Bahá’í World/Volume 7/The World of Heart and Spirit
THE WORLD OF HEART AND SPIRIT
BY HORACE HOLLEY
THE dire hardship, mental and moral strain, and the perils of war and revolution involved in the world’s economic problems have come to constitute the severest challenge which religion has ever faced in the entire course of history. There is no retreating from the fact that this problem represents the acute aspect of the whole general social condition of the age, the major symptom of the disease of civilization affecting not merely the security of the individual but also the structure of every social institution. Our status as human beings, our most profound interests and responsibilities as conscious individuals, and our capacity as citizens, alike depend upon a final solution of the economic problem. During the brief span of a few generations it has steadily enlarged in scope from the controlled relations of individuals within the organized nation to the uncontrolled relations of nations themselves. An apparently small break in the dike has become an overwhelming flood.
But while the traditional religious view has endeavored to envisage the economic problem within limits corresponding to conditions existing in the past, or sought to reduce it to the field of personal ethics, or to assume experimental relations with some existing secular social philosophy, the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh anticipated the whole problem of modern civilization and for four generations has upheld the true world outlook upon the trend that is now everywhere recognized to be as wide as the world and as deep as the motives and purposes of human life on earth.
The vital importance of a sound and adequate approach to the economic problem arises from the very fact that the popular understanding of the term "economics” magnifies it far beyond its original and intrinsic scope, and involves the economic problem with every other aspect of social instability and unrest. This means that the power, effectiveness and continued existence of both religious and civil institutions depend upon their ability to bring relief and establish progressive order in the collective life of mankind. From the Bahá’í point of view, what is loosely called the “economic problem” is simply a descriptive phrase employed to cover the fundamental issues of religion and civilization. The disease has become identified with its most painful and widespread symptom.
WHAT IS ECONOMICS?
The simplest conceivable economic system would be the life of a family in the wilderness, sustained by hunting, fishing, agriculture and handcraft. Practically every operation and function of the most intricate and evolved social system would exist in the activities of that family in rudimentary form, with, however, one vital distinction: that the family bond supplies the strongest possible motive for mutual cooperation, and makes possible the exchange of goods and services with the least possible interference. If for that symbolic family we substitute the same number of hostile, suspicious or indifferent individuals, the problem of sustenance would be transformed from the fulfillment of mutual love to the application of the principle of personal advantage. Unless supreme necessity controlled that selfish instinct, such a group of individuals would soon be overwhelmed. But the family bond, minimizing selfishness, making one individual willing to sacrifice himself for the others, uplifting the daily task from drudgery or danger to the realm of voluntary self-expression and group harmony, can and has survived difficulties and dangers throughout history which would soon destroy the group were its mutuality to be lost. At the outset, therefore, one must
Twenty-ninth Annual Convention of the Bahá’ís of the United States and Canada, May 1, 1937.
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recognize that,
irrespective of the technical
distinctions between different
economic systems, the problem of
physical existence and
social fulfillment involves two diametrically
opposed motives and spiritual qualities—the
motive of unity and the motive of selfish
advantage.
History is but the record of the spread of that symbolic family around the earth, the fatal loss of its sense of kinship, and the substitution of social systems of varying degree of unity or selfishness for the instinctive mutuality characterizing the original family unit. The pressure of necessity has at times produced, as within the nation at war, a quality of cooperation resembling the family bond, even though but temporarily and even though this cooperation within the nation has been spiritually offset by the concentration of struggle against the foreign foe. Such effect of historical necessity like war testifies over and other again, despite the opposed facts, to the great truth that human beings are capable of social fusion and that whenever fusion takes place, reserves of energy, efficiency, and inner joy are released from long-hidden and long-forgotten spiritual resources within the human soul. The “glory of war” persisting in warriors down the ages reflects this inner release of unsuspected power and sense of fulfillment during supreme emergency, though tragically its source is ascribed to the fact of struggle rather than to the condition of social fusion the struggle produced.
In normal times, the substitute for necessity, or social pressure, is the function of government. As peoples grow civilized they feel less and less pressure from the wilderness and encounter fewer supreme emergencies of the type confronting the original settlers or pioneers. To the degree that they become unable to attain social fusion through religious faith or psychological experience, they make up for its lack by developing the power of the king or state. The economy their civilization evolves rests upon authority at all points where it can not rest upon instinct, and henceforth the economic system remains so inseparably a part of their civil and religious code that it can only be altered indirectly, by altering the civil code or the religious values first.
The question, what is economics? simply can not be answered in terms of any unvarying scientific definition. Economics is and has always been an evolving reality, at first so implicit in human relations and external tasks that those concerned are completely unconscious of it; gradually extended to include relationships which take on the character of the external problem and, in doing so, lose the quality of mutuality; and finally, an aspect of imposed social authority either civil or religious in form. What the modern man means by economics is that order of human relations and daily tasks so far removed from the concept of family loyalty that the physical token of exchange, money, has become the one and only symbol of wealth. The real wealth represented by vigorous effort, successful attainment, cooperative work and social fulfillment in a community inspired by one sustaining spirit, is forgotten or lamented as no longer attainable on earth.
Economics, in brief, when as a system or a science or philosophy it can be apprehended and manipulated as an entirely separate and distinct aspect of civilization, represents nothing else than the decay of an ancient religion or the vain hope that the ills of society can be healed without the inspiration of true faith. The civilization in which economic reality can be intellectually or ethically severed from all other realities and relationships is itself in the condition of decay. One who isolates economics from the whole scheme of life is no longer dealing with life, but is musing upon a blueprint abstraction which represents but a skeleton whence life has fled.
The spiritual tragedy of the age is our loss of true historical perspective. We begin our social inquiry with the invention of the steam engine or with the breakdown of the feudal order shortly before. Such a limited view fails to perceive the organic nature of society and its rise and fall in terms of spiritual or material motive.
The feudal order disappeared for two
reasons: first, because the component
territorial units broke away from
the social body of
Christendom; and second, because its
submerged individuals struggled for their rights
and insisted upon a new and higher status.
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The nations arose,
and with the nations, the
ideal of liberty among the people. Those
who had been serfs wanted political, legal
and social rights, and the personal
status developed under feudalism was transformed
into status by contract. Written
constitutions established a
contractual basis for citizenship,
and the wage system had a similar
effect for industry. The movement,
outwardly, was from unity and conformity to
separatism and differentiation. Inwardly, it
was from instinct and social habit
to reason and conscious will. To accomplish such
a movement, powerful religious sanctions
had to be repudiated by at least a
considerable portion of the public. The trend can
only be explained and appreciated in terms
of a far greater social cycle, involving the
rise, development and eventual
disintegration of a civilization.
THE PROBLEM OF CIVILIZATION
Beneath the modern industrial period, consequently, one must recognize the working of forces in the direction of the secularization of life, and the reduction of a moral culture to its component parts, which would have operated quite independently of the eruptive influence of science and invention. The swift progress of the machine in the West intensified but did not create the general trend.
By that swift progress, the territorial isolation of the nation, which was the historical justification for nationalism, was eventually destroyed. An “industrial process” developed under which it became necessary to seek both raw materials and markets in areas beyond the political frontier. The national sovereignty which had been essential and sufficient to deal with the relations of individuals and groups within the nation became a fictitious authority when applied to the industrial process as a whole. Hence came into being the complex problem of our civilization: the factor of competition transferred from domestic groups to sovereign states, each multiplied in power by scientific industry and all more and more dependent upon the world as a whole, less and less capable of maintaining themselves in independent isolation; with, furthermore, the secular outlook established in terms of struggling class philosophies within many of the nations.
The element of social tension within the nation is no less vital than the competition of the national states themselves.
The factory system, created from feudalized classes and peoples, made sharp divisions between wages and profits, and between labor and management. The consuming markets were so under-capitalized that profit and low wages seemed synonymous terms. As factories increased in size, the owners and managers became more and more separated in feeling and outlook from the workers. The organic principle, that society is and must be only an extension of the family, weakened and died; a considerable proportion of the people found that in winning the political struggle for equality they had lost the basis of economic security and sustenance. Too late and too unorganized to prevent this outcome of individualism arose the realization that industry, to maintain itself, must maintain its own market, its market being the people as a whole and not merely a small wealthy class.
The conviction that industry constituted too great a power to depend upon individual wills inevitably gathered force. From that force has been released the ideas, programs and organizations whose influence opposes industrial individualism with the principle of socialization.
THE PROBLEM OF INDUSTRY
The general principle of socialization underlies a number of mutually exclusive programs and parties, from those motivated by conceptions of a classless society eventually reducing the functions of the state to a minimum, to those which promote the conception of the totalitarian state possessing a maximum of centralized authority, ownership and control.
The strife between the theories and programs has served to obscure the fundamental issue and to introduce the factor of violence into a problem which in essence is highly spiritual in nature.
The fundamental issue may be defined as
the question of determining the
proper relations of individuals to
society, and of
society to individuals. This question, in
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turn, resolves itself
into the problem of how
the psychology of the united, mutually
cooperative family applies to mankind as a
whole. Are factory owners and workers
entrenched enemies, or are they partners in
a common task? Does the political liberty
of the individual extend to the corporation
which combines the property of ten
thousand individuals and carries responsibility
for the income and welfare of a million
workers? Are some economic enterprises
so inherently social in aim, method
or result that they come into a different area of
truth than individual conscience or class
outlook?
But these vital questions, raised in one form or another in all industrial countries, can not be treated on their intrinsic merits nor solved in relation to their ultimate human significance in a world so darkened and troubled by international conflict as is the world today. No national state at this time is able to solve simultaneously both its internal and external problems, for the reason that both problems are worldwide in scope and both are spiritual in character. We reach the end of our available human resources, and our future destiny lies with the Creator of mankind.
For it has become evident that the application of authority alone, in the form of unrestricted physical force and psychic influence, does not solve social problems. If sufficient power is concentrated to suppress class dissension, that power but serves to augment the larger dissensions of peoples and states. The world has come to a dire extremity for lack of a unifying spirit capable of producing instruments of agreement and mutual decision, and for lack of an international order capable of removing the sources of strife and inculcating the consciousness of the oneness of mankind.
THE ONENESS OF MANKIND
Our lack of an organic sense of history is no mere matter of deprivation of intellectual knowledge. It is but one symptom of the decay of religious faith. If the heart still turned in adoration to the ancient Founder of religion, that attitude would bridge the chasm between the centuries and provide a living sense of the unity of peoples and of events. In losing that source of universal love, we have departed from any realization of a family bond in society, and in losing the vision of the unity of peoples we have repudiated the connections between successive historical events. We regard events merely as manifestations of personal or group will; those connections by which alone the workings of cause and effect are made apparent have become completely veiled. A secular society ignores the manifestations of Providence but does not thereby remove itself from their full and complete application to human affairs. The modern world has public policy but no social morality; it has desperate hope in the power of the state but no faith in God; it has the technology of material fulfillment, but its spiritual isolation makes inevitable the increase of poverty, of class disturbance and of international war.
A more vivid spiritual faith, or a truer spiritual culture, would bring appreciation of the fact that the workings of Providence throughout the course of known history have had a visible and not merely a hidden or mysterious manifestation. As the Bahá’í teachings assert, each civilization has had its origin in the power of faith released by the Prophet or Manifestation of God; each civilization has developed to the height of its capacity, and at that apex of attainment has worshiped human works and human powers, lost its faith, and thence undergone a process of division and strife until completely overthrown. The rise and fall of successive civilizations mark the footprints of a Divine will interposed upon human affairs.
Bahá’u’lláh, whose mission was to renew
the spirit of religion in this age, upheld the
conception of mankind as an organic unit.
He taught the progressiveness of religion as
the vitalizing spirit which from age to age
restores, by conscious faith in the one God,
the sense of kinship among human beings.
He has bridged the yawning chasm between
the Prophets of past ages, whose followers
limited their faith and loyalty to one race or
one territorial area and failed to recognize
the sublime truth that all religions have
been phases of one Religion. To the Bahá’í,
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the bond of faith removes
and obliterates
the false divisions and distinctions between
the peoples, races, classes and creeds
of humanity. "Ye are the leaves of one tree,”
Bahá’u’lláh declared to the people of this
age. The fire of devotion to this principle
consumes that prejudice which underlies
each and every source of organized
and inveterate strife. The spirit
of conscious faith,
returning to mankind in the hour of direst
need, has created a spiritual
community including believers in
many parts of the
world. The rich and the poor have true
inner contact; the whites and the blacks
recognize one another as members of the
same human family, all alike dependent
upon unity for their very security
and continued physical existence.
The spread of this faith quickens the realization that the spiritual imperative is the true dynamic of social progress, the fundamental reality whose mere shadow has given rise to such concepts as “economic determinism.” It produces capacity for peaceful discussion and agreement upon truths which concern the welfare of all. It frees human beings from the influence of local environment and tradition, making them ready for world citizenship. It raises to the level of moral and ethical principles those social problems which have been regarded as merely economic or political in significance. The Bahá’í answer to what is termed the "economic problem” is that this problem, in reality, constitutes but one facet of the true problem confronting mankind today, the unification of peoples in the light of their attitude to God, and the attainment by the nations of a world order possessing the elements of deliberation, decision and action in the realm of international affairs.
The Bahá’ís have full conviction that any course of action and any attitude falling short of this goal will fail to remove the dangers of modern life and bring no relief. The motives of mankind, and hence their institutions, so long as they seek isolation or partisan victory, can only intensify the chaos into which destiny has brought a time responsible for a collective failure to know and obey the laws revealed by the Prophets of the past.
The follower of Bahá’u’lláh holds fast, in an hour when all else fails, to the principle of evolution in the life of the race. This age, he is informed, represents the maturity of man. The Divine teachings, therefore, have been revealed in greater measure than could be understood or applied in prior ages. With the coming of maturity, man collectively becomes responsible for the achievement of higher tasks, as he is given the privilege of greater truth. The establishment of a world civilization calls for the use of the utmost spiritual, ethical and mental capacity. In accepting this gigantic task, the race consciously works out its destiny, thereby drawing nearer to the will of God. What men now fail to recognize as their true human function, or ignore as the measure of their collective possibility, will reappear to their consciousness as additional social burden and torment until ignorance or indifference is consumed as by fire.
The greater measure of spiritual truth Bahá’u’lláh revealed contains the elements of a world order, for religion today is a social and not merely a personal truth.
“Soon will the present-day order be rolled up, and a new one spread out in its stead.”
“Arise, O people, and, by the power of God’s might, resolve to gain the victory over your own selves, that haply the whole earth may be freed and sanctified from its servitude to the gods of its idle fancies —gods that have inflicted such loss upon, and are responsible for the misery of, their wretched worshipers. These idols form the obstacle that impeded man in his efforts to advance in the path of perfection.
"Having created the world and all that liveth and moveth therein, He, through the direct operation of His unconstrained and sovereign Will, chose to confer upon man the unique distinction and capacity to know Him and to love Him—a capacity that must needs be regarded as the generating impulse and the primary purpose underlying the whole of creation.”
"God’s purpose in sending His Prophets
unto men is twofold. The first is
to liberate the children of men from the darkness
of ignorance, and guide them to the light
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of true understanding.
The second is to insure the peace
and tranquillity of mankind,
and provide all the means by which they can
be established.”1
"THE WORLD OF THE HEART AND SPIRIT”
The Bahá’í teachings assert definitely that "the fundamentals of the whole economic condition are Divine in nature and are associated with the world of the heart and spirit.”2 They therefore offer no detailed and final plan for the operation of industry and finance. Their aim is to produce in man himself that quality of personal motive and social vision out of which an organic and functional world society can alone proceed. If we can but view the world of mankind as a vital organism, sustained by one spirit, its institutions serving as organs and limbs, all interdependent and mutually serving the interests of the whole, we emerge from the consciousness of an era that is dying and can serve an age that is coming to birth. In this conception, the office of religion differs profoundly from the maintenance of rites, ceremonies and specialized institutions which religion has seemed to be throughout ages in the past. Its mission today is to release the spirit of world unity, and to convey truths about man and society possessing the validity of spiritual law. Nothing can re-inspire vital life within the mechanisms of the old order. A new order is required, a new order ordained. Only that possesses survival value which can adapt to the needs and purposes of a unified world.
"For Bahá’u’lláh . . . has not only imbued mankind with a new and regenerating Spirit. He has not merely enunciated certain universal principles, or propounded a particular philosophy, however potent, sound and universal these may be. In addition to these He, as well as ‘Abdu’l-Bahá after Him, have, unlike the Dispensations of the past, clearly and specifically laid down a set of Laws, established definite institutions, and provided for the essentials of a Divine Economy. These are destined to be a pattern for future society, a supreme instrument for the establishment of the Most Great Peace, and the one agency for the unification of the world, and the proclamation of the reign of righteousness and justice upon the earth.”3
To summarize: No secular economic philosophy can be interposed into the present national societies as a solution of their ills for the reason that secular systems are based upon material considerations which exclude the spiritual element in man. A sound economy must be a world economy and at the same time represent fulfillment of individual possibilities and the potential resources of social cooperation. The way to true progress, moreover, can not be attained merely by shifting ownership or control back and forth between secularized individuals and secularized states. Man’s relationships to man must reflect spiritual laws, and statutes deprived of spiritual content seem but temporary expedients in the light of the grave international emergency.
As the human organism is the unity of diverse elements, substances and organic powers, so in the world community of the future there will be institutions, regulations and methods for dealing with economic affairs. Economic affairs, however, will be integrated with all other fundamental human activities and aims, in the same manner as the human skeleton, nervous system, tissues and blood are correlated into the whole scheme of personality. But only the outlines of the future order can now be discerned. The elimination of war must precede the adoption of international law in the economic field. We are in the midst of a dynamic world movement, which static definitions either of human nature or of social principle utterly fail to interpret. The Bahá’í teachings are in themselves dynamic, unfolding continuously their significance as they penetrate into the human soul. These teachings establish the stupendous truth that a World Economics can be nothing else than the social a application of a World Faith.
“A world community in which all economic barriers will have been permanently
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1Excerpts from "Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh.”
2The Promulgation of Universal Peace, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá.
3The World Order of Bahá’u’lláh, Shoghi Effendi.
Previous method of treatment of prisoners in Írán. The figure fourth from the left marked X was a well-known Bahá’í teacher.
demolished and the interdependence of Capital and Labor definitely recognized; in which the clamor of religious fanaticism and strife will have been forever stilled; in which the flame of racial animosity will have been finally extinguished; in which a single code of international law—the product of the considered judgment of the world’s federated representatives—shall have as its sanction the instant and coercive intervention of the combined forces of the federated units; and finally a world community in which the fury of a capricious and militant nationalism will have been transmuted into an abiding consciousness of world citizenship—such indeed, appears, in its broadest outline, the Order anticipated by Bahá’u’lláh, an Order that shall come to be regarded as the fairest fruit of a slowly maturing age.”4
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4The Goal of a New World Order, Shoghi Effendi.