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Prophecy Fulfilled
BY ELISABETH H. CHENEY
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Prophecy
Fulfilled
Elisabeth H. Cheney
BAHA’I PUBLISHING TRUST WILMETTE, ILLINOIS
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© Copyright 1944
BY THE NATIONAL SPIRITUAL ASSEMBLY OF THE
BAHA’IS OF THE UNITED STATES
Approved by the Reviewing Committee of the National Spiritual Assembly
Printed in U.S.A.
Ninth Printing 1963
ALL of the world’s revealed religions have assured mankind of the eventual triumph of righteousness and the establishment of peace and justice on earth. Each faith expects this advent to herald the beginning of a great new era of human experience, when the world will be judged according to its works, and the Kingdom of God will become established upon the earth with peace and equity for all mankind.
This time is referred to variously in the Holy Scriptures as “the end of the world,” “the latter days,” “the time of the end,” “the day of judgment,” or simply “that day.” All prophecy leads up to it in a united symphony of combined warning and promise. The Holy Books are filled with signs whereby we are to recognize that day and the Messenger of God when He comes again into the world, so that we may be spared from opposing or ignoring Him, and may attain the bounty of knowing and serving our Lord.
Nearly 2,000 years ago the disciples of Jesus Christ pondered together the sayings of their Master concerning the end of the world, and they came to Him as He sat upon the Mount of Olives and questioned Him, saying, Matt. 24:3-5: “‘Tell us, when shall these things be? And what shall be the sign of Thy coming[Page 4]
and of the end of the world?’ And Jesus answered and said unto them, ‘Take heed that no man deceive you. For many shall come in My name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many’.”
Jesus warned His disciples to beware of those who claimed the name of Christ, for He knew that the Promised One of the latter days would not bear that holy name. It would be the same Word of God, which Jesus brought, the same Divine Reality, but another human temple and another name. Ridpath’s “History of the World” shows how Jesus’ warning began to be fulfilled within a few years of His own passing, when in 70 AD. one arose, claiming the name of Christ, and led the revolution against Rome which resulted in the great dispersion of the Jewish nation. May not the warning be fulfilled today also by the hundreds of sects, each claiming the name of Christ, each asserting itself to be the true path to God, and each differing with the others concerning the Divine Truth taught by His Holiness Jesus?
The Lord Christ continued to address His followers, Matt. 24:6-7: “And ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famine and pestilences, and earthquakes in divers places.”
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Certainly, we see this prophecy being fulfilled in the world-wide disturbances that are wreaking havoc in one form or another in every quarter of the globe. Millions are perishing from starvation in India, Spain, Greece and China. The earth’s surface was terribly shaken in Lisbon, in San Francisco, in Chile, in the Argentine, in Greece, in dozens of places where disastrous quakes have snuffed out thousands of lives in recent years. Great floods and storms have taken their toll of life without warning.
Matt. 24:9: “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for My name’s sake.”
Jesus knew that the Christian church would be an established, orthodox religion in the latter days. He knew it would not be the Christians who would be persecuted, hated and slain in that day, but those who, like the early Christians, would recognize and follow the returned Word. Baha’is believe that this prophecy has been fulfilled, for more than 20,000 men, women and children, who recognized in the Báb and in Baha’u’llah, the two promised Manifestations of God, were brutally tortured and murdered by the Muhammadans in Iran (Persia) in the last century.
Matt. 24:12: “And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.”
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We need look no further than the daily newspaper to see how evil has increased in the world today. The selfishness and greed which have made possible the undertaking of global wars of conquest, testify to the growing cold of that love which Jesus taught, when He said to His disciples (John 13:34-35): “A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are My disciples, if ye have love one to another.”
Matt. 24:15: “When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place; (whoso readeth, let him understand).”
In this answer Jesus refers His disciples to the eighth chapter of the Book of Daniel, saying that everyone who reads it with understanding will know that this is the time spoken of by Him. In the eighth chapter of the Book of Daniel, verse 13, it is said: “Then I heard one saint speaking, and another saint said unto that certain saint which spake, ‘How long shall be the vision concerning the daily sacrifice, and the transgression of desolation, to give both the sanctuary and the host to be trodden under foot?” Then he answered (v. 14): “Unto two thousand and three hundred days; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed’;”[Page 7]
(v. 17): “But he said unto me—‘at the time of the end shall be the vision’.”
That is to say, how long will this misfortune this abasement and degradation last, meaning, when will come the dawn of the Holy Word of God with power to cleanse the sanctuary? And the answer: two thousand and three hundred days." Each day, according to the text of the Holy Book, is as a year. Therefore, we have a period of 2,300 years.
These 2,300 years begin with the restoration and rebuilding of Jerusalem concerning which four edicts were issued by three kings. The first was issued by Cyrus in the year 536 B.C., this is recorded in the first chapter of the Book of Ezra. The second edict, with reference to the rebuilding of Jerusalem, is that of Darius of Persia in the year 519 B.C.; this is recorded in the sixth chapter of Ezra: The third is that of Artaxerxes in the seventh year of his reign, that is in 457 B.C.; this is recorded in the seventh chapter of Ezra. The fourth is that of Artaxerxes in the year 444 B.C., - this is recorded in the second chapter of Nehemiah. But Daniel refers especially to the third edict which was issued in the year 457 B.C.” (“Some Answered Questions” p. 48) It was following this edict that the temple at Jerusalem was rebuilt, the holy of holies being desecrated by alien hands, thus causing the “abomination of desolation” referred to by Christ and by Daniel.
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From this third decree given by Artaxerxes in 457 B.C., we have a period of 456 years up to the time of the birth of Christ, and from the birth of Christ until May 23, 1844, the day of the manifestation of the Báb, the forerunner of Bahá’u’lláh, we have a period of 1844 years. The total of 2,300 years is the period named by Daniel and referred to as the time of the end by Jesus the Christ.
Daniel also gives other signs by which this time is to be recognized.
Dan. 12:1: “And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people; and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time.”
Baha’u’llah, Who, Baha’is believe, is the great Manifestation of God in the latter days, was born Prince of the Province of Nur, one of the wealthiest and most powerful princes of modern Iran. All of this wealth and power He sacrificed and accepted forty years of unrelenting imprisonment in order to bring to mankind the message and the laws of the day of peace. He is the prince foretold by Daniel. As to the time of trouble, who has ever heard before this day of an era of dire tribulation involving every nation on earth as the difficulties and sufferings of today have done?
Dan. 12:4: “But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of[Page 9]
the end: many shall run to and fro and knowledge shall be increased.”
Here Daniel shows clearly that these are signs of the time of the end, which will be understood only when they are fulfilled. Has there ever been in the history of the world so great a running to and fro as that developed by modern inventions such as the airplane, the railroad, automobile and steamship? The vast growth of modern science together with the beginning of universal education in every continent of the globe, show forth the increase of knowledge.
In Nahum 2:3-4: we find one of the interesting signs—“The chariots shall be with flaming torches in the day of his preparation—The chariots shall rage in the streets, they shall jostle one against another in the broad ways: they shall seem like torches, they shall run like the lightnings.”
In the imagery of that early day, could we have a better description of our modern automobiles?
Second Thessalonians 2:3-4, gives still another sign: “Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped, so that[Page 10]
he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God.”
Can we look about our world with honest sight today and not acknowledge that materialism and egoism have become the god of the earth, being worshipped by the action of men? Do we not see millions of people standing helpless in the grasp of theories of material conquest, racial superiority, and economic equality that have taken the place of belief in God and the brotherhood of man?
Bahá’u’lláh wrote of these times: “The vitality of men's belief in God is dying out in every land; nothing short of His wholesome medicine can ever restore it. The corrosion of ungodliness is eating into the vitals of human society; what else but the Elixir of His potent Revelation can cleanse and revive it? The world is in travail, and its agitation waxeth day by day. Its face is turned toward waywardness and unbelief. Such shall be its plight that to disclose it now would not be meet and seemly.” (“The World Order of Bahá’u’lláh” p. 181).
Now does our Bible give us signs which may help us to recognize the Bringer of this healing Elixir? Yes, it tells us where the Manifestation of the latter days will appear, where His teachings will be given, and even the titles by which[Page 11]
He and His Herald will be known in that day. In Jeremiah 49:38 we find: “And I will set my throne in Elam. . . .” In the Bible, “throne” is often used as a symbol of the Word of God, so that the meaning is that the Word will appear in Elam. Daniel also, 8:2, gives the “Province of Elam” as the place of the vision of the latter days.
The Báb (“The Door—or Gate—of the Spirit”), the Forerunner of Bahá’u’lláh, was born in that part of Iran which was formerly known as Elam. On May 23, 1844, He proclaimed His mission of heralding the coming of a mighty educator who would quicken the souls, illumine the minds, unify the consciences and remold the customs of mankind. After six years of heroic teaching and by which the Muhammadan world was rent in twain, the Báb became the victim of fanatical persecution and was publicly martyred at Tabriz, July 9, 1850.
A most interesting prophecy of place occurs in Micah 7:12: “In that day also - he shall come even to thee from Assyria, and from the fortified cities, and from the fortress even to the river, and from sea to sea, and from mountain to mountain.”
Bahá’u’lláh was born in Tihrán, the capital city of Íran, which is located in a part of Íran which was included in the ancient Assyrian Empire. Not in any effort on His part to fulfill prophecy, but as a prisoner of the Muhammadan[Page 12]
church-state government, Bahá’u’lláh was carried and gave His teachings of the day of peace from the fortified city of Constantinople to Roumelia, Adrianople and finally ‘Akká, from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea and from the Sulaymán Mountains to Mount Carmel. In this way the ancient prophecy recorded by Micah was quite literally fulfilled.
Isaiah 35:1-2: “The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them, and the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose. It shall blossom abundantly and rejoice even with joy and singing; the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon, they shall see the glory of the Lord and the excellency of our God.”
Bahá’u’lláh was banished to the solitary desert place in the prison at ‘Akká, Palestine. He gave His teachings in the Valley of Sharon and upon Mount Carmel, so that these places quite literally saw the Glory of the Lord through His Manifestation, just as Isaiah had promised. Bahá’u’lláh, translated into English, means the Glory of God, the title frequently given by the Bible to the Manifestation of the latter days.
Isaiah 65:10: “And Sharon shall be a fold of flocks, and the valley of Anchor a place for the herds to lie down in, for my people that have sought me.”
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Again, Sharon and ‘Akká (anciently spelled Achor) are named as places of bounty and blessing for those who seek the Lord in the latter days. Hosea 2:15 also names ‘Akká as a “door of hope” for that day, for the Word of God is the hope of the world in the day when He comes.
All the prophecies are unanimous in declaring the Glory of the Lord shall come to the Holy Land from the east, manifesting itself in the west. Bahá’u’lláh appeared in Íran, which is eastward from Palestine, and He was exiled to the Holy Land where He spent the last twenty-tour years of His life. If He had gone there as a free man, people might have said that it was the trick of an impostor in order to conform to the prophecies, but He was sent there as a prisoner.
Isaiah 9:2, 6-7: “The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined.—For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even[Page 14]
forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.”
In part, Christ might have fulfilled this prophecy, for, unlike the philosophers, the Manifestations of God are not the product of an enlightened people. On the contrary, they arise in the darkest part of the world of their day, in the “land of the shadow of death” where men cling to the forms and have forgotten the spiritual realities. The material temple of Jesus was born of a nation of slaves under the heel of Rome. But He had nothing to say concerning “government” except “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and unto God the things that are God’s.” This was one of the reasons why He was rejected by the Jews, who had misunderstood this prophecy and thought that it must be fulfilled in the day of Christ, instead of realizing that it referred to the time of the end, when the thousand years of peace, promised by Isaiah (11:6-9 and 65:21-25), and later in the Christian dispensation by John the Divine (Rev. 20:1-3), were to be fulfilled. But Jesus Himself never claimed to be the Prince of Peace. On the contrary He foretold the great wars which would precede the day of peace. (Matthew 24:6-7) Of Himself He said: (Matthew 10:34) “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.” Jesus was never known as the[Page 15]
“Father.” This much misunderstood prophecy really applies to this day.
The light of Bahá’u’lláh shone forth from Íran, the darkest, most bigoted, ignorant and misgoverned part of the world of His day. In some one hundred books, which He wrote during forty years of imprisonment, Bahá’u’lláh outlined a complete plan of government for the day of world peace, many phases of which are becoming generally accepted by outstanding thinkers of this day, such as a world federation of all nations, on international tribunal, and an international police force to maintain the peace. Bahá’u’lláh is known as the Manifestation of the Father in the sense of being the One Who unites and brings together into one common family under God, all religions, all races and all nations. Bahá’ís believe that Jesus referred to Bahá’u’lláh, when He said: (Matthew 16:27) "For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father.”
Often those who do not stop to think, to investigate sincerely the claims of a prophet and to ask God about it in prayer, say hurriedly of anyone who claims to fulfill the prophecies of the Holy Books: “He is the anti-Christ.” The first epistle of John 4:1-3, explains the meaning of “anti-Christ”: “Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God; because many false prophets are gone out into the world. Hereby know ye[Page 16]
the Spirit of God. Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God: And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God; and this is that spirit of anti-Christ whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is in the world.”
Even a superficial examination of the Baha’i teachings would quickly prove that Bahá’u’lláh could not be the anti-Christ, for He fully confirms the teachings of Christ, and no person is permitted to become a Baha’i without first acknowledging Christ Jesus as the Word made flesh, which dwelt among us, and as the Son of God. Thousands of Jews and Muhammadans have accepted Christ through the Bahá’í teachings. Bahá’ís believe that Bahá’u’lláh is that Spirit of Truth foretold by Jesus when He said (John 16:12-13) “I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit, when He, the Spirit of truth is come, He will guide you into all truth.”
Jesus the Christ knew all things, for He was a Manifestation of God the All-Knowing, and His knowledge was from God and not of men. In His wisdom He also knew that the people of His day could receive only that part of His knowledge which they were mature enough to understand. But He foresaw a day of greater maturity, when the world would be able to receive a fuller measure of that some truth,[Page 17]
and He promised that, when that day dawned, Another would come, Who would be like Himself, Who would come in the glory of the Father, and Who would bring that further truth, which the world would then be able to receive.
It is as if God conducts a great school. In school the second grade is taught the things that a seven-year-old may be expected to comprehend. When the child graduates and passes into the third grade, he does not lose the things he learned before, but merely adds to them a fuller measure of knowledge in accordance with his increased power to understand. In the same way the Manifestations of God have taught the world at various stages of its development, each in succession adding the further truths which mankind has become capable of learning. Since the world of man has now reached its maturity, God has sent the Spirit of Truth to reveal the spiritual and social laws, which, as they become accepted and practiced by mankind, will bring about the great millennial age, the Kingdom of God on earth, for which we as Christians have prayed for nearly two thousand years.
The new name is always a difficulty in the day when God speaks again, and yet Jesus warned us against those using the name of Christ (Matthew 24:5), and Isaiah and John both prophesied a new name.
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Rev. 3:12: “Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out; and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, which is the new Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God, and I will write upon him my new name.”
It is evident from the above that a new name is destined for the elect of God at the consummation of the prophetic cycle which began with Adam, when the old heaven and the old earth shall pass away, and a new order shall be spread out in its stead. Therefore, the following passage often quoted by Christians, refers only to the duration of the dispensation of Jesus Christ: Acts 4:12: “For there is none other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved.”
When all things are made new, there is a new name, which naturally supersedes the old. Inasmuch as Baha’u’llah shall, in Christ’s own words “testify of me” (John 15:26) and “shall glorify me” (John 16:14), and in His books and tablets Bahá’u’lláh has done this, then to exalt and praise Bahá’u’lláh, the Glory of God, as the return of Christ, is to exalt and praise Christ. A true believer in Christ Jesus acknowledges the power of God to fulfill the prophecies and prayers of Christ.
Isaiah 62:2 “and the Gentiles shall see thy righteousness, and all kings thy glory; and[Page 19]
thou shalt be called by a new name, which the mouth of the Lord shall name.”
“The Bahá’í Faith is the fulfillment and completion of all the ancient faiths. The Jews await the Messiah, the Christians the return of Christ, the Muslims the Mahdi, the Buddhists the fifth Buddha, the Zoroastrians Shah Bahram, the Hindus the reincarnation of Krishna.” (The Glorious Kingdom of the Father Foretold p. 56) Bahá’u’lláh is the name chosen, not by any of these religions of the past, but is the “new name” which the mouth of the Lord Himself has spoken. By using a new name, rivalries, enmities and jealousies, which have existed between religions of past ages, are destroyed, for the new name represents all of them universally. God’s Manifestation for the age of peace on earth comes to reconcile all religions in their original purity, and to set them free from the acquired conceptions of nonessential dogmas and forms.
Christians always ask: “Do we give up Jesus in accepting Baha’u’llah?”
His Holiness Christ answers in His own words: (John 6:39) “This is the Father’s will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day.” We lose nothing of Christ and He loses nothing in us, when we accept the fulfillment of His prophecies. On[Page 20]
the contrary we add to His glory and fulfill His will.
Isaiah 2:2-4: “And it shall come to pass in the last days that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. And many people shall go and say, Come ye and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”
The law of God has already gone forth from Mount Carmel, for it was there that Baha’u’llah gave the laws of the day of peace, both spiritual and social.
Bahá’u’lláh wrote: “The time foreordained unto the peoples and kindreds of the earth is now come. The promises of God, as recorded in the Holy Scriptures, have all been fulfilled. Out of Zion hath gone forth the Law of God, and Jerusalem, and the hills and land thereof, are filled with the glory of His revelation. Happy is the man that pondereth in his heart[Page 21]
that which hath been revealed in the Books of God, the Help in Peril, the Self subsisting. Meditate upon this, O ye beloved of God, and let your ears be attentive unto His Word, so that ye may, by His grace and mercy, drink your fill from the crystal waters of constancy, and become as steadfast and immovable as the mountain in His Cause.” (“Gleanings from the Writings of Baha’u’llah” pages 12 and 13).
