In it [the Kitáb-i-Aqdas] He . . . rules out the possibility of the appearance of another Manifestation ere the lapse of at least one thousand years.

It is a propitious moment for the publication of this first authorized translation into English of the Mother Book of His Revelation, His "Most Holy Book", the Book in which He sets forth the Laws of God for a Dispensation destined to endure for no less than a thousand years. Of the more than one hundred volumes comprising the sacred Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, the Kitáb-i-Aqdas is of unique importance. "To build anew the whole world" is the claim and challenge of His Message, and the Kitáb-i-Aqdas is the Charter of the future world civilization that Bahá’u’lláh has come to raise up.

The Kitáb-i-Aqdas, the Most Holy Book, stands out as the mightiest testimony to the sovereignty of Bahá’u’lláh. To any Bahá’í who deeply meditates on this book, Bahá’u’lláh appears as the ruler of all mankind . . . When the glory of his station is unveiled to the eyes of humanity, it will be hard to imagine that the Lord of Hosts was made to live in the most desolate of the cities, the Heavenly Father held as a captive by a perverse generation and the King of Kings confined in a small room unfit to be a dwelling. And yet in that small room devoid of all the luxuries of life and not even properly furnished, the Kitáb-i-Aqdas described by Him as His 'weightiest testimony unto all people' was revealed. It is a staggering thought that in such a room, in an obscure corner of a prison city, unknown to the world, such a mighty instrument as the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, the great Charter for future world civilization, should have been born.