Index: wp-includes/functions.php
===================================================================
--- wp-includes/functions.php	(revision 10773)
+++ wp-includes/functions.php	(working copy)
@@ -2376,6 +2376,9 @@
 			$title = 'WordPress &rsaquo; Error';
 	}
 
+	$text_direction = 'ltr';
+	if ( isset($r['text_direction']) && $r['text_direction'] == 'rtl' ) $text_direction = 'rtl';
+	if ( ( $wp_locale ) && ( 'rtl' == $wp_locale->text_direction ) ) $text_direction = 'rtl';
 ?>
 <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
 <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" <?php if ( function_exists( 'language_attributes' ) ) language_attributes(); ?>>
@@ -2384,7 +2387,7 @@
 	<title><?php echo $title ?></title>
 	<link rel="stylesheet" href="<?php echo $admin_dir; ?>css/install.css" type="text/css" />
 <?php
-if ( ( $wp_locale ) && ( 'rtl' == $wp_locale->text_direction ) ) : ?>
+if ( 'rtl' == $text_direction ) : ?>
 	<link rel="stylesheet" href="<?php echo $admin_dir; ?>css/install-rtl.css" type="text/css" />
 <?php endif; ?>
 </head>
Index: wp-load.php
===================================================================
--- wp-load.php	(revision 10773)
+++ wp-load.php	(working copy)
@@ -43,7 +43,8 @@
 	require_once( ABSPATH . '/wp-includes/classes.php' );
 	require_once( ABSPATH . '/wp-includes/functions.php' );
 	require_once( ABSPATH . '/wp-includes/plugin.php' );
-	wp_die(sprintf(/*WP_I18N_NO_CONFIG*/"There doesn't seem to be a <code>wp-config.php</code> file. I need this before we can get started. Need more help? <a href='http://codex.wordpress.org/Editing_wp-config.php'>We got it</a>. You can create a <code>wp-config.php</code> file through a web interface, but this doesn't work for all server setups. The safest way is to manually create the file.</p><p><a href='%ssetup-config.php' class='button'>Create a Configuration File</a>"/*/WP_I18N_NO_CONFIG*/, $path), /*WP_I18N_ERROR_TITLE*/"WordPress &rsaquo; Error"/*/WP_I18N_ERROR_TITLE*/);
+	$text_direction = /*WP_I18N_TEXT_DIRECTION*/"ltr"/*/WP_I18N_TEXT_DIRECTION*/;
+	wp_die(sprintf(/*WP_I18N_NO_CONFIG*/"There doesn't seem to be a <code>wp-config.php</code> file. I need this before we can get started. Need more help? <a href='http://codex.wordpress.org/Editing_wp-config.php'>We got it</a>. You can create a <code>wp-config.php</code> file through a web interface, but this doesn't work for all server setups. The safest way is to manually create the file.</p><p><a href='%ssetup-config.php' class='button'>Create a Configuration File</a>"/*/WP_I18N_NO_CONFIG*/, $path), /*WP_I18N_ERROR_TITLE*/"WordPress &rsaquo; Error"/*/WP_I18N_ERROR_TITLE*/, array('text_direction' => $text_direction));
 
 }
 
