Bahá’í World/Volume 11/Articles and Reviews

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[Page 651]PART FOUR

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ARTICLES

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AND REVIEWS

1 .

RELIGIOUS EDUCATION FOR A PEACEFUL SOCIETY

BY HORACE HOLLEY

THE UNIVERSE or PADOMAR

THE largest telescope yet designed has been raised by scientists on a mountain under the clear California sky. Its lens, measuring sixteen feet eight inches in diameter, gathers light with so much more intensity than the human eye that its reflected image discloses an endless heaven hung with brilliant orbs. Its power is so encompassing that it extends human vision to bodies whose distance from the earth, measured by the time required for the travel of a ray of light, is not less than one billion years.

Since the speed of light is 186,000 miles a second, no terrestrial system of measurement can contain this utter remoteness or translate it into ordinary human meaning.

The universe of Palomar engulfs the small and familiar worlds sustained by the imagination of the poet, the shepherd and the mariner of ancient times. Its infinity of space and time can never be subjective to hope or fear. It is a motion we cannot stay, a direction we cannot divert, a peace we cannot impair, a power we cannot control. Here existence realizes the fulness of its purpose. The design and the material, the means and the end, the law and the subject, seem wholly one.

At Palomar the mind of man, standing on tiptoe, can behold the cosmic spectacle and grow by the eternal majesty it feeds on, but searching east or west or north or south one finds here

no candle lighted to welcome the errant human heart.

“This nature,” the Bahá’í teachings observe, “is subjected to an absolute organization, to determined laws, to a complete order and a finished design, from which it will never depart; to such a degree, indeed, that if you look care fully and with keen sight, from the smallest invisible atom up to such large bodies of the world of existence as the globe of the sun or the other great stars and luminous spheres, whether you regard their arrangement, their composition, their form or their movement, you will find that all are in the highest degree of organization, and are under one law from which they will never depart.

“But when you look at nature itself, you see that it has no intelligence, no will . . . Thus it is clear that the natural movements of all things are compelled; there are no voluntary movements except those of animals, and above all, those of man. Man is able to deviate from and to oppose nature, because he discovers the constitution of things, and through this he commands the forces of nature; all the inventions he has made are due to his discovery of the constitution of things

“Now, when you behold in existence such organizations, arrangements, and laws, can you say that all these _are the effects of nature, though nature has neither intelligence nor perception? If not, it becomes evident that this na 653

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First Spiritual Assembly of Amsterdam, Holland, elected April 21, 1948.

ture, which has neither perception nor intelligence, is in the grasp of Almighty God Who is the Ruler of the world of nature; whatever He wishes He causes nature to manifest.”1

Another passage states: “Know that every created thing is a sign of the revelation of God. Each, according to its capacity, is, and will ever remain, a token of the Almighty . . . So pervasive and general is this revelation that nothing whatsoever in the whole universe can be discovered that does not reflect His splendor . . . Were the Hand of Divine Power to divest of this high endowment all created things, the entire universe would become desolate and void.”2

The Bahá’í teachings also declare: “Earth and heaven cannot contain Me; what can alone contain Me is the heart of him that believes in Me, and is faithful to My Cause.”3

MAN’S INNER WORLD

From man’s inner world of hope and fear the cry for help has never been raised so desperately nor so generally across the whole earth. Civilization is

in conflict with the man of nature.

Civilization betrays the man of under standing and feeling. The individual has become engulfed in struggles of competitive groups employing different weapons to attain irreconcilable ends. The beginning and the end of his actions lie concealed in the fiery smoke of furious, interminable debate. His personal world has been transformed into an invaded area he knows not how to defend.

Sickness of soul, like physical ailment, manifests itself in many forms. It need not be a localized pain nor an acute sense of shock and disability. An ailment can produce numbness as well as torment, or it can spare the victim’s general health but deprive him of sight, hearing or the use of a limb.

Soul sickness that goes deep into the psychic organism seldom finds relief in hysteria or other visible adjustments to ill-being. It expresses itself in successive re-orientations to self and to society, each of which results in a conviction representing a definite choice or selection between several possibilities. When the conviction hardens, all possibilities but one are denied and dis [Page 655]ARTICLES AND REVIEWS

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International Center, 37 Quai Wilson, Geneva, Switzerland, site of Bahá’í International Bureau and offices of Bahá’í European Teaching Committee

missed. If individuals come to realize that effort to express certain qualities through their daily lives is continuously unsuccessful, they will, in the majority of cases, abandon the exercise of that quality and concentrate on others. If individuals find that their civilization makes demands on them for the exercise of qualities they personally condemn, in most cases the necessary adjustment is made.

The modern individual is in the same position as the mountain climber bound to other climbers by a rope. At all times he is compelled to choose between freedom and protection—to balance his rights and his loyalities, and compromise between his duty to protect others and his duty to develop something unique and important in himself. As long as the route and the goal are equally vital to all the climbers, the necessary adjustments can be made without undue strain. But modern life binds together in economic, political and other arrangements groups of people who never entered into a pact

of mutual agreement, who inwardly desire and need diverse things. The rope that binds them is a tradition, a convention, an inherited obligation no longer having power to fulfill.

Here, in essence, is the tragic sickness of modern man. What he sows he cannot reap. What he reaps he cannot store until a new harvest ripens. He feeds on another’s desire, he wills to accomplish an alien task, he works to destroy the substance of his dearest hope. Moral standards stop at the frontier of the organized group. Partisan pressures darken the heavens of understanding.

Humanity is undergoing a complete transformation of values. The individual is being transplanted from his customary, sheltered traditional way of life to the vast and disruptive confusions of a world in torment. The institutions which have afforded him social or psychic well-being are themselves subject to the same universal dislocation. The label no longer identifies the quality or purpose of the or [Page 656]656

ganization. One cannot retreat into the isolation of primitive simphcity; one cannot advance without becoming part of a movement of destiny which no one can control nor define.

Where can a new and creative way of life be found? How can men attain knowledge of the means to justify their legitimate hope, fulfill their normal emotions, satisfy their intelligence, unify their aims and civilize their activities‘.7 The astronomer has his polished lens of Pa10mar to reveal the mysteries of the physical universe. Where can mankind turn to behold the will and purpose of God?

CONSCIENCE: THE MIRROR HUNG m A DARKENED ROOM

Many persons feel that in man there is a power of conscience that will unfailingly, like the compass needle, point to the right goal, If in any individual case, this conception believes, the power of conscience fails to operate, it is because the human being himself has betrayed his own divine endowment. He has heard the voice but refused to heed. He has seen the right course of action but preferred to take the evil path.

If we examine this contention as applied to ourselves and others familiar to us over a considerable period of time, we find that conscience, as a faculty, cannot be understood by reference to any such naive and conventional view.

The individual has no private wire to God. The dictates or impulses we call conscience indicate different courses of action at different times. The truth, the law, the appropriate principle or the perfect expression of love is not when wanted conveyed to our minds like a photograph printed from a negative developed in the subconscious self. No individual can afford to rely for guidance in all vital affairs on the testimony offered from within.

Individual conscience appears to be compounded of many ingredients at this stage of mass development: childhood training, personal aptitude, social convention, religious tradition, economic pressure, public opinion and group policy.

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It is when we examine individual conscience in the area of social action and public responsibility that its limitations become clear. Public policy is the graveyard in Which the claim to perfect personal guidance lies interred. In every competitive situation involving social groups, conscientious persons are found on both sides of the struggle. The conscience of one leads to a definition of value or a course of action which stultifies the other. Conscientious persons in the same group seldom agree on matters affecting the Whole group. Individual conscience retreats to the realm of the private person when it cannot share or alter the conscience and conviction of others.

The result is that while theoretical exaltation of conscience is seldom abandoned, the operation of conscience, outside the small area controlled by personal will, is continuously suppressed. Policy is the conscience of the group, and dominant groups sanction collective actions frequently abhorrent to the individual. Our dominant groups are the successors to the primitive tribes in Which the individual was once completely submerged. Like the primitive tribe, their basic policy is to survive.

So helpless has the individual become under pressure of world-shaking events that leaders of revolution dismiss his moral worth entirely from their considerations. The individual ceases to be a person. He is made subject to mass regulation under penalty of punishment for disobedience and, if obedient, under hope of his share of a mass award. Societies have arisen composed of this unmoral mass of human beings, the nature of which resembles the physical monsters terrorizing the earth aeons ago.

Between the naive spiritual conception of conscience as divine spark, and the naive rational View that conscience is automatic response to external stimuli, the actual truth undoubtedly lies.

Human conscience is a quality existing in different stages of development. In the child it makes for obedience to the power by which the child is protected. It can manifest as an expression

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of the instinct of self—survival or selfdevelopment. It can inspire loyalty to the group. It can subject the individual to complete sacrifice for the sake of his group or for the truth he most reveres.

Moral attitudes become established through social education and discipline conducted over long periods of time. The moral worth of the individual consists in his capacity to share in a process of endless evolution. Though at times he seems bogged down in the swamp of evil, the ladder of development stands close to his hand and he can ascend it rung by rung. His moral responsibility can never be disclaimed by him nor voided by others on his behalf, since the principle of cause and effect operates throughout all life. No man and no society exists in a universe shaped to the pattern of human desire.

Conscience is not a form of wisdom or knowledge. It cannot be dissociated from the development of the individual or from the condition of his society. But one may say that conscience is a mirror hung in a room. If the room is darkened the mirror reflects but dimly. Light is needed—the light of truth and love. Then will the mirror of spiritual awareness disclose to the individual the essential nature of his own problem of choice, and open for him the door that leads from the private person to mankind. The helplessness of the individual today is due to the absence of light.

“When man allows the spirit, through his soul, to enlighten his understanding, then does he contain all creation; because man, being the culmination of all that went before and thus superior to all previous evolutions, contains all the lower world Within himself. Illuminated by the spirit through the instrumentality of the soul, man’s radiant intelligence makes him the crowningpoint of creation.

“But on the other hand When man does not open his mind and heart to the blessing of the spirit, but turns his soul towards the material side, towards the bodily part of his nature, then is he fallen from his high place and he becomes inferior to the inhabitants of the lower animal kingdom. In this case

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the man is in a sorry plight! For if the spiritual qualities of the soul, open to the breath of the Divine Spirit, are never used, they become atrophied, enfeebled, and at last incapacitated; While the soul’s material qualities alone being exercised, they become terribly powerful, and the unhappy, misguided man becomes more savage, more unjust, more vile, more cruel, more malevolent than the lower animals themselves.

“If, on the contrary, the spiritual nature of the soul has been so strengthened that it holds the material side in subjection, then does the man approach the divine; his humanity becomes so glorified that the Virtues of the celestial assembly are manifest in him; he radiates the mercy of God, he stimulates the spiritual progress of mankind, for he becomes a lamp to show light on their path.”4

In such words the Bahá’í teachings describe the two paths Which open before each human being, choice of which he himself is free to make.

SECTARIANISM—FROM CREATION T0 CHAOS

If individual conscience éannot illumine from man’s inner world the nature of basic social problems, What of religion? Have the traditional faiths such command of spiritual truth that they can serve as the guide and conscience of mankind? Do these sects and denominations constitute the moral Palomar bestowing vision upon a divided, a desperate humanity? Has God spoken to our age from these minarets, these temples, mosques, chapels and churches Which represent the meaning and purpose of religion to the masses ‘in East and West?

The world of sectarian religion is not a universe, ordered by one central creative Will, but the fragments of a world Which no human authority has power to restore. There are the main bodies of ancient, revealed religion: Hinduism, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Muhammadanism and Christianity, standing apart like continents separated by the salt, unplurnbed sea. There are in each of these bodies a large

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number of independent, mutually exclusive subdivisions. Their diverse claims to organic sovereignty maintain in the realm of faith the same condition which exists among nations, principalities, kingdoms and empires. They deal with one another by treaty and truce; there are conquests and seizures, colonies and alliances, plans and strategies, wars and revolutions, all without control of the greater and vital movements of society or even foreknowledge of what was and is to come.

This is why mankind has suffered two world wars, social dislocation and a plague of immorality, faithlessness, materialism and discontent. No universal religious body has existed to stay the swift descent of our age into the gloom of savage strife. Events do not wait upon doctrinal readjustments. When peace does not exist in the world of the soul it cannot exist in any other realm of human intercourse and experience. The masses have been given no moral unity, no common purpose which, stamped with divine authority, could raise them above the fatal disunities and conflicts distilled by their economic and political institutions.

Yet each of these faiths was divinely revealed, imbued with a universal spirit, charged with a high creative mission, and established itself through the sacrifice and heroism of those early believers who beheld the Word of God. Each faith has reconsecrated human life and by its lifeblood nourished great progress in civilization. What has happened to the first, true vision? What has extinguished the flame upon the altar of worship?

The superhuman character of revelation has gradually undergone dilution and admixture. The human explanation of a truth has been substituted for the truth itself. The performance of ceremonial rites has come to occupy the place held by the mystery of spiritual rebirth. Obligation to a professionalized institution has weakened the duty laid upon individuals to serve society and mankind. The aim of a regenerated, righteous, peaceful civilization inspired by the founders of religion has become diverted into hope for the vies

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tory of the church. Sectarianism in essence is not freedom of religion. It is an opportunity to abandon the way of life revealed from on high and substitute belief for sacrifice, ritual for virtue, creed for understanding, and a group interest for the basic rights of mankind.

All things exist in a process of life and death, growth and development, extinction and renewal. The fact that what men devise as a counterfeit for truth is eventually destroyed, does not confirm the rejection of religion by the cynic or the materalist. On the contrary, the succession of faiths throughout the period of known history points to a complete Vindication of faith in God, since He divides truth from error, the spirit from the letter. He punishes and He rewards. For every death He sends a new life.

“0 army of life!" the Bahá’í teachings warn, “East and West have joined to worship stars of faded splendor and have turned in prayer unto darkened horizons. Both have utterly neglected the broad foundation of God’s sacred laws, and have grown unmindful of the merits and virtues of His religion. They have regarded certain customs and conventions as the immutable basis of the Divine Faith, and have firmly established themselves therein. They have imagined themselves as having attained the glorious pinnacle of achievement and prosperity when, in reality, they have touched the innermost depths of heedlessness and deprived themselves wholly of God’s bountiful gifts.

“The cornerstone of the Religion of God is the acquisition of the Divine perfections and the sharing in His manifold bestowals. The essential purpose of faith and belief is to ennoble the inner being of man with the outpourings of grace from on high. If this be not attained, it is indeed deprivation itself. It is the torment of infernal fire.”5

And even more definitely: “Superstitions have obscured the fundamental reality, the world is darkened and the light of religion is not apparent. This darkness is conducive to differences

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and dissensions; rites and dogmas are many and various; therefore discord has arisen among the religious systems whereas religion is for the unification of mankind. True religion is the source of love and agreement amongst men, the cause of the development of praiseworthy qualities; but the people are holding to the counterfeit and imitation, negligent of the reality which unifies, so they are bereft and deprived of the radiance of religion.”6

“When the lights of religion become darkened the materialists appear. They are the bats of night. The decline of religion is their time of activity; they seek the shadows when the world is darkened and the clouds have spread over it.”7

“If the edifice of religion shakes and totters, commotion and chaos will ensue and the order of things will be utterly upset.”3

“Religious fanaticism and hatred,” the Bahá’í teachings affirm, “are a world-devouring fire, whose Violence none can quench. The Hand of Divine Power can alone deliver mankind from this desolating affliction.”9

INTERNATIONALISMZ THE END OF AN ERA

When changes take place in the spiritual life of a people, they produce effects not only upon the realm of personal conscience or upon the definitions of denominational faith—their results flow forth throughout the civilization. Society, indeed, is the outer surface of human action, as religion is the inner surface. The persons who are impressed with certain values from the religious teaching of their childhood, strive to fulfill them as adults in their civilization. The nations of the world are not composed of a separate race of human beings called citizens or subjects; all this mass of humanity who serVe as citizens or subjects are at the same time members of different racial groups and members of different religious bodies.

Since religious training has for the most part been based upon pre-rational states of childhood, the vital assumptions of faith or theology continue from

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generation to generation without analysis or investigation. The child assumes that his religion sets him off in some mysterious but inevitable and justifiable manner from those people who belong to a different religion. This prerational experience becomes an imperative directing his activities in other fields, all the more effective because it works behind his conscious and rational thought. Religion has thus prepared the way for the spirit of exclusive nationalism, class competition and other self-centered types of social institution. The pre-rational experience of justifiable division matures in the irrational attitudes of partisan loyalty which set people off from one another in political and economic matters, eventuating in strife and ruin.

The modern nation represents the most powerful and effective social unity ever achieved. It has coordinated the human qualities and possibilities to an unprecedented degree, liberating people from servitude to nature and laying the foundations of orderly progress by reconciling the political claims of the state with the social and cultural needs of the individual. But like every human institution, the nation cannot become an end unto itself. It cannot draw arbitrary lines and decree that human evolution must stop short at this line or that. The nation cannot reduce all questions of human relations to political principle, and solve them by a formal relationship to the state.

The movement of life is irresistible. When the modern nation had organized its area and completed the creation of the necessary institutions, it became mature and incurred obligation to establish useful relationships with other nations. The nation became more and more involved in activities and affairs outside its boundaries and beyond its jurisdiction. Internationalism has been the principle of civilization for more than a hundred years, but the nations could not realize themselves as means to an end, as instruments called upon, for the sake of humanity, to create a sovereignty of and for the entire world. This moral resolution has been lacking.

Denied fulfilment in world order,

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modern internationalism has organized the nations for their own destruction. The social organism made an end unto itself becomes self-consuming. First there has been an interval of spiritual blindness, a miscalculation of the essential nature of human life; then a denial of the obligation to join with other nations for the sake of peace, then a denunciation of some threatening foe, and, finally, a plunge into the maelstrom where every trend toward world unity is accelerated faster than the public intelligence can comprehend.

Power to make permanent and workable decisions has been temporarily lost. Our international relations rest upon formal agreements which have not yet become translated into world relationships and hence remain subject to abrupt dissolution if the strains of social dislocation go to the breaking point. In this condition of crisis humanity stands, unable to return to the simpler societies of the past and unable to generate sufficient power for true unity in a world civilization. The races and peoples meet in a fateful encounter, each cherishing its separateness as a duty and a right. One may say that humanity does not yet exist, for men are not directed by a world consciousness or impelled by a mutual faith.

“Today the world of humanity,” the Bahá’í teachings stated a generation ago, “is in need of international unity and conciliation. To establish these great fundamental principles a propelling power is needed. It is self-evident that unity of the human world and the Most Great Peace cannot be accomplished through material means. They cannot be established through political power, for the political interests of nations are various and the policies of peoples are divergent and conflicting. They cannot be founded through racial or patriotic power, for these are human powers, selfish and weak. The very nature of racial differences and patriotic prejudices prevents the realization of this unity and agreement. Therefore it is evidenced that the promotion of the oneness of the kingdom of humanity, which is the essence of the teachings

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of all the Manifestations of God, is impOSSible except through the divine power and the breaths of the Holy Spirit. Other powers are too weak and are incapable of accomplishing this.”10

“Among the teachings . . . is man’s freedom, that through the ideal Power he should be free and emancipated from the captivity of the world of nature; for as long as man is captive to nature he is a ferocious animal, as the struggle for existence is one of the exigencies of the world of nature. This matter of the struggle for existence is the fountainhead of all calamities and is the supreme afi'liction.”11

“Universal peace is a matter of great importance, but unity of conscience is essential, so that the foundation of this matter may became secure, its establishment firm and its edifice strong.”2

In the Bahá’í writings, peace is revered because in essence it is a spiritual mystery in Which humanity has been invited in our day, for the first time, to partake. Peace is a divine creation; a reconciliation of human and divine purpose. Peace appearsfirst as a universal religion; as its influence gathers force and its principles spread then peace can permeate the body of society, redeeming its institutions and its activities and consecrating its aims.

“Universal peace,” these writings promise, “is assured . . . as a fundamental accomplishment of the religion of God; that peace shall prevail among nations, governments and peoples, among religions, races and all conditions of mankind. This is one of the special characteristics of the Word of God revealed in this Manifestation.”13

SPIRITUAL EDUCATION—II‘HE INSTRUMENT OF PEACE

The issues of human existence turn upon the axis of education. Education alone can overcome the inertia of our separateness, transmute our creative energies for the realization of world unity, free the mind from its servitude to the past and reshape civilization to be the guardian of our spiritual and

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physical resources.

The true purposes of education are not fulfilled by the knowledge conferred through civil education, since this knowledge ends with the purposes of the individual or the needs of the state. They are not fulfilled by sectarian education, since sectarian knowledge excludes the basic principle of the continuity and progressiveness of revelation.

The true purposes of education are not achieved by independent pursuit of knowledge undertaken through study of the classics, the great philosophies or even the religious systems of the past. Such education enhances the individual capacity and deepens the insight of a group. It opens the door to a world of superior minds and heroic accomplishment. But that world is the reflection of the light of truth upon past conditions and events. It is not the rising of the sun to illumine our own time, inspire a unified world movement, and regenerate withered souls.

Nor may we hope that psychology can develop the necessary transforming power for a dislocated society, a scientific substitute for the primitive offices of religion. The explorer in the world of the psyche sees the projection of his own shadow, finds the answer determined by his own question. He can prove mechanistic determinism or demonstrate the freedom and responsibility of the soul. The area within which he works is suitable for the development of personal healing. He can learn the habitual reactions of persons in a group or of groups in a society, but this knowledge is statistical until applied by a comprehensive organ of intelligence on a world scale.

“The human spirit which distinguishes man from the animal,” the Bahá’í teachings state, “is the rational soul; and these two names—the human spirit and the rational soul—designate one thing. This spirit, which in the terminology of the philosophers is the rational soul, embraces all beings, and as far as human ability permits discovers the realities of things and becomes cognizant of their peculiarities and effects, and of the qualities and properties of

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beings. But the human spirit, unless assisted by the spirit of faith, does not become acquainted with the divine secrets and the heavenly realities. It is like a mirror which, although clear, polished and brilliant, is still in need of light. Until a ray of the sun reflects upon it, it cannot discover the heavenly secrets.”14

This significant comment is also found: “With the love of God all sciences are accepted and beloved, but without it, are fruitless; nay, rather, the cause of insanity. Every science is like unto- a tree; if the fruit of it is the love of God, that is a blessed tree. Otherwise it is dried wood and finally a food for fire.”15

A new and universal concept of education is found in the literature of the Bahá’í Faith.

“When we consider existence, we see that the mineral, vegetable, animal and human worlds are all in need of an educator.

“If the earth is not cultivated it becomes a jungle where useless weeds grow; but if a cultivator comes and tills the ground, it produces crops which nourish living creatures. It is evident, therefore, that the soil needs the cultivation of the farmer. . .

“The same is true With respect to animals: notice that when the animal is trained it becomes domestic, and a1so that man\ if he is left without training becomes bestial, and, moreover, if left under the rule of nature, becomes lower than an animal, whereas if he is educated he becomes an angel. . . .

“Now reflect that it is education that brings the East and the West under the authority of man; it is education that produces wonderful industries; it is education that spreads glorious sciences and arts; it is education that makes manifest new discoveries and laws. If there were no educator there would be no such things as comforts, civilization, facilities, or humanity. . . .

“But education is of three kinds: material, human and spiritual. Material education is concerned with the progress and development of the body, through gaining its sustenance, its material comfort and ease. This educa [Page 662]662

tion is common to animals and man.

“Human education signifies civilization and progress: that is to say, government, administration, charitable works, trades, arts and handicrafts, sciences, great inventions and discoveries of physical laws, which are the activities essential to man as distinguished from the animal.

“Divine education is that of the Kingdom of God: it consists in acquiring divine perfections, and this is true education; for in this estate man becomes the center of divine appearance, the manifestation of the words, ‘Let us make man in our image and after our likeness.’ This is the supreme goal of the world of humanity.

“Now we need an educator who will be at the same time a material, human and spiritual educator, and Whose authority will be effective in all conditions . . .

“It is clear that human power is not able to fill such a great office, and that the reason alone could not undertake the responsibility of so great a mission. How can one solitary person without help and without support lay the foundations of such a noble construction? He must depend on the help of the spiritual and divine power to be able to undertake this mission. One Holy Soul gives life to the world of humanity, changes the aspect of the terrestrial globe, causes intelligence to progress, vivifies souls, lays the foundation of a new existence, establishes the basis of a marvelous creation, organizes the world, brings nations and religions under the shadow of one standard, delivers man from the world of imperfections and vices, and inspires him with the desire and need of natural and acquired perfections. Certainly nothing short of a divine power could accomplish so great a work.”16

Who is this educator? “The holy Manifestations of God, the divine prophets, are the first teachers of the human race. They are universal educators and the fundamental principles they have laid down are the causes and factors of the advancement of nations. Forms and imitations which creep in afterward are not conducive to that progress. On the contrary these are de THE Bahá’í

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stroyers of the human foundations laid by the heavenly educators.”17

“Religion is the outer expression of the divine reality. Therefore it must be living, vitalized, moving and progressive. If it be without motion and non—progressive it is without the divine life; it is dead. The divine institutes are continuously active and evolutionary; therefore, the revelation of them must be progressive and continuous?“5

Tm: MANIFESTATION OF GOD

The focal point of the Bahá’í teachings is clarification of man’s relationship to God. As long as peoples differ, or are unaware, or accept a substitute for this relationship, we cannot distinguish between truth and error, or discriminate between principle and superstition. Until we apprehend human beings in the light of the creative purpose, it is impossible to know ourselves or others. Social truth is merely experiment and hypothesis unless it forms part of a spiritual reality.

The founders of revealed religions, who have been termed prophets, messengers, messiahs and saviours, in the Bahá’í teachings are designated Manifestations of God. These beings, walking on earth as men, stand in a higher order of creation and are endowed with powers and attributes human beings do not possess. In the world of truth they shine like the sun, and the rays emanating from that sun are the light and the life of the souls of men.

The Manifestation is not God. The Infinite cannot be incarnated. God reveals His will through the Manifestation, and apart from what is thus manifested His will and reality remain forever unknown. The physical universe does not reveal the divine purpose for man.

“Every one of them,” the Bahá’í teachings state, “is the Way of God that connects this world with the realms above, and the standard of His truth unto every one in the kingdoms of earth and heaven. They are the Manifestations of God amidst men, the evidences of His truth, and the signs of His glory.”19

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What almighty power is exercised by a will manifested through a person who has been flouted, denied, imprisoned, tortured and crucified? No human authority could survive such savage onslaughts as have greeted each messenger who has come from the heavenly realm to this lowest of worlds. The divine power expresses itself by compulsion in the kingdoms of nature. In the kingdom of man the divine power operates in such a manner that men are free to accept and adore, 0r repudiate and condemn. The divine power compels that from age to age men must come to a decision, but the decision itself is free. By that decision, when the prophet has revealed the will of God, men separate into two organic companies: those who believe and those who deny.

The whole pattern and process of history rests upon the succession of dispensations by which man’s innate capacities are developed and by which the course of social evolution is sustained. The rise and fall of civilizations proceed as the effect of prior spiritual causation. An ancient civilization undergoes moral decadence; by division of its own people and attack from without its power and authority are destroyed; and with that destruction collapses the culture and the religious system which had become parasites upon its material wealth. Concurrently, a new creative spirit reveals itself in the rise of a greater and better type of society from the ruins of the old.

The critical point in this process is the heroic sacrifice offered the Prophet by those who see in Him the way to God, and His official condemnation by the heads of the prevailing religious system. That condemnation, because men cannot judge God, recoils back upon the religion and the civilization itself. They have condemned themselves. In the same manner, the small and weak minority who have seen the Face of God in His Manifestation grow from strength to strength. The future is with them. In their spiritual fellowship the seeds of the new civilization are watered and its first, tender growth safeguarded by their heart’s blood.

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Through the Manifestation of God the power of the Holy Spirit accomplishes the will of God. Nothing can withstand that power. Because its work is not instantaneous, a darkened age cannot perceive the awful process of cause and effect—the divine will as cause, and human history as effect—guiding human destiny from age to age.

But the Bahá’í teachings penetrate farther into the mystery when they affirm that in spirit and in aim the successive prophets are one being, one authority, one Will. This teaching on the oneness of the Manifestations of God is the essential characteristic of a revelation which represents religion for the cycle of man’s maturity and the creation of world peace.

“There can be no doubt whatever that the peoples of the world, of whatever race or religion, derive their inspiration from one heavenly Source and are the subjects of one God. The difference between the ordinances under which they abide should be attributed to the varying requirements of the age in which they were revealed.”20

Those who deny and condemn the Prophet, therefore, are not defending the divine purpose from sinister betrayal by one who introduces new laws and principles; on the contrary, since the Manifestation in Himself is one, they condemn their own Prophet when He returns to regenerate the world and advance the true Faith of God. Thus is the moral nature of human life, and man’s responsibility to God, sustained throughout the devious course of history. Faith is no mere belief, but a connection with the only power that confers immortality 0n the soul and saves humanity as a whole from complete self—destruction.

“A man who has not had a spiritual education,” the Bahá’í writings attest, “is a brute.” (21) “We have decreed, O people, that the highest and last end of all learning be the recognition of Him Who is the Object of all knowledge; and yet behold how ye have allowed your learning to shut you out, as by a veil, from Him Who is the Dayspring of this Light, through Whom every hidden thing hath been revealed.”22

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THE BAHA’I' WORLD

Bahá’ís attending the First Bahá’í European Conference, Geneva, Switzerland, May, 1948.

The oneness of the Manifestations has been thus established in the Bahá’í writings: “In the Word of God there is . . . unity, the oneness of the Manifestations of God, His Holiness Abraham, Moses, Jesus Christ, Muhammad, the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh. This is a unity divine, heavenly, radiant, merciful; the one reality appearing in successive manifestations. For instance, the sun is one and the same but its points of dawning are various. During the summer season it rises from the northern point of the ecliptic; in winter it appears from the southern point of rising. Although these dawning points are different, the sun is the same sun which has appeared from them all. The significance is the reality of prophethood which is symbolized by the sun, and the holy Manifestations are the dawning-places or zodiacal points.”23

The coming of the Manifestation in this age signalizes the termination of a long epoch in human history, the prophetic era in which mankind was gradually prepared for the promised day of universal peace. In Bahá’u’lláh the spirit of faith is renewed and given ex pression in teachings Which affirm the

organic unity of the whole human race. Nothing sacred and valid revealed in former dispensations is denied, but the spirit of faith has been endowed with a worldwide and universal meaning.

The Bahá’í teachings overcome prejudices of race, nation and sect by inspiring sentiment of brotherhood. They create not only a pure well of feeling but constitute also a unified body of knowledge in which the power of reason can be fulfilled. They connect social truth with the truth of worship, and broaden the field of ethics to include right relationships of races as well as individual persons. They formulate law and principle which will bring order into international affairs.

“In this present age the world of humanity,” the teachings declared before the first World War (anticipating the conditions of today) “is afflicted with severe sicknesses and grave disorders which threaten death. Therefore His Holiness Bahá’u’lláh has appeared. He is the real physician bringing divine remedy and healing to the world of man.”24

“The first teaching of Bahá’u’lláh is the investigation of reality. Man must

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Group of representatives present at the Second European Teaching Conference in Brussels, August 5-7, 1949. Taken on the steps of the Université Libré where the entire conference was held.

seek the reality himself, forsaking imitations and adherence to mere hereditary forms. As the nations of the world are following imitations in lieu of truth and as imitations are many and various, differences of belief have been productive of strife and warfare. So long as these imitations remain the oneness of the world of humanity is impossible. Therefore we must investigate the reality in order that by its light the clouds and darkness may be dispelled. If the nations of the world investigate reality they will agree and become united.”25

“The source of all learning is the knowledge of God, exalted be His glory, and this cannot be attained save through the knowledge of His divine Manifestation.”26 This knowledge offers to men the substance of the education needed for the establishment of a society worthy of the blessings of justice and peace.

REFERENCES

1. Some Answered Questions, page 3 2. Bahá’í World Faith, page 97

0142-09

. Bahá’í World Faith, page 98 . Reality of Man, page 6 . Selected Writings of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá,

page 43 Bahá’í World Faith, page 237

. Bahá’í World Faith, page 238

. Bahá’í World Faith, page 289

. Gleanings, page 288

. Selected Writings of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá.

page 5

. Bahá’í World Faith, page 288

. Bahá’í World Faith, page 285

. Bahá’í World Faith, page 247

. Bahá’í World Faith, page 317

. Bahá’í World Faith, page 366

. Some Answered Questions, page 8 . Bahá’í World Faith, page 250

. Bahá’í World Faith, page 224

. Bahá’í World Faith, page 21

. Gleamings, page 217

. Some Answered Questions, page 135 . Epistle to the Son of the Wolf, page

129

. Bahá’í World Faith, page 259 . Selected Writings of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá,

page 12

. Bahá’í World Faith, page 238 . Bahá’í World Faith, page 140

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First Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Geneva, Switzerland.

First Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Bern, Switzerland, elected April 21, 1948.

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2.

667

THE OLD CHURCHES AND THE

NEW

WORLD-FAITH

BY GEORGE TOWNSHEND, M.A. (OXON)

(Sometime Canon of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin, and Archdeacon of Clonfert)

HAVING identified myself with the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh and sacrificed my position as a canon and a dignitary of the Church of Ireland that I might do so, I now make this statement on the relation of this Faith to Christianity and to the Churches of Christ.

It is submitted to all Christian people in general but more especially to the bishops and clergy and members of my own communion, with the humble but earnest and urgent request that they will give it their attention as a matter of vital concern to the Church. Only through an impartial investigation of the Cause of Bahá’u’lláh will they find, I fully believe, a means of reviving the fortunes of the Church, of restoring the purity and the power of the Gospel and of helping to build a better and more truly Christian world.

Bahá’u’lláh (Whose approaching advent had been announced in Persia nineteen years before by His prophetic Herald, the Báb, Himself a worldfamous figure) made His public declaration as a Messenger of God in Baghdad in the year 1863. He affirmed that His appearance fulfilled the promised Return of Christ in the glory of the Father. He brought a Teaching which though ampler and fitted to a more advanced Age was in spirit and purpose the same as that of Christ. He revealed those “other things” which Jesus told His disciples He had to give them but which they could “not bear” at that time. His mission was to bring the work of Christ to its completion and realisation, to reconstruct the social order of the world and build the long promised Kingdom of God in very fact.

He addressed individual letters or specific messages to the monarchs of

the West and to the members of the various ecclesiastical orders of the Christian Churches, and directed numerous and repeated exhortations and warnings to the entire Christian world. These without exception were ignored by Christendom when they were made, and they have now been set aside and disregarded for some eighty years. During that period the long established influence of Christ in Christendom has suffered a decline so unprecedented, so precipitous that the Bishops gathering for the Lambeth Conference were greeted in the London press with the challenge that “Christianity is fighting for its life”; while the Bahá’í Faith proclaimed at that time by one lone Prophet shut in a Turkish prison has spread through the whole globe, has led the constructive thought of our time, has created a spiritual world-community joining the East and the West, and is fast making good its right to a place in the age-long succession of worldfaiths.

“Followers of the Gospel,” exclaimed Bahá’u’lláh addressing the whole of Christendom, “behold the gates of heaven are flung open. He that had ascended unto it is now come. Give ear to His voice calling aloud over land and sea, announcing to all mankind the advent of this Revelation—a Revelation through the agency of which the Tongue of Grandeur is now proclaiming: ‘Lo, the sacred Pledge has been fulfilled, for He, the Promised One is come.’ ”

. “The voice of the Son of Man is calling aloud from the sacred vale, ‘Here am I, here am I, O God, my God!’ . . whilst from the Burning Bush breaketh forth the cry, ‘Lo, the Desire of the world is made manifest

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in His transcendent glory!’ The Father hath come. That which ye were promised in the Kingdom of God is fulfilled. This is the Word which the Son veiled when He said to those around Him that at that time they could not bear it. . . . Verily the spirit of Truth is come to guide you unto all truth. . . . He is the one who glorified the Son and exalted His Cause . . . ” “The Comforter whose advent all the Scriptures have promised is now come that He may reveal unto you all knowledge and wisdom. Seek Him over the entire surface of the earth, haply ye may find Him.”

Through a period of some twenty-five years from about 1865 to 1890, Bahá’u’ll’éh. sent letters and messages to the monarchs and leaders of mankind proclaiming to them that—however little they recognised it—a worldcrisis had already taken shape and profound changes on a world-scale were at hand; the old civilization would pass away and another take its place; a new race of men would arise, and reverence, unity, peace, justice would become watch-words in a new and happier order. He challenged them in burning words of power to acknowledge the spiritual cause of world—events already coming into view and to fill the lofty and noble part for which God and Christ had prepared them. He warned them not to let prejudice or dogma or superstition or self—interest or desire for leadership and glory from men deter them from accepting this summons. Again and again He urged on their notice that the true cause of this New Age and its happenings was spiritual and that they would find the key to it in the Gospel which they so continually perused.

In a Tablet to Napoleon III, the most outstanding monarch of the moment, He informed his Majesty that in the providence of God a new age of unprecedented changes in human history was opening. He outlined certain features of its ordained pattern, which would vitally concern a King-statesman, and called on him to arise, humble himself before God, follow the guidance of God’s Prophet and take a bold initiative in unifying mankind.

THE BAHA’I’

WORLD

This, he wrote, was the Wondrous Age Christ had come to announce. Christ’s dominion had spread westward that the West and its rulers might now give a lead in His holy service. Would Napoleon now play the man in the precious Cause of God, he would make himself an emperor of the wide world.

Bahá’u’lláh had already been in communication with Napoleon and had discovered his hypocrisy and insincerity. He makes mention of this, and warns the Emperor (then in the plenitude of his pride and power) to give immediate heed to the Prophet’s word, else, He writes, “thy kingdom shall be thrown into confusion and thine empire shall pass from thy hands. . . .commotions shall seize all the people in that land

We see abasement hastening after

thee, whilst thou art of the heedless. ”

The contemptuous rejection of this warning was followed not many months after by the sudden outbreak of the Franco-Prussian war, the utter defeat and capture of Napoleon at Sedan, and the collapse of his empire.

To Queen Victoria Bahá’u’lláh sent a letter in the course of which He declared His identity: “0 Queen in London! Incline thine ear unto the voice of thy Lord, the Lord of all mankind

.He in truth hath come into the world in His most g'reat glory and all that is mentioned in the Gospel hath been fulfilled. . . . Lay aside thy desire and set thine heart towards thy Lord, the Ancient of Days. We make mention of thee for the sake of God and desire that thy name may be exalted through thy remembrance of God, the Creator of earth and heaven . Turn thou unto God and say: O my Sovereign Lord, I am but a. vassal of Thine, and Thou art, in truth, the King of Kings

_ Assist me then, 0 My God, to remember Thee amongst Thy handmaidens and to aid Thy Cause in Thy lands. . . .”

To Alexander II He wrote, “0 Czar of Russia! Incline thine ear unto the Voice of God, the King, the Holy. Beware lest thy desire deter thee from turning unto the face of thy Lord, the Compassionate, the Most Merciful . . . . He verily is come with His Kingdom,

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and all the atoms cry aloud, ‘Lo, the Lord is come in His great majesty.’ He who is the Father is come, and the Son in the holy vale crieth out, ‘Here am I, here am I, O Lord, My God.’ . . . Arise thou amongst men in the name of this all—compelling Cause and summon, then, the nations unto God. . . . Could’st thou but know the things sent down by My Pen and discover the treasures of My Cause and the pearls of My mysteries. . . . thou would’st in thy love for My Name and in thy longing for My glorious and sublime Kingdom lay down thy life in my path. . . .”

He wrote to Pope Pius IX announcing that “He who is the Lord of Lords hath come” and that he who is the Rock (meaning Peter), crieth out saying “Lo, the Father is come, and that which ye were promised in the Kingdom is fulfilled.” Bahá’u’lláh bade him ——-“A»rise in the name of the Lord, the God of Mercy, amidst the peoples of the earth and seize thou the cup 03‘ life with the hands of confidence and first drink thou therefrom and proffer it then to such as turn towards it amongst the peoples of all faiths.” He warned him not to repeat the error of the Pharisees and of the men of learning who on His first coming opposed J esus Christ and pronounced judgment against Him, whilst he who was a fisherman believed on Him. He called on him to “sell all the embellished ornaments thou dost possess and expend them in the path of God” to “abandon thy kingdom unto the kings, and emerge from thy habitation,” and should anyone offer him all the treasures of the earth “refuse to even glance upon them”: then, detached from the world, let him, “speak forth the praises of thy Lord betwixt earth and heaven” and warn the kings of the earth against injustice in their dealings with men.

In the concluding pages of His communication to the Pope which contain some of the most tender, moving and impassioned passages in these writings He expresses the warmth of His desire, the earnestness of His effort to bring the followers of the Gospel into the Most Holy Kingdom of God and to

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enable the true-hearted to discern its opened Gates. He urges them to rend the spiritual veils that blind their eyes, to cast away everything, everything that prevents them accepting this divine deliverance. He calls them to come out of the darkness into the light poured forth by the sun of the Grace of God. He tells them of the sovereignty that awaits them in the Kingdom on High if they will but heed and obey, of the friendship of God and His companionship in His everlasting realm of Beauty and of Power that He longs to bestow on them according to His ancient promise. The Kingdom is theirs of right. He has bidden them welcome to it, and His heart is sad to see that others enter but they, alas! tarry before its gates in the darkness. How blessed are those who will keep the covenant Christ made with His people, who will watch for their Lord’s return as He bade them, and know His voice when He calls them. Blessed are they who will walk forward in the path Christ laid out for them so straight and true and will take their rightful place in the van of the Legions of Light.

Elsewhere in these letters to the kings, and also in other writings, Bahá’u’lláh speaks to the entire Christian world and addresses directly officers of the various ecclesiastical orders in Christendom. For instance: “0 concourse of archbishops! He who is the Lord of all men hath appeared. 1n the plain of guidance He calleth mankind whilst ye are yet numbered with the dead. Great is the blessedness of him who is stirred by the Breeze of God and hath arisen from amongst the dead in this perspicuous Name‘.”

“O concourse of bishops! . He who is the Everlasting Father calleth aloud. between earth and heaven. Blessed the ear that hath heard and the eye that hath seen and the heart that hath turned unto Him. . . .” And, “the stars of the heaven of knowledge have fallen, they that adduce the proofs they possess in order to demonstrate the truth of my Cause and who make mention of God in My Name; when however I came unto them in My majesty, they turned aside from Me. They,

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verily, are of the fallen. This is what the Spirit (Jesus) prophesied when He came with the truth and the Jewish Doctors cavilled at Him. . . .”

He addressed the priests, telling them it was their duty to proclaim aloud the Most Great Name among the nations—they chose to keep silence when every stone and every tree shouted aloud, “The Lord is come in His great glory!” “The Day of Reckoning,” He wrote, “hath appeared, the Day whereon He who was in heaven hath come. He verily is the One whom ye were promised in the Books of God.

. . How long will ye wander in the wilderness of heedlessness and superstition?” . . .

He warned the monks that they little understood the real greatness of Jesus Christ which had been “exalted above the imagination of all that dwell on the earth. Blessed are they who perceive it.” “If ye choose to follow Me,” He wrote, “I will make you heirs of My Kingdom; and if ye transgress against Me I will in My long suffering endure it patiently.” He expressed His wonder at their men of learning who read the Gospel and yet refused to acknowledge its All—Glorious Lord on His appearance.

Again and again, in general statements and in particular prophecies, Bahá’u’lláh warned the rulers of the world and their peoples that if these clear, solemn and public pronouncements went unheeded and the reforms enjoined were not made, then divine chastisement would descend from all sides upon mankind: irreligion would spread and deepen; from it would flow anarchy; authority and power would pass from the priesthood; the social order would break up and dissolve to make place for another which God would guide men to build in its stead.

Whatever “Lesser Peace” the warweary nations might at last arrange among themselves, it would not bring them a final solution of their problems. This would come only with “The Most Great Peace” of which He wrote in His Tablet (or letter) to Queen Victoria, with the creation of a world-commonwealth and with the ultimate emergence of a divine world-civilization.

THE Bahá’í

WORLD

These objectives could be attained only through acceptance of the Prophet of the Age and through the adoption of the principles, plans and patterns for the new World Order which were transmitted by Him from God.

When no heed was given to Bahá’u’lláh’s Declaration that His prophethood was the return of Christ, when His appeal for the examination of His Cause and the redress of cruel wrongs inflicted on Him was ignored; when no one regarded His forecast, so forcefully and so fully presented, that a new Dawn had broken, a New Age had come (new in a spiritual sense, in a moral sense, in an intellectual sense) an Age which would bring a new outlook and new concepts, an Age of Divine Judgment, in which tyranny would be thrown down, the rights of the people asserted, and in which the social structure of the human race would be changed; when no attention was paid to the vision He opened, to the opportunities He offered, to the bold challenge which He had from prison flung before the mighty ones of the world; then alas! the Churches as the years went by found themselves caught into a current which bore them irresistibly downward at an ever increasing speed and which at the end of eight decades was still to be bearing them down to lower and yet lower levels in their political standing, in their moral influence, in their intellectual prestige, in their social authority, in their numbers and their financial resources, in the popular estimate of the relevancy and the reality of the religion which they taught and even in the vigour and unanimity of their own witness to the basic truth upon which the Church itself had been founded.

No comparable period of deterioration is to be found in the long records of the Christian Faith. In all the vicissitudes of fifteen eventful centuries (and they were many); in all the misfortunes, the mistakes, the failures and the humiliations in which from time to time the Church was involved, no such catastrophic decline is to be traced. The sovereignty which the church had wielded in the Middle Ages had indeed

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by the nineteenth century become in Western Europe a thing of the past; but the diminution had been gradual and moderate. The loss suffered during the previous eight hundred years can hardly be compared with the vital damage inflicted during the last eighty.

In past crises the foundations of faith and of western society were not shaken; hope remained dominant, and from tradition and memory men drew inspiration. Society remained Christian and to that extent unified. But now the very foundations have gone. Reverence and restraint are no more. The heights of human nature are closed: its depths opened. Substitute systems of ethics, man-made and man-regarding, are invented, dethroning conscience. The dignity of reason and of knowledge is denied; truth itself is impugned.

The story of this calamitous decline is well known to all, and its outstanding features can be briefly summarised.

In the year 1870, not long after the despatch of Bahá’u’lláh’s Tablet to his Holiness, the Pope was through King Victor Emmanuel’s seizure of Rome deprived by force of virtually the whole of that temporal power which Bahá’u’lláh had advised him to renounce voluntarily. His formal acknowledgment of the Kingdom of Italy by the recent Lateran Treaty sealed this resignation of sovereignty.

The fall of the Napoleonic Empire was followed in France by a wave of anti-clericalism which led to a complete separation of the Roman Catholic Church from the State, the secularisation of education, and the suppression and dispersal of the religious orders.

In Spain, the monarchy which for so long had been in Christendom the great champion of the Roman Church was overthrown and the State secularised.

The dismemberment of the AustroHungarian monarchy caused the disappearance both of the last remnant of the Holy Roman Empire and of the most powerful political unit that gave to the Roman Church its spiritual and financial support.

In Soviet Russia an organised assault directed against the Greek Orthodox Church, against Christianity, and against religion, disestablished that

671

church, massacred vast numbers of its hundred million members, stripped it of its six and a half million acres of property, pulled down, closed or perverted to secular uses countless thousands of places of worship and by “a five year plan of godlessness” sought to eradicate all religion from the hearts of the people.

In every land and in all branches of the Christian Church, even where there was no system of Establishment, the rising power of nationalism continually made churches more and more subservient to the interests and the opinions of the State—a tendency brought into strong relief and notoriety in the first world-war.

The gradual decay of the intellectual prestige of religion in Europe had extended over many generations, but it was brought prominently before the public mind in the seventies of the last century, largely through the controversies which followed Tyndale’s Belfast address in 1874. The character of this decay has been epitomised by Professor Whitehead, writing in 1926, thus:

“Religion is tending to degenerate into a decent formula wherewith to embellish a comfortable life. . . . For over two centuries, religion has been on the defensive, and on a weak defensive. The period has been one of unprecedented intellectual progress. In this way a series of novel situations has been produced for thought. Each such occasion has found the religious thinkers unprepared. Something which has been proclaimed to be vital has, finally, after struggle, distress and anathema been modified and otherwise interpreted. The next generation of religious apologists then congratulates the religious world on the deeper insight which has been gained. The result of the continued repetition of this undignified retreat during many generations has at last almost entirely destroyed the intellectual authority of religious thinkers. Consider this contrast; when Darwin or Einstein proclaim theories which modify our ideas, it is a triumph for science. We do not go about saying there is another defeat for science, because its old ideas have been abandoned. We know that another

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step of scientific insight has been

gained. ”

The loss in the moral and spiritual field has been even more vital and conspicuous, especially of recent years. There is no need to enlarge upon the matter. The sickness at the heart of Christian life and thought which made these humiliations possible has been the decay of spirituality. Love for God, fear of God, trust in God’s overruling providence and ceaseless care have been no longer active forces in the world. The religious thinkers find themselves baffled by the portents of the time: When men in disillusionment, in anguish and despair come to them for counsel, seek from them comfort, hope, some intelligible idea as to what this cataclysm means and whence it came and how it should be met, they are completely at a loss. Though the Church for nineteen centuries has proclaimed, and has enshrined in its creeds, the emphatic and repeated promise of Christ that He would come again in power and great glory to judge the earth, would exalt the righteous and inaugurate the Kingdom of God among mankind, yet they believe and teach that through all these years of deepening tribulation no Hand has been outstretched from heaven, no light of Guidance has been shed upon the earth; that God has withheld from His children in their deepest need His succour, His comfort and His love; that Christ has utterly forgotten His promise or is impotent to redeem it and has permitted His universal Church to sink in ruin Without evincing the least small sign of His interest or His concern.

Meantime the Bahá’í Message has kindled once more on earth the ancient fire of faith that Jesus kindled long ago, the fire of spontaneous love for God and man, a love that changes all life and longs to show itself in deeds of devotion and of self-sacrifice even to death and martyrdom. To them who have recognised Christ’s voice again in this Age has been given in renewed freshness and beauty the vision of the Kingdom of God as Jesus and the Book of Revelation gave it—the same vision, but clearer now and on a larger scale

THE Bahá’í

WORLD

and in more detail. A new enthusiasm has been theirs, a power that nothing could gainsay or resist. Their words reached the hearts of men. With a courage, a determination that only divine love could quicken or support they rose in the face of ruthless persecution to bear witness to their faith. Fearless, though comparatively few, weak in themselves but invincible in God’s Cause, they have now at the close of these eighty years carried that Faith far and wide through the globe, entered well nigh a hundred countries, translated their literature into more than fifty languages, gathered adherents from East and West, from many races, many nations, many creeds, many traditions, and have established themselves as a world-community, worshipping one God under one Name.

The Bahá’í Faith today presents the Christian Churches with the most tremendous challenge ever offered them in their long history: a challenge, and an opportunity. It is the plain duty of every earnest Christian in this i1lumined Age to investigate for himself with an open and fearless mind the purpose and the teachings of this Faith and to determine whether the collective center for all the constructive forces of this time be not the Messenger from God, Bahá’u’lláh, He and no other; and whether the way to a better, kinder, happier world will not lie open as soon as we accept the Announcement our rulers rejected.

“0 Kings of the earth; He Who is the Sovereign Lord of all is come. The Kingdom is God’s, the Omnipotent Protector, the Self—Subsisting. Worship none but God and with radiant hearts lift up your faces unto your Lord, the Lord of all names. This is (1 Revelation to which whatever ye possess can never be compared could ye but know it.

“Ye are but vassals, 0 Kings of the earth! He Who is the King of Kings hath appeared, arrayed in His most wondrous glory, and is summoning you unto Himself, the Help in Peril, the Self-Subsisting. Take heed lest pride deter you from recognising the Source of Revelation, lest the things of this world shut you out as by a veil from

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Bahá’í Community of Addis-Ababa, Ethiopia, 1948.

Him Who is the Creator of Heaven. A-rise and serve Him Who is the Desire of all nations, Who hath created you through a word from Him and ordained you to be, for all time, emblems of His sovereignty. . . .”

“0 Kings of Christendom! Heard, ye not the saying of Jesus, the Spirit of God. ‘I go away and come again unto you?’ Wherefore, then, did ye fail, when He did come again unto you in the

clouds of heaven, to draw nigh unto Him, that ye might behold His face and be of them that attained His Presence. In another passage He saith: ‘When He the Spirit of Truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth.’ And yet behold how when He did bring the truth ye refused to turn your faces towards Him and persisted in disportmg yourselves with your pastimes and your fancies. . . .”

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BAHA'IS LOOK TO THE FUTURE

BY WILLIAM KENNETH CHRISTIAN1

MANY people feel that religion has nothing to offer modern life except idealism for the very young and consolation for the aged. Bahá’ís do not share such a limited view. In their experience religion is dynamic, applies to all the major phases of the individual life, and is the unifying force in society. Bahá’ís look to the future with confidence. They know that grave difficulties lie ahead for the people of the world. But their Faith strikes at the roots of modern problems and offers a healing and unifying solution. At the heart of the Bahá’í teachings is a universal moral basis for the building of an enduring and just world order.

We must recognize that, first and foremost, the Bahá’í Faith is a revealed religion. It is not an economic system even though its teachings include some principles of economics. It is not a political system even though it offers a plan for world organization. The Bahá’í Faith is a revealed religion with its basic tenet being a belief in one God, Who reveals His will and purpose for human development in each age of history through a Manifestation. Bahá’ís recognize Bahá’u’lláh, the Founder of the Bahá’í Faith, as the Manifestation of God for our own time.

THE BASIS OF MORAL AUTHORITY

In the last one hundred years human life has undergone many radical changes. Methods of travel and work, ideas of time and distance have been rapidly altered. Classes, races, and nations can no longer live and work apart from each other. These revolutionary changes upset the old moral values so that now men and women live in great moral confusion. There are several reasons for this. The old moralities were largely sectional; they tended to apply to a certain race, nation, or class. And

also, time has shown that the 01d moralities were suited to a simpler age and not meant for our present complex world.

To condemn all forms of morality and religion would mean that men can now manufacture their own moral law to suit themselves. Bahá’ís reject this idea. The Bahá’í Faith upholds a belief in God, Who speaks His will to men in each age through a chosen Manifestation. The moral law is not manufactured by men and women to suit their own inclinations or to serve as a mask for catch phrases in order to gain power over others. Bahá’ís firmly declare that the moral law originates in the teachings of those few men in history who are the Manifestations of God.

The basis of authority in determining what is right and what is wrong, what is good and what is bad, is, for the Bahá’í the teachings of Bahá’u’lláh. The Bahá’í rejects political tradition as the chief measure of what is good or bad. The Bahá’í rejects economic necessity as the chief measure of good. The Bahá’í rejects class or race or national interests as a fit measure for determining the ultimate good for human beings.

Bahá’ís feel that the moral law is the basis of personal happiness and the basis of decency and order in the local,

1Wi11iam Kenneth Christian is now teaching written and spoken English at Michigan State College and doing graduate work in American Literature. He was graduated from New York State Teachers’ College and received his MA. degree from Cornell University. Before going to Michigan State. he taught at Morrisville Agricultural and Technical Institute, Syracuse University and Cornell University. Mr. Christian became a Bahá’í in Binghamton, New York in 1930. He has served on several local Spiritual Assemblies and as regional secretary of New York State. He is a well-known lecturer and a frequent contributor to World Order magazine. He is a member of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States.

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national, and world community. They look at the present world around them —with millions oppressed by fear, misery, and hatred—and reject the idea that any group of scientists, economists, or politicians could formulate an adequate moral force to remove these evils. They are convinced that materialism and the rejection of God are the prime causes of these evils. They recognize the teachings of Bahá’u’lláh as the higher,,divine law for the development of humanity in this age.

Perhaps we might summarize it thus: while some men proclaim materialism — the kingdom of man -Bahá’ís proclaim the growing World 01'der of Bahá’u’lláh—the Kingdom of God.

THE CHIEF BASIS OF SOCIETY

Some people regard the economic organization of society as the most important factor in the solution of human affairs. They think of man as an economic unit, as if he were valuable only in terms of what he could produce. Such people are apt to regard history as a continuous struggle between economic classes.

Bahá’u’lláh taught that the chief basis of society is religion, that the moral, divine laws provide the real framework for civilization. As ‘Abdu’l-Bahá taught: “The fundamentals of the whole economic condition are divine in nature and are associated with the world of the heart and spirit.” The Bahá’í teachings stress the idea that man is a responsible moral being, and the chief purpose of his life is the attainment of spiritual greatness. Because of the approaching maturity of the human race, Baha’u’flah has brought us a system of divine economy: laws, principles, and institutions for unifying the people of the world in one religion and one order.

THE INTERPRETATION OF HISTORY

Bahá’ís reject the national, racial, or class struggle theory of history as too limited a view since it ignores the influence of religion and other forms of idealism. Bahá’ís regard history as the evolution of man and society toward higher forms of moral conduct and a

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wider organization of social life. When men and society repudiate moral values, then class divisions appear as part of the disintegration of an old order. The solution cannot be found in the triumph of one group at the expense of others, but the solution grows as men accept a renewed statement of the divine law. Bahá’ís feel that the ethical justification for the changes of individual standards and social forms in history, has been the successive revelations of religion.

THE MEANS OF SOCIAL CHANGE

Bahá’ís completely reject the use of force to bring about a change in human affairs. They reject the principle of violence because it has its roots in lawlessness, it denies human rights due to all men, and it is contrary to the moral law.

Bahá’ís believe in the use of persuasion and the demonstration of Bahá’ís, in their personal conduct and their social relations within the Bahá’í community, of a way of life morally and socially superior to general practice in the modern world. Bahá’ís cannot use secrecy to hide their methods or their ultimate objectives. Anyone can find out what Bahá’ís teach and what they are doing. The Bahá’í teachings condemn deception. There is no secret about the objective of Bahá’ís to unite all the people of the world in one faith and one order.

In the Bahá’í View, any man or group of men who attempt to divide human beings along racial, nationalistic, religious, or class lines, are committing the greatest possible evil against the wleare of the human race.

Bahá’ís believe in uniting all men and women, regardless of class, creed, or color, on a spiritual basis. Bahá’ís cannot accept any philosophy which tries to divide society on arbitrary class lines. Bahá’ís teach brotherly love, regardless of who the brother may be. The Bahá’í Faith changes all classes by establishing a spiritual unity; this is much more effective—it is the divine way.

The Bahá’í position on the means of social change is probably best summarized in this way: Bahá’ís believe in

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peaceful means, not force; openness, not plots; evolution, not revolution.

ATTITUDE TOWARD GOVERNMENT

Bahá’ís are obliged to obey their government. Bahá’ís do not fear the idea of government; they know that a government is as good or as bad as the people who are in responsible charge. Bahá’ís believe in the necessity of government if justice is to be established throughout the world.

The teachings of Bahá’u’lláh show men how a just society—for all kinds of people—may be evolved. The growing Bahá’í world community is a laboratory where the principles of Bahá’u’lláh are being applied in human relations, where the future institutions of justice are taking shape, where Bahá’ís are learning how to act justly and to develop methods for the just conduct of their own affairs.

Since Bahá’ís reject the idea that all men are controlled by self—interest, they know from increasing experience that a governing body of men and women can be elected to act as responsible trustees for the whole community. Bahá’ís believe, and strive to practice in their own affairs, the principle that positions in government should go to those men and women who have demonstrated that they can rise above selfinterest and serve as “trustees of the Merciful One among men.” They believe that government—Whose members are freely selected and secretly elected by the people—is the natural social agency for attaining “the best beloved of all things” in the sight of God—justice.

ECONOMIC PRINCIPLES

The Bahá’í teachings contain some economic principles, but not a system of economics. “The fundamentals of the whole economic condition are divine in nature and are associated with the world of the heart and spirit.” An economic system must be flexible, evolving and changing according to the needs of the time.

The Bahá’í Faith creates the vision of a united world composed of various

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classes and races, each man and woman of which possesses equal human rights. Bahá’ís likewise believe that unless social planners recognize the superior law of God they will not be able to plan justly.

The Bahá’í teachings advocate the organization of society so that extremes of wealth and poverty may be eliminated. To attain this, the men in positions of public responsibility need a high sense of spiritual trusteeship. In this sense, Bahá’ís believe in the principle of equitable distribution of income.

The Bahá’í Faith advocates (1) that the state should be the mediator between capital and labor, (2) that both capital and labor are essential to the welfare of all the people, (3) that both should have their rights and responsibilities clearly defined in law, (4) that various classes, economic as well as social, are inevitable in human society and must realize their mutual interdependence, (5) that labor deserves the security of a share in the profits of business.

Any economic system, no matter how appealing in theory, Will be immoral and unjust unless the men and women responsible for it have a high sense of dedication to the well-being of humanity. It is to protect men and women from injustice — economic and political—that Bahá’u’lláh has emphatically declared: “The fundamental purpose animating the Faith of God and His Religion is to safeguard the interests and promote the unity of the human race, and to foster the spirit of love and fellowship amongst men.”

THE RIGHTS or ALL PEOPLE

Bahá’ís believe that any rights which are valid, should apply to all people regardless of class, sex, or color. The rights of men and women have their origin in the moral law as revealed by the divine Prophet of the age.

These rights should be written into law, but they are best safeguarded and applied in plans and policy by men and women dedicated to the service of God. Such men and women recognize as their first obligation the shaping of policy closer and closer to the divine standard.

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The laws of God, the Creator, give men their true liberty. Moses enunciated the Ten Commandments. These gave basic rights—the right to property, the right to live without fear of lawful murder. Jesus stressed the dignity of man, and from this have come such rights as are implied in the phrase “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

Bahá’u’lláh has brought men the right to live in a united world society, the right to be recognized as a spiritual being and not a mere physical and economic mechanism, the right to an education and equal opportunities, the right to worship God through creative work, the right to such self-knowledge as will eliminate useless fears and frustrations, the right to the means of physical health and human necessities, the right to family life and normal human relationships, the right to develop spiritual capacities Without the corrosion of ruthless competition or arbitrary authority.

‘Abdu’l-Bahá declared: “There shall be an equality of rights and preroga 677

tives for all mankind." The Bahá’í insistence upon the divine law and its application everywhere in the world grows from two facts. First, Bahá’ís recognize Bahá’u’lláh as the Manifestation of God chosen to renew religion in our time. And second, the teachings of Bahá’u’lláh stem from the fundamental principle of the Oneness of Mankind. This principle “represents the consummation of human evolution—an evolution that has had its earliest beginnings in the birth of family life, its subsequent development in the achievement of tribal solidarity, leading in turn to the constitution of the city-state, and expanding later into the institution of independent and sovereign nations.

“The principle of the Oneness of Mankind, as proclaimed by Bahá’u’lláh carries with it no more and no less than a solemn assertion that attainment to this final stage in this stupendous evolution is not only necessary but inevitable, that its realization is fast approaching, and that nothing short of a power that is born of God can succeed in establishing it.”

THE NEXT HUNDRED YEARS

BY STANWOOD COBB 1

Bahá’u’lláh is known to the world as the Founder of a World Religion named after Him, the Bahá’í Faith. He is not so well known, however, in relation to His remarkable prophetic utterances, dating from 1868 on, regarding the cataclysms and disintegration of modern civilization. More clearly and more powerfully than anyone who has subsequently analyzed the vital flaws in world civilization of the present day, Bahá’u’lláh diagnosed its condition, revealed its symptoms of decay and prophesied its complete disintegration.

“The signs of impending convulsions and chaos can now be discovered, in asmuch as the prevailing order appeareth to be lamentably defective.”2 Again

lStanwood Cobb is well known in the field 01 child training, having written many books on the subject, among which are: The New Leaven, Discovering the Genius Within You and New Horizons for the Child. He is the founder of the Progressive Education Association and Director of the Chevy Chase Country School. A graduate of Dartmouth College, he studied at Harvard. Then in 1907 he went to Constantinople to teach at Robert College. At that time he made a Visit to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, who was then a prisoner at ‘Akká, Palestine. He became interested in the broader field of education for a better social order. His book, Security for a Failing World, analyzes the basic needs of this age and presents the answer in the comprehensive teachings of Bahá'u’lláh.

2Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 216.

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and again He pointed out the causes of this disintegration, which could be all summed up in the single word “godlessness." This evil, like a cancer, He said, was gnawing at the Vitals of Europe, and would completely destroy the stability of all its institutions.

He foretold the overturning of empires, the downfall of dynasties, revolutionary and disintegrating changes sweeping away all the established institutions and leaving chaos in their stead.

He forecast in vivid terms the complete downfall of the powerful Islamic clergy in Persia, who at the time of Bahá’u’lláh’s preachments were more powerful even than the Shéh. He forecast the coming of universal war, including even the discovery of atomic power, a discovery which He said had been held back from humanity lest it destroy itself. Of Germany He made prophecies which have definitely been fulfilled: “Oh banks of the Rhine! We have seen you covered with gore, inasmuch as the swords of retribution were drawn against you. . . . And we hear the lamentations of Berlin, though she be today in conspicuous glory.”3 He foretold the humiliation and disaster approaching Napoleon III of France.

Reflecting that same gift of prophetic vision, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, His son, who in this country in 1912 lectured from coast to coast on the new World Order of the Bahá’í Faith, said in California in 1912: “We are on the eve of the battle of Armageddon . . . The time is two years hence, when only a spark will set aflame the whole of Europe. The social unrest in all countries, the growing religious scepticism, antecedent to the millennium, and already here, will set aflame the whole of Europe. . . . By 1917 kingdoms will fall and cataclysms will rock the earth.”4

More important by far than the forecasting of important events by Bahá’u’lláh is His prophetic delineation of the outline of a new World Order, destined by the Will of God to develop and ultimately control the whole planet

33ahd’i Warld Faith, 9. 55. éBahd’u‘lláh and. the New Era, p. 296.

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in a great universal civilization based on world peace, world brotherhood, and world unity expressed in terms of a concrete world organization. If we examine one by one the chief principles which Bahá’u’lláh proclaimed as the essential foundations of this world unity and world civilization, we shall trace in each instance a remarkable correlation between these principles as enunciated by Bahá’u’lláh (in the name of God) and the growing conviction of the intelligent leadership of the world as to the vital need of such principles, and in most cases the actual development of these principles to an embryonic degree.

1. WORLD UNITY

Bahá’u’lláh said that humanity must develop a new consciousness, the consciousness of the oneness of mankind. Only on such a new psychology could world unity be effectively organized. “The world is one country and mankind its citizens.”

A remarkable advance has been made in world consciousness since this utterance of Bahá’u’lláh. Intelligent people the world_ over realize, as did Wendell Willkie, that this is indeed “one world.” There is no nation on the planet, no matter how powerful it may be or how retarded and weak from a political and military point of view, but what realizes that the destiny of each people is linked up indissolubly with the destinies of all the other people on the planet.

As an intellectual concept then, this pronouncement of Bahá’u’lláh has a parallel the world over in the realization of the essential oneness of mankind. But this progress toward unity is still in the domain of man’s intelligence only. Such a concept of oneness must pervade the heart and be fortified by the spiritual potencies before it can become effective in the sense that Bahá’u’lláh indicated.

2. WORLD PEACE

Bahá’u’lláh called, in the name of God, upon all the rulers of the world to abolish warfare 0n the planet and organize in terms of peace. The instrumentations of warfare, He stated, were

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becoming so devastating as to threaten the very existence of humanity. Wmwas disastrous to civilization. World peace, on the contrary, would become the foundation for universal prosperity and happiness.

It is hardly necessary to point out the extraordinary development, subsequent to these pronouncements, on the part of world leadership as to the imperative need for world peace. Two world wars have proved more convincing than any arguments could be in the development the world over of a will—to-peace. Great as are the obstacles to such a longed-for goal, there is no one who doubts the alternative of its achievement, or of the complete and permanent destruction of civilization on this planet.

3. WORLD FEDERATION

Bahá’u’lláh proclaimed also to all the rulers of the world their duty in the name of God to organize the planet into an effective Federation with an International Legislature, Court of Justice, and Police Control. To make effective such an organization individual nations must relinquish such factov's of their sovereignty as would compete with this new international order, most notably, the privilege of nationalistic militarism. National armamentation, He stated, should be reduced to the needs of internal order only; and an international police force should be built up, powerful enough to regulate any contrary-minded nations which might from time to time endanger world peace.

The world has advanced to this point also, as evidenced by its creation of the United Nations and the recognition of the imperative need of those very factors of world organization emphasized by Bahá’u’lláh.

The world recognizes these needs. But tragically enough, it is not yet prepared sufficiently in mind and spirit to sacrifice national sovereignty to that point at which international sovereignty could become effective.

The unwillingness of the most powerful nations to submit their destiny completely to the majority will of a World

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Federation is the Achilles’ heel of the United Nations.

An even greater weakness is the lamentable truth that a world government can have no potency if and when many of its component parts have a tremendously greatei“ military force than the world government they are supposed to obey. Just as in the days of feudalism, kings had little power when their feudal lords had greater armed forces than the king himself, so it is clear the anarchy of war which at present prevails upon this planet can never become regulated into ways of peace until this nationalistic feudalism gives place to a strongly constituted planetary rule and order.

Several necessary factors of world federation, then, remain still to be developed. But it is evident to any intelligent person that destiny will gradually impel the acceptance of those terms without which world peace and world order could not be established.

4. WORLD TRADE

Bahá’u’lláh indicated that international trade, through whose arteries the pulse of international prosperity must flow, should be freed from barriers. There should be established also an international control of those important basic resources of the planet, the lack of which or the desire for which has up to date been such an impelling influence towards war. Also, there should be a unitary system of moneys, weights and measures for the whole world.

In these important directions we see both concept and practice, feeble up to the present it is true, but indicative of the growing consciousness on the part of world leadership that international trade must be freed from tariff barriers and that the world’s basic resources, under some form of international guarantee, must be equitably available to all peoples of the planet; just as in the United States of America the resources of each and every state are mutually available without calling into requisition the force or threat of warfare.

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crete objectives of facilitating international trade even to the point of reduction of tariff barriers, weak and obstructed though its efforts be, is a welcome evidence of the desire of world leadership to work toward those noble goals which Bal’x’z‘l’u’llah envisioned.

5. A UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE

Bahá’u’lláh stated the need of a universal auxiliary language, the purposes of which should be not only to facilitate travel, trade and culture, but also to help create that consciousness of the oneness of humanity which is the keystone of the arch of Bahá’u’lláh’s new World Order. The leaders of the world should meet in council, He stated, and. select such a language—either an existing language or an artificial language—and require it in all the schools of the world, not to displace the native language, but to serve as auxiliary to it. Thus in a single generation such a language would become effective all over the planet. And as a corollary to universal language there should also be established a universal Script.

Modern progress shows vividly the need of such an auxiliary language. International conferences; the sessions of the United Nations and its component bodies such as UNESCO; the radio and the moving pictures—all these expressions of modernization emphasize the need of unity in speech the world over.

So closely was Bahá’u’lláh’s pronouncement followed by the inspired thought of humanity that only a few years subsequent to His declaration on the subject of a universal language, a Polish educator, Zamenhoff, became aflame with the vision of creating an artificial language to neutralize the jealousies of existing nationals and to make possible an effective universal auxiliary to the world’s languages. This artificial language, Esperanto, has steadily won its way to the forefront of all such experimental creations. Probably it would be the world’s choice as an artificial language in case such a selection were to be made.

Among existing languages, English has shown in the last generation an extraordinary development. A tre THE BAHA’I WORLD

mendous advantage possessed by an existing language, such as English, lies in the great body of literature already present in the language. And it is safe to say that either in original creation or in translation there is more literature extant in the English language than in any of the other languages of the world. Hence the resident of a small country like Bulgaria, or of a retarded country such as China could upon the study of English as an auxiliary language become immediately heir to all its vast body of literature in the belleslettres and the sciences. Whereas if Esperanto were to be the choice as the international language its study would unlock to the pupil only a few hundred volumes of literature.

6. UNIVERSAL EDUCATION

Bahá’u’lláh ordained as a spiritual obligation to humanity the complete 0bliteration of illiteracy and the training of all children, not only in the arts and sciences but also in some practical line of vocation, which should fit them for a livelihood. “Knowledge is as wings to man’s spirit.”

This insistence on universal education, although hardly needed in the Occident, remains still an obligation unfulfilled by over half of humanity. But the consciousness of this obligation has by now permeated all countries of the world. Most significant is the dedication of UNESCO to this task. Special committees have been set up to investigate illiteracy the world over, to formulate plans for its elimination, and to stimulate backward nations in that process.

Surely one of the first steps toward raising the human race in the direction of its ultimate goals must be the opening of the gates of literacy and knowledge to all human beings. This is in reality a spiritual enterprise, based upon the doctrine of the soul constituting every man a sacred individualworthy of all the benefits and developments that God has destined for humanity — it was this spiritual factor chiefly that instituted in Christian countries the noble doctrine and practice of universal education.

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The doctrine of universal education proclaimed by Bahá’u’lláh has already powerfully begun to affect Oriental groups that have become His followers. Wherever such groups are sufficiently large to make it possible, schools are established not only for the boys but also for the girls. For Bahá’u’lláh stated that it is more important even to educate the female than the male, because the female becomes the mother and in her hands chiefly lies the destiny of her children.

7. A UNIVERSAL CURRICULUM

The world pattern of Bahá’u’lláh calls ultimately for a universal curriculum, establishing the foundations for a noble cosmic culture and civilization freed from all limitations of insularity and local idiosyncracies. This universal civilization would, however, not obliterate those pleasing features of racial and national culture which are the varying expressions of the variegated emotional tones and background. of racial groups.

This development of a universal curriculum is already making steady headway Without the need of any propaganda in its favor. For modern science demands and obtains this right. There cannot be varying and contradictory approaches to scientific knowledge. Truth is one, science is one, the world over. And a true scientist—whether in Tokyo, Bombay, Leningrad, Constantinople, Paris, London, or New Yorkmust have identical foundations and qualifications for scientific procedure and exposition.

If we add to this oneness of knowledge, already arising on the planet, the significant aid of an auxiliary universal language, not many generations will have passed until education the world over, apart from belles-lettres and certain local needs, will follow one and the same curriculum. So again we see how recent developments in the evolution of civilization on this planet are distinctly in line with Bahá’u’lláh’s teaching for a universal curriculum.

8. THE EQUALITY OF MAN AND WOMAN Bahá’u’lláh proclaimed the absolute

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equality of man and woman. Man and woman are the two wings upon which humanity flies and if one of these is weak humanity cannot make due progress.

In the Occident the feminist movement had begun before the days of Bahá’u’lláh, but its progress was feeble and its claims only partial. Since the period of His pronouncements, however, there have taken place significant developments in the feminist movement, bringing about women’s suffrage in many countries; opening the doors of higher education and of all professions to women; freeing matrimony in the most advanced sections of humanity from that economic bondage which tended to hold woman in servitude and hence in virtual inequality.

Bahá’u’lláh did not assert that man and woman are the same. It is equality of opportunity, privileges and rights which He demands for woman. This, too, is destined to come to pass.

9. THE HARMONIZATION OF SCIENCE AND RELIGION

So important is the need of a rapprochement between science and religion that Bahá’u’lláh made it one of the cornerstones of His world pattern. He said that science and religion are equally needed for the progress and, development of humanity. Either one without the other will not suffice for its perfect development. Both He and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá powerfully asserted the claims of the verities of sciences as over against the traditions and superstitions of an erring theology which dispute those noble truths that science brings to humanity.

In all the history of humanity no schism has been so disastrous as the modern schism unnecessarily dividing man’s allegiance between science and religion. Such is the apparent opposition between the two that if a man elects to follow zealously the path of religion he fears to admit the claims of science; while on the other hand those who devote themselves earnestly to science feel themselves forced into a state of mind critically agnostic toward religion.

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This schism cannot go on. Next to war, it is the most dangerous foe to human progress. The Bahá’í religion frankly faces this difficulty and solves it. Truth cannot be divided against itself. The universe is one and the truth about it is one. If any religion denies the plain truths of science, says ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, then it is not religion.

We see a slight movement in the secular world toward this harmonization of science and religion. For science —which has not itself escaped the evils of dogmatism, of tradition and of fallaciousness —— is now becoming less dogmatically assertive in relation to those occult approaches to existence which we call spiritual. The great scientists of today realize that their discoveries in the world of matter by no means preclude spirit from the universe. And the bewildering majesty and complexity of the universe force them to recognize that back of all this infinite detail there must be a Plan and a Planner. And hereby they approach a reconciliation with religion. All that remains then, is to continue on this road, and through complete scientific thinking and investigation work out man’s relation to this Plan and Planner.

As to the nature of this Planner whom we may call God, Bahá’u’lláh concords with the scientist in stating that He is the great Unknowable of the Universe. God in His essence cannot be understood or comprehended. The Infinite does not at any point contact finite phenomenal existence. The ways in which this Infinite Essence, the Creator, does approach, vivify and direct His creation is a story that cannot be unfolded here. Suffice it to say that in the Bahá’í universities of the future all the sciences will be earnestly studied, as well as the spiritual doctrines which are needed for the revaluation and direction of man’s daily life.

10. ONENFss 0F RELIGION

Last and of great significance in the noble pillars of the Bahá’í temple for humanity is the proclamation of the essential oneness of religion. Religions in their essence are one, said Bahá’u’lláh, and the divisions and differences between them are due to

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human error and human limitations and do not flow from the purpose of the Founders of religions, or of that divine power which stands back of all Revelation. Religion is one, and should be recognized and practiced as one, the world over.

This is a breath-taking pronouncement for humanity. That which the greatest vision and zeal of missionary movements in the various religions has been unable to accomplish, the Bahá’ís accomplish by the simple factor of the recognition of the validity of all the world’s religions and of their essential unity. Thus obstacles are obliterated. The unity of religion in actual practice, however, remains for a future century to witness.

Since this statement of Bahá’u’lláh there has been a miraculous transmutation in all enlightened religious thought in the direction of the recognition of the validity of other religions than one’s own. One can approach this concept from pure logic, as the writer did in his youth, upon reflection that of the some three-hundred-fifty sects of Christianity—many of which claim not only to have truth but to have an absolute monopoly of it — it is evident that it would be a strange universe if one of these sects should have all truth and the other sects be completely in error. It must be, rather, that all sects have some truth, and none a monopoly of it. Enlarging this thought to a consideration of the major religions of the world, one might also conclude that all of them have some truth, but none of them a monopoly of it.

This process of reasoning has evidently passed through the minds of intelligent people the world over, because it is today the prevailing attitude among those intellectuals who still follow religion, whatever sect or religion they belong to.

And this transformation has affected missionary movements so that their approach now to other religions is not to attack them as inventions of the devil but to admit that they have truths and spiritual values. The effort is to meet other religionists on a basis of fellowship, and friendship.

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’ *iiss; ‘3

The National Bahá’í Center, Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany, August, 1949.

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Many an intellectual of today has become an eclectic, gleaning truth as he finds it from any source the world over ——taking effectively into his spiritual life gems of wisdom springing from various climes and races and epochs.

The progress as regards these ten principles in the world situation between the day of Bahá’u’lláh and the present day, is so tremendous as to significantly support the writer’s contention that the world is inevitably evolving in the direction of Bahá’u’lláh’s teachings, quite apart from any conscious knowledge of His message and mission. “God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform.”

With this thesis in mind, let us look ahead a hundred years. What may we expect, in a general way, to be achieved in the direction of world order and world unity?

The Bahá’ís are not blind optimists. They do not expect such a noble world order to spring full fledged from the brains of the twentieth century, as Athene sprang from the brain of Zeus. No, they expect, and have been told by Bahá’u’lláh, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and the present Guardian, Shoghi Effendi, that dire disasters will press upon humanity; that the world may and probably will pass through greater cataclysms than it has yet faced.

This is hardly cheerful news. But while its destiny lies within the will and power of mankind, do we see sufficient will toward world unity to steer the power of mankind into safe channels? Or shall it be that humanity must learn still greater lessons; must drink its cup of degradation to the bitter dregs, before its eyes are opened clearly and its

will becomes effectively directed toward its own true welfare. What do the Bahá’ís then expect

will happen within the next hundred years? Their expectations are based On three distinct premises:

1. The evident trend of human progress, as already indicated in the foregoing pages.

2. Faith in the prophetic vision of

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Bahá’u’lláh and His son, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Who have repeatedly made definite statements regarding the developments to be expected in the near, as well as distant, future.

3. Faith in a new world order as part of the blue prints of destiny—so to speak; a development of humanity that pre-exists on the plane of the unseen, the archetypal—described and preached by Christ as the Kingdom of God on earth.

Bahá’ís, then, look forward to a bright future for humanity and confidently expect better conditions to commence on effective foundations before the end of the present century. The Bahá’ís thus are, as one government official, not himself a Bahá’í, recently said, “the only true optimists left in the world.”

The Bahá’ís, as has already been stated, believe world conditions will continue to worsen. But they expect that these chaotic disturbances will end within the present generation; and that then world peace will be effectively established and a form of international federative government put into practice. They expect all this to happen before the end of the twentieth century.

Beyond that point, they see a steady ascent, a sound human progress founded not on the sands of materialism, but on the everlasting rock of spiritual verities and human righteousness. This is to be the Day of the Kingdom. This will be the beginning, feeble though it may be at the start, of man’s Golden Age upon this planet.

The energies of the human race, at last freed from war with its dire and absorbing necessities, and freed from want by science and technology put world—wide at the disposal of all peoples,—the energies thus released will cause to blossom forth a world civilization, the beauty, the prosperity, and the joyousness of which it is hard to conceive under the present condition of humanity.

The Bahá’ís, because of this vivid faith, endure more cheerfully than other groups, the shocks, the turmoils, the fateful exigencies of this era of transition. And they work, with the aid and guidance of their world Guardian,

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Shoghi Effendi, with steadfast assurance and indefatigable energy for the directives given them by their Founder and Teacher.

Faith is a great and important factor of achievement. Enlightened faith has, in addition to the automotive power which even a blind zeal bestows, the perfect chart for arriving at the aimedfor goals.

May our readers, whoever they may be, derive from the foregoing pages

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some bit of added assurance as to human destiny, and as to the individual part they may play in it. Black as the present clouds may be, let us remain convinced, as the history of human progress compels us to believe, that no effort of idealism is ever futile, no consecration to the world’s progress ever wasted. These drops, these springs of dedicated service flow inevitably together with great streams of progress toward the ocean of perfection.

AND WORLD PEACEl

BY DR. R. BRADLEY ROE

TONIGHT I have the very pleasant duty of introducing the speakers of the Bahá’í Community in a discussion on the» most important subject, “Can We Hold the Peace?” I hope to hear a most interesting discussion following the main speeches; an open forum should be truly open to all shades of opinion, and the more free the discussion is on so important a subject, the better for all.

In particular, I should like to thank the Northampton Bahá’ís for what I consider to be a signal honor in being asked to take the chair tonight. I know of no movement of greater interest, or, in my opinion, of greater importance today. Moreover, I think this Movement may yet play a greater part in public affairs than we at present recognize. For in the last analysis I believe the peace of the world will depend on what the people of the world think in their hearts.

I have long been an interested observer of this Movement. However, there may be some in the audience who have no knowledge of the Bahá’í Com 1Introductory remarks by Dr. R. Bradley Roe as chairman of a symposium on the subject "Can We Hold the Peace" given in Northampton, England on Naw-Rt'iz, 1946.

munity and their aims, and who may be wondering who the Bahá’ís are and why in particular they should be in a position to discuss peace, so it may save the time of the speakers if I very shortly state the Bahá’í aims from the point of view of an outsider, and if I am wrong, the Bahá’ís present will, I hope, correct me.

To explain briefly, then, this Movement was started just one hundred years ago in Persia by the Leader of a Great Reform Movement for World Unity and Regeneration. The Founder of the Movement was Bahá’u’lláh, a great Prophet. The character of the Movement is therefore reformative. The basis is spiritual. The goal and aim is the formation of a new World Order of a constructive nature leading to world peace. Its quality is that of a great unifying or harmonizing force in the world of today.

Two matters need further qualification. The first is the character of this Movement. The point that has always caught my attention has been the extraordinary degree of prophetic insight Bahá’u’lláh showed in sensing the intense urgency of the situation. I am talking of the period approximately between 1860 and 1870, some seventy—five

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years ago. Bahá’u’lláh, a Persian nobleman, spent a large part of His life either in exile, or, on account of the force of His teaching, in prison in the fortress of ‘Akká, in Palestine, with no access to the outside world. At this same time, we, in England, were in a century of unparalleled Scientific and industrial expansion, in the midst of a long peaceful period in the reign of Queen Victoria. The Boer War was not in sight, while the two great wars of 1914 and 1939 were not only undreamt of, but any suggestion of their extent would have been laughed at.

Yet one Man only in the whole world saw the danger, and although imprisoned, took immediate action. He wrote to all the crowned heads in Europe, warning them that unless humanity united (and He outlined some of the basic factors which would bring about the unity of nations), the most terrible disaster would follow. That is why He is so widely regarded as a Prophet, since of His own knowledge, in the limited circumstances in which He was placed, He could not possibly have received sufficient information to enable Him to have formed an adequate and accurate opinion, that has, in the light of subsequent events proved to be absolutely right. He grasped the absolute and urgent necessity at that date, long before the great events we have passed through, of the necessity for cooperation and unity in order to achieve peace; as opposed to selfishness. greed, nationalism, and the ruthless international competition which inevitably must lead to international jealousy, hate and war.

That brings me to the second point concerning the spiritual basis of the Bahá’í Movement. A year after His death in 1892, the Reverend Dr. Jessup, said of Him that “He was the head of that vast reform movement (he was talking of Persia) who accept the New Testament as the Word of God, and Christ as the Deliverer of men, who regard all nations as one and all men as brothers.” Bahá’u’lláh based the spiritual foundation of this great call to the world on the simple fact that all men in all nations and of all re THE Bahá’í

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ligions worship the same God. Here was a common basis on which all men could meet and cooperate with each other in full understanding. It was a common basis which interfered with no existing religion either then, or today. . . . And so, on that basis, Bahá’u’lláh launched His great call to all men of every nation, every color, every caste, and every creed—to join together under God, to unite, and together to build a World Order, based on justice, tolerance, wisdom, and love under God, and expressed in most practical measures by their acts. He raised the consciousness of the individual to an understanding of the need of other peeples as well as of their own, so there should come into existence a positive world consciousness of brotherhood expressed in practical work and reform.

It is not surprising that a Movement with such spiritual force behind it has, in a hundred years, spread into five continents and seventy-three countries. For it is a world Movement, probably better known outside England than in it. Nor is it surprising that so many men of great character have appreciated this Movement. For tonight we Walk in good company. To enumerate all their names would take half the evening, but I quote a few from memory. Great writers such as Tolstoy, Emil Ludwig, and Ernest Renan have written in high praise of this Movement. So have great statesmen, such as the late President Masaryk, President Benes, and the late Lord Curzon. Bahá’u’lláh’s son, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, came to the West on a world tour. He visited England in 1911 and was invited to preach in the City Temple by the Reverend J . R. Campbell, and also in St. John’s Church, Westminster, by Canon Wilberforce.

I was interested to see that Sir Ronald Storrs, in opening the Centenary Celebrations in London in 1944, quoted the late Dr. J owett of Balliol as having said of the Bahá’í Movement, that we were too near this great Movement to appreciate its full extent, but that it was probably the greatest religious movement since the time of Christ. It is interesting to remember also that the

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Exhibit of Bahá’í literature, Bern, Bahá’í gathering in Zurich, Switzerland Switzerland, April, 1947. April 27, 1947.

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Group of Bahá’ís, Bern, Switzerland, April, 1947, at International Esperanto Congress.

Bahá’í gathéri‘rfiig, Bernéék, SvgrmitzelIv‘land, April, 1947.

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present Guardian of the Faith was being educated at Balliol at the time of his Grandfather’s death in 1921, and went straight from that college to take

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up his great work in Haifa.

I think the Bahá’ís in Northampton have indeed every right to inaugurate a discussion of this type tonight.

NEW HOPE FOR MINORITY PEOPLES BY EMERIC SALA1

RELIGIONS of the past have been successful in instilling moral responsibility in individuals, families, tribes and even, with certain reservations, in national communities. The way seems to have been paved for a world religion which can command universal allegiance to the one and same God, and develop a world conscience without which there is no hope for justice nor peace among minority peoples.

The Bahá’í Faith, founded one hundred years ago in Persia, is not another creed to compete with the older faiths. It does not offer a new path to immortality, nor does it attempt to abrogate the religions that have preceded it. It upholds the principle that “religious truth is not absolute but relative and that divine revelation is progressive, not final.”

The pivotal message of the Bahá’í Faith is the consciousness of the oneness of mankind. “Regard ye not one another as strangers . . .”, declares Bahá’u’lláh, the Founder of the Faith, “Of one tree are all ye the fruit and of one bough the leaves . . . It is not for him to pride himself who loveth his own country but rather for him who loveth the whole world.”

Bahá’u’lláh offers world justice as the highest moral principle for our present stage of evolution: “The best beloved of all things in my sight is Justice.” Justice, as Bahá’ís conceive it, is the collective moral expression of the community. The range of moral awareness

of the individuals that compose a community, determines the area in which justice can function. If the range of individual conscience does not project across national frontiers world justice is impossible.

One of the distinctions of the Bahá’í Faith is that it can, unlike Christianity, project its faith into the realm of social action. In Bahá’í experience, divine love of the individual is transformed to divine justice in the community. Bahá’í religious practice does not consist only of formal worship and adherence to certain rituals, but rather of membership in an organically united world community which satisfies the individual and collective needs of men.

A NEW CONCEPTION OF DEMOCRACY

Under our party system, which is inherently divisive, minorities cannot hope to attain an equal status with majority groups.

At best, they are tolerated. Our democratic form of government, perhaps the best so far developed, boasts

1Emeric Sala, widely traveled Montreal executive and Bahá’í author, knows the tragedy of war and its uncertainties. His birthplace in Hungary has changed its national flag four times since'the first World War. He has lived as subject of eight crowned kings, and one year under a South American President. A Canadian citizen with a Czechoslovakian mother, a Hungarian father, a Scotch wife, he has earned the citizenship of the world. Mr. Sala has lectured in several universities, before cultural, social and religious groups, speaking to audiences as far apart as Haiti and Vienna, Vancouver and Buenos Aires. His book, This Earth One Country is very popular and is used extensively by discussion groups in several countries.

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of being government of the people since it derives its authority from the majority of the electorate. The minority groups feel separated and neglected, the nation is pulled apart by a crosscurrent of racial, religious, regional, economic and party interests, preventing it from functioning as an integral unit.

The justification of the democratic party system is vigilance. The party in power is mistrusted by those who are not in power. The opposition checks and criticizes the party wielding power for fear that it might usurp it. This attitude, therefore, is uncooperative. It watches jealously and critically the actions of its avowed political enemies. The net result is a house divided against itself. In such a democratic house the minority communities, fighting for their own existence, cannot hope for equal treatment. In a divided house loyalty belongs to the part and not to the whole. The divisive forces within our own democracies offer a premium for allegiance to a group rather than to the nation. The circle of interest, and the world to which most people belong, is usually smaller than that of the nation. Only an attack from outside, or a major crisis from within, could arouse our unintegrated democracies to anything resembling a concerted national effort.

In contrast, the Bahá’í conception of a democratic form of government, which already operates in an embryonic form in more than seventy-countries of the world, establishes a new standard of social responsibility, unknown in the history of political or ecclesiastical institutions.

No Bahá’í can join a political party or a religious group which divides a community into parts. It is inconsistent with the Bahá’í attitude of life to sacrifice the whole for a part. No Bahá’í can conscientiously subscribe to a program which discriminates against a class, a race, a religion, or a nation. Nor can a Bahá’í take sides in any economic, political or military conflict. He is not a conscientious objector, for it would be inconsistent with the Bahá’í requirement for law-abiding citizenship. Nor is he a pacifist, for Bahá’ís

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First Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Stockholm, Sweden, elected April 21, 1948.

accept the necessity of enforcing just laws. He is first of all a citizen of the world, and in any dispute between nations he sees no settlement unless the interests of all parties are respected.

Bahá’u’lláh speaks to kings and rulers as the trustees of mankind. He admonishes them to dispense “justice” rather than “love.” He refers to just governments and Houses of Justice as ”one soul and one body,” with a collective conscience, collectively responsible to God. Bahá’u’lláh’s greatest contribution lies perhaps in the projection of individual conscience into collective action, through the establishment of local, national and the universal Houses of Justice. For in the Bahá’í community responsibility to God is coexistent in the individual and society.

The world plan of Bahá’u’lláh calls for democratic elections at regular intervals without political parties, without any campaign promises or party platform, without candidates or nominations, and without party funds. The people chosen do not represent any party or group interest. They are chosen for their ability, character and past service to the community, rather than for their political views or personal interests. The local, national and universal Houses of J ustice elected by the Bahá’ís are, contrary to present democratic practice, not responsible to the people who elect them, nor are they allowed to be swayed by public opinion, mass emotion or the convictions of the elec [Page 690]690

torate. They are bound only by the promptings of their own conscience, a conscience which in the process of Bahá’í education is transmuted into the collective conscience of the community.

Under our present system the party in power tends to extend its favor to those who contribute to the party fund and to those who might vote for it at the next election. Such favoritism, inherent in the system, is made at the expense of the rest of the community. Social justice under such patronage is unobtainable. It leaves the minority problem unsolved.

MEmTNG Tm: MINORITY PROBLEM

With the shrinking of the world into a neighborhood the minority problem can no longer be shelved. Migration of large groups of people has not been stopped. If the pressure of future conflicts is to be relieved, the movement of populations will continue. The tendency in favor of larger and larger political administrative units will increase rather than lessen the minority problem. And when this tendency culminates in the political federation of all the peoples of the world, every majority group of today will find itself a minority in such a world federation.

The social laws of Bahá’u’lláh have an answer to the minority problem. To appreciate them, however, understanding of the Bahá’í principle of consultation is necessary, a principle which, incidentally, reconciles freedom with authority, minorities with majorities, and mercy with justice. Each Bahá’í community elects once a year a House of Justice (temporarily called a Spiritual Assembly), consisting of nine adult members, to legislate and adjudicate on all matters of community action. When these nine people meet, they may represent different temperaments and cultures, and will probably differ in their points of view. The chairman chosen from their midst encourages opposing views and every side has a hearing for “the shining spark of truth cometh forth only after the clash of differing opinions.”

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What makes this meeting unique is that, when each member gives his conscientiously considered opinion, he gives it away. Once a vote is taken, it is no longer his, and if carried by a majority, though usually modified, it becomes an expression of the collective conscience of the community. Since the majority as well as the minority surrender their personal views to the assembly, the decision reached is not the wish of the majority, but of all nine members. That is why it is not likely that two Bahá’ís will argue With each other. They will, after presenting their case as well as they can, try to understand the other point of view rather than defend their own. The religious mind is considered usually a closed mind. Bahá’í training does exactly the opposite, by constantly testing and purifying one’s ego.

In Bahá’í consultation each mind gives as well as takes, is constantly trained to remain open, and to understand and appreciate points of view other than its own. The ideas born in such a meeting are the result of creative interaction With other minds, inspired by a common faith and a common aim: the welfare of the whole community. As social responsibility is shifted from the individual to the assembly, individual opinion tends to become more and more impersonal. A mind freed from personal ambition and detached from the ego, can see more clearly. It is the detached attitude of a scientist absorbed in an objective search, and yet with a passion for truth. It is a new process of intercreative thinking. It cures the opinionated person whose mind is all made up.

One Who obeys his conscience has overcome his baser instincts. A community with a collective conscience overcomes the desire for national supremacy, for monopolistic privileges or for racial priority. The Bahá’í administrative system not only incorporates individual good will into a social mechanism, but produces a quality of the soul which can be born only out of a collective experience.

Justice as an abstract idea is relative. It is often mistaken for legalized revenge. J ustice is the balance between

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reward and retribution. This balance is impossible between individuals without love. Between nations, or between minority and majority groups, this love is expressed through justice. Though love and justice spring from the same divine source, their expression is different. One hundred true Muhammadan, J ewish or Christian believers will, as individuals, show the same qualities of love and goodwill as one hundred true Bahá’ís, but with this differencethe hundred Bahá’ís will elect a House of Justice and Will express their social attitude towards others as one organic unit, with a collective conscience, train 7.

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ed for collective action, collectively responsible to God.

Justice cannot be enshrined in any constitution. No book can contain it. Justice like love cannot be preserved in a legal document or established by precedent. Justice like love cannot be separated from conscience. When conscience goes, justice goes with it. Social justice is impossible without a collective conscience. And it is this collective conscience which is the basic working principle of the Bahá’í House of J ustice, and the new hope for minority peoples of the future.

THE PROPHET AND THE SCIENTIST BY Ross WOODMAN, M.A.

FEW would deny that in this modern age the laws given to the world by the scientist are more highly esteemed and more universally applied than the laws given by the Prophet. Indeed it might be said that modern society is the product of the application of those laws enunciated by the scientist on the one hand, and the lack of application of those laws enunciated by the Prophet on the other. This has produced a onesided, materialistic society. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá has observed that religion and science must work together as the two Wings of a bird if man is to keep his balance in his progressive flight to truth. It is the failure to keep both wings in operation that has produced the sickness of the age. Man, attempting to scale the heights of knowledge on the Wing of science alone, has fallen into the quagmire of materialism, as the broken-winged bird, attempting to fly into the heavens, falls to the earth.

If this broken wing is to be healed so that once more mankind may continue its flight it is imperative that we should learn to appreciate and ac cept the station and the function of the Prophet. With this in mind let us compare the scientist and the Prophet, noting wherein they are alike and wherein they differ.

The function of the scientist lies in the investigation of nature in an attempt to discern its laws so that their operation may be predicted and subjected to human control. Through the discoveries of the scientist the whole realm of nature is progressively brought under man’s control and its powers exploited for human ends. “Man,” says ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, “through scientific knowledge and power rules nature and utilizes her laws to do his bidding. According to natural limitations he is a creature of earth restricted to life upon its surface, but through scientific utilization of material laws he soars in the sky, sails upon the ocean and dives beneath it. The products of his invention and discovery so familiar to us in daily life were once mysteries of nature. For instance, man has brought electricity out of the plane of the invisible into the plane of

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the visible, harnessed and imprisoned the mysterious natural agent and made it the servant of his needs and wishes.”

The scientist is to nature what the Prophet is to man. Just as the scientist discovers the laws that govern nature so that nature submits to the will of man, so the Prophet reveals the laws that govern man so that man submits to the will of God. The scientist brings the forces at work in nature, “out of the plane of the invisible into the plane of the visible.” As with nature, so with man. The Prophet brings the powers and capacities hidden in man “out of the plane of the invisible into the plane of the visible.”

The scientist and the Prophet, therefore, are alike in that both are enunciating laws and releasing powers which are harnessed to serve a higher end. In the case of nature, the powers serve man; in the case of man, the powers serve God. The scientist and the Prophet differ, however, in their field of activity. The scientist works with nature, the Prophet works with man.

It is unnecessary to deal here with the laws of nature which the scientist discovers since our chief concern is with the Prophet. His laws are to be found in all the Holy Scriptures. In the Hidden Words, revealed by Bahá’u’lláh prior to His declaration, these eternal, spiritual laws are restated “clothed in the garment of brevity.” In the great civilizations that have emerged from the revelation of these laws is to be witnessed their application to human affairs. Civilization is the meeting place of applied science and applied religion. As more physical and spiritual power is released and harnessed the tent of civilization spreads and more and more of humanity are held together in unity within it.

The distinction between the scientist and the Prophet, however, goes beyond their different fields of activity. They belong to different orders of reality so that, in the final analysis, the scientist, like the rest of humanity, is dependent upon the Prophet. The scientist is primarily one of us, a human

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being and nothing more. The Prophet of God is something more. When Jesus asked Peter whom He, Jesus, was, Peter replied, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.” No one has declared this of a scientist. No one has claimed that he is anything more than a gifted human being. No one has claimed that he is divine. And here, of course, is the barrier that keeps many from accepting the Prophet of God; they cannot accept His divinity.

The idea of divinity belongs to the realm of revealed religion so that if we are to understand what is meant by this idea it is necessary to know something of the nature of religious truth. The truths of religion, declares Bahá’u’lláh, are relative, not absolute, in the sense that the teachings of the Prophet are relative to man’s capacity to understand them. The word divine must, therefore, be understood in this relative sense. Divinity may be defined as that which, by its very nature, cannot be comprehended by the finite human mind. The Prophet is divine in the sense that no mortal can comprehend His station. “All comparisons and likenesses,” declares Bahá’u’lláh, “fail to do justice to the Tree of Thy Revelation, and every way is barred to the comprehension of the Manifestation of Thy Self and the Day Spring of Thy Beauty.”

The Prophet is as different from man as man is different from the animal. His divinity lies in the nature of this difference. It does not lie in the fact that He is one with God in essence. “Nay, forbid it, O my God,” declares Bahá’u’lláh, “that I should have uttered such words as must of necessity imply the existence of any direct relationship between the Pen of Thy Revelation and the Essence of all created things.”

Just as it is possible to maintain the divinity of the Prophet relative to man so would it be possible to maintain the divinity of man relative to the animal and the other lower kingdoms. And the nature of that divinity relative to the animal would lie in the rational soul of which the animal is totally bereft. The divinity of the

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Prophet, on the other hand, lies in the fact that He is the temple of the Holy Spirit. It is the activity of the Holy Spirit that makes the discoveries within man, illumines his powers, kindles his light, and raises him to the utmost perfection. “Every time it appears,” states ‘Abdu’l-Bahá speaking of the Holy Spirit, “the world is renewed, and a new cycle is founded. The body of the world of humanity puts on a new garment. It can be compared to the spring; whenever it comes, the world passes from one condition to another. Through the advent of the season of spring the black earth and the fields and wildernesses will become verdant and blooming, and all sorts of flowers and sweet-scented herbs will grow; the trees will have new life, and new fruits will appear, and a new cycle is founded. The appearance of the Holy Spirit is like this. Whenever it appears, it renews the world of humanity and gives new spirit to the human realities; it arrays the world of existence in praiseworthy garments, dispels the darkness of ignorance, and causes the radiation of the light of perfections.”

Just as nature submits to man through the scientist so man must submit to God through the Prophet. Unlike nature, however, he must do so through his own volition. This law of submission of a lower to a higher kingdom is one that operates throughout the creation. In a sense, the lower kingdom submits to a higher kingdom through the turning of the higher to the lower. The vegetable kingdom sends its roots down into the mineral kingdom and from the earth receives its sustenance. The animal kingdom, in turn, is nurtured by the vegetable, and the human by the animal. “Thus this flower,” says ‘Abdu’l-Bahá speaking of this process, “once upon a time was of the soil. The animal eats of the flower or its fruit, and it thereby ascends to the animal kingdom. Man eats the meat of the animal, and there you have its ascent into the human kingdom, because all phenomena are divided into that which eats and that which is eaten.”

This same relationship in a spiritual, rather than physical sense, holds be tween man and the Prophet of God. The Holy Spirit makes its descent into the human form of the Prophet and humanity submits to the manifestation of that higher reality. Man casts himself into the fire of the love of God. This is the meaning of rebirth and can be compared to the rebirth of nature when its powers are harnessed by man so that they become a part of human society. “Blessed is the neck that is caught in His noose,” declares Bahá’u’lláh of this sacrifice of man’s will to the will of God revealed by the Prophet, “happy the head that falleth on the dust in the pathway of His love. Wherefore, O friend, give up thy self that thou mayest find the Peerless One, pass by this mortal earth that thou mayest seek a home in the nest of heaven. Be as naught, if thou wouldst kindle the fire of being and be fit for the pathway of love.”

When man submits to the will of God revealed by the Prophet the law of creation is fulfilled. The whole creation, including man, then reflects the glory of its Creator as different objects reflect the light of the sun according to their capacity. “In this station,” declares Bahá’u’lláh, “he pierceth the veils of plurality, fleeth from the worlds of the flesh, and ascendeth into the heaven of singleness. With the ear of God he heareth, with the eye of God he beholdeth the mysteries of divine creation. . . . He looketh on all things with the eye of oneness, and seeth the brilliant rays of the divine sun shining from the dawning-point of Essence alike on all created things, and the lights of singleness reflected over all creation.”

Thus, when science brings nature under human control and religion brings man under God’s control, science and religion become the two wings supporting man in his onward flight to truth. In this day Bahá’u’lláh has come to heal the broken wing of religion that man once again, in the name of God, may leave the world of clay and “seek his home in the nest of heaven.” Through the recognition of the unity of science and religion mankind is destined to achieve in this day the Kingdom of God on earth. “This is the

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Day,” Bahá’u’lláh has revealed, “whereon the unseen world crieth out: ‘Great is thy blessedness, O earth, for

&

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thou hast been made the foot—stool of Thy God, and been chosen as the seat of His mighty throne’.”

A WAY OF LIFE

BY ELSIE AUSTIN1

T HE achievement of effective understanding and cooperation among the diverse nations, races, and classes of mankind is the chief essential for the survival of civilization. This urgent need is only partially fulfilled by the political, social, and economic theories proffered today. The great and powerful religions emphasize this need in their proclamations, but their practical programs have barely touched the issues involved.

Against this background of dire need and groping effort, the Bahá’í World Community stands out significantly for its development of a real and workable technique for harmonizing the differences of humanity and using them to achieve something new in cooperation. The Bahá’ís are numerically a small force in contrast with old established religions; yet, in a little over a century they have spread from a small, persecuted and harassed group in Persia to a world community touching eighty—eight countries and embracing peoples of widely different cultural, racial and national backgrounds. The Bahá’ís are a people Who are “at home” all over the world. To those

lElsie Austin is a graduate of the College of Law of the University of Cincinnati. In 1937 she was appointed Assistant Attorney General of Ohio, and was awarded the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Law by Wilberforce University for outstanding service as the first colored woman to hold this post. Subsequently, she served in legal capacities

who study this Faith and observe its communities, it is apparent that the Bahá’ís have made world unity a way of life.

The antagonisms growing out of racial differences, the jealous pride and conflict from national differences, the suspicion and estrangement springing from religious differences, and the despairing conflict, irritability, and tensions of any group of humans Who differ greatly, make the existence of unity under such circumstances a cause for serious question and examination. How have the Bahá’ís achieved this unity?

The Bahá’ís have accepted and used that which is the core of change and development in civilization: change and development in human beings. They have made faith the force for change in both the individual and the social order. For them behavior is the measure of spiritual conviction and devotion. The Bahá’í lives world unity by lifting human relationships from the realm of personal susceptibility to the realm of spiritual principle. Religion to the Bahá’í is an attitude toward God expressed in living. Thus human rela with various agencies of the United States Government. Miss Austin has been active- in national educational and public welfare organizations. She was a representative of the International Councfl of Women at the first World Organizations Conference called by the United Nations. Since 1946 she has been a member of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís Of the United States.

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693

Bahá’ís and friends at the reception dinner of the Third South American Bahá’í Congress, in Séo Paulo, Brazil, January, 1949.

tionships, the attitudes and values they express, become a means of worship, a form of prayer.

“Your behavior toward your neighbor should be such as to manifest clearly the signs of the one true God,”1 enjoined Bahá’u’lláh, the Founder of the Faith. The neighbor of a Bahá’í is not just the person with whom he is familiar, or to whom he is related by some accident of residence, race, creed, or mutual interest. The Bahá’í is a world citizen and his neighbor is in this sense any man. Every principle of. his Faith keeps before him the oneness of mankind, the unity and interdependence of the world, the necessity of treating the stranger as a friend.

Such relationship and responsibility toward all peoples is achieved through the experience and exercise of a spiritual love which has tremendous social force. It is difficult for most people to understand, let alone experience, a love which is not based upon some human attachment or mutuality, which does not rise from some ego-building concept of charity and pity, or which does not have its roots in some human urge for possession and power. The

love which is the welding force of the Bahá’í community is different. Its drawing power is not dependent upon human perfections or imperfections. This love has been described by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, the great Exemplar of Bahá’í living: “Love the creatures for the sake of God and not for themselves. You will never become angry or impatient if you love them for the sake of God. Humanity is not perfect. There are imperfections in every human being and you will always become unhappy if you look toward the people themselves. . . . Therefore do not look at the shortcomings of anybody; see with the sight of forgiveness. The imperfect eye beholds imperfections.”2

If we reflect deeply upon these words, we can understand the wisdom and vitality in such an attitude toward humanity. We are able to grasp dimly the profound statement that “unity is the expression of the loving power of God and reflects the reality of divinity.”3 Assuredly this is love at its greatest maturity, love which wid lBahá’í World Faith. 1:. 118. zSelected Writings of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, p. 18. SBahá’í World Faith, p. 217.

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ens the horizon of human appreciation. A deeply spiritual love of God changes the values by which man interprets people and experience, and frees him from dependence upon values based on emotion and temperament.

The Bahá’í community provides striking evidence of this change in values. We see it in the Bahá’í attitude toward individual capacity. As the Bahá’í matures in his Faith he is freed from both depreciation and overemphasis of his abilities and talents. He understands that his capacity, whatever it may be, is of great importance to the community, but that it must also be related to the capacities of other believers. “All men,” said Bahá’u’lláh, “are created to carry forward an everadvancing civilization.” This is the standard and this is the goal. Conviction of one’s worth in these terms brings a sense of responsibility to develop, to train, and to perfect one’s talents; it leaves no place for the sluggard or the parasite. Yet the impulse to develop must never by expressed at the expense or by the exploitation of others. The working of this principle of individual worth and responsibility makes possible an important step in social maturity. It removes at least two of the great impediments to cooperation between human beings who must work together: the insecurity of the individual as to his worth and function in the group, and the inability of individuals to accept without hostility the differences in human capacity and ability.

No less striking is the effect of this change of values in dealing with the wide differences of race, culture, nationality, and religious background which are found in Bahá’í communities. The Bahá’ís are not developing a regimented culture. There are Americans, Europeans, Africans, Indians, Arabs, and Orientals among them. Languages, features, dress, and thought associations are extremely varied. Beyond these differences, however, there is the tough and vibrant bond of unity which makes every Bahá’í at home in every community, although he may meet people he has never before known and

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with whom he shares little in custom or language.

The strength of this bond lies in the fact that for all Bahá’ís the main emphasis is upon the things which unite them, which make them see differences as a source of an interesting and beautiful variety. There is an overall emphasis upon freedom and dignity, upon spiritual depth, upon high moral standards, noble motives, and good character as set forth in the Bahá’í teachings. In the attainment of these objectives mutual respect and a maturity of judgment combine to adjust the cultural traits of all, preserving the diversities which are the source of color and beauty, and sloughing off those habits which cause friction, animosity and degradation.

In dealing with differences of race, creed, and nationality, which have such a tradition of hate and estrangement, the Bahá’í is educated by his Faith and his community. His race consciousness is turned into humanrace consciousness. His national pride widens to a sense of world citizenship. He learns by direct association with those of other races and backgrounds that behavior, which is often considered to be a characteristic of race, nationality, or creed, is purely cultural, and that problems of character are human problems. The truth of the matter is that human beings tend to act like human beings. They respond in a similar way to environmental and cultural pressures. The Bahá’í learns not only intellectually but also emotionally that the basis for antagonism is not instinct, but is rather an accumulation of wellpropagated falsities, enhanced by tradition and custom. As one writer expresses it: “Race theories are not only a modern invention to explain group conflicts, but they are also a means for fomenting them.”4

The life of love and faith surmounts all barriers. Its appeal, like the appeal of the Word of God, is to the spirit of man. The power of this spiritual love was demonstrated by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. All people came to Him. They

4The Faith of A Liberal, Morris Cohen.

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Miss Beatrice Irwin, holding the Greatest Name, with the Assembly at Tunis, North Africa, two members absent due to illness.

were from distant countries, strange to Him and to each other. They did not know His way of life. Often they could not speak His language. But they felt the power of His spirit and His great love for mankind. They learned, through their reverence and love for Him, an appreciation and respect for each other which transcended all their differences.

Even as the love of God gives a man new values with which to measure other men and his relationship with them, it also gives him a deeper regard for the law and order which are the basis for any progressive society. Loyalty to spiritual principle and conscientious use of it in human affairs is the beginning of social order and security. The spiritual laws of God give man his great ethical standards. Belief in God and sincere effort to live one’s faith are the generative forces of man’s conscience. When human conscience and social ethics are united in their objectives there is cooperation

between inner and outer disciplines. The result is a matured and refined individual and society. The forward pressures of these maturing forces can be seen even now in Bahá’í communities, though most of them are not yet at a stage of full development.

In these communities one may observe the unique process of consultation. Bahá’í consultation is a procedure which attains truth and agreement by prayer, free and open discussion, and harmonious decision. Decision is not arrived at through partisan activity, pressure, or the trading of interests. Truth is not achieved by the influence of one personality or the pressure of authority. It dawns when all have expressed themselves and striven in the light of all views to arrive at a solution consistent with the Faith and which best embodies its principles. Even for individual problems the procedure of consultation is used. The individual may consult with elected representatives, the Assembly, for prayer and discussion of

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a problem. He is helped without violation of the privacy and dignity of his personal life.

Certainly the Bahá’ís are moving toward something new and epoch—making in civilization. To many their progress seems slow and their influence slight. They are, however, a powerful leaven. What cause in human history has spread so far, so steadily, and despite such persecution and handicaps as has this Bahá’í Faith? There are those who doubt the effectiveness of spiritual force in an utterly materialistic age. There are those who will oppose anything new which threatens old and established barriers. There are those who will rise up to calumniate and attack, seeing in the Bahá’ís a dreaded and long overdue challenge to the forces of corruption, cruelty, and decay in society. The Bahá’ís have power within their Faith and in their conviction to meet all these forces. They will go on, and as they perfect their patterns and demonstrate the efficacy of their teachings, a frantic and searching world will give them attention and accept their principle of human unity as the one great force for saving and improving civilization.

“There is perfect brotherhood underlying humanity, for all are the servants

9

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of one God and belong to one family under the protection of divine providence. The bond of fraternity exists in humanity because all are intelligent beings created in the realm of evolutionary growth. There is brotherhood potential in humanity because all inhabit this earthly globe under the one canopy of heaven. There is brotherhood natal in mankind because all are elements of one human society subject to the necessity of agreement and cooperation. . . .

“The real brotherhood is spiritual. . . . Material brotherhood does not prevent or remove warfare; it does not dispel differences among mankind. But spiritual alliance destroys the very foundation of war, effaces differences entirely, promulgates the oneness of humanity, revivifies mankind, causes hearts to turn to the Kingdom of God and baptizes souls with the Holy Spirit. Through this divine brotherhood, the material world will become resplendent with the lights of divinity, the mirror of materiality will acquire its lights from heaven, and justice will be established in the world so that no trace of darkness, hatred, and enmity shall be visible.”5

5Selected Writings of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, p. 21

BUILDING THE PEACE

BY SHIRINFOZDAR1

WHILE statesmen, political leaders and other trained observers some time ago recognized the signs of growing confusion, only comparatively recently has the average man begun to appreciate what lies ahead. Judging by his reactions, he is unhappy and indignant. He feels that somehow, somewhere in the tangled course of negotiations, he has been let down.

Within a quarter of a century humble men and women in different countries

were asked twice to sacrifice their material possessions, their near and dear ones, and their very life’s blood at the altar of permanent peace. In 1919 when people were jubilant at the establishment of the League of Nations, and felt sure that the foundation for peace had been laid through international arbitration, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, the son of Bahá’u’lláh assured His audiences that the end of war was not yet, and that the very terms of the Treaty of Ver [Page 699]ARTICLES AND REVIEWS

sailles would be the cause of another war. He taught that war could not abolish war, nor bloodstain be erased with blood. He warned the people of the world that hardships and misfortunes would increase day by day, and the people would be distressed. The doors of joy and happiness would be closed on all sides and terrible wars would take place. Disappointment and frustration of hopes would surround the people from every direction until they were obliged to turn to God.

To a world which has sunk deep in the mire of materialism and godlessness, the prospect of having ultimately to turn to God is not a very promising one. The people of this generation have been disillusioned by the sorry spectacle presented to the world by men known to be treading the path of religion. Such men have presented no solution to the knotty problems that face the world, and their lives have not reflected any greater virtues than the

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lives of others who have made no special claim to righteousness.

The dignitaries of the established churches, temples and mosques, have failed to come together in a concerted manner to work for the amelioration of the living conditions of humanity. A confederation of the existing churches of the various denominations could perhaps, through cooperation and collaboration with one another, have contributed toward the laudable task of regenerating human personality. But, on the contrary, this institution of religion,

1Prominent woman lecturer and writer, Shirin Fozdar is a leader of thought in India today. She has been active in promoting education and in advancing the status of women in her country, and in spreading the ideals of the Bahá’í Faith. In 1934—35 she served as delegate to the League of Nations, representing the All-Asian Women's Conference. In 1943 she was sent by Gandhi to Ahmadabad, where she worked among the poorer classes. Recently she was a delegate to the Indian Educational Conference in Delhi. For several years she has been a member of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of India, where she has held the office of vice-president.

Bahá’í National Headquarters, New Delhi, India.

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whose avowed aim is to promote human brotherhood, has only succeeded in creating greater division.

A present-day survey of old religions shows them divided into many warring factions; without any clear message for the age we are living in, and devoid of their pristine purity and sublimity. The question arises, has the mission of the Prophets failed, since it is obvious that human nature has yet many imperfections and defects and God does not seem to have come to His Own, in His Own universe. The law of love is replaced by that of hate, and men are left guessing as to their duties as individuals and as a community. Students of world Scriptures cannot deny that the message of the Prophets was delivered for a practical purpose, as a way of life, and not for intellectual entertainment or the quenching of speculative thirst, nor as a mode of spiritual perfection far removed from the scene of a workaday world. People glibly remark that religion has outlived its utility and should now be abolished. These criticisms are understandable, for the believers today hug the lifeless body of their former faiths, worshipping a mental image of their God, Without realising that it is the negation of all that Abraham, Moses, Krishna, Buddha, Christ or Muhammad preached to their followers.

The terrible world-devastating wars, followed by the misery which they entailed in the form of economic depression, unemployment, starvation and disease, have left many in doubt whether after all there is an omnipotent, omnipresent God, and Whether He is just and merciful. They cannot understand why God does not stop the destruction of innocent lives. If, they ask, He can feed the birds in the air, the fishes in the sea, the beasts in the jungle, Why must man, who is created in His own image, suffer shortage of food, of clothes and of many things which contribute to a contented life in which God could be remembered and praised?

The answers to these doubts have been fully met in the various Scriptures, but people are not interested to refer to them for guidance as they

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seem to be confirmed in their beliefs that these “antiquated” writings cannot solve present-day problems. The Prophets, they say, lived in primitive ages when men walked and did not fly, and when communities lived isolated and in water-tight compartments, ignorant of the vastness of the world. How could they have visualized modern world problems in politics, economics, trade and social relationships between people of different nations and communities?

The Prophets of the past, it is true, did not give the solutions to the prevalent problems of our time. The Prophets of the past could not have given the solutions to such problems as there was no need for them then. But they did visualize and predict the chaos and world calamity and the terrible wars in which humanity would be involved. They also exhorted their followers to await the advent of a great Divine Teacher who would arise and found a universal religion that would usher in universal peace and brotherhood Whereafter mankind would attain its full stature of mental and spiritual growth culminating in 'a golden age.

The claim of Bahá’u’lláh is that all these predictions referred to His advent, and that He is the promised World Redeemer. Considering His life, teachings, place of birth, sufferings, imprisonment and banishment, one finds that in these events the prophecies are fulfilled. His opponents, however, object that while Bahá’u’lláh’s claim is to usher in an era of permanent peace and brotherhood, yet there have been wars of greater intensity than any the world has known before. These critics seem to be ignorant of the fact that immediately with the advent of the World Redeemer peace was not to be established. Bahá’u’lláh in His Tablets to the monarchs of the world between 1865 and 1870, clearly warned them of the terrible cataclysms and miseries in which humanity would be involved, and He assured all that it was after this purgation through the fire of intense wars and their aftermath, that God would be reinstated in human hearts and mankind regenerated.

The teachings of Bahá’u’lláh deal

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with the root causes of conflicts which lie deep iii the entire socio-political system of the world. The immediate causes of war are often mere pretexts, yet tradition has made people look upon political issues as much more important than any others. The ultimate source for even political issues lies in spiritual and economic factors. They are, therefore, the real motivating impulse in all international jealousies, nowadays culminating in war. This does not mean that the political aspects of economic factors have to be ignored. But the removal of the root causes of conflict makes the best foundation for peace.

Peace in the Bahá’í terminology is not armed neutrality, nor an interlude between wars, but is something much more positive and constructive. The real and abiding peace is a condition of human society wherein all parts of the world are in harmony with one another and seeking to do each other good. Without a complete, unconditional, unreserved renunciation, by the free consent of each and all concerned, of any recourse to violence for settling international differences; without adequate, efficient machinery to settle such differences amicably; without effective arrangements for constant cooperation—there can never be real, abiding, universal peace.

People who wish to belittle the importance of religion in the establishment of peace, argue that the United Nations, having come into existence and having delivered the charter to the world, will induce nations to no longer appeal to arms in their dealings with one another, but bring their case to law and settle it by reason. Little do they realize that peace is not created by any human concept. None of the horrible means of extinguishing life that science has discovered, nor the Hague Tribunal, the League of Nations, the Atlantic Charter, the Dumbarton Oaks conference, the Yalta meeting and the United Nations can bring about universal peace. Submission through preponderance of force is not peace. With the aid of science we have improved our method of killing and mass butchery and

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have fallen pitiful victims of the machines of our own creation. It is futile to imagine that the world could be reconstructed with mundane ideas. It is like putting new wine into old bottles. Humanity needs new hearts free from the deadly poison of racial and national prejudices. Without this first requisite all efforts will be useless. It is sages and seers, not statesmen and strategists, who can reconcile the differences that prevail among the various nations. The evils of race rivalries, economic competitions and armament disputes will vanish if the nations of the world realize that human nature and needs are fundamentally the same all the world over, and that in the eyes of God there is no difference between man and man. Past attempts at international amity and peace have failed because they were not inspired by the true spirit of friendship and love which can result only from an understanding of the principle of the oneness of mankind.

After six weary years, 1939 to 1945, wasted in the destruction of human life and property by the followers of a Prophet, Who exhorted His flock to love their neighbor as themselves, the united experience and wisdom of the world gathered at San Francisco to bring about a real union of mankind. In ’spite of the best will in the world, the great powers that constitute the United Nations have, after two long years, proved themselves unable not only to bring peace to the world, but even among themselves. This was not what humanity had longed and died for.

Under the stress of the blitzkrieg and the fear of invasion, the governments and the clergy of the various countries urged their countrymen to flock to the churches and pray to God for deliverance. Is it not strange that now, when the prayers have been answered, God has been forgotten again? The Bahá’ís have, indeed, attracted the favorable attention of various United Nations and other statesmen to the Peace Charter of Bahá’u’lláh, but the majority of today’s policy makers are reluctant to consider seriously any plan with a religious aspect; this, although renewed religion is the only medicine for the ills

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Bahá’í Assembly, Quetta, Pakistan, 1946-47.

that afflict mankind. Writing in this connection in his article on “Prelude to World Society,” Mr. Manu Subedar, India’s renowned economist and politician, states, “If a council of one hundred Wise men from all over the globe were sitting down for a year, they could not have reached a nobler conception of peace than Bahá’u’lláh’s Peace Plan.”

The Bahá’í teachings provide the motive and the pattern, the spirit and the form of a divinely-ordained World Order toward which humanity must strive. They affect the very basis of our lives. Their social consequences are far-reaching. They lead to the development of new standards and new institutions. These are best explained by Shoghi Effendi, the Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith. In The Unfold'ment of World Civilization, he writes:

“The unity of the human race, as envisaged by Bahá’u’lláh, implies the establishment of a world commonwealth in which all nations, races, creeds and classes are closely and permanently united, and in which the au tonomy of its state members and the personal freedom and initiative of the individuals that compose them are definitely and completely safeguarded. This commonwealth must, as far as we can visualize it, consist of a ,world legislature, whose members will, as the trustees of the whole of mankind, ultimately control the entire resources of all the component nations, and will enact such laws as shall be required to regulate the life, satisfy the needs and adjust the relationships of all races and peoples. A world executive, backed by an international Force, will carry out the decisions arrived at, and apply the laws enacted by this world legislature, and will safeguard the organic unity of the whole commonwealth. A world tribunal will adjudicate and deliver its compulsory and final verdict in all and any disputes that may arise between the various elements constituting this universal system. A mechanism of world inter-communication will be devised, embracing the whole planet, freed from national hindrances and restrictions, and functioning with

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marvellous swiftness and perfect regularity. . . . A world language will either he invented or chosen from among the existing languages and will be taught in the schools of all the federated nations as an auxiliary to their mother tongue. A world script, a world literature, a uniform and universal system of currency, of weights and measures, will simplify and facilitate intercourse and understanding among the nations and races of mankind. In such a world society, science and religion, the two most potent forces in human life, will be reconciled, will cooperate, and will harmoniously develop. The press will, under such a system, while giving full scope to the expression of the diversified views and convictions of mankind, cease to be mischievously manipulated by vested interests, whether private or public, and Will be liberated from the influence of contending governments and peoples. The economic resources of the world Will be organized, its sources of raw materials will be tapped and fully utilized, its markets will be coordinated and developed, and the distribution of its products will be equitably regulated.

“National rivalries, hatreds and intrigues will cease, and racial animosity and prejudice will be replaced by racial amity, understanding and cooperation ..... Destitution on the one hand, and gross accumulation of ownership on the other, will disappear. The enormous energy dissipated and wasted on war, whether economic or political, will be consecrated to such ends as will extend the range of human inventions and technical development, to the increase of the productivity of mankind, to the extermination of disease, to the extension of scientific research, to the raising of the standard of physical health, . . . and to the furtherance of any other agency that can stimulate the intellectual, the moral, and spiritual life of the entire human race.

“A world federal system, ruling the whole earth and exercising unchallengable authority over its unimaginably vast resources, blending and embodying the ideals of both the East and the West, liberated from the curse of war and its miseries, and bent on the ex

Bahá’í Center, 63 Elizabeth Street, Hobart, Tasmania.

ploitation of all the available sources of energy on the surface of the planet, a system in which Force is made the servant of Justice, whose life is sustained by its universal recognition of one God and by its allegiance to one common Revelation—such is the goal towards which humanity, impelled by the unifying forces of life, is moving.”

It is impossible to lay out in this brief article the great results nations can achieve by uniting together under one world government. The ideal of a single world federation is not merely a legal or constitutional matter. Everything depends upon the people’s understanding of correct values, their spirit of goodwill and love and justice for one another. The governments of the world, instead of wasting their time, wealth and energy on building up alliances and hoping to abolish war through balance of power should turn their attention to the Bahá’í Charter, which, besides being complete, is claimed to be revealed by God to Bahá’u’lláh, His Manifestation for this day. It is incumbent upon the governments of the world to investigate this claim, and if they find it justified, to

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accept the plan as the Will of God.

It is said that nations learn slowly and often times at a dear price. The incalculable horrors of two world wars do not seem to have yet seriously impressed upon the world how vain and how unworkable is the worn-out idea of rival empires, safeguarded by armed force, and how practical is the idea of federation, secured by law and based on love and human fellowship. The more humanity clings to old methods and ideas, the quicker the succession of wars and disasters; and the greater the intensity of conflict, the greater is its failure.

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memberment of enemy countries through force and fear will not maintain the peace; fear gives birth to hate, not to love; to revenge, not to cooperation that endures. Nations must learn to build their fortifications not upon the sands of intrigues and selfishness, but upon the rock of God’s love. Kingdoms and empires raised upon the bespoiled and ruined cities of smaller nations are bound to disintegrate and decay. Mighty rulers and dictators have gone the way of the damned, but eternal are the glories that await those who bring prosperity and peace to the world, for “Blessed are the peacemakers.”

10.

ASSURANCES OF IMMORTALITY

BY J OYCE LYON DAHL1

WE LIVE in a world on the brink of chaos. Nations are aggressive and fearful. People are bewildered and uprooted, acting through custom or impulse. We know that we must have a pattern for a world society, international organization, wise laws and agreements, but also we need, as individuals, inner security, hope and assurance.

One of the questions most ignored, and yet profoundly rooted in our hearts and minds, is that of immortality. We are curious, naturally, about our individual destinies, dwarfed though they may seem in the kaleidoscope of world events. We might say that the desire for self—perpetuation is inherent in us. Whether we believe that we live as personalities in another world after death

1Joyce Lyon Dahl graduated in social sciences from Stanford University and did graduate work at the University of California. After her studies she spent a year in Paris, France, where she was introduced to the Paris Bahá’ís by Mrs. Grace Holley. The interest they aroused led her to dedicate herself to the promotion of the ideals of the Bahá’í Faith. She is a writer and teacher, and has served on the National Teaching Committee. She now lives in Palo Alto, California and devotes much of her time to her three children.

or live in our works that live after us, the idea of continuing to exist gives us deep satisfaction. We have also a natural longing for progress and fulfillment, heightened in many of us by a religious tradition which has come down to us through the ages. These two wishes, for life after death and for selfimprovement, are linked and have an important bearing on our actions.

In the teachings of the Bahá’í Faith we find answers to the questions we have often asked ourselves—“Why are we here?” “What is death?” “Do we continue to exist after death?” “Where does justice fit into the picture?”

Let us consider first the question: “Why are we here?” According to the Bahá’í view, in the larger sense man exists because it is God’s Will. God, the pre-existent Essence, without beginning or end, has eternally been the Creator, and therefore always has had and always will have a Creation. Man is to this earth as the fruit is to the tree. He is the apex of creation, its potential goal and crowning glory. Through long

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ages man evolved. He took different forms as he progressed, but always he was man evolving.

As the sum of creation, man includes in his physical make—up the distinguishing quality of the mineral kingdom, cohesion, plus the essential attribute of the vegetable kingdom, growth, also the special quality of the animal kingdom, sense perception. In addition he has a rational soul, a quality which is not shared by any other thing in nature. This rational soul, of which the human mind is a power, gives man his mastery over nature. The soul, however, remains in its essence a mystery.

There is another and all—important attribute which man may acquire: the spirit of faith. This is the quality which links him with the spiritual world and without which he sinks into the lowest depths of abasement. In Some Answered Questions ‘Abdu’l-Bahá says: “But the human spirit, unless assisted by the spirit of faith, does not become acquainted with the divine secrets and heavenly realities. It is like a mirror which, although clear, polished, and brilliant, is still in need of light. Until a ray of sun reflects upon it, it cannot discover the heavenly secrets.”2

The motivation for this progress beyond the natural realm had to be given by some force distinct from and above the world of nature. This animating power has come successively through the ages from the Foundersof the great religions Who are Manifestations of God and reflect the Will and the Effulgence of the unknowable Essence, God, as a pure mirror reflects the rays of the sun.

Answering the question: “Why are we here?” in a narrower sense, we can say that we are here to start on a journey. Each of us is born into this world an individual, eternal soul. According to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, “The wisdom of the appearance of the spirit in the body is this: the human spirit is a Divine Trust, and it must traverse all conditions; for its passage and movement through the conditions of existence will be the means of its acquiring perfections.”3 Before birth we evolve

2p. 244. 31bid. p. 233.

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and acquire perfections. During childhood this process is continued and many factors of heredity, environment, and training play their parts. When we reach the age of discretion the age-old choice between good and evil is our responsibility. There are two aspects to our natures. We all have an animal side and a spiritual side. If the qualities we have in common with animals, such as jealousy, lust, and cruelty, become strongest, we become bestial, but if the spiritual qualities, such as wisdom, kindness, justice, and faithfulness, predominate we become enlightened human beings capable of progressing indefinitely.

Two other questions: “What is death?” and “Do we continue to exist after death?” have been more fully answered in the Bahá’í writings than ever before. Briefly, the explanation is as follows: the soul or spirit of man is exempt from place or time. In the words of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, “the soul of man is exalted above and is independent of all infirmities of body or mind.”4 If a person becomes sick or insane, loses a limb or sight, his spirit remains outside the realm of these bodily disorders and is not damaged or harmed. So it is, when the body, which is composed of elements, must become decomposed in obedience to an unalterable natural law, this death does not affect the spirit except to liberate it. Death for us, then, is a change of condition, a release from the limitations of the body and the restrictions of time and space. Bahá’u’lláh has said, “O Son of the Supreme! I have made death a messenger of joy to thee. Wherefore dost thou grieve?”5

This earthly existence and the worlds after death, though divided by a curtain of our incomprehension, are hot two separate, far—apart places. Through the spirits of men and their efforts, the material world reflects the spiritual world. The spiritual force of the heavenly souls continues to exert its influence after their departure from this world. “They are like unto

4Bafui’i med Faith, 1). 120. 5Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, Arabic, no. 32.

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leaven which leaveneth the world of being. . . .”6

In a volume entitled ‘Abdu’l—Bahd in London we find this enlightening passage:

“A friend asked: ‘How should one look forward to death?’

“ ‘Abdu’l-Bahá answered: ‘How does one look forward to the goal of any journey? With hope and with expectation. It is even so With the end of this earthly journey. In the next world, man will find himself freed from many of the disabilities under which he now suffers. Those who have passed on through death, have a sphere of their own. It is not removed from ours; their work, the work of the Kingdom, is ours; but it is sanctified from what we call ‘time and place.’ Time with us is measured by the sun. When there is no more sunrise, and no more sunset, that kind of time does not exist for man. Those Who have ascended have different attributes (conditions) from those who are still on earth, yet there is no real separation.

“ ‘In prayer there is a mingling of stations, a mingling of condition. Pray for them as they pray for you!’ ”7

Many thoughtful people are troubled because they cannot see justice in the pattern of our lives. Justice is one of the attributes of God. Through the teachings of Bahá’u’lláh men are called upon to reflect the heavenly justice in their dealings with each other, both individually and collectively. In the 01d order there is little or no justice in the distribution of wealth, in the relationship between master and slave, in the inferior position of women, etc. But those standards which were formerly accepted have been superseded by the principles of Bahá’u’lláh. At present the world is in the throes of reshaping its institutions to meet the new standard of justice.

For the individual soul, there is justice, the giving of what is deserved, and mercy, the giving of bounty not deserved. Both in this world and in

BGleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 157. 7‘Abd.u’I.-Bah.ci in London, p. 97.

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the next there are rewards and punishments for our own actions. Heaven is nearness to God; hell, whether in this world or hereafter, is our remoteness and indifference to God, and our deprivation of His Love and Bounty.

If we cannot find justice in the pattern of our lives, the answer lies in the fact that our lives are not finished here. We cannot see the deserved retribution or the earned reward that may await the soul in the next world. God will recompense patience and longsuffering, and for those who have died before birth or in childhood, and for those who have been struck down by calamity, He has a special mercy and a bountiful favor.

When we are beset by doubts, we ask ourselves, “Are there any proofs of immortality?” In Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh and in Some Answered Questions we read the rational proofs and evidence that the spirit exists independently of the body. So we find that with our power of reason we can deduce the logic of immortality, but with spiritual insight we gain conviction.

If we have assurance of immortality, what difference does it make in our daily lives? One salutary result is that much of the fear of death vanishes. That burden we do not need to carry any longer. Also, the knowledge that our life is to continue gives us a great impetus to make the most of our time on this earth, and gives us a balance with which to weigh our pursuits. When death comes to those who are dear to us, the inevitable pain of separation is softened by the thought that we are not cut off completely from them, and that they, like treasured plants in a garden, have been transplanted to a freer and more desirable location.

This earth has been composed with wondrous perfection, but it is of necessity a world of change, of becoming and of reverting, of composition and of decomposition. We will find the fulfilment of our desperate need for security and tranquillity in the abiding spiritual world.

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11.

AN EXPERIMENT IN RACE RELATIONS

BY BOB POWERS.1

THERE was fear of a race riot in Richmond, California, during the late summer of 1945. Ever since the Detroit riots of 1943, when 35 persons were killed and property damage amounted to more than $2,000,000, there had been glowing concern on the West coast that racial tension would explode into a riot.

In Richmond altercations between negroes and whites were on the increase. Fantastic rumors were to be heard in every barber shop, at every lodge meeting, and on many street corners. Alertness of the police amounted to tension.

One incident took place in a shipyard: A fight started between a white man and another worker who was negro, the latter having inadvertently kicked over a lunch pail. While only the two exchanged blows, many others came close to conflict. An alert officer noticed that during and immediately after the fight negroes and whites were gathering in separate groups, and that each man, as if by accident, had in his hand a wrench, a hammer, or a heavy drill. Guards were immediately summoned, and their timely arrival served to break the tension.

Another apparently trivial but significant incident was reported. Officer Olvera while patrolling came upon a negro and a white boy fighting. Ques 1Bob Powers is a free lance writer who is retired as Coordinator of Law Enforcement Agencies for the State of California. He also has served as Chief Law Enforcement Officer for the California State War Council and was a police chief for ten years prior to that. He has written narratives for race relations documentary films and was co-author of A Guide to Race Relations for Police Officers. Mr. Powers was first attracted to the Bahá’í Faith by the “principle of an unfettered search after truth.” The first Bahá’í book he read was This Earth, One Country. He has remarked: “When I read the chapter on Islam I accepted Muhammad as a Prophet. When I'd finished the book I was a Bahá’í, although it was five Enfixlilth's later. in April, 1947, before I declared my a .

tioned, the white boy replied: “Sure, I started it. He’s got no business walking on this street, It’s just for white people.”

The boy’s father came out of a nearby house. “I saw the fight from my window; and my kid was doin’ all right, too! He’ll teach that other kid his place.”

Incidents of this kind, coupled with fast-spreading rumors, could not but disturb the city officials. Richmond, which had expanded to a city of 120,000 population during the war, found itself facing danger—almost one-tenth of its citizens were negroes. And now, with the war ended, cut-backs in production, lay-offs in the shipyards, uncertainty as to the future, and all the problems of readjustment facing the people of this community~trouble was brewing.

After many sleepless nights, the city manager decided to call for help from the American Council on Race Relations and the State Department of Justice. I was assigned by the Attorney General to work with Davis McEntire of the American Council and see what could be done.

McEntire and I met, for the first time, to discuss the problem and plan a course of action. We knew that a police department tends to reflect the prejudices of a community, that prejudiced officers do not inspire confidence in any group of the citizenry, and that people are more liable to riot when they hold their enforcement officers in contempt. Consequently we decided to give the police some training in human relations so that they could do a better job, allay fears, scotch rumors, afford all citizens a greater sense of security, and enhance their own prestige. As nothing like this had been attempted before in California, hardly in the Unit [Page 708]708 THE Bahá’í WORLD

away 49;

Making of Braille plates at the Braille Institute of America. Alice Tilly is doing the Braille work on a Bahá’í book.

Bahá’í Exhibit, Palmer Fair, Palmer, Alaska.

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ed States, we were free of any restriction by precedent.

One question which had to be answered was this: “How can good practical methods of handling minority group members be taught?” And the answer, of course, was that they can’t be taught as skills or methods or techniques.

It proved fortunate that our final decision was to concentrate on eliminating prejudice and giving the officers a better understanding of the effects the environment of segregation and discrimination has on citizens in a democracy.

Eliminating prejudice and influencing social attitudes in the short time we had to devote to this project appeared to be a gigantic undertaking—almost impossible. We decided that more help was needed. After making four telephone calls we had promises of that help from Walter Gordon, a negro who is Chairman of the California Adult Authority of the Department of Corrections; Joseph James, another negro who was President of the San Francisco chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People; Joe Grant Masaoka of the Japanese American Citizens’ League; and Ken Kato, a Nisei soldier just back from the Pacific. They were enthusiastic about helping.

Two weeks later, on a Monday morning, fourteen officers of the Richmond Police Department were assembled for a conference that was to last a week. Frankly they were skeptical that anything of value could come out of the course, yet it must be said to their credit that they were willing to “try anything once.” On one point everyone was in agreement: something had to be done without delay.

McEntire was an economist who had for a number of years been devoting his full time to work in the field of race relations. His background made him an outsider to the police—a “do-gooder” or “social worker” they would have stereotyped him. However, I had had more than twenty years of experience in law enforcement and was known, at least by reputation, to all of the men present. They were willing to accept

me, but with some reservations because 01' the company I was keeping.

McEntire opened the discussion by reviewing the problem nationally and locally. He had hardly finished his summation when one inspector spoke up: “I don’t think there’d be any problem,” he said belligerently, “if those people would keep their place!”

It was a fortunate remark reflecting the attitude of the officers and many members of the white community. Another officer turned to the inspector, "You say they should keep their place; but what is their place?”

The question was unanswerable, but it served to bring to the surface all of the prejudices, doubts, fears, and questions of those present. When the class adjourned for the day it was difficult to clear the room. No one had finished talking. All through that first meeting derogatory terms and epithets had been bandied about quite freely; and it appeared that our pupils thought they had gained an upper hand over their instructors.

Next day came the surprise. When the officers had been seated around the conference table, McEntire entered with J oseph J ames, introduced him and gave him a seat among the officers. On the following days there were other participants in the discussion, Walter Gordon, Joe Grant Masaoka, and Ken Kato. They answered many questions. making it clear that in so far as they and the people they represented were concerned, no public officer could advocate segregation or countenance discrimination and retain their respect or remain constant to his oath to “uphold the Constitution of the United States.”

If nothing else had been accomplished, affording these policemen the opportunity to become friends with leading negroes and Japanese-Americans would have justified the whole undertaking. In miniature we had begun to solve the problem which is national and world—wide. Through bringing strangers together, we were breaking down the barriers of misunderstanding, fear, and distrust which separate people into potentially warring groups. Stagnant ponds of prejudice were beginning to evaporate

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and the poisonous vapors to dispel. Segregation came in for much discussion, and there developed an understanding of its effects on the Negro, the Jew, or anyone else who is so confined. One of the consultants explained: “Aside from the natural desire for decent homes, restricting a negro to some particular area is making him want to escape. And even when good housing is available, surrounding territory whichcannot be entered because of restrictive covenants is a constant source of irritation. Segregation is a form of imprisonment, and since it is directly contrary to the principles of democracy and Christianity, it is fundamentally cruel and unjust.” Another consultant told the police officers: “When you, a white man, go into a restaurant only to find that the service is slow, the food is poor, and the prices are high, you cuss the service, the food, the prices, the management, or even the ration boards. But you do not'identify these unsatisfactory conditions with the fact that you have skin of a particular color; there is no personal affront. Yet when I, as a negro, go into a restaurant I am inclined to feel that the slow service means ——‘Why did you come here in the first place?’ The poor food—‘You know we don’t want you here’ And the high prices—‘Maybe you will stay out next

,?’

time .

During the course of the conferences, the President of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People chapter spent two hours sitting down at a table discussing the problems of race relations with police inspectors, sergeants and patrolmen. He told of his own experiences and those of his friends; and he spoke of what the Negro eventually hopes to get from and contribute to life in America.

He told of an American boy who, having spent years in study and preparation to fit himself for a job, finds the doors of employment locked against him by bigotry—this because he happens to be one-sixteenth Negro. He discussed the irresponsible, rabble-rousing leaders among negroes who profit from stirring up hatred. He told the police officers that he, as a negro,

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believed that they were doing him a service when they suppress the negro hoodlum, the rowdy, and the thug. He went on to tell them how concerned farsighted negroes are over any bad conduct by others. Within a half-hour questions were coming too fast for him to answer. He was no longer the representative of a minority group; he was a confrere—with special knowledge, yes; but with special interest, no. All differences had disappeared in the search for and contribution to better understanding.

The California Adult Authority fixes prison terms and serves as a parole board. Its Chairman, a lawyer and former police officer, was present during two of the sessions. He told of the problems faced by a negro peace officer; not only those encountered in dealing with the public, but also those of relationship with white members of a force. And he convinced some of the group that a negro can serve in law enforcement performing general duties—in contact with all kinds of people—that he need not be confined to the ghetto.

During one of the conferences a regional representative of the JapaneseAmerican Citizens’ League and a young Japanese-American who, as a staff sergeant in the United States Army, had served with the Marines from Guadalcanal to Leyte, told of tragic experiences of their people uprooted from the west coast during the war and confined in concentration camps. The young soldier related his story of service with the Marines, of the protection thrown around him to prevent his being shot through mistake; of the extreme consideration with which he was treated by his fellow fighting men; and of an experience which was significant because it was the only unpleasant one he encountered in more than two years of service. Even that consisted merely in one marine’s referring to him as a ”Jap.”

No lectures, no prepared speeches were given. There were interruptions, questions, contrary stands taken on issues. Control was merely direction of conversation toward knowledge, sympathy, and solution of the problems of

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Japanese-Americans, Mexicans, Ne groes—and policemen.

In no instance, during the series of conferences was any peace officer told how he should handle a case, or how he should conduct himself; but each was very definitely given the opportunity to understand the effect of his actions, good or bad, on the people with whom he was dealing, on his department, and on himself as an individual.

There were ten hours spent by fourteen police officers, a race relations expert, and various of the consultants, sitting around a table engaged in the common purpose of trying to gain a better understanding of their fellowmen.

And it is significant that whereas on the first day derogatory and contemptuous terms were carelessly and frequently used, on the last day of the discussions, anything other than “colored man” or “Negro” or “JapaneseAmerican” caused group discomfort, the raising of eyebrows by those present.

Shortly after these original conferences were completed the entire police force was ordered into a meeting. A panel of officers and consultants told those assembled what had been learned. Questions were asked from the audience. They were answered with authority.

A test of the effectiveness of this experiment came early in October. The incident occurred which might have precipitated a riot. Trouble developed between negro and white children in the schools; there were fights; rumors spread like a grass—fire on a windy day; the white pupils went on strike demanding segregation.

But a small group of informed and assured policemen quickly averted the danger. They met with both negro and white groups; they insisted that the school authorities take a firm stand; they worked with radio stations and newspapers to dispel rumors; and they gave assurance of protection and fair treatment to the negroes in the community. Within a week all was quiet, the children back in school, the tension broken.

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,1 Wm...

Manuel Gorgas, First Indian Bahá’í of Panama.

McEntire and I had separated, considering our job done. He went back to his work and I to mine. We didn’t realize that we had set in motion forces that were greater than either of us.

Inquiries started coming in regarding our experiment. We found it necessary to write a booklet, “A Guide To Race Relations for Police Officers.” It was published by the State of California and re-printed by the American Council on Race Relations. More than 15,000 copies went to police Chiefs and other enforcernent officers throughout the United States. The story was told in newspapers all over the country. The New York Times devoted two columns to it; Eleanor Roosevelt told of the experiment in her column, “My Day.” The Saturday Evening Post published an account in its issue of December 28, 1946. The State Department, early in 1947, decided to tell the story in documentary film to the people of other countries; the script has been written.

The Rosenwald Fund and the Columbia Foundation are jointly exploring the possibility of using training films based on the Richmond Experiment to teach law enforcement officers something of

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the evils of segregation and the nature of prejudice. Five—thousand dollars have been made available for research and the writing of scripts.

This is not an account of how the problems arising from racial tension were solved. It is the story of the instrumentality of two men who, fumbling and groping in an effort to improve the way men live together, attained results far beyond their expectations. The publicity and the effects of our effort were gratifying. However, my greatest satisfaction came from a letter written by one of the officers who

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had participated in the conferences. He

wrote: “Being a policeman I naturally come into contact with the criminal element and I had be‘en judging all negroes accordingly. After attending the classes on race relations I understand things a lot better. I know that these classes were a real step in the right direction. If it were only possible to teach every person what I know now, it would be a great thing for mankind. You can depend on me to do whatever I can to help you attain your goal.”

12.

THE ALTERNATIVE TO LABOR WAR

BY HAROLD GAIL1

T HE city lay quiet. On Powell Street the salt fog had brushed the cable tracks with the first faint touches of rust. The yards of the drayage companies were clogged with silent trucks. The waterfront, too, was dead. Motionless ships filled San Francisco Bay.

This was the general strike of 1934. This might have been revolution. Most of the union leaders who voted for the general strike thought in terms of labor solidarity, of helping their fellow workers, but the implications of their action hung over the grey, lifeless city.

By choking the entire economy of an area, the general strike forces not only all the anti-labor groups, but also a great mass of ordinarily neutral people into the fight to break the strike. Labor must then either seize control of and operate all vital services—in effect a

1Harold Gail has had twenty—two years of industrial experience. both in direct production and in management. He has worked for Republic Steel and for Studebaker as well as in smaller factories on the Pacific Coast. He is now in charge of production and of labor relations for his company in San Francisco. As a Bahá’í, he has tried to present an impartial view and has been aided in this by his personal knowledge of the problems besetting both labor and management.

revolution—or gradually permit vital services to function under customary management, thus releasing its grip on the economy and causing eventual disintegration or abandonment of the general strike.

Since the majority of the union leaders in San Francisco were not prepared, either practically or ideologically, to carry through the full implications of the strike, it failed. The newspapers said public opinion defeated the strike. This may have been true in part, but the difficulty with public opinion is that it is often opinionated rather than analytical, it is second hand and second rate, and its rush into battle woefully late.

This need not be the case. A wellinformed, judicious, responsible public opinion could force industrial disputes to be arbitrated, could result in fair labor-management legislation being passed and justly executed. At present we have only the pendulum swings from pro—labor to anti-labor legislation and the pendulum is rather like the one in Poe’s story, swinging its edged blade closer with each stroke to the bound

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victim—in this case, the public.

Although labor-management relations may be complicated, the essentials of the conflict are easy to understand: labor is a commodity—a commodity of world-wide distribution, and the most vital primary need in any economy. Although the labor problems discussed in this article Will center on industrial labor it should be understood that the term labor reaches far beyond the factory. The commodity, labor—the ability to render necessary or desired services—is placed on the market by most of us, whether we are workers in mills or in offices, whether we are in the professions or in service trades. To a degree, even the employer offers his working ability and training in the labor market.

Since labor is a commodity, and enters into the cost of any product, a manufacturer is forced by competition to obtain it for as little as possible. This need not mean that he pays low wages; it does mean that he must try to get the greatest number of units produced for the number of dollars paid out.

Everybody recognizes the fact that the manufacturer needs to buy his materials, for example, his steel, as cheaply as possible; but not everybody realizes that he would, owing to the logic of his situation, also need to buy his labor as cheaply as possible. Opposing this need of the manufacturer, is the working man’s need to sell his labor, his ability, as high as he can. His own welfare and the proper care and education of his children make this demand upon him.

From these two factors—the need for the employer to keep his costs low and the need for the employee to sell his labor at as high a figure as possiblewe get a direct clash of interests. Such a clash, in fact, that it has become warfare.

In the strategy of strikes—industrial warfare—concern for the public welfare is bound to be a secondary consideration, if indeed it is considered at all. When military forces are fighting for possession of a city, civilian

lives and property are likely to be destroyed before the battle ends. Not only do union workers and strikebreakers die in bitter industrial struggles, but the far-reaching effects of strikes may bring death to persons who have never been inside factory gates.

Every so often I hear someone complain that a strike has come at an inconvenient time. Strikes always do. They must. But sometimes even a union man will fail to see the logic of strike tactics. I recall, a number of years ago, talking to a shipyard worker who was on strike. “Why do they have us go out on strike,” he asked, “right when we have a chance to get some big overtime checks? Why don’t they wait till this winter when work will be slack?” I pointed out to him that nothing would suit the employers better than to have a strike, if it must come, when work is slack. They don’t need workers then. They can let a strike drag on until economic pressuresdebts and hunger—force the workers to give in. According to the system under which we now operate, labor is in its best bargaining situation when it is in greatest demand. This happens also to be the time when there is the greatest need for goods: when labor should be producing the most. Conversely, as we have seen, labor is at its lowest bargaining power When business is bad.

As long as this situation obtains, with the clash of interests and the changes in degree of bargaining power, we are bound to have interruptions in production—i.e., strikes, or lockouts 0n the part of employers—and these interruptions are bound to come at the most inconvenient times for one party or the other, or sometimes both.

And because of our extremely involved industrial organization and its ever—increasing complexity, any strike and particularly a strike affecting any large segment of the working population, becomes so disrupting in its effect not only on the industry concerned but on all the interdependent industries, that it produces a virtually intolerable situation. So intolerable that in recent years we have seen that the Govern [Page 714]714

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First Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Addis-Ababa, Ethiopia.

ment has had to step in and maintain production in order to prevent a breakdown of the entire economy.

Strikes, while they have been labor’s only powerful weapon, have become potentially so devastating that most thinking people are trying to find some other solution to the problem. Then too, another factor has become obvious: that strikes work against'the workman himself; as we have seen recently, the net gain in increased wages from a long drawn out strike has not been sufficient in some cases to offset the loss of wages incurred during the strike.

It is interesting that the strike now tends to follow a fairly definite pattern. If the general public knew this pattern it would be in a much better position to understand the strike problem. First of all, strikes are apt to center around the wages to be paid. Most of the other issues are likely to be spoken of by labor relations people as “fringe” issues. There are several good reasons why strikes center around wages.

These provide a clear objective: 16 cents more per hour is a definite concept. Also, and probably most important of all, a union leader gains more popularity from a wage increase put through than for putting through welfare measures for his men.

Now it would seem to reasonable persons that the wages asked should be the wages that the workers feel they should receive. Not at all. They are “bargaining”; hence the wage demands at the outset of the strike have to be excessive so that they can be scaled down during negotiations. One of the by-products of this method is that when a settlement is effected the workers may feel let down. This dissatisfaction plants the seed of the next strike. Furthermore, if a worker is out on a picket line carrying a placard that demands “A dollar twenty an hour if it takes all summer,” that placard becomes his battle slogan and he may feel his union leaders have “sold out” When, after it does take all summer, they settle for $1.07 per hour.

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First Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the city of Hobart, Tasmania, April 21, 1949.

Another factor in making the strike take all summer is the employer’s counter offer. Does he go over his books and make the best possible offer in keeping with conditions and business prospects? No. He “bargains” too. It is, I should mention in passing, and speaking from experience both as employee and employer, fundamental employer psychology for the employer to believe that whatever wage he is paying is the maximum he can afford to pay, but his offer to the union Will almost always be lower than he is prepared to settle for. Suppose the union is asking $1.20 an hour; the employer feels sure it does not expect to receive this amount; he offers, let us say, $1.00 an hour, although he knows that he will have to settle for a higher figure. This is the poker—playing stage. While the bluffing goes on, the public, labor, and the employer, all lose.

When the strike is finally settled, what are the results? The workers return to work happy to be earning mon ey again but full of ill will toward their employers Who in the course of many union meetings were denounced as greedy, scheming exploiters Without heart or conscience. Management, too, is bitter—over lost production, over the libelous charges made against them, over the divisive action of the union in coming between them and their employees.

Society likewise has suffered irreparable losses. Strikes and lockouts (strikes on the part of the employer) rob society of the products that should have been produced during those strikes or lockouts. That amount of production can never be made up. It is lost forever.

This also holds true for losses from interrupted production in interdependent industries. A coal strike Will cause steel mills to shut down, This in turn will cause automobile plants to slow down production or close altogether. Parts suppliers for the auto companies will then have to curtail production to

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allow for the shrinkage in deliveries for autos. Production stops all down the line, in all sections of the country, sometimes in other parts of the world. This lost production, too, can never be regained.

What is the solution to this fundamental clash of interests?

When an attempt is made to prevent strikes through the arbitration of a Government agency, we find employers seeking to gain control of the Government so as to control the arbitrating agency. And we find associated unions seeking the same control of Government. Thus, the clash of interests goes on, at higher levels.

If the unions control enough votes, the Government naturally reflects the wishes of the unions. If management, through the press, radio and other media successfully influences the public, it can control the election to government of its candidates. The Government tends to be manipulated by one or the other of the conflicting interests —and a large part of the population is bound to suffer.

This tendency to strive for the interests of a particular group always impedes attempts at a solution. And yet, if Government gets absolute control of both parties—that is, if Government through many changes becomes not the agency of the people but the dictatorial power over them—then we suffer from the attendant and all-toowell demonstrated evils of the police state.

Legislative action is surely a remedy for the abuses of both management and labor, but Bahá’ís believe, and the events of the last sixteen years provide ready proof, that legislation to have long range and world wide effectiveness, and to avoid the evils shown above, must be founded on more than the will of the electing majority. It must have regard for all mankind.

By the two steps forward and one step backward method (occasionally replaced by the two steps backward and one step forward technique) we have made some progress in labor relations. But we could easily slip once more into the old ways. It has not been many years since I was told of a man

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who had to oil a line shaft running in a tunnel between buildings. He had barely room to crawl through the tunnel, it was so narrow, and he had to oil the bearings while the shaft was turning. One day his clothes caught on the shaft; his body was whipped around the shaft and he was smashed against the brick wall of the tunnel. The superintendent of the plant went to the owner and told him what had happened. His hope was the owner would take action to prevent a recurrence. The owner’s only comment was: “How soon can we get another man?”

The inhumanity of employers has been matched by ruthless union terrorism as exemplified by goon squads and one of their gentler practices, that of breaking arms over curbstones as if they were kindling wood. Murder, too, has had a long history in labor relations.

Brutality and murder can have no place in our future if we are to reach our destiny: a unified, peaceful world. They can and will be eliminated when labor and management work together for common, clearly understood, and socially responsible goals.

One of the means of fusing the interests of workers and employers is profit—sharing. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá clearly expounded this Bahá’í principle on His visit to the United States in 1912. We now see it gaining such momentum that a number of companies, among them Pitney—Bowes, Inc., of Stamford, Connecticut, Lincoln Electric Co., Cleveland, Ohio, S. C. Johnson 8: Son, Racine, Wisconsin, and Progressive Welder Co., Detroit, Michigan, have organized a Council of .Profit~Sharing Industries. Encouraging as this is, we would be wrong to assume that much work does not lie ahead before the benefits of profit—sharing can be extended throughout all industry. The initial reluctance of employers to apply this principle is, of course, an obstacle, but one which will diminish in importance as proofs of the beneficial results grow increasingly apparent. In many industries, the immediate advantage to the worker will be small and greatly out of proportion to his anticipations. He is not likely to place

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the blame on competition, failing natural resources or other causes of a low rate of profit, but upon management. Union attacks as well as employer actions have caused him to lose faith in employers. He is apt to feel that he is not getting his just share. He distrusts bookkeeping because he does not understand it, and tends to think the books are juggled to give him only a token payment out of profits. He thinks high production always means high profits. This is not necessarily the case, for the increased sales may have been achieved by reducing the profit margin on each article. As a survey has shown, workers have a greatly exaggerated idea of the percentage of profit made by their employers. Some who were questioned thought 75 percent of each sales dollar went into profit; many others thought 50 percent; whereas the average profit for the recent period of high national prosperity was less than 10 percent of the sales dollar.

Contrary to the opinion of most workers and of the public, there is not a great fund of profits which can be converted to wages. We are very apt to make the mistake in these days of believing that because a few corporations show large profits this is true of all companies, and that this condition will continue from year to year. Some profits have to be ploughed back into expanded and more efficient plant, and considerable reserve has to be set aside for bad years, otherwise businesses will fail; and when that happens, the worker will find himself out of a job.

If we have not already reached it, we are inevitably reaching the stage where the only way in which workers can get more take-home pay is by greater productivity. Not per hour, not per day, but per working lifetime.

Educational campaigns can do much to clarify this situation for the workers. They should be shown the extent to which they actually are the partners of management, where the difficulties lie, and what they as a working group can do to overcome them.

The Bahá’í principle that work is identical with the worship of God, that

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one should occupy himself with that which will profit himself and others beside himself, will go far in reestablishing the craftsmanship that once made his work a source of pride for the worker and will do away with the trend toward poor workmanship and shoddy products that often mars our present output.

N or should we neglect to educate employers. They ought to know the present—day needs of their employees. Many need to realize they have responsibilities other than to their own families and their stockholders. A campaign of employer education in regard to taxes, would, I think, bring good results. Taxes represent an additional cost factor, often quite a large one, and businessmen tend to wage a constant and generally indiscriminate battle against taxes as they do against other costs. They need to understand that taxes are levied to finance vital group activities which they as individuals could never perform; that the graduated income tax and inheritance taxes—both set forth in the Bahá’í Teachings before they found legislative acceptance—are respectively the necessary means of reducing the inequities in earning power which are bound to arise, and of preventing the amassing of huge family fortunes. When businessmen realize fully the extent to which they participate through taxation in the administration and continual development of their economy, they may be expected to bring to bear upon the management of that economy the same zeal for efficiency and progressive methods that is now narrowly channeled in their individual enterprises.

Pension plans are being placed in operation by some of the larger corporations. Although management doubtless expects definite material gains from such plans and at present they can only be considered as supplements to the United States social security program, they do demonstrate that industry is becoming aware of its long-term duties. These plans Will provide psychological as well as cash benefits for the workers. When their pension checks come from the company in whose service they worked, they will

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enjoy a feeling of having earned their retirement, not of being dependent on governmental charity, and they will continue to be interested in the activities of that company. Anyone who has had a former employee tell him: “Say, you ought to go down to the old place and see that new automatic furnacepractically thinks for itself,” knows that the man is just as interested in the expansion of “his” company as the president.

The increase in pension plans and in profit—sharing is eSpecially heartening to Bahá’ís because it proves that the benefits from the acceptance and translation into action of Bahá’í principles are already at hand, and precede the world—wide acceptance of the spiritual responsibilities of this age.

Nevertheless, Bahá’ís know that what we witness today are ameliorations that could easily be lost in another economic disaster. We must insure the future.

The only complete solution to the labor—management problem is not one that can be put into practice today, or this week. It involves changes in the individual and also in the social structure.‘ Shoghi Effendi says, “It implies an organic change in the structure of present—day society, a change such as the world has not yet experienced.” It means ceasing to think of What is good for the steel industry, or what is good for the steel—workers union, and beginning to think of what is good for mankind.

I do not wish at this point to sound utopian or seem to offer a vague panacea such as “the brotherhood of man” or “pie in the sky when you die” as the old socialist jibe had it. The Guardian of the Faith states: “Let there be no mistake. The principle of the Oneness of Mankind—the pivot round which all the teachings of Bahá’u’lláh revolve —is no mere outburst of ignorant emotionalism or an expression of vague and pious hope. . . . It represents the consummation of human evolutionan evolution that has had its earliest beginnings in the birth of family life, its subsequent development in the achievement of tribal solidarity, leading in turn to the constitution of the

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city-state, and expanding later into the institution of independent and sovereign nations.

“The principle of the Oneness of Mankind, as proclaimed by Bahá’u’lláh, carries with it no more and no less than a solemn assertion that attainment to this final stage in this stupendous evolution is not only necessary but inevitable, that its realization is fast approaching, and that nothing short of a power that is born of God can succeed in establishing it.”

Labor economists properly place considerable emphasis on raising living standards. This is a Vital need and visits to workers’ homes, even in the United States with its high wage levels, will show that we must make much progress before we shall have a sound economy and more fully evolved individuals. An increase in living standards is bound up with three things: increase in productivity; an efficient and low—cost distribution of goods; a fair distribution of profits, so that profits are not siphoned off for the benefit of a greedy few.

This rise in living standards can be achieved through cooperation based on mutual trust. And this mutual trust has to be based upon a joint responsibility to a higher power. Not Government, which can become the tool of one or the other contending parties, but a power that transcends all government and all human affairs. This means religion in labor relations. Socialists and Communists love to talk about Christ being the greatest Socialist, or Communist, but meanwhile they reject His other principles. They forget that, as an editorial in Life pointed out, He emphasized the Fatherhood of God three times more often than the brotherhood of man.

What the Bahá’í Faith presents to management and labor alike is a program geared to modern technology, a religion promulgated during the Industrial Age. First of all, certain goals will be. set up which will seize the imagination and cause all groups to merge their interests in the interest of mankind. There will be mutual trust and responsibility toward each other based

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upon a renewed understanding of our responsibility to God. These goals I have spoken of, the goals that have already seized the imagination of Bahá’ís and will in turn seize all our minds, are world goals. I know that within the framework of these goals there will be more immediate aims to be realized: profit-sharing will be made to work because it will be firmly founded on mutual trust and common aims. Social security measures will be greatly broadened. Public health programs, welfare programs, educational programs will be greatly expanded. But, important as these measures are, they are but part of the major projects of our age.

It is like unrolling the master plan for the world to read Shoghi Effendi’s “A Pattern for Future Society.” The same excitement surges through one that must be experienced by an engineer when the blue prints are unrolled for some vast industrial expansion: here is expansion for all humanity.

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Although it is still a long way ahead, we are steadily moving toward the establishment of a world commonwealth, based on the unity of the human race. Science and religion will be brought into harmonious and cooperative development. The economic resources of the world will be efficiently organized; full utilization of natural resources will be achieved, world markets will be coordinated and developed. In that day, we shall not see class ranged against class, for “ . . . the inordinate distinction between classes will be obliterated. Destitution on the one hand, and gross accumulation of ownership on the other, will disappear.” We shall see workers and managers, freed from the necessity of fighting bitter and costly battles for supremacy, engaged in a common cause—the production of goods of quality at lowest possible cost. With harmonious, integrated production, the struggle can cease to be for existence and can become the infinitely more rewarding struggle toward God.

1&

SCIENCE AND BYGA.

WHAT Do WE KNOW?

WE DO not have to prove that we are happy. Our own unsupported testimony is sufficient. The cause of our happiness is, however, quite another matter. That is an inference, and our inferential knowledge is not infallible. We are never absolutely sure about the origin of our inner experiences, but the experiences themselves are known to us by direct cognition, that is, they are immediately apprehended. If a man has an aversion to religion no argument will convince him that the feeling of aversion is not real. It is real and

REVELATION SHOOK1

we can do nothing about it. But we might convince him that the reason for this feeling is false.

The, feeling of beauty, compassion, or love is just as real to us as are external objects. In fact it is decidedly more real, for the external world is

1Glenn A. Shook. Pn.D., F.R.S.A., is Professor of Physics and Director of Observatory at Wheaton College in Norton, Massachusetts. He is a pioneer worker in mobile color and applied 0ptics. His publications on mobile color apparatus are the only available source of information on the design and construction of color organs. Dr. Shook’s articles have appeared in many journals of science, both here and abroad. He is a lecturer of note and has g.ven addresses at leading universities on science, art and music. He is a frequent contributor to World Order, the Bahá’í magazine, and has given many courses at Bahá’í summer schools.

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known to us only by inference. We see an object before us and we call it a stone merely because it looks like other objects which are known to us as stones.

Again we know that in meditation, when. the mental activity is low, insight or intuition often suggests what is new. Perhaps we should not call intuition knowledge, but since it is so essential to new knowledge we are justified in using the term intuitive knowledge. We must remember, however, that intuition like all other human methods of acquiring knowledge, is liable to error. Broadly speaking, then, there is a kind of intuitive knowledge which comes to us through an inexplicable, unconscious process of thought. Science does not deny this kind of knowledge. In fact, no great creative work was ever accomplished without it.

We might distinguish between the intuitive knowledge of the scientist and that of the religious genius, which is ostensibly of a higher order. The mystic in a state of ecstasy or vision sometimes receives what he calls revealed knowledge. The mystic believes that the phenomenal psychic experience produces something that is superior to any kind of mental effort. Moreover, he is inclined to believe that his intuitive or revealed knowledge is more valid than the intuitive knowledge of the scientist. But here again we must remember that the intuition of the mystic, like the intuition of other artists, is not infallible.

Contrasted with intuitive knowledge there is the kind that comes through experience, which we call empirical knowledge. The scientist, as we all know, is concerned with empirical knowledge—but not exclusively. He is also concerned with the kind of knowledge that comes through mental processes, logic, inductive and deductive reasoning. This inferential knowledge is indispensable to science. Some of the most important scientific truths are derived from known laws and assumptions. For example, the inverse square law of gravitation may be derived from Kepler’s second and third laws.

When we think of divine revelation we naturally think of revealed or intui THE BAHA’I'

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tive knowledge. .The knowledge possessed by the great creative personalities of prophetic religion, or in the language of religion, the Prophets, like Moses, Jesus and Muhammad, is innate, immediate. We are fairly certain that they did not attend schools, nor did they create eclectic systems out of contemporary or ancient wisdom.

‘There is, however, this essential differ ence between the intuitive knowledge which we associate With divine revelation and that which we associate with science: The intuitive knowledge of the scientist must be checked constantly by empirical knowledge whereas the intuitive knowledge of the Prophet needs no check. This is rather difficult for the scientist to accept, but as we hope to show, the difficulty begins to vanish when we think of revealed knowledge in terms of total experience, not merely experience in the world of science.

We must admit, however, that the phenomenal success of science in the physical world, the failure of religion to establish peace and harmony in the world at large, and, finally, the secularization of religion as well as society, all tend to create in the mind of the layman the idea that the revealed knowledge of the Prophet is not so reliable as the intuitive knowledge of the scientist. Of course, many laymen feel that scientific knowledge is the only certain knowledge we possess today. They firmly believe that scientific knowledge is final and absolute, but the modern scientist, at least the modern physicist, does not make this claim.

Ever since the decline of organized religion there have been many attempts to create eclectic systems out of the salient features of extant religions. So far as world outlook goes, some of these movements are superior to religious systems, but they lack the force to effect any large scale reform, either in the individual or in society.

Within the pale of any particular religious system there are many who have faith in revealed knowledge, but they feel constrained to regard the revealed knowledge of their own religion as final and absolute. For the Christian

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the Divine Will was revealed through Christ once and for all time; all other Prophets are at least inferior if not false. Despite the teachings of the Qu’ran, the average follower of Muhammad makes a similar claim for Islam. It has taken man a long time to realize that creation is a mode of causation, and it may take him some time to realize that divine revelation is continuous.

For the scientist, however, the problem is not progressive revelation, but simply revelation. How can we reconcile the innate revealed knowledge of the Prophet with scientific thinking? The intuitive knowledge of the mystic presents some difficulties but, as we shall see, they are insignificant when compared with the revealed knowledge of the Prophet.

PROPHETIC RELIGION AND MYSTICISM

In the words of Heiler, “Mysticism and the religion of revelation are the two opposite, tendencies of the higher piety Which in history ever repel, yet ever attract each other.”

Prophetic religion is dominated by the idea that the Divine Will is revealed to mankind through a great spiritual genius, or through a Prophet like Christ or Muhammad. When the Prophet appears the world is always revived spiritually. The Prophet may also reveal new social laws, as in Judaism, or He may stress individual spiritual development as in Christianity. In either case the transcendent Divine manifests Himself to man through the Prophet, who is an intermediary. He is the creator of the world of value. If we follow the precepts of the Prophet, if we try to understand Him, try to become like Him, we shall be re-created, and without this re-creation religion is of very little value.

Mysticism, at least in its extreme or absolute form, maintains that through meditation and contemplation man may enter the presence of the infinite God, and may be absorbed in the infinite unity of the Godhead. In a broad sense anyone Who is aware of the indwelling Spirit of God is a mystic, but we must use the term in a more restricted sense. In fact we are concerned here

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with the modern mystic who has completely discarded asceticism but who retains the doctrine that a particle of the Divine Essence exists in man and who believes that man may enter the presence of God. He also believes that divine revelation can come to humanity through the mystic as well as the Prophet. That is, the Divine Will may be revealed to man as well as to the Prophet. For most of these modern mystics, man differs from the Prophet only in degree and not in kind.

In general then, we are concerned with two types of revealed knowledge: the kind that comes to the Prophet, which is innate, independent of training or reflection, and the kind that comes to the mystic in his moments of meditation, particularly in the state of ecstasy or vision.

REVEALED KNOWLEDGE OF THE MYSTIC

Let us consider the revealed knowledge of the mystic first as it is more akin to the intuitive knowledge of the scientist. To begin with let us observe that Bahá’u’lláh refutes the claim that man is a part of the Divine Essence, and that man can experience immediately, the presence of God. This removes two formidable stumbling blocks to the scientist for certainly no scientist would admit that man is a part of God, nor that man could experience immediately the infinite, that is, enter into the presence of God. Bahá’u’lláh also reminds us that man’s insight or intuition is not infallible. This applies to the revealed knowledge of the mystic as well as to the intuitive knowledge of the scientist. The mystic and the mystic philosopher realize this. In the words of Russell, “Of the reality or unreality of the mystic’s world I know nothing. I have no wish to deny it, nor even to declare that the insight Which reveals it is not a genuine insight. What I do wish to maintain—and it is here that the scientific attitude becomes imperative—is that insight, untested and unsupported, is an insufficient guarantee of truth, in spite of the fact that much of the most important truth is first suggested by its means.” James reminds us that, “Mystical

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states indeed wield no authority due simply to their being mystical states.” Underhill speaks in a similar fashion.

The majority of modern mystics are concerned primarily with individual spiritual development and we must allow that they have succeeded Where organized religion has failed. It is true that by turning inward, men (a very few men) have been able to improve their individual behavior, but it is equally true that mysticism has no solution for our baffling social problems. A small minority feel that new social laws can and will be revealed to gifted individuals and that in this way a new world order will be created. Although mysticism has exerted considerable influence upon prophetic religion, history does not indicate that the creative force back of great religious movements is due primarily to mysticism. The combined effect of all the great mystics of Christianity is surely small compared with the effect of the adherents of the primitive church who were inspired by the Founder of Christianity. The same may be said of Islam.

SCIENCE AND SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCE

Let us digress long enough to defend the spiritually-minded individual who does not make extravagant claims for his inner experiences.

From what we have said above it must not be inferred that all those inner experiences which we associate with spirituality are illusions, or projections of emotional experiences. Clearly we cannot say that the love, the trust, and the faith which we experience in our devotion to God are purely subjective.

When the scientist tells us that the inner experiences which we associate with our spiritual life have no objective validity, he apparently forgets that he never worries about the validity of: other inner experiences. Should science question the validity of aesthetic appreciation as it sometimes questions the. validity of religion we should have to conclude that the aesthetic feeling we experience when, for example, we are uplifted by a great symphony, is a pure illusion. The sight of a certain color may evoke within us an emotion which

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we can neither measure nor describe, but we do not deny its reality. To be sure, in the analysis of color the physicist treats color as he treats other objects of sense perception, but while he is considering color in this way he is not thinking of aesthetic appreciation. The beauty that is apprehended is beyond physics. On the other hand, probably no scientist is so deficient in aesthetic appreciation as to be entirely incapable of the feeling of beauty. It is true that there have been many attempts to establish some kind of aesthetic measure, but it is also true that these attempts have been severely criticized by creative artists Who have aesthetic appreciation and also scientific knowledge.

The reader probably will agree that values like beauty, justice, and mercy, are in a category which is beyond the space-time world of science. When we try to evaluate spiritual experiences we must remember that they also may be in a category which is beyond science. There are, to be sure, many reasons why a skeptic would deny objective validity to a spiritual experience and not deny it to a feeling of beauty. One, certainly, is the tendency toward abnormality. While theorists have grossly exaggerated this factor, often there is just enough to discourage many healthy-minded individuals from becoming spiritual. This is particularly true in evangelistic piety. The most disturbing factor is, of course, the conglomeration of superstitions and unwarranted practices which we invariably associate with religious orthodoxy. This is the obstacle that prevents the majority of thinking people (as well as the scientists) from investigating the reality of religion. Many years ago, speaking of the history of religion, James said, “There is a notion in the air about us that religion is probably only an anachronism, a case of ‘survival,’ an atavistic relapse into a mode of thought which humanity in its more enlightened examples has out grown. . . .”

Even the old nomenclature, Which we cannot wholly discard, is often a barrier to many who are in search of a

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rational religion, a religion that is compatible with a scientific age. The spiritually-minded scientist (and perhaps the creative genius) could accept the “numinous” of Rudolf Otto more readily than the Holy Spirit of prophetic religion.

THE REVEALED KNOWLEDGE OF THE PROPHET

We have considered briefly the revealed knowledge of the mystic, which, like the intuitive knowledge of artists, sometimes goes astray. Now we must consider the revealed knowledge of the Prophet, which is of a different order. The knowledge of the Prophet is infallible and therefore requires no test. As we said in the beginning, the scientist is skeptical about this kind of knowledge. For him and for the layman who tries to follow him, there is simply nothing in our scientific experience that corresponds to the innate revealed knowledge of the Prophet. In a very real sense, perhaps, this is true, but there is still another approach.

First, however, let us bear in mind that a scientific search for revealed truth might be about as useless as a scientific search for beauty. One should experience a feeling of beauty before he starts looking for it. Values are antecedent to discussions about them. For this reason, one should have some awareness or appreciation of revealed truth before he starts on his search for it.

It is sometimes maintained that if the scientist would pursue his search far enough (whatever that means) he would discover God. This may be true, but the god he finds Will not be the historic God of prophetic religion, who reveals Himself to man through a Prophet, like Bahá’u’lláh. Should he investigate secular and religious history he might fare better, but the chances are really against him. He might arrive at the conclusion that all religions are equally true and none really false. By the time he reaches this stage of his quest, however, the divine element will probably have disappeared—at least, that is what usually happens. He might conceivably conclude that all

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religions are divine in origin but that is really asking too much of a scientist, even a hypothetical scientist.

The case is not hopeless, however, for two reasons. In the first place, revealed knowledge has come to mankind in our day. In the second place, I believe we can demonstrate that revealed truth is not foreign to our experience. The historical fact that Bahá’u’lláh did bring to our age a divine Faith commensurate with our scientific advancement enables us to reconstruct our analysis along easier paths. If the scientist will investigate the tenets of this Faith, which has now encircled the globe; if he will study the lives of the Founders with an unbiased mind, he will discover that divine revelation is not incompatible with scientific thinking.

Let us now consider the problem of experience. To be more specific, we might say the problem of total experience or all experience.

REVELATION AND EXPERIENCE

The average intelligent thinker who is influenced by the method of science finds it difficult if not impossible to believe that a Manifestation of God or a Prophet could completely change the consciences, the patterns of thought, or the thinking habits of the generality of mankind. He also finds it difficult to believe that laws and principles for a new social order could ever be revealed to mankind through a religious genius. At the same time he is, at least dimly, aware that the existing ideologies can never establish any kind of peace and harmony. The dilemma may be due to a restricted view of experience. If we limit ourselves to the scientific approach in evaluating the Prophet, we may find nothing in our experience that corresponds to revealed truth. And yet in a very real sense, there is nothing in our experience that corresponds to scientific truth. Science has failed to explain the underlying reality of nature in terms of mechanical models, Which is equivalent to saying that science has failed to explain nature in terms of experience. Moreover, for the average man the symbolism of mathematics is just as irrelevant

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to his experience as is the concept of revelation.

To be sure, we assume that there is an underlying reality in the physical world and we draw diagrams and construct models to represent it, but we cannot prove that these pictorial representations really correspond to this reality. We may build, in our imagination, a scientific model to imitate a given phenomenon but, today at least, we do not claim that the model really explains the phenomenon. Science is concerned with a world of appearance, and the best we can do is to express our knowledge of this world in a sort of symbolic language which is unfamiliar to most of us. As we have indicated, the external world is known to us only by inference. Scientific laws and concepts are not immediately apprehended as are values like beauty, justice, and goodness.

The idea of revealed truth is not wholly incomprehensible to us if we think in terms of all experience and not merely experience in the world of science. When we turn to the world of value—the world of art, music, and literature~we see that creations and standards come to us through inspired individuals and not through any scientific procedure. These creative personalities reveal aesthetic values to us. The language of the world of value is not the unfamiliar symbolic language of science but the more intimate language of color and form, rhythm and harmony.

We are all familiar with this sort of revealed knowledge. It is not really foreign to our experience. We know, moreover, the futility of applying any kind of scientific analysis to aesthetic values. It has been done, to be sure, but the results are certainly not very convincing. We do not evaluate the art of Leonardo, the music of Beethoven, or the style of Shakespeare, in terms of our experience in the world of science. Can we not evaluate the revealed knowledge of the Prophet as we evaluate the revealed knowledge of the artist or musician? It is true that in the realm of aesthetic values men do not resort to the sword or the torch, but it is also true that in the realm of

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aesthetic values a complete transformation of society is not effected. To illustrate, in the realm of art we are now suffering a relapse but there is no indication that there will be any bloodshed. Should a great creative genius appear and establish new art values it is highly improbable that he would be persecuted. However, if at the same time he should attempt a few social reforms, we all know what would happen. A literary genius may not have an exemplary character, in fact he may have a very bad character, but we usually accept his contributions for their intrinsic worth.

The Prophet must necessarily deal with man’s grosser as well as his finer nature. Everything that is small, contemptible, and ferocious comes to the surface, but surely that does not mean that his work is less meritorious than that of the revealer of art values. Should the Prophet overlook the despicable characteristics of a declining social order and preach only individual spiritual development, he would never be persecuted but neither would he establish social justice. In eliminating in its adherents racial animosity, national hatreds, and class distinctions, the Bahá’í Faith has succeeded where humanitarian movements and older faiths have failed. The Bahá’í Faith has actually transformed the individual lives of its adherents.

The proof of a creative artist’s message is the artist himself and his creation, and the same can be said of the Prophet. Bahá’u’lláh says, “The first and foremost testimony establishing His Truth is His own Self. Next to this testimony is His Revelation.” The advent of a Manifestation of God in our day is an historical event which cannot be overlooked but we will not attempt here even a cursory glance at this world-embracing Faith. Our purpose is to show that the concept of divine revelation is not wholly foreign to our experience, provided we take a comprehensive, inclusive view of experience. In fact, all new knowledge is a matter of revelation but revelation in its completeness is seen only in prophetic religion. '

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In the words of Bahá’u’lláh, “To whatever heights the mind of the most exalted of men may soar, however great the depths which the detached and understanding heart can penetrate, such mind and heart can never transcend that which is the creature of their own conceptions and the product of their

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own thoughts. The meditations of the profoundest thinker, the devotions of the holiest of saints, the highest expression of praise from either human pen or tongue, are but a reflection of that which hath been created within themselves through the revelation of the Lord, their God.”

14.

SEARCH FOR FAITH

BY EDRIS RICE-WRAY1

THE religion, or the lack of it, with which we start out in life is usually dependent upon the environment into which we happen to be born. Usually, we take on as our own the religious beliefs or philosophy of our parents; it is a passive process like taking on our family name. We become emotionally attached to a particular religion and use our intellects to justify our belief that it is superior and right, because our parents tell us that it is superior and right. Everything goes along fine so long as life is pleasant and we have no problems to face.

Then the day comes when something goes very wrong. We are disappointed in love; we fail in school; we don’t get the job we felt we should have had; we lose a loved one by death. In short, the time finally comes when we need to use our faith. We desperately need a source of strength to draw upon. Nothing adds up and nothing makes sense. We have lost our emotional equilibrium; we can’t find any answers.

1A graduate of Vassar College and of Northwestern University Medical School, Dr. Edris Rice-Wray has practiced medicine in Chicago and Evanston, Illinois, and was on the staff of Northwestern University for Several years. She was also school physician at National College of Education in Evanston and has lectured extensively on "Marriage and Sex Education." Dr. Rice-Wray has given public addresses in many parts of the United States and Canada on the application of the Bahá’í teachings to individual and world problems. She now lives in San Juan, Puerto Rico xhel'fi3 she is Medical Director of the District of

rem 0.

Then we may try to turn to God, only to find perhaps that we are at a loss for words, or that the prayers we have been accustomed to saying don’t help, don’t give us any assurance or solace.

Weaklings may take to drink to try to forget, or jump off a building, or find escape in insanity. Others actually enjoy their troubles; they like to worry and to dramatize their grief. They would only find something else to worry about if the particular difficulty should be solved, for although they profess to want to find a way out they really don’t; they resist violently any new attitude which might challenge their preconceived ideas.

There are others who, upon hitting rock bottom, realize they need help and determine to get it. First, naturally, they go to the source of help with which they are most familiar. Some seek help from psychiatry, and they may get some help, but not enough.

Some seek help from their own religious background, and, in their need, may find real faith for the first time. For faith is not something that anyone can inherit. Every soul has to find it for himself. He may find that his father’s particular brand is empty for him and has nothing to offer him in his need. He may then abandon religion altogether, as many have done, to wander aimlessly and uselessly

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through a meaningless, troubled life.

But others may set out on their quest determined to find answers, logical, acceptable answers to life’s questions. And these seekers begin to recognize the indefinable quality that they are seeking in this or that person, and the desire grows in them to be like these people to whom they are attracted, those who have this indefinable thing —“inner serenity,” “inner radiance,” “inner balance.” It is a vital quality and one unconsciously feels that by being around such people, he can acquire it by absorption, or as one catches a disease. But this is not enough. Finally the time comes when one is ready to make the necessary sacrifices to get this quality for himself. It takes great eagerness and constant effort and a complete willingness to sacrifice all preconceived ideas in order to attain an understanding of spiritual truth.

The Bahá’í Faith teaches that the attainment of spiritual qualities is the object of human existence on this planet. Unless this is achieved, the whole purpose of life here is unfulfilled. Then, indeed, everything is meaningless. At the hour of death, one becomes aware of the uselessness of having lived; and he is born into the next world completely unequipped and undeveloped, like a babe born into this life, deaf, dumb and blind. He will receive help there from those more advanced, just as handicapped children here are helped in special schools, but his progress will be painfully slow and difficult.

Should one be aware of. the need for something intangible, should one be conscious of his own helplessness, that is good. This is the first step out of the blind complacency which is stagnation. In order to find, one must first be aware of a need to seek.

Trials and difficulties then have tremendous significance, for without them we cannot progress. They serve to shake us out of our indifference and negligence. They give us our first opportunity to test our faith.- It is not enough to say, “I believe;” one must be tested—just as it isn’t enough for a student to say, “I know”; he must

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take and pass the examinations to prove his knowledge to himself as well as to others. A student who knows his subject does not dread his examinations; he takes them in his stride when they come and that’s that. Similarly, if we have real faith we will not spend time worrying about what misfortune may befall us in the future or even about a present difficulty. Instead our attitude will be one of turning to God and relying on Him for guidance. We will use this prayer from the Bahá’í writings:

“O God, refresh and gladden my spirit. Purify my heart. Illumine my powers. I lay all my affairs in Thy hand. Thou art My Guide and My Refuge. I will no longer be sorrowful and grieved, I will be a happy and joyful being. O God, I Will no longer be full of anxiety, nor will I let trouble harass me. I will not dwell on the unpleasant things of life.

“O God, Thou are more friend to me than I am to myself. I dedicate myself to Thee, O Lord.”

And we may repeat these words: “Put thy complete trust and confidence in God Who hath created thee; help cometh from Him alone!”

The result is a sense of relaxation. Worry, anxiety, fear, and resentment disappear. Now we can begin to think clearly. Usually the solution becomes apparent or the problem solves itself. After having met a few difficulties in this way, we take them as they come and they lose their power to dismay us. Insight grows, understanding increases, inner strength becomes apparent. A new stability is attained and life takes on a thousand new meanings. If whatever faith or philosophy we have does not give us all this, then we have no real faith. An individual who worries, and complains about his lot, and fears the future is a person without faith, regardless of what he may call himself.

It is not enough to say, “I am a Catholic” or “I am a Methodist” or “I am a Muslim,” and “therefore, I have faith. Therefore, I believe in re [Page 727]ARTICLES AND REVIEWS 727

First Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Brussels, Belgium, elected April 21, 1948.

First Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Oslo, Norway, elected April 21, 1948

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ligion." The Bahá’í Faith declares that humanity in this day is, for the most part, clinging to the counterfeit in re ligion. Creeds, dogmas, ceremonies, and man-made interpretations have become more important than the

original message of the Founders of religion. Further, the Bahá’í Faith declares that all religion has come from the same source, the one God. Its purpose has always been the same—to guide man so that he may attain his destiny which is the gradual unfoldment of his God-given perfections.

Man was created in the image and likeness of God. But this likeness is not physical; it is spiritual. Moreover, this likeness is potential, as the flower is potential in the seed. It needs to be brought forth, and so the Founders of the world’s great religions are like gardeners; by Their tender care, Their teachings, and the example of Their own lives, They coax forth this hidden beauty. The purpose of the coming of God’s Messenger in every age has been to reveal God to man and to make available to him the power and the spirit of God, of which he can partake by turning to the Prophet of God. This is the attainment of the second birth to which Christ refers. Man must be born of the spirit; otherwise he is as dead.

We may ask why God needed to reveal Himself to man more than once. Bahá’ís believe that religion is progressive, that God speaks to mankind in every age for three reasons:

First, man gets off the track as time goes by; he becomes confused by the mass of man-made explanations of what the Prophet said until he is not sure just what the Prophet did say. He loses sight of what is really important because there are so many different ideas of what is important.

Second, times change and as man becomes more mature, he finds it difficult to apply a teaching given to a former people at a former time, to a modern age which is different in so many ways. The new Prophet renews the original message which man has lost and applies it to the day in which He speaks. Each age has its particular

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problems which differ from those of previous ages. Today, for example, we have the all-important, the imperative problem of world order. At the time of Christ, the world was not yet discovered, and it would certainly have been premature and meaningless if Christ had given a plan for world government. The people at that time could not even conceive of a united world. Bahá’u’lláh, the Founder of the Bahá’í Faith, has concerned Himself greatly with world order, world government, world education, world religion.

And third, man loses the spirit of real religion. For example, in the first century it was very difficult for the sincere Jew to find true faith, for although Moses had pointed out the path many years before, the early teaching had been largely obscured by the interpretations of the rabbis and scribes. Judaism had become largely a matter of the letter of the law instead of the spirit.

God renewed the spirit of religion in His own way. He revealed Himself anew through Jesus, the Christ. Thus, the faith of the early Christians became the light wherewith the lamp of civilization was relit. They became new individuals. They experienced what Christ meant by the second birth. This transformation of the heart of these people made possible the transformation of society, and civilization again took an upward swing.

Today the light of true faith has largely flickered out in our world. The result is, as always, chaos and confusion. It is being relit by a fresh revelation from God. We will not find it—and we never have—by trying to dig it out of the past, but we will find it in this day, one by one, little by little. Mankind will find security and peace as rapidly as the individuals making up our world find real faith and practice it.

Bahá’ís believe that Bahá’u’lláh, is the Voice of God for this day. They believe that God has again taken a hand in human affairs, that Christ really has returned to reawaken the Christians, to unite them, and to bring the spirit of true faith and unity to the followers of all religions.

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The student of the Bahá’í Faith finds that he grows in his love and understanding of Christ and in his appreciation of His great value to mankind. He sees that Christ has the power to fulfill His promises and has done so. As he reads and studies, the mists begin to fall away and he sees meaning in his experiences. His great realization comes When he grasps the fact that his problems and difficulties were the very things which started him thinking and questioning and seeking. Now he can say, “Thank God for every bit of it. What I wanted was understanding and assurance and inner peace. Now I have them, or at least I know how I am going to get them and I am on the path. If life had continued to be easy, I would still be where I was—blind, complacent, and stagnant. Now I understand what Bahá’u’lláh means when He says, ‘Should calamity exist in the greatest degree we must rejoice for these things are the gifts and favors of God.’ ”

Many believe that to put one’s affairs in the hands of God is a supine act. This shows a lack of understanding of what faith means. Real faith is the sense of inner relaxation and assurance which comes from consciously putting our affairs in God’s hands and sincerely wanting His will, knowing that nothing can happen to us from which we cannot derive benefit. But this inner state must not lead to stagnation. Just as one can’t steer an automobile which is parked at the curb, but only one which is in motion, so God can’t very well guide someone who is inactive. Thus, an inner dependence upon God coupled with intelligent activity is real faith. God becomes a vital, living, personal God, a source of power to draw upon in time of need.

The Whole process of attaining spirituality is a slow one. It takes constant effort and desire. It does not come all in a rush but little by little. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, the son of the Founder of the Bahá’í Faith, once said, “Faith is like rain. At first the drops are far apart. Later they come in torrents.”

It should be pointed out that one who attains faith can lose it unless he constantly prays to God, reaches out to God in his heart, and makes a steady

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effort to maintain the right attitudes.

The difference between a person who has faith and a person who has not is one of attitude and perspective. Life’s problems are ever-present to both, but the individual who has real faith is not thrown off balance by his experiences. He knows that his life here is for the purpose of developing him toward spiritual maturity; that the problems which come to him, come for a specific reason, as the means of his development; and that God does not test any soul beyond the limits of his capacity.

Each problem one meets, makes the next one less difficult. One learns the method of handling them. A pleasant surprise is that once one has met real difficulties and risen above them, he is in a position to help others. Until then, faith is only printing on a page.

We should be aware of our good fortune in living in this day. Real faith is much easier to attain. God has again spoken and told us just what it is and how to attain it and has revealed prayers for our assistance. He has shown that, in essence, a lack of spirituality or faith is the underlying cause of the world’s ills. The chief goal of the Bahá’í Faith is “the development of the individual and society through the acquisition of spiritual virtues and powers. It is the soul of man which has first to be fed.”1 Our inner spiritual life must be transformed and perfected. “Otherwise religion will degenerate into a mere organization and become a dead thing.”2

Man cannot raise himself by his own bootstraps. He can only achieve his destiny with the assistance of God. God does not forget us. He sends His Messengers in every age. These Messengers come for the distinct purpose of helping man to know His Creator and to achieve his destiny. God has spoken again in this day. The spirit of real religion has been renewed. The remedy has been given for the world’s ills. But, as always, God has given us free will. We can stumble along blindly, or we can consciously turn to His Messenger and partake of this life-giving spirit.

1Letter to the author from Shoghi Effendi. 1938.

21bid.

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THE BAHA’I' WORLD

15.

UM DIE LEBENSFRAGE DER MENSCHHEIT

VON DR. EUGEN SCHMIDT, STUTTGART

D ER Eintritt der Volker in die zweite Halfte des 20. J ahrhunderts christlicher Zeitrechnung hat in der westlichen Welt éusserlich einen besonderen Anlass zur Rfick- und Umschau geboten. Das Ergebnis dieser Betrachtungen léisst sich trotz der Verschiedenheit der Standorte und Blickrichtungen in der nuchternen Feststellung zusammenfassen, dass dem Menschen die Illusion des “unvermeidlichen” Fortschrittes durch die fiberstfirzenden Ereignisse des 20. J ahrhunderts entrissen wurde. An die Stelle der Fortschrittsgl'éubigkeit ist die ANGST gleichsam als Stigma zur beherrschenden Stimmung unserer Zeit geworden.

Ein weiteres Kennzeichen der heutigen geistigen Situation ist die weitgehende Entpersénlichung des sozialen und Wirtschaftlichen Lebens. Die Industrialisierung hatte eine Vermassung und Anonymitéit der gesellschaftlichen Struktur und dadurch eine Zerstérung personlicher Bindungen zur Folge. Mit dieser Erscheinung steht der Zerfall der ethischen Grundlagen der sozialen Ordnung im unmittelbaren Zusammenhang. Die Unternehmensform der Aktiengesellschaft (société anonyme) kann fiir diese Verhiiltnisse als charakteristisch bezeichnet werden, ebenso die im Mittelalter noch undenkbaren Begrifie des Strohmannes und Manager. Arthur Schlesinger Jr. schreibt in einem Aufsatz von der Aktiengesellschaft: “Sie machte das, was nunmehr unpersiinlich war, in Gestalt einer Einrichtung greifbar; aber eine Aktiengesellschaft hatte — wie die Redensart lautete —- weder einen Kb'rper, der misshandelt. noch eine Seele, die verdammt werden konnte.” Die Zerstérung jeglicher fiusserer Sicherheit und die Verweltlichung des menschlichen Daseins, der zivilisatorische Preis der Verzichtleistung auf die Pflege des Innenlebens und die

Uberbewertung materieller Werte treiben den heutigen Menschen in “die Flucht vor der Freiheit,” die Erich Fromm als einen charakteristischen Zug unseres Zeitalters bezeichnet. Angst, Resignation, Orientierungslosigkeit und Verzweiflung entziehen dem Menschen die Kraft der Entscheidung und der eigenen Verantwortung. Es wird versucht, auf dem Boden einer atheistischen, anthropozentrisch ausgerichteten sog. “Existentia1"-Philosophie klarzumachen, dass der Mensch “zur Freiheit verurteilt” und diese Freiheit eine Biirde sei. (Sartre) Mit diesem “existentialistischen Humanismus” soll der Mensch daran erinnert werden, “dass es ausser ihm keinen anderen Gesetzgeber gibt und dass er in seiner Verlassenheit fiber sich selber ents‘cheidet.” Wir Wissen, dass eine solche pessimistisch—antireligiése aus der Lebensangst geborene Denkrichtung dem unerlésten Menschen keine neue bindende Ordnung der wahren Werte des Lebens zuriickbringen kann. Sie muss in ihren geféhrlichen Konsequenzen besonders ffir unsere Jugend erkannt werden.

Wie steht es heute um die Verstéindigungsbereitschaft unter den Véilkern die réumlich im Zeichen der modernen Verkehrs— und Nachrichtenmittel einander so nahe geriickt sind? Lésst sich keine Brficke von den Wunschtr‘aiumen der kriegsmfiden Welt zu den technischen Gegebenheiten unseres Planeten schlagen? Die ofi'ensichtliche Diskrepanz zwischen der gegebenen r'aiumlichen und technischen Einheit einerseits und der geistigen Zerrissenheit der Menschheit andererseits ist zur Lebensfrage geworden. Es zeigt sich immer deutlicher, dass die Bildung einer planetaren politischen. wirtschaftlichen und sozialen Einheit ohne die Begrfindung einer fibernationalen Gemeinschaft des Geistes

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und guten Willens unméglich ist. Die Einheit der Menschheit erweist sich heute als das Problem erster Ordnung. Reinhold Niebuhr schrieb: “Die Technik hat zwar eine rudimentére Weltgemeinschaft geschafien, doch beruht diese auf dem gegenseitigen Abhángigkeitsverhaltnis der Vélker und nicht auf gegenseitiger Achtung und Vertrauen.” Zweifellos hat Albert Einstein recht, wenn er sagt: “Letztlich ist jede Art der friedlichen Zusammenarbeit zwischen den Menschen in der Hauptsache auf gegenseitigem Vertrauen aufgebaut und erst in zweiter Linie auf Gerichten und der Polizei. Das gilt ebenso ffir die Staaten wie fiir den einzelnen.”

W0 sollen nun die Menschen und V61ker die Grundlagen des verloren gegangenen Vertrauens angesichts der heutigen Weltsituation finden, in der nach Einstein als Folge einer radioaktiven Vergiftung der Atmosphfire “die Vernichtung alles Lebens auf der Erde in den Bereich der technischen M6glichkeiten geriickt” ist? Da Vertrauen und Glauben unlfislich miteinander verbunden sind und wir uns einer wachsenden Glaubenskrise gegenfiber sehen, scheint es ffir viele auf diese Frage keine befriedigende Antwort zu geben. Ein amerikanischer Universitfitslehrer (Walter T. Stace) meint im Hinblick auf die moderne Skepsis, die “den Glauben an eine sinnund zweckvolle Welt” zerstért habe, “. . . dass Ohne romantische und religib’se Verbriimung . . . der baldige Untergang unserer Kultur unvermeidlich” erscheine. Es liegt eine grosse Gefahr in dieser modernen Skepsis, die als Krise des abendléndischen Geschichtsbewusstseins in Erscheinung tritt und in der unumwunden von der “M6g11chkeit des Nichts, des Scheiterns jeder Sinnbemfihung” gesprochen wird. “Die Angst um die M&Sglichkeit sinnvollen Menschseins” ist an die Stelle der Versuche getreten, den Sinn der Geschichte zu retten. (Herbert von Borch)

Wir erkennen, dass sich die oben aufgeworfene Frage unter den skizzierten Verhéltnissen weder politisch noch wirtschaftlich oder soziologisch hinrelchend beantworten léisst. Aus der Diagnose der tiefsten Ursachen der heutigen Unsicherheit, des Misstrauens

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und des Zwefels, der Verantwortungsmiidigkeit und des Glaubensschwundet ergibt sich fur den tiefer Schauenden fast zwangsléiufig die Antwort: Nur eine neue sittliche Fundamentierung der einzelmenschlichen, gesellschaftlichen und zwischenstaatlichen Beziehungen und Bindungen kann eine durchgreifende Wendung der bedrohlichen Lage der Menschheit herbeifiihren.

Der einzelne wie all Vb'lker haben sich heute zu entscheiden ffir Versténdigung oder Chaos, Ordnung oder Untergang. Diese Lebensfrage hat sich zur Schicksalsfrage der Menschheit, zum Problem der Welteinheit verdichtet. “Gabe es ffir das Problem der Welteinheit eine Patentlésung, so k6nnten Wir unsere Gelehrten deffir bezahlen, sie zu finden. Wenn diese Aufgabe aber ~ wie es in Wirklichkeit der Fall ist——einen inneren Wandel des modernen Menschen erfordert, dann kb'nnen Wir sie nicht irgendwelchen Fachleuten fibertragen. Jeder einzelne von uns muss die Arbeit selber leisten . . . Die grossen geschichtlichen Entscheidungen sind immer sittlich fundiert.” (Arnold J . Toynbee)

Wie sollen aber die “emotionellen und sittlichen Kréfte des Individuurns und der Gemeinschaft auf das fiusserste” angespannt werden, wenn die LebensKraft der “alten Religionen” als Grundlage sittlichen Handelns mehr und mehr versandet, wenn sich die westliche und 6stliche Welt ideologisch nicht mehr versteht, wenn man glaubt, tats'aichlich keine Gewissheit zu besitzen, “dass irgendeine Lésung mfiglich ist”? Sollte es der Wissenschaft und Technik durch die Verweltlichung und Atomisierung des menschlichen Zusammenlebens gelungen sein, die Glaubenskréifte als tragenden Grund sittlicher Verantwortung und schb'pferisch-aufbauender Tat endgfiltig zu verschiitten? Viele Menschen neigen heute dazu, vor solchen Fragen zu resignieren oder gar zu verzweifeln. Wir teilen aber die Auffassung Toynbee’s “Was der moderrien Welt zutiefst not tut, ist eine Neugeburt des Glaubens an das Ubernatfirliche. Ohne ihn kann man dem Menschen — dem noch nicht wiedergeborenen Menschen — kaum das gefiihrliche Spielzeug anvertrauen, das seine Laboratorien ausgebrfitet haben.”

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Die Probleme des Aufbaus einer friedlichen und gerechten Weltordnung fibersteigen ausser jedem Zweifel menschliches Kiinnen und Vermégen; sie erheischen wahrlich eine géttlich mspirierte Lésung, die nur aus dem Bereich der Religion kommen kann. Alle grossen Kulturen hatten ihren Auf. stleg einem religib'sen Impuls zu verdanken und zerfielen mit dem Niedergang ihrer géttlichen Bindungen (Griechenland, Rom)

‘Abdu’l-Bahá hat uns folgende Charakterisierung der Religion gegeben: “Religion ist der éussere Ausdruck der gattlichen Wirklichkeit. Sie sol] daher lebendig, kraftvoll, beweglich und fortschrittlich sein. Mangelt sie der Bewegung und des Fortschrit‘ces, so fehlt ihr das gfittlich Leben — sie ist tot. Da die gbttlichen Gesetze stets Wirksam und in der Entwicklung begriffen sind, muss ihre Offenbarung immer eine fortschreitende sein. Alle Dinge sind der Neugestaltung unterworfen. Wir befinden uns m einem Jahrhundert des Lebens und der Erneuerung. Das Wesen aller Religionen ist die Liebe Gottes und sie ist die Grundlage aller heiligen Lehren.” Die innere Bereitschaft und der Gehorsam gegenfiber dem Willen Gottes kennzeichnen den religiésen Menschen. Bahá’u’lláh verki'mdete: “Das Wesen der Religion ist, das anzuerkennen, was der Herr ofienbarte und zu befolgen, was Er in Seinem michtigen Buch verordnet hat.”

In allen Heiligen Schriften der Offenbarungsreligionen erblicken wir die Niederlegung des Wortes Gottes. Die absolute Einheit der Gottesoffenbarungen, im Hauptthema und Ausmass der jeweiligen Fassungskraft der Menschen angepasst, begrfindet die umfassende Geltung jeder Religion und schliesst den von Menschen gesetzten Absolutheits- und Einmaligkeitsanspruch aus. Uber die ewige und zeitliche Bestimmung der geschichtlichen Religionen schrieb Shoghi Effendi u.a.: “. . . dass religifise Wahrheit nicht absolut, sondern relativ ist, dass Gottesoffenbarung ein fortdauerndes und fortschreitendes Geschehnis ist, dass alle grossen Religionen der Welt gfittlich in ihrem Ursprung sind, dass ihre Grunds'étze

THE Bahá’í

WORLD

WW

hz—WA! MW f} r

Bahá’í Exhibit at World Federalist Congress held in Luxembourg, September, 1948.

zueinander in vélligem Einklang stehen, dass ihre Lehren nur die Widerspiegelungen der einen Wahrheit sind, dass 1hr Wirken sich erglénzt, dass sie sich nur in unwesentlichen Teilen ihrer Lehren unterscheiden und dass ihre Sendungen aufeinanderfolgende geistige Entwicklungsstufen der Menschheit darstellen.” Bahá’u’lláh antwortete auf eine Frage fiber das Wesen der Religion folgendes: “Wisse du, dass jene, die wahrlich weisse sind, die Welt mit dem menschlichen Tempel verglichen haben. Wie der Kiirper des Menschen eines Gewandes bedarf, um sich zu bekleiden, so muss der K6rper der Menschheit mit dem Mantel der Gerechtigkeit und Weisheit geschmiickt werden. Ihr Gewand ist die von Gott ihr gewéihrte Offenbarung. Wenn immer dieses Gewand seinen Zweck erfiillt hat, Wird der

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Allmachtige es gewisslich erneuern. Denn jedes Zeitalter erfordert ein neues Maass des Lichtes Gottes. Jede Gdttliche Offenbarung ist in einer Weise nerabgesandt worden, die den Umsténden des Zeitalters angepasst war, in dem sie erschien.”

Die Geschichte der Offenbarungsreligionen bestimmt die Geschicke der Menschen und V61ker. Es ist erwiesen, dass keine soziale oder politische Ordnung l‘éngeren Bestand hat, wenn sie ihrer sittlichen Grundlagen beraubt ist. Die Lebensfrage der Menschheit ist eine sittliche und somit eine religidse Frage im ausgeffihrten Sinne. Bahá’u’lláh hat erkléirt, dass die Religion der Eckstein der kommenden Weltordnung sein wird.

Die zurfickliegenden Ereignisse und die heutige Verwirrung lassen zwingend erkennen, dass die Sicherung des Weltfriedens und eines sozialen Ausgleichs ohne die Errichtung einer gerechten Weltordnung ein Wunschtraum bleiben mfisste. Diese Menschheitsordnung muss aber géttlichen Ursprungs sein. In religionsgeschichtlicher Einmaligkeit hat Bahá’u’lláh schon vor mehr als achtzig Jahren trotz Verfolgung, Verbannung, Einkerkerung und Lebensbedrohung “den Zirkel der Einigkeit geffihrt, Er hat einen Plan niedergelegt fiir die Vereiningung aller Vb‘lker, um sie alle unter dem schiitzenden Zelt der Einigkeit zu sammeln.” (‘Abdu’l-Bahá) Fur die Vélker der Welt liegt eine géttlich geofienbarte Welt-Charta in authentisch—dokumentarischer Form bereit. Die Zukunft der Menschheit wird durch deren allgemeine Annahme und Verwirklichung bestimmt werden.

Die von Bahá’u’lláh niedergelegte Weltordnung und deren autoritative Erl‘ciuterung durch ‘Abdu’l-Bahá verbiirgen in ihrem Aufbau soziale Gerechtigkeit, treuhiinderische, beratende und iibernationale Zusammenarbeit im Bewusstsein wahrer und weltoffener Bruderschaft. Ausgehend von der von Bahá’u’lláh verkiindeten Idee der geistigen Einheit der Menschheit zielt Seine Ordnung der Vélkergemeinschaft auf die schliessliche Bildung eines Weltgemeinwesens ab, denn die nationalstaatliche Entwicklung hat ihren Abschluss gefunden. Zu den wesentlichen

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Bestandteilen der neuen Menschheitsordnung werden folgende Voraussetzungen z'aihlen: Uberwindung aller imperialistischen Macht- und Herrschaftsansprfiche, Einfiihrung der obligatorischen internationalen Schiedsgerichtsbarkeit und Bildung eines Internationalen Schiedsgerichtshofes nebst einer Weltpolizei als Sicherheits- und Vollzugs-Weltorgan, allgemeine Abriistung, Kriegfiihrung nur bei unbestrittener Verteidigungszwangslage im Sinne einer kollektiven Verteidigungs- und Schutzpflicht im Agressionsfalle, Abschaffung der allgemeinen Wehrpflicht ohne unbedingte Kriegsdienstverweigerung, Léisung der sozialen Fragen auf der Grundlage der Wfirdigung jeglicher menschendienenden Arbeit und einer Begrenzung von Armut und Reichtum nach Grundsatzen der Leistung und gerechter Teilhaberschaft am Arbeitsertrag. Einheit von Religion und Wissenschaft als Basis der Vélkerversténdigung, Einfiihrung einer Welthilfssprache und Einheitsschrift, einer Weltverfassung unter Einbeziehung der unverletzlichen Menschenrechte und-Pflichten. Das Menschheitsziel, das von Bahá’u’lláh, dem Sprecher Gottes un serer Zeit, umrissen wurde, fasst Shoghi Effendi in folgenden Worten zusammen:

“Ein Weltbundsystem, das die ganze Erde beherrscht und eine unanfechtbare Befugnis fiber ihre unvorstellbar umfassenden Hilfsquellen ausfibt, die Ideale sowohl des Ostens als auch des Westens verschmilzt und verkbrpert, von dem Fluch des Krieges und seines Elends befreit ist und sich auf die Ausnfitzung aller verffigbaren Kraftquellen auf der Oberfl‘ache des Planeten richtet, ein System, in dem die Starke zur Dienerin der Gerechtigkeit gemacht ist, dessen Dasein durch seine allumfassende Anerkennung des einen Gottes und durch seinen Gehorsam gegen eine gemeinsame Offenbarung getragen wird — dies ist das Ziel, dem die Menschheit durch die vereinenden Lebenskrafte zustrebt.”

Der Ruf von Bahá'u’lláh, der ein neues Bfindnis zwischen Gott und der Menschheit schuf, ist zugleich Warnung und verheissende, trastliche Antwort auf

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die Lebensfrage der Menschheit. Seine Sendung macht den Menschen klar, dass die Weltfriedensfrage keine Frage der Organisation oder der Laboratorien, sondern eine sittlich-religiijse Grundfrage ist. Sie lautet: Wie findet die Menschheit den Weg zu einem alle Vélker, Rassen und St'énde vereinigenden Glauben, der sich schépferisch mit der Wissenschaft zum Wohl der ganzen Menschheit verm'éhlt, der das Gebot der N'échstenliebe und der Gerechtigkeit zwischen allen Menschen und Viilkern der Welt wirksam werden lésst? Bahá’u’lláh hat in Seiner géttlichen Botschaft den Weg zur Ausséihnung und Einigung des Menschengeschlechts gewiesen und wendet sich an dieses mit

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folgenden Worten: “Wisst ihr, warum Wir euch aus einer Erde erschaffen haben? Damit keiner sich fiber den anderen erhete. Denket immer daran, wie ihr erschafien wurdet. Lasset alle Vélker in einem Glauben sich vereinigen und alle Menschen Briider werden, auf dass das Band der Zuneigung und der Einigheit zwischen den Menschenkindern gest'érkt werde. Diese Kampfe, dieses Blutvergiessen und diese Uneinigkeit miissen aufhéren, und alle Menschen miissen sein, als gehb'rten sie einer Rasse und einer Familie an . . . Der wahrlich ist ein Mensch, der sich heute dem Dienste am ganzen Menschengeschlecht weiht.”

16.

Bahá’u’lláh’S MESSAGE AND THE GERMANS

BY KARL SCHUECK1

“Two souls dwell, alas, in my breast; One tries to tear itself away from the

other . . . .” Gomm, Faust, PART ONE

WTH the same divinely inspired sagacity and faithfulness with which they transcribed the Prophet’s austere and Godly message into more worldly notions and realistic interpretations, both ‘Abdul-Bahá and Shoghi Effendi

lKarl Schueck was born and reared in Germany, where he studied at the universities of Munich, Leipzig, and Heidelberg. For several years he was engaged in directorial work with theaters and operas. He also wrote poetry, novels, and plays for the stage and radio, receiving many awards. In 1933 he left Germany, and six years later came to the United States where he is now living. He became a Bahá’í in 1947. Since then he has worked in collaboration with the Bahá’ís in Germany, translating several Bahá’í books, writing radio scripts, and preparing plans for a German Bahá’í Publishing House. His new novel gig! Time is scheduled for publication in the near

re.

put equal trust in the great missions of the American and the German peoples. America had become, With all its peoples and races and creeds from all over the world, the testing ground upon which, by the strength of the Bahá’í Faith of this age, the idea of the oneness of mankind was to become a reality. The German people, on their part, felt, with their deep and ancient disposition to advocate the cause of mankind as their own, the driving force of the spiritual conquest of the world.

Deep and ancient, indeed, is this innate dream and yearning in the German soul for a moral and spiritual reality greater than the realities they have been forced to experience throughout the tragic course of their history.

Such an assertion may appear paradoxical in face of the havoc and calamities of war wrought upon the world

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by these very Germans. But was it merely an unquenchable thirst for destruction that spurred them on to wage war after war, merely an insanely devilish ambition to Germanize and rule the world? How could it be that the same nation which had produced the world’s great geniuses of peace and art and music, inventive masters of patient efficiency in all sorts of crafts, could combine its high ethical considerations and ideals with merciless destructiveness?

There must be elements and dispositions in these Germans to respond to the Prophet’s mission, ‘Abdul—Baha’s interpretation, and the Guardian’s wise appeal to these people. And this appeal—to what did it call, regardless of the world’s horror and distrust of the German possibilities? To the deep source of Faith which princelings and leaders have, time and again, abused for their own greedy purposes? To a special disposition waiting to be roused and directed towards the very fulfillment of an ancient German dream?

We know the havoc frustrated dreams can wreak upon man’s inner being. His peaceful disposition will suddenly change into cruel lust for destruction, his ideal of beauty be distorted to the grimace of painful disharmony. Thus, the German history is a chronology of increased frustrations, of snapping tensions, new yearnings and more suppressions.

In the sparse news coming now from Germany, the reports of intellectual and artistic activities in that gutted country, remind us of similar phenomena at the end of the first world war. There was no art exhibition, no theater, no book, no lecture, or other intellectual manifestation that did not emphatically and most seriously exalt the greatness of the ideal of a unified mankind. People cheered upon hearing such words as “Unification of the World” and “Spiritual Justice.”

Mankind! This, truly, was the ancient, German dream. Mankind, this supreme unity which would eventually deliver the German nation, too, from its so creative and alas! so destructive disunity.

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Looking back into history one can see this deep nostalgia, this yet nameless yearning, take root within the inhabitants Of strongwalled burghs where they, vassals to 10rd1y knights, emerged from their narrow work-shops and, glancing from the towers into the far lands, dreamed themselves away from this narrowness towards the hazy, blue mountain ridges and star-studded horizons. With eagerness they listened to the errant troubadours telling of cities and lands near and far, which, in their frustrated imagination, took on the fabulous and mystic character of divine beauty and holiness.

Unable to read and to write, they depended on the veracity of story-tellers and of monks. And when the latter spoke to them of a Holy Grail or roused their indignation over the pagans’ profanation of the distant Holy Sepulchre, they did not hesitate to follow their knight on his God-ordained mission of deliverance. Whatever made a breach in the walls of their dark enclosures and opened to them the gate of the burgh to emerge and to roam towards the blue horizon, was gratefully welcomed and willingly obeyed. Somewhere, they heard, there grew a mysterious Blue Flower. What this meant nobody much cared, nor did it matter if one ever found it; for to possess is to know and to remain without the fascination of dream, and possession stifles further aspiration. Dreaming was better.

But these exploits for which the burghers had been called upon to serve and die, were not always of unselfish or of saintly character and purpose. The knights and princelings were shrewd enough to abuse for their own frivolous purposes, the people’s untiring nostalgia. They simply cloaked the warlike enterprise with the garment of a lofty mission, called the dwellers of other burghs and lands heathens and sons of devils, thus confusing the aim of conquest, mystifying the uneducated minds of peasants and burghers, and calling this new adventure another Holy Cause. Once their ardor had been aroused, it was easy enough to appeal to and sanctify—with the zealous help

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First Bahá’í Spiritual Assembly, Copenhagen, Denmark, elected April 21, 1949.

of vassal-monks—the quickly roused, baser instincts of the people, who, aiming for beatitude and with an efficiency worthy of the mystic goal, fought for their knights as the appointed representative of God.

They returned, then, to the old, dark steads where the unquelled yearning seeped into the work of carving and molding. But a schism had cleft their beings. Here was the loving attachment to the little hut and small piece of land and there the constantly growing nostalgia for those worlds of which they had barely gained a foretaste. It was impossible to combine these trends, and painful tension was the result. This tension demanded release and called upon the instincts to justify the heedless rush into war and strife.

This dualism grew, notwithstanding enlightenment and the expansion of burghs and lands. The constant yearning for the Blue Flower in the remoteness of space had created a deep love for mysticism which made these Germans eager and devout followers of

such mystics as St. Francis, Tauler, Eckehard, while their own strong and loving attachment to their proper soil and stead had sharpened their sense of observation and such efficiency as proved indispensable to make the most of the least. Consequently the critical and rationalistic mind increased its power. These two dispositions were uncombinable and created nothing but unbearable tension requiring release.

This dualism broke through everywhere. At one moment Christians, they became, at the next moment, critical of Christ as not being German and of Christianity itself, innoculated as an alien thing upon their own pagan nature. They worshipped the idol and the image of the Crucified One and, while one self bemoaned all suffering and was humble, the other ego dreamt of Siegfriedian heroes commissioned to slay the dragon of mischief and grief with the power of a fabulous and mystic sword. And just as the German’s Christianity was, thus, of dualistic nature, his deep—rooted paganism suffered

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First Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Rome, Italy, elected April 21, 1948.

from a similar schism. To him, the complex of nature was inhabited by the ancient gods. He felt in concord with the elementary spirits of trees and fire, of water and Winds. But, soon enough, his other, rationalistic self would step into the foreground and go about dissecting what he had just adored. With unemotional aloofness and defiant reason he probed into the mysteries of Nature to discover its laws and exploit them for his prospective inventions. By the same token at one moment he deeply believed in a worldembracing faith, in a mystic and saintly entity of all mankind, and at the next fell back into the medieval narrowness of his burgh. Here he dreamt of a supernatural blend of all nations into one, and there his old vassal—obedience—repudiated such a thought as sacrilegious. Here he was convinced this mankind-ideal would come true by means of organic growth and inner necessity and there he fancied that he, descendant of Siegfried, had been commissioned to this

task regardless of the means.

Paradoxical though it may appear, the Germans possess a similar quality, a similar nostalgia to that with which they characterize their “very opponents”: the Jewish people. Both yearn for the Messiah of deliverance, and for unity and station in the world. The Germans hated the J ews for what they themselves had ever hoped to accomplish: world-citizenship, overcoming of the old narrowness, and release of their inner—most powers of faith.

This old battle between the ego and the world was keeping the German soul in agonizing confusion and tormenting dualism, while the search for the Blue Flower continued despite the growing mechanization and materialism all around. This constant ten'sion kept their forces awake and vigilant while other nations merely existed on in old, though harmonious, patterns.

Then came the great experience when the French revolutionaries of 1789 proclaimed for the first time Humanité, Mankind, as the dawn of a new age.

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With the power of a storm this word shook the Germans out of a temporary stagnation. Their response was jubilant. What had remained vague and nameless in their souls, suddenly arose, unfurling its banner and pronouncing its destiny. Humanity! Beethoven’s titanic voice proclaimed this jubilation in his Ninth Symphony and its final chorus, “Be embraced, you millions, take the kiss of the whole world.” The Olympian Goethe pronounced the new station of man as that of world-citizenship, and even the austere and sober genius of reason, Immanuel Kant, added his confirmation of mankind’s new morale to the general acclamation of the ancient and reborn ideal.

Here, truly, was the foundation of the German’s self. Here was his destiny. The Blue Flower had its name. Here was substantial food for reason, sufficient inspiration for dreams, legitimate right to turn to the world, ethical justification for a new heroism, the chance of tearing down the barriers between people What was more exalting and invigorating! What greater Faith could ever be found!

The great idea] stood beyond the gate; to reach it one had only to crash the barrier. But with what means? He was told to accept “Germany, Germany above all” as his national hymn; philosophers such as Hegel, whose authority he dared not doubt, taught him to deify the State and its representatives or, like Nietzsche, called on his grotesquely overdrawn heroic feeling; and the materialism of the new age started to absorb his forces. Unable by nature to keep balance between mind and yearning, rationalism and idealism, and other conflicting antagonisms within his nature, he found a new tension growing in and pulling at himself. And as the knights in old times called on his obedience and his deference for a Holy Cause to inspire him for warfare, so did now the Kaiser. And as the Kaiser failed, sadness and despair befell the German who, convinced of the Divine Necessity of his world-converting mission, could not forgive the other nations, not blessed by such high vocation, for obstructing his heroic march.

THE Bahá’í WORLD

And then Hitler came, the voice of the confused, inner yearnings, who shrewdly played on the ancient mysticism and the new religion of mankind blending both into one and bidding for the throne. The fantastic computation would have promised success—if the fundamental essence had not been forgotten: the new ethics as the premise for the new world. The new ethics, the name of which was consideration, kindness, and responsibility of all for all. The new reality, the name of which was mankind rather than any particular or favorite nation! Here was the deciding error: mistaking the drive for the aim. The old medieval pettiness that grew in the walled burghs could not be used for a “mission” of unmaterialistic nature. The fact that in this colossal gamble the spiritual station of man himself was harnessed and subjected to a military maneuver, the fact that this satanic venture was carried by the misconception of man as well as by the same old fatal forces of power, and that this drive exalted and continued the old worship of the morale of power rather than changed to the worship of the power of morale predestined the exploit to a catastrophic collapse.

Now the country is in ruins. For the second time the German has had to wake up to the fact that he has abused the tremendous possibilities Within himself, and that every attempt at arbitrarily wanting to change a Godly ordained course of history must by necessity end in tragedy. He has known so long that spiritual history, in contrast to the chronological one, has been developing since the early dawn of man toward just one goal: the awakening of man’s consciousness of his true station and mission and the ripening of the seed of man’s ultimate destiny—Mankind as a reality ordained by God.

This, the German has known and felt. Of this, he has dreamt. He has yearned towards that goal. Only this he has failed to grasp: the fulfillment of this final reality is less man’s own decision or the German nation’s selfmade privilege than it was, is, and will be God’s will and postulation. The

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power of faith to accomplish this high goal is there; what he now has to learn and to accept is to put the name of God where he had but seen the word “Germany.”

And now? There are innumerable indications pointing to the German soul writhing in agony without, however7 letting loose of its mankind-vision. The old dreams of Siegfried and Barbarossa are shattered, but the power of faith has not spent itself. Yes, faith, religious faith it was with which the Germans accepted the self-deification of Hitler. They saw in him their own potentialities, their own confusion, and worshipping him, worshipped themselves.

He who has studied German history and become acquainted with the unusual German disposition for faith, has no difficulty in grasping the meaning of Bahá’u’lláh’s Message to the German people. Here, for the first time, they are being offered a Faith the spiritual aim of which has been their own. The romantic ideal of their own has found confirmation from a Divine Source, on a realistic foundation such as their own geniuses had sometimes dreamt about. This being a world religion, the German no longer has to fear the incompatibility Of the remnants of his pagan inclinations With an “inoculated Christianity.” There can be no danger of a wanton and mystic misinterpretation nor of leaders using this Message as a pretext for a specific German mission. The holy blue print of Bahá’u’lláh’s new World Order excludes the risk of having to ramble again through the haze and vagueness of Blue-Flower-Dreams. Acceptance of this magnificent and world-embracing oneness and unity will, by necessity,

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lead to the long-yearned-for consolidation of a German spiritual unity. The German’s power of faith will forge the tools necessary to keep driving himself and leading other nations towards the high goal. There is room for every believer in heroic living, for all those finding happiness in and through obedience. This is the language of God the German ear and soul can understand. He will not stay behind in this universal drive towards the envisioned Holy Grail. On the contrary, he feels he owes it to his very nature and predisposition to show the way and to enlighten others. His ambition will find nourishment and satisfaction. The mystic and the real have merged into one reality thus appealing to his ancient dualism Which, in turn, will find deliverance and release in and through this German mankind-service. Even the antagonism between his love for materialism and for high spiritual qualities will come to an end, and triumphant as Beethoven’s Chorus, “Be embraced, you millions,” will be the German’s dedication to the Faith of Baha as the reality of his own dream of mankind which, having now fully become a property of his consciousness, Will henceforth refuse to swear allegiance to the semi-gods and fallible idols of power.

Thus the World Faith of Bahá’u’lláh will, by necessity, find its most eager and devoted European believers and forefighters in all those who had been forced by fate to understand that their reality is not a world Germanized by force of arms, but a Germany peacefully and faithfully permeated by God’s love of this world as manifested by His beloved Bahá’u’lláh.

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THE BAHA’I'

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17.

THE COUNTRY OF LIGHT

BY ROBERT LEE GULICK, JR.1

TmRAN

T HE departure from Bag_hdéd had been hectic because the plane for Persia arrived at an unscheduled time. I had hurried to the airport with the goal of persuading the American pilot to postpone taking off until an ‘Iráqi friend could round up my baggage. The confusion was followed by happy serenity with the discovery that the steward on the plane was a Bahá’í. Once aloft I repeatedly asked, “Have we reached Iran yet?” It was as though I were approaching my native land after a long absence. Soon came the time to fasten our seat belts for the landing in Persia’s glorious capital. Below us was Tihran, “the holy and shining city—the city wherein the fragrance of the Well—Beloved hath been shed.”

My arrival was unannounced, but I met another Bahá’í at the airport and he escorted me to the magnificent Ḥaẓíratu’l-Quds, a building of which the Persians have every right to be proud. The design for the dome was drawn by a young artist whom I had already seen in Paris. The National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Persia was in session when I reached the Bahá’í Headquarters and the members graciously put aside other business to welcome me. The Assembly then invited me to be its guest at one of Tihran’s better hotels, but I accepted instead an invitation to the home of the esteemed believer, Nfiri’Din FathA‘azam, whose son, Shidan, is studying agriculture in the United States. The same qualities which have endeared Shidan to the Americans are abun—dantly manifested by the other members of his family.

As we were leaving, an interesting episode occurred; a young Bahá’í whom I had never seen before came up and greeted me with great cordiality; I was surprised at this warmth from a total stranger, but afterward learned that six months previously, the youth had dreamed of an American standing on this very spot, and accompanied by the Bahá’ís who were now with me; he had even visualized the red automobile in which we were about to ride. At the time of his dream the car had not been purchased, and my trip had not been planned.

One of the world’s best known statesmen had reminded me that the people of Persia have been blessed by the teachings of more than one Messenger, and I often reflected on his words and on the special bounty which God has bestowed on beloved Persia. It was here that the Zoroastrian Faith was born, and that Islamrwas later established. Although represented in the Majlis or Parliament, the Zoroastrians are today not a large group. The teachings of Zoroaster continue to exert an ennobling influence on the lives of those followers who have not abandoned Him for the ways of materialism. Future scholars will develop His undoubted influence on the West; it is significant

1In the summer of 1947, Robert Lee Gulick, Jr. visited France, Switzerland, Egypt, “Iráq, Persia and Spain, returning to the United States by way of the British Isles. Mr. Gulick is Secretary-Treasurer of the Committee on International Economic Policy, New York City, and lecturer at the Institute of Economics, University of California, Berkeley. He attended the Congress of. the International Chamber of Commerce, Montreux, Switzerland, as Adviser to Winthrop W. Aldrich, President of the I.C.C., and as Delegate of the Camegie Endowment for International Peace. He remained in Geneva during the drafting of a Charter for an International Trade Organization as the observer for the Committee on International Economic Policy. April-July 1947.

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that one of the early teachers of Socrates was a Zoroastrian. At the present time, the Parsees are more numerous in India than in Persia, just as the Buddhists are more in evidence in Japan than in the land of the Buddha. Striking, too, is the fact that Christianity has never succeeded in winning the allegiance of the neighbors of Jesus.

A guide at the Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico explains to visitors that ninety per cent of the action of the water in creating new formations is completed. There are cities which give the impression that their greatness has passed, that little remains to happen to them, that the action is completed. Ṭihrán is the reverse of these; here everywhere are signs of wonders to come. Regardless of appearances, the people are in my view like unworked diamond mines. They are abundantly intelligent, and they have a special facility for winning friends and influencing people. They are more understandable to Americans than the nationals of many other countries of Europe and Asia. We are closer to them than geography would indicate; we are psychological neighbors.

The hospitality of the Persian Bahá’ís is justly famous. When visiting Shíráz, I reposed between silk sheets in a large room hung with lovely tapestries. Just before I left, the host apologized—and with a straight face—for the trouble and discomfort to which he maintained I had been subjected. In another city, the chairman of the Assembly noticed that I was looking through my luggage for a change of linen; he promptly contributed the articles from his own wardrobe. After that, I took pains to conceal my wants.

The spirit of sacrifice shown by the Bahá’ís in Persia verges on the miraculous. An illiterate man of considerable wealth recently gave all his property to the Cause. Later, he humbly requested a distinguished Bahá’í teacher sometime to read him the Most Holy Book of Bahá’u’lláh.

At the time of my visit, the Persian Bahá’ís were sending a thousand packages a month for the relief of the needy

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in Europe. They had already dispatched around fourteen tons of foodstuffs. In one of the Villages, a nine—year-old Persian boy stayed awake one night trying to think of something he could contribute to relieve distress in another country. He had no money or food to give. When morning came, the idea occurred to him to donate the cloth that had been purchased for his new suit. The Bahá’í boy continued to wear his old clothes and the cloth went to a twelve—year-old German boy who replied with a letter of heartfelt gratitude.

The devotion of the Persians toward the Faith is wonderful to witness. When I was in Persia, there were meetings to discuss the Forty-five Month plan under which believers are to be dispatched to hostile villages and unhealthful regions and to countries whose inhabitants hate, not only Bahá’ís, but all Persians. The first letter I received from Persia after leaving carried the good news that the fifty families required by the Plan had already volunteered. We can learn tavajjuh from the Persians: this term may be defined as a steadfast, unwavering love in our hearts for God, an adoration whose existence is proven by daily service to the human race. During my visit in Tihran, a curfew ordinance prevented the residents from being on the streets after midnight. This was not an altogether bad idea as it made it necessary for people to advance their evening meal to a time not much later than eleven o’clock, and prevented guests from tarrying too long. I was interested to see how the friends overcame the curfew problem in order to commemorate the Ascension of Bahá’u’lláh at the appointed time of three in the morning: they assembled at eleven and prayed all night! I shall never forget the exquisite chanting of that night.

One meets excellent people in the Cause of God. Among them are Miss Adelaide Sharp and her mother, Americans who have spent the last eighteen years in Tihran. Among the persons to whom Miss Sharp has taught English is ‘Ali, a shepherd boy from northeastern Persia. ‘Ali has been using his

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knowledge of English to familiarize himself with God Passes By and other writings of the Guardian. Later, he will teach his neighbors. I also recall the blind man at Abadih whose rendition of a difficult prayer in Arabic was extraordinarily beautiful.

I saw the Gulistan palace with the Peacock Throne, and the national museum containing treasures from Persepolis. In the older sections of the city, there are everywhere places made sacred by the presence of Bahá’u’lláh, streets sanctified by the blood of the martyrs. The Siyéh-(Lhél, the Black Pit of Tihran where Bahá’u’lláh was chained, is no more; they are erecting a modern bank building on the site. I went to the room in which the body of the Báb was once hidden. A magnificent boulevard now leads toward the Alburz Mountains and the hill villages of Shimran where the Blessed Beauty used to go in the summer time. Somewhat eastward is the Niyavaran Palace to which the illustrious Badi‘ carried an epistle from Bahá’u’lláh to the shah, and was killed for it. I hiked over a part of the extensive land that has been acquired as the site for Persia’s first Mashriqu’l-Adhkár.

Karaj, situated about 25 miles from Tihran, has an agricultural college that is conducting research of great importance to the Persian people. It is my hope that under the Fulbright program and other measures, America will find it possible to extend important technical assistance for the economic development of Persia. As a member of the Persian Majlis said to me, the Bahá’ís are the best friends of Persia in America. It is my hope that this friendship may be demonstrated in concrete terms. We Bahá’ís are assured of the glorious future of Persia, the “mother of the world and fountain of light unto all its peoples.”

Persia seemed to me a country of light, both spiritual and physical light. At present the Faith there is obscured by encircling prejudice and disbelief; but I remember that Mt. Dimévand, a snow—capped peak of about 18,600 feet, was during my first weeks in Tihran hidden by mists—and then one morn THE BAHA’I

WORLD

ing, suddenly and without fanfare, it shone out in all its splendor. Perhaps the day is not so distant when the Faith of God will shed its radiance over the entire planet and the slumbering peoples will waken and enter the army of life in troops. “Let nothing grieve thee, 0 land of Ta (Tihran), for God hath chosen thee to be the source of the joy of all mankind.”

ISFAHAN

The road was good, even though unpaved, and the companionship excellent but Iṣfahán still seemed to be a long journey from Tihran. The high altitude kept the temperature moderate, even for late May, and an occasional stop prevented the trip from becoming too wearying. Once we stopped to drink from a roadside stream. The only ill effect I suffered from the consumption of this unboiled water, against Which all my Western friends had warned me, was that I lost a silver tie-clasp.

The landscape could easily be duplicated in California, Utah, Arizona, or New Mexico—vast empty spaces requiring only water and moderately intelligent human effort for their transformation into highly productive wheat fields, gardens, and pastures. This is no desert, but fertile, dry land. The Persians need machinery and “know~how” and America is well equipped to furnish both, but something rarer is also needed; I refer to that state of mind which exalts honest and efficient effort to the rank of worship. Engineers and economists fully understand the importance of this intangible factor but they cannot mention it in their reports. It is something with which they cannot cope. Fortunately, the Bahá’í Faith has amply demonstrated its power to change human nature. Muslims often choose Bahá’ís for positions of trust and responsibility, finding them more reliable and dependable than the others.

In the highest part of the province of Fars, is a village named Dih Bid. It is a wholesome place with a refreshing atmosphere, excellent water, and simple, nourishing food? Although the Bahá’í community is small, it boasts a

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First Spiritual Assembly, Barcelona, Spain, elected April 21, 1949, with pioneer from Madrid.

new, attractive Bahá’í Headquarters or Ḥaẓíratu’l-Quds. A member of the gendarmerie had been notified by the Governor General of our impending arrival and he courteously extended his salutations and offers of assistance. His religious views were very liberal, at least for the occasion; he affirmed that all of the great religions of the world have the same fundamental teachings and objectives. The friends were hurriedly assembled and we had another meeting which constituted visible evidence of the universal, unifying power of the Faith; in one fold, under one Shepherd, there were friends from Asia and America, city-dweflers and farmers, learned and unlettered.

We came next to a small city, Abadih, famous in Bahá’í annals. Here the gendarmerie was in greater evidence than elsewhere, partly because the Ḥaẓíratu’l-Quds is next door to the p01ice station, and perhaps also for the reason that the name of one of our companions was scrambled in the advance notice of our arrival, so that it

became “Greatest Pope” instead of “Greatest Victory” (Fath-A‘azam). Anyhow, the officers stood at attention as we passed. Our American advisor, Mr. Schwartzkopf, seems to be doing an excellent job in improving the gendarmerie.

Evidence of the great, recent persecution of the Bahá’ís still remained within the walls of the Ḥaẓíratu’l-Quds. Three years before our Visit, a band of fanatics, unrestrained and even abetted by the police, broke into the Bahá’í premises, destroyed the garden, desecrated a tomb, and tried to set the building on fire. I saw photographs of the wounded believers, and I saw a charred door. When the courteous and quiet head of the gendarmerie visited us, I explained that those fanatics who had attacked the Bahá’ís were not true Muslims but were in fact spiritually in the “Days of Ignorance” (the time of idolatry, preceding the advent of Muhammad), and as evidence I quoted in the Arabic that injunction of the Qur’án which has been translated: “Let

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there be no compulsion in religion.”

After attending two meetings and a dinner, we spent the night at the Bahá’í property. Three of us slept on the porch and the stars seemed unusually large and brilliant. In a corner of the courtyard, two members of the gendarmerie stood guard. A few steps away, beneath a nine-pointed star, rested the heads of two hundred martyrs of Nayriz. As I fell asleep I thought how a malicious mullé, still active in the bazars, is striving to add to their company. Perhaps he will fail, because in signing the Charter of the United Nations, Persia has subscribed to the principle of no discrimination against religion and she cannot afford to incur the wrath of other countries by permitting a repetition of those barbarous acts which must forever constitute a condemnation of the reign of Nésiri’dDin Shéh.

At daybreak, we left for Iṣfahán. The expression, “Half the world is Iṣfahán,” is a translation of the Persian pun: Iṣfahán nisf—i-jihén. This one—time capital and throne—city of Persia is a place of lovely gardens. Flowers are so common that it was not possible to find a shop where I might purchase some for the grave of our ardent and powerful American Bahá’í teacher, Keith Ransom-Kehler. Instead, I was given some by my host and we went to the cemetery where the King of Martyrs, the Beloved of Martyrs, and Keith Ransom-Kehler are buried.

It was about a century earlier, toward the close of the summer of 1846, that the Báb made His triumphant sojourn in Iṣfahán. The first to embrace His Cause in that city was a sitter of wheat who was a “waiting servant,” a prepared soul who accepted the Message at the instant of hearing it. A few years later, sieve in hand, he rushed through the bazars of the city on his way to join the defenders of Shaykh rI‘abarsi. When questioned as to the cause of his excitement, he cried: “With this sieve Which I carry with me, I intend to sift the people in every city through which I pass.”

The time of the Báb’s visit in Iṣfahán was a period of keen expectancy. Great

THE Bahá’í WORLD

numbers of perceptive souls sensed that the day was at hand for the advent of the Promised One, even as the Millerites in America had recently been disposing of their possessions in anticipation of the Second Coming of Christ.

The mosques of Iṣfahán are magnets for the reverent, the curious, and the lovers of beauty. Tourists are fascinated by the Minér-i-Jumban, two small minarets that shake together like dancing Siamese twins when one is moved. In the center of the Masjid-i—SLl'iah, Persians often say, “mullés are donkeys,” and hear the words echoed four times. The tiles form intricate patterns that encourage abstract meditation and conversation With God. In my opinion, the Masjid-i-Shéh surpasses in beauty the mosques of Cairo and even the Alhambra. Incidentally, a scholar in Spain told me that the name “Espafia” is derived from Iṣfahán; even if this should some day be disproved as folk etymology, it is of interest to note that the Spanish people themselves claim. this connection with the fascinating city in the heart of Persia. Also of incredible beauty is the Masjid-i-Jum‘ih, which has a room dedicated to the Lord of the Age (the Séhibu’z—Zaman, Whose coming was fulfilled in the advent of the Báb) and which has been hallowed by the presence of the Báb, Who came there to pray.

Certain groups have spread the report that there are no Bahá’ís in America and that the Temple at Wilmette is only a drawing, not a building. On our way to the town of Najafabad, center of a rich fruit and almond section, we drove to a service stationed operated by a Bahá’í. One of the sceptical customers at that place remarked that if he could be shown one American Bahá’í, he would become a believer. I was gleefully pointed out to him.

It is wonderful to visit small cities like Najafabad where there are thousands of believers, leavening the lump. The grandson of the Beloved of Martyrs led us through alleys which had been sanctified by the feet of the Báb. When our guide was a small boy, he was often beaten by the enemies

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of the Cause. His attackers have long since dispersed and he remains a strong champion of the Cause which teaches that “all nations should become one in faith and all men as brothers.” SHI’RAZ

It was my inestimable bounty to be the first pilgrim from the West to enter the blessed House of the Báb on the anniversary of His inauguration of the new world faith which provides mankind with the means of attaining a peaceful world of freedom, happiness and justice. I have often visited the lovely Bahá’í Temple in Illinois, and it has been my privilege as well to come into the precincts of the Holy House of Bahá’u’lláh in Baghdad, and to see Káẓimayn and other shrines of Islam, and such Christian cathedrals as Notre Dame. But within the Holy House in shiraz, I found a spiritual atmosphere more exalted than any I had experienced before. Even persons of other faiths and of no religion comment on their feeling that the Declaration Chamber is in reality an “upper room.” The French ambassador on the occasion of his visit to the House expressed a similar feeling.

The way to the House, past bazars and through winding, noisome alleys, was anything but promising. Once inside the portal, however, I found another world. The Persian friends and I performed our ablutions with water from the same well that the Báb had used. It is virtually as it always was, and the water is cold and refreshing. Next to it is the orange tree planted by the Báb and nearby a small pool bordered with flowers. The pilgrims remove their shoes before entering this tiny courtyard. The crossing of each threshold, the ascending of each step is an occasion for prayer and demonstrations of devotion. After kneeling down and touching with our lips and foreheads the steps leading into the House, we entered a chamber on the main floor and Hadrat-i-Afnán, the third cousin of the Báb, poured rosewater into our hands so that we might anoint our heads before climbing the eight steps leading to the floor above.

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The friends asked me to chant in Persian and Arabic and I felt highly honored to participate in the praying in such a wondrously holy spot. In my prayers, I remembered many friends in various parts of the world and also the National Spiritual Assemblies of Persia and America.

I also thought of that model American teacher, Martha Root, who laid her forehead on the sacred Threshold here and wept. That such a great Cause, that a Messenger of God, should have come from such a small House filled her with sorrow. But the House seemed to me a gem, perfect in size. In the future when vast multitudes make the pilgrimage to this place, it will not be possible for the friends to enter the House.

Finally, we assembled in the room where the glorious Youth of twentyfive years had bidden His friend, Mulla Iqusayn, to enter—a hundred and three years ago this night. Rare, framed Tablets hung on the walls. A magnificent silk rug, donated by Shoghi Effendi at the time of the Centenary, covered the floor. The room has five windows which face the garden. We turned toward the corner near the first window; here a lamp marks the place where the Báb was seated as He gave the glad tidings of the birth of a wondrous, world-embracing Cause. He had truly prophesied on that immortal night: “This night, this very hour, will in the days to come, be celebrated as one of the greatest and most significant of all festivals.”

Later, we went to the house of Hadrat-i-Afnán and he showed us relics of the Báb, Bahá’u’lláh, and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. There were garments worn by the Báb when He went to Mecca; we saw how delicate that precious Being must have been, although He was about the average height of the Shírázis of His day, and that very slightness enhanced our appreciation of His grandeur. We saw a ring on which the Greatest Name was cut and we learned that it had been worn by Bahá’u’lláh. I have mentioned only a few of the wonders in store for the pilgrim to Shíráz.

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THE Bahá’í

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The First Bahá’í Spiritual Assembly of the Philippines, Solano, Nueva Viscaya.

Shíráz is famed for nightingales, roses, lovers, and poets to write about them. Some Bahá’ís who operate a bus service placed a vehicle at our disposal and we first went to the tomb of Hafiz, the “Tongue of the Invisible,” a poet far greater than ‘Umar Igiayyém but who lacked a Fitzgerald. On another occasion, we visited the grave of Sa‘di, perhaps even more admired by the Persians than Hafiz, and we noticed with interest that some of the inscriptions on the walls surrounding the tomb were verses from the blind Bahá’í poet, shliridih, whose own grave is in another room not far distant.

On our departure from the Ṭihrán Airport, many friends came to bid us goodby. Of interest was the comment of a wealthy non—Bahá’í who was leaving on the same plane: “See how much love these Bahá’ís show toward each other; but nobody cares very much whether we go or stay.” It was exciting to see the friends of Iṣfahán rush forward to the plane during the brief stop in that delightful city; they brought flowers and candy, especially the white, hard gaz for which the place is famous, and also books to supply the requirements of their co-workers.

One of my memorable experiences in Persia was an appearance before an assemblage of 340 Bahá’í children in shiraz. I urged them to store up in their minds those verbal treasures which are to be discovered in the Hidden Words and other Bahá’í books, and also referred to the Tablet revealed by

the Master when Shoghi Effendi, as a small boy, had told Him of a dream in which he saw the Báb. I was followed on the program by Jinah-i-Samandari, an extremely capable and devoted believer, who on the spot—without advance warning as to my subject—described the circumstances of the dream of that marvellous figure who is now our Guardian, produced the text of the Tablet, and also quoted the affirmative words of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to an American woman who had inquired as to whether the Guardian had yet been born.

In the footsteps of Martha Root, we also visited Persepolis, Talfixt—i—JamSllld, that testimonial of Persia’s past. Sixty years ago the Master described various articles at Persepolis and these were not discovered until a half—century afterward. A few miles from there is Talgit-i-Tavfis, a holy place of the Zoroastrians where are to be found inscriptions in Pahlavi and Latin.

Shiréz fills the receptive soul with wonderment. Yes, the skies are bluer and the stars much brighter there even than in California, and there is an air of peace and repose. In that blessed city we acquired—even if only for the time being—some of the “priceless possessions of the people of Paradise” and we sensed in a measure the experience of Mullá Husayn, the gate of the Gate of God, on that long-ago night: “Methinks I was in a place of Which it could be truly said: ‘Therein no toil shall reach us’; ‘No vain discourse shall they hear therein, nor any falsehood, but only the cry, Peace, Peace!’ ”

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BAHA’I’

18.

ENCOUNTER IN JAPAN

BY MICHAEL J AMIR

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IT WAS the early part of November 1945 when our hospital ship docked in the harbor of Yokohama. As part of the medical personnel I was stationed for a few weeks near Yokohama, and then transferred to a hospital in Tokyo.

Now, as I was about to enter this new, strange country about which I knew little, I looked forward eagerly to finding the Japanese Bahá’ís. For several years nothing had been heard of them. In a country devastated and disorganized by war, I faced the challenging but fascinating task of trying to locate my fellow believers. I recalled my experiences with the Philippine Bahá’ís only some ten days before. After months of waiting I had finally been able to make the difficult trip one hundred and fifty miles north of Manila, to a town called Solano. There I had found my friends. They had little worldly goods, but nevertheless were eager and enthusiastic to talk of plans to promote the Bahá’í World Faith. I wondered if I would repeat this pleasant experience now that I was in Japan.

My first few months were very busy because of the rapid change in personnel. During this time I wrote to friends in the United States and asked for addresses of Japanese Bahá’ís. I received several names, and wrote letters to each of them. Then I went about my work, waiting for results.

At last I received my first reply. It came from Mr. Tokujiro Torii of the city of Kyoto. In 1916, Torii had written two letters—one in English, one in Esperanto——t0 ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had replied to both letters. Torii expressed his gladness at having a Bahá’í friend in the United States Army. He then said, “After the long night of war, we can take our hands in each other’s now. How happy it is for us! But we are very sorry that we Bahá’ís could

not prevent the war. We Japanese are now in great difficulty in every way, but I still believe that God is love.” It was a heart-warming letter, and I looked forward to the time when I could meet him. But there was not to be until several months later, in May.

Another reply was a card sent by a friend of another Bahá’í, Mrs, Yuri Furukawa. This friend wrote that Mrs. Furukawa had left Japan for Manchuria ten years ago, and that when communications improved, contact might be established. To Mrs. Furukawa, when she was a young girl in Tokyo, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had sent three inspiring Tablets. The opening salutation and sentence of the first Tablet points to the quality of Mrs. Furukawa’s soul when He says: “O thou beloved daughter. Thy letter was received and was perused in the utmost joy, that, praise be to God, in the land of Japan, the light of the love of God has appeared resplendently and a torch, such as thee, has been kindled, for thy heart overflows with the wine of the love of God and thy spirit is ablaze. . . .”

From Torii’s letter I made contact with Mr. K. Sawada who, before becoming blind, had traveled and studied in America. He was of slight build and had a very gracious manner. He had a good education and expressed himself easily in English. It was a familiar sight to the neighbors to see Mrs. Sawada escorting her husband to the Censorship Department of the Tokyo Post Office where both worked. Because of his many meetings with Miss Agnes Alexander, Bahá’í teacher from Honolulu, and his meeting with Miss Martha Root, internationally knOWn American Bahá’í teacher, Mr. Sawada was acquainted with many of the Bahá’í teachings. At his home in

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Tokyo, we had several interesting visits discussing our experiences.

Through the kindness of Mr. Sawada, I was able to meet Mrs. Naoe Naganuma, wife of a Japanese educator in Tokyo. Mrs. Naganuma is a former New York City girl who first came to J apan as a tourist. She fell ill during her Visit and remained to regain her health. It was during her convalescence that she met her future husband. A professor of J apanese and English, Mr. Naganuma is much admired by his students because of his kind and just nature.

Mrs. Naganuma was conversant with several Bahá’í tenets and also had the privilege of meeting Miss Alexander and Miss Root. At her home we held several meetings, attended by Japanese students, Nisei girls, and an American whom Miss Alexander had met in Honolulu.

Among Naganuma’s duties as an instructor, was the task of teaching English to Prince and Princess Takeda, the prince being a cousin of Emperor Hirohito. I had thus the opportunity, on Naganuma’s arrangement, to visit the royal couple twice at their winter home in Tokyo. The prince appeared to be about forty years of age and was of medium build. His bearing was dignified but not stilted. The princess, about six years younger than her husband, was charming and gracious. She was dressed in a western style woman’s suit. Her pretty face was lightly made up, much in the manner of western women, except for a pink spot of rouge in the middle of each eyelid.

Though we spoke little English, our first visit was a very pleasant one. It included a dinner of various J apanese vegetable and pastry dishes exquisitely and colorfully prepared, and a view of the doll festival exhibit. This is one of the many festivals of Japan. It is called the D011 Festival for Girls (Hina. Maturi). It is observed throughout the country on the 3rd of March by families with young daughters. The dolls are made to represent the Emperor and the Empress, court officials and nobles, court minstrels and dancers, all in their old-fashioned, magnificent costumes. Originally there was a religi THE Bahá’í

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ous significance in this doll festival. The children supposedly transferred their bad qualities to the dolls which would then be thrown into the river. The festival has now become mostly a pastime for the girls and an occasion for family reunions. Before leaving our royal hosts that day, we were presented with souvenir dolls.

In another visit several weeks later, a Nisei friend and I were shown the prince’s miniature horse collection. During this visit, I was able to take some photographs of the prince and his family. They accepted from me a pamphlet of the Bahá’í principles in English and Japanese, and also A Bahá’í Child’s A.B.C which I hoped would be used especially for the four young children of the royal couple.

One of my most difficult tasks was contacting Mr. Daiun Inouye, a Bahá’í who was formerly a Buddhist priest. He resided in Hokkaido, a northern island of Japan. This island is the home of the Ainu, the aborigines, who before the war numbered about fifteen thousand. It has beautiful parks, botanical gardens, museums and numerous hot springs. Visitors are also attracted by the Ainu village at Tikabumi. The island itself is about the size of the state of Indiana. Sapporo, the capital of Hokkaido, has a population of one hundred and ninety-six thousand. It is the home of Hokkaido Imperial University. This administrative and industrial center was first laid out in 1871, and patterned after our American cities.

Inouye is mentioned in the first Tablet sent to Torii by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, who sent His love to Inouye and his friend, and then said, “My hope is that those two blessed souls may shine like unto two heavenly stars from the horizon of Japan and may be the cause of its enlightenment.” Inouye finally learned of my presence in Tokyo through his friend Torii. He then wrote a very warm and enthusiastic letter from Hokkaido, saying that he wished to come to Tokyo and teach the Bahá’í Faith. Later he mentioned Martha Root. He said he remembered meeting her at a hotel in Kobe and he still recalls “her gentle and full-of-love grace.” He was

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Japanese Bahá’ís in Tokyo, 1947.

not able to come to Tokyo however, because of the military restrictions on people from the country coming into the larger cities where there was such an acute shortage of food and housing. Therefore, in another letter, he said he would do the utmost he could for the Bahá’í Cause while living in Sapporo, Hokkaido, because “we Japanese must awaken to the truth which has been revealed by Bahá’u’lláh. The time has come when His light should cover not only Japan and the whole of Asia, but all the world.” In both our conversations and letters, my J apanese friends would repeatedly say what a sorrowful thing it was that these teachings of the Bahá’í World Faith, which had been given to mankind by its Founder almost eighty years ago, were so long in being understood and accepted by the world.

Mr. Tanaka, from the western part of the Island of Honshu, came to see me at the hospital where I was stationed. Unfortunately I was away at the time. Later I received a letter from him explaining that he had learned of my address from Torii, that he was a Bahá’í, and that he had wished to visit with me. In a second letter, Tanaka wrote this interesting observation: “I believe that present J apan indeed should find her aspiring way in the Bahá’í twelve basic principles!” He also wrote that he was employed in a raw silk mill and that he had a family of ten children. Before leaving Japan, I made sure that among the Bahá’í

literature I sent to him, I included

A Bahá’í Child’s A.B.C.

I was still unable to locate H. S. Fujita, an internationally known Bahá’í. Mr. Fujita had gone to America in 1904 as a young student. There he had learned of and accepted the Bahá’í Faith through Mrs. Kathryn Frankland. Later he had had the great experience of meeting ‘Abdu’l-Bahá during his visit to the United States. In 1919, he had gone to Haifa, Palestine, and there served first ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, and then Shoghi Effendi until 1939 when he left Haifa and returned to his native land.

Knowing the great interest of American Bahá’ís in Mr. Fujita’s welfare and whereabouts, I had exhausted every avenue of search. One afternoon, to my delight, I received a very welcome letter. It was from Mrs. Corinne True of Chicago. During his sojourn in America, Mr. Fujita lived for several years at the home of Mrs. True and her family. In her letter Mrs. True told me that through a discharged American soldier she had received word that Mr. Fujita was alive, and was still in Japan. She sent me a more complete address. I wrote him again, and this time I also wired him. In a few days, a telegram reached me saying, “Received wire—many thanks—awaiting letter—hope you are well. Bahá’í greetings. Fujita.”

As soon as it was verified that he

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was in Yanai, a town some six hundred miles southwest of Tokyo, I was determined to make the trip to see him. Fortunately I was able to ride on the fast hospital train which was running to the north and south of Japan. After an overnight trip I arrived in Yanai On Sunday, May 19, 1946.

During the, two days and night that I visited with Mr. Fujita, I found him enthusiastic in our discussions on the Bahá’í Faith. At sixty—one he was youthful and vibrant. Although less than five feet in height, he gave the impression of strength and vitality as he went about his duties in the railroad office. He would laugh and joke with the service men as he gave his directions and, when a humorous situation would arise, he would heartily enjoy it. His work as interpreter at the Yanai railroad station, put him in contact with many American, British and New Zealand soldiers and civilians. This gave him frequent opportunities to speak of the Bahá’í principles, something which he, of course, was not able to do during the long years of Japanese imperialism. During the war he had lived quietly, working on his brother’s farm.

Fujita’s native town of Yanai is located but a few train hours south of the atom-bombed city of Hiroshima. Yet it was untouched throughout the war. It is still sleepy, small and quaint. It lies at the foot of little hills and borders the beautiful Inland Sea. Like many other westernized Japanese cities, Yanai presents a curious mixture of ancient and modern. Up-to-date banks, hospitals, business establishments, stand next to old-style J apanese homes and ancient shrines. Throughout Yanai, even the smallest piece of land —whether a backyard or small patch in the foothills—is cultivated for the all-important production of food. This intense cultivation assured Yanai an ample supply of food even during the war.

Fujita told me that now that the war was over, and there was more opportunity to live and speak freely, his wish was to go to a larger city where he could teach the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh.

THE BAHA’I WORLD

We shared our many wartime experiences. And, as I told him about the work of the Bahá’í Faith in America, his head would nod up and down and his whole face would light up. He told me that when he heard the names of these old friends, memories came flooding back to him from sunnier days. He wished me to express his loving greetings to his friends when I returned home. He brought out his address book and we went over every one of the names to see what I could tell him about them. During our meals together, Fujita enchanted me with stories of his experiences in the service of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and Shoghi Effendi.

On the day he did not work, he took me on a tour of the town. We visited his brother’s farm on which he worked. Then we went to the Inland Sea, where he liked to rest and fish on occasional summer evenings. This sea is in the southern part of the main island of Honshu. It is part of one of the most scenic of Japan’s national parksa natural playground for yachting, boating and fishing. A breath-taking study in contrasts, it has a granite rock coastline, and blue-green waves that wash along a winding beach of white sand. Dark, somber green pines stand against a robin’s egg sky.

After discussing my plan to meet Torii in Kyoto, Fujita and I decided to send a wire to Mr. Fukushima, a friend of Torii. We sent this wire early one evening at a nearby postal station, saying that I would wish to meet the Bahá’ís of Kyoto when I arrived there Tuesday morning. Then we walked back to Fujita’s small room on the second floor of his brother’s home. In a short while, from my position at the low J apanese table, I saw him bringing in a tray of four J apanese dishes, very colorfully prepared. The food was part of a marriage feast which neighbors across the street were celebrating, and they had kindly presented this food to me. Before tasting it, I photographed the table with the tray, beside which lay a copy of World Order magazine. At the same time I was able to get a photograph of Fujita.

Because no new Bahá’í literature or

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news had reached Fujita, he was very glad to accept some Bahá’í magazines and the book, God Passes By, written by the Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith.

On Monday night I said goodbye to Fujita’s relatives. They invited me to come again. Accompanied by Fujita’s niece, we walked to the station Where farewells were said as I boarded the train for Kyoto.

After a three hundred mile overnight ride from Yanai, I arrived the next morning in Kyoto, which had also been spared the bombings. Kyoto is a city celebrated for its artistic handmade products such as lacquer, silk embroidery, kimonos, Cloisonne, bronze and porcelain. It is a classic city, representing the civilization of 016. Japan in art, literature, temples and shrines. It is rich in history and legend. Of the three thous and temples and shrines that once existed in Kyoto and its environs, more than a thousand still remain. For over a thousand years, from its founding in 794 AD. until the removal of the Imperial Court to Tokyo in 1868, Kyoto was the capital of Japan. It is situated on the main line between Tokyo and Kobe.

I was met at the station by Mr. and Mrs. Torii, and Mr. Fukushima. They had been waiting for me without knowing what I would look like. However, remembering that Mr. Torii was blind, I was able to recognize him because of his cane and dark glasses. I introduced myself. At once there was a feeling of gladness at our being able to clasp hands. Mr. Torii was about fifty—two. Possessed of a very kindly disposition, he was greatly loved by the blind children he taught in school. His friend, Fukushima, a Catholic and Esperantist, also taught in the same school. Being a friend of Torii for many years, Fukushima knew of the Bahá’í teachings. He showed me an Esperanto book, Bahá’u’lláh and the New Era, which he said Miss Alexander had given him years ago.

After our warm greeting, we decided to visit the Kyoto School for the Blind where Torii had been teaching for many years. Torii invited me to speak before one of the classes, a class in

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English, consisting of about fifty blind pupils, ranging in age from fifteen to twenty—five.

Arriving at the school, I was introduced to the principal and a few of the instructors. We were served tea before proceeding to the class room. I was introduced by Torii, who said I was an American soldier who would speak on the twelve Bahá’í principles. A light of interest illumined the faces of the students as they adjusted themselves in their seats.

Torii acted as interpreter. On our way out from the class room I passed among the children again. I shook hands with many of them and I will remember for a long time their cheerful, upturned faces. In the school office we were treated to some Japanese music played on Japanese string instruments. At the end of a well-performed concert, I shook hands with the musicians and thanked them. The Japanese custom of greeting. is to bow to each other a few times, but now many are learning again some of the western customs.

Leaving the school amid the happy good—byes of the students, we took a trolley to Torii’s for the evening meal. Knowing the scarcity of food, I gave Mrs. Torii some of the army “K” rations and some dehydrated soup mixture that I had with me. She accepted them, but served a delightful J apanese dinner. The meal, prepared with the greatest of care by Mrs. Torii consisted of boiled rice, with some of the following: otsuyu (clear soup) sashimi (sliced raw fish), yakimono (broiled fish), sukiyaki (chicken or beef stew), various scalloped dishes, tempura (fritters), chawanmushi (steamed egg custard), kabayaki (spitchcock), or boiled vegetables, and pickles.

Mrs. Torii did not speak English, yet I was very much at home with her. She radiated such a strong feeling of

.friendliness and kindness. Through Mr.

Torii, she told me that Miss Alexander had been a guest at their home and that they had spent many pleasant hours together.

After our dinner we took some pictures both inside and outside their home. Torii, Fukushima and I then

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went on a walking tour through treelined avenues of temples and gardens. Again I was busy with my camera.

Our visit together had to be cut short that summer afternoon for it was necessary for me to meet the army hospital train. As we walked to the station, I remarked to Torii how much I admired his wife. This he translated to her, and as she understood, she smiled and put her arm about me. I boarded the train carrying their parting gifts of lacquer ware, silk goods and fans in my hand and a never-to-be forgotten memory of their kindness in my heart.

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When I arrived in Tokyo, I returned to my base. In just a few weeks, I found myself leaving Japan. Before sailing for America, I sent my farewell letters to Japanese Bahá’ís, expressing my regret that another meeting had not taken place, but also my delight that we had been able to see and talk with each other. I promised to carry with me to America their greetings and affection, to share with the American Bahá’ís the story of their experiences during those isolated years. It was with a lighter heart that I embarked for home, cheered by their own hope for the future of Japan.

Fireside meeting—Bahá’ís of Japan.

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19.

ILUSIONES

BY HASCLE M. CORNBLETH

IN THE city of Quito, capitol of Ecuador, there is a flower mart in the square of San Blas. It is nothing more than a row of rude tables upon which are displayed carnations. Long—stemmed, full-bloomed carnations with their salty fragrance. Scarcely ever anything else, except the wistful, tiny white blooms of gypsophila (baby’s breath) often given you by the florist as a green or background for your bouquet. These the Indian Quichua women of the flower mart call “ilusiones.” Whether in Spanish the word means elusive or illusion I do not know, but it is as descriptive of the flower as is the Quichua word “wah—wah” for baby.

In writing now of my experience as a Bahá’í pioneer in Ecuador I am blocked for the moment; barred, as it were, from collecting my thoughts beyond a recollection of startlingly large and fragrant carnations sensed through a filmy veil of ilusiones.

There are other squares or plazas, of course, in Quito of which the Plaza San Blas is one of the smallest. There is the Plaza de Independencia upon which the Palacio de Gobierno faces. It was in this palace of Government I was honored by witnessing the historic interview by Mrs. Gayle Woolson, Bahá’í pioneer of Bogota, Colombia with Dr. José Maria Velasco Ibarra, President of the Republic of Ecuador. It was then he, the President, said, “I am happy to see there is a Centro Bahá’í in Quito,” and likened the Bahá’í Message to the opening of a window to allow fresh air to waft through. It was over the Plaza de Independencia I heard the President’s voice rebound in strident tones, “Bahá’u’lláh!”, he voiced. What happened to my heart I

do not know, but, I felt I was carried out the window over the plaza on the force of the intonation. “Is this how His Name is pronounced?” I regained my composure as Gayle assured him he had done well.

There is the park in Quito called the Alameda upon which faces the presidential palace. It was in the yellow room of the White House of Ecuador I escorted Gayle Woolson on her interview, at the invitation of the President, with his charming intellectual wife, Sra. Corina Porras de Velasco Ibarra. The first lady of Ecuador during our rather long visit excused herself to go into a bedroom to see the copy of Bahá’u’lláh and The New Era in Spanish, which her husband was reading. She then presented us each with a copy of one of her books of prose.

There is the Plaza Sucre in Quito upon which faces the national theater of Ecuador, El Teatro Sucre. The Teatro Sucre was put at the disposal of the Bahá’ís of Quito by the Minister of Education for a Bahá’í talk by Gayle Woolson. The theater was filled to the rafters. The loveliness of her person, the soft elegance in her manner of presenting the Cause of God enthralled the capacity audience into exhibiting a decorum of reverence.

There is the Recoleta in Quito with a guard at the gate for it is here that stands the building of the Ministry of Defense. The Minister of Defense called a meeting in the officers’ salon of this building where Gayle gave the Message, speaking on the attainment and maintenance of peace to about seventyfive of the high ranking officers of the Ecuadorian army. One of them, Major Carlos Suarez Palacios, was already a Bahá’í. The uniformed and caped as [Page 754]754

semblage hung on each word with the hunger and respect one gives true manna from heaven. Here was felt an air of awesome attentiveness.

Of all these things I hope Gayle will write in detail. There are many other facts of her visit in Quito of interest to the Bahá’í World: the intimate talks at table; the talks to groups and clubs such as the Rotarian and Lions clubs; the cooperation of radio and press, for the Bahá’í Message was front page news in Quito for some weeks. The leading papers carried her picture and a full column or more on the front page several times during her visit to the “city of eternal spring,” Quito.

Quito has many stories one of which, I know, an historian will some day record. It will be an historian who will collect the data and record only the proven facts in order to retain the drama of the sacrifice of the lone Bahá’í figure of Ecuador, John Stearns.

I was present at the establishing of the first Bahá’í Assembly of Quito a few years after Johnny’s death. The assembly was formed in April, 1947 in the Centro Bahá’í at Calle Sodiro No. 133, a half block up the cobblestone street from the Alameda. There I witnessed the tears of the men who formed that Assembly when someone said, “If only J ohnny were here.” And the answer came, “I think he is.”

That historian will record how John Stearns left the comparative luxury of his native United States for the then much different mode of living in Quito. Quito is lodged 9000 feet up in a valley between the peaks of the Andes. Until recently it was quite isolated. At the time Johnny came such commodities as butter and bread were for the first time being made available to the public in the market places. Water was scarce, some days there was none at all. These luxuries and many others were indulged in only intermittently by Johnny.

He will tell how J ohnny seated in the dining room of a middle class pension having difficulty in ordering a plate of soup because of his inability to speak Spanish. He will tell of the Ecuadorian youth, Eduardo (Les) Gonzalez, who

THE Bahá’í

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spoke English, helping him order his soup. And then of their long talk; Les and Johnny together, into the small hours of the morning when Les accepted the Bahá’í Faith.

He will tell of Johnny’s difficulty in manufacturing candy, a delicacy not before on the open market in Quito. How his equipment had to be made by hand. Yes, pots and pans too. How he had to learn to cook his products at that high altitude, on wood, alcohol or gasoline stoves.

He will tell how Johnny inaugurated and maintained a Bahá’í radio program. How he played his cello in the symphonic programs at the Teatro Sucre. And how he played it again when he changed to a mean room in order to maintain his Bahá’í activities —this time accompanied by Bahá’í students, including Les with his guitar, playing, laughing, and singing atop a load of his belongings piled on a rickety little truck rumbling over the cobblestones.

And how he fell ill with cancer.

And he will tell how Johnny’s radio program during the war years gave the Bahá’í principles of peace, the Lesser Peace and the Most Great Peace. Then of the Bahá’ís pressing him to go home to the States for treatment. And of the great turmoil and boycott of his business caused by a group of European refugees because of his peace program. And of the jamming of his radio programs. And of the worsening of his health.

With the world about him bent on his destruction the laughing, young, eager John Stearns made his decision. He moved. Not back to the States for medical treatment. He rented a room in the home of a European woman who had attended Bahá’í classes. She told me that he had said he hadn’t slept between sheets for the three previous years. He spoke to consuls and officials to no avail. Then, counteracting attacks in the newspapers, he placed an advertisement inviting Quito to listen to a Bahá’í radio program of current importance. Outwitting those who had caused interference in the remote control presentations of his radio pro [Page 755]ARTICLES AND

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Bahá’í Conference, Mexico City, November, 1947.

grams, he went out into the country to the transmitting towers. There the broadcast was made direct and without interference. In the broadcast, among other pertinent facts, he gave the statements on the Bahá’í Faith made by Jan Masaryk and Eduard Benes of Czechoslovakia.

The next day, at his candy shop, there was a lineup of the people who had caused the misunderstanding. They made token purchases, indicated they regretted their behavior and extended words of encouragement. A few years later a young Czech girl asked me for Bahá’í literature in English, explaining that she had been translating it from the Spanish into her native tongue and sending it on to Czechoslovakia.

A historian will get interesting data from Eve Nicklin in Lima, Peru, where afterward J ohn Stearns went to die in peaceful surroundings. Or from Virginia Orbison who, I believe, was there at the time.

I never met Johnny, not in person, that is. But I’ve a peculiar feeling he was present among the friends that April in Quito. About a year previous to that historic event the first Ecuador ian Bahá’í Assembly was established in Guayaquil with the assistance of Virginia Orbison. Many of its members are former pupils of John Stearns.

Of Ambato, I have not heard from the Bahá’í group since the recent disastrous earthquakes. I have seen pictures of the ruins of buildings I had known. I can only pray that God will assist in rebuilding that city with the spirit that demands an unshakable foundation.

Of Manta, I recall With awe the rising of a huge golden moon over the sea to appear white and small in the dark sky. It was whiter and brighter than I have ever seen the moon. After a meeting in the sala which the duefia of the hotel had given us we watched the moon for hours. Never will I forget the moon at Manta.

Of Bahia de Caraquez, its beauty evokes a yearning to feel again the soft delight of its yellow and blue sunset: clear gold of the sun on clear gold of the sands and clear blue of the sea. This blue-gold sunset blends in my memory with the love and courtesy of the seekers as we sat in tropical salas of strong bamboo-like buildings dis [Page 756]756

THE Bahá’í WORLD

Official delegates to First South American Bahá’í Congress. Buenos Aires, November, 1946.

cussing the wonders of the Bahá’í Faith. There are carnations and ilusiones in

the other cities also, but they are for

the most part flown in from Quito.

When I visited the Equatorial Monument, an unimposing marker purported to fix the spot for the dividing lines of the earth, I was told to circumambulate the pillar and to say I had been around the world in a few steps. Then I was shown a picture of J ohn Stearns and was told to stand with one foot on either side of the equatorial line, hold my hand high and smile joyously as Johnny had done. I tried to do so.

Ecuador to me is the remnant of the cultures of the Incas and the Conquistadores. For Ecuador holds still extant some of the oldest buildings in the Americas of European architecture, and the traces of medieval Southern European culture. This is clearly visible as well as the underlying trend of passive resistance maintained for centuries by the underprivileged conquered hordes, to which the Conquistadores

made concessions in order to call them their own. And concessions are still being made, as witnessed by their festivals. All of this I see through a delicate tracery of ilusiones. Baby’s breath, we call the flower. It is well, as I see the birth of the people of this land in spirituality, soft and elusive as a baby’s breath, grow into consciousness of its development in the future, all of its inhabitants as one unit instilled with confidence in the capacity of a human being to develop into a man among men. Just as in the United States men must become conscious of their abilities as human beings, regardless of color.

As I think of some nine days spent in Colombia, my memory is no longer filtered through ilusiones. However, for brevity my thoughts will light only as briefly as the planes that carried me on.

I left Quito by plane one day to bid the friends in Guayaquil good-bye. An interesting evening was spent there

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with the pangs that go with the parting of friends. The plane next day was bound directly for Cali. However, a change was made and the plane stopped in Quito for repairs. We were grounded for the night. There was no place at the airport to check my baggage. You can imagine the surprise of Flora Hottes when I arrived at the pension with my bags. Next day as I was hurrying to get to the airport again, I met a young lady who had been attending classes. As we spoke on the street she announced her intention to make her declaration as a Bahá’í. So with a happy heart I left Ecuador for Colombia, arriving in Cali the same day.

I put up at a hotel and half-hearted1y, not even hoping he might succeed, I gave the bell boy an address and a coin. I told him to find the secretary of the Local Bahá’í Assembly, deliver my note personally and wait for a reply. The bell boy did not return. But before I could finish my shower the secretary, Sr. Compos, and his son were in my room. I had several Bahá’í visitors and gave a talk that night followed by more visits in coffee shops, and left the next day for Bogota.

At the airport of Bogota there were two sedate and elegant ladies softly calling my name to each passenger as he passed through the gate. They were a committee sent to fetch me. Gayle Woolson, the only person in Bogota who knew me, could not come. There is a rather large Bahá’í community in B0gota; I stayed there for a couple of days for I was loath to leave these friends, who feted me sumptuously. I remember a princely banquet befitting a dignitary, but with the added warmth of sincere Bahá’í love and friendship. I could look down the long table as far as the eye could see, and there were faces, all kindly, overlooking my gorging myself with foods I hadn’t had for some time, such as good ice cream. No wonder I didn’t want to leave Bogota! Gayle Woolson and Leonor Porros of the teaching committee for Colombia suggested I go to Mogotes, warning me it was a difficult trip over the mountains. I refused, with the ex 757

cuse that I needed rest. Nevertheless, Gayle gave me the name of a young man in Bucaramanga who was interested in knowing something of the Faith. So I boarded a plane for Bucaramanga where I went to the home of the young fellow, whose name was David Silva. He was so interested in our conversation about the Faith that he went with me about a mile out of town to a crossroads where I hoped to catch a bus to Mogotes. We talked there for some time before David said he would accompany me to Mogotes if I would wait while he went home and packed his bag. I sat on my suitcases in the scarce shade of an adobe wall for an hour or more before his return. Then we decided we had either missed the bus or it might not run that day. So we hitchhiked through several towns and stopped for lunch at a village in the foothills. We were fortunate in getting a ride on a truck all the way to Sanquil. We had to hire a cab to take us from there to Mogotes. It took hours through the rain over slippery roads to get to Mogotes, where we arrived long after nightfall. We put up at a dimly lit and dank inn, which I must say was not too clean—but we were tired and it was shelter. We opened the window and watched the rain pour down in a solid sheet as we lay on the thin pads over wooden slats that made our beds. We fell into a restful slumber, satisfied in having made the trip over the spine of the cordilleras of the Andes and caught a glimpse in Mogotes of one of the friends. Later I learned that Leonor Porros and Gayle Woolson, both of delicate frame and mild constitution, had made the arduous trip and washed the floor in that very room before they would sleep.

The Mogotenos are a simple country people, campesinos. We spent two days in Mogotes With two meetings each day for the Bahá’ís, and a meeting for the public. Then the tortuous trek back by bus through Sanguil to Bucaramanga.

It is interesting to note the distinct breakfasting habits of the different towns of South America. In Quito it is always just a dry roll and a cup of coffee made with milk. In Bucaraman [Page 758]758 THE Bahá’í WORLD

Partial view of table at banquet at close of Second Bahá’í Latin American Conference of Panama, 1947.

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ga one is awakened about six in the morning with a small glass of citrus fruit juice and a tiny cup of delicious strong black coffee. An hour or so later one has a full course breakfast starting with an enticing light soup called pavo peligroso (dangerous turkey), eggs with ham or sausage, pots of hot milk and coffee, and all topped off with a rice pudding of fresh coconut and fresh pineapple. In the late afternoon on arrival at the hotel I had intended to sleep until breakfast. This, I thought, would rest my aching back from the rough treatment of the buckboard that was my seat on the bus and upon which I had bounced over the precipitous ridges of the Andes from Mogotes.

I had not yet had time to enjoy the luxury of a shower before David burst in with the news that he had arranged for a meeting at his home that very night. He had invited the members of his athletic club to hear the Bahá’í Message. The room fairly bulged at the seams with these interested young men. The girls with their duefias filled the doorway and windows. There was much conversation that night in the coffee shops of Bucaramanga, vibrant discussions on the Bahá’í Faith. In the morning I had visitors at breakfast, and on until David and his brother, who had also become interested, took me to the airport.

Back in Bogota for a day, and then to Barranquilla, the teeming Colombian port. I visited with Bahá’ís in Barranquilla that night and the next day until the meeting time which was followed by the usual delightful discussions in a coffee shop. Then by bus to Cartagena.

Cartagena is a Spanish sea fort with a walled town. The modern city has grown far beyond the old walls. The walls themselves are being torn down in order to let air into the old town. There is a fresh Spirit being wafted in old Cartagena for the Bahá’í Assembly there which meets in the Masonic hall is anxious to deepen in the teachings and asks always for more and more Bahá’í literature in Spanish. During a public meeting there I lost my sense of time and spoke for two hours in my ungrammatical and limited

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Spanish. These men listened most attentively and then kept me for another two hours with pertinent questions. After this some of them gathered about a table in a coffee shop where we talked until the cafe closed. Then a few sat in the lobby of the hotel where we talked, never able to quiet their insatiable hunger for the Bahá’í teachings.

Here as everywhere are shown the results of Gayle Woolson’s work. Here as everywhere there is a constant clamoring for Bahá’í literature in Spanish.

Of interest to North American Bahá’ís is the fact that in these countries there is a great preponderance of men who have found the courage to make their declarations as Bahá’ís. By contrast, in the United States the Bahá’í women outnumber the men.

So, leaving the then all-male Bahá’í community of Cartagena, I flew back to Barranquilla and on to Panama. It was nice to be in the Tivoli Hotel at Ancon again. This hotel is in the Canal Zone and it is just across the street and up a block to the apartments of Cora Oliver and Julie Regal, long-time pioneers in Panama City. After a short visit with them I took the train across the isthmus to Colon. The train takes about an hour and a half as it follows the Canal from the Pacific to the Atlantic side.

In Colon I was met by Louise Caswell, who for a decade had pioneered for the Faith. Would I take over her apartment in Colon for three months while she went to San Salvador?

Cristobal in the Canal Zone is just across the street from Colon, Panama. I was told by the labor office in Cristobal that there was no work to be had, that many were out of work. However, the first day I went out to look for work I want to dock No. 9 at Cristobal Where I was offered a job if I would take it for a temporary period of three months. When Louise returned I moved into bachelor quarters in Cristobal. The beautiful spirit of the friends of Colon was exemplary. We continued the classes inaugurated by Louise Caswell. The Assembly in Colon was established in April, 1948 as a crowning achievement of the efforts of Louise

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Members of the Bahá’í community of Séo Paulo, Brazil rejoicing over the

choice of their beautiful mountain city as the site of the 3rd annual South

American Congress and International Summer School, held January, 1949.

Settlers in the group are Mr. Edmund Miessler, standing center, Muriel, his

wife, at right and Margot at left of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s picture, with Bob standing second from left.

Caswell. She has made many trips into the interior, as have Julie Regal and others. The trip across the isthmus and return in order to give a talk can be made after work. This interchange of speakers is made by both communities.

I spent nine months in Panama, working until the day I left. Early in 1948 I boarded a boat in the sweltering heat of Cristobal and five days later arrived in New York in zero weather. Still three thousand miles from my home in Los Angeles, I stopped at several Bahá’í centers on my way. While I was in Chicago the National Teaching Committee asked me to go to the northwestern states of Washington and Oregon to help prepare groups for assembly status before April, 1948.

A fast train brought me home for about ten days with my family. Then, taking my still unpacked suitcases with me, I made my headquarters in Seattle. The Regional Teaching Committee there did a splendid job in planning my itinerary and the Bahá’ís themselves

were most cooperative. The hospitality and personal kindnesses of these people, mostly of Nordic descent, is bound in my memory with those of Colon, of West Indian ancestry, and Quito, of Spanish extraction, as a token of worldwide respect shown to anyone, anyone at all, who arises to promote the Word of God.

In some instances the people are most receptive, in others they are adamant in old world immobility.

I rack my brains trying to think of how I can convey to you how it feels to travel and teach the Faith. It all sums up to this: not to see the friends, not to travel among the searchers would result in stagnation. Not to teach the Faith by word or deed is a life without value, without validity of existence. It is the age-old choice between the quick and the dead.

What urges one on is the dawning of pride and gratitude in the face of the seeker when he has been guided to his purpose in life. It is the same thing I

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saw in the face of a ragged Indian when, using Professor Laurbach’s method of alphabetization, I took the time to teach him to read and write. What bliss people radiate when they achieve what they had been led to think

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they were incapable of doing! It was then I realized that man has capacity of which he is not aware. The Bahá’í Faith sheds the great light on this subject of revealing to the human being

his true station as Man.

ACQUAINT THE PEOPLE

BY EVE B.

I

“Warn and acquaint the people, 0 Servant, with the things we have sent down to thee, and let the fear of 710 one dismay thee, and be not of them that waver.” (Bahá’u’lláh)

T HUS admonished through the Pen of Bahá’u’lláh, the pioneers of the Bahá’í Faith have gone out to meet the people. Since His precepts have to do primarily with a way of life, it.is not difficult to introduce His words into the conversation Wherever we may be. Because of its universal appeal, the Cause of God has brought us into contact with the peoples of all races, and of different religious backgrounds, in the various countries we have visited, professional men and women, office workers, laborers, homemakers, students — faces, names, personalities —— crowd the memory, clamoring to be presented. Only a few individuals can be chosen here a few incidents related, as representative of the way in which we are able to acquaint the people with the Message of Bahá’u’lláh.

II

“When a man had found gold in a mine he returns again to the mine to dig for more gold.” (Wisdom of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá)

NICKLIN

We were teachers together at a cultural institute in one of the capital cities of South America, Frances and I. Casually, the name “Bahá’í” slipped into our conversation. I sensed that it was the first time Frances had heard the name. Later on, over a cup of tea, she admitted that she had memorized the word and hurried home to look it up in the dictionary.

A day came when Frances had an opportunity to go to the United States. Letters began arriving from her, saying, “I’ve sought the Bahá’ís in every city in which I have visited. They are hospitable and make me feel at home.”

Then Frances journeyed on to Scotland to see her mother. It was at the close of World War II; people were restless, and Frances missed the assurance of hope and the tranquility of spirit that Bahá’í associates had been able to impart through their Teachings. It was then that she put a notice in the local paper, requesting Bahá’ís to get in touch with her. Evidently none saw her announcement, because none answered. Her visit ended, she returned to her home in South America. One day, a few weeks after her return, she came to the Bahá’í Center with a clipping from an Edinburgh newspaper. “Look,” she exlaimed, “an account of a Bahá’í School summer session in Scotland! If it had been a few months earlier, I could have attended it,” she mourned. Although Frances

I’!

has not as yet become a Bahal in

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name, everywhere she is, on board ships, at summer resorts, or among her own circle of friends, she acquaints people with the Message, and tells them to get in touch with the believers. Many people have heard the name “Bahá’í” for the first time, because of Frances.

III

“Deeds man.”

reveal the station of the (Wisdom of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá)

A book lay open on the small table beside her chair. Mrs. Braddock glanced down at it. Suddenly, a name was alive on the printed page. “ ‘Abdu’l-Bahá!” She spoke the name aloud. Her hostess looked up from her knitting. “What did you say, my dear?” “The name in this book!” she said, “ ‘Abdu’l-Bahá—I knew Him. Where did you get this book?” “A woman lent it to me. She teaches here in Lima, Peru.” Mrs. Braddock and her daughter found their way to the Bahá’í Center. She told us of her life as a young Armenian woman, living in Egypt, of her Visits with ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and His family in Haifa, Palestine. “Although I was just a child, I remember Him too,” said the daughter. “I remember sitting at His feet with the other children.” She added, “And He gave me a ring-stone that I treasured very much.” We showed them the Bahá’í World books. How eagerly Mrs. Braddock searched through them for pictures of familiar faces! There was an especial face that she wanted to findLua Getsinger. “Lua was a guest in our house,” she said, “and it was there that. she died.” “We all loved her very much,” she added softly. We told her that Lua had been named The Mother Teacher of The West.

Mrs. Braddock invited us unto her home to meet her husband, an Englishman. They showed us their albums of photographs. One picture was of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá walking along a path, His cloak billowing in the Wind. Mrs.

Braddock seemed surprised when we

informed her that the Faith Which ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had advanced, was becoming recognized around the world.

THE Bahá’í WORLD

She had not thought much about religion through the years, but she had often remembered the way of life exemplified by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. His selfless life of service had said louder than words that He was a Bahá’í; she could not speak His name without betraying her emotion. To us, Who had not known ‘Abdu’l-Bahá personally, yet loved him with an overwhelming love, Mrs. Braddock had brought another glimpse of His matchless example of Bahá’í living. We in turn, shared with the Braddocks, His writings.

IV

“Such children I have never seen, so courteous, unselfish, thoughtful of others, unobtrusive, intelligent, and swiftly selfedenying in the little things that children love.” wrote Mr. Thornton Chase of the household of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá.

Irene is a well-known writer of books on parent education. We were having tea together; our talk centered around the topic of education. I brought out stories that had been prepared for preschool children, and let her read them, commenting that Bahá’ís believe that character-training is of paramount importance, that accordingly the aim of these stories was to influence the child to keep his word, to be on time, and to be thoughtful of all creatures. Then I quoted from The Wisdom of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá: “For unless the moral character of a nation is educated, as well as the brain and talents, civilization has no basis.” Irene was thoughtful. “My people here in Peru need this type of training,” she said. “Yes, and in every country in the world,” I added. Suddenly, she asked, “May I translate these stories into Spanish? I’ll help you have them printed too,” she added. After much labor the task was finished. It is dedicated to an organization that Irene had founded, “The Crusaders of Education for the Future Mothers of Peru,” and also to that generation of children that will make a new and better world. In the prologue of the little book, one may read Irene’s own words, “. . . thinking people everywhere are realizing the importance of child—training as a firm basis for a

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Bahá’í picnic in Old Panama with Indian friends.

better humanity, ”

V

“Bodily cold and heat cannot affect the spirit for it is warmed by the power of the love of God. When we understand this, we begin to understand something of our life in the world to come.”

(Wisdom of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá)

How cosmopolitan a Bahá’í pioneer’s correspondence becomes! The mail had arrived—welcome at any time and place, but even more when one lives in the southernmost city in the world. The letters were from an English friend, a Hungarian, a Jewess, a Japanese, a Peruvian; all non—Bahá’ís, but each had been made acquainted with the teachings, and each had been moved by them. One letter contained a request: “Please say a Bahá’í prayer for my little new baby; he is so very ill.” Another wrote of a man in public office: “He must have heard of the Bahá’í teachings because he is doing good works.” And a letter from a youth learning English: “Write more the beautiful words of Bahá’u’lláh.” I prayed for each of them. The cold wind

blew in from the Strait; it howled at my windows and doors to chill me, but my spirit was warmed by the power of the love of God.

VI

“A physician ministering to the sick, gently and tenderly, free from prejudice . . . is giving praise.”

(Wisdom of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá)

Dr. Guillermo A. comes to the English Academy in the Bahá’í Center in Punta Arenas, Chile. He is taking private lessons to facilitate his studies in the United States this coming year. One evening, not long ago, he came to the word “dwarf” in an article that he was reading. It was a new word for the Doctor. “The word ‘dwarf’,” I explained, “means a person much below average height.” Then using it in a sentence: “There are many dwarfs here in Punta Arenas. The cause, I presume, is rickets, but What is medical science doing about it?” His eyes brightened With interest.

“We have been working very hard since 1938,” he said, “in collaboration with the Government, and With the help of the people. The work has been slow," he continued, “but it is growing stead [Page 764]764

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Bahá’ís and friends at Punta Arenas, Chile, southernmost city of the world, November 21, 1948. Eve Nicklin, pioneer, back row center.

ily. Now we have a clinic called ‘La Gota de Leche’ or ‘The Drop of Milk.’ ” “And for whom is this service?” “For all those who cannot afford to pay for medical care. Last year, 1948, in the Province of Magallanes, there were 1,400 babies born; of that number nearly 700 were given free service.” “And afterward?” “Afterward, ‘La Gota de Leche’ takes charge of them. The children receive medical care and milk; the mothers, information in child-care. When I first came to Punta Arenas in 1932,” he stated, “the fight had not yet begun against rickets, and one saw an unusual number of dwarfs,” he said, pronouncing the new word carefully, “but the new generation,” he added, “is growing to average height, and with straight limbs. The last health census showed that Magallanes had the lowest mortality rate in all of Chile.” “Why has rickets been so prevalent here?” “Partly because of climatic conditions,” he answered. “The weather is severe at times, as you know, and chil dren must of necessity wear many clothes; therefore, the skin is not sufficiently exposed to air and sunshine. Then, too, lack of vitamins in the soil is a factor.”

“Is health schools ? ”

care taught in the

“A little, but as yet, not enough. We doctors, realize that with all our medical assistance, there are many things we cannot overcome until children learn certain fundamental health rules for themselves.”

Thus the doctor had a practical lesson in English on a subject dear to his heart. And the teacher?—another revelation of the regenerative spirit at work in this present—day world.

Often the minutes stretch on, over the class period—minutes free_to discuss with the doctor, the advanced teachings of Bahá’u’lláh on such vital topics as health, religion, science, and the creation of society.

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VII

“The Source of all learning is the Knowledge of God, exalted be His Glory. And this cannot be attained save through the knowledge of His divine Manifestations.” (Bahá’u’lláh)

There is no lack of charm in the landscape of Patagonia, but there are also large territories which for geographical and climatic reasons must be reckoned among the most desolate on earth. There are the ice—bound, g1acier-covered portions of the High Cordilleras, and in the western part of the Strait of. Magallanes, glaciers which reach all the way down into the sea and form icebergs. Deep esteros, or fjords, cut through the mountains into the seafjords that are said to resemble those of Norway. This is Patagonia, or the “Big Foot,” a fantastic land, where the Strait of Magallanes and the Beagle Channel make sea lanes for travel and commerce among the nations of the world. Patagonia, Which has long held a fascination for explorers, is now becoming a great tourist attraction.

It is in this far, southern country, in the city of Punta Arenas, Chile, that I met Mary. Mary is a tourist. In her early years, she taught philosophy in a State University, travelled in many lands, and even won fame for herself as a mountain climber. But this is her first trip to Patagonia, and here in this southernmost outpost of the Bahá’í Faith she has heard the name Bahá’u’lláh for the first time. She is destined to stay in Magallanes for many weeks because the boat that is going to the fjords is under repair. The other day she said to me, “I can’t understand this delay, but,” she added philosophically, “there must be some good reason.” I said, but not aloud, “Yes, Mary, there is a good reason. This delay will give you an opportunity to hear the most important Message of all times, the news that the Promised One of all the ages has now come! Oh, I know that you have told me, by implication, that my religion cannot be as important as I think it is, for otherwise you, with your wide experience and learning, would

surely have heard of it. But, I pray, that you will grasp its importance When you read through the literature that I have chosen for you. I shall not force these teachings on you, Mary, but I shall be praying that you will investigate them with a humble heart. You are a woman with a keen mind, and fine innate qualities. God can, if you will let Him, bless your closing years with the most wonderful career of your life—that of becoming a humble teacher of great Truths, and a wayfarer in the Path of God.”

VIII

“Give a hearing ear, O People!” (Bahá’u’lláh)

Many times, it so happens that the person who is not yet ready to give a listening ear to the Bahá’í teachings, is the means of acquainting another, who has long wanted to hear it, that there is a worldwide, unified faith at work today, building a civilization founded upon spiritual and universal principles.

Last Sunday, Mary invited me to go to the house of a European family to whom she had been given a letter of introduction. The young mother in the family is an artist. She has thought up the interesting occupation of designing and having Magallanicos made into saleable articles, ski suits, sweaters, mittens, slippers and caps. She uses the wool from sheep raised on the Patagonian pampas; penguin and seal skins from the coast and nearby islands; feathers supplied by the ostriches ; white crystals picked up in the mountains and which make pendants and pins. My interest in her work resulted in her acceptance of an invitation to visit the Bahá’í Center to see materials from Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador that are used there as decorations. Almost upon entering the room, my new friend asked me to explain to her the significance of the sign on the door “Centro Bahá’í”. Forgotten for the moment were ponchos, mantos, llamas and rugs, in the excitement of hearing for the first time the Message of Bahá’u’lláh. She commented: “These

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are my ideals. One reason for my learning many languages, was in order to know my fellow men better.” From the Bahá’í bookshelf I took three books, Spanish, English and French translations, of Bahá’u’lláh’s teachings. “Someone has borrowed the German copy,” I remarked; “In which language

THE BAHA’I'

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do you wish to read His Message?” “I’ll choose the French book,” she said, “I’m teaching French.” When we parted, we planned to have tea together and more talks. All day long, my heart said, “Another opportunity to give the Glad Tidings, and thanks be to God, to hearing ears.”

21.

THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

FULFILLS

ITS DESTINY

BY ARTEMUS LAMB

TO A Bahá’í who has never lived in the capital of the United States, it is a most interesting experience to come to Washington, DC. during these closing days of the “fateful forties” and to speculate on what the immediate years ahead hold in store.

Are there any signs here which can indicate to us the direction in which both the nation itself and the world are heading? Is the United States showing any evidence of fulfilling the high but demanding destiny predicted for it in the Bahá’í Writings? Surely here at the heart of the nation one should be able to feel its pulse and make a diagnosis. Let us see what we find.

A REVIEW OF THE EVIDENCE

To begin, let us turn to the Current Events Section of a single edition of one of the leading newspapers of the capital. States one paragraph of the editorial: “This Christmas Day finds us full of so many tensions, fears and anxieties that it is almost as though the first Christmas had not come at all. There is no real peace upon earth, and even men of goodwill — who perhaps even now, if we make due allowance for human frailty, constitute the bulk of mankind—are full of foreboding. Fear runs as a sort of insistent undertone in all our festivity and merriment. . . . Over the screams of the propa gandists, the warnings of statesmen, the clamor of jealous minorities, it is hard, indeed, to distinguish the voice of an angel saying: ‘Fear not; for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, . . . ’ It seems to us that it can be heard only with the ears of faith—and of a powerful faith at that.”

Another paragraph of the editorial treats the new International Court of Justice, terminating: “and its importance as an instrument of peace is certain to grow as rapidly as justice can be substituted for force in the settlement of disputes that reach across national boundary lines.” On the same page is a letter from a reader entitled “Approaches to World Government” in which two plans for a world government are outlined. Still another letter from a reader pleads for an army to pray for peace: “Perhaps the most significant utterance of this year on the subject of peace,” it says, “was that of General MacArthur, when he said that 99 per cent of the people of the world want peace . . . It may be later than we think, but surely it is not too late to do something about mobilizing that overwhelming mass of the earth’s population into the greatest army the world has ever known, an army not to fight war, but to pray for peace, an army to make war against war . . . And here is a hope: May the Voice of America sound the call to prayer. . . . ”

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And on the opposite page an internationally known columnist apologizing that “even a hardboiled newspaperman may be forgiven for letting his thoughts stray on Christmas,” heads his column “Applying Sermon on the Mount” and then proceeds to show “how miserably the present generation has failed in keeping the peace of the world” because it has not applied to diplomacy and international relations the spiritual principles voiced by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount. He concludes: “Thus, all too slowly are we veering around to some of the principles of the Man whose birth today we celebrate, . . . And while timid men may not be willing to risk the revolutionary diplomacy necessary to achieve His goals, yet the alternatives in this day of the atomic bomb may be what the prophets of Israel warned: Reform or ye perish.”

In appraising this evidence it must be said in all fairness that every number of this neWSpaper is not so full of thoughts and sentiments of this class as is this one, but, on the other hand, no edition is void of them. Surely to one looking for signs, it indicates a remarkably deep and poignant yearning for “peace on earth, good will to men” on the part of the people of the capital.

What about Government? Do we find these same sentiments of peace and global consciousness among political leaders and statesmen, or are they too embroiled in personal and partisan interests to perceive reality? Let us again review the evidence at hand.

In January of this year 1950, the agenda of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee includes a series of hearings on different proposals dealing with regional or world union. One of these proposals was introduced by no less than 19 Senators and declares that the goal of the United States foreign policy should be to strengthen the United Nations and “seek its development into a world federation” with defined powers to enforce peace by international law. Another, sponsored by 22 Senators as well as several former high officials of the Federal Government, seeks the formation of an Atlantic Union. A third

767

calls for a United Nations Conference to establish “true world government.” Last year a special committee of the House of Representatives listened to similar proposals.

Speeches and other public utterances of high officials make repeated references to the responsibility of the United States to establish world peace and order, to protect the freedom of the individual, and to help less fortunate members of humanity in all parts of the earth to better their lot. God and the necessity for religion are mentioned with increasing frequence in high places. As one example, one of the top officials of the US. armed forces declared in a recent public speech that “this country’s democracy is based upon recognition of a Supreme Being” and that there is “increasing recognition and admission that hope of the solution of the problem of the world, hope of re-establishment of better conditions, lies in religion and in more faithful reliance on religion.”

As concrete proof of the sincerity of such declarations is the steadily growing number of institutions founded by Government Whose purpose is in some way linked with international collaboration and the building of a better world. Typical of these are the Institute of Inter—American Afiairs and the Division of Libraries and Institutes.

The former was organized by Congress in 1947 as a separate corporation “to further the general walfare of, and to strengthen friendship and understanding among, the peoples of the American Republics through collaboration with other governments and governmental agencies of the American Republics in planning, initiating, assisting, financing, administering and executing technical programs and projects, especially in the fields of public health, sanitation, agriculture and education.” It can be added that this institution is establishing an enviable record for the skill, sincerity and understanding with which it is carrying out its truly noble mission. It has not only already gained much good-will in Latin America but has also contributed greatly to raising the standard of living

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Mexico City Bahá’ís and friends at a picnic, January 1, 1949.

in the countries in which it has functioned. Its projects are financed jointly by Congress and the government of the country involved. The Division of Libraries and Institutes, a separate section of the State Department, has as its principal function the creation of better understanding through the medium of culture, especially the teaching of English. One of the chief instruments used in this work is the Cultural Center, established in different countries through the joint efforts and finances of the United States and the country in question, and governed by a Board of Directors elected by its own local associates. Both the Division of Libraries and Institutes and Institute of InterAmerican Affairs are expressly forbidden by their own charters to have anything to do with political matters, and neither has any provision for get ting back any of the money spent in its '

programs nor does the United States profit materially in any way from their operations except in so far as helping to create better and more prosperous neighbors can be of benefit to it. Finally, probably the most discussed single item is “Point Four” of the President’s Inaugural Address which would provide technical assistance to

help underprivileged peoples in other parts of the world improve their lot.

Younger men — lawyers, business men, educators—are giving up some years of their private careers and taking key spots in Government often with the chief motive of helping their country to help the world. As a wellknown writer and educator of the capital expresses it: “ a new type of statesman is making his appearance, one with truly humanitarian and idealistic motives.” As one talks with these men, he is impressed with the deep sense of mission that many of them have, although probably they cannot explain the origin. Many departments are frankly only interested in employing people with this “sense of mission.”

Hardly any one speaks any more in narrow, nationalistic terms; practically all have or are obtaining a global point of view. The words “the world,” “mankind,” are as common here now as were “the nation,” and “Americans” 10 years ago.

THE Bahá’í PLAN FOR WORLD ORDER

Now what does all this indicate for the nation and for the world, and how does it fit in with the predictions found

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in the Bahá’í Writings referred to earlier?

Let us try to summarize the latter.

The Bahá’ís believe that Baha’u’n'ah, Author of the Bahá’í Faith, brought the Divine Teachings necessary for humanity’s development and guidance in this age, and that therefore any one who studies His Teachings will find complete orientation in what is otherwise a period of distress and confusion.

Over 80 years ago Bahá’u’lláh outlined the Plan for World Order which He said must be put into effect in order that the Divine Will be carried out for our times. In subsequent writings He intimated quite clearly that mankind would only adopt this Plan after a time of wholesale frustration and suffering, even predicting world-wide disorder and destruction akin to chaos before enough people would awaken to the Divine Message in order to make it sufficiently effective to build world peace and order.

The core of Bahá’u’lláh’s Plan is world unity. Up until now, He declared, man has been going through a preliminary period of growth and training during which, in addition to developing his individual capacities, he has established successively the unity of family, tribe, city-state and nation. Now he is about to enter the stage of maturity and so he must complete the process already started by unifying the planet. This means briefly that a world commonwealth must be set up in which “all nations, races, creeds and classes are closely and permanently united, and in which the autonomy of its state members and the personal freedom and initiative of the individuals that compose them are definitely and completely safeguarded!”* This world commonwealth must have a world legislature, a world executive, a world tribunal, and a world capital. It will be necessary to establish a world language, a world script, a uniform currency and system of weights and measures, and a universal system of education. A world religion, in Which tradition and man-made creeds, rituals of worship and ecclesiastical organizations are subordi ‘Patte‘m For Future Society—By Shoghi Effendi

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nated to fundamental spiritual truths and universal laws revealed by the Divine Prophets, must serve both as the inspiration and foundation of this world commonwealth.

Naturally a change so radical as this in the very basis of society must come about as a gradual evolution as man himself matures sufficiently to become fit and capable to live in and play his part in running such a world. However, if we interpret correctly Bahá’u’lláh’s utterances, certain critical stages of suffering and destruction accompanied by spiritual awakening and growth of the surviving members of society bring in their wake rather sudden and farreaching developments. Some of these crises have already been experienced; others are still to come, probably very soon.

Now it seems that for reasons still perhaps not completely understood by us, Providence has decreed that the fate of the world at this juncture depends to an important degree upon that of N orth America; that upon the shoulders of the United States of America has been placed the tremendous and exacting burden not only of taking the vanguard in promoting the unity of the world but also in leading the world spiritually. Over and over during His visits to this country in 1912, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, eldest Son of Bahá’u’lláh and appointed by Him as Interpreter of His Teachings, referred to this divinely-conferred mission of the United States of America, fervently expressing the hope that she would not fail in her tasks. In more recent years Shoghi Effendi, present Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith has reiterated these statements, and added further that only in fulfilling these responsibilities could the United States of America hope to solve its own problems.

Clearly then, it should be of vital interest at this critical hour in the affairs of humanity, not only to the Bahá’ís but also to every citizen of the planet, to focus their eyes upon the American Nation to try to determine whether or not her people and her government are showing any signs of fulfilling her divinely-appointed destiny.

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WORLD

Much attention was attracted by the interesting window displays on the Main

street of Santiago, Chile, during the second South American Bahá’í Congress

held in that city, 1948. The one shown above depicts the Bahá’í world. The

rays radiating from the map point to photographs of Bahá’í gatherings in most of the countries of the world.

THE UNITED STATES FULFILLS ITS DESTINY

On summing up the evidence, great care must be used because the Bahá’í is so keenly aware of the future as traced by the prophetic Pen of Bahá’u’lláh, that it can be too easy to pick out one or two isolated signs and designate them a trend.

We are not trying to declare that all or even a majority of the people in or outside of Government have a clear picture of what the future holds or a positive faith of achieving world peace or unity. On the contrary, the confusion at times is rather appalling, as indeed it must be for those who do not possess the Divine Blueprint as revealed by Bahá’u’lláh. What we do claim is that at long last a great number of people are awakening; that the masses are becoming spiritualized; and that certain ones of the leaders are beginning to realize their responsibility

and that of the United States and that the trouble confronting the world is of such magnitude that human efforts and brains alone cannot solve it. These we hold to be very hopeful signs both for the future of the United States and for mankind.

As we finish this article on January 17, 1950, a synopsis of a recent unreported speech of the President is published which is most relevant. It states in part: “He (the President) said . . . that the welfare of this country is the welfare of the world . . . ‘Whether we like it or not, we are at the top of the heap in world affairs, a position which none of us likes to contemplate, a position which has possibilities almost too big for any man or group of men to contemplate. . . . I am just an ordinary citizen of this great republic of ours, who has the greatest responsibility in the world and whose responsibility is

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your responsibility. . . . And that is peace in the world,—-peace in Europe, peace in Asia, peace in South America, peace in Africa, peace in the Western Hemisphere, and the assumption of the leadership to bring that about.’ ”

From the review of the evidence as well as because of a tremendous feeling in the atmosphere of the capital of the United States, we conclude that this nation is going to fulfill its destiny.

“May this American Democracy be

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the first nation to establish the foundation of international agreement. May it be the first nation to proclaim the unity of mankind. May it be the first to unfurl the Standard of the Most Great Peace.” “The American Continent gives signs and evidences of very great advancement. Its future is even more promising, for its influence and illumination are far-reaching. It will lead all nations spiritually.”

(‘Abdu’l-Bahá —- 1912)

22.

IN THE HIGH SIERRAS

And they shall see the Son of man coming

BY MARZIEH GAIL1

D AYTIMES the trout stream was a big trout, slippery, dappled, now and then flashing white, easing under the watery aspens. At night it was pale in the blackness. Sitting by the campfire one could only hear it and see a vagueness down there under the bank where it ran. One could not distinguish between the moths brought into the flame, and the sparks flying out, and higher insects catching the light as they passed, and shooting stars, and stars. One could not keep track of these things.

Except that the stars were campfires again. This used to be Indian country, here under the incongruously Swiss-looking snow crags, along the trout stream; here you can still pick up Indian arrowheads of dark bottle-green obsidian, with the hairy chisel marks. When the white man drove the Indians away, they went up there in the sky, over our heads, and lit those campfires. So we have peace between the two again, with the red man up there the Winner. His spirit is always seeping back into America, like the blood of the heart seeping back, and it never wipes away. (That time we saw

Boulder Dam, the least Indian of all things, we found that Indian patterns had been worked into the massive floors; soft, moccasined, his spirit had come back.)

You would look into the redness of the campfire, and there, standing on its tail and watching you with white, piteously smoking eyes, was the ghost of the trout you had caught in the morning and fried at noon; fried it so fresh that it leapt in the pan.

That particular night something was going to happen, up there in the mountains. Everything was waiting for it. The wind had lowered, the hot ashes fell softly, the stream quieted and the aspens stilled. Now it was happening. We looked up out of our well of black lMarzieh Gail was born of a Persian-American marriage and was brought up in ,Washington, D.C., Paris, Istanbul, Tiflis, and Tihran. She holds degrees from Stanford University and the University of California, and is a member of Phi Beta Kappa. Returning to Ṭihrán after college. she served on the staff of the leading newspaper there. later joining the Office of War Information in New York City as a Persian Language Editor. She is now on the stafi of The Bahá’í World. Mrs. Gail has traveled widely in the interests of the Bahá’í Faith and has paid three visits to Shoghi Effendi at Haifa. Palestine. Early in 1948 she attended the Caribbean Bahá’í Congress in Mexico City, where she ave a course on Islam at sessions of the Interna ‘onal School.

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ness to the ridge: the trees along the ridge were catching fire, they were burning, like hair in a nimbus on some old saint’s picture. Flaming hair of trees along the ridge. We waited not moving, and we saw the white fire growing, and then we saw it was the white moon burning and rising up there over the fall of the ridge. Then the night went on as before. It resumed.

Later in the night we went over to the little store on the lake for a couple of bottles of milk. This place is listed on the map as “primitive area,” and it is safely far away from any towns, but even so we were only around the corner to milk “from non-reactive tuberculin tested cows.” That is America.

No moon during the mile’s walk, only the black wind to lean against. The lake was rimmed with a beach piled With tree limbs twisted satiny-white wood that made good burning. We could have sworn the lake was an ocean with China just beyond it, its further shores were so lost and unattainable.

On our way back we punched the dark now and then with our flashlight.

THE Bahá’í WORLD

Everything was black and quiet. Something was going to happen. We looked up to the hilltop, above the road, and there suddenly was the moon, dawning again, with all the freshness and drama, the ceremony and pause, of its dawning an hour ago, over our campfire.

I had never known before that the moon has many dawnings in a single night. It comes up as many times as there are hills and valleys and eyes watching.

An idea in the world is the sameit has many risings, each authentic and new and especially for the people it shines on. When you describe it, the people do not only hear what you tell them, they get the idea at first hand. It rises for them as it did for you.

The great world ideas are like that. For instance, about the time J esus rose over England—597—Buddha rose over J apan, 552. A new world idea comes, this time from Shiréz and Baghdad, and it is only beginning to rise, say over the western seas.

“I do not see the new world idea

Havana, Cuba Bahá’ís with Natalia Chavez, center, during first Regional Conference of the Bahá’ís of the Antilles, November 6, 1949.

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coming out of the East as you describe it,” people comment. It is perfectly all right for them to say this; they are telling you the truth. But then other people, apparently no more brilliant or stupid than the first, do see it. It rises for them, a special dawning for them, and their faces begin to glow With it. It is not only your moon any more, it is theirs too. You don’t have to repeat any more, “See the moon coming up—” or “Wait a minute and you’ll see the moon coming—” They would only look at you and say, “Are you crazy? Of. course I see it.”

Back at the campfire, the tamaracks had turned to cypresses in the moon 773

light. You had to force yourself not to imagine an Eastern palace there, piling lightly into the sky, poised above seven cloudy pools, tiled and terraced, one below the other, one spilling into the other. You had to hang on to yourself not to feel a nostalgia for something long ago that you never knew about; this is much worse than missing something that was once yours. Probably, through a twisting of time, it is a homesickness for what will come later on, perhaps in the world beyond this. Anyhow it takes hold of you if you sit by a trout stream in the summer moonlight.

23.

TO GATHER JEWELS1

BY HONOR KEMPTON

I T WAS a never—failing source of excitement to walk up the hill to the Book Cache, my shop in Anchorage, Alaska. On this particular winter’s morning I left the house early, wondering what colored dress the “Sleeping Lady” would be wearing. As I reached the top of the hill all excitement left me. It was as if a hand had been laid upon me and I was still. Only a quiet awe remained. Never had my mountain looked so beautiful. She lay wrapped in a pure white robe of glistening snow. Beneath her lapped the living blue waters of Cook Inlet. Across the valley stood the sentinel peaks of the Chugach Mountains paying tribute as the rising sun behind them softly touched my “lady’s dress.”

Whatever hardships one may endure in Alaska they are more than compensated by the majestic grandeur and beauty of the country. God must have loved this land when He created itthis land of a thousand lakes, of snowy mountain peaks, of green forests, of rare and delicate mosses, and gorgeous flowers. But God desired this lovely

land to be still more brilliantly illuminated and blessed.

These were the thoughts of a Bahá’í pioneer going to work on a winter’s morning.

‘Abdu’l-Bahá tells us in America’s Spiritual Mission: “Alaska is a vast country . . . yet the call of the Kingdom is not yet raised through that spacious territory. Consequently strive as far as ye are able to send to those parts fluent speakers, who are detached from aught else save God, attracted with the fragrances of God, and sanctified and purified from all desires and temptations. Their sustenance and food must consist of the teachings of God. First they must themselves live in accordance with those principles, then guide the people. Perchance, God willing, the lights of the most great guidance may illumine that country and the breezes of the rose garden of the love of God may perfume the nostrils of the inhabitants of Alaska.”

“Oh God, if it is Thy Will, give me an opportunity to speak of Thy Cause this day. Help me to spread Thy Faith

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Anniversary of the Birth of the Báb celebrated in Anchorage, Alaska, October 19, 1947.

over this vast and spacious country. Help me to ‘become like unto a regiment and conquer these countries through the love of God and the illuminations of divine teachings.’ ” Such was my earnest supplication before a busy day at the Book Cache.

Later that day, as always after the weekly broadcast of the Bahá’í teachings, I left the radio station in a state of utter happiness, almost of ecstasy. Such elation comes because something great has happened. One feels a vibrant power as the name of Bahá’u’lláh goes out over the ether, and with the knowledge of that power comes a sense of humility and of tremendous responsibility.

The word of God is sent out far into the wilderness, to the tiny cabins of the sourdoughs, to the trappers’ lonely homes, the prospectors’ log cabins, the Ranger’s lookout at the foot of Mt. McKinley, the old trading posts in Canada; to places like Dawson Creek, Whitehorse, Skagway; to Matanuska Valley, nestling under towering mountains, with its cluster of red roofed farmhouses, its school and its hospital. It goes up north to the native villages of Nome, Point Hope, Wainright, King Island; still farther north to the

lonely outpost of Point Barrow with its valiant band of nurses and teachers, Who, under terrific hardships, serve these happy people, the Eskimos. It goes west to Kodiak, Dutch Harbor, and still farther west down to the lonely wastes of the Aleutian Islands, to the villages of the Aleuts, as far down as the windswept island of Atka, where there lives a radiant Bahá’í, Ethel 01iver, and her talented husband Simeon. (In their home in this desolate yet strangely beautiful village there hangs a picture of the Bahá’í House of Worship, and the little native children when the pass before this picture look up and say, in their quaint Aleutian dialect, “The Temple of Light”)

The Word goes out to the sturdy little planes of the “bush pilots,” to the majestic planes on their way to and from the Orient, down to the ships plying the waters of the Bering Sea, and across that sea to the wastelands of Siberia, to the Alaskan Gulf and the Arctic Ocean.

To the sea, the earth, and the sky goes out the creative. Word of God and the name of His Manifestation, Bahá’u’lláh.

Later that same winter day, when I was back again in the Book Cache with

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its constant, exciting activity, the telephone rang. It seemed an unusually insistent ring. I picked up the receiver. A quiet voice asked, “Will you please tell me about this Bahá’í Faith? I listened to your program for the first time three weeks ago and thought, ‘That is good.’ I listened the next week and said to myself, ‘That is very good. I must do something about it.’ I heard you again today and I cannot stand it any longer. I must know more.” Our invitation to dinner was immediately given and accepted.

That evening, as we were putting the finishing touches to the dinner table, there was a knock at the door. There stood a beautiful woman. Her regal bearing and glowing face marked her as a leader of her race. In the soft rich tones heard often among the Negro people she introduced herself as Grace Bahovec from Baranof Island, Alaska.

Her story is a fascinating one. She and her husband, who is postmaster, live on this remote island. During the long summer evenings they would walk along the edge of the water seaching for semiprecious stones, petrified pearls, and the like. After a while they found that they had a valuable collection. Then Mr. Bahovec began to carve the stones for setting into rings, bracelets, lockets. He came to have a strong desire to possess some Alaskan jade. This jade comes from the interior of Alaska far up north.

One day Mr. Bahovec said to his wife, “You have worked hard this winter with little recreation. I suggest that you go ‘outside’ for a trip.” Grace quickly agreed and made plans for her trip. Instead of going to Seattle she headed for Anchorage to see if she could find the much-coveted jade for her husband. Once in Anchorage she obtained work and quietly began to search for some clue to the whereabouts of the jade, but with no results. It was at this time that she heard the radio talks on the Bahá’í Faith.

Grace told us her story and expressed her keen disappointment at her failure to find the jade. Dagmar Dole looked up at her smilingly and said, “I can tell you where you can get all the jade

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you want,” and then proceeded to tell her just how she could procure the jade. Later, following Dagmar’s instructions, Grace did obtain all the jade she wanted.

That was a memorable night. We talked of the Bahá’í Faith way into the small hours of the morning. Our listener was so deeply interested. When she arose to go, both Dagmar and I felt impelled to give her a Bahá’í book. On the fly—leaf I wrote these words of Bahá’u’lláh:

“To gather jewels have I come to this world. If one speck of a jewel lie hid in a stone and that stone be beyond the seven seas, until I have found and secured that jewel, my hand shall not stay from its search.”1

Grace came again and again; she asked many questions and read the Bahá’í books. One Sunday night we were holding a fireside and were planning to show pictures of the Bahá’í Temple. There were many young couples present — about thirty-five people in all. There was a knock at the door and there stood Grace with two of her friends. We welcomed them with great joy, and presented them to the rest of the gathering. The graciousness and courtesy of Grace Bahovec won everybody’s heart. When after the meeting she thanked each one for the welcome so freely given, every man in the room came forward to shake her hand. For many of the non-Bahá’ís it was a new and wonderful experience.

As time drew near for her to leave Anchorage we decided that we would arrange a farewell dinner. All the Bahá’ís in the community helped. It was to be a very special evening. Just as everything was ready, there came the familiar knock and there stood Grace. Again her face had that illumined look. I stood very still, possessed by a strange feeling of expectation. Again that radiant smile. Then she said: “I am one of Bahá’u’lláh’s jewels and He has found me. I came for jade but I have found a priceless jewel.”

1From "Gems of Nabil translated by Shoghi Effendi and Dr. Esslemont, p. 934, Bahá’í World, Vol. VIII.

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Delegates to Congress at Guatemala City, with Mrs. Dorothy Baker, center.

Delegates and visitors, Second Central American Bahá’í Congress at Mexico City, 1948.

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Delegates and representatives at Press Conference, Continental Hotel, November 7, 1946. First South American Bahá’í Congress, Buenos Aires, Argentina.

That night we talked, and read the creative words of Bahá’u’lláh. We read and discussed the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. Grace expressed her ardent desire to become a Bahá’í. After she had signed the card of membership, I bent over and kissed her and said, “Now you are my Bahá’í sister.”

That was only one of the things that happened in Alaska. A chosen soul, born in Haiti, had found her way to Anchorage and there, out of the ether, came to her the message of Bahá’u’lláh —the Manifestation of God for this day. It is one of my precious memories of the things that happened in the shadow of the “Sleeping Lady.”

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THE Bahá’í WORLD

24-.

LA CIVILISATION,

FRUIT DE LA

I I REVELATION

PAR LUCIENNE MIGETTE

ON A l’habitude d’assimiler avant tout les religions 2‘1 une série de gestes rituels devant un autel matériel et 53 1a croyance en des dogmes obligatoires inexplicables pour beaucoup. S’il y a conflit entre les dogmes et l’intelligibilité des Ecrits sacrés révélés, c’est que ces dogmes ne reflétent pas ou plus 1a Révélation primitive.

Une Révélation a toujours été une grande lumiére jetée sur toute la création: religion certes, puisque notre but est d’approcher Dieu de plus en plus, mais aussi enseignements sur bien d’autres questions: philosophie, sciences, arts, lois de la vie, sociales et juridiques, en un mot moyen de civilisatlon. Si le monde ne l’a pas toujours compris, c’est cependant un fait qui ressort de l’étude et de la méditation de l’histoire.

D’aucuns diront: mais i1 n’y a eu qu’une seule Révélation. Et chacun d’ajouter que c’est celle qu’il posséde, tandis que celle prénée par 1e voisin est fausse et sort du diable. Conséquence: toutes sont qualifiées de fausses. Seulement . . . d’ofi vient ce fait étrange que ces “Révélations fausses” ont toutes apportées au monde chacune dans leur temps ce magnifique fruit: une civilisation? Il est impossible, 2‘1 moins d’étre de mauvaise foi de nier ces faits historiques. A chacune des Révélations du passé émanant d’un Fondateur, les peuples qui l’acceptérent eurent 1e pouvoir de construire une civilisation; puis, avec le temps et pour des raisons évidentes £1 trouver, ces civilisations dégénérérent et moururent; d’autres montérent alors au zénith, toujours provenant de la méme origine divine. Quelques regards dans le temps et sur chaque partie du monde ancien suffisent é. convaincre.

La premiére conclusion qui s’impose est donc celle-ci: puisque les civilisations meurent, i1 faut que la Lumiére universelle revienne de temps é autre. Sinon, comment les reconstruire. C’est ce que nous allons constater: ce retour périodique de la Lumiére qu’on appele “Révélation”. A travers les éges, c’est une longue chaine ininterrompue de grands jours et de grandes nuits, comme des saisons spirituelles é longue échéance. Aussi loin que remontent les souvenirs actuels de l’histoire de notre terre, nous retrouvons ce rythme. Depuis Adam, dernier souvenir parmi les plus anciens, cette grande respiration berce le monde. Les Révélations du passé dont il reste encore 1a trace visible sur la terre apparaissent sous deux aspects: des unes, les plus anolennes, nous ne retrouvons que des traditions orales comme par exemple dans le Zoroastrianisme ou le Boudhisme, mais aucun écrit originel du Prophéte lui-méme d’ofi, comme dans toute transmission humaine verbale, surtout é longue échéance, elles sont sujettes é caution; des autres nous possédons des textes écrits comme dans le Judaisme, 1e Christiansme, l’Islamisme. Quelques-uns d’entre eux cependant ont été remaniés ou récrits depuis leur premiére parution. Ces textes sont: l’Ancien Testament et l’Evangile; seul, 1e Coran dicté par le Prophéte luiméme nous offre encore les textes primitifs. Mais aprés 1e Coran, d’autres écrits sacrés ont été donnés au monde é une époque fort rapprochée de nous puisqu’ils datent d’é peine un siécle. Ils sont encore é l’état de manuscrits originaux, parfaitement authentiques et conservés soigneusement. Ce sont donc les seuls qui ne peuvent étre suspectés de déformation humaine et chacun peut

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Recently acquired land for the first Bahá’í Summer School Institution of New Zealand.

First Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Madrid, Spain, elected April 21, 1948.

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les consulter s’il 1e désire: ce sont les Oeuvres du Báb et de Bahá’u’lláh. Ancien Testament

L’Ancien Testament est le document de la Révélation de Moise. Le fruit de cette Révélation est la civilisation judaique. Qui 1e contestera si, ne se contentant pas de lire les fastidieux récits des actes matériels des juifs primitifs ou de la vie de tel ou tel roi israélite, il étudie plutét le développement et la hauteur de la civilisation que ce peuple sut créer aprés son installation en Palestine. Le grandeur de cette civilisation ne rend-elle pas plus perplexe encore si l’on songe é l’origine et é l’abaissement de ces hordes esclaves, les parias d’Egypte, de la catégorie la plus basse de naissance, esclaves de la société qui étaient voués par définition é une Vie rampante auprés de leurs maitres; destinée toute tracée et sans espoir, ils étaient élevés dans le dur apprentissage des plus basses besognes matérielles maintenus dans une obscure ignorance intellectualle, sans étincelle spirituelle non plus. Ce sont ces éléments craintifs, bornés, ignares, habitués :31 1a tyrannie et aux coups, n’ayant donc nulle notion de la discipline volontaire que doit comporter toute liberté que Moise sut sortir des mains de leurs maitres: 11 1e fit seul. Sa seule force était Sa parole. Comment réussitil é mener ce troupeau redoutablement indocile et aveugle devant cette inconnue: sa liberté? 5. 1e conduire victorieusement en Palestine, é vaincre toutes les tribulations de 40 années de marche errante? Suivons ensuite 1e chemin ascendant de cette histoire jusqu’é l’épanoujssement d’une civilisation qui éclaira tous les autres peuples, au point que les grecs eux—mémes, ces représentants d’une autre glorieuse civilisation venaient chercher l’instruction et la philosophie auprés du peuple juif. Certes, cette marche ascendante fut étroitement entretenue par les envoyés inspirés que furent les prophétes d’Israél. Ce ne fut pas sans chutes et rechutes que cette progression fut fidéle et continue; mais précisément voyonsnous lé une continuité de pensée, d’illumination et d’action. C’est précisément cette influence £1 longue

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échéance qui souligne une des caractéristiques d’une véritable Révélation de Dieu. Outre sa puissance qui permet de faire d’un peuple d’esclaves un des premiers de la terre par l’intelligence et l’activité développées par la foi, 1a longue durée de cette action place une Révélation 2: un rang infiniment supérieur 21 celui d’une simple réforme ou d’un simple mouvement spiritualiste bienfaisant. Tandis qu’une réforme ou un mouvement doi’c trouver devant soi une organisation déjé. construite qu’il modifiera ou transformera, 1a Révélation israélite offre 1e spectacle d’un peuple de parias ignorants parti de zéro a plusieurs points de vue et parvenu au sommet d’une civilisation basée sur les enseignements donnés par cet Etre supérieur: 1a Manifestation divine. Nulle comparaison ne peut tenir entre une Manifestation divine et un héros, un philosophe ou un réformateur religieux quant au degré de son influence et de son action réele profonde et durable sur la vie des peuples. Décadence

Comme dans toute société humaine, l’influence bienfaisante méme d’une Révélation n’est pas éternelle. Tant que les hommes savent vivre l’esprit méme de la Révélation spirituelle 2‘1 travers les formes dont ils ne peuvent se soustraire puisque nous vivons dans le domame de la forme, ils continuent é progresser et élargir leur civilisation. Dés que, quelle que soit 1a cause: intérét, incompréhension, négligence, ils glissent dans l’accomplissement mécanique des formes rituelles en suivant par ailleurs leur seules impulsions dans la vie courante, 1a Révélation devient lettre morte pour eux et la décadence commence. La civilisation s’efirite peu 2‘1 peu, des désordres naissent an sein de la société, 1a corruption s’installe, 1a paresse et la discorde. Le grand souffle harmonique qui dynamisait les individus et les institutions semble s’en étre a11é. La confusion régne et les individus, troublés et malheureux au sein de leurs plaisirs mémes et de leur apparence de parfaite liberté se mettent, les uns consciencieusement, d’autres sans toujours s’en rendre compte, d’autres enfin sans

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Bahá’ís representing seven participating South American countries and the United States gathered at the site of the Third South American Teaching Congress, January, 1949, $210 Paulo, Brazil.

Bahá’í Conference in Panama, 1947. Delegates and friends visiting ancient ruins.

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vouloir l’avouer, a la recherche d’une Chose nouvelle, un reméde qui ranimerait et revivifierait les activités et les institutions. Ceux qui cherchent consciencieusement savent qu’une Révélation nouvelle apporterait 1a résurrection au monde agonisant; les autres ne 1e savent pas. Ils cherchent é imaginer un systéme ou une doctrine qu’ils croient pouvoir étre une panacée universelle. Les uns, les réformateurs et les spiritualistes s’inspirent des écritures et, le plus souvent, dénoncent l’éloignement profond des peuples de la Source pure qui les avait élevés. Ils téchent de supprimer certaines formes matérielles devenues surannées pour l’époque, formes emprisonnant les ailes‘ de l’éme; ils imaginen’c d’autres formes mieux aptes selon eux é refléter ce qui fut ]a Cause premiére de vie. 115 y réussissent é divers degrés; et ils font plus 011 moins d’adeptes. Certains sont purifiés et éclairés. Mais en méme temps, cela crée des divisions au sein de la société. Comme toute entreprise purement humaine, cela produit un progrés dans une seule spécialisation: ceux qui deviennent ainsi sectaires ne sont pas toujours animés de cette charité bienveillante é l’égard des autres croyants commandée cependant par tous les Révélateurs; car seuls, Ceux-ci sont capables de l’insuffler au coeur humain par leur nature divine douée précisément d’un pouvoir re-créateur.

D’autres se détournent de la Révélation a eux imposée dans leur jeunesse par leur famille ou leur instructeur et essaient de remonter é une autre qui se perd dans la nuit des temps et qui, révélée é une époque différente de la leur ne peut, dans sa forme, leur étre adaptée. Comme ils se perdent dans des traditions plus ou moins déformées et des commentaires humains surajoutés, i1 s’ensujt une doctrine purement imaginaire qui ne ressemble plus que de fort loin :21 1a doctrine originelle.

Les autres enfin tournant complétement 1e dos £1 la Révélation, é toute idée d’inspira’cion divine, é toute croyance en un Dieu, essaient de construire quelque systéme purement politique ou quelque doctrine sociale. Mais dans ces tentatives 2‘1 base complétement hu THE BAHA’T

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maine, 1e résultat n’est que partiel; i1 peut étre bon pour un petit nombre d’hommes s’il avantage ce petit groupe; mais i1 ne satisfera qu’un nombre restreint parce qu’un cerveau humain ordinaire ne peut construire une panacée pour le monde entier. II faut un cerveau dominant de bien loin tous les nétres et une prescience surhumaine pour mettre au point une doctrine convenant 2‘1 tous et dans tous les domaines.

Evangiles

Ce cerveau supérieur existe de temps 51 autre sur terre. A ces périodes de tétonnements et de tentatives de resurrection, i1 apparait 51 point et apporte aux hommes ce qu’ils cherchent, bien que ceux-ci 1e traitent presque tous chaque fois en ennemi, I’obligeant chaque fois aux soufirances, au sacrifice complet. Ce cerveau une fois disparu, son oeuvre et sa doctrine demeurent cependant et, au fur et :21 mesure que les années s’écoulent, 1e monument constructif qu’il a laissé se dévoile, les hommes 1e reconnaissent plus ou moins Vite et, sur cette inspiration, construisent 1a civilisation nouvelle. Et ils réussissent cette fois, car 1a nouvelle Révélation apportée posséde deux caractéres distinctifs surhumains: 1°-elle est compléte pour l’époque; 2°elle posséde 1e gage et la puissance de vie, condition indispensable 5 son succes.

Qui peut nier que la Révélation Chrétienne ait apportée cette résurrection 5 son époque, é um monde décadent et corrompu?

Islamisme

Mais si 1e Christianisme en son essence é'tait parfair pour la terre entiére, 1a terre entiére ne put en profiter car tous les peuples ne se connaissaient pas encore entre eux et beaucoup n’ont connu 1e Message Chrétien que bien des siécles aprés sa naissance. Avant qu’il ne parvienne é tous au long des éges, une autre Révélation était donnée au pays Arabe; l’Islamisme. A nouveau, 1e miracle s’accomplissait, faisant d’un peuple arriéré, cruel, barbare, un peuple ordonné, soumis et travailleur. Le merveilleuse civilisation musulmane fleurissait en Orient mais venait éclairer une partie de l’Occident lui [Page 783]ARTICLES AND REVIEWS

méme, Afrique du Nord, Espagne. Tout ceci peut étre connu et compris par l’étude intégre de l’histoire. L’impartialité nous commande méme d’avouer que la civilisation chrétienne sur laquelle nous sommes toujours seulement censés vivre, a adopté bien des principes sociaux et des institutions don’c les bases furent révélées dans le Coran. Nous vivons sur ces institutions sociales bienfaisantes; nous ne pourrions plus nous en passer, mais tant de personnes continuent a railler l’Islamisme on a ignorer son Fondateur.

L’epoque Moderne

Si cette courte revue des Révélations é travers les éges a réussi :31 mettre quelque peu en lumiére cette grande loi du rythme des saisons spirituelles, une réflexion bien courte nous aménera é cette conclusion: “dans ce cas, 2‘1 quel degré aujourd’hui avons-nous besoin d’une fraiche Révélation si on en juge par l’état chaotique non d’un seul pays, mais du monde entier cette fois, puisque 1a terre entiére est maintenant connue et forme une unité matérielle. Et quelle devrait étre 1a force inouie et la complexité de cette Révélation pour lui permettre de satisfaire tous les hommes difiérents des antipodes et étre adaptée é tous les modes de vie.”

C’est en effet lé que nous en sommes. Et, fidéle aux tableaux antiques précédant l’apparition de la spendeur prophétique, l’image des peuples cherchan’c la “Chose nouvelle”, 1e reméde ranimant et revivifiant se présente :1 nos yeux une fois encore, mais :3 un degré universel et 5 une profondeur vertigineuse. Nous assistons aux angoisses multiples d’un monde divis'é é l’extreme: les uns s’accrochent désespérémen’c aux ruines dogmatiques de leurs sectes qui ne représentent que peu on plus rien de l’esprit initial de leurs Révélations, d’autres réalisent 1e vide de ces formes, s’en affranchissent. mais . pour en réformer immédiatement d’autres qui ne sont toujours que des formes plus 011 moins dénuées d’esprit; d’autres, rejetant comme toujours croyance et foi, se tournent vers un systéme politique ou vers une doctrine philosophique ou sociale quelconque, pensant y trouver 1e reméde universel du monde, en méme

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temps que l’idéal de toute leur vie. Mais de meme qu’un étre humain n’a jamais pu combler é lui tout seul la vie d’un autre, encore moins une doctrine politique ou sociale ne peut-elle suffire é donner un idéal complet.

“Ne te dépouille pas de la beauté de mon Manteau; ne te prive pas de ta part de ma merveilleuse Fontaine, autrement 1a soif te saisirait dans mon éternité”, a dit Bahá’u’lláh. C’est cela la soif: c’est cette recherche angoissée, cette poursuite et ces essais infructueux qui ne vous satisfont point.

Queue conclusion? A l’évidence, 1a terre a soif d’une nouvelle Révélation et ce besoin est d’une urgence aigué. Bahá’u’lláh

Ces Révélations successives torment é travers l’histoire une chaine ininterrompue. Chacun des chainons s’encastre dans le précédent. Et les hommes qui s’y accrochent sont arrivés au port et ne risquent plus de se perdre.

Le chainon d’aujourd’hui s’est présenté de Lui-méme comme les Autres: c’est Bahá’u’lláh. A l’image de ses illustres Prédécesseurs, II a apporté preuves et arguments et laissé des fruits beaucoup plus encore que naguére. Les bases de la civilisation que peut construire le monde sur Sa Révélation sont puissantes et universelles, aussi bien pour l’Orient que pour l’Occident; elles sont acceptables par les hommes de toute race, tout nation, toute classe et, miracle nouveau, par toutes les dénominations religieuses du globe. Loin de paraitre ennemie — je dis bien “paraitre”, car toutes les Révélations sont unes dans leur essence, ayant Dieu comme source; ce sont les hommes qui se font :31 tort les ennemis les uns des autres en leurs noms de ce qui subsiste sur terre des Révélations du passé, elle les confirme clans leur essence primitive, tandis qu’évidemment, elle dévoile et dénonce les déformations que leur ont fait subir les hommes.

Mon but n’est pas ici de détailler ce qu’est 1a Révélation Bahá’íe, pas plus que je n’ai détaillé ce que sont celles du passé que chacun connait plus ou moins. Tout le monde peut aisément s’informer A son sujet et se faire rapide

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ment une opinion personnelle. Mon but a simplement été de tracer en quelques touches schématiques 1a vision de cette chaine gigantesque qui se tisse lentement dans le temps et qui est le guide fixe, stable, solide et sfir, 1e céble indéracinable toujours 2‘1 portée de la main de l’homme dans son chemin de l’évolution. Mon but a aussi été d’ajouter le nom du Dernier Chainon encore si peu connu.

Conclusion

On pourrait se demander pourquoi, parmi ces masses d’étres humains $1 la recherche ardente d’une nouvelle ascension évolutive, si peu savent voir et accepter le grand Maitre de la Révélation lorsqu’Il parait, au point qu’ils 1e persécutent horriblement chaque fois. Et cependant, le temps ouvre ensuite leurs yeux; un grand nombre viennent é Lui et se rallient A son programme de tout leur coeur. Les raisons sont certes diverses. Sans énumérer les raisons personnelles multiples, attardons-nous sur une raison trés courante de cet éloignement, cause impersonnelle affectant quantités de personnes de bonne foi: c’est la confusion de deux parties trés distinctes dans la Révélation: 1a partie transitoire avec la partie éternelle. Toutes les Révélations ont comporté deux aspects: 1°— La partie profonde, toujours invisible, une dans son essence avec les autres sources puisqu’elles sont toutes de Dieu, é’cernelle, et que chaque Prophéte ou Manifestation divine ne modifie jamais A son apparition, ne faisant que le confirmer d’une maniére plus énergique encore; 2°— 1a partie transitoire qui n’est qu’une forme visible et qui est adaptée é une période de temps d’évolution sur terre.

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La partie éternelle est la portion purement spirituelle, celle en somme que l’on pourrait qualifier de “valable” dans tous les mondes, méme sans connaitre ces mondes, que l’on soit incarné ou non: morale, amour, fraternité, justice, etc . . . 1a partie visible est le cété dogmatique, celle que l’on cristallise dan des rites extérieurs matériels et qui n’est qu’une tentative de manifester sur le plan purement physique, les beautés et les réalités suprémes du monde spirituel.

Dira~ton done que les hommes, parce qu’ils ont adhéré 721 une religion révélée anc1enne, parce qu’ils ont reconnu une Manifestation divine, un des Messies des peuples venus au cours de l’histoire, sont soudainement devenus si parfaits que leurs pratiques et leurs dogmes reflétent fidélement, parfaitement et d’un seul coup, 1a pure et éternelle spiritualité? Sfirement pas. Alors, il faut compter modifier ces enseignements, ces rites, ces institutions, afin de s’approcher de plus en plus du reflet cherché. On est donc obligé de changer les rites et les dogmes lorsque ceux-ci ont fait avancer l’humanité 51 un point maximum de ce qu’ils pouvaient. C’est é ce moment que le Révélation suivante vient confirmer 1e partie éternelle, mais donne de nouveaux moyens de pratiquer 1a vraie vie pour la rendre plus proche des réalités spirituelles. Et c’est pour cela que beaucoup tournent 1e dos é cette Révélation nouvelle: parce qu’elle abroge 1a partie transitoire de la précédente pour le remplacer par une autre progressive pour l’époque et destinée r21 faire franchir un bond nouveau é l’humanité, les hommes se détournent de l’efiluve éternelle pour s’accrocher aux formes transitoires et mortelles.

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25.

DIE KLEINE WELT UND DER GROSSE FRIEDE

BY DR. HERMANN GROSSMANN

D IE Erfindungen der letzten hundert Jahre haben die Welt klein gemacht. Weit auseinander leigende Lander und Kontinente sind durch Dampfschiff, Eisenbahn und Flugzeug, Telegraph, Fernsprecher, Fernseher und Radio naher zusammengeruckt als die entfernteren Gebietsteile Deutschlands oder Frankreichs zu Anfang der Neuzeit. Gebirge, Flusse und Meere haben aufgehort, Hindernisse zwischen den verschiedenen Kulturen zu bilden, und selbst die Landesgrenzen beginnen ihren hemmenden Charakter zu verlieren. So konnten Handel und Wandel weithin uber die Erde fluten, vermochten die Geister des Abend—und des Morgenlandes einander zu durchdringen. Sculen und Ausbildungsmoglichkeiten entstanden in den uberseeischen Landern, durch die abendlandisches Wissen, Denken und Empfinden vermittelt wurden, spater sandte Aisien und Afrika selbst seine Sohne nach dem Westen, um ihm die Geheimnisse seiner Zivilisation abzulauschen. Ausgrabungen und scharfsinnige wissenschaftliche Ueberlegungen flordern ein immer umfangreicher werdendes Bild alter und altester Zeiten, ihrer Anschauungen und Gebrauche, wahrend die Astronomie entfernteste Welten, Physik, Chemie und Biologic die Grenzen des Stoffes und den Ursprung des Lebens erschliessen. So ist nicht nur die Erde sondern der ganze Kosmos gleichsam in der Retorte des forschenden Menschengeistes zusammengeschmolzen, und hat sich eine Fulle von Erkenntnissen, freilich auch von ungelosten Fragen und scharfsten Gegensatzen ergeben. Die Welt ist kleiner, das Blick feld grosser geworden, aber das Auge sieht sich einer verwirrenden Unzahl von Einselheiten gegenuber, ohne sie mehr zu einem geschlossenen Bild Vereinen zu konnen. So stossen die Geister des Ostens und Westens, des Nordens und Sudens mit ihren Weltanschauungen und Sitten, ihren Bestrebungen und Instinkten hart aufeinander, jeder bestrebt, sich durchzusetzen, und dpch ist jeder in sich selbst durch die Fulle der unverarbeiteten Einflusse geschwacht und zersetzt, keiner stark genug, den andern niederzuzwingen und jeder zu stark, um selbst zum Erliegen zu kommen. Die fruhere grosse Welt konnte in einzelnen Teilen versteppen, Volker ausrotten und Kulturen vernichten, ohne dass es die ubrigen Gebiete betraf oder sie auch nur darum wussten, und wenn auch einzelne Zweige des Baumens der Menschheit verdorrten und abstarben, so blieb doch anderswo ubergenug an Leben vorhanden, das sich entWiCkeln und ausbreiten konnte. Die heutige Welt aber in ihrer gegenwartigen Durchdringung und Verflechtung, bei der unabweichbar eines vom andern abhangt, kann nicht recht leben noch sterben—bis sie den Sinn ihres chaotischen Zustandes und die Notwendigkeit seiner Ueberwindung in einem allgemeinen Frieden der Einheit erkannt hat und sich ernsthaft und mutig auf den Weg des einzig moglichen Heils macht. Und wie es eine grosse Einheit ist, die im Ziel liegt, so ist es auch ein grosser Friede, den die Menschheit benotigt, umso grosser, je kleiner die Welt wird.

Mit dem Wort, dass Wir alle “die Fruchte eines Baumes und die Bluten

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eines Zweiges” sind, fasst Bahá’u’lláh die Quintessenz der durch J ahrtausende genahrten Shensucht der Menschheit nach jenem “Frieden auf Erden”, der ihr endlich Erlosung aus den qualenden taglichen Aengsten und Noten bescheren soll. “Diese Handvoll Staub, die Welt, ist eine Heimat, lasst sie eine solche in Einheit sein. Entsaget dem Stolz, denn er ist eine Ursache der Zwietracht. Folget nur dem, was Harmonie zur Folge hat.” Es ist das Befehlswort der gottlichen Autoritat selbst, das in der Geburtsstunde des allumfassenden Einheitsbegriffes durch den Mund des Offenbarers an die gebarende Welt geht.

Der erste Schritt zu einem dauernden Frieden, von dem Bahá'u’lláh spricht, ist der “kleinere Friede,” ein Friede in der politischen Sphare der Volker. “Die wahre Zivilisation,” so fuhrt ‘Abdu’l-Bahá dazu aus, “wird ihr Banner inmitten der Welt erheben, wenn einige edle Herrscher mit hohem Ehrgeiz, gleich Sonnen am Himmel der menschlichen Begeisterung leuchtend, zum Besten der ganzen menschlichen Art Schritte ergreifen und mit tester Entschlossenheit und geistiger Tatkraft eine der allgemeinen Weltfriedensfrage gewidmete Versammlung berufen, wenn sie, unter Ausnutzung aller Moglichkeiten zur Verwirklichung ihrer Ideale, eine Einheit under den Staaten der Welt schaffen und ein endgultiger Vertrag und starkes Bundnis unter ihnen zu Bedingungen folgt, die kein Ausbrechen mehr moglich sein lassen. Sobald das ganze Menschengeschlect einmal durch seine Vertreter beteiligt und zur Ratifizierung dieses Vertrages eingeladen ist, der in der Tat ein universaler Friedensvertrag sein und von allen Volkern der Erde heilig geachtet werden muss, wird es die Pflicht der vereinigten Menschen der Welt sein, daruber zu wachen, dass dieser grosse Vertrag Kraft und Dauer gewinne.” Die Grundlage dieses Bundnisses “$011 so gefestigt sein, dass sich im Fall der Verletzung irgend eines seiner Paragraphen durch einen Staat die ubrigen Nationen der Welt erheben und ihn zum Gehorsam zuruckzwingen. In der Tat, die ganze Menschheit muss ihre Krafte derart vereinen, dass sie die betref THE Bahá’í WORLD

fende Regierung zum Sturz bringt.” Ein internationales Schiedsgericht, dessen “Mission die Vorbeuge gegen den Krieg” sein wird und eine universal zu lehrende Welthilfssprache und Welteinheitsschrift sollen die Bemuhungen der verbundeten Nationen erganzen.

Doch dieser “kleine Friede” ist nur ein Schritt, und er vermochte zu keinem bleibenden Ausgleich zu fuhren, wenn ihm nicht der “Grosste Friede” als wirkliche Erfullung des Traumes der Jahrtausende nachfolgt, der Friede, der in gleicher Weise von Herz und Bewusstsein der Menschen Besitz nimmt, der seine Kraft aus dem WeSen der wahren Religion zieht und seine Grundlagen in der Erkenntnis der von Bahá’u’lláh gelehrten allumfassenden, vorurteilslosen Einheit in der Mannigfaltigkeit hat. Das ist die Einheit, die “in ihrem wahren Sinn bedeutet, dass Gott allein als die einzige Macht gedacht werden sol], die alle Dinge belebt und beherrscht, die ja nur Aeusserungen Seiner Schopferkraft sind,” und die Quelle der Erkenntnis dieser Einheit bildet darum die “Erkenntnis Gottes,” die “auf keine andere Weise erlangt werden kann, als durch die Erkenntnis Seiner gottlichen Manifestation” (Bahá’u’lláh).

So erschliesst uns die Offenbarung Bahá’u’lláh’s in Wahrheit “einen neuen Himmel und eine neue Erde” und mit ihnen einen neuen Menschen in einer neuen Ordung. Der “homo sapiens,” der uns erstmalig in den Funden aus der mittleren Steinzeit entgegentritt, ist nach J ahrtausenden der Vorbereitung nun ins Alter der Reife eingetreten, in dem er beweisen 5011, was er seither gelernt hat. Gross erscheint uns der Wandel von jenen fruhen Menschen bis heute, unendlich grosser noch mag den Spateren die Veranderung zum neuen Menschen, der nun in den Wehen seiner Geburt liegt, und zu seiner kommenden Ordnung dunken, denn “dies ist ein neuer Zyklus. Alle Horizonte der Welt sind erleuchtet, und die Welt wird in der Tat zu einem Garten und Paradies werden.” (‘Abdu’l-Bahá).

Mit den Manifestationen des Báb als dem strahlenden Harold und Wegbereiter “Dessen, Den Gott nach Ihm

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offenbaren” werde, wurde vor hundert J ahren das glorreiche Zeitalter der Einheit eroffnet, mit der Erscheinung Bahá’u’lláh’s hat es seine universale Offenbarung erfahren, deren uberragende Bedeutung noch durch die von Bahá’u’lláh Selbst vorgenommene Einsetzung ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s als “Mittelpunkt seines Bundes” eine Hervorhebung findet, eines Bundnisses zwischen dem Offenbarer und Seinen Getreuen, gleich wie Er, der Offenbarer, Ausdruck des Bundnisses Zwischen Gott und Seinen Geschopfen ist. Mit diesem hohen ein 787

maligen Amte wurde den Glaubigen in ‘Abdu’l-Bahá das “wahre Beispiel” und der erleuchtete zeitnahe Erklarer seines Wortes gegeben. Durch das Wort aber ergeht der gottliche But an die in den Wehen liegende Menschheit: “Kein Friede ist dir beschieden, es sei denn, du entsagst deinem Selbst und kommst zu Mir, denn es geziemt sich, dass dein Ruhm in Meinem Namen und nicht in dem deinen liege und dass due dein Vertrauen auf Mich und nicht auf dich selbst setztest, denn Ich will allein und vor allem geliebt sein" (Bahá’u’lláh).

26.

THE SMALL WORLD AND THE GREAT PEACE

BY DR. HERMANN GROSSMANN (Translated by Karl Schueck)

THE inventions of the last hundred years have made the world small. Countries and continents, far apart before, have by means of steamship, railway and airplane, telegraph, telephone, television and radio, been brought closer together than the farthest territories of Germany or France at the beginning of the new era. Mountain ranges, rivers, and oceans have ceased to be barriers between the various civilizations, and even the national boundaries are beginning to lose their separating character. Under such circumstances trade and commerce were able to encompass the entire world, and the spirit of Occident and Orient could increase its mutual penetration. Schools and educational institutions were founded in countries overseas which transmitted occidental knowledge, experience and emotions; in 1ater time, Asia and Africa sent their sons to the West to study the secrets of its civilization. Excavations, and methodical, scientific speculations keep un earthing a steadily widening picture of remote and ancient eras, of their manners and habits, while astronomy reveals the distant worlds, and physics, chemistry and biology approach the borders of the elemental part and the origin of life itself. In such fashion, not only the earth, but the entire cosmos have been reduced in the retort of the searching human mind, and an abundance of knowledge—and also of unsolved problems and extreme conflicts—has come forth.

The world has become smaller, the outlook has become larger. Yet, the human eye finds itself in view of a confusing multitude of details Without succeeding in combining them into one complete picture. Thus, the spirits of the East and the West, of North and South keep conflicting and antagonizing one another bitterly with their worldconcepts and morals, their aims, and their instincts, each of them trying to assert itself against the others and each of them so weakened and sapped

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Bahá’ís attending the opening session of the First Regional Teaching Conference for Brazil held in Rio De Janeiro from October 9 to October 12, 1949, inclusive.

by the multitude of undigested influences, none of them strong enough to force down the other and yet each of them still strong enough to escape defeat.

The erstwhile “great world” partially succeeded in destroying nations and annihilating civilizations without remote and other territories becoming afflicted by or aware of it. Regardless of single twigs of the tree of mankind rotting and dying, there remained life enough to develop and to extend itself. The present-day world with its increasing integrations and mutual adaptations in which one thing depends on and affects the other, can neither quite live nor die. It has, first, to grasp the meaning of its chaotic condition together with the necessity of overcoming it in and through a universal peace of unity, moving then forward determinedly and courageously on the path of the only possible salvation. Just as there is one great unity as the goal of all efforts, there is a great peace, too, Which is needed by all; the smaller

the world, the greater the peace.

With the words that we are all “fruits of one tree and the blossoms of one twig” Bahá’u’lláh expresses the quintessence of a yearning reaching back into the ages and groping for a “Peace on Earth” which is to deliver mankind from the torments of continuous fears and needs.

“This handful of dust, the world, is one home. Let it be in unity. Forsake pride, it is a cause of discord. Follow that which tends to harmony” (Bahá’u’lláh). This is the key-word of Divine Authority Itself which in the birth-hour of the all-encompassing concept of unity comes from the mouth of the Revealer to this nascent world.

The first step towards lasting peace of which Bahá’u’lláh speaks, is the Lesser Peace, a peace within the political realm of the nations. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá explains, “True civilization will unfurl its banner in the midmost heart of the world whenever a certain number of its distinguished and high—minded sover [Page 789]ARTICLES AND

eigns——the shining exemplars of devotion and determination—shall, for the good and happiness of all mankind, arise, with firm resolve and clear vision, to establish the Cause of Universal Peace. They must make the Cause of Peace the object of general consultation, and seek by every means in their power to establish a Union of the nations of the world. They must conclude a binding treaty and establish a covenant, the provisions of which shall be sound, inviolable and definite. They must proclaim it to all the world and obtain for it the sanction of all the human race. This supreme and noble undertaking—the real source of the peace and well-being of all the world—should be regarded as sacred by all that dwell on earth. All the forces of humanity must be mobilized to ensure the stability and permanence of the Most Great Covenant . . . . The fundamental principle underlying this solemn Pact should be so fixed that if any government later violate any one of its provisions, all the governments on earth should arise to reduce it to utter submission, nay the human race as a whole should resolve, with every power at its disposal, to destroy that government.”

An international tribunal with the “mission to seize every conceivable means for preventing war, an auxiliary universal language, and a world literature are to complete the efforts of the unified nations.”

This “lesser peace” is but one step, though, which would have but little chance of equalization without the consecutive “Most Great Peace” as the true realization of a dream which has propelled mankind throughout thousands of years: a peace taking equal possession of man’s heart and consciousness; a peace which draws its potency from the essence of true religion and which is based on the understanding of Bahá’u’lláh’s principle of all-embracing, unbiased unity in the plurality of appearances. This “unity in its true meaning is that God should be realized as the one power which animates and dominates all things which

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are but the manifestations of its energy.” (Bahá’u’lláh); the source of knowing this unity is, therefore, the “knowledge of God” which can be obtained only through the knowledge of His Divine Manifestation.

Thus, the dispensation of Bahá’u’lláh reveals to us in truth “a new heaven and a new earth” and, with them, a new man in a new order. The “homo sapiens” as we know him from the findings of the stone-age, has after thousands of years of preparation entered the age of maturity where he is to apply the knowledge acquired during his growth. Immense though the change of the early man to that of our days may appear, vaster still shall future generations call the transformation of this new man, now in the state of nascence, into the future order of mankind. For “this is a new cycle of human power. All the horizons of the world are luminous, and the world will become indeed as a garden and a paradise.” (‘Abdu’l-Bahá)

With the Manifestation of the Báb as the radiant Herald and the pathmaker of “Him Whom God shall make manifest,” the glorious age of unity has been started a hundred years ago; with the appearance of Bahá’u’lláh it has entered the state of its universal Manifestation. Its outstanding significance is the appointment bestowed by Bahá’u’lláh upon ‘Abdu’l Baha as “the Center of His Covenant,” a covenant between the Manifestor and His believers, such as He, the Revealer, is the expression of the Covenant between God and His creations. Through this high and unique station ‘Abdu’l-Bahá became to the believers the “true example” and the inspired expounder and interpreter of His word. The word itself is the bearer of the Divine Appeal to this nascent mankind: “There is no peace for thee save by renouncing thyself and turning unto Me; for it behooveth thee to glory in My name, not in thine own; to put thy trust in Me and not in thyself, since I desire to be loved alone and above all that is.”

(Bahá’u’lláh)