The Lawh-i-Ahmad (Tablet of Ahmad) is one of the best known Tablets of Bahá'u'lláh, translated into English and many other languages. It was revealed around 1282 A.H. (1865) in honour of Ahmad, a native of Yazd. A cursory glance at the original Tablet makes it clear that Bahá'u'lláh wrote this before He was poisoned by Mirza Yahya.
The life story of Ahmad is very interesting. An account of his life is recorded in the annals of the Faith prepared by the Bahá'í community of Ishqabad. According to this account he lived to be one hundred and died in the year 1320 A.H. (1902). In his unpublished 'History of the Faith in the Province of Yazd', Haji Muhammad-Tahir-i-Malmiri has also written a brief account of Ahmad's life. In it he states that Ahmad died at the age of one hundred and thirteen!
Probably one of the reasons for this discrepancy is that in an Islamic community, people often did not know the date of their birth. There was no such thing as public registration of births; some parents used to record the birth of their children privately, but the individual did not care about the date. He did not attach importance to his birthday, nor did he ever celebrate it. This attitude was due to the teachings of Islam which taught man to be self-effacing and not to glory in himself. The only person whose birthday merited celebration was the Prophet of God.
Ahmad was born into a rich and influential family in Yazd. From his early days, when he was still in his teens, he felt a great attraction towards mysticism. At that age he often secluded himself in a room in order to commune with God. His greatest hope in life was to come face to face with the promised Qá'im (Promised One of Islam). He listened to any person who would show him the way, and often sat at the feet of ascetics and dervishes who claimed to possess the divine light within them.
However, his father and the family, who were orthodox Muslims, were perturbed by the way Ahmad was inclined towards mendicancy and asceticism. They brought much pressure upon him to relinquish his ideas, but Ahmad's indomitable spirit could not be fettered by orthodoxy. Knowing that the atmosphere of his homeland was not conducive to his spiritual development, Ahmad took the unusual step of leaving his home. In those days it was a rare occasion for a young person to leave his native town, especially without the consent of his parents. But Ahmad was driven by an irresistible force to find the essence of Truth and attain the presence of the Qá'im.