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Fall 1980 / Winter 1981

World order

Racial Prejudice:

Still the Most Challenging Issue

Editorial

Islám: The First 138 Years

Nosratollah Rassekh

The Bahá’í Faith and

Mormonism

William P. Collins

Paying Men and Women Equally

in the European Economic

Community

Vinson Jamir

[Page 0]

World Order

A BAHÁ’Í MAGAZINE • VOLUME 15, NUMBERS 1 & 2 • PUBLISHED QUARTERLY

WORLD ORDER IS INTENDED TO STIMULATE, INSPIRE AND SERVE THINKING PEOPLE IN THEIR SEARCH TO FIND RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN CONTEMPORARY LIFE AND CONTEMPORARY RELIGIOUS TEACHINGS AND PHILOSOPHY

Editorial Board:

FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH

BETTY J. FISHER

HOWARD GAREY

GLENFORD E. MITCHELL

WORLD ORDER is published quarterly by the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States, 415 Linden Avenue, Wilmette, IL 60091. Application to Mail at Second-class postage rates is pending at Wilmette, IL. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to WORLD ORDER, 415 Linden Avenue, Wilmette, IL 60091.

The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the publisher, the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States, or of the Editorial Board. Manuscripts should be typewritten and double spaced throughout, with the footnotes at the end. The contributor should keep a carbon copy. Return postage should be included.

Subscription rates: USA, 1 year, $6.00; 2 years, $11.00; single copies, $1.60. All other countries, 1 year, $7.00; 2 years, $13.00; single copes $1.60.

Copyright © 1981, National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States, All Rights Reserved. Printed in the U.S.A.

ISSN 0043-8804

IN THIS ISSUE

1 Racial Prejudice: Still the Most Challenging

Issue, Editorial

3 Interchange: Letters from and to the Editor

7 Islám: The First 138 Years

by Nosratollah Rassekh

33 The Bahá’í Faith and Mormonism: A

Preliminary Survey, by William P. Collins

48 The European Economic Community: Paying

Men and Women Equally, by Vinson Jamir

Inside back cover: Authors and Artists in This Issue

[Page 1]

Racial Prejudice: Still the Most Challenging Issue

THE STEADFAST COMMITMENT of Bahá’ís to the principles of the oneness of mankind and the abolition of all forms of prejudice will come to be, in the next few years, a distinguishing feature of our community. In the last twenty years or so, these principles were so taken for granted by the wider community, at least in their verbal aspect, that it was hard to see how Bahá’ís differed from all the other well-meaning liberals. But now there is some evidence that the commitment of the great mass of Americans (to speak only of our own country) may be weakening. The great struggles of the fifties, sixties, and seventies have had salutary results: laws compelling fair employment practices with respect to women and racial minorities have been promulgated, as well as laws and court decisions affirming the rights of all citizens to equal opportunity of access to education and public services. Affirmative action has been largely successful: the members of racial minorities have achieved high positions in business, government, and the professions.

But all is not well. Poverty is still very much with us, and its principal victims belong to those ethnic groups that have traditionally been disadvantaged in our society. Martin Luther King said in 1967 that the first phase of liberation has been accomplished—that is, the improvement of the lot of the Negro—but that the second phase—the accession of the Negro to full equality with all Americans—is being resisted by the whites, many of them the same liberals who earlier espoused their cause. The measure of sincerity of those whites who do not desire for themselves special privileges at the expense of nonwhites is now being taken. How many measure up?

King was speaking in 1967, but it could just as well have been yesterday or tomorrow. Was 1967 the year that progress stopped? It was, we recall, the year that liberals turned their attention to the Vietnam War, when they turned aside from their mighty struggle for racial equality—with a sigh of relief? But we must say in defense of this shift in emphasis that there was a racial issue in the war, since blacks were represented by 20 percent of the armed personnel, whereas they constituted only 10 percent of the population.

Today Americans have new preoccupations: the influx of refugees from the Caribbean, from Southeast Asia. from the Middle East; an economic condition marked by unemployment and inflation; an unprecedented increase in crime in high places and low; the destruction of the environment along with the shortage of energy sources that some say can only be made up by further pollution and waste; and, finally, the unending threat of a world-destroying war.

[Page 2] Anxieties are building up equally among minorities and within the racial majority. Disappointment and disillusionment prevail among the former, King’s “first phase” having created expectation and resolve that will not be satisfied short of full achievement of equality. There is no turning back to the easy assumption of superiority by some of the population and to endlessly patient resignation by the rest. The achievements of a relatively small number of blacks are no occasion for self-congratulation by the desperately poor who comprise the greater part of the black people in America. The progress toward full equality cannot be arrested without the most serious consequences to the whole society.

At the same time, the uneasy majority, not poor, but uncertain about its economic capabilities, about the possibility of maintaining a “decent” standard of living, of improving the social and economic prospects of its children, is less inclined than formerly to concern itself with the wellbeing of those elements of society that it has come to identify as the problem itself rather than as fellow victims of the problem. It is hard to evaluate the meaning of demonstrations by hooded racists as they are carried out by people who are too young to remember the thirties and forties. Are they representative of a real social trend, or are they symptomatic of the kind of individual psychopathology that also manifests itself in gratuitous murders and massacres?

If we look at the world outside the United States, we find conditions even more appalling—from racism to terrorist bombings. Border disputes; guerrilla warfare; harsh dictatorship; ethnic, religious, and racial conflict—within countries and across the borders dividing them—account for an increasing tendency in people to take care of themselves and of those whom they perceive as their own, by family, race, or nation. Thus it is that in threatening times the circle of benevolent concern shrinks and the altruism that has characterized our country is somewhat less in fashion that it was a few years ago.

Not too long ago the concern of Bahá’ís for brotherly love and racial justice was so completely in tune with the times that it was almost invisible. But as that commitment slackens in the general population, the Bahá’í stand becomes increasingly visible against the backdrop of changing public opinion. All over this country Bahá’ís are consulting, with a renewed sense of urgency, to find ways of recognizing and vanquishing racial prejudice wherever it occurs. Whatever may be the fashionable attitude in a highly uncertain future, this is certain: Bahá’ís are keeping the faith.

[Page 3]

Interchange LETTERS FROM AND TO THE EDITOR

Robert Hayden, 1913-1980

WORLD ORDER has been proud to carry Robert Hayden’s name on its masthead since the Spring issue of 1968 (Vol. 2, No. 3). His service as poetry editor was marked by a high standard that has earned the American literary world’s respect. He twice organized portfolios of recent American poems (Spring l97l, pp. 33-61; Summer 1975, pp. 44-73), with a wide range of poets and styles, Bahá’í and non-Bahá’í. In his introduction to his first portfolio he stressed the spiritual nature of the poetic enterprise, in which the “serious artist” is necessarily involved. “‘Abdu’l-Bahá,” Hayden told us, “makes no distinction between ‘secular’ and ‘religious’ art. . . . poetry . . . need not be limited to religious themes (in the usual sense of the term) in order to serve ‘the Kingdom of God.’ ‘Abdu’l-Bahá sees the creative act as essentially a religious act. . . . The poet’s efforts to master form and technique are themselves a kind of prayer.”

In the introduction to the second portfolio Hayden spoke of the general acceptance of poetical subjects, language, and techniques that had some time ago been rejected with horror as entirely unsuitable for poetry. But with the passage of time the “‘revolution’” has become tame and, in retrospect, seems “less controversial” and “less iconoclastic than its partisans boasted. It was, really, less spontaneous combustion than the upsurge of fires kindled in the past.” While in general approving of the freedom and breadth of expression now available to the poet of our times, Hayden warned us against the superficial revolt against traditional standards that manifests as a refusal to take the pain that true artistic creation entails:

An exchange of one set of mediocrities for another has resulted in a species of nonpoetry—verse that is amorphous in structure, trivial in substance, and pretentious. This kind of verse is, more often than not, informed by a crass naturalism and linguistic violence which delude those responsible for it into believing they are “telling it like it is.” Yet they have been hailed in some quarters as the “voices of revolution.”

But the truly revolutionary poets are always those who are committed to some integrative vision of art and life. Theirs is an essentially spiritual vision which leads to the creation of new forms and techniques, to a new awareness.

“Without vision the people perish.”

These words tell us, better than any of ours, who was a man we now mourn. His “integrative vision of art and life” was beautifully manifested in his own poems, as in those he carefully selected for our magazine.

[A future issue of WORLD ORDER will be devoted to Robert Hayden, his life and poetry]

* * *

[Page 4] The second essay in Nosratollah Rassekh’s trilogy on the early centuries of each of the three most recent dispensations in the flow of progressive revelations appears in this issue of WORLD ORDER. The trilogy itself mirrors the triad of past, present, and future, a figure that leads to some reflections on time and history. The past is always with us; the future has already begun; the present consists of waning past and waxing future. If we are tempted to equate Christianity with the past, Islám with the present, and the Bahá’í Faith with the future, we must, nevertheless, keep in mind that Christianity continues to be a force in our lives, as does its predecessor Judaism, though Toynbee once relegated it to the station of a “fossil religion.”

Similarly, Islám, which arose some thirteen centuries ago, did not totally displace Christianity, though it is long past its prime. There is a new dispensation coming into its early maturity, a religion that, newest in the procession of revelations, is to occupy the future with an impact more global and more profound than any of the past. The Bahá’í Faith, in its second century, has much more future than past. The fascinating parallels and differences, marked by Professor Rassekh, among these three dispensations as each got its start, emerge as the series continues and will find their culmination in our next issue.

* * *

Vinson Jamir gives us a glimpse into the future in his history of equal pay for men and women in the European Economic Community. The principle seems obvious, but its realization is often complex and elusive. The EEC may well prefigure the world community to come and the down-to-earth implementation of spiritual principles that will confront it.

* * *

To the Editor

ABOUT LOUIS GREGORY

Now that we have had Gayle Morrison's sketches on the life of our dear Hand of the Cause, Louis G. Gregory [“To Move the World,” Summer 1979, Fall 1979, Winter 1980], I feel so grateful to the editors, to Gayle, and to all who helped in the research. Mr. Gregory was almost like an uncle to my sister and me, as he gave the Message to our parents, visited in our home in Cleveland; and on those occasions he always held us spellbound during all the lectures and meetings where he spoke. Through informal conversations we were charmed by the many stories of his experiences with ‘Abdu’l-Bahá.

Mr. Gregory’s excitement about the Faith was so unrestrained in his heart that he wanted to go to every leader in the land from the President and to anyone to shout out the Message of Bahá’u’lláh.

The knowledge I have gained from the three articles appearing in WORLD ORDER magazine by Gayle Morrison has expanded my vision of the concern which every believer should have for obeying the command of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to love all the friends, to bring in the blacks as brothers and sisters as equals and the same as anyone else. One sees very readily why we have not achieved our goals because we have not obeyed this single mandate on the essential pivotal principle of the Bahá’í Faith . . . the oneness of mankind.

For the past seventy years too many of the American Bahá’ís have practiced within the Bahá’í Faith the attitudes developed in American society toward the colored race. The Guardian told us not to wait and let other liberal organizations take the lead in their cordial treatment of colored peoples. Although the Bahá’ís have always been eager to obey the mandates coming from the Central Figures of the Faith, the entirety of the American and Canadian Bahá’ís have not yet seen the importance of embracing wholeheartedly the colored peoples in their midst. The fact that Gayle has to record the separate Bahá’í meetings for blacks and whites in Washington even in the twenties indicates how far the Bahá’í community has had to come to attain the imperative objective of practicing the oneness of mankind.

The problem of obliterating racial prejudice was foremost in the mind of Louis G. Gregory. [Page 5] And one can make a laudatory comment about the insight of the delegates at the National Bahá’í Conventions who voted to elect him a member of the National Spiritual Assembly. A suitable election it was, to be sure, as ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had remarked how Mr. Gregory was a willing student of His. The Master found him to be a “well-educated, articulate, humble man bridging in his own upbringing the formidable chasm resulting from both legal and de facto segregation that separated black and white Americans in his day.” Wherever he went, or with whomever he traveled, as Gayle points out so carefully, Mr. Gregory’s concern was the universal view, but he never let anyone forget his particular commitment to interracial unity.

In my opinion, every Bahá’í, black and white, as well as non-Bahá’ís, should read and study these articles on the biography of Louis Gregory, because through them one can get a bird’s eye view of the challenges we have yet to meet in implementing the principle of the oneness of mankind.

‘Abdu’l-Bahá came with the answers to the question of what this country needed, and to solve our racial problems here. When the Master visited us in 1912, it was to bring us the solutions. After reading these WORLD ORDER magazine articles on Louis Gregory we come to understand better the Master’s description of Mr. Gregory as “pure gold.” Gayle Morrison has captured the spirit and the stature of Mr. Gregory.

LYDIA J. MARTIN

Silver Spring, Maryland

MORE ON “THE TABLET OF WISDOM”

In regard to Todd Lawson’s letter in the Winter 1980 WORLD ORDER, I would like to thank Mr. Lawson for taking the trouble to read my article on the Tablet of Wisdom, and to comment. I am in strong agreement with him when he stresses that much in the Bábí and Bahá’í writings must be understood in the light of in Islamic literary and cultural tradition. I also agree that “A prophet, after all, is restricted to the language of His people” and that a prophet who attempted to be totally original in regard to language would simply not be understood by the people to whom He was sent. Shoghi Effendi urged Bahá’ís to study Islám, I think, precisely because he wanted us better to grasp the complex cultural and literary context of the Writings, so as to deepen our understanding of them.

However, I feel it necessary to reply to Mr. Lawson’s suggestion that I was perhaps too hasty in concluding that Bahá’u’lláh was actually quoting from Shahrastání and Abú’l-Fidá’. As I point out in the article, there is internal evidence in the Tablet of Wisdom that Bahá’u’lláh was quoting from the wise and the learned. Second, if Mr. Lawson . . . will take the trouble to look up the sources I have cited, or to examine the whole Islamic historiographical tradition about the Greek philosophers from Sijistání through Abú’l-Fidá’, and to compare them paragraph by paragraph with the relevant passages in the Arabic original of the Tablet of Wisdom, I think he will in the end concur with me that the phrases in the latter are selective quotes and close paraphrases of particular sources and not John Wansbrough’s cultural topoi. Any scholar who writes out the passages in these sources about, say, Socrates, in one column, and in another column wtites out the passage on Socrates from the Tablet of Wisdom, will be able to see quite clearly that Bahá’u’lláh was here quoting from Abú’l-Fidá’. There are some controversial and arguable points in my article. This is not one of them.

I should also note that it was quite common in Islamic literature for writers to quote past authors without indicating they were doing so. There was no structure of footnotes in classical Islamic prose, and many of the basic sources were committed to memory. Just as a contemporary essayist would expect his audience to know when he used a phrase from Shakespeare, Bahá’u’lláh expected Nabíl-i-Akbar to know the sources for His statements about the philosophers. Finally, as Bahá’u’lláh notes in the quote I give in the article from the Seven Valleys, whenever He quoted other sources this was a condescension to the ways of men, and not a detraction from His own supernatural insight.

In the end, I think that Mr. Lawson and I are in substantial agreement in regard to the majority of his comments. I thank him once again for those comments, and wish him the best of luck with his valuable studies, for which he is obviously well-equipped. I look forward to his own contributions to scholarship on the Writings.

JUAN R. COLE

von Grunebaum Center for

Near East Studies

University of California-Los Angeles

[Page 6]

[Page 7]

Islám: The First 138 Years

The Second of Three Studies on Religion and Society

BY NOSRATOLLAH RASSEKH

Mankind were one community. and Allah sent (unto them) Prophets as bearers of good tidings and as warners, and revealed therewith the Scripture with the truth that it might judge between mankind concerning that wherein they differed. And only those unto whom (the Scripture) was given differed concerning it, after clear proofs had come unto them, through hatred one of another. And Allah by His will guided those who believe unto the truth of that concerning which they differed. Allah guideth whom He will unto a straight path.

Qur’án 2:213

Every religious community stands in need of a leader who will watch over it, in the absence of its Prophet, and enforce the rules and prescriptions of its religion and be looked upon as his successor. . . .

Moreover, in view of the need for authority in every human grouping ans society, a chief is needed who will guide men towards objects which are advantageous to them and will force them to keep away from those things that are harmful. Such chiefs are known as Kings.

Now in the Muslim religion, which is all-inclusive in its appeal and seeks to convert all, by persuasion or by force, the Jihad [Holy War] against infidels is obligatory. Hence, in Islam, Caliphate and Kingship are conjoined, in order to unite all efforts towards a common end.

[The religious leaders other than Islám] do not concern themselves with political affairs, but leave the temporal power in the hands of men who have seized it by chance or for some reason with which religion has nothing to do. Sovereignty exists among such peoples owing to social solidarity, as we said before; their religion as such, however, does not impose any sovereignty on them seeing that it does not demand of them dominion over other peoples, as is the case with Islam, but merely the establishing of their faith among themselves. . . .

Ibn Kaldun of Tunis

---

SIX HUNDRED and twenty two years after the crucifixion of Christ, Muḥammad, the Apostle of God, and the handful of His followers were forced to leave the city of Mecca and find refuge among the people of Medina. This was the year of the Migration (hegira). The persecution of the Prophet and of His converts in His home city had become so intolerable that to have stayed there would have meant the annihilation of the new Faith. The journey was dangerous and desperate, but the event changed the course of Islám and the history of man. In Medina, Islám survived and expanded. Some seventeen years later the Caliph ‘Umar made the lunar year (beginning 16 July) in which the hegira took place the official starting point of the Muslim era.

By the year A.H. 138 the followers of the Prophet had swept aside two magnificent empires—the Persian Sassanid and the Byzantine. In the west they had crossed North [Page 8] Africa and entered Spain and France. In the north they had reached the gates of Constantinople. In the east they had marched into central Asia beyond the River Oxus and into the Indus Valley.

In the year 138 the great grandson of al-‘Abbás, the Prophet’s uncle, Abú-Ja‘far, called al-Mansúr (meaning “rendered victorious”), was the ruler of the most extensive empire the world had yet seen. He was personally conducting a reconnaissance to find a site for the location of a new capital; he found it on the west bank of the Tigris River, not far from the ruins of the old Sassanid capital, Ctesiphon. Here the Tigris was joined by a navigable canal to the Euphrates; the land was centrally placed between Arabia, Egypt, and Syria, on one hand, and Persia, Transoxiana, and the Punjab, on the other.

Two years later (A.H. 140 or A.D. 762) some 100,000 architects, craftsmen, and laborers were to begin the construction of the legendary city of Baghdád, which was destined to become the most illustrious city on the face of the earth. It was truly a city of gold, for every building was covered with it. Baghdád was a round city within a double circle of brick walls. Its chief glory was the royal palace at the center, which, with its annexes for the officials, eunuchs, and the harems, occupied a third of the city. Resplendently furnished, the audience chamber was to be the setting for an elaborate ceremonial continuing that of the Byzantines and Sassanids down to minor details.

The supporters of the dynasty, the bureaucrats, and the ordinary citizens were to live in the suburbs outside the walls. This remarkable isolation of the Prince of the Faithful in his luxurious palace, protected by walls and carefully chosen retainers, stood in dramatic contrast to the simplicity of the early Muslim society in Medina, where the Prophet and His immediate successors, barefoot and in mended clothes, mingled freely and unceremoniously with the crowds in market places. In 138 years the Arabs and Islám had, indeed, come a long way.

The Setting

WHEN Muḥammad was born, the Arabs were not barbarians, though they lacked the refinement of Romans and Persians. Arabia was, and still is, almost completely desert, where it might not rain for ten years, and had only a narrow strip of habitable land around the periphery. But long before the advent of Islám the Peninsula had begun to emerge from its isolation to play a part in world affairs. The camel was an essential part of communication. In the long, dry, and lonely landscape it could carry loads weighing up to four hundred pounds, cover a distance of sixty miles in a day, and travel for twenty days without water in 120 degree temperatures. Thus Arabia, though it had no easy access to the outside world, was crisscrossed by caravan routes. Caravans carried trade between the civilized parts of southern Arabia and the Fertile Crescent, East Africa and the Far East, and the Mediterranean world. From the beginning the southern Arabs traditionally had been economically and culturally advanced. They had developed Yemen, at times colonized Ethiopia, and traded across the Indian Ocean. Some areas in Yemen and the Ḥijáz (regions along the Red Sea) had adopted Christianity and had their own bishoprics and churches, such as the great one in Najrán.

With the immigration of considerable numbers of Jews influences of the Hebraic religion had entered Arabia. In the first and second centuries A.D. the Roman government had violently crushed the Jewish independence movements. It may have been during the dispersal that Jews came to Arabia and settled in Yemen and the Ḥijáz city of Yathrib, where they greatly increased the area of land under cultivation and established numerous date-palm plantations.

By the latter half of the sixth century A.D. the Jews accounted for a large share of the total population of that city.

The Arabs of the north had been more [Page 9] isolated, but even there, two centuries before the Prophet’s time, some of the tribes had moved across the frontier into Syria and ‘Iráq, and some had adopted Christianity and Judaism. In the northeast the Arab kingdom of Ḥírah had allied itself with the Persian empire, and in the northwest the kingdom of Ghassán usually was in alliance with Byzantium.

A number of markets and fairs had grown up along the caravan routes, particularly from Syria to Yemen and from the Fertile Crescent to the Indian Ocean, and had become permanent fixtures.

Some forty-eight miles inland from the Red Sea in a rocky valley was the city of Mecca. It was purely a trading community and owed its existence to a well, Zamzam, with tepid, salty, bitter water. By the end of the fifth century A.D. it had become the commercial center of the Peninsula, wealthy and sophisticated in comparison with the life in the surrounding desert. The city also had religious significance because it housed the Ka‘bah (“cube”), the square temple, which contained the sacred Black Stone and in which each major tribe had its idol—all together perhaps as many as three hundred of them—some in human forms, others in the shape of animals, and some even in the form of vegetables.

In towns and the oases the social structures governing the life of the desert were formed and continued. The basic units were small groups, clans, or subtribes. Each clan was independent, protected its own members, and all considered one another as if one blood, subject to the authority of the sheikh. Nor all clans were equal because some had become rich by trade, plunder, or raids.

A tribe was made up of clans that, rightly or wrongly, acknowledged some kind of kinship. Each tribe had its eponymous ancestor, and the chief of the tribe performed functions that in a more complex society are assumed by scores of officials; he was the political head, the commander-in-chief, the chief judge, and the treasurer.

Thus the government was simple, direct, and unorganized. There was no written code of law; there was no state or police force. Each group did elect a leader, but his authority depended strictly on his personal prestige. And he, as Bernard Lewis has pointed out, was “rarely more than a first among equals.”

He followed rather than led tribal opinion. He could neither impose duties nor inflict penalties. Rights and obligations attached to individual families “within” the tribe but to none outside. . . . He was advised by a council of elders called the Majlis, consisting of the families and representatives of clans within the tribe. The Majlis was the mouthpiece of public opinion.

In Mecca the Quraysh tribe, the custodians of the Ka‘bah, comprised a dozen or more clans and had been dominant for more than a century.

The Arabs had little time for religion, the arts, or architecture. The poverty of environment left little room for artistic expression except in words. The Arabs admired eloquence. Poetry was their supreme art. The vocabulary was rich, and the sense finely shaped and allusive. The poet was the spokesman of the tribe who sang the praise of its heroes and leaders and attacked its enemies. As Professor Hitti has put it, “[b]eside being oracle, guide, orator and spokesman of his community, the poet was its historian and scientist, in so far as it had a scientist. Bedouin measured intelligence by poetry. ‘Who dares dispute my tribe . . . its preeminence in horsemen, poets and members?,’ exclaimed a bard.”

Arabic poetry also embodied the Arab’s code of values—bravery in battle, patience in misfortune, persistence in revenge, protection of the weak, defiance of the strong, [Page 10] loyalty to the tribe, hospitality to guests, generosity to the needy, and fidelity to promises.

To judge by his poetry the pagan Bedouin before Islám had little if any religion. There were living things of a beastly nature called jinn—or demons. They differed from gods in that the latter were on the whole friendlier to man than the hostile jinn. The Bedouin did not believe in personal immortality. Magical superstition dominated what religious sentiments existed among the Arabs.

The Call

AMID the solemn grandeur of Arabian wilderness, in the deep solitude of a cave in the hill of Hirrá’, a few miles northeast of Mecca, a bare, arid upland “devoid of all beauty,” its “dull, monotonous coloring varying from dirty yellow to dirty light brown and muddy grey,” Muḥammad, a forty-year-old native of the city, heard three Arabic words that were soon to shake the world: “You are the Messenger of God.”

The experience took place on the night of the twenty-sixth or twenty-seventh of the month of Ramaḍán in the year A.D. 610. Muslim tradition has identified the voice as that of the Archangel Gabriel (Jibrá’íl).

It was a painful and agonizing experience for Muḥammad, Who feared that He might have been possessed by some evil spirit. But the voice persisted and commanded:

Read: In the name of thy Lord who createth,

Createth man from a clot.

Read: And thy Lord is the Most Bounteous,

Who teacheth by the pen,

Teacheth man that which he knew not.

What a change in the life of a man who had lived a quiet, happy, simple, and abstemious life. He had been born a few years after the death of the great Byzantine emperor Justinian, in the reign of Khusraw Anúshirván, the illustrious Persian king. His father ‘Abdu’lláh, who through His mother’s side was related to the Quraysh tribe, had died either during his wife’s pregnancy or shortly after her delivery, while on a business trip to Medina on his way home from Gaza. He had left his wife Áminah very little in worldly goods—one slave, five camels, and a few sheep. Muḥammad was six years old when His mother died on her way home from a journey to Medina with her slave Umm Ayman. His eighty-year-old grandfather ‘Abdu’l-Muṭṭalib then took Him to live in his house. The grandfather died two years later, and young Muḥammad became the ward of Abú-Ṭálib, His uncle and the son of the same mother as Muḥammad’s father. Abú-Ṭálib, the leader of the clan known as the Banú-Hashím, was a merchant in comfortable circumstances in Mecca. Muḥammad most probably learned to read and write, though the extent of His learning is not known. He was known for His intelligence and His calm, confident, and balanced way of conducting Himself both in His own affairs and in His dealing with others. He was also highly respected for His honesty and integrity.

He did not marry until He was about twenty-five years old, having remained a bachelor longer than most of His contemporaries perhaps because of His poverty. Then He married Khadíjah, a widow, who had already been married twice and was fifteen years His senior. Her caravans brought merchandise from Syria and Byzantium to [Page 11] Mecca and made her prosperous. The marriage brought material comfort and economic security to Muḥammad, but it also was a union of two individuals who strongly loved and respected one another. His deep affection for His wife never wavered.

They had four daughters, but their sons died at an early age. One was al-Qásim, who died when he was about two years old. There seemed also to have been another son by the name of ‘Abdu’lláh. But Muḥammad adopted His young cousin ‘Alí, whose father Abú-Ṭálib was experiencing some business difficulties. He also adopted as a son, Zayd, a slave given to Him by His wife—a young Christian man from Syria from the tribe of Kalb.

Thus at the age of forty Muḥammad was living a serene life, surrounded by affection, respected by all, and could have gone on living happily the rest of His life. The mystical experience in the hill of Hirrá’, however, interrupted it all. He ran from the cave and threw Himself over a precipice, when suddenly He saw Gabriel “in the form of a man, with his feet astride the horizon.” In the stress of the great emotion caused by the vision, His face covered with sweat. Muḥammad was seized with a violent shuddering and lay unconscious for some time. He then rushed home in alarm and asked His wife Khadíjah to put some covers over Him. Once again the voice commanded Muḥammad: “O thou enveloped in thy cloak, Arise and warn!”

Khadíjah then and there became the first to believe in her husband’s mission. Thus, inconspicuously, a religion was born in the heart of the Arabian desert. The significance of that Night of Power was known only to two individuals on the face of the earth. Otherwise there were no outward signs to herald the coming of a New Day—no falling of stars, no darkening of the sun, no trembling of the earth. Life continued as it had before; the potency of the spiritual forces released was yet to be demonstrated.

For three years Muḥammad, now the Prophet (an-Nabí’), did not publicly declare His mission. The Messenger of God (an-Rasúl) shared His Faith but with a very few. His first converts were members of His own family. After Khadíjah, ‘Alí, His cousin, still in his teens, embraced the new religion. Abú-Bakr’s conversion was helpful since he was a prominent merchant and a recognized member of the Quraysh tribe. ‘Umar and ‘Uthmán, who, like Abú-Bakr, were to become after the death of the Prophet the leaders of the Muslim community, were also among the early believers.

Among the handful of converts were a few who were younger sons of influential men of the leading families and clans of Mecca. The majority, however, were young men of no great social standing. Some had neither family nor clan ties; others had ceased for one reason or another to receive their clans’ protection. Early Islám, as one historian has characterized it, “was a movement of young people mostly well under forty years old” and predominantly “weak people.”

The public preaching of the Faith began around A.D. 615. During the early formative years of Islám the new religion had transcended but had not destroyed tribal customs and traditions. Through new revelations Islám’s strong monotheistic principle was becoming more clearly defined and the break with the paganism of the past more discernible. Now the city and the tribe had to take some action. At first the Quraysh had [Page 12] tolerated the little community, and the Banú-Háshim clan had stuck by the Prophet. Abú-Ṭálib, His uncle, had not approved his Nephew’s ideas but nonetheless had extended his family’s protection to Him; and many Meccans had considered the Prophet as a harmless visionary, possessed, perhaps, like the káhins (“soothsayers”), magicians, and poets, by a spirit of lesser order. Were there not a number of others who had also claimed prophethood for themselves? Was there not Maslamah (or Masaylimah) who was also reciting revelations in rhythmic prose? Was there not the prophetess Sajaḥ of the tribe of Tamím? Had not Khadíjah’s own cousin preached some of the very ideas now being espoused by Muḥammad?

Names of Christians and Jews were quoted by the townspeople from whom the Prophet was said to have received His information and whose teachings He was merely repeating. But as the Prophet became bolder in preaching His religion and more clearly emphasizing its truth and independence, the persecution and opposition began. The Prophet was subjected to verbal insults and tongue-lashings. His unprotected followers were beaten by their fellow clansmen, as were the Quraysh Muslims. Economic pressures were exerted. Meccans refused to pay their debts to Muslims, and severe boycotts greatly reduced the fortunes of many, including Abú-Bakr's. When Abú-Ṭálib refused to withdraw his protection from the Prophet, other Quraysh families initiated economic boycotts against that clan and its closest ally, the al-Muṭṭalib clan.

In the year A.D. 615 the Prophet sent His followers to Abyssinia for sanctuary under its Christian king. There may not have been more than fifteen of them, though the list of emigrants was certainly added to at a later date. At the same time the little community of believers that remained in Mecca perhaps counted some forty men and ten or twenty women.

The Year of Emigration: Hegira

IN THE YEAR 619, Khadíjah and Abú-Ṭálib, the two significant persons who to a great extent had supported and sheltered the Prophet, died within a few days of one another. Now the historian enters a period in the life of Muḥammad and the development of Islám in which the chronological order of events can be treated with comparative safety.

Abú-Ṭálib was succeeded as the head of the Banú-Háshim clan by his brother, Abú-Lahab. His hostility to his Nephew caused the withdrawal of clan protection from the Prophet. As a result the infant community’s prospects for the future looked hopeless. No spectacular conversions were being made. Physical persecution became common, and the Prophet’s warnings to the Meccans were to no avail: “"So We took each one in his sin; of them was he on whom We sent a hurricane, and of them was he who was overtaken by the (Awful) Cry, and of them was he whom We caused the earth to swallow, and of them was he whom We drowned. It was not for Allah to wrong them, but they wronged themselves.” At the same time God also comforted the believers with promises of punishment to their oppressors:

And if Our revelations are recited unto them in plain terms, they say: This is naught else than a man who would turn you away from what your fathers used to worship; and they say: This is naught else than an invented lie. . . .

And We have given them no Scriptures [Page 13] which they study, nor sent We unto them, before thee, any warner.

Those before them denied, and these have not attained a tithe of that which We bestowed on them (of old); yet they denied My messengers. How intense then was My abhorrence (of them)!

Say (unto them, O Muḥammad): I exhort you unto one thing only: that ye awake, for Allah’s sake, by twos and singly, and then reflect: There is no madness in your comrade. He is naught else than a warner unto you in face of a terrific doom. . . .

Couldst thou but see when they are terrified with no escape, and are seized from near at hand,

And say: We (now) believe therein. But how can they reach (faith) from afar off,

When they disbelieved in it of yore. They aim at the unseen from afar off.

But the unbelievers were not moved. As the fate of the little community of Muslims seemed doomed in Mecca, they had to look to Medina for future success.

Medina, some two-hundred miles northwest of Mecca, was also on the south-to-north caravan route. It was in an oasis of some twenty square miles, rich in underground water and dense plantations of date palms and other fruit trees. The tribes who lived there had small forts to which they could retreat when attacked by their enemies. There was no concentration of houses or anything resembling a city at the time.

Among the leading families of Medina were some Jewish clans who had settled there, adopted Arab customs, and spoke a dialect of Arabic. The Jewish name for Yathrib was the Aramaic medinta, which meant simply “the city.”

In March 620 the Prophet met seven men from Medina who had come to Mecca on a pilgrimage. He had a private conversation with them that led to their conversion. The following year the seven men came back and brought five more with them. The twelve met the Prophet at night in a little valley east of Mecca and pledged their loyalty to Him. In March 622 seventy-three men came from Medina and offered their allegiance. Now, with His eyes set on that city, the Prophet asked the Meccan Muslims to leave the city. The Faithful set out for Medina in small groups, the departures taking place over a period of about three months—July, August, and September. In Medina the emigrants, perhaps no more than seventy (though some have estimated two hundred), were welcomed by the local adherents. Muḥammad and a few of His closest disciples were the last to leave Mecca.

On 28 June 622 a Jewish peasant looking over the walls of his settlement saw the weary Prophet and His companions urging their camels toward the cool shade of the palm trees. He ran to take the news to the Muslims, and some five hundred men, women, and children rushed out joyously and shouted, “The Prophet of God has come!”

The date and the event proved to be of major significance in the history of Islám and the fortunes of the Prophet. In Medina Muḥammad founded the Islamic ummah, or community, apart and independent from others. Ummah was a congregation of Alláh, a community governed by a divine plan as revealed by God’s Messenger.

Here in Medina, isolated from their base and separated from their familial tribes, the Emigrants and the Helpers still calling themselves the Faithful (mu’min, in the singular), rather than Muslims, slowly gained autonomy, developed their own organization, and saw its limits and objectives becoming more defined and its doctrinal capital growing. In the City of the Prophet a state of a [Page 14] special kind—a theocratic state—was developing. Emphasis on a community of belief rather than blood relationship brought peace to settlements heretofore torn by interfamily feuds.

Though very early there formed an “inner circle” composed of a small group of the believers closest to the Prophet, believers whose advice He often would ask, Muḥammad was the one force unifying the group. Here the Prophet became also a statesman. Here the process of the Arabization and the nationalization of Islám began.

When the Emigrants came to Medina, they, as a whole, possessed no funds and had no material base. But the Quraysh tribe did have a thriving trade with Syria, and the caravans had to pass within sixty miles of the oasis. Medina was a convenient center for any expedition against these enterprises of the rich. Soon after the Hegira the Muslims did in fact start to raid the caravans. At first the attacks were no great matter since extreme care was taken to refrain from bloodshed. But in the month of Rajab, the second year of the Hegira (January 624) the first blood was spilled when one of the four caretakers of the caravan was killed, two were taken prisoners, and one escaped. The caravan was captured and taken to Medina in triumph.

Not too long after this incident (March 624) a caravan of one thousand camels returning from Damascus was due to pass close to Medina. The Muslims in the city decided to intercept it. But the leader of the caravan, Abú-Sufyán, of the Umayyad family became aware of the plot while still in Syria. He immediately dispatched a swift camel rider to Mecca, urging the Meccans to send an armed force to protect the caravan and escort it past Medina.

Muḥammad with a force of approximately three hundred men, seventy camels, and two horses waited some twenty miles south of Medina near the well of Badr where the route from Syria left the coast and ran a little way inland on the way to Mecca, and from which point a road branched off toward Medina. The Quraysh had sent an army of well over nine hundred with three hundred camels, and one hundred horses, hoping to make a strong impression on the dissidents in Medina. When the two armies met, after a few single combats between champions, the Quraysh advanced. But they fought as individual clans, whereas the Muslims had the unified and unifying command of the Prophet. The Quraysh were facing the east and had the morning sun in their eyes; they were thirsty and had no particular desire to fight their kinsmen for the protection of a caravan which, they had now heard, had already passed safely. Their principal leader was killed at the very beginning of the battle. They could not withstand the fierce enthusiasm of the Muslims, and before noon the Meccans broke in flight. leaving fifty to seventy of their comrades dead and seventy others prisoners. On the Muslim side there were only fifteen dead.

The Muslims returned in triumph to Medina. The Quraysh had not met a defeat for generations. The spoils of war were significant: a great quantity of arms and armor, 115 camels, and 14 horses. It was Islám’s first great success, and it confirmed the Prophet’s position in Medina and laid the foundation of His temporal power.

The Battle of Badr signalized the emergence of Islám as a militant religion. The Prophet Himself had led an army. Defense of the Islamic community was not only justified, it became the responsibility of the Faithful. “Fight in the way of Allah against those who fight against you, but begin not hostilities. Lo! Allah loveth not aggressors.”

[Page 15] Now, to intercept all trade between Mecca and Syria, thus ruining the economy of the Quraysh, became Muḥammad’s strategy. But the open deserts crossed by the caravans were inhabited by nomadic tribes whose cooperation had obviously become essential. One tribe, the Juhaynah, was won over; but two other tribes, further east, remained loyal to the Quraysh. With the memory of the defeat at Badr firmly impressed in their minds, and the threat to their very way of life becoming more real every day, the Meccans determined to strike back at the Muslims and once and for all to eliminate the Islamic community and its leader.

Almost exactly a year after the disaster of Badr, a Meccan force three thousand strong, including two hundred cavalry, under the command of Abú-Sufyán, who had led the caravan to safety at the time of that battle, set out for the city of the Prophet. Muḥammad had no more than one thousand men under His command, only one hundred of them with armor, and only two horses. Nonetheless, the Muslims sallied out of town. The Qurayshites had reached Mount Uḥud some two miles north of Medina on the evening of Thursday, the fifth of Shawwál in the year A.H. 3 (21 March 625). On Sunday morning the Muslims arrived, and the battle was joined. Muḥammad Himself wielded a spear and drew a bow. A stone split His lips and broke one of His teeth. Another smashed into the cheek piece of His helmet, and there was blood on His face. A Qurayshite dealt Him a blow that sent Him stumbling backward into a hole. Some fifteen Muslim warriors formed about the Prophet and slowly fought their way back with Him to the shelter of the hill. Someone cried that the Prophet was dead, and panic increased among His followers. Ḥamzah, His uncle, was killed. Qurayshi ranged over the plain, finishing off the wounded.

Muḥammad’s army had been totally defeated by nightfall. The victors, however, did not march on Medina. As Sir John Glubb has observed, “the old Arabs did not practice total war. Final victory was not to them a familiar concept.” Abú-Sufyán, standing in the plain below, addressed the fugitives clinging to the rocks of the hill: “Today is in exchange for Badr. We will meet again next year.” The Quraysh then mounted their camels and rode toward Mecca.

The Muslims, soon after the defeat, were confronted by the Prophet:

Faint not nor grieve, for ye will overcome them if ye are (indeed) believers.

If ye have received a blow, the (disbelieving) people have received a blow the like thereof. These are (only) the vicissitudes which We cause to follow one another for mankind, to the end that Allah may know those who believe and may choose witnesses from among you; and Allah loveth not wrong-doers.

And that Allah may prove those who believe, and may blight the disbelievers.

The Meccans and their allies returned, not in a year as promised, but in two. They were some ten thousand strong, including four thousand of the Quraysh. The Muslims this time did not go out to challenge such an overwhelmingly superior force but shut themselves within the fortresses of the city. The drudgery of a siege did not suit the temper of the tribesmen, who enjoyed their galloping desert battles. After three weeks of frustrating blockade the Meccans withdrew.

[Page 16] The Prophet, taking advantage of circumstances, proceeded to consolidate His power as the undisputed leader of the city. The loyalty of the believers was unwavering, but the loyalty of the Jews who were such a major force in the settlement was another matter.

The tension between the two communities was not only political; it was religious as well. At first the Jews had shown a great deal of consideration and tolerance for Muḥammad and His followers. They had welcomed Him to Medina in the year of Hegira. His teachings seemed remarkably close to their own. Did He not claim Abraham as His ancestor as they did? Had He not referred repeatedly to Moses, Joseph, Noah, Ishmael, Lot, Saul, Daniel, Solomon, Elijah, Job, and Jonah? Did not the Prophet recount the story of the creation and fall of man, the flood, and Sodom? Might not He, in fact, be the Messiah? After all, there were Jewish prophecies that had forecast the end of the world at the end of the fifth century A.D. War between the two great empires Of the region—the Persian and Byzantine—had resumed and seemed to confirm the prediction. “When you see kingdoms fighting among themselves, then look for the footsteps of the Messiah. Know that it will be so because so it was in the days of Abraham. When nation made war against nation [Gen. xiv] then was redemption granted to Abraham.” Other Jewish prophecies had claimed that a great war between Rome and Persia would take place just before the end:

Rejoice, Exult, O Constantinople, city of Wicked Edom [another name for Rome and the Romans], built on the soil of Romania, possessed of the countless armies of the people of Edom! For Thou also shalt be chastized. The Parthians [the Persians] shall ravage Thee, the accursed cup comes to meet Thee and Thou shalt be made drunken and cast out. And then shall Thy sign be expiated, O community of Zion! Thou shalt be delivered by the Messiah Thy King and by Elijah the priest.

Though there were prophecies and predictions, soon after Muḥammad’s arrival in Medina its large Jewish population rejected Muḥammad’s initial conciliatory gestures symbolized by the adoption of such Jewish practices as praying in the direction of Jerusalem. The Jews could appreciate Islám’s recognition of the divine mission of Abraham, Moses, and the prophets, but they resented Muḥammad’s inclusion of Jesus and Ishmael among God’s messengers, as well as His own claim to be God’s Apostle.

For His part, the Prophet considered the presence of pockets of disaffected Jews as a source of political weakness. During the last unsuccessful Meccan siege of Medina, a Jewish tribe, Banú-Qurayẓah, had been in contact with the enemy. The Prophet ordered the capture of its settlement; the able-bodied men of the tribe were put to death; and the Emigrants were established on the date plantations thus made ownerless. Soon thereafter the Jews who were not converted were expelled from the Ḥijáz.

Now, almost without opposition in Medina [Page 17] and its environs, the Prophet became the cohesive force uniting every segment of Medinese society. Hitherto, Islám had been a religion within a state; but within six years, under Muḥammad, it passed, as Professor Hitti pointed out, “into something more than a state religion—it became the state. Then and there Islám came to be what the world has ever since recognized it to be —a militant polity.”

In March 628, during one of the months in which raiding and fighting were forbidden by all Arab tradition, Muḥammad declared His intention of making a pilgrimage to the temple of Mecca.

Some fourteen hundred Muslims followed the Prophet on that trip. The Meccans, not at all convinced that the Muslims would honor the code, mobilized their forces and took up a position to defend the city. The Muslims halted at Hudaybíyyah, a short day’s march from Mecca, and all took the oath to fight to the death for their Faith. However, there was no war and the two sides concluded a truce by which the Muslims were to return to Medina, but were allowed to make the pilgrimage after the expiration of one year.

The next year the Prophet led some sixteen hundred Muslims on the pilgrimage. The Quraysh tribe had evacuated the city and camped in the surrounding mountains. The Prophet went to the Ka‘bah and performed the seven circuits of the building, as had been done by the pagan Arabs long before. There were no expressions of antagonism toward the Meccans and no insults to the sanctity of their religion. He called the Ka‘bah the House of God, a monument built by Abraham. The Arab’s sin was to place idols in its precincts; once the idols were removed, its sacredness would endure.

Now a number of Meccans were converted to His cause, among them the two great future military luminaries, Khálid Ibn al-Walíd, the conqueror of Syria, and ‘Amr Ibn al-‘Áṣ, the future victor in Egypt.

On the tenth of Ramaḍán in A.H. 8 (1 January A.D. 630) the Prophet, at the head of an army of ten thousand, camped two days’ march from Mecca. Obviously, this was no ordinary pilgrimage!

The Meccans sent Abú-Sufyán, the conqueror of Uḥud, to the Muslim camp to negotiate with the Prophet. Instead, he became a convert and went back to his city to tell the townsfolk of the Prophet’s terms. The sanctity of life and property of all was promised, as long as the Meccans laid down their arms and shut themselves in their houses or took refuge in the house of Abú-Sufyán.

On Thursday, the twentieth of Ramaḍán (the eleventh of January) Muslims in four columns, led by Muḥammad, entered the deserted streets of the city. What little resistance there was, al-Walíd easily brushed aside.

Mounted on a camel, with a long wand in His hand, in the midst of a rejoicing army and a crowd of men, horses, and camels, the Prophet made His way to the sacred Black Stone, touched it with His stick, and cried out in a loud voice “Alláh-u-Akbar!” He then made the seven ritual circles, asked for the key to the Ka‘bah and went inside. Upon returning from the sanctuary, He made a speech inviting the Quraysh to acknowledge Him as God’s Messenger. As He sat on the rock of Ṣafá, a long column of Meccans— men first, women behind—filed past Him and swore allegiance to Alláh. He proclaimed a general amnesty, and with His clemency on this day of triumph He won the hearts of the Meccans. The Prophet, finally, had been honored by His own people!

From Mecca He sent a number of small expeditions into the surrounding country. On the twenty-seventh of Dhul l-Qa’da in the year [Page 18] A.H. 8 (18 March A.D. 630) the Prophet returned to Medina. The year A.H. 9 is known as the Year of Delegation. Representatives from all the major tribes went to Medina to offer their submission to the Prophet and promised to furnish troops and not to attack one another. In the same year He concluded treaties of peace with the Christian chief of al-Aqabah and the Jewish tribes in the oasis of Magná, Adhzúh, and Jarbá of the Ḥijáz to the south. To these Jews and Christians was extended the protection of Islám on payment of a special tax—jizyah.

In March 632 the Prophet once again led a multitude of His followers to Mecca for pilgrimage. This was His “Farewell Pilgrimage.” He gave a sermon to the assembly of the Faithful, and closed His preaching by looking up to heaven and crying, “O, Lord, I have delivered my message and fulfilled my mission.” One day soon after His return to Medina the Prophet complained of high fever and severe headache. For a week His condition deteriorated. On the tenth day the symptoms were greatly aggravated, and He was racked with pain. However, to the surprise of all, He appeared the next day in the mosque at the hour of the dawn prayer, smiled at the congregation, and told them to go ahead with their devotions. But He was weak. Within a few hours He returned to His room and fell back on His bed. His head, resting against His wife’s breast, suddenly grew heavy. He called for water and wet His face. “O Lord,” were the Prophet’s last words, “I beseech Thee to assist me in the agonies of death,” and in a faint whisper He prayed, “Lord, grant me pardon. Eternity in Paradise.” On that Monday at noon, late in May or early in June, the Prophet met His Lord.

The Message

THE PROPHET’S messages since His first revelation on the Night of Power were, over some twenty-two years, taken down on scraps of leather, flat camel bones, potshards, palm leaves, parchment, even stones—or memorized. In His lifetime these fragments began to be collected into súrihs and became known collectively as “The Recitation”—in Arabic, al-Qur’án.

However, during the course of the wars following the death of Muḥammad, so many Qur’án memorizers and reciters were lost as to endanger the perpetuation of the sacred words. Abú-Bakr, the Prophet’s first successor, began the collection of the materials that, some nineteen years later, resulted in the compilation of the entire Qur’án in the days of ‘Uthmán (644-56)—the third successor —who canonized the Medinese code and ordered all others destroyed. In no other major religion before had there been such early agreement on the official version of the Founder’s words and teachings.

The Book made Islám a literate religion. It constitutes the smallest basic scripture of any great religion, about two-thirds the size of the New Testament, but is the best authenticated, and was arranged so early that it must be considered ipsissima verba of the Prophet, almost unaltered. Of the 114 súrihs, 92 were revealed in Mecca and 22 in Medina. though the Medinese chapters are longer and constitute about one-third of the Book. Meccan revelations were mainly concerned with faith in God and devoted mainly to spiritual [Page 19] principles grounding the Muslims in that faith. Medinese revelations were mostly intended to translate that faith into action.

The arrangement of the súrihs was arbitrary and mechanical. All except the first are placed automatically in diminishing order of length and bear no relation to chronological sequence or subject matter.

The Qur’án was designed to be recited. Anyone who has listened to its verses being chanted can attest to the Qur’án’s cadence, melody, and power.

Because the Qur’án must never be used by Muslims in translation for worship, the spread of Islám created an impressive degree of linguistic unity that remains today. By forbidding its translation, Islám imposed Arabic as the enduring cultural bond to hold the adherents together long after the religious bonds had become weakened. There are significant parallels with Judaism, which through the use of Hebrew has given the community a strong sense of cultural and spiritual unity, and with Roman Catholicism, which by the imposition of the use of Latin gave Western Europe a cultural heritage of lasting value.

The theological doctrines of the Qur’án are simple. The central tenet of Islám is monotheism. There is but one God, and Muḥammad is His Messenger: “Say: He is Allah, the One! Allah, the eternally Besought of all! He begetteth not nor was begotten. And there is none comparable unto Him.”

Though there is only one God, Islám, like Christianity, recognized other supernatural beings, such as angels (very similar to those described in the Bible) and jinn, spirits midway between angels and men, some good and others evil.

Though the Prophet was the Apostle of God for His day, there had been many other Apostles before Him. The Qur’án mentions twenty-eight, of whom four are Arabian, eighteen are found in the Old Testament, and three (Zachariah, John the Baptist, and Jesus) in the New Testament.

In the Qur’án Muḥammad presents a majestic procession of the Messengers of God from Adam to His own Person:

Say (O Muslims): We believe in Allah and that which is revealed unto us and that which was revealed unto Abraham, and Ishmael, and Isaac, and Jacob, and the tribes, and that which Moses and Jesus received, and that which the Prophets received from their Lord. We make no distinction between any of them, and unto Him we have surrendered. Qur’án 2:136

Lo! Allah preferred Adam and Noah and the Family of Abraham and the Family of ‘Imrán above (all His) creatures. [Page 20] They were descendants one of another. Allah is Hearer, Knower. Qur’án 3:33-34

And verily We gave unto Moses the Scripture and We caused a train of messengers to follow after him, and We gave unto Jesus, son of Mary, clear proofs (of Allah’s sovereignty), and We supported him with the holy Spirit. Is it ever so, that, when there cometh unto you a messenger (from Allah) with that which ye yourselves desire not, ye grow arrogant, and some ye disbelieve and some ye slay? Qur’án 2:87

And verily We have raised in every nation a messenger, (proclaiming): Serve Allah and shun false gods. Then some of them (there were) whom Allah guided, and some of them (there were) upon whom error had just hold. Do but travel in the land and see the nature of the consequence for the deniers! Qur’án 16:36

God’s attributes of love and mercy are overshadowed by those of majesty and might; nevertheless, all the súrihs of the Qur’án are introduced with the same formula: “In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful.” The Faithful must also believe in resurrection, the day of judgment, heaven and hell.

The Qur’án raised the ethical standard of the Arab society to an infinitely higher plane than it had known before. Charity, humility, patience, forgiveness of enemies are strongly prescribed, and avarice, lying, and malice are condemned. The humane treatment of slaves is enjoined, and their manumission encouraged. Special care and love for orphans is called for. Dowries, divorce, and inheritance are regulated in detail. Fraud, perjury, and slander are repeatedly and severely condemned. Rules of social behavior are laid down in several passages.

The status of women in general, by contrast with the anarchy of pre-Islamic Arabia, was enormously enhanced. Though the Qur’án explicitly maintains the superior right both of the father and of the husband, women were allowed a share in property, and their legal rights were recognized. It limited polygamy to four wives. Further than that the Prophet did not legislate; rather He tried to set an example of proper respect for women.

Unfortunately, soon after Muḥammad’s death most of the rights accorded women were curtailed by restrictions imposed by their guardians and by the ingenuity of Muslim jurists.

Polygamy was sanctioned, but for the first time in all legal and religious traditions a limit was established. No man could have more than four wives: “And if ye fear that ye will not deal fairly by the orphans, marry of the women, who seem good to you, two or three or four; and if ye fear that ye cannot do justice (to so many) then one (only) or (the captives) that your right hands possess.” And though divorce was still easy, the divorced wife could not be sent away penniless.

Idolatry, infanticide, and usury were prohibited, as were gambling and the drinking of wine. A dietary law, somewhat like that of the Jews, banned certain foods, especially pork. There was also a rudimentary code of law designed to check the selfishness and violence that had prevailed among the Arabs. Arbitration was to take the place of the blood feud, and elaborate rules of inheritance safeguarded the rights of orphans and widows.

In pagan days a man acted with his tribe: morality was tribal. Islám abolished tribal ties and morals. The new brotherhood was religious. Morals were what God enioined. In the Battle of Badr the Muslims took arms in the name of their Faith against their own tribes and families.

The principal religious practices of Islám were as simple as its theology. The requirements of Islám were not severe. Five times [Page 21] a day in prayer, facing toward Mecca, the Muslim must bear witness that there is no God but God and that Muḥammad is His prophet. During the sacred month of Ramaḍán he must fast. He must give alms to the poor. If he can, he must make a pilgrimage to Mecca once during his lifetime.

Pervading Islám was the principle of religious equality. Islám provided for no organized church, for it had neither priesthood nor a sacramental system. Each individual had to assure his salvation by his own right belief and good conduct. It was customary for the Faithful to meet together for prayers, especially on Friday, and from the earliest period certain men devoted themselves to explaining the Qur’án. But neither the assembly nor the theologian was essential; anyone could accept Islám without waiting for the organization of a religious community, and any believer could preach the Faith without waiting for the coming of an ordained priest.

The Islamic community as established by the Prophet was an excellent example of a theoctatic state, one in which all power resides in God on Whose behalf political, religious, and other forms of authority are exercised.

The Dilemma of Succession

THE NEWS of the Prophet’s death was shattering to His community. He had been the Father in the Brotherhood of Islám. He was the soul and the spirit of the theocracy that He had created. His followers had not even entertained the idea that one day He would be absent from amongst them. It has been recounted that ‘Umar refused even to listen to the news of Muḥammad’s physical departure, and with “drawn sword he stood in the thoroughfare defying anyone who dared to assert the fact of the Prophet’s death.” It was the gentle Abú-Bakr who finally pacified him.

But once the Prophet was gone, what was the community to do? Who should succeed Him? And what should be the role and function of the successor?

It is a divine mystery why the Prophet left neither a will nor any other document to specify a successor. From a historical perspective it seems that the urgency for such a document was far greater for the success of Islám as a religion than for the success of Christianity. Upon His crucifixion Jesus left nothing but a handful of disciples—no organization, no state, no community in a political sense. His teachings, one can reason, were enough as a guideline for the individual conduct of His followers on this earth. But Muḥammad had created a nation, and because of it spiritual guidelines were not enough. There was also a need for communal behavior, an infallible source to direct the polity, to resolve disputes and prevent doctrinal schism. Some Muslims—the Shí‘ihs, primarily—have maintained that the Prophet orally had mentioned His cousin and son-in-law ‘Alí as His successor. But if this had been the case, only a few must have been witnesses to the event, since it is highly improbable that so many Muslims would knowingly have violated their Prophet’s command. Though it would not be impossible, one would find it hard to believe that the calm, wise, and earnest Abú-Bakr, who had spent a lifetime devoting his personal energies and his material resources to his Faith, would now, for selfish reasons, declare that a successor to the Prophet had to be chosen.

The controversy over the succession was the first major political and spiritual problem that confronted Islám. There was confusion in the ranks of His followers and rebellion [Page 22] on the part of recently converted tribes. The Companions—the Emigrants— claimed the right of succession on the basis of blood kinship and priority in belief. The Medinese—the Helpers—contested that claim and argued that without their support Islám would have perished in its cradle. The Shí‘ihs—the Legitimists—believing that God and His Messenger could not have left such an issue to the determination of the community at large, maintained that ‘Alí was the rightful and divinely appointed imám (“the guardian”) of the community. Even the Umayyad family, the aristocratic branch of the Quraysh tribe, claiming their traditional role as the head of the tribe, felt that they should continue to do so even though they were the last to believe!

This was a dangerous moment in the history of the infant cause. But, acting swiftly, some of Muḥammad’s closest associates selected the fifty-eight-year-old Abú-Bakr as the first Caliph or “deputy” of the Prophet. The choice, naturally, did not end the controversy, and in the words of a twelfth-century Arab historian of Islamic sects, “no other issue in Islám brought about more bloodshed.” However, the choice seemed appropriate. Abú-Bakr was well respected by all and was also a father-in-law of Muḥammad. He could, and did, maintain the political unity that the Prophet had created. Since a number of tribes considered their religious and political allegiance to have ended with the Prophet’s death, the first Caliph’s first task was to prevent the disintegration of the Islamic community. In the two short years of life left to him he accomplished the goal by a series of military campaigns, headed, among others, by a brilliant young Qurashí general, Khálid Ibn al-Walíd—the “Sword of Islám.”

After Abú-Bakr the Caliphate went to another of the Prophet’s earliest companions, the shrewd, strong-willed, and capable ‘Umar, whose ten-years’ rule proved to be a turning point in the history of the world.

Triumph and Tragedy

WITH THE UNITY of Arabs restored, the young, dynamic state had begun to look outward. To Arab historians the motivation for expansion was religious; the Arab triumph was providential as was that of Islám. However, modern historiography maintains that what triumphed was not Islám the religion but Islám the state—the Arab state. The motives for expansion were the age-old ones of conquest for living space and booty. There was a need to find an outlet for the physical energies of the desert warriors and search for supplies to sustain the impoverished Muslim community, The prospect of rich and fertile territory, as well as of plunder, proved a strong incentive to a people who had been eking out a bare existence from the unyielding soil.

The Arabs had long been in the habit of raiding their wealthier neighbors to the north. Even the Prophet in the year A.H. 8 (September 629) had sent an expedition northward into the outskirts of the Byzantine empire, and its commander was none other than Muḥammad’s adopted son, Zayd Ibn Ḥáritha. But at that time Theodore the Vicar had raised a force of Arab auxiliaries, both Christians and pagans, from the frontier regions and had inflicted on this “band of brigands” a resounding defeat.

Times had changed. The Prophet’s sanctification of warfare bred fanatical courage in the Arabs, already a fierce fighting people. The proud and tenacious Bedouins were magnificent warriors. Their natural fighting ability was augmented by military techniques learned from the Byzantines and the Persians [Page 23] and by their adroit use of the desert, from which they could strike the enemy and to which they could retreat. By moving outside of Arabia into the civilized agricultural lands on the edge of the desert, the Fertile Crescent, they could find glory and profit without risks to the peace and internal security of the Peninsula.

Under the banner of Islám the Arabs were unified while both the Persian and Byzantine empires had been weakened by the disastrous wars that had begun under Justinian and had continued into the reign of Heraclius. Moreover, the non-Greek subjects of Byzantine emperors were disgusted by the religious polity of a government that offered them no toleration. They had little reason to give the empire their support. The Greeks had never succeeded in their attempts to impose their Hellenistic culture and their own orthodox Christianity on the Egyptians, who spoke Coptic (a language derived from ancient Egyptian), and the Syrians, whose tongue was the Semitic Aramaic and who professed the Monophysite heresy.

In Mesopotamia the natives were in constant rebellion against their Persian overlords. The persistent wars between the two great empires were particularly devastating for the border territories. There had been war between Persia and Byzantium from 502 to 505; it resumed in 527 and continued until 532 when the Persian king Khusraw offered to make eternal peace with Justinian. The “eternal peace” lasted eight years. Anatolia fell to the Persians in 540, an armistice was signed in 545, and a fifty-year peace concluded in 562. But the fifty-year peace lasted for only ten years. In 572, about the time of the Prophet’s birth, the two empires were at it again. Four years after Muḥammad’s emigration to Medina (A.H. 4, A.D. 626) a Persian army camped in Chalcedon, across the Bosporous from Constantinople. But the Byzantine naval superiority as well as the heroic defense of the city kept the empire’s capital safe. Then Byzantium took the war to Írán. In February 628 as Heraclius was moving toward Ctesiphon, the Iranian capital, the mutinous Iranian generals put to death the king of kings and had his son crowned in his place. On 3 April once again a peace treaty was signed; and in August of 629, after an absence of six years, the Byzantine emperor returned triumphantly to his capital. In March 630—the same year in which the Prophet conquered Mecca—Heraclius performed a solemn pilgrimage to Jerusalem, ceremoniously bringing back the True Cross. But militarily, financially, and emotionally, the two great empires had exhausted one another.

Thus the first probing attacks of the Arabs met such slight resistance that soon the nature of conflict changed. Raids turned into wars of conquest. Though it is true that the Arabs’ success was due to the propelling force of their internal dynamism and military prowess, it should at the same time be emphasized that the campaigns of Khálid Ibn al-Walíd and ‘Amr Ibn al-‘Áṣ were, as one authority has said, “among the most brilliantly executed in the history of warfare, and bear favorable comparison with those of Napoleon, Hannibal, or Alexander.”

Syria was the first to fall. As the Arabs moved north toward Damascus, Heraclius sent an army of fifty thousand, commanded by his own brother, to block their way. The Arab commander Khálid had half as many men, but when on 20 August 636 the two armies met in the Valley of the Yarmúck, a tributary of the Jordan River, history took a new course. The battle was fought in one of the world’s most torrid spots, and the hot day was clouded by windblown dust. The chants and prayers of the priests and the presence of their crosses were not enough to save the Byzantine army. The rout became a slaughter. Damascus fell after six months’ siege. Two years later Jerusalem surrendered to ‘Umar. By 640, less than eight years after the death of the Prophet, the Arabs had conquered [Page 24] all of Syria, and Khálid had won his proud title as the “Sword of Allah.”

In 642 the battle of Nahávand brought final victory to the Arabs over the Persians. Already the Persian capital, Ctesiphon, had fallen to the invaders without a fight (in June 637); and, when Yazdigird, the last of the proud Sassanid dynasty, was killed as he fled before the conquerors in 651, the Persian empire that had lasted with little interruption for twelve hundred years had come to an end.

From Syria the Arabs moved to Egypt. In December 639 the Arab general, ‘Amr Ibn al-‘Áṣ, with a force of three thousand cavalry appeared at al-‘Arísh, which is still Egypt’s eastern frontier. The Egyptians offered no resistance. He easily reduced the fortress of Babylon, near the present site of Cairo. Only Alexandria held out for another fourteen months. The second strongest city of the Eastern Roman Empire fell to the Arabs in September 642, the same year in which they defeated the Persians at Nahávand. “I have captured a city,” write ‘Amr, the commander of victorious Arabs, to the Caliph ‘Umar in Medina, “from the description of which I shall refrain. Sufficient to say that I have seized therein 4,000 villas with 4,000 baths, 40,000 poll-tax paying Jews, and 400 palaces of entertainment for the royalty.”

Now all of North Africa lay open before the conquerors. They took Carthage in A.D. 698 and subjugated the native Berber tribes who had resisted Romans, Vandals, and Byzantines. Once they had subdued the North African coastal belt including Morocco, the next logical jump was across the Strait of Gibraltar into the kingdom of the Visigoths in Spain. By then a durable political fusion of Arabs and Berbers had been forged. The great Arab-Berber cities of Kairouan in Tunisia and Fez in Morocco had been founded, and the systematic Arab settlement of the countryside had begun.

In 711 Ṭáriq, a Berber ex-slave of the Arab governor of North Africa, Músá Ibn Nuṣayr, with an army of seven thousand, crossed the body of water separating North Africa from Spain. The Arab chroniclers commemorated the event by calling the spot the Mountain of Ṭáriq (Arabic Jahal Ṭáriq ‘Gibraltar’). Ṭáriq easily defeated the Visigoth King Roderic. The Jews particularly welcomed the invaders. By 714 all of Spain and Portugal, except a small independent state in the northwest, were in Arab hands. In 717 they moved across the Pyrenees into the fertile lands of the Franks. By 732 they had taken over Nîmes, Narbonne, and Bordeaux. However, the Frankish kingdom was not quite so helpless as Spain. The Franks could not defend the south, but when the invaders pushed north, the course of war changed. On a cold Saturday in October 732, at a place between Poitiers and Tours, Charles Martel (The Hammer), the Mayor of the Palace, having assembled an effective army, met a marauding Moorish band under ‘Adb ar-Rahmán ash-Shadífí. Charles’ foot-soldiers, wearing wolfskins, stood shoulder to shoulder, forming a square “firm as a wall and inflexible as a block of ice.” For the first time the Arabs had met their match. It should also be pointed out that the climate of central and northern Europe never attracted the Arabs, and the line of communication from Damascus, their capital, was dangerously stretched.

The Battle of Tours was fought in the year A.H. 110, the year of the centennial commemoration of the Prophet’s death. During that one hundred years His followers had created an empire greater than any in ancient times and comparable only to the British and the Russian empires of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Tours marked the extreme limit of that empire’s western expansion. Spreading east from Persia throughout what today is Russian Turkistan, the Muslims had reached the Indus River, Sind, and the western boundaries of China.

[Page 25]

What Price Glory?

THE GREAT Ibn Khaldún, the fourteenth-century intellectual giant of the Islamic world and one of the greatest creative minds in the history of civilization, commented that:

. . . Generally speaking. Arabs are incapable of founding an empire except on a religious basis such as the Revelation of a Prophet or a Saint. This is because their fierce character, pride, roughness and jealousy of one another especially in political matters, make them the most difficult of peoples to lead, since their wishes concord only rarely. Should they, however, adopt the religion of a prophet or a saint, they have an internal principle of restraint and their pride and jealousy are curbed, so that it becomes easy to unite and to lead them. For religion drives out roughness and haughtiness and restrains jealousy and competition. If, therefore, there should arise among them a prophet or saint who calls upon them to follow the ways of God, eschew evil, cling to virtue, and unite their wills in support of righteousness, their union becomes perfect and they achieve victory and domination.

Yet Arabs are, withal, the quickest of peoples to follow the call to truth and righteousness. For their natures are relatively simple and free from the distorting effects of bad habits and evil ways; their only grave moral defect is their roughness, which indicating as it does a primitive and uncorrupted nature, can be rectified. For, as the Prophet said, ‘Each child is born with an unformed nature,’ as we said before.

But even as they were establishing their empire, “their pride, touchiness and intense jealousy of power” were already weakening its foundation and framework and compromising their spiritual zeal.

The rule of succession not having been conclusively established by the Prophet, the controversy over it never ceased among His followers. Unlike the slow rise of Christianity, the rise of Islám was meteoric. Its quick military triumphs and the conquest of great empires made the material stakes formidable. The worldly prizes at the disposal of the Faithful were tempting and very early tested the spiritual fervor of the ruling Muslims. The Prophet, even in triumph, had lived a simple and unpretentious life. He was often seen mending His clothes and was at all times within the reach of His people. The little wealth He left, He regarded as state property. The luster of the Prophet’s life had not ceased to shed its light and influence over the thoughts and acts of the first four Caliphs, who were all close associates or relatives of the Prophet.

But all this changed when the Umayyad family took over the reign. The Caliphate of Abú-Bakr and ‘Umar already has been mentioned. When ‘Umar was assassinated during the tenth year of his rule (A.D. 644), ‘Uthmán, also a son-in-law of the Prophet, was chosen as the third Caliph. He had been a wealthy Umayyad merchant who had lived in luxury; his capacity to rule was mediocre at best. He appointed his relatives as governors of provinces and practiced other forms of nepotism. He chose Mu‘áwíyah, the Prophet’s secretary and his own kinsman, as governor of newly conquered Syria. [Page 26] The unscrupulous but very able governor, with an unusual administrative skill, developed out of chaos an orderly society in his province. He occupied Cyprus and Azadus (649-50), sent a naval expedition against Constantinople, and destroyed the Byzantine fleet commanded by Constans II, grandson of Heraclius, off the Lycian coast (A.D. 655), providing Islám with its first maritime victory.

But in the next year ‘Uthmán too was murdered. The plot against his life was conceived and carried out not by the outsiders or the infidels but by fellow Muslims. His favoritism had alienated many of the early believers who were more distinguished for their faith than for their political ability and yet felt that they were not being properly rewarded for their services. The band that broke into the Caliph’s house and laid violent hands on him was led by one of Abú-Bakr’s sons, who also put the dagger in his heart. ‘Uthmán’s blood reportedly flowed over the copy of the Qur’án that he was reading. The first murder of a Caliph by a Muslim was not to be the last. His death ended the political unity of Islám, and soon Islám’s religious unity would also come to an end. In less than a generation after the death of the Prophet Islamic society had entered upon a period punctuated by civil strife and doctrinal schism from which it never emerged.

Upon the assassination of ‘Uthmán, ‘Alí, the son-in-law, cousin, and adopted son of the Prophet, was chosen as the fourth Caliph. He was the paragon of Arabian nobility and Islamic chivalry. But the Syrian governor, Mu‘áwíyah, did not recognize ‘Alí’s right to succession and called for vengeance against those who had killed his cousin ‘Uthmán. In the mosque of Damascus the blood-stained shirt of the Caliph, along with the chopped off fingers of his wife who had tried to defend him, were exhibited. Mu‘áwíyah demanded from ‘Alí that he either produce the assassins or accept the role of accomplice. With the support of ‘Amr, the conqueror of Egypt, Mu‘áwíyah now led his army eastward to challenge ‘Alí.

To ‘Alí’s side rallied the Ḥijazís who saw in him a symbol of Arab nationalism, puritanical piety, and bravery, as well as the people of Iráq, whose city of Kúfah, ‘Alí had chosen as a second capital. In July 657 the two armies faced each other at Ṣiffín, on the west bank of the Euphrates. Only twenty-five years after the death of the Prophet, His followers, disputing the right of succession, were shedding each other’s blood in the first—but alas! not the last—civil war.

As ‘Alí’s army was gaining the upper hand in the battle, the Syrian commander ‘Amr sent his men with copies of the Qur’án fixed to the points of their spears, as if calling upon God to choose the victor. Chivalrous ‘Alí halted the fighting, and arbitration was agreed upon. But the mere fact of arbitration with the Caliph raised Mu‘áwíyah’s status to the caliphal level and weakened ‘Alí’s position. Thousands in fact deserted his camp. The partisan representatives did not meet until January of 659. The arbitration session was a public one held in southern Palestine and witnessed by a large crowd. What transpired is not recorded, but it seems that ‘Alí had lost the case even before it was opened. Until then Mu‘áwíyah had not dared to announce his candidacy, and in fact he did not claim the title of Caliph for himself until 661 after ‘Alí had been struck with a poisoned sabre by one of his former followers. His assassination left no rival for Mu‘áwíyah.

Thus was the office of the Caliph usurped be one totally lacking any moral or spiritual qualities. He and his family, the rulers for the next one hundred years, established a new style of Caliphate. It was monarchial, [Page 27] worldly, ruthless, and efficient. Any pretense to the principle of “election” was buried by Mu‘áwíyah when five years before his death he induced the leaders of his empire to recognize his son, Yazíd, as his successor. Henceforth, the Caliphate was to be, in fact, though never in law, a hereditary office.

Mu‘áwíyah transferred the capital of the empire to Damascus. This was typical of him and his family—the Umayyad—who put far more emphasis on politics than on religion. Unlike the simple city of the Prophet, Damascus had been a Byzantine metropolis, with magnificent public buildings and a large group of experienced and educated civil servants. It was a more centrally located city; and, conveniently, it had few Arab inhabitants. Anchored in Syria, the Umayyad looked less toward the Arabian desert for new inspiration and more toward the West. Now the behavior of the rulers of Islám mirrored more the majestic practices of the Byzantine emperors than the simplicity and piety of the Apostle of God. The Umayyad changed the Arab empire from a loosely organized theocracy into a centralized, secular state, retaining the basic structure of government and administration bequeathed to them by the Byzantine system, but bestowing key positions on members of Arab aristocracy, primarily their own clan.

As secular rulers the Umayyad, on the whole, were exceptionally effective and competent. It was their armies that marched to Poitiers and Sind and to the Rhone and the Indus. They built roads and beautified cities. The Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem was built under Caliph ‘Abdu’l-Malik (died on 8 October 705) over the rock from which Muḥammad had ascended to heaven. It was a monumental structure of noble beauty. The builders were native architects trained in the Byzantine school, but the intention was that the Dome should outshine the adjacent Church of the Holy Sepulchre—and it did. The Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, next in chronology to the Dome of the Rock, was built on the site of the basilica of St. John the Baptist, originally a temple of Jupiter. It was a far cry from the Prophet’s simple mosque in Medina. The majesty of the plan and the splendor of ornaments served notice that the believers in the new religion were not inferior to the followers of Christ worshiping in their great cathedrals in Byzantium.

Undet the Umayyad Islám lost its puritanical character. It was not only the lust for power that corrupted the regime. The family’s total disregard for both the letter and the spirit of Islamic laws was appalling. Yazíd, the appointed successor of Mu‘áwíyah, was corrupt and frivolous, a drunkard who kept a drunken pet monkey. His behavior toward the saintly grandson of the Prophet expressed well the spiritual degeneracy of the clan. When Ḥusayn, the son of ‘Alí and Fáṭimah, Muḥammad’s only surviving daughter, emerged from retirement in Medina to challenge Yazíd and claim the rule as a God-chosen Imám, the Caliph wasted no time. Ḥusayn was richly endowed with the spiritual qualities of his forebears. As he approached Kúfah with his little army, he was met and surrounded by a body of Umayyad cavalry at Karbilá, about twenty-five miles northwest of Kúfah. On the tenth of Muḥarram A.H. 58 (10 October A.D. 680) the cavalry moved in. They were four hundred strong; Ḥusayn had seventy-two relatives and retainers. After his companions had fallen at the hands of the archers, Ḥusayn, bleeding from several wounds, stood at bay alone, except for the women crouching in the tents behind. The troops under Shimr closed in, and Ḥusayn fell beneath their swords. The head of the Prophet’s grandson was sent to Damascus as a trophy. This brutal act would remain the greatest blot on the Umayyad family record.

The death of Yazíd in November 683 once again brought about fratricidal civil war that lasted for twelve years. It was not until 3 October 692 that another member [Page 28] of the family, ‘Abdu’l-Málik, could claim to be the sole ruler of the Muslim world. But despite the civil wars and intertribal rivalries, the Arab armies’ advance to the east and the west went on. In fact, it was in the Caliphate of Abdu’l-Málik’s heir, Walíd (A.D. 705-15), that the Muslims entered the Spanish peninsula in the west and added Bukhara, Balkh, and Samarkand, centers of Buddhist culture, in the east. By then the followers of the Prophet were straddling, like a colossus, a territory stretching from the Atlantic Ocean to the borders of China.

However, as the empire grew, the challenge of its administration became even greater, the latter Umayyad Caliphs were less capable than the first ones. The second Yazíd, the brother of Walíd (who ruled from A.D. 720 to 724) spent far more time chasing women and game, and drinking wine, than on state affairs. Walíd II (who ruled for only fifteen months, 743 to 744) was a blasphemer and a cynic whose great joy and relaxation was swimming in a pool of wine, drinking as he swam. When he was killed, his head was raised on the point of a lance and paraded through the streets of Damascus. His successor, Yazíd III, was born of a slave mother, as were the next two Caliphs, including the last Umayyad ruler, the fourteenth of the line, Marwán (known as Marwán the Ass) who ruled from A.D. 744 to 750.

But even if these men had been endowed with extraordinary abilities, they would have still found it most difficult to rule effectively an empire that included dozens of different nationalities, among whom Islám had not created a bond of unity. The non-Arab Muslims and the new converts resented the domination and privileges of the Arab aristocracy. At first the Arabs had not attempted to proselytize in the conquered territories north of their peninsula. It was their faith. Recognition was granted to Sabeanism, Judaism, Christianity, and Zotoastrianism. Pagans and members of other faiths were theoretically forced to submit to Islám or perish; but generally the Arabs had allowed them to live if they paid their taxes.

However, within a generation or two after the death of the Prophet, every year increasing numbers of the conquered races—Persians, Syrians, Egyptians, Berbers, and so on —professed Islám. Should non-Arabs be allowed to become Muslims? Clearly the Qur’án had sanctioned it, but the idea was at first so alien to the Arabs that any convert not a full-blooded Arab, had to become a Mawálí (a “Client”) of one of the Arab tribes. In theory they were to be equal; in practice they were treated with contempt.

In the empire Peoples of the Book (dhimmís) enjoyed religious and personal toleration but not equality before the law; since they paid most of the taxes, mass conversion would have created financial disaster. Some Caliphs, in fact, discouraged too many conversions.

As the empire grew, Arab manpower was no longer sufficient for its further extension or the control of conquered territories. The Arabs were forced to recruit mawálís—but not dhimmís—and though they fought in Muslim armies, they received less pay and a smaller share of the booty than the Arabs and were confined to the infantry and were not permitted to join the cavalry, which remained an Arab privilege. The Arabs paid no taxes on the lands they acquired by conquest. Though a minority within the empire, they provided its leaders and government officials and controlled millions of conquered people.

Naturally, resentment, especially among the non-Arab Muslims, many of whom had possessed cultures much more advanced than that of their rulers, increased every year. Without them the economic and cultural life of the empire could not have survived; yet they were considered and treated as second-class citizens.

The non-Arabs were not the only ones resentful of the Umayyad rule. The Muslim puritans loathed the family’s luxury and worldliness, and the Shí‘ites, never forgetting [Page 29] the memories of ‘Alí and Ḥusayn, considered them as breakers of the Prophet’s covenant and usurpers of a divinely ordained office.

Open revolt against the Umayyad broke out in A.D. 747. Two years before that the Byzantine emperor Constantine V (774-75) had already taken the offensive against them as his armies pushed the Arab forces along the entire border of Asia Minor and carried the war into Syria itself. But it was in the eastern part of the empire, in the Khurásán province of Írán, that the challenge began in earnest. Under the leadership of Muḥammad Ibn ‘Alí Ibn al-‘Abbás, the great-grandson of the Prophet’s uncle, Iranians, Syrians, ‘Iráqís, and other non-Arabs joined the Arab tribes who were traditional rivals of the Umayyad, and raised the standard of rebellion. By August 749 their forces had occupied Kúfah and were threatening all of ‘Iráq.

Marwán the Ass, with an army of twelve thousand loyal Syrian troops, marched east to Great Záb, a tributary of the Tigris River some eighty miles from Mosul. On 25 January A.D. 750 the two armies met. Marwán was decisively defeated and fled to Syria and then to Egypt where on the night of 5 August he was caught hiding in a church in the little village of Busir. He was killed, and his corpse, decapitated.

Soon after, some eighty members of the royal family were invited by the ‘Abbásid family to a banquet near Jaffá. While eating, the guests were brutally cut down by the order of al-‘Abbás. Leather covers were spread on the dead and the dying, and the ‘Abbásid officers and hosts continued their repast to the accompaniment of human groans. Caliphal tombs in Damascus and elsewhere, with the exception of those of Mu‘áwíyah and ‘Umar, were opened and their contents exhumed and desecrated. This abominable act by one Arab family against another took place only 132 years after the Year of Emigration and 122 years after the death of the Prophet. Four years later al-‘Abbás, called as-Saffáḥ (“the bloodletter”) died and was succeeded by his brother Abú-Ja‘far, called al-Manṣúr (“rendered victorious”). He was the ancestor of the next thirty-five ‘Abbásid Caliphs who were to rule the empire, in name if not in fact, until A.D. 1258, when the last of them, al-Musta‘ṣim, was murdered by the Mongol invaders.

The replacement of Umayyads by ‘Abbásids was far more significant than a mere change of dynasty. “It was,” according to Bernard Lewis, “a revolution in the history of Islám, as important a turning point as the French Revolution and Russian Revolution in the history of the West. It came about not as the result of a palace conspiracy or coup d’etat, but by the action of an extensive and successful revolutionary propaganda and organization, representing and expressing the dissatisfactions of important elements of the populations with the previous regime and built up over a long period of time.”

Epilogue

SIX HUNDRED YEARS before Islám, Christianity, against the magnificent background of the Roman imperial system, had crept half hidden along the foundations of society. In the year A.D. 138 a Christian could look at the world around him and see nothing but obstacles to the establishment of the Kingdom of God on earth. Rome was a thriving empire. It was in its golden age. Pax Romana [Page 30] extended from Britain to the Caspian Sea, from the Rhine and the Danube to the Sahara. It included more than 1,250,000 square miles and one hundred million people representing almost all races, nationalities, and creeds. The Empire had created a concept of “civilization” that was an impressive phenomenon and perhaps the most enduring legacy of the peculiarly Roman genius.

A Christian was viewed, by an overwhelming majority of the Romans, as a member of one of the multitude of the mystery sects aspiring to capture their hearts. He was suspected by his government, despised by his fellow citizens, and challenged by other cults. The New Testament had not as yet been arranged; and without a canonized literature and a centralized spiritual authority, unity and uniformity could not be expected to prevail over the small Christian communities that had sprung across the Empire. In different provinces of Rome different systems of church government existed. Christianity was still exclusively a faith and a movement rather than a Church or an institution.

But despite the obstacles and oppositions, that transcending faith in Christ and the Second Coming, in heaven and in hell, drove the “multitude of obscure enthusiasts” to do their share, unceasingly and unhesitatingly, to bring about the promised Kingdom of God on earth. Persecution and threats of persecution kept the unbeliever out; and the faithful, humble men and women, unnoticed by history, but fortified and guided by the Spirit of Christ were to become the architects and builders of a whole new civilization that was to be the foundation of Western society for the next two thousand years.

Islám, on the contrary, almost from the moment of its inception, burst out in a flame of conquest. By A.H. 138 the Islamic state was well established, and the Islamic religion was triumphant. Between the military conquests of the Arabs and the religious conversion to Islám of the peoples who lived within their empire, a long period intervened. But from the beginning of the conquest Islám was presented to the world as the religion of the conquerors. It had to be respected, even if not accepted. No one can tell how many of the millions of the converts were motivated by self-interest: to escape tribute, to avoid the status of an outcast, or to be identified with the ruling class. But one thing is certain. In the empire the Arabs created, the followers of the Prophet never suffered the trials of religious persecution, and thus the purity of their motives and the depth of their convictions were never really tested. Hence whether the much-too-early worldly success of Islám compromised its spiritual strength must remain one of the great unanswered questions of history.

In the year A.H. 138 Islám had authoritative religious literature—the Qur’án and the Tradition—but in the absence of an authenticated will of the Prophet, the issue of the legitimacy of His successors had remained unresolved.

Muḥammad had created a total theocracy for the Islamic community. He had asserted His temporal leadership by political and military means, and His spiritual leadership was, naturally, undisputed because the umma’ had accepted His Prophethood. But what about His successors? Prophethood was a divine station for Muḥammad only. The Caliphs were mortal men, and though they too claimed temporal as well as spiritual leadership, their actions were an open testimony to their incapacity to fulfill both. By political and military means they kept the community and the empire together, but their worldly and too often cruel behavior had demoralized and despiritualized the office. The Caliphate had become a body without a soul.

But despite this great handicap, the spiritual forces released by the new religion were to give birth to a new civilization. The [Page 31] Umayyad era had been, in general, an age of incubation. Too many wars and too many unsettled social and economic conditions had made it difficult to develop intellectually. Under the ‘Abbásids, however, conversion to Islám minimized the differences between the ethnic groups, and through the use of the Arabic language, ideas circulated freely. The cosmopolitan spirit that permeated the ‘Abbásid rulers supplied the tolerance necessary for a diversity of ideas so that the philosophy and science of ancient Greece and India could find a welcome in Baghdád.

One hundred years after that city was founded, it had become the cultural capital of the world. While the West Saxon rulers strove to deliver England from the Danes, while France was but a mutilated fragment of the vanished empire of Charlemagne, and while St. Peter’s in Rome fell prey for a short time to Muslim invaders, the luxurious and cultivated court of the ‘Abbásids fostered learning and the arts; The ‘Abbásid period well demonstrated Islám’s great ability to synthesize the best in the non-Arab cultures over which it held sway. The high attainment of the Muslims in intellectual and artistic fields can be attributed, primarily, to those peoples who embraced Islám in Persia, India, Mesopotamia, Syria, Egypt, North Africa, and Spain. And it was that Islamic civilization, radiating first from Baghdád, that was to illumine the world for the next five hundred years.

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The Bahá’í Faith and Mormonism: A Preliminary Survey

BY WILLIAM P. COLLINS

I am indebted to the Universal House of Justice and its Research Department for furnishing the quotations from letters written on behalf of Shoghi Effendi; to Counselors Anneliese Bopp and Hooper Dunbar for reading the manuscript and providing helpful comments; to Barbara Barrett, a Bahá’í of Mormon background, whose valuable knowledge of both groups was of great assistance; and Mr. Donald T. Schmidt. Librarian/Archivist of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, who read the manuscript from a Mormon point of view and found the statement of Mormon doctrines to be sound.

IN THE LATE AFTERNOON of 27 June 1844 in an Illinois jail, the Mormon leader Joseph Smith was assassinated by an angry mob. This act ended the career of one of the most powerful religious figures in American history. In the 1820s, while a young man, Joseph Smith had sought in prayer for guidance in choosing the Christian denomination he should join. Religious fervor was at a peak in western New York and preparation for Christ’s imminent return was considered imperative.

Joseph Smith reported that in a grove near his home he saw a vision of two personages who told him that he should join none of the sects because they were all part of a Great Apostasy from true Christianity. In succeeding years, Smith records, he was visited by a heavenly being who showed him the hiding place of a historical record on golden plates that he would later translate as The Book of Mormon. Other celestial beings gave him the authority to administer in a new church certain rites and “ordinances” preparatory to Christ’s second coming. That church, founded in 1830, is now known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or the Mormon Church. It asserts that it is the true Christian Church, empowered to establish God’s Kingdom on earth in anticipation of Christ’s return to assume the reins of divine government.

A month before Smith’s assassination, half a world away in Írán, a young merchant had proclaimed Himself to be the Báb, the Gate of God, Who would inaugurate a new dispensation and prepare the way for another Messenger of God greater than Himself. The Báb’s open declaration fulfilled the messianic expectations of many within Islám, providing a steady influx of new believers into His Cause. The Báb was publicly martyred after a six-year ministry, but He had succeeded in readying a large number of people for the advent of Bahá’u’lláh, Who proclaimed His mission in 1863 as the One foretold by the Báb, “He Whom God will make manifest,” the return of Christ, the Promised One of all religious. The Bahá’í Faith, the religion founded by the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh, claims to be the changeless Faith of God, the latest chapter in a continually progressing revelation given through successive Manifestations of God from Adam through Bahá’u’lláh. It promises to establish the Kingdom of God [Page 34] on earth and the long-awaited millennium.

A handful of commentators have noted the coincidence of Joseph Smith’s death and the declaration of the Báb, in some cases positing a spiritual connection between the two events. Nothing has yet been written, however, to show historical contacts between the Mormon Church and the Bahá’í Faith, to compare and contrast their respective beliefs, and to indicate the approach taken by each of these faiths toward the other. In this essay I aim to provide a preliminary assessment of these problems.

Literature on the Mormons and Bahá’ís

OF WHAT LITTLE has been written to compare the Bahá’í Faith and the Mormon Church, most has been provided by Bahá’í converts from Mormonism. The first such item was Artemus Lamb’s “The Fulfillment of Mormon Prophecy,” in which he quoted and explained several verses from Mormon Scriptures to show that the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh fulfill Mormon promises. Nearly three decades later there appeared So Great a Cause! by Kenneth D. Stephens. It is a full-length book that attempts a detailed consideration of Biblical and Mormon prophecies and their fulfillment in the Bahá’í Faith. Approximately half of Stephens’ work is dedicated to a list of scriptural references in answer to questions about the founding of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the station of Joseph Smith, and the meaning of Prophethood and Manifestation. More recently, Jacques Chouleur, who is neither Mormon nor Bahá’í, has devoted several pages of his doctoral thesis on Mormonism to a comparison of Bahá’í teachings with Mormon beliefs.

Historical Contacts

THERE IS NOT NOW, nor has there ever been, any official direct contact between the Bahá’í Faith and the Mormon Church. There have been, however, two significant personal contacts between Bahá’ís and Mormons, both in 1912.

In that year John A. Widtsoe (1872-1952), who was president of the Utah State Agricultural College and later a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of the Mormon Church, attended the International Dry-Land Congress. Also present at the congress was Ali—Kuli Khan, Persian chargé d’affaires in Washington and a devoted Bahá’í. The friendship established between these two men brought about an exchange that included the enrollment of many Persian [Page 35] students at the Utah State Agricultural College and other Utah universities and the offer of agricultural assistance to Írán from several agricultural experts who were Mormons.

On 28 September 1912 ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, the Son of Bahá’u’lláh, and the head of the Bahá’í Faith at that time, arrived in Salt Lake City during His speaking tour of America. Although He was only able to stay for two days, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá attended a session of the National Irrigation Congress, which was being held at the Mormon Tabernacle, and at which He was invited to a seat on the speaker’s platform. It was also the week of a State Fair, which ‘Abdu’l-Bahá attended. Sometimes Bahá’ís relate the story saying that ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and His entourage attempted to visit the Mormon Temple in Salt Lake City but were denied entrance because they were non-Mormons. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá is even sometimes quoted as saying, “This temple was made for me, did ye but know.” There appears, however, to be no evidence to substantiate such an attempted visit, either in notes left by early believers in Salt lake or in records of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s travels such as Mírzá Maḥmúd’s diary.

Mormon and Bahá’í Doctrines

A FULL TREATMENT of the beliefs of both the Bahá’í Faith and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints would require going far beyond the scope of this essay. It does, however, seem appropriate in the context of a preliminary survey to provide a basic examination of a few fundamental doctrines of the two groups, which would serve to outline a few points of divergence, as well as areas of general agreement

God and Man. The Mormon use of the word God is liable to be misinterpreted by the uninitiated. In Mormon terminology the Godhead or “supreme presidency of the universe” is composed of three distinct personages: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost. Mormons subscribe to a belief in the plurality of gods, for each personage of the Godhead is in himself a god. In addition, Joseph Smith explained that “there is a God above the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

If Jesus Christ was the Son of God, and John discovered that God the Father of Jesus Christ had a Father [Rev. 1:61], you may suppose that He had a Father also. Where was there ever a son without a father? And where was there ever a father without first being a son?

Thus there are gods above God—that is, over the three gods of the Godhead there are other gods.

An adjunct to the infinite relationships of gods to higher gods is the Mormon assertion of a literal relationship of parent to child between God the Father and man. These relationships are not static in the Mormon view, but are part of a scheme of eternal progression:

In accordance with the inviolable law of organic nature . . . the child may achieve the former status of the parent, and . . . in his mortal condition man is a God in embryo. However far in the future it may be . . . before any individual now a mortal being may attain the rank and sanctity of godship, nevertheless man carries in his soul the possibilities of such achievement. . . . Mormonism claims that all nature . . . operates on a plan of advancement; that the very Eternal Father is a progressive being; that his perfection, while so complete as to be incomprehensible to man, possesses the essential quality of true perfection—the capacity of eternal increase. That therefore, in the far future [Page 36] . . . man may attain the status of a God.

The corollary that arises from these doctrines is that man and god are of the same kind. A Mormon adage to express this is “As man is, God once was; as God is, man may yet come to be.” God is not a spiritual essence, but a “glorified and perfected Man, a Personage of flesh and bones” who “occupies space and is and can be in but one place at one time.”

For Mormonism, then, men are capable of becoming gods, and the three gods of the Godhead possess human attributes and characteristics.

In Bahá’í teaching, God and man are different in essence. Bahá’u’lláh reiterates throughout His Writings the essential unknowability and unfathomability of God:

To every discerning and illumined heart, it is evident that God, the unknowable Essence, the divine Being, is immensely exalted beyond every human attribute, such as corporeal existence, ascent and descent, egress and regress. . . . He standeth exalted beyond and above all separation and union,all proximity and remoteness.

‘Abdu’l-Bahá confirms that God is wholly other and transcendent, criticizing the idea “that the Unlimited Reality is limited to this place of appearance. God forbid! This is the belief of the adherents of anthropomorphism.” While stressing that God is unknowable and not anthropomorphic, the Bahá’í Writings do acknowledge that God is perceived as a Being that has attributes, qualities, and characteristics. Man, who was created by God in His spiritual image, is said by Bahá’u’lláh to be capable of reflecting these attributes: “Upon the inmost reality of each and every created thing He hath shed the light of one of His names. . . . Upon the reality of man, however, He hath focused the radiance of all of His names and attributes, and made it a mirror of His own Self.” Therefore, the Bahá’í conception, while upholding God’s mystery, does not regard Him merely as a vague Essence but sees Him as a Being with characteristics that man can mirror. Rather than granting human attributes to God in the manner of anthropomorphism, Bahá’ís see man as endowed with the capacity to acquire spiritual characteristics.

The Bahá’í Teachings do contain the principle of eternal progression. Where Mormons believe that faithful members will reach a state of godhood in the life to come, Bahá’í hold that “the soul, after its separation from the body, will continue to progress until it attaineth the presence of God. . . . It will endure as long as the Kingdom of God . . . will endure. It will manifest the signs of God and His attributes.” Bahá’í belief, in contrast to the Mormon teachings, clearly preserves the stations of God and man, never hinting that they are of the same nature:

If it were possible to reach a limit of perfection, then one of the realities of the beings might reach the condition of being independent of God. . . . But for every being there is a point it cannot overpass; that is to say, he who is in the condition of servitude, however far he may progress in gaining limitless perfections, will never [Page 37] reach the condition of Deity. . . .

For example, Peter cannot become Christ. All that he can do is, in the condition of servitude, to attain endless perfections; for every existing reality is capable of making progress.

Manifestations and Prophethood. In Mormon belief there is no equivalent to the Bahá’í term “Manifestation of God.” For Mormons, Jesus Christ is unique, the literal first-born son of God, a God in His own right, and one of the three exalted Men of the Godhead. Prophethood, however, has several clear meanings for Mormons. First, what distinguishes a Prophet is “personal revelation from the Holy Ghost that Jesus is the Christ.” Moreover, a Prophet foretells the future, bears witness to the divinity of Christ (even the Old Testament Prophets), teaches the plan of salvation, and performs saving ordinances for mankind. The Prophet par excellence was Jesus Christ, though He is also more than a Prophet. There are other Prophets lesser than Christ who bear their witness to various nations and peoples, such as the Old Testament Prophets, John the Baptist, Prophets of The Book of Mormon, and Joseph Smith. Finally, Prophets include those members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who have “received the . . . Holy Ghost when they were confirmed members of the Church” and who fulfill all the obligations and duties required by the restored Gospel. Each of the latter is called upon to act as a Prophet in his personal affairs and in the part of the Church organization over which he presides.

In the Bahá’í Teachings there are two classes of Prophets, described by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá as “the independent Prophets who are followed” and those who “are not independent and are themselves followers.” The independent Prophets are lawgivers, founders of a new cycle, revealers of a new Book. They are like the sun, which is self-luminous. They “establish a new religion,” “change the general morals, promote new customs and rules.” Such independent Prophets or Manifestations of universal Prophethood include Abraham, Moses, Christ, Muḥammad, the Báb, and Bahá’u’lláh. The other Prophets, who are not independent, are “followers and promoters”; they “profit by the light of the Guidance of the universal Prophets. They are like the moon, which is not luminous and radiant in itself, but receives its light from the sun.” These lesser Prophets include Solomon, Isaiah, David, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel.

Although Bahá’í Teaching, as already stated, insists upon God’s transcendence and unknowability, the Manifestations of God provide the essential bridge over the gap between God and man:

The door of the knowledge of the Ancient Being hath ever been, and will continue for ever to be, closed in the face of men. . . . As a token of His mercy, however, and as a proof of His loving-kindness, He hath manifested unto men the Day Stars of His divine guidance, the Symbols of His divine unity, and hath ordained the knowledge of these sanctified Beings to be identical with the knowledge of His own Self.

Bahá’ís preserve a distinction between God and man. This distinction is also true of the Prophets and Manifestations in relation to man. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá specifies three conditions of existence: servitude, prophethood, and Deity. No condition can become another condition. Shoghi Effendi clearly identifies all Prophets, independent and dependent, as different in nature from man: “The Prophets [Page 38] ‘regarded as one and the same person’ include the lesser Prophets as well, and not merely those who bring a ‘Book.’ The station is different, but They are Prophets and Their nature thus different from that of ours.”

Creation. In Mormon terminology to create means to organize. Thus the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints holds that God did not create the universe out of nothing but that He organized it out of already-existing matter: “The elements are eternal” (D & C 93:33). Mormon teaching also emphasizes that no thing, not even God, can be immaterial: “All spirit is matter, but it is more fine or pure, and can only be discerned by purer eyes” (D & C 131:7). This spirit element is co-eternal with God.

Certain aspects of Bahá’í doctrine are superficially similar to the Mormon belief, especially regarding the eternality of creation: “Know assuredly that God’s creation hath existed from eternity, and will continue to exist forever. Its beginning hath had no beginning, and its end knoweth no end.” References in Bahá’í Writings to God’s creating the universe out of nothingness mean, according to Bahá’u’lláh and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, that God is the Source and Sustainer of the universe, far exalted above the imagination of men: “[T]here was God, and His creation had ever existed . . . from the beginning that hath no beginning, apart from its being preceded by a Firstness which cannot be regarded as firstness and originated by a Cause inscrutable even unto all men of learning.”

Eschatology. Both The Book of Mormon and The Doctrine and Covenants are replete with verses promising the imminent return of Jesus Christ, the resurrection of the dead, and the commencement of the millennium. Even the name Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day Saints clearly indicates that Christ’s return is considered by Mormons to be “near, even at the door” (D & C 110:16). Mormons hold that He will come “not in the form of a woman, neither of a man traveling on the earth” (D & C 49:22) but that He will literally descend to earth even as He ascended from it (see Acts 1:9-11).

The Mormon Church itself holds a special place in the last Days because Mormons believe their church to be the Kingdom of God on earth, organized so that Jesus Christ may come to be its head and hold the reins of theocratic government for a thousand years.

[Page 39] At the same time that the Mormons were expecting the second coming in the nineteenth century, the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh were proclaiming the fulfillment of all the prophecies of the past religions, including Christianity. Bahá’u’lláh claims to be none other than Jesus Christ Himself returned in the Glory of the Father. He explains this in such works as the Kitáb-i-Íqán, where He quotes biblical and Qur’anic verses in support of His claim Bahá’u’lláh demonstrates that with the advent of the Báb the resurrection of the heedless from the graves of ignorance and error had begun, and that His World Order would be the Kingdom of God on earth over which He would extend God’s rule for a period of at least one thousand years before a new Manifestation comes.

It is obvious that the Mormon Church is working in anticipation of the second coming, resurrection, and millennium, whereas Bahá’ís labor in the conviction that these events have occurred or are now taking place in a world which is in the throes of a disintegration destined to force mankind to turn to the institutions of the Kingdom of God established by Bahá’u’lláh.

Other Doctrines, Practices, and Principles. Both Mormonism and the Bahá’í Faith affirm the importance of prayer and fasting as pillars of personal spiritual life. In Mormon practice, prayers are said extemporaneously and must be directed to God the Father through Jesus Christ, ending in amen. Prayers said by Bahá’ís, on the contrary, are prayers revealed by Bahá’u’lláh, the Báb, and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, recited as they were written. These prayers are in two categories: a set of obligatory prayers, one of which a Bahá’í is under obligation to recite each day; and communes for use in group or private prayer.

Fasting is an obligation for Mormons in good standing, and there is generally one day a month designated as a fast day. The Bahá’í fast is from March 2-20, with no food or drink taken from sunrise to sunset.

Mormonism requires chastity of its adherents before and after marriage, which is held to be a sacred institution. Celestial [Page 40] marriage, which is a covenant entered into in the Mormon Temples by members in good standing, is believed to be a necessary prelude to godhood and will ensure the continuation of the union “in time, and through all eternity” (D & C 132:19). Bahá’ís also consider that “the command of marriage is eternal. It will never be changed nor altered” and that Bahá’í marriage calls upon the partners to be “at one with each other for time and eternity.”

In matters of health, Mormons and Bahá’ís have similar principles. All Mormons are required to observe the “Word of Wisdom” (D & C 89:1-21) to remain in good standing. This directive prohibits the use of alcoholic beverages, tobacco, and hot drinks (interpreted to mean coffee and tea). Whereas the Bahá’í Writings do not mention hot drinks, they do contain absolute prohibitions against alcoholic beverages and drugs, such as opium, and they strongly discourage smoking.

Blacks and Women. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, although it did not at first practice the exclusion of blacks from the priesthood, held for over a century and a quarter to the belief that blacks were not worthy of full membership. During the lifetime of Joseph Smith at least one black man was admitted to the priesthood, but because of heated emotions surrounding slavery and the abolitionist movement Mormons had to be careful about their position on blacks. Joseph Smith himself criticized the abolitionist movement with the argument that the sons of Canaan (Ham), whom Smith identified with blacks, were cursed with servitude by divine decree, and that curse was not yet taken off them. The Pearl of Great Price indicates that the seed of Cain was cursed with a black skin (see Moses 7:22). Later historical developments led the Church under Brigham Young to hold that Joseph Smith’s teachings on this subject deprived blacks of the blessings of the priesthood and all temple ordinances. Later Presidents of the Church strengthened the “seed of Cain”-“Sons of Ham” curse with the idea that blacks had been lukewarm in the spirit world of pre-existence during the war between Christ and Satan. The deprivation of priesthood membership and of participation in temple ordinances effectively prevented black Church members from obtaining godhood according to Mormon doctrine. During the 1960s the Mormon Church was much maligned for its policy, which Church leaders explained could not be changed except by revelation through the President of the Church. Nevertheless, Church authorities did issue a statement to the effect that “it is a moral evil . . . to deny any human being the right to gainful employment, to full educational opportunity, and to every privilege of citizenship. . . .” The Church was, and apparently still is, opposed to intermarriage between blacks and whites. At long last, in a letter dated 8 June 1978 the First Presidency of the Church stated that God “has confirmed that the long-promised day has come when every faithful, worthy man in the Church may receive the holy priesthood, [Page 41] with power to exercise its divine authority, and enjoy . . . the blessings of the temple.”

The Bahá’í Faith has, since its inception, unequivocally upheld the oneness of mankind and the need to eliminate all racial prejudice. No office in the Bahá’í Faith is limited to believers of a certain race. Bahá’u’lláh says, “Ye are the fruits of one tree, and the leaves of one branch.” ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, in a number of His talks in the West, called upon mankind to eliminate all prejudice and hatred and warned the Americans in particular that if this issue of race antagonism was not solved blood would flow in the streets. Shoghi Effendi calls “racialism” one of the “triple gods” in “the desecrated temple of mankind.” The Bahá’í teachings call for such positive action that the “black and white . . . shall not only unite but even intermarry.”

In Mormonism women do not hold the priesthood and, therefore, do not fill the administrative and organizational offices of the Church. They do have a separate organization called the Relief Society, which performs charitable work. Mormon women are generally expected to be helpmeets in subjection to their husbands and to bring forth children. Most Mormon women at this time are homemakers and mothers. There are other views of the station of women in Mormonism. The women of the Utah territory in 1870 were the first women in the United States to exercise the vote. Brigham Young said of women:

We believe that women are useful, not only to sweep houses, wash dishes, make beds, and raise babies, but that they should stand behind the counter, study law or physics, or become good bookkeepers and be able to do the business in any counting house, and all this to enlarge the sphere of their usefulness for the benefit of society at large. In following these things they but answer the design of their creation.

In the Bahá’í Faith, the legal, spiritual, and educational equality of women with men is abundantly confirmed. Women and men are envisioned as two wings of one bird that cannot fly if one wing is undeveloped, for “each is the complement and helpmeet of the other.” Motherhood is given a high station; because mothers are the first trainers of their children, girls and women should have the best education available. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá defended the right of women to vote before it was granted to them in most countries, and prophesied that women would enter “the same arena of activity” as men. Many Bahá’í women have figured prominently in the history and administration of the Bahá’í Cause~as heroines and martyrs, as teachers and benefactresses of the Faith, as Auxiliary Board members, Continental Counselors, members of Spiritual Assemblies, and as Hands of the Cause of God. Only the Universal House of Justice consists of men alone.

The contrasting approaches to blacks and women in Mormonism and the Bahá’í Faith have prompted the judgment by Jacques Chouleur that “intellectuals in general will undoubtedly find more attractions in the religion of Bahá’u’lláh than in that of [Page 42] Joseph Smith. . . . Liberals will lean towards Baha’ism, conservatives to Mormonism. Bahá’ís are more ‘world-minded’, more in tune with the spirit of the time.”

Comparison of Mormonism and the Bahá’í Faith with Religions from Which They Originated

IN COMPARING the origins of Mormonism in the matrix of American Protestant Christianity with that of the Bahá’í Faith in Islám, two commentators have asserted that the Bahá’í Faith stands in the same relation to Islám as does Mormonism to Christianity. The facts used to support this assertion are that both groups demand acceptance of new Prophets, both have new sacred Books, both claim a new dispensation and the abolition of the old order. While superficially attractive, such a comparison is not wholly accurate.

In the case of the Founders of Mormonism and the Bahá’í Faith, the stations claimed for them by each religion are quite different. Joseph Smith, while considered by Mormons to be a Prophet in the Old Testament sense, is definitely under the shadow of Christ. Smith himself claimed to be promoting the true law of Christ by restoring the original Christian Church. The Báb and Bahá’u’lláh, on the contrary, are considered to be Manifestations of universal Prophethood, equal in rank to Jesus Christ, Founders of a new Faith outside the pale of its parent religion.

The question of Scriptures is slightly more complex. Mormons use the Bible as one of their standard works, along with The Book of Mormon, The Doctrine and Covenants, and The Pearl of Great Price. Of these, the second and fourth were claimed to be translations, not revelations from Joseph Smith. Only The Doctrine and Covenants could be considered a new, “revealed” Scripture. However, all three of the added sacred Books of the Mormon Church are tied to the Bible as a source of doctrine. The Bahá’í Holy Texts, however, are all claimed to have been revealed by God through His two Manifestations for this age. Although Bahá’ís revere the spiritual content and inspiration of the Bible and other previous Holy Books, only the Scriptures revealed by Bahá’u’lláh have authority in determining doctrine and practices of the Bahá’í Faith.

With the statement that the Bahá’í Faith and Mormonism both seek to abolish the old order, one must ask in what sense this abolition is expressed. For Mormons the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the restoration of the true Christian Church. What is being abolished is Christian apostasy. Although the Bahá’í Faith does in a sense renew or restore the spirit of true Christianity (and true Islám, true Judaism, and so on), it claims to abrogate the secondary and outer practices of previous religions. It does not seek to restore the practices of an earlier religion or an earlier time, but by its very nature as a new Revelation is concerned with the spiritual and social exigencies of this time in man’s history.

Therefore, it seems more correct to view the Mormon Church as a sect or denomination within Christianity, albeit a sect that claims to be the true restored Christian Church. The Bahá’í Faith, by its own claims for the Station of its Founders, and its stated purposes of fulfillment and abrogation in relation to past religions, can best be considered to stand in the same relation to Islám as does Christianity to Judaism.

The Mormon Approach to the Bahá’í Faith

THE HISTORICAL DEPARTMENT of the Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day Saints has noted that it is “unaware of any policy statement of the Church regarding the Bahá’í Faith specifically.” It does, however, indicate [Page 43] the general direction of Mormon thinking about other religious groups, by making reference to a talk by Elder Boyd K. Packer at a conference of the Mormon Church in 1967. Packer emphasized in his speech that unity does not come purely from discussion, human effort, or ecumenical councils. Rather it comes from revelation and from the restoration of Jesus Christ’s teachings, which Packer affirms have taken place in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, “the only true and living church upon the face of the whole earth with which he, the Lord, is well pleased.” This theme is confirmed in articles in the reference work Mormon Doctrine, which state that “with the exception of the restored gospel [i.e., the Mormon Church], every system of religion in the world today is born of religious syncretism”; and “true religion, the religion of Jesus Christ, was instituted of God for the benefit of man, and it is found only in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”

The Bahá’í Approach to Mormonism

THE AUTHORITATIVE Bahá’í point of view of Mormonism is largely stated in letters of Shoghi Effendi, covering the question of Joseph Smith’s station, the accuracy of The Book of Mormon, and the manner of teaching the Faith to Mormons.

Joseph Smith’s Station. Shoghi Effendi states clearly what Joseph Smith’s station is not:

Regarding your question concerning Joseph Smith and the ‘Book of Mormon’; as the Bahá’í Teachings quite clearly outline [Page 44] the succession of Prophets from the days of Christ as being Muḥammad, the Báb, and finally Bahá’u’lláh, it is obvious that Joseph Smith is not a Manifestation of God.

Regarding your questions: we cannot possibly add the names of people we (or anyone else) think might be Lesser Prophets to those found in the Qur’án, the Bible and our own Scriptures. For only these can we consider authentic Books. Therefore, Joseph Smith is not in our eyes a Prophet.

Joseph Smith we do not consider a Prophet, minor or otherwise. Certainly no references he made could have foretold the Coming of this Revelation in his capacity as a Prophet.

These three statements make it clear that Bahá’í do not regard Joseph Smith as a Manifestation of God (a major Prophet) or as a lesser Prophet; for this reason, any predictions of the Bahá’í Faith in Mormon Scriptures could not have been made by the power of Prophethood. There is a hint, however, of a way in which Bahá’ís may categorize Joseph Smith. Ramona Brown records in her book that Shoghi Effendi indicated that Joseph Smith could be termed a “seer”: “Joseph Smith was a seer, not a Prophet of God, neither major nor minor Prophet. He had a high standard . . . but the Bahá’ís have a higher standard coupled with God’s power that comes direct from God for this age.” One of the definitions of a seer is “a person credited with extraordinary moral and spiritual insight.”

The Accuracy of “The Book of Mormon.” Shoghi Effendi addresses himself only once to the question of the content of The Book of Mormon: “As there is nothing specific about Joseph Smith in the teachings, the Guardian has no statement to make on his position or about the accuracy of any statement in the Book of Mormon regarding American history or its peoples. This is a matter for historians to pass upon.” This leaves Bahá’ís free to base their judgment of the accuracy of The Book of Mormon on the available historical evidence.

Teaching the Bahá’í Faith to Mormons. Shoghi Effendi underscores two aspects of the subject of teaching the Bahá’í Faith to Mormons. First, he emphasizes the possibility of little response to the Bahá’í Message:

The Mormons are a people with high principles and ideals, and the step into the Cause is not as difficult for them as for many others not possessing their faith and devotion. However, the very zeal with which they serve their own Faith makes it difficult for them to grasp the greater vision of our Holy Cause.

He appreciates indeed your efforts for the spread of the Bahá’í Teachings among the Mormons. But while he would approve of your maintaining your teaching work with [Page 45] them, he does not consider it advisable that you devote all your time and energies to this service, specially if you find that your efforts do not awaken much response.

Yet Shoghi Effendi does indicate the importance of finding common ground and the attitude Bahá’ís should endeavor to show forth in dealing with Mormons:

The Bahá’ís should deal with the members of all religious sects, however, with the greatest tolerance and friendliness, and try to point out to them the significance of the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh to the world in this great Day. The Guardian would advise you to teach the Mormons, like everyone else, the Faith, when you find them receptive. They have many good principles, and their teachings regarding chastity, not drinking or smoking, etc., are quite similar to ours, and should form a point of common interest.

Thus the authoritative Bahá’í approach to Mormonism unequivocally states that Joseph Smith is neither Manifestation nor lesser Prophet. There is, nevertheless, the possibility that Shoghi Effendi considered Smith a “seer.” While Bahá’í teaching does not address the question of the origin of The Book of Mormon, it does allow for personal judgment based upon historical findings to determine the accuracy of statements in the book. Bahá’ís are also called upon to maintain a balance in their teaching of the Faith to Mormons, neither expecting too much, nor losing the chance to stress to receptive Mormons the common approaches of both religions to certain problems.

Both the Mormon Church and the Bahá’í Faith have vigorous international teaching programs, and both are comparable in the size of membership. Bahá’ís and Mormons will inevitably come into increasing contact. Bahá’ís in particular will need to understand the Mormon teachings, and the complexities inherent in any comparison of religions. Bahá’ís are called upon to avoid two extremes: the desire to fit all religions and sects into the Bahá’í pattern by ignoring differences; and the rejection of other religions by ignoring similarities. The Bahá’í claim to attention from Mormons rests not so much on any prophecies of Joseph Smith as in the fulfillment of the prophecies and promises of Christianity. The Mormon books, as already noted, are filled with verses from the Bible about Christ’s return. In the accomplishment of these prophecies is the key to the fulfillment of the dreams and hopes of all Christians, Mormons included. This is why Shoghi Effendi concluded one of his letters about Mormonism with the expression of hope that a Mormon would “through a study of the life and spirit of Bahá’u’lláh, come to see that Christ, far from being lost to Bahá’ís, is enthroned in their hearts more deeply than ever through recognizing Him in this new Manifestation.”

[Page 46]

Haiku

Feast of Sultán:

the child’s prayer is heard

over the traffic

Feast of Masá’il:

the street light flickers, then,

slowly grows brighter

Feast of ‘Izzat . . .

the night voices grow louder

with each prayer

first day of spring:

the mother and child

play peek-a-boo

headlights

of an approaching car

pass in the mist . . .

—Harley King

[Page 47]

[Page 48]

The European Economic Community: Paying Men and Women Equally

BY VINSON JAMIR

ON 25 MARCH 1957 the plenipotentiaries of six European nations (Belgium, France, West Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands) gathered at the Palazzo dei Conservatori on the Capitoline Hill in Rome to affix their signatures to the Treaty Establishing the European Economic Community (also referred to as the Treaty of Rome and the EEC Treaty). The treaty, which came into effect on 1 January 1958, consisted of 248 Articles, 15 Annexes, 4 declarations of intention, and 3 protocols, all designed to bring into being a “common market” in which barriers to the free movement of goods, labor, and capital between the member states would gradually cease to exist. The six nations were required to adjust their tariffs and customs duties in such a way that eventually, by orderly stages, the other nations of the world when trading with the six would be obliged to deal with them as if they were a single unit of commerce and trade.

Although essentially an economic alliance, the Treaty of Rome contains unique provisions. It goes further than any other economic agreement toward merging the vital interests of its members, who denominate themselves a true “Community” of social, political, and economic interests. The Treaty ordains institutions possessing legislative, executive, and judicial powers not only over the governments but over the citizens and enterprises of the Community. It is drafted in broad language, and many terms and provisions are deliberately left undefined but susceptible to the authoritative interpretation and application of Community institutions acting within their delegated powers. One who is accustomed to thinking of nation-states and noncompulsory forms of international organization as the only two methods of organizing relations between peoples of different countries will be at a loss to describe accurately the legal order established by the Treaty of Rome. It falls short of establishing a federal union of European states along the pattern of the United States of America, but at the same time it goes much further in its intent and operation than a permissive form of cooperation among sovereign powers. The European Economic Community can best be described as a hybrid, a missing link, between mere friendly cooperation between states and a pure federal union that would create one superstate out of many. It is, in a word, a “community.”

The community of nations and peoples established by the Treaty of Rome is based on the premise that social issues and economic issues go hand in hand. It was the intent of the nations ratifying the Treaty that, within the Community, goods, workers, and money should be able to move freely in whatever direction and to whatever destination would result in the greatest productivity and growth in economic terms. Europe was still in ruins from the Second World War. Economic reconstruction seemed to be the most urgent task. It was felt that social progress would follow economic progress automatically.

[Page 49]49 Nevertheless, the authors of the Treaty felt it necessary to take precautions against selected forms of “social dumping,” by which one member state might gain economic advantage over another within the Community. It is clear, for example, that, if the laborers of one country receive lower pay or if employers are not required by law to provide safe and sanitary working conditions, goods and services produced in that country will cost less and will sell at a price lower than that of competing goods and services produced in a neighboring country where wages are higher and working conditions more satisfactory. The same effect will occur if only certain categories of workers are paid less or subjected to less favorable conditions of work. To counter such tendencies within the newly established Community, the Treaty of Rome sets forth, in Articles 117 through 130, various aspects of a Community “Social Policy” that give substance to the affirmations in the Preamble of the Treaty that “the constant improvement of the living and working conditions of their peoples” constitutes the “essential objective” of the nations that ratified the Treaty.

Among the Social Policy provisions of the Treaty of Rome is Article 119, which, in its first paragraph, laid down that “Each Member State shall during the first stage ensure and subsequently maintain the application of the principle that men and women should receive equal pay for equal work.” The reference to “the first stage” is understandable in terms of section one of Article 8 of the Treaty, which simply says that “The common market shall be progressively established during a transitional period of twelve years. This transitional period shall be divided into three stages of four years each. . . .” As the Treaty entered into force on 1 January 1958, it is, therefore, clear that the equality principle of Article 119 was to be fully established in the European Economic Community by 1962.

Upon reading the full text of Article 119 one is struck by its similarity to another provision of international law—namely, the International Labour Convention (No. 100) Concerning Equal Remuneration for Men and Women Workers for Work of Equal Value, which was passed by the General Conference of the International Labour Organisation on 29 June 1951. Indeed, three of the countries that signed the Treaty of Rome in 1957 had previously ratified the convention of the I.L.O.: France in 1953, West Germany and Italy in 1956.

The International Labour Organisation was established as part of the League of Nations system following the First World War and invested with the responsibility of carrying out the program laid down in the Treaty of Versailles with respect to the improvement of conditions of labor as a means of ensuring peace. Among the ideals made explicit in the text of Article 427 of the Treaty of Versailles was “the principle that men and women should [Page 50] receive equal remuneration for work of equal value.” This principle also became embodied in the constitution of the I.L.O., which, unlike the League of Nations, survived the Second World War and now functions as a vital organ of the United Nations system. During the years immediately following the end of the Second World War, the I.L.O. adopted a number of conventions relating to the human rights of workers, such as freedom of association, the right to organize and bargain collectively, the abolition of forced labor, and so on. Among them is the convention on equal pay for work of equal value, which must, therefore, be viewed in terms of the humanitarian purposes of the I.L.O. as well as the economic basis from which that organization acts. As of 1 January 1977 ninety nations of the world had ratified that convention.

In the negotiations leading to the signing of the Treaty of Rome in 1957 it was apparently France that took the initiative and insisted that the principle of equal pay be explicitly set forth as part of the Social Policy of the Treaty Establishing the European Economic Community. France found support in West Germany and Italy. All three nations had constitutional and statutory provisions that required equal pay for men and women doing the same work. These nations obviously felt that there were economic as well as humanitarian reasons for establishing the principle of equal pay in the text of the Treaty. One of the unforeseen consequences of the two World Wars was that women had become more active in the labor market. When finally the Second World War came to an end and the task of rebuilding Europe began, women did not leave their jobs but rather began to enter the labor force in ever greater numbers For a variety of reasons women tended to be paid less than men even though their work was very similar to that of men. It was clear at the beginning that, if certain nations were to be allowed to use women as a source of cheap labor, they would have a competitive advantage over nations that did not. This would be contrary to the theory and practice of a “common market.”

Institutions and Actions

THE INSTITUTIONS ordained by the Treaty of Rome are: The Assembly, The Council, The Commission, and The Court of Justice. Each, acting within the limits of the “powers conferred upon it” by the Treaty, is entrusted with carrying out the tasks delegated by the member states to the Community (Article 4). Member states, for their part, are committed to cooperating with Community institutions, while Community institutions are obligated not to lay too heavy a burden on any one member state (Articles 5-6). The Assembly at its inception was, under the Treaty, an advisory parliamentary body whose members were sent as delegates appointed from the parliaments of the individual member nations. Not until 1979 did the Assembly, which has consistently called itself the “European Parliament” become a body elected by direct universal suffrage to represent European rather than national interests. Neither in the beginning nor at present does the Assembly have any legislative powers to speak of, although its considered opinion is sought on many important issues as required by the terms of the Treaty. The Assembly is not utterly powerless, for it possesses some control over the Community budget and can by a two-thirds majority vote call for the resignation “en [Page 51] bloc” of the members of the Commission (Article 144). The Commission is the executive and administrative arm of the Community. Its thirteen members, chosen for their competence and independence, function as the heart of the bureaucracy that runs the daily affairs of the Community. Its duties are to see that the provisions of the Treaty are actually carried out, to make proposals and recommendations to the Council, to exercise powers conferred upon it by the Treaty and by the Council, and to “have its own power of decision and participate in the shaping of measures taken by the Council and by the Assembly in the manner provided for in this Treaty” (Article 155). Most important, the Commission represents the Community and not the individual governments of which the Community is composed. Members of the Commission may not allow themselves to be influenced by member states, nor may member-state governments attempt to influence their judgment. Such a requirement of disinterestedness does not apply to the Council, which is composed of ministers of the governments representing the member states. Although composed of individuals representing the executive branch of the governments of the member states, the Council exercises the legislative power within the organization of the European Economic Community. It acts normally only after receiving a proposal from the Commission concerning a matter falling within the scope of the Commission’s power of initiative under specific Treaty provisions. The Council may alter a Commission proposal only by unanimous action (Article 149). When the Treaty fails to provide Community institutions with explicit powers to achieve fundamental objectives of the common market, the Council is empowered under Article 235 to legislate such powers into being through unanimous assent to a proposal of the Commission supported by a resolution passed by the Assembly.

The Court of Justice, although not involved in the political decision-making process, acts as the supreme arbiter of the Community. The Court is composed of one judge from each of the member states. According to its own rules of procedure the Court of Justice speaks with a single voice; dissenting and separate opinions are not permitted. The Court fears that if each judge gave his own opinion in each case the unific function of the Court would evaporate, and it would be powerless to fulfill its obligations under Article 164 of the Treaty to “ensure that in the interpretation and application of this Treaty the law is observed.” Under the terms of the Treaty, the Court of Justice has jurisdiction in many areas of Community action. It may deliver authoritative interpretations of the meaning of the text of the Treaty when asked to do so by national courts of member states (Article 177). It is not an appellate court in the strict sense of the word. Rather it is a single court acting solely in the area of matters concerning the Community by virtue of powers conferred upon it under the Treaty. It is more accurate to think of the Court of Justice as a trial court endowed with extraordinary powers of interpretation; there is no appeal from its decisions except by amendment of the Treaty. The judges of the Court are appointed for terms of six years. They are assisted in their deliberations by “Advocates-General,” who are of [Page 52] equal rank with the judges. The assistance rendered by the Advocates-General is to make absolutely impartial oral presentations in open court in every case; the “reasoned submissions” of the Advocates-General are often, but not always, taken by the Court of Justice as highly persuasive (Articles 166-67).

These, then, are the institutions of the European Economic Community, each of which has had a vital role to play in the interpretation and application of the principle of equal pay of Article 119 of the Treaty. The primary actors have been, in the first instance, the Commission and the Council. We shall examine their acts first The Court of Justice has also had an important role to play in the interpretation and application of Article 119. Finally, the Assembly or “European Parliament” may in the very near future begin to take a more determinative part in the action.

In its regular annual report for the year 1959-60 the Commission drew attention to the obligation that the Treaty laid upon member countries to harmonize their social systems. “Chief among these,” said the Commission, “is the duty to ensure . . . the application of the principle of equal remuneration for equal work as between men and women workers. In this field, discussions have already taken place with representatives of the Governments and with business organizations. The Commission attaches great importance to the implementation of this principle.” That the Commission should have attached great important to the principle of equal pay should come as no surprise when one considers that even in 1960 women counted for roughly a third of the labor force throughout the Community, while wages paid to women for equal work varied from country to country.

After preliminary investigations the Commission on 20 July 1960 forwarded to the Council a formal recommendation concerning implementation of Article 119. The greater part of the recommendation dealt with the Commission’s view of the proper way in which to understand the import of the principle of equal pay as set down in the Treaty. We have already seen that one of the antecedents of Article 119 was the International Labour Convention (No. 100) concerning Equal Remuneration for Men and Women Workers for Work of Equal Value. The wording of Article 119 of the Treaty of Rome, however, refers to “equal pay for equal work.” Much can be made of such a slight difference of wording. Some employers, many in fact, expressed their preference for a restrictive interpretation of Article 119, which would make “equal work” read as “identical work.” The I.L.O. convention, as interpreted by its authors, had come to mean “similar work.” The Commission very strongly favored a broad reading of the text of Article 119 as a statement of principle tending toward full equality of men and women in the labor market. Specifically, the Commission held that the principle required minimum wages set by statute to be the same for men and women, that where wages are fixed by a system of job classification the categories should be gender neutral, that no difference in pay should be permitted when job qualifications set by employers for a position were equal, that all differences in pay based on the worker’s sex alone should be prohibited, and that the [Page 53] additional cost of female labor due to protective social legislation should not be taken into consideration by employers in setting wages for work paid by time. The Commission felt these principles should apply across the board, whether wages were fixed by statute, by collective bargaining, or by any other system. It did not oppose different pay for women on the basis of economic yield when done in the context of piece work but did oppose such differentials in the context of time work. Nor did the Commission oppose the application to women of all other customary criteria of employability other than sex, such as professional qualification, age, seniority, and the like. Most dramatically, the Commission called for an accelerated implementation of Article 119 throughout the Community and set a target date of 30 June 1961.

After making this bold recommendation the Commission set up a special working party to monitor the implementation of Article 119 by the individual governments of the member states. By the end of 1961 the findings of the Working Party were submitted to the Council. The substance of the report was that each member state had its own way of interpreting the equal-pay principle. To be more specific, some of the member states did not grant women a right to assert through judicial processes their claim to equal pay, and many collective bargaining agreements did not contain provisions for equal pay. The Commission urged that these very tangible deficiencies be eliminated as soon as possible so that the principle of equal pay would become fully implemented by the end of the first stage of the establishment of the common market.

The Assembly, meeting in October of 1961, debated the Commission’s recommendation and, on 20 October, voted to uphold the Commission’s interpretation of Article 119 of the Treaty. In conveying its advisory opinion to the Council the Assembly drew the Council’s attention to the importance of the problem of equal pay and stressed that it must be implemented by the end of the first phase.

The representatives of the member states met in the Council on 30 December 1961 and adopted a resolution that called upon the governments of individual member states to implement the equal-pay principle according to a time table, as follows:

a) By 30 June 1962 any difference in wages exceeding 15 percent, to be reduced to 15 percent;

b) By 20 June 1963 any difference in wages exceeding 10 percent, to be reduced to 10 percent;

c) By 31 December 1964 all discrimination to be abolished.

It should be noted that this particular resolution was not, strictly speaking, an act of legislation but rather an informal bit of pontificating done by the ministers of the member states when they could have been acting according [Page 54] to formal legislative powers conferred upon them by the Treaty. One power not conferred upon the Council by the Treaty is the power to change the terms of the Treaty, which clearly said that “Each Member State shall during the first stage ensure and subsequently maintain the application of the principle that men and women should receive equal pay for equal work.” Although the Treaty permitted the progression from one phase of transition to another to be delayed, those provisions did not in fact operate to excuse, in legal terms, the failure of the member states or the Council to act vigorously enough to establish the principle of equal pay in the “common market” by 1962. Nevertheless, the Council’s resolution was the announcement of human and political reality. The full integration of women into the labor force in Europe on a basis of full equality with men was, and is, a formidable task.

By June 1962 it was clear that the governments of the member states were not making great progress in the implementation of the principle of equal pay. In a resolution of 26 June 1962 the Assembly urged the Commission to oppose the restrictive interpretations placed on the principle of equal pay in some of the countries of the “common market.” In its report to the Council of 19 December 1962 the Commission noted that progress had been made. However, a study of the situation in conjunction with governments and employers’ and workers’ associations had revealed that “certain countries had longstanding or even recent collective agreements whereby women workers were placed in the lowest-paid groups. In other instances, women wage earners in categories that were not covered by collective agreements, or in which wages were higher than those stipulated by such agreements, had no satisfactory assurance that the principle of wage equality would be fully observed Moreover, the governments, employers’ associations, and trade unions themselves had in some cases done very little in this matter.”

The Commission continued with surveys and inquiries. Some of the statistics produced in this period showed that women constituted 31.6 percent of the work force in Belgium, 36.9 percent in Germany, 34.9 percent in France, 29 percent in Italy and Luxembourg, and 25 percent in the Netherlands. A large part of the total women working in the Community then consisted of unpaid females employed primarily in agriculture on family farms. Nonsalaried women were also found in each of the six Community countries in such small family businesses as shops, restaurants, and service stations. The proportion of wives and daughters working on family farms, in parents’ hotels, or in husbands’ businesses was 15.1 percent of the female working population in Belgium, 18.9 percent in France, 22.3 percent in Germany, and 24.3 percent in Italy.

As the 20 June 1963 deadline for the reduction of wage differentials between men and women to 10 percent approached, the Commission made inquiry concerning the application of equal pay in the six countries of the Community. Again, it reported to the Council that “Progress has been made but the deadline was not met in all sectors and in some countries the principle [Page 55] of equal pay only applies in jobs done by both men and women, and therefore affects only a limited number of women workers.” The Commission continued gathering and generating statistics through its Statistical Office, sending out reminders to governments, and contacting experts from trade associations to help serve on special committees focused on problems in certain industries. Also, a Joint Advisory Committee on the social problems of farm workers was set up. This work continued into 1964, when the Commission drew up a questionnaire in cooperation with governments, employers’ associations and workers’ organizations to help in reporting on the equal pay principle to the Council and the Assembly.

The agreed upon deadline for the eradication of all discrimination against women in wages and pay was 31 December 1964. In July 1965 the Commission released its report on where the Community countries stood on the issue of equal pay at the deadline. In Belgium women still did not have access to the courts to assert their rights. In Germany the Commission felt the situation was more satisfactory. Women had access to the courts to assert equal-pay rights. In France labor unions declared that equal pay was the rule. but the Commission pointed out that women in some types of jobs not covered by collective agreements lacked proper legal protection. In Italy women got equal pay in most sectors of the economy. The means by which women’s lot was improved involved a reclassification of jobs in industry and equal-pay agreements in other sectors. In Luxembourg the Commission noted satisfaction with a minimum-wage law and collective agreements that provided for equal pay in all professions except domestic work, agriculture, aviculture, and horticulture. In the Netherlands wide disparities between men’s and women’s salaries were found, and Dutch women had no access to the courts to assert equal-pay claims. To the Commission it seemed that labor and management groups, which carried most responsibility for fixing of wages, really had not done enough to implement the principle of equal pay in labor agreements reached through collective bargaining.

Through 1966 and 1967 the Commission continued to make reports, gather statistics, pursue studies, always passing the information on to the Council. The Council, in its turn, noted the reports and then asked for more reports. The situation for working women in Europe became one of the best reported of all the social problems of the sixties. By the end of 1968 Belgium and Luxembourg had passed statutes providing for equal pay for men and women, but the Commission, reporting on 26 June 1970, still thought authorities were not doing enough. A 1966 wage survey had shown differences in men’s and women’s average hourly earnings to be least in Germany, France, and Italy and greatest in the Netherlands, with Belgium in between.

[Page 56] The 1960s had been boom times. Relative to other tasks more directly bearing upon the establishment of the “common market,” not much thought had been given to social problems. Nevertheless, it had become apparent by 1970 that economic prosperity had not automatically eliminated social problems. The rich got richer, and the underdeveloped regions within the European Economic Community lagged far behind. In the process of producing a more efficient economy the Community had accentuated long-standing social problems. Leaders of the governments of the member states and of the Community institutions agreed that it was time to start working in earnest on the Social Policy provisions of the Treaty of Rome. At a summit conference convened at The Hague in 1969 the representatives of “the Six” agreed the time was ripe to enlarge the Community by starting negotiations with Norway, Denmark, the United Kingdom, and Ireland, which had applied for admission into the European Economic Community. The leaders at the summit wanted the best of all possible worlds: enlargement of the Community from six to ten, the “close concerting” of the social policies of all the member states old and new, and the phased establishment of economic and monetary union. The close concerting of social policies involved the Community in bringing a more humane aspect to the economic growth and integration of the “common market” or, as some said, a “human face.” As it turned out, Norway did not ratify the treaty of accession to the Community, but Ireland, Denmark, and the United Kingdom did. The oil crisis of 1973 and the mounting inflation of the seventies brought unemployment and financial crisis in their wake and put a damper on phased monetary and economic union. Nevertheless, the movement toward a “social action programme” got off to a good start when in 1971 the Commission submitted to the Council a document called “Preliminary Guidelines for a Social Policy Program in the Community.” Fourth among its listed priorities for action by the Community was “Improvement of Women’s Working Conditions.” The Commission asserted that the inequality of women was principally due to their position in economic society and that it could be corrected only by coordinated Community action. “In the absence of such co-ordination,” said the Commission, “purely national measures to remedy the situation would be hampered by the distortion of competition resulting from differences between member states. This applies in particular to revision of the often discriminatory classification of jobs as ‘masculine’ or ‘feminine’, the latter being less well paid because they are referred to as ‘light’.” The “Preliminary Guidelines” served as a basis for discussion throughout the Community. While discussion was going on, the Commission in 1972 proceeded with further research, refined its program proposals, and sent them to the special Standing Committee on Employment, which had been set up when unemployment problems started to develop throughout the “common market.”

The statistical studies of the Commission during this period drew more [Page 57] heavily on independent bodies of experts than on governmental reports and were, therefore, much more convincing. The Commission’s “Article 119 Special Group” report, released in July of 1973, provided the international bureaucracy at Brussels with an army of useful facts with which to wage war against sex discrimination. The report showed that half of France’s female population between the ages of fourteen and sixty-five held a job. In the Netherlands only one woman out of four worked; in Italy, one out of five. The report found that many of the member states had inadequate supervisory facilities. The inspectors used by Luxembourg and France to oversee the application of equal rights provisions had too many other responsibilities and were too few in number to be effective. Only Italy employed inspectors responsible solely for supervising equal rights, while Germany and the Netherlands had no administrative checks whatsoever. As for the definition of “equal work,” the courts of Italy and Germany had decreed that women could not receive lower wages for their supposed lower economic yield, nor could the fact that social protection of women was costlier than for men be used as an excuse to reduce women’s salaries. In the Netherlands the Commission reported that women were excluded from one in every four pension plans. Also, several occupations, employing large numbers of women, were not covered by national minimum wage requirements. Among those excluded in France and Luxembourg were caretakers and domestic servants, and farmers, wine growers, and truck gardeners, as well as those under eighteen years of age. Although nearly 60 percent of all women workers in the Netherlands were under twenty-three years old, Dutch law applied only to full-time workers between the ages of twenty-three and sixty-five.

The Commission’s “Special Group” report also distinguished between direct and indirect forms of sex discrimination. Direct discrimination in the form of separate wage scales for men and women had been done away with, but in Italy a million and a half workers, three quarters of whom were women, worked at home. Only forty thousand of them were covered by collective-wage agreements. Lower salaries for Dutch women did persist in the garment, textile, bakery, laundry, ceramic, and footwear industries. Indirect discrimination, through inequitable job classification systems, was widespread. Even in countries where governments had through legislation moved to abolish separate job classifications for men and women, trade unions complained that discrimination continued even under unified systems.

The difference between men’s and women’s wages throughout the “common market” had not been eliminated even by 1973. The textile, food, and clothing industries showed a variance of 13 percent in Italy, 15 percent in France, 20 percent in Germany, 22 percent in Belgium, and 27 percent in the Netherlands. In the electric industry sectors, wage differentials were 10 percent in France. 12 percent in Italy and the Netherlands, 20 percent in Germany, and 21 percent in Belgium. Most women were still at the bottom of the wage hierarchy, although this tendency was less frequently to be found in the government services.

[Page 58] The three new members of the Community (Denmark, Ireland, and the United Kingdom) showed many of the same characteristics. Women constituted 38 percent of the total labor force in Denmark, 37 percent in Britain, and 26 percent in Ireland.

Facts like these could not help but stimulate some kind of action, and on 21 January 1974 the Council adopted a resolution concerning a Social Action Programme. As before, the resolution was not an act of legislation but rather a declaration of intention to proceed by an orderly agenda to adopt certain very definite forms of social legislation for the entire European Economic Community. Fourth on the list of priorities, the Council listed “The undertaking of action to achieve equality between men and women as regards access to employment and vocational training and advancement and as regards working conditions, including pay.” The declaration was significant because for the first time the chief legislative organ of the Community explicitly adopted an all-inclusive approach to the problem that women were having as active members of the European economy. By unanimous consent the Council accepted the Commission’s approach toward women’s employment problems, which involved some specific actions, such as the setting up of an ad hoc group to assist the Commission, the creation of a Community documentation center on women’s problems and an information service to help change public attitudes concerning women’s work, preparation of a Community contribution to the International Women’s Year 1975 of the United Nations, and the creation of a permanent working group on women’s employment problems.

The resolution of the Council adopting a Social Action Programme came at the very beginning of 1974, which was the very moment that many European businesses were apprehensive of a major economic crash due to the Arab oil embargo of 1973. During the spring of 1974 the business mood had become less pessimistic and unemployment did not rise as sharply as had been feared. By late summer, however, it became clear that the European economy was indeed slowing down. Unemployment began to rise, and it rose more quickly among women than among men. The decline in economic activity was strongest in the consumer-goods industries, which were the very industries where women were most heavily employed. In Belgium, by the end of 1974, 60 percent of all unemployed persons were women. In Denmark 40 percent of all unemployed were women; in Germany female unemployment was running 75 percent higher than male unemployment, while in France female unemployment was nearly double that of male unemployment. In Ireland the percentage of female unemployment rose by 48 percent as compared to a rise of 25 percent for men, but that increase in female unemployment, taken in the context of the absolute numbers of women in the labor force (under twenty thousand) meant that most women had to give up looking for work at all. Although at the beginning of 1974 female employment [Page 59] in Italy seemed to be increasing, by the end of the year the trend had been reversed. Luxembourg in 1974 was blessed by a growing economy in spite of the energy crisis, while the Netherlands was hit especially hard, and unemployment for both sexes rose higher than at any time since 1958. Unemployment in the United Kingdom rose to 15.9 percent for women as opposed to 11.1 percent for men. The Commission in analyzing and interpreting these statistics concluded that women were “last hired, first fired” and that some very concrete steps had to be taken to improve their position in the labor market.

It was on such a somber note that International Women’s Year began in Europe. On 10 February 1975 the Council acted upon a proposal of the Commission backed by the assent of the Assembly and adopted a Directive “on the approximation of the laws of the Member States relating to the application of the principle of equal pay for men and women.” This piece of binding international legislation formally commanded all the member states of the “common market” to adopt very specific legal and administrative measures to abolish “all discrimination between men and women” within one year and to inform the Council “immediately” of action taken to conform to the Directive. Specifically, the Council wanted women in every member state to have access to judicial or administrative tribunals in order to press equal-pay claims without fear of reprisals in the form of arbitrary dismissal by employers as a reaction to such proceedings. The Council formally adopted a broad interpretation of the meaning of “equal work” and went so far as to require that national governments provide for posting of notices of equal-pay legislation in places of work. In the Community legal system, such formal legislative acts set the stage for further enforcement actions against violators by the Commission.

In November 1975 the Commission organized two European seminars on women’s employment problems. One of these, on vocational training and guidance for women at work, was held in Paris from 24 through 28 November and was attended by sixty top Community vocational training executives. The purpose of the seminar was “to assemble data on vocational training and guidance for women in the Community.” The new emphasis on vocational training was brought about by the creation of a European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training by a Council Regulation adopted under Article 235 of the Treaty of Rome. The founders of the European Economic Community had not anticipated the development of severe structural unemployment in the Community. The institutions of the Community, acting under [Page 60] Article 235, established the Centre to deal with the employment problems of particular groups of work seekers, such as youth, women, and migrants. On 9 February 1976 the Council acted again under the reserve powers granted by Article 235 of the Treaty to pass further international legislation on the “implementation of the principle of equal treatment for men and women as regards access to employment, vocational training and promotion, and working conditions.” The principle of equal treatment of women is much broader than equal pay and was not laid down in the Treaty. Nevertheless, the Commission, the Council, and the Assembly all concurred that the employment problems of women arose from forms of sex discrimination going beyond inequalities in wages. The institutions of the Community felt further legislation necessary to remove barriers placed before women seeking an equal place in the world of business. Not until such barriers were removed, and the position of women in all the member states harmonized, would significant distortions in patterns of economic growth and competition be removed. Hence the Council Directive of 9 February 1976 particularly addressed indirect discrimination against women. Also, by the end of 1976 the Commission had opened a new “specialized department” within its own bureaucracy. For the first time, there was a full blown European “Women’s Bureau” in Brussels.

Early in 1976 the Irish government, under the terms of the treaty by which it became a member of the European Economic Community, asked to be excused from the requirements laid upon all member states by the Council’s Directive of 10 February 1975 “on the approximation of the laws of the Member States relating to the application of the principle of equal pay for men and women,” claiming that economic problems would arise for a number of sectors already in difficulties if women’s wages and salaries were increased. The Commission refused to permit an exception on the grounds that it “would rob women of a fundamental right confirmed by the Treaty and run counter to the Community’s endeavours to attain equality of pay.” This action revealed a new attitude on the part of the Commission. The equality principle had now become a moral as well as an economic issue. After so many years of delay economic hardship (to men) could no longer excuse prejudicial treatment accorded to women. Nearly two decades after the founding of the Community, its institutions were finally realizing the necessity to enforce one of its basic Treaty provisions.

As part of its effort to influence public opinion on the issue of equality of women in the world of work, the Commission in 1977 produced a film entitled “Equal Chances, Equal Opportunities.” Filmed “on location” at farms and factories, it depicted a working world in which men and women are on an equal footing by virtue of the full application of each person’s acknowledged rights. During the year it was viewed by at least twenty thousand people. In 1978 a special brochure was published to accompany the showing of the film, and the film’s use was promoted in circles concerned with employment, [Page 61] education, vocational guidance, and training for women. Also, in 1978, assistance to women in need of vocational training was made possible out of the European Social Fund; the Council Directive of 9 February 1976 concerning “the principle of equal treatment for men and women as regards access to employment, vocational training and promotion, and working conditions” came into effect 12 August 1978, after the lapse of a thirty-month grace period.

The Contribution of the Court of Justice

ALTHOUGH the executive and legislative institutions of the European Economic Community were actively involved in a slow but sure implementation of Article 119 of the Treaty of Rome over the years, the Court of Justice was not called upon to render its interpretation until 1970. In that year the Court, acting under Article 177 of the Treaty, answered a question referred to it by a Belgian national court concerning the proper interpretation of the principle of equal pay for equal work of Article 119. The Conseil d’Etat of Belgium wanted to know whether social-security pensions paid out of public funds came within the definition of “pay” in the context of Article 119. The Court answered in the negative. The case involved a Belgian airline stewardess who had been forced to resign her job in 1968 when she turned forty years old. This was required of her by a collective employment agreement the terms of which did not require compulsory retirement of male flight attendants upon reaching the age of forty, even though both men and women attendants did precisely the same work. Gabrielle Defrenne asked the court to require the government of Belgium to pay her a pension identical to that which a male flight attendant would have been paid if forced to retire at age forty by reason of total disability. Her theory was that forced retirement of women at age forty should be treated as a disability. She lost on that point, both in the Belgian court and at the European level at the Court of Justice, which held that only pensions paid by employers could come within the definition of “pay” in the equal-pay provision of the Treaty. Gabrielle Defrenne was, therefore, made to suffer discrimination in the form of unequal laws, for it was the Royal Decree of 3 November 1969 that explicitly excluded airline stewardesses from the special pension plans for which all other members of an airline flight crew were eligible. Under a general plan airline stewardesses did receive pensions much lower than those received by their fellow workers who did the same work but were men. Because of the interpretation given to Article 119 by the Court of justice in this case, the Commission and the Council six years later were forced to rely upon the reserve powers of Article 235 when they drew up and enacted Council Directive of 9 February 1976 [Page 62] “on the implementation of the principle of equal treatment for men and women as regards access to employment, vocational training and promotion, and working conditions.” Among the working conditions addressed by the Directive, in Article 5, are “conditions governing dismissal.” This directive in effect overrules the Court’s decision in Case 80/70 by creating a legal principle for the Community that prohibits such mandatory early retirement of women as Gabrielle Defrenne suffered at the hands of her employer.

The next cases to be brought before the Court of Justice on the issue of sex discrimination reached more satisfactory conclusions and involved employers of no lesser stature than the Commission and the European Parliament. In the early 1970s the Commission, which was then becoming an ardent champion of women’s rights, came under criticism by leaders of women’s groups, who pointed out that only about a hundred of the Commission’s 1,625 “A” category employees were women. The Commission explained, rather lamely, that Community officials must be recruited through competitive examinations. The number of “A” women Community employees could increase only if more women took the tests and did well in them. In answer to this the critics pointed out that in the top two grades of the “A” stream appointments were largely political and exempt from formal examinations and that it was at that high level that sex discrimination seemed most marked. Be that as it may, the cases brought against the Commission in 1971, and then again in 1975, were by women considerably below the “A” level.

Luisa Bertoni of Italy entered the service of the European Parliament (the Assembly) on 1 January 1960 as a Grade C1 official. Because she worked for the Parliament at Luxembourg, which was not her home and never had been, Community regulations authorized her to be paid an expatriation allowance, which she received until on 4 November 1970 she became Mme. Sabbatini. Her marriage to a citizen-resident of Luxembourg made her, ipso facto, ineligible under Community personnel regulations for the expatriation allowance. She thought this unfair and brought a case against the Parliament before the Court of Justice.

Monique Bauduin of France entered the service of the Commission of the European Economic Community on 2 July 1962 as a Grade C3 official. Because she worked for the Commission at Brussels, which was not her home and never had been, Community regulations authorized her to be paid an expatriation allowance which she received until on 31 October 1970 she became Mme. Chollet. Her marriage to a citizen-resident of Belgium made her, ipso facto, ineligible under Community personnel regulations for the expatriation allowance. She also thought this unfair and brought a case against the Commission before the Court of Justice.

The Court of Justice decided these two cases together. The Advocate-General in his reasoned submissions before the Court urged that both petitions be dismissed. The Court decided otherwise. It saw in Article 119 a general principle. Although Article 119 literally applied only to the governments of [Page 63] member states, the Court of Justice thought the principle of equality should apply with equal, if not greater force, to the institutions of the Community itself. The administrative actions by which the expatriation allowances for these female employees had been withdrawn were annulled. The provision of the personnel regulations that the Court found unduly arbitrary were those making the women ineligible for the expatriation allowances unless they could prove that they had become “head of the family” upon getting married. The Court found no fault with the idea of cutting off an expatriation allowance when a Community employee, through marriage, became so attached to the work locale as to be no longer an expatriates. But the regulation made an arbitrary difference of treatment between officials on the basis of sex and, therefore, violated the general principles embodied in the Treaty establishing the Community.

The regulations were changed after these two decisions in order to eliminate any reference to “head of the family” requirements that would discriminate against women. Nevertheless, the basic condition for the granting of an expatriation allowance to a Community employee remained—namely, that the employee is not and never has been a national of the State in whose territory the place where he is employed is situated.

Jeanne Airola of Belgium became a student trainee at the joint Research Centre at Ispra, Italy, on 1 January 1964. On 26 April 1965 she married an Italian. Under Italian law she automatically and without recourse became an Italian national. Under Belgian law, however, she could and did formally declare her intent to retain Belgian nationality. Through the operation of the laws of these two nations, she acquired dual citizenship. On completion of her period of training she entered the service of the Commission on 23 November 1966 and was simultaneously posted to the Joint Research Centre at Ispra, but she received no expatriation allowance. Eventually she brought her case before the Court of Justice and won. The Court did not even mention Article 119 of the Treaty or the principle of equal pay but simply noted that national laws were not uniform with regard to the nationality of married women. The Court held that her Italian nationality that was imposed upon her simply by virtue of marriage to an Italian was not to be taken into account when applying the provision in the Community personnel regulations concerning nationality as the determining factor in the granting of an expatriation allowance. The Court said, “The concept of ‘nationals’ . . . must therefore be interpreted in such a way as to avoid any unwarranted difference of treatment as between male and female officials who are, in fact, placed in comparable situations.” In this and in the cases of Sabbatini and Chollet the Court of Justice proved itself willing to do its best to establish equality for female Community employees. The result is especially satisfying when one takes note of statistics showing that women predominate in the secretarial and clerical lines of work. These are the people who genuinely need an expatriation allowance.

[Page 64] In 1976 Gabrielle Defrenne was again before the Court of Justice, represented by Marie-Thérèse Cuvelliez, an attorney of the Brussels bar. She had pursued a claim for payment in arrears through the Belgian labor courts. Finally, in May 1975 the Cour du Travail of Brussels was moved to refer a question about the meaning of Article 119 of the Treaty of Rome to the Court of Justice. What the Cour du Travail wanted to know was whether Article 119, which laid upon “Member States” the duty to “ensure and subsequently maintain” the equal-pay principle by the end of the first stage of the establishment of the European Economic Community, could be relied upon by a private individual in a personal claim for back pay. For Gabrielle Defrenne from 1963 to 1966 was paid less than were male airline “cabin stewards” doing precisely the same work. The Court of Justice answered that question in the affirmative. It, furthermore, made explicit the date upon which Article 119 had become directly applicable so that private persons could so rely upon it in national courts; the date was the end of the first stage: 1 January 1962. But in answer to special interrogatories directed to them by the Court the new members of the “common market” indicated that their economies could not bear the flood of back-pay claims that would ensue as a result of the Court’s decision should it be given retroactive effect. As a result of that assertion, and also because the Commission had never made good on its threats, originally made in 1973, to initiate infringement actions against the governments dragging their feet in implementing Article 119, the Court refrained from giving retroactive effect to the direct applicability of the equal-pay principle. Rather it was held to apply only from the date of the Court’s decision, which was 8 April 1976. As to Gabrielle Defrenne, however, and other women who had already initiated equal-pay claims posited upon the direct applicability of Article 119, the Court made its findings retroactively applicable. Nor was that her final appearance before the Court of Justice. After receiving the authoritative interpretation of the import of Article 119, the Cour du Travail, Brussels, ordered Gabrielle Defrenne’s former employer to pay her back wages. She then pursued an appeal from the judgment of that court to the Cour de Cassation of Belgium to see if she might not be able to have justice for the economic injury resulting from her having been required to resign at the age of forty, although males doing precisely the same work were not required to resign at that age. The Cour de Cassation felt it necessary to refer a question to the Court of Justice under Article 177 of the Treaty. The Belgian court wanted to know whether the principle of equal pay for equal work found in Article 119 required not only equal pay but general equality of working conditions for women such that mandatory retirement at age forty for women but not for men constitutes discrimination prohibited by the Treaty. The Court answered the question in the negative. It felt that such a broad interpretation of Article 119 could not be achieved without sacrificing the incisive effect of its terms upon which depended its direct applicability in national courts by private persons pursuing equal-pay claims. The issue of equal pay would then be transformed into an issue of nearly absolute equality in matters concerning conditions of employment not readily reducible to [Page 65] dollars and cents. The Court also noted that the Commission and Council had already enacted a Directive designed to implement a principle not originally set down in the Treaty—namely, that of “equal treatment for men and women as regards access to employment, vocational training and promotion, and working conditions” on 9 February 1976. But that Directive did not come into full force and effect until August 1978, long after Gabrielle Defrenne’s dismissal in 1968. While the Court acknowledged that such a fuller recognition of equal treatment for men and women at work had indeed become a general principle of the law of the member states, yet at the time of her dismissal, it was not the law. Such was the Court’s interpretation.

Recent Developments

ON 18 JANUARY 1979 the Commission forwarded to the Council its report on the application of the principle of equal pay for men and women. The main objective of this report was to examine progress made in incorporating into national law the provisions of the Council Directive of 10 February 1975. Some of the member states had not at that time complied with the equal-pay Directive. Now, over twenty years after the foundation of the European Economic Community, the Commission has decided to begin enforcement proceedings against the following governments: For violation of the Council Directive of 10 February 1975, relating to the application of the principle of equal pay for men and women, Denmark, the Netherlands, the Federal Republic of Germany, Luxembourg, France, Belgium, and the United Kingdom; for violation of the Directive of 9 February 1976 concerning the principle of equal treatment for men and women in regard to access to employment, vocational training and promotion, and working conditions, the Federal Republic of Germany and the Netherlands. On 9 May 1979 the Parliament of Europe (the Assembly) adopted a resolution welcoming the decision by the Commission to initiate infringement proceedings against those member states that have still not complied with the principles of equality for men and women. It should be noted that if the Commission goes through with its infringement action decisions, this will be the first time that the Court of Justice will be called upon to decide equality cases under Article 169 of the Treaty of Rome, which states: “If the Commission considers that a Member State has failed to fulfil an obligation under this Treaty, it shall deliver a reasoned opinion on the matter after giving the State concerned the opportunity to submit its observations. If the State concerned does not comply with [Page 66] the opinion within the period laid down by the Commission, the latter may bring the matter before the Court of Justice.” If the Court of Justice does indeed find violations of the Treaty, under Article 171 it may order the member states concerned to take corrective action. Of course, the European Economic Community has no armies or any other compulsory means by which to enforce its rules. The Court of Justice relies upon the jurisprudential force of its reasoning to bring about conformity with the law of the Treaty on the part of national governments. However, it seems that so much time has gone by since Article 119 was supposed to have been completely implemented that no government in the “common market” could convincingly raise any defense. Equality of men and women at work has now become recognized as a moral as well as an economic issue of great dimensions. Further development in this area of law and administrative implementation can be expected to continue well into the 1980s.

One event of singular importance took place in June 1979. More than 110 million Europeans went to the polls to elect the 410 members of the European Parliament by direct universal suffrage. According to the report of the Commission, “In each of the Member States the campaign for the first European ballot saw an impressive mustering of politicians, thus satisfying the hopes of those for whom the election was a golden opportunity to bring the Community home to 260 million Europeans.” It should go without saying that the directly elected Parliament is a much more authentic representative of the people of Europe in the Community. The new President of Parliament happens to be a woman, Simone Veil, formerly the health minister of the French cabinet, whom President Giscard d’Estaing personally asked to step down as minister in order to head the party ticket of the Union pour la Démocratie Francaise in the European elections.

The principle of equal pay was further interpreted by the courts as a result of litigation initiated by Mrs. Wendy Smith, who was employed by the English firm of Macarthys Limited as a stockroom manager from 1 March 1976 through 9 March 1977. When Mrs. Smith discovered that her male predecessor had earned £60.00 per week compared to her £50.00 per week, she brought proceedings before an Industrial Tribunal in London for back pay under English law. On 27 June 1977 the Industrial Tribunal decided in her favor. Her (former) employer appealed, and the Employment Appeal Tribunal on 14 December 1977 dismissed the appeal of Macarthys Limited, who next appealed to the English Court of Appeal. That court found itself in disagreement with the industrial courts’ interpretation of English statutes, which did not, in its view, permit Mrs. Smith to compare her salary with a male predecessor. Rather she was required by statute to compare her salary with men contemporaneously employed by the same firm to do the same work. A majority of the Court of Appeal did, however, agree that reference should be made to the Court of Justice of the European Economic Community (of which England is a member) for an interpretation of Article 119 of the [Page 67] Treaty of Rome in the light of the specific facts of Mrs. Smith’s case. Questions were referred to the Court of Justice by the English Court of Appeal in August 1979. On 27 March 1980 the Court of Justice ruled:

1. The principle that men and women should receive equal pay for equal work, enshrined in Article 119 of the EEC Treaty, is not confined to situations in which men and women are contemporaneously doing equal work for the same employer.

2. The principle of equal pay enshrined in Article 119 applies to the case where it is established that, having regard to the nature of her services, a woman has received less pay than a man who was employed prior to the woman’s period of employment and who did equal work for the employer.

Once provided with the authoritative interpretation of Article 119 by the European Court of Justice, the English Court of Appeal unhesitatingly and unequivocally declared that interpretation to be as much a part of English law if it had been enacted by Parliament. Then it applied the interpretation to the case and found that “Mrs. Wendy Smith was right. Although she was employed subsequently to the man, she was entitled to be paid the same as the man . . . The appeal that the employers brought to this court must therefore be dismissed.” The losers—Macarthys Limited—then sought to avoid paying the costs of the appeal on the ground that they were entitled to look solely to the literal language of the English statutes and to ignore the broad principle set down in Article 119 of the EEC Treaty. This plea was also rejected, and Mrs. Wendy Smith had the satisfaction of knowing that she had not only won her case in England but had also been able to estab1ish a precedent that would be useful to her sisters throughout the European countries of the Common Market.

Conclusion

THE TREATY establishing the European Economic Community included the provision, in Article 119, for the implementation of the principle of equal pay for men and women for equal work by the member states of the “common market” established by the Treaty. Although originally to be implemented fully by 1 January 1962, this has yet to be achieved. All of the institutions of the Community—the Council, the Commission, the Assembly, and the Court of Justice—have expressed their belief that the principle of equality is at one and the same time an economic principle and a fundamental human right forming part of the vital foundation of Community economic and social policy. Nevertheless, stubborn inflexibilities associated with entrenched attitudes from the past concerning proper roles for women in society, [Page 68] and the complicating effects of a recession from which Europe has not yet fully recovered, together with continued high rates of inflation and unemployment, combine to create an atmosphere in which the ideals of equality are more difficult to achieve. It is said in some circles that a woman who works is taking the bread out of a man’s mouth. Difficulties experienced by women, migrant workers, and youth in gaining entry and security within the labor force have precipitated Community legislation under the reserve powers of Article 235 to lay down measures concerned with vocational training, reform of the Social Fund, and equal treatment of women in all aspects of employment from first training to retirement and pension. These new measures are as new to the Community as was Article 119 at its inception and may, therefore, require a similarly extended period of time for their enforcement. It is clear that the implementation of various aspects of equality between men and women in the economic life of the Community and of its member states is a challenge of the highest order. The initiative of both men and women, in government, management, and trade unions, is required for its achievement. Finally, much depends upon the political development and further strengthening of Community institutions and the internal cohesion of the Nine. It seems likely that one of the reasons why the Commission failed to follow through on enforcement procedures in 1973 was the entry at that time of three new nations into the “common market.” Perhaps the further enlargement of the Community during the remainder of the twentieth century, through the accession of Greece, Portugal, Spain, and perhaps Turkey, will again raise these same issues in ever more insistent ways. One can only hope that continuing political and economic growth and stability are in store for Europe and the Community. The health and happiness of her men, women, and children depend upon it. Can anyone doubt that the “Grand Design” of a unified and prosperous and peaceful Europe can possibly be achieved without the full and equal partnership of women in the economic, social, cultural, and political life of the Continent?

[Page 69]

Authors & Artists

WILLIAM P. COLLINS holds a B.A. in Russian and French from Middlebury College and an M.S. in library science from Syracuse University. He has been head catalog librarian of Middlebury College Library and cataloger in the pamphlet collection in the Library of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin. He now serves as the librarian at the Bahá’í World Center in Haifa, Israel. Mr. Collins’ “Islám’s Taḥríf: Implications for the Bahá’í Faith” appeared in our Fall 1976 issue.

VINSON JAMIR, an attorney with a degree from the University of Oklahoma School of law, is now working on an LL.M. degree in international law at the University of Georgia at Athens. During his tenure in the Peace Corps he worked as a volunteer public defender in the Public Defender’s Office in the Marshall Islands.

HARLEY KING, whose real love is poetry, is a methods and procedures analyst for Americana Healthcare Corporation. He has been writing haiku seriously since 1975 and has had his work published in some ten literary magazines. His Winter Silence, a collection of haiku, was published in 1977. Mr. King makes a first appearance in World Order.

NOSRATOLLAH RASSEKH is a professor of history at Lewis and Clark College. He holds B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees in political science, international relations, and history from Stanford University. His varied contributions to World Order include: “Three Studies on Religion and Society: Christianity, 138 A.D.” (Spring-Summer 1980); “Melting Pot or Boiling Cauldron: The Ethnic Experience in America” (Winter 1975-76): “Of Time, Space, and Man: Reflections on Progressive Revelation” (Summer 1974); and “The Non-Hero in History” (Fall 1967). Among his other publications are A Bibliography of Persian Gulf Sheikdoms and White Revolution of Írán.

ART CREDITS: Cover, design by John Solarz, photograph by Glenford E. Mitchell; p. 6, photograph by Hooper Dunbar; p. 32, photograph by Delton Baerwolf; p. 47, photograph by Chris Cholas.