'Akká had achieved fame more than once in its long history.
It had refused to bow to mighty conquerors. Prophets of Israel as well as the
Prophet of Arabia had alluded to it in terms that exalted it above other towns
and cities of glittering splendour. Hosea had said that 'Akká was 'a door of
hope'. Ezekiel had referred to it as 'the gate that looketh toward the east' to
which 'the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east' It was
Ptolemais in the days when Jesus walked the Mediterranean shore. And Muhammad
had said: 'Blessed the man that hath visited 'Akká, and blessed he that hath
visited the visitor of 'Akká . . . A month in 'Akká is better than a thousand
years elsewhere.'
- Hand of the Cause, Balyuzi (‘Abdu'l-Baha - The Centre of the
Covenant’; citations from God Passes By, by Shoghi Effendi. See also Hosea ii.
I5, and Ezekiel xliii. I-2. Hosea refers to it as ‘the valley of Achor’)
