In the Abjad numerals system the letters of the Arabic alphabet are assigned numerical values. The Arabic letters h ح and y ي, which compose the Arabic singular adjective meaning "living" in the phrase Letters of the Living, add up to 18, and therefore the phrase Letters of the Living refers to the number 18. Interestingly, there is a similar symbolism about the numerical value of the corresponding Hebrew word in Judaism.

The Báb referred to the 18 Letters of the Living, along with himself, as the first Váḥid of the Bayán Dispensation. The Abjad numerical value of the word Wáḥid (واحد) is 19. The word Wáḥid means "One". The Báb used this term as a reference to God and his Manifestations.