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The Mission of Baha’u’llah
By
George Townshend M.A.
BAHA'I PUBLISHING COMMITTEE
WILMETTE, ILLINOIS
[Page 1]
The Mission of Baha’u’llah
By
George Townshend M.A.
Bawa’! PUBLISHING COMMITTEE
WILMETTE, ILLINOIS
[Page 2]
From George Townshend’s introduction
to God Passes By, by Shoghi Effendi,
Copyright 1944.
Printed in U.S.A.
[Page 3]
The Mission of Bah&4’u’llah
By Georce TowNSHEND M.A.
O PROPHET has ever
come into the world with
greater proofs of His identity than
Baha’u’llah: nor in the first century of its activity has any older
Faith achieved so much or spread
so far across the globe as this.
The mightiest proof of a Prophet has ever been found in Himself
and in the efficacy of His word.
Baha’u’llah rekindled the fires of
faith and of happiness in the
hearts of men. His knowledge
was innate and spontaneous, not
acquired in any school. None
could gainsay or resist His wisdom and even His worst enemies
admitted His greatness. All human perfections were embodied in
Him. His strength was infinite.
Trials and sufferings increased
His firmness and power. As a divine physician He diagnosed the
malady of the Age and prescrib
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ed the remedy. His teachings were
universal and conferred illumination on all mankind. His power
has been poured forth more abundantly since His death. In His
prescience He stood alone and
events have proved and are still
proving its accuracy.
A second proof which every Prophet has brought with Him has been the witness of the past: the evidence of Ancient Prophecy.
The fulfillment in this Day of the prophecies contained in the Qur’an and in Muslim tradition has not prevented Islam from persecuting the Baha'i Faith but it has been startling and notorious.
The fulfillment of the prophecies of Christ and the Bible has been over a period of a hundred years or more matter of common knowledge and remark in the West. But the full extent of that fulfillment is only seen in Baha’u’llah. The proclamation of His Faith was made in 1844, the year
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when the strict exclusion of the
Jews from their own land enforced by the Muslims for some twelve
centuries was at last relaxed by
the Edict of Toleration and “the
times of the Gentiles” were “fulfilled.” The Advent has been long
delayed and has fallen in a time of
oppression and iniquity, of religious unreality and disbelief, when
love for God and man had grown
cold, when men were immersed
in material business and pleasure.
The Prophet came like a thief in
the night and was here in our
midst while people were wrapped
in deep spiritual slumber. He
tried and tested souls, separated
the spiritual from the unspiritual,
true from false believers, the
sheep from the goats; and the
people taken unawares were
caught as in a snare and knew
not their danger till the retributive justice of God closed in upon
them. Yet the appearance of the
Faith and the rapidity and direction of its extension was as the
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lightning which flashes from the
East to the West. Christianity in
contrast to the Revelation of Muhammad had spread from the
East to the West and has been
predominantly a Western Faith.
The Bahai Faith likewise has
moved westward but with even
greater speed and momentum
than Christianity.
From the beginning of the Era,
from the days of the Herald of
the Faith, the Bab, the chronicles
show a conscious sympathy of
Christians with the New Teaching, which was in marked contrast with the attitude of their
Muslim neighbors. The earliest
instance of this perhaps is the
kindly tribute of Dr. Cormick, an
English Physician resident in
Tihran, to the Bab whom he attended in prison when suffering
from the effects of torture, and
his record of the prevalent opinion that the Teaching of the Bab
resembled Christianity. The first
Western historian of the Move
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ment, Count Gobineau, a French
diplomat, wrote (1865) with enthusiasm of the Bab’s saintliness,
of the loftiness of His Ideals, of
His charm, His eloquence, and of
the astonishing power of His
words over both friend and foe:
Ernest Renan in “Les Apdtres”
(1866), Lord Curzon in “Persia,”
Professor Browne of Cambridge
in several works, and many Christian men of letters of later date
have written in a similar strain.
But among the many instances
of this instinctive sympathy, the
most spectacular is that which
marked the execution of the Bab
in the market square of Tabriz on
July 9th, 1850. The officer in
charge of the firing party was a
Christian. He approached the
Bab and prayed Him that on this
account and because he had no
enmity towards Him in his heart
he might be spared the guilt of
perpetrating so heinous a crime.
The Bab replied that if his prayer
were sincere God was able to ful
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fill his desire. The remarkable
miracle by which this prayer
was granted, and the martyrdom
of the Bab carried out by another regiment under a Muslim officer, is a part of history.
The Christian West, though far from the scene of the Prophet’s ministry, felt and responded practically to the divine World Impulse decades before the East. Poets, major and minor, Shelley and Wordsworth and many another, sang of anew Dawn. A new missionary effort spread the Christian Gospel through the earth: spiritual men and women sought to revive reality in religion; reformers arose to redress long standing evils; novelists used their art for a social purpose. How different all this from the action of the corrupt, fanatical, persecuting East!
The Bab Himself identified His Teaching in spirit and purpose with that of Christ which was a preparation for His own: and He
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quoted some of Christ’s Instructions to His disciples as part of
His own Ordination Address to
the “Letters of the Living.”
Baha’u’llah from the beginning
seems to have realized the special
capacity of the progressive and
enterprising West. He took the
most vigorous steps possible to
bring the Truth of the Age to the
knowledge of the West and its
leaders. Debarred from delivering
His message to Europe in person, He wrote from a Turkish
prison a general Tablet to the
Christians, and another Tablet to
the Sovereigns and leading men
of the world but especially to the
rulers of Christendom: and He
also addressed five personal Tablets, one to the Czar, another to
the Pope, another to Queen Victoria and two to Napoleon III.
In these, in ringing tones of power and majesty such as would
become the King of Kings imposing commands upon His vassals,
He declared this Age the Su
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preme Day of God and Himself
the Lord or Lords, the Father
Who had come in His most great
glory. All that had been mention in the Gospel had been fulfilled. Jesus had announced this
Light and His signs had been
spread in the West, that His followers might in this Day set their
faces towards Baha’u’llah.
These letters are indeed pronouncements of a far-sighted
Providence: and the catastrophe
of the West which has occurred
since they were written gives to
them now a tragic and terrible
interest. They are of some length
but their drift may be generally
indicated in a few paragraphs.
In His Tablet to Queen Victoria He commends Her Majesty
for ending the slave trade and for
“entrusting the reins of counsel
into the hands of the representatives of the people.” But they
who entered the Assembly should
do so in a spirit of prayer to God
and of trusteeship for the best in
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terests of all mankind. The human race was one whole and
should be regarded as the human
body which though created perfect had become afflicted with
grave disorders. It lay at the
mercy of rulers so drunk with
pride that they could not see their
own best advantage, much less
recognize this mighty Revelation.
The one real remedy for the
world’s ills was the union of all
its peoples in one universal Cause,
one common Faith. This could be
brought to pass only through the
Divine Physician. He called on
the Queen to insure peace, to be
just and considerate to her subjects, to avoid excessive taxation,
to effect an international union
for the reduction of armaments
and the joint resistance of all nations to any aggressor Power.
His Tablet to the Pope contains an impassioned, loving
appeal to Christians that they will
recognize this, the Promised Day
of God, that they will come forth
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into its light and acclaim their
Lord, and enter the Kingdom in
His name. They were created for
the light and He likes not to see
them in the darkness. Christ purified the world with Love and
with the Spirit that in this Day
it might be able to receive Life at
the hands of the Merciful. This
is the coming of the Father of
whom Isaiah spoke: the teaching which He now reveals is that
which Christ withheld when He
said, “other things I have to say
unto you but ye cannot bear them
now.” He bids the Pontiff take
the Cup of Life and drink therefrom and “offer it then to such as
turn towards it amongst the
peoples of all Faiths.”
The Tablet to Alexander II is in answer to a prayer addressed by the Czar to His Lord and in recognition of a kindness shown to Baha’u’llah when in prison and in chains by an ambassador of the Czar. He impresses on the Czar the supreme greatness of this
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Manifestation, tells him how the
Prophet has subjected Himself to
a thousand calamities for the salvation of the world and, having
brought life to men, is threatened
by them with death. He bids
him expose this injustice, and in
love for God and God’s kingdom
offer himself as a ransom in God’s
path: no harm will come to him
but a reward in this world and
the next. Great, great the blessing
in store for the king who gives
his heart to his Lord.
In His two Tablets to Napoleon III, Baha’u’llah impresses on the Emperor the oneness of mankind whose many maladies will not be cured unless the nations, abandoning the pursuit of their several interests, agree together and unite in common obedience to the plan of God. The human race should be as one body and one soul. A far higher degree of faith than the world has ever reached before is demanded by God of every man in this Era. All
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are commanded to teach the
truth and to work for God’s
cause: but no one will produce
good results in this service unless he first purify and ennoble
his own character.
Baha’u’llah bids the clergy give up their seclusion, mingle in the life of the people and marry. God is calling men to Him in this Age and any theology which takes its own theses as a standard of truth and turns away from Him is deprived of value and efficacy.
He has come to regenerate and unite all mankind in every deed and truth and He will gather them at the one table of His bounty. Let the Emperor call on His name and declare His truth to the people.
Grave warnings and open or implicit threats if the kings do not acknowledge the Manifestation and obey His commands are contained in all these Tablets, especially in this to Napoleon III. The collective Tablet addressed
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to all the kings is however stern
and minatory beyond the rest.
Baha’u’llah warns the rulers that
if they do not treat the poor
amongst them as a trust from
God; if they do not observe the
strictest justice; if they do not
compose their differences, heal
the dissensions that estrange
them and reduce their armaments, and follow the other counsels now given them by the
Prophet, “Divine chastisement
shall assail you from every direction and the sentence of His justice shall be pronounced against
you. On that day ye shall have
no power to resist Him and shall
recognize your own impotence.
Have mercy on yourselves and
on those beneath you.”
Christ long centuries before had wept over the city whose children had ignored His visitation and refused His protection. Now at His second coming the same event recurred. But they who brought down the wrath of
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God on themselves were not the
members of a nation but of an
entire world.
Before he passed away Baha’u'llah proclaimed: “The hour is approaching when the most great convulsion will have appeared.” And again, “The time for the destruction of the world and its people hath arrived.”
More than forty years after the dispatch of these Tablets ‘Abdu’lBaha, the son of the Prophet and the appointed Exemplar of His Faith, being freed at last from prison by the Young Turks, made a three years’ tour of Europe and America. Saddened by many things He saw, and knowing the doom to which the heedlessness . of the nations was hurrying them, He was sparing of denunciation, reproach or criticism; instead, with words of cheer and undiscriminating love He summoned His hearers to high, heroic action. He spoke much of the spiritual and social goal set by God for
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this enlightened Age: “The Most
Great Peace.” He Himself in His
joy, in His serenity, in His love
for all,“ in His wisdom, His
strength and resolution and utter
submissiveness to God, seemed
the incarnation of the Spirit of
that Peace. His very presence
brought receptive souls into
touch with a state of being of
which they might have heard but
which none of them had ever
known. Through many months
of missionary work He explained
the moral and spiritual conditions
which would make possible the
Most Great Peace, and developed
in many addresses the practical
means by which it could be approached. In the United States, at
Wilmette on the shores of Lake
Michigan, He laid the foundation
stone of the first Baha’i Temple
of the West, round which are to
be grouped buildings devoted to
social, humanitarian, educational
and scientific purposes, the whole
to be dedicated as one scheme to
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the glory of God and the service
of man. He also saw in America
the first beginnings of the building of the Administrative Order
of Baha’u’llah.
But the general response of the public was not sufficient to stem the tides flowing towards war. Before He left the United States, ‘Abdu’l-Baha foretold the outbreak of hostilities in two years’ time.
When at last peace was made, He declared that the League of Nations as constituted could not prevent war; and before He passed away in 1921 He announced to his followers the outbreak of another war fiercer than the last.
To many, at the opening of the second Baha'i century, mankind seems to be drifting in a helmless barque upon a stormy and uncharted sea. But to the Baha’is another vision is revealed. The barriers by which men blocked their path to progress are torn down. Human pride is abased, human
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wisdom stultified. The anarchy of
nationalism and the insufficiency
of secularism are thoroughly exposed.
Slowly the veil lifts from the future. Along whatever road thoughtful men look out they see before them some guiding truth, some leading principle, which Baha’u'llah gave long ago and which men rejected. The sum and essence of the best hopes of the best minds today is garnered in such a simple statement as that of ‘Abdu’l-Baha’s “Twelve Points.” 1. Unfettered search after truth. 2. The oneness of mankind. 3. Religion a cause of love and harmony. 4. Religion hand in hand with science. 5. Universal peace. 6. An international language. 7. Education for all. 8. Equal opportunities for both sexes. 9. Justice for all. 10. Work for all. 11. Abolition of extremes of poverty and wealth. 12. The Holy Spirit to be the prime motive power in life.
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The immense, complex, baffling
task of unifying all peoples is set
forth in its complete and inmost
simplicity by ‘Abdu’l-Baha in
seven pregnant phrases. 1. Unity
in the political realm. 2. Unity of
thought in world undertakings.
3. Unity of freedom. 4. Unity in
religion. 5. Unity of nations. 6.
Unity of races. 7. Unity of language.
Already the Baha'is have begun
in deed and in fact to build the
instrument destined to be the
model and nucleus of the Most
Great Peace. The Administrative
Order is as simple as it is profoundly conceived, and it can
only be conducted by those whose
lives are animated by love and
fear of God. It is a system in
which such opposites as unity
and universality, the practical
and the spiritual, the rights of the
individual and the rights of
society, are perfectly balanced
not through arranging a compromise, but through the revela
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tion of an inner harmony. Those
who have the experience of operating the Order testify that it
seems to them like a human body
which is made to express the soul
within.
On the lake shore at Wilmette stands the completed Temple of Praise, a sign of the Spirit of the Most Great Peace and of the Splendor of God that has come down to dwell among men. The walls of the Temple are transparent, made of an open tracery cut as in sculptured stone, and lined with glass. All imaginable symbols of light are woven together into the pattern, the lights of the sun and the moon and the constellations, the lights of the spiritual heavens unfolded by the great revealers of today and yesterday, the Cross in various forms, the Crescent and the nine pointed Star (emblem of the Bahai Faith). No darkness invades the Temple at any time; by day it is lighted by the sun whose rays
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flood in from every side through
the exquisitely perforated walls,
and by night it is artificially illuminated and its ornamented shape
is etched with light against the
dark. From whatever side the
visitor approaches, the aspiring
form of the Temple appears as
the spirit of adoration; and seen
from the air above it has the likeness of a Nine-Pointed Star come
down from heaven to find its
resting place on the earth.
But for the leading of the peoples into the Promised Land, for the spiritualizing of mankind, for the attainment of the Most Great Peace the world awaits the arising of those whom the King of Kings has summoned to the task—the Christians and_ the Churches of the West.
“Verily Christ said ‘Come that I may make you fishers of men’ and today We say ‘Come, that We may make you quickeners of the world’... Lo! This is the Day of Grace! Come ye that I may
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make you kings of the realm of
My Kingdom. If ye obey Me you
will see that which We have
promised you, and I will make
you the friends of My Soul in the
realm of My Greatness and the
Companions of My Beauty in the
heaven of My Might for ever.”
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