Notes to Aqdas, Sentence #204
Notes from the Authorized Translation
116. O Emperor of Austria! He Who is the Dayspring
of God's Light dwelt in the prison of Akka at the time
when thou didst set forth to visit the Aqsa
Mosque. # 85
Francis Joseph (Franz Josef, 1830-1916), Emperor of
Austria and King of Hungary, made a pilgrimage to
Jerusalem in 1869. While in the Holy Land he failed to take
the opportunity to inquire about Baha'u'llah Who at that
time was a prisoner in Akka (Acre).
The Aqsa Mosque, literally, the "Most Distant"
Mosque, is referred to in the Qur'an, and has become
identified with the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.
Earl Elder's Notes
2. The Emperor Franz Joseph visited Jerusalem in 1869. He was the first German sovereign to visit the area since his ancestor, the Emperor Frederick IV, in 1436. Al-masjid al-aqsa
is used in the Qur'an 17:1 to denote Jerusalem. It is also referred to as al-quds or al-bayt al muqaddas or bayt al maqdis (The Holy House) (See Enc. of Islam, ii,
1094 ff., Lane, Lexicon, p. 2497). If this is the visit here referred to, the Aqdas could have been written not long after 1869.
Kitab-i-Aqdas Multilinear Translation table of contents
). [note 2] of translation | Glossary of select Arabic terms