World Order/Volume 12/Issue 10/Text

From Bahaiworks

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_.< nmA-"HJ‘ ‘


JANUARY. 1947


THE ANATOMY OF PREJUDICE—Duart Brown RACIAL AND GROUP PREJUDICE—Joseph Lander, M.D. BLACK METROPOLIS, Book Review—Eleanor S. Hutchens

Two FACETS OF ONE GEM—Maye Harvey Gift THE GUARDIAN, Eziitorial—William Kenneth Christian

UTOPIA?—-—Robert Reid THE PRICE OF PEACE—N. M. F iroozi PIONEER JOURNEY—PERU—-—Virginia Orbison

WITH OUR READERS

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1-:1'HE BAHA’I’ MAGAZINE ,

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organ of the American Bahá’ía. In March, 1911, its title was changed under the name of The Bahá’í Magazirie. The issue of April, 1935 carried the present title of World Order, combining The Bahá’í Magazinc and World Unity, which had been founded October, 1927. The

publication.

WORLD ORDER is published monthly in Wilmette. 11]., by the Publishing =Committee of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States and Canada. EDITORS: Eleanor S. Hhtchens, William Kenneth Christian, Gertrude K. Heuning. Horace Holley, Bertha Hyde Kirkpatrick.

Editorial Office Mrs. Gertrude K. Henning, Secretary 69 Annonsroan Row, menm, ILL.

Publication Office 110 LINDEN AVENUE, Wmum-m, 11.1..

C. R. Wood, Business Manager I Primed ii U.S.A.

7L ' . JANUARY, 1947, VOLUME XII, NUMBER 10

SUBSCRIPTIONS: 81.50 per year, for United States, its territories and posses dons; for Canada, Cuba, Mexico, Central and South America. Single copies, 15c.

. Foreign subscriptions, 81.75.1431“: checks and money orders payable to World

Order Magazine. 110 Linden Avenu‘e, Wilmette, Illinois. Entered a second clan

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3 ‘ 3,1879. Content copyrighted 1947 by Bahá’í Publishing Committee. Title - , 7 registered at U. 5. Patent Office.


CHANCE 01? ADDRESS shamanmonm ONE mom‘m ADVANCE



World Order was founded March 21,1910 as Bahá’í News, the first .

to Star of the West..Beginning November, 1922 the magazine appéared ‘

‘prwent number represents Volume XXXVII of the continuous Bahá’í




[Page 289]WOBLD 0BDEB

The Bahá’í Magazine

VOLUME XII

JANUARY, 1947

NUMBER 10


The Anatomy of Prejudice

DUART BROWN

HE first rejudice of man was prohab y against the dark.

Night was an unpleasant time for early man. He was a day-feeding creature and as the shadows grew longer a chilling fear sent him scurrying to find a bed for the night in the crotch of some great tree or to seek the comfort in numbers of a group of his own kind. Then in the dark would come the monsters of that early world to roar and growl and tear up the ground in titanic battles

while the little man creature ‘

clung shivering to his branch. In the dark also came the great spiders, the scorpions and the snakes against whom there was no defense save to hold as still as

death.

No wonder children sometimes wake screaming from a nightmare in which they have been attacked by the creatures of the dark. No wonder most women and many men seem to have an instinctive revulsion for snakes and spiders. Here indeed are prejudices that seem to be inherited

from a terror-haunted past.

But what of prejudices of man against man, the most besetting problem of the modern world, are they too inherited? Scientists line up in an almost 100% “no!” Experiences of teachers with very young children of different races show a complete lack of prejudice among the very young.

Prejudice of man against man is thus almost entirely a result of the influence of environment. Parents, relatives, friends, teachers, condition your outlook on life by what they say and do. Gradually you come to believe that all men of a certain skin color or nationality or religion are bad or inferior. That is prejudice, the dangerous prejudice that through its starting of the second World War has almost ruined the world. Since the overcoming of such a state of mind is recognized by most of the leading'statesmen and scientists, and a large number of the religious leaders of the earth as the only certain path to world peace, it

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behooves us to study carefully the anatomy of man’s distaste for man. Just understanding prejudice within ourselves and others is a good beginning.

We have an excellent statement of ‘Abdul-Bahá on this vexing subject. Speaking of His father, He says: “Bahá’u’lláh has taught that prejudices whether religious, racial, patriotic or political are destructive to the foundations of human development. Prejudices of any kind are the destroyers of human happiness and welfare. Until they are dispelled the advancement of the world of humanity is not possible, yet racial, religious and national bias are observed everywhere. For thousands of years the world of humanity has been agitated and disturbed by prejudices. As long as it prevails, warfare, animosity and hatred will continue. Therefore if we seek to establish peace we must cast aside this obstacle, for otherwise agreement and composure are not to be attained.”

Christ has said to us: “Save you come to me with the hearts of little children, you cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven.” But. the hearts of little children are pure of prejudice and other dark thoughts because of ignorance. This, as ‘Abdu’l-Bahá has said, is purity through weakness. The

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heart of a grown man, He says, reaches purity through strength. This is the difierence between a man and a child that was never explained in the Bible but has been explained to the world by the prophets of the New Life.

But how does prejudice come in the shaky period between childhood and true manhood? It comes mostly sugar-coated as do all temptations to evil. The individual sees in himself the center of the universe since naturally, so far as he is concerned, all the world revolves around him. He tends to draw to himself that which is pleasant for his ego and reject that which is unpleasant. The spoiled brat and the spoiled rich man or woman are the result of this tendency carried to extremes. Hence it is part of growing up to learn that what is pleasant is not necessarily good and what is unpleasant is not necessarily bad. Another part of this growing up process is to detect the difference between greater and lesser pleasures, so that you know that a pleasure such as the creation of something useful to others is more satisfying and long lasting than one dedicated solely to gratifying your own senses.

The prejudiced man has decided to gratify his lust for selfimportance. This is the sugar ._.._;“

[Page 291]ANATOMY OF PREJUDICE 291

coating around the idea that he is superior to man with a colored skin. To gratify this desire to feel superior, a desire that may be fed by his own active feeling of inferiority to others of his own race, he will believe every vicious lie and half truth about colored people that he hears and even pass it on in a magnified form to others. The end result of such a state of mind we see in Germany where lies Were shouted so vociferously, that the foolish believed the noise necessarily made truth. This infantile belief in anything that will strengthen your own ego is the very opposite of the return to the pure-heartedness of childhood advocated by God. One is the creation of strength through knowledge, the other the turning of weakness into evil.

Many of us have prejudices drilled into us for so long that it is difficult to get rid of them. It requires some hard and honest thinking to sweep them from our minds like the dark cobwebs they are. The question we all need to ask ourselves is: “Is my harmonious relationship with God drilled into us for so long that it more important than my personal pleasure of the moment?” If your answer is “yes,” then it must be unequivocal, because,

make no mistake about it, the Lord is a jealous taskmasker. From those who have given allegiance He demands the complete sacrifice of self. This we know from the words of all the prophets.

The child in his simplicity asks: “Why does a dark skin make any difi'erence between my friend and me?” The simplicity of the child is a God-like wisdom against which adults strike back with anger or clumsy arguments that are the reflections of their own uneasy consciences. Ask such a man if he believes that God would give him preference over another because of a lighter skin and the balloon of his self-importance is quickly pricked. Fury or injured silence are his only answers.

Nothing worth while comes easily, and so also it is hard to drive all prejudices from the human heart. But God has seen fit to give rewards of the highest order to those who have the courage. “Let no man place himself above his brother, but rather let him be his brother’s keeper.” Glorious indeed is the heart of the man who receives all men equally in the way of the Lord. He is contented when others worry, and satisfied when another man is consumed by envy.

[Page 292]Racial and Group Prejudice

JOSEPH LANDER, M.D.

Y function on the panel is to present whatever help psy chology and psychiatry have to offer to the problem of racial prejudice, which is so important from so many points of view as to make it urgently necessary for all men of good will to make whatever contribution they can for its solution.

I don’t believe I overstate the matter when I say that if the problem of racial and group prejudice is not dealt with soundly, rationally, and successfully, the human race will not survive. Unless the people of the earth learn to live peacefully together there will certainly be another war. Living together peacefully is not possible unless we begin to practice the central principle of Democracy, i.e., all men are created equal; all men are entitled to equality of opportunity. If one group or one race can set itself up as superior or can dominate another so-called inferior race, there will inevitably be another war.

By far the greatest amount of


Condensed rind reprinted from the article in the Winter Issue of Opportunity, Journal of Negro Life. Dr. Lander gave this as a speech before the Adult Education Council Workshop, Cincinnati, Ohio.

prejudice is what we call culturally determined; it exists in the early environment of the child in every community and is absorbed almost with his mother’s milk. For a moving and a graphic description of this process, I refer you to Richard Wright’s book, Black Boy, in which one sees how Negro children at five or six are already learning to chant anti-Semitic rhymes before they even know what the words mean. All through the early and impressionable years we grow in an atmosphere in which the air is thick with feelings against sonie group or several groups: white against black, Christian against Jew, Protestant against Catholic, rich against poor, Northerner against Southerner. We cannot emphasize too strongly that prejudice is not instinctive, is not innate. One’s prejudices seem so natural, are so taken for granted, that we come to look on them as something with which we were born. Yet there is not the slightest evidence that anyone has such inborn prejudice against others of a different color or religion, of a diflerent society or culture. If the adults leave them alone, white and black children can and

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[Page 293]RACIAL~ AND GROUP PREJUDICE

do play together naturally and easily.

Since one of the most important aspects of prejudice is aggression, we shall have to turn our attention for a moment to the matter of aggression in general. We are all born with a certain fund of aggressive drive, a certain urge to mastery, a quantity of competitiveness and activity expressing itself in a need to assert in a positive fashion one’s own individuality. What happens to the normal aggressive drive after one leaves the playgrounds? Some people employ it in business, by mastering their competitors. Others divert their aggressiveness into the field of science and conquer some problem of nature. Others drain it by engaging in sports or beating their wives. When the environment is conducive to racial or group prejudice, many people can drain off their hostilities, their aggressiveness, their drive to mastery in asserting their dominance over some so-called IOWer race or group.

If an individual feels inferior for any reason, he is only too happy to be able to lord it over someone else, in this way restoring his self-esteem and freeing himself of the unpleasant feeling of personal inferiority. Since the society in which we live provides

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an atmosphere of racial prejudice, such people find a readymade avenue for the expression of their hostilities. If an individual feels guilty about something and can find someone onto whom he can shift this feeling of guilt, he himself will feel less guilty

and more comfortable.

That brings us to another point: prejudice is a mechanism which grows up to defend oneself against some real or fancied threat. Thus the urban business man feels that his business is threatened by a competing Jew, therefore, he is more than willing to believe the most fantastic falsehoods and malicious stories about Jews, thereby hoping to get rid of the one who threatens his livelihood.

I said that prejudice arises as a defense against some real of fancied threat. One might put that somewhat difl'erently: prejudice arises in an effort to maintain the status quo, to prevent any change in the relationship between groups or social classes. If such change is prevented in other ways, group prejudice as we know it does not appear. This is best typified in India where the class lines are so sharply drawn that no one even dreams of trying to leave his particular level, his class, his caste. We find the same phenomenon in this


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country: so long as the Negro or the Mexican or the Oriental or any other minority group is willing to stay in the place assigned him by the dominant group, no particular hostility is displayed.

That brings us to the question of why it is that prejudice and group and racial hostilities are strongest in a democracy. The relationships between the different classes and groups in our society is theoretically fluid. Theoretically everyone has equal opportunity, and every man can be President. Trouble arises when minority groups act in accordance with these democratic principles and actually try to raise their economic and cultural level, when they are sufficiently dissatisfied with being exploited to try to do something about it. The dominant groups resist any such change because it threatens their position, and they therefore employ every means to suppress those they consider to be “uppity.”

How did all this group prejudice arise in the first place? Probably on the basis of a suspicion, a distrust, of whatever was new or strange. Primitive man had the greatest difficulty is surviving, and inter-tribal wars were a constant menace. The outsider was always someone who might put out the fire

without which he could not survive, might kill him without warning, might take away his food or his wife. There arose, therefore, a strong distrust of any and every outsider as a potential enemy. This attitude became so deeply ingrained, this need to band together with one’s own group became so strong that the suspicion of something new and different, although very mild, has been passed on from generation to generation, and to this day there is a certain uneasiness about someone different or foreign. This does not mean that we are born with the uneasiness, we learn it from the environment. Our self-love makes us feel that anything different from ourselves is alien, dangerous, threatening. If, however the different person, the stranger, constitutes no economic threat, or if conscious and deliberate efforts are not made to stimulate hostilities, the initial uneasiness about the stranger quickly disappears.

A democracy is a most difficult and challenging way of life because it demands of its memhere a degree of intellectual maturity, emotional maturity, and intellectual honesty which one does not need in a feudal system or an authoritarian state, or in any other system in which one does things by command in rig [Page 295]RACIAL AND GROUP PREJUDICE

idly prescribed fashion. If a man is to be free,’ he must accept responsibility for learning to live with his fellowman. A democracy demands a reasonableness, a live-let-live attitude that runs against the profound aggression which most of us today reach with maturity. Unless and until human aggression can be channeled into socially constructive activity, it will be directed into anti-social channels, and that means irrational prejudices and hostility.

That brings us to a point de-. serving the greatest emphasis: the cure of group prejudice cannot be carried on without concomitant cure of the other ills from which our society suffers. So long as people are threatened by the loss of livelihood, so long as people are required to live in slums, so long as there is the anxiety of anticipating another

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war, so long as children are reared in an enironment which over-stimulates the competitive. spirit, just so long will humanity have within itself an unhealthy degree of frustration and tension leading to abnormal degrees of aggression. And as long as that condition prevails, man will need to find a scapegoat, an inferior onto whom he can spill his hate, his frustration, his hostility.

In psychiatric treatment, the patient works at least as hard as the doctor. The patient undergoes this because he knows the reward is a healthier, a fuller, a richer, and a happier life. The members of a democratic society, if they want to preserve, enrich and make healthy the society in which they live, must work at it. If treatment of our society is to occur, it will have to be carried on by the members of that society themselves.


The unity which is productive of unlimited results is first a unity of mankind which recognizes that all are sheltered beneath the overshadowing glory of the All-Glorious; that all are servants of one God; for all breathe the same atmosphere, live upon the same earth, move beneath the same heavens, receive efl'ulgence from the same sun and are under the protection of one God. This is the most great unity, and its results are lasting if humanity adheres to it; but mankind has hitherto violated it, adhering to sectarian or other limited unities such as racial, patriotic or unity of self-interests; therefore no' great results have been forthcoming. Nevertheless it is certain that the radiance and favors of God are encompassing, minds have developed, perceptions have become acute, sciences and arts are widespread and capacity exists for the proclamation and promulgation of the real and ultimate unity of mankind which will bring forth marvelous results.

—‘ABDU’L-BAHA


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BLACK METROPOLIS

Book Review ELEANOR S. HUTCHENS

WARNED as they have been repeatedly, first by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá

and more recently by Shoghi Effendi, that the solution of the race problem is the greatest of all tasks facing America, Bahá’ís welcome any book which clarifies some ‘of the factors underlying racial tension. Black Metropolis by St. Clair Drake and Hor. ace R. Cayton, published in 1945 by Harcourt, Brace, and Company, is an 800 page sociological study of Chicago’s 330,000 Negroes, based upon material gathered by twenty sociologists during four years of re. search. It describes greater Chicago, traces a history of Negroes in Chicago, and gives a picture of the lives and aspirations of the people of “Bronzeville” today. Filled as it is with statistical data, pictorial graphs, case histories, interviews, and the conclusions of trained observers on the problems of urban Negroes, the book assumes importance to any student of American race relations. The first settler at Chicago (called Eschikagou, “the place of the evil smell” from the wild garlic which was abundant there) was a French speaking Negro, Jean Baptiste Point de Saible, who came in 1790 and established a bakehouse, smokehouse, poultryhouse, dairy, workshop, horse mill, barn and We stables as well as his homestead. He not only presaged by his own activity, the future Chicago as a manufacturing center, but its position as a trading center as well, for he traded with the Potta watomie Indians, the English, and the French. The further history, as

recorded by the authors, follows that of Negroes in other Northern cities. Slaves who had been able to buy their freedom or who had been able to flee from their masters continued to trickle into Chicago. After the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law, Chicago became an important stop on the Underground Railway to Canada. By 1890 there were 15,000 Negroes in Chicago supporting twenty churches, a dozen lodges, several social and cultural clubs, and three newspapers. For the most part, they were employed as coachmen, butlers, cooks, and maids in the homes of the wealthy; servants in hotels, stores and restaurants, and porters on the new Pullman coaches.

The “Negro Problem” was spoken of only after the great migration of Negroes which took place during the years of the first World War when war industries, faced with a labor shortage, had solicited in the South’s Black Belt. The area consigned to Negroes in Chicago by custom became gravely overcrowded, causing friction leading to the Riot of 1919 and minor violent incidents from time to time. Although the return of veterans meant that many of these new laborers lost their jobs, Negroes who had once lived in the North had no wish to return South. The Depression, of course, brought even more acute distress to the citizens of Black Metropolis who came to claim that they were the last to be hired and the first to be fired. Many were for a time dependent upon government relief, and the efiect of this in 296

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security upon the social and family life of the city was profound. World War II brought another large wave of migrants from the South to the labor-hungry city. If the post-war period brings economic discrimination and widespread unemployment, Drake and Cayton share the fears of other trained observers that interracial conflict may result.

The third of a million citizens of Black Metropolis form a complex and interesting city with 500 churches, newspapers, and in many cases, its own merchants, physicians, lawyers, and educators. It is still largely dependent upon the rest of Chicago for the employment of its members, however. The recent policy of some of the labor unions which have accepted Negroes as members and even protected their rights, and the temporary enforcement of the Fair Employment Practices Act opened to Negroes many occupations which had previously been closed to them. Nevertheless, the Negro is still conscious of a barrier to his economic advance raised by a prejudice which keeps him out of some branches of endeavor and relegates him to the less important and more menial tasks in others. The authors give a careful survey of the types of jobs open to Negroes and of those that still remain closed to him.

A further source of frustration is the housing shortage which has always been more acute in Black Metropolis than elsewhere in Chicago as shown by the fact that there are 90,000 persons crowded into one square mile of Black Metropolis in contrast to the 20,000 persons per square mile in the adjacent white

apartment house area. This overcrowding is not self-imposed. Prejudice keeps Negroes within a very restricted zone, enforced by restrictive covenants by which real estate men refuse to sell or rent property unless the owner or lessee signs a contract not to sell or rent to a member of a non-Caucasian race. Within the bounds of Black Metropolis it is not at all unusual for an enterprising landlord to rent a six room apartment, cut it up into six “kitchenettes” [which may or may not have cooking arrangements], and rent these to six families. Such congestion with its inherent peril to health and morality! can account for much of the juvenile delin'quency, the escape behavior, and the loose family relations in parts of Black Metropolis.

Several chapters deal with the different types of churches varying from high-church Episcopalian to the Holy-roller churches; with the influence of the Negrp press in arousing pride in racial achievements at the same time they point out the inequalities that still separate the Negro and white communities; and with the growth of Negro business and politics. Even “Policy”, the numbers racket is discussed.

What many of their co-Americans fail to realize is that Negro society is stratified. Drake and Cayton make it clear that there are many types of Negroes living in any community, respectable and non-respectable, church-going and non-church-going, upper class, middle class, and lower class, differing in wealth, education, type of employment, family tradition, social aspirations, and morality. One of the most interesting sections of the book is that dealing with


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these different classes. Readers are introduced to the upper class woman who divides her time between charity and bridge-playing, to the middle class family which is giving music and dancing lessons to its children and planning a college education for them, and to Baby Chile, Slick, and

Mr. Ben, pathetic and unstable as they were.

There is little doubt that for a long time Black Metropolis will be used as a source book for any serious study of the Negro in America. The Negro authors have made every effort to be detached and scientific in their analysis of the factors which have made the urban Negro what

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he is. They are equally clear in their conclusions as to the necessary conditions for the prevention of future inter-racial conflict: “1. The continuous interpretation of the Negroa’ aspirations and demands to all sections of the white community; 2. The actual progressive relaxation of discrimination and segregation, beginning immediately; 3. The inclusion of Negroes in all pcstwar plans on an equitable basis; 4. The strengthening of social controlsfamilial, associational, and governmental—within the Black Belt; 5. The constructive channelizing of the Negroes’ mass resentment into successful action-patterns of non-violent protest.”



Let there he no mistake. The principle of the Oneness of Mankind—the pivot round which all the teachings of Bahá’u’lláh revolve—is no mere outburst of ignorant emotionalism or an expression of vague and pious hope. Its appeal is not to be merely identified with a reawakening of the spirit of brotherhood and good-will among men, nor does it aim solely at the fostering of harmonious cooperation ambng individual peoples and nations. Its implications are deeper, its claims greater than any which the Prophets of old were allowed to advance. Its message is applicable not only to the individual, but concerns itself primarily with the nature of those essential relationships that must hind all the states and nations as members of one human family. It does not constitute merely the enunciation of an ideal, but stands inseparably associated with an institution adequate to embody its truth, demonstrate its validity, and perpetuate its influence. It implies an organic change in the structure of present-day society, a change such as the world has not yet experienced. It constitutes a challenge, at once bold and universal, to outwo-rn shibboleths of national creeds—creeds that have had their day and which must, in the ordinary course of events as shaped and controlled by Providence, give way to a new gospel, fundamentally different from, and infinitely superior to, what the world has already conceived. It calls for no less than the reconstruction and the demilitarization of the whole civilized worlda world organically unified in all the essential aspects of its life, its political machinery, its spiritual aspiration, its trade and finance, its script and language, and yet infinite in the diversity of the national characteristics of its federated units.

-—SHocHI EFFENDI

[Page 299]Two F acets of One Gem

MAYE HARVEY GIFT

MANY of us have the expe rience that scientific studies disturb our belief in things spiritual, and confuse our values generally. One seemingly easy way out is to relegate religion to the background. A more drastic way is to cast belief in God overboard in favor of the more convincing science. 0r We may resent the upheaval science brings, and hug to us in ‘unreasoning fashion beliefs which deep within ourselves we distrust. Neither the spiritual experience nor the psychological result of these attitudes is constructive.

There is another and better way. It begins by facing the issue with a determination to understand it, then, by means of reason plus faith to work toward a solution.

In reality, proven science and true religion cannot be contradictory. Both are expressions of underlying laws of the universe. Science refers primarily to the realm of nature; religion, to the realm of the human spirit. Both science and religion are inextricably intertwined in the realm of human relationships and in the institutions of society. We have such sciences as psychology, sociology and political science.

And religion teaches us how to deal with our fellowmen, and furnishes some laws regulating society, such as laws of marriage and divorce, of sanitation, and of punishment. Both science and religion stem from the one Power that creates and governs all things. Our difficulty is that We do not as yet understand them aright.

Science, rightly understood, is one of God’s greatest gifts. It opens never-ending vistas of discovery and invention. .We uncover mysteries of the past through archeology. We foretell movements of celestial bodies billions of light years distant by means of astronomy. By the help of many other sciences we can make the unimaginable vast resources of this planet our servants in the new civilization we must build. This infinite orderly universe brings us in awe to a final Cause—Cod, whom we can neither understand nor explain nor dispense with. The possibilities of science can never be exhausted. Our life, at every turn, is in contact with practical evidencesof the reality and value of science.

Religion, rightly understood, is God’s supreme bounty to us.

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By religion we mean man’s acceptance of God’s laws and his application of them to all aspects of his life. We tend to confuse religion with contending sects and abstruse theologies. Brotherhood seems to have failed, in the face of global war involving, not only Christian nations, but

adherents of all the World Faiths.

As a corrective, let us take a survey of history. The historian recognizes that among the great civilizations are the J ewish, the Buddhist, the Christian and the Islamic. Each, in its day, is conceded to have been the high point of world development. Each carried mankind progressively forward. Each gradually lost its original impetus, became corrupt, and was superseded. With the Jewish, captivity followed captivity. With the Buddhist, India lost the most complete unity she had attained. With the Christian, the Dark Ages prevailed. With the Saracen or Islamic, emphasis on world conquest combined with inner decadence, completely corrupted its life. Any renewal of civilization must be upon a spiritual basis if history is not to contradict itself. The sources of past civilizations were not at once apparent, and so it may be today. But the fundamental trend can WORLD ORDER

not be mistaken: it is the unification of the nations of the world into a common global civilization which the prophets have termed the Kingdom of God. This cannot be a permanent realization until a spirit of brotherhood and unity, based on the acceptance of one God, permeates our hearts as individuals. Religion for the twentieth century must be both individual and social, both scientific and spiritual.

Our personal religious beliefs and experiences too often do not have the clear-cut practical value for us that science has. We cannot state them as self-evident laws and principles. Take these teachings: “Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged.” “A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit . . . Therefore by their fruits shall ye know them.” “A soft answer turneth away wrath: hut grievous words stir up anger.” As laws, these are as unfailing as any in geometry or chemistry. But you cannot necessarily isolate one of them in a test tube in a two-hour laboratory period. Perhaps we have not been taught that equally definite laws govern prayer and the daily guidance of our lives. Our spiritual teachers have hardly been so efficient as

[Page 301]TWO FACETS

our professors of science. However, the former have the unique privilege of proving by their daily living the workability of their spiritual teachings. And youth has the right to expect this.

In the field of science we have both proven science, such as the law of gravitation, and theoretical science, such as the Einstein theory. Some theories will be proved true; many will be discarded in favor of more workable explanations, since scientific knowledge comes mainly through the process of trial and error. But true science can always be harmonized with true religion.

In the field of religion we have both the Message of God revealed through His prophet, and man’s interpretation and application of the revealed Word. The latter may represent a majority ruling of a church council; it may he the opinion of one man; it may be the basis of a particular sect. The original teachings of Christ and Moses never contradict proven science. But human interpretation along one line can easily contradict human the 301

ories along another. Perhaps one

is wrong; both may be in error; both cannot be right.

Proven science and true religion are as two facets of one gem; they are as the two wings of one bird. Each enh a 11 ce 3 and strengthens the other. Science divorced from religion becomes materialistic. Being w i th 0 u t moral guidance, it can become, as today, a most powerful instrument of destruction. Religion divorced from science falls into superstition. As such it can become a fanatical instrument of repression, rather than man’s inspiration and guide.

Scientific theory and human interpretation of religion can readily disagree. Materialism and superstition are mutually antagonistic. Science freed from materialistic philosophy, and morally motivated, works inevitably for the true progress of mankind. Religion free from dogma, with its true relation to science made evident, is the most potent factor in bringing confidence to our confused hearts, and peace to the whole body of mankind.


God has endowed man with intelligence and reason whereby he is required to determine the verity of questions and propositions. If religious beliefs and opinions are found contrary to the standards of science they are mere superstitions and imaginations; for the antithesis of knowledge is ignorance, and the child of ignorance is superstition. Unquestionably there must be agree ment between true religion and science.

-——‘ABDU’L-BAHA



[Page 302]

—£a[£toria/

N the cit of Haifa, in the

land 0 Palestine, lives

Shoghi Effendi, the first Guardian of the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh. F rom him stretch out into over seventy countries of the world those invisible bonds of devotion and unity which mark the strength of this World Faith.

Bahá’ís are a world-wide community of many diverse people. They are a religious community which is centered. And this is a fact of tremendous importance. The nature and meaning of this fact spells hope for millions who now live in division, in fear, and in want. . . . Letus look at the origin of this fact that its nature and meaning may be clearer.

In the middle of the nineteenth century a young man in Persia took for Himself the title Báb, which means gate, and preached throughout that land the coming of a great Spiritual Leader who would bring together under the banner of God’s Word the divided peoples of the world. Bigotry struck down the B511). But thousands of people had their hearts and minds centered on the coming of the Promised One.

When Bahá’u’lláh announced His Mission as the Manifestation

The Guardian


of God for this age, the expectation awakened by the Báb was fulfilled. Through successive journeys into exile and years of imprisonment at ‘Akká, Bahá’u’lláh changed the followers of the Báb from people of limited vision into members of a world community. Bahá’u’lláh g ave them a higher morality, a greater social vision, and the laws and institutions for the uniting of the world’s peoples in one common faith and one order. Bahá’u’lláh centered His fOIIOWers in devotion to the principles and institutions for creating a.world civilization. .

With the passing of Bahá’u’lláh came a new period of growth under the guidance of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá Whom Bahá’u’lláh appointed as the Exemplar of the Faith and the Interpreter of the teachings. Freed from imprisonment, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá journeyed to the west and labored to raise up in this continent a group of people devoted to the teachings of Bahá’u’lláh. He encouraged the American believers to form Spiritual Assemblies to prepare for the Houses of Justice which Bahá’u’lláh decreed for the fu ture.

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[Page 303]THE GUARDIAN

In 1921 ‘Abdu’l-Bahá was

laid to rest upon the aged slopes of Mount Carmel, the Mountain of God. He had patiently and lovingly increased the understanding of the Bahá’ís the world over. He led them into the first forming of the institutions of a new age. And, too, He had provided for the future. In a Will and Testament He completed the pattern of world order which His Father had initiated. He created the institution of the Guardianship to serve as the point of unity and guidance in the evolution of the Faith. He named Shoghi Effendi as the first Guardian.

For twenty-five years now we have known the steadying, helping, encouraging hand of Shoghi Effendi. Year by year the unity of this growing community of people has deepened. Year by year Shoghi Effendi has clarified our vision and deepened our understanding of the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh. Step by step he has spoken the encouraging word, reminding us, always, that the unlimited resources of divine power surround and confirm each true believer who serves with purity of heart. And ever he has kept before our eyes the vision of Bahá’u’lláh—the Father Who

came to dwell among us.

In truth, history has never seen one hundred years of a re ' . M1 \ t

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ligion like the first century of the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh. Bahá’ís belong to a world community which is centered. Bahá’ís are centered in faith in God. Bahá’ís are centered in devotion to a revelation from God which came through Bahá’u’lláh. Bahá’ís are centered in service to social institutions divine in origin, institutions which Bahá’u’lláh created for the order and well-being of mankind. Bahá’ís are centered in a Plan for the unfoldment of world civilization, 8. Plan formulated by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá for the winning of the world to the Message of Bahá’u’lláh. Bahá’ís are centered in guidance and inspiration from God. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá promised, in His Will and Testament, that the Guardian of the Faith would be under the protection and guidance of Bahá’u’lláh. Thus, to us is given a unique and unparalled stream of direction.

Is it any wonder then that this month Bahá’ís look back with thankful hearts over the first quarter century of Shoghi Ef-y fendi’s labors? In a world divided, distracted, filled with confused, fearful, self—centered people, we can look to the city of Haifa, in the land of Palestine, where lives Shoghi Effendi, the first Guardian of the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh. ——W. K.‘ C.


[Page 304]

Utopia?

ROBERT REID

E can build a better social system: a social system in which the whole of mankind can live as brothers; in which there will be full employment for all and each individual will be free to develop his particular talents and capacities to their fullest extent, using them for the benefit of mankind; a social system in which there will be no misfits and no “square pegs in round holes”—for each will be taking part in the work of society for which he is fitted. We can build a social system in which there will be no more wars, and in which the resources of the planet will be organized and distributed in such a manner that every one will have full security from want and all the possible needs which one can now conceive of will be satisfied. Such a system can be built by men, and such a system must in the fullness of time come about. Utopia is a practical possibility. We can build it and we must. The present world wide unrest, chaos and‘insecurity have created a desire in the minds of all thinking men and women for a better world order. Nearly everyone is suffering in some way through the confusion of

finance and trade, and the dislocation of the machinery of production and distribution brought about by wartime conditions. At present we are going through a very difficult time of conversion from war to peace. We have housing shortages, food shortages and clothing shortages; in fact, all the amenities of life are in short supply.

Not only are the times difficult, but there is a widespread fear of the future. We all dread the possibility of another war. Already it is being discussed in the newspapers and mentioned by commentators as an imminent possibility. '

All these conditions demand that we should give our wholehearted attention to anyone who claims to be able to reform the social system and wipe all these evils away. It is the duty of everyone to consider and investigate the matter of a better world; for we must all build it or sufl'er the evils which are the result of a bad social order.

Although we can build a utopia, the road to it will be hard. Only through the united and persistent efforts of men of goodwill can the tremendous difficulties which lie in the way be over 304

[Page 305]UTOPIA?

come. One of the greatest difficulties is that of stirring people into action.

We are sunk in spiritual apathy and are waiting for someone else to pull us out of our troubles.

Then there are other great difficulties which confront those who would build a united world. These are the barriers of racial prejudice, the color question, different money systems, and the polyglot of different languages.

The road to utopia is long; the obstacles are many.

We need a map or a blueprint to show us the way; and we have a map and a blueprint, a practical, detailed guide, with full instructions complete With warning signs to show us the danger spots. We have glorious views of our destination to cheer us on the way when we grow weary.

God is concerned with the progress of mankind. He means us to live in peace and to devel: op along the road to a complete civilization. Down through the ages, at long separated periods of time, he has sent His Messengers to lead us on the road and to provide us with a plan, so that we can, if we are obedient to the instructions, build firmly and securely.

The Prophets of God were no dreamy mystics shut away from

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practical affairs. No! They were social workers and took an active part in leading the people of their day into a better social order. Moses revealed to the children of Israel the ten commandments and a system of ethics, which enabled them to organize a society suitable for the conditions which then existed in the world. He was a practical leader and He organized the Israelites so that from a race of slaves living in the most abject misery they grew into a great and victorious nation.

Muhammad revealed to the Arabs a teaching and a system of love and justice which enabled them to develop from scattered tribes wandering the sands of Arabia into the mighty Islamic ' civilization which at one time extended from Cordova in Spain all along the shores of the Mediterranean through Morocco, Al-' giers and Egypt, on through Mesopotamia and Arabia to the frontiers of India. To this civilization which was built on the revelation of Muhammed we owe our system of numbers and more

of our science than we commonly acknowledge.

The Prophets of God were all practical men of affairs; to them we must go for our road map to utopia.

Jesus took the multitude up

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on a mountain and there He taught them in simple language. He told them the way men» should live. We can read these words in the Gospel according to St. Matthew. We all know His talk recorded there as “The Sermon on the Mount.” If we live according to His instructions so plainly given, we should take a long step toward building our Utopia!

But alas, the pure teachings of Jesus have become overladen with dogmas and false creeds and have been explained away and smothered with elaborate ceremonials to such an extent that it is doubtful whether the orthodox churches can ever rid themselves of the incrustations which the blind following of tradition has deposited over the original teachings of Jesus.

One hundred years ago the time was ripe for a new Prophet to appear to lead us back to the original truths which have been revealed by all the Prophets. We believe that Prophet did appear. He took the name of Bahá’u’lláh and over a period of forty years gave us the writings upon which the Bahá’í Faith is founded. These writings contain our blueprint, our road map to utopia, which is in spiritual essence the same as the Revelations given by

all the Prophets of God. It is a revised, complete and up-to-date

WORLD ORDER

guide-book and plan containing all instructions necessary to build our utopia under the circumstances which exist today.

The Prophets all agree upon the first step to be taken on the road to social reform. They all teach that a better socialorder can only be brought about by an improvement in the individual. Therefore, they have all commanded that each individual shall take stock of his moral qualities and shall turn towards the good and forsake evil. For it is indeed true that the nature of the social order is governed by the nature of the men and women who form it. If we have a community of bad men, then the government and organization of that community will be corrupt and evil according to the degree in which those men are evil. The same law applies to all human organizations. If honest, charitable men gather together to form a club, then that club will be honest and charitable.

If we would reform the world, we must reform, the men in it. ‘W’ the individual with whom we have the most influence is ourself. We must start with ourselves. We must realize just how important it is that we do right. If one man does an unselfish act, no matter how small that unselfish act might be, he makes the

[Page 307]UTOPIA? ,

world so much the better for everybody in it. Truly it has been said, “Ye must be born again.” If we are to build our utopia, we must start to live our lives with unselfish motives. A moral regeneration is necessary and the Bahá’í Teachings show how each can reorganize his life in the paths of service to humanity.

A study of the Teachings of Bahá’u’lláh will help each one of us to regain a belief in God Who created all things, and it will confirm us in the belief that there is Divine planning behind the vast evolutionary processes which our sciences tell us have been in operation from all eternity. All knowledge which man has attained is his groping endeavor to understand the stupendous plan of God. Surely the hearts of everyone today are yearning for a belief in God and in a Divine Plan for the Universe!

The Bahá’í Teachings will

take each one of us thus on the road to Utopia.

After we have put into operation our first step by becoming men and women of goodwill, we must look for some means of handing the people of goodwill together and forming a chain of

goodfellows which shall encircle the earth.


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The Bahá’í Teachings explain clearly and in detail an organization capable of doing this. The Bahá’í Administrative Order is no less than a system of international administration which is capable of binding all of the different nations of mankind into one organization in which each will have freedom, in which there shall be true proportional representation, in which no section will be able to dictate to another section, in which a man shall not he considered inferior because of his place of birth or the color of his skin, and in which mankind can truly live as brothers. The Administrative 01" der of the Bahá’í Faith is a pattern for world government which ~' is practical and capable of creating a social order based on justice, love and truth.

So the second step along the road to utopia is plainly shown to be that we must live in brotherhood with our fellow man. We must develop within our minds a feeling of unqualified brotherhood with every other individual upon the earth. There must be no exceptions. We must feel brotherly love for our next door neighbor, for the poorest member of' our community, for the drunkard and the social outcast, for men of a different race, for strangers, for friends and for

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those who have done that which is harmful to us: we must if we are to build our utopia, love them all. Only through a conscious cleansing of our minds from hate and a deliberate development of a loving attitude can we conquer the tremendous obstacles of national pride, insularity, racial and religious prejudices which now keep men apart in separate groups hating one another.

The Prophets of God have all shown clearly in their teachings that to live in loving brotherhood is a necessary condition for building an improved social order. In the Bahá’í Revelation, we have a comprehensive and detailed Plan which we can follow and so build an all-inclusive brotherhood which will be universal and will include every individual upon the earth.

That the Bahá’í Faith is capable of binding many and varied

WORLD ORDER

types together is already evident, for in Bahá’í groups we find a cross-section of the community. We find rich and poor, old and young, and people of all stages of intellectual development, all working together to form a better world. We do not have to wait until some distant time to receive our benefits, for as soon as we start to act from unselfish motives we make our own lives happier, and also brighten those of every one about us. Each one of us has the power to make this day a better one, and when we do, we advance the general progress towards a better world.

We all desire to live in an utopia. Therefore, surely it is the duty of every individual to investigate and study very carefull any system which claims to be a means toward that end. Investigate the Bahá’í Teachings; they are freely available to all seekers after Truth.


All men have been created to carry forward an ever-advancing civilization. The Almighty beareth Me witness: To act like the beasts of the field is unworthy of man. Those virtues that befit his dignity are forbearance, mercy, compassion and loving-kindness towards all the peoples and kindreds of the earth. Say: O friends! Drink your fill from this crystal stream that floweth through the heavenly grace of Him Who is the Lord of Names. Let others partake of its waters in My name, that the leaders of men in every land may

fully recognize the purpose for which the Eternal Truth hath been revealed, and the reason for which they themselves have been created.

—Bahá’u’lláh

[Page 309]The Price of Peace

N. M. FIROOZI

HAVE you not, in your com munity, noticed that here and there are found some families that are comparatively calm and tranquil? Don’t many of us envy them and wish that we, too, could be tranquil and peaceful? Is one not indeed fortunate to have a peaceful family at least, at a time when selfishness and greed, hunger and starvation, pestilence and disease and many other seemingly insurmountable difficulties have enveloped the entire world?

With but little investigation We find that for every peaceful and tranquil home a great price has been paid—a price perhaps that we in our family have not been willing to pay. For example, in a peaceful family we note that the mother, at the expense of her own rest and ease, with calm and wisdom leads the children towards material and ethical maturity and in turn towards tranquility; while the father, at the price of his own comfort and pleasure, endeavors to bring about the mother’s, nay rather the entire family’s comfort and pleasure. The children, too, we would note, as good beginners in life, led by the examples the parents have set, are willing to do


their share in their small way. They cooperate in home affairs; they are more pleasing in the eyes and thoughts of the neighborhood; and to our surprise we even find out that they share the use of the family radio with their parents with almost no coercion. These are some of the prices that such families have paid and are paying in order to have peace and tranquility, while on the other hand each one of us in our families wants what he wants and tries to get it, even at the expense of others. The result of the one is the establishment of a healthy, happy and peaceful family, which can maintain its unity, and will result in the tranquility of the next generation; while in the case of the other, quarrels and discord, friction and disorder exist, which if continued may result in separation or ' divorce, the eventual destruction of the family and consequently the unhappiness of the younger generation. There are two ways in which we may pay the costly price of peace in a family. One is through intelligence and enlightened selfinterest; that is to say, for one’s own case and happiness one makes comparatively small sacrifices to prevent much greater.

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ones. And when every individual does this, it brings about a happy and useful circle instead of a vicious one. The other way is through the spiritual approach. By this we mean that the family unit is no less than a training school for the spiritual development of its members. In this school one of the lessons we learn is to sacrifice our own personal rest and ease, not on the basis of enlightened self-interest, but rather for the love of God.

We have a great advantage in the spiritual approach over that based on enlightened self-interest. When we love our family for God’s sake, this love is purer, its boundaries are greater, its foundation stronger and more lasting. Furthermore, love of family based on enlightened seIf-interest does not contain the love of God, while loving one’s family for the sake of God is all-inclusive. This is true with all spiritual approaches for the solution of the problems of life. The greater includes the lesser.

To state our subject in a few words let us say that we cannot have peace in a family without paying the price. This price could be called self-sacrifice, or willingness to give in order to be able to take. There are two bases on which sacrifice may he made, namely enlightened self-interest

WORLD ORDER

and the love of God. These are

laws of social relations. They cannot be ignored without harmful consequences.

If these are laws, they must be applicable on a large scale as well as on a small. That is the nature of a law. For example, the laws and environment applied to obtain one drop of waterby combining hydrogen and oxygen are applicable in obtaining a million dgops or an ocean. '

With but little reflection on the history of the United States we oan discover that this great nation became great mainly because it adopted the formula applied in a peaceful family. The thirteen original states having merged into one family, or one nation, though slowly and painfully, had to give up many of their rights, such as the right to issue currency, to have a separate army, to have separate tariflz' regulations, the right of separate diplomatic representation in other countries of the world, and many similar prerogatives.

F seed with eventual destruction, these states, though gradually and‘with much difficulty, paid the price of putting their then slim shoulders under the heavy load of their federal government. As a result of these seeming sacrifices they and their thirty-five children states estab [Page 311]PRICE OF PEACE

lished this great nation which you and I enjoy and which other nations envy.

The sacrifices which the states made were mainly based on e n l i g ht e n e d self-interest, though many of the founders of our constitution were well aware of the other approach, which we call in our discussion the love of

God.

Keeping in mind the price of peace and tranquility in a family and the sacrifices made by the thirteen original states and later by other states for the establishment of this great republic, let us now move forward and take the next inevitable step, the step at the very threshold of which humanity is longingly standing. This step is toward the peace and tranquility of the whole world. This step is the one foretold and promised by all the divine Revelations. This step has been the plan of God and the destiny and goal of humankind from the beginning of its existence. This step is, when fulfilled, the same that the Zoroastrians of Persia. the long-persecuted Jews, the Christians and the Muhammadan world have for thousands of years been praying for.

The price of world peace is fundamentally the same as that we have to pay for the peace of a

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family or a nation. It differs only in scale.

In order to have world peace we must become world-conscious and world-loving instead of selfcentered and self-loving. There was much significance in Mr.

Willkie’s phrase “One World.” What did he mean by this phrase? Did he not mean that weakness, instability, illness, ignorance or poverty, in any part of this one world affects the other parts? Putting it in positive terms, did he not mean that in order to have peace and security in any given part of this one world We must establish peace and security in all parts? Is this not the same principle we had to use for the peace of a family? Is this not the same formula we used for the founding of this great nation? And finally, is this not, as we termed it, a law of social relations, applicable in a large scale as well as a small?

The price for world peace also must, and will, be paid by sacrifice, or giving in order to be able to take. It is paid in the same two

About a quarter of a century ago a few far-sighted individuals, such as Woodrow Wilson and hisco-thinkers, abandoned the pitfalls of blind nationalism and climbed to the heights of the conception that the world is one organism and that its inhabitants


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312 WORLD ORDER

can have no peace and security unless and until each and all harmoniously work with and for each other. The result of this, as you well know, was the League of Nations. But this League, being the world’s first infant of its kind and given to a group of selfish, ignorant and immature nations, died a natural death and failed to prevent a second world war. N ow, out of the ashes of this second world war and through the forced and inevitable marriage of great powers, the world has a second instrument for world peace, the United Nations. Let us hope and. pray and help that, unlike the League of Nations, this new organization will be properly nursed and nourished.

If and when this, our newborn instrument of peace, passes its stages of growth and reaches maturity, We will have peace, a peace based on enlightened selfinterest. This peace, though decidedly better than what we have now, which is no peace at all, would still be short and inadequate, because our approach would not have been a spiritual one, because it would not have been built upon the impregnahle foundation of the love of God.

Bahá’u’lláh, the Founder of the Bahá’í Faith, close to a century ago when very few thought of the need for world peace, pro claimed a new Revelation. Knowing the inevitable destiny of the peoples of the world, diagnosing their ills and foreseeing their needs. He included among His teachings a God-sent formula for a healthy and lasting world peace.

He wrote and warned the kings and rulers of the world that the termites of selfishness, greed and ignorance had eaten into the fibres of society which would soon collapse. He, as a Divine Physician, in clear and unmistakable language informed them that unless they adopted and applied the God-sent formula for peace, the security of their people, together with their own kingdoms and leadership, was doomed.

Bahá’u’lláh’s letters to Queen Victoria, to the Czar of Russia, to Napoleon III, to Nésiri’d-Din Shéh of Persia, to ‘Abdu’l-‘Aziz the Sultan of Turkey, to the American Republics and to Pope Pius IX, and others, _all published and at hand, are outstanding witnesses to His spiritual foresight and divine wisdom conspicuously pointing to the spiritual road leading to a permanent and progressive world peace.

Unfortunately, as has been the case with all the other divine Revelations of the past in their early stages, the rulers and lead [Page 313]PRICE OF PEACE

ers of the world ignored Him or scofled at His claims and teachings and some arose to oppose and destroy Him. He was atraigned, put into prison and exiled from city to city from the time 'He began His mission until His death, a period of about

forty years.

What were Bahá’u’lláh’s teachings concerning world peace which today everyone longs for, but is unwilling to pay the price for?

Among Bahá’u’lláh’s teachings for the establishment of a dur able peace is the recognition of the oneness of God, the Creator; and of the oneness of man. His creation—His only creation on this earth in His image. He says to mankind, “Ye are the fruits of one tree, and the leaves of one hranc .”

Bahá’u’lláh prescribed a true understanding and sincere belief that as long as the Founders of all divine religions were sent by God and each confirmed the truth of the others, it would be contrary to the will of God to look down on any one of them or consider one’s own faith superior to the others. Can the peoples of the world estimate other faiths as inferior and yet seek their sincere cooperation for the establishment of world peace?

Bahá’u’lláh teaches that all

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prejudices, national, racial, class or religious, must be eliminated from the hearts of the individual members of our world society. How can we be prejudiced against others and yet be in harmony with them? How can we, without harmony, hope to create a lasting peace?

Bahá’u’lláh teaches universal compulsory education for men and women alike. Is it not unsound to ignore that it is very difficult, if not impossible, for a highly educated nation or people to work effectively with another nation poorly educated or even illiterate?

Bahá’u’lláh nearly a century ago advocated the adoption of a universal auxiliary language to be taught in all the countries of the world. Is not one of the bulwarks of peace understanding? Is not understanding r e a c h e (1 through the medium of speech, or expression? Then how difficult it would be to establish peace without a common language. Haven’t many corrupt leaders in the past taken advantage of the absence of a common language to misrepresent facts, arouse hatreds, and cause wars and strife?

A hundred years ago Bahá’u’lláh advocated an international tribunal, the members of

which should be elected by the peoples of the world rather than

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appointed by the governments. The function of this tribunal would be to protect and promote the interests of all nations, small or large, on an equal basis.

On this vital. matter Bahá’u’lláh wrote: “The time must come when the imperative necessity for the holding of a vast, an all-embracing aSsemblage of men will be universally realized. The rulers and kings of the earth must needs attend it, and, participating in its deliverations, must consider such ways and means as will lay the foundations of the world’s Great Peace amongst men. Such a peace demandeth that the Great Powers should resolve, for the sake of the tranquillity of the peoples of the earth, to be fully reconciled among themselves. Should any king take up arms against another, all should unit WORLD ORDER edly arise and prevent him. If this be done, the nations of the world will no longer require any armaments, except for the purpose of preserving the security of their realms and of maintaining internal order within their territories. This will ensure the peace and composure of every people, government and nation.”

These are some of the prices we will have to pay for world peace if we wish it. If we do not, consciously and conscientiously, begin to pay this price now, We will struggle and sufler until we

are ready to do so, because it is God’s ordained destiny for mankind. It is the will of God foretold and envisaged by Christ Himself, when He said, “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven.”


To the kings of the earth, both in the East and in n . . Bahá’u’lláh, during the darkest days of His confinement in

and Muslim, .

the West, both Christian

‘Akká, addressed some of the noblest passages of His Most Holy Book . . .

In a celebrated passage addressed to William 1, King of Prussia and newlyacclaimed emperor of a unified Germany, He, in His Kitáb-i-Aqdas, bids the sovereign hearken to His Voice, the Voice of God Himself; warns him to take heed lest his pride debar him from recognizing “the Day-Spring of Divine Revelation,” and admonishes him to “remember the one (Napoleon III) whose power transcended” his power, and who “went down to dust in great loss.” F urthermore, in that same Book, apostrophizing the “banks of the Rhine,” He predicts that “the swords of retribution” would be drawn against them, and that “the lamentations of Berlin” would be raised, though at that time she was “in conspicuous glory.” —-Snocm EFFEND!

[Page 315]Pioneer J ourney—Peru VIRGINIA ORBISON

was January 25th, 1944,

ITwhen my passenger plane sailed down from the eroded 12,000 foot heights of La Paz, Bolivia, to Lima, Peru, having paused only a few minutes of those five hours in the ancient city of Arequipa, where conical “Misti”, the beloved mountain, stands with its companion volcanoes at a distance in the crystal, ever-temperate, atmosphere of that southern portion of Peru, midway between the Sierra and the sea.

As I flew over that vast, leafless desert land and then over the sea, I imagined that I saw running far below one of the Inca’s speedy “chaquis” making his swift three-hour relay up from the ocean to Cusco, the mighty and rich capital city of the Inca empire. He would be hearing messages to persons of importance, and perhaps fish caught just before his departure, destined for the table of the King. The fish would still be good by the time these fast runners, relieving each other instantly at stations situated at three hour intervals, would finish their ever-upward three day journey. Throughout all the ages in South

America, until only a few years

ago, transportation has been mostly on foot or by donkey or llama. Horses came with the Spanish conquistadores, and centuries later motors began to travel on retardingly poor roads. Railways are comparatively few and far from speedy. Boats have been the only means between many ports. But suddenly all of South America is being covered with a droning, mighty, swift network of airplanes carrying cargo as well as passengers, thus beginning the destined complete union of the Americas dreamed of by the great Bolivar and others.

Lima, situated a few miles inland from its port of Callao, was lighting up in the misty twilight as we flew in to Limatambo airport. Its background was the immediate slope up to the bare elevations of the high Andes. All west coast air passengers must stop in Lima, as in South America there is as yet little or no night travel. They usually go to the beautiful Hotel Bolivar ' which has become the modern rival of the famous old Maury a few blocks down the Union. Well placed in the great white Plaza San Martin, it reflects the wonderful colonial architecture brought by the virreyes to their

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capital city of the Spanish Colonial Empire of Peru. Everywhere are memories of those lushly romantic times—the great Cathedral where lie the bones of Pizarro, the exquisite palaces and houses with their carved latticed windows and balconies. Fortunately for posterity, We can conjure up the period by seeing and feeling the vestiges and reading Ricardo Palma’s matchless collection of “Tradiciones Peruanas.” A step out of Lima re veals many remains of Inca ’ glory, as never a drop of rain comes to wash entirely away these ruins of cities built only of earth. Any coverings of gold, silver or tiling have long since disappeared by pillage and collectmg.

A few blocks dowu the Colmena I found Eve Nicklin in her apartment, which she had acquired not very long before. The wonderful Lima carnations started 05 our unforgettable association which was based upon true generosity of spirit and complete

cooperation in the work of the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh in Peru.

Living quarters for me were found in the house of Isabel and Alfredo Barreda, where Flora Hottes had stayed during her two months’ visit from La Paz, Bol ivia. These, and many other friends of Miss Nicklin’s and

WORLD ORDER

also of Miss Hottes had become interested in this Faith. We wondered how we should increase this interest and find the necessary nine for a Spiritual Assembly by April.

Just at this time, Miss Nicklin was asked to renew her teaching of English in the Instituto Cultural Peruano-Americano at a summer session for Peruvian teachers of English from all over Peru. It was the first such session ever held and was attended by one hundred and twenty persons. Therefore, by putting into action the idea of my speaking to all the classes ( in slow English) on “Motion Pictures, Their Place in the Future” We were able to invite them in small groups to tea in order to hear more about the ideologies mentioned. In the groups of nine to nineteen persons, they heard in Spanish a direct talk on the Bahá’í World Faith. The result was that we were kept very busy indeed with invitations to tell these ideas of world friendship and hamiony to their friends and relatives with whom we met for tea in their houses, which ranged from the very humble to the homes of professors and ministers.

One day in February Isabel de Barreda became the first believer to sign in Peru (Other Peruvians who had signed in the

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States are Octavio Illescas and Alberto Lovatén Mesa, the latter joining the Lima Community in 1945.) Soon, Alfreda Barreda came in, and then on April 9, a North America Professor on an educational mission to Peru signed, and on the same day gave a radio talk on Pan-America Day for the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Aflairs for the United States Government in which was uttered for the first time on the air in Peru, the Name of Bahá’u’lláh.

People continued to gather in Miss Nicklin’s apartment to hear of the Faith, and then she undertook the sudden urge to have, at all costs, a large place where many friends could be together! During this time former pupils and also some of the teachers of that summer course became believers. We held special meetings for studying, as well as the gath‘ erings for newly attracted ones.

John Stearns, pioneer for Ecuador, who had come -to Lima for medical treatment, recovered for a while, and through his example of living and his teaching, Raymond Betts, a North America business man long a resident in Lima, became a devoted believer. The pioneers were laboring under great tension at this period, as none could predict just how many would become convinced

317

by the appointed day of April twenty-first. We prayed and worried as the individuals were gradually “chosen” for us. (Of course, no pioneer asks a person to sign as a Bahá’í; this matter being strictly something the candidate decides for himself after due consideration and preparation.) A few days before the date, however, the last two needed to make up the nine requisite members of the Spiritual Assembly petitioned to become recognized believers. Even on the day before the formation, a former pupil of Miss Nicklin’s Alejandro Franco, whom she had not seen for a year, appeared and declared himself a Bahá’í! He attended the little but historic ceremony and signed later, after deeper consideration.

So it happened that on the eve of April 21, 1944, the first Spiritual Assembly of Lima (and of Peru) was formed. Loving and eloquent words were spoken by each one. The new “Bahá’í family”, which included I oh I) Stearns, was deeply thankful for this final acceleration of confirmations allowed by Bahá’u’lláh and for the fulfillment of Eve Nicklin’s long period of selfless and devoted service under great handicaps in a difficult land. We thought of Martha Root, who in 1921 touched briefly at Callao

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and sent her messages into Lima for the newspapers. She was the first to answer the Master’s call to go to South America and other lands, carrying-the remedy for the healing of the world. Flowers were abundant on this longto-be-remembered occasion, and while much mutual love was expressed, it was the Cause of God, and His Messenger Bahá’u’lláh, to which their allegiance and devotion were directed.

Soon, the idea of starting an English conversation class for young people was put into action. Energetic Alejandro Franco and others invited young friends to come for tea and to talk in English. Miss Nicklin’s special training with young people which was to have been her life work with one of the Christian denominations was now to be exercised in full measure, in the Bahá’í World Faith, after a long period of comparative disuse. Her courageous stand with the consequent sacrifice of her career was now to have its rich reward, as this resourceful handling of a group of young people developed into a flourishing club from which has been gleaned a spectacular and steadily increasing membership in the Bahá’í Community. Added also, have been persons of more years and much capacity—educators, scientists, and others.

WORLD ORDER

Miss Nicklin has also made another contribution of great interest. Her small book of stories for pre-school children in collaboration with one of the most distinguished women writers and educators of Peru, Sefiora Doiia Irene de Santolalla who made the Spanish translations, has attracted wide attention. The stories are a new idea, being published both in Spanish and in English. The moral carried by each one impresses itself in an attractive way rather than by means of the horror and witchcraft designed to terrify the child into obedience.

Miss Nicklin’s lovely apartment gained through three years of steady perseverance, teaching of English to adults and organizing children’s schools for the purpose of self—support and the making of contacts, now overflows with Bahá’í activity. There every day of the week sees a meeting or small party—never forgetting the purpose and animating impulse behind this harmonious and steady Community of the Bahá’ís of Lima, Peru, where can effectively be seen put into action Bahá’u’lláh’s great injunction: “Consort with all people in love and fragrance, for fellowship is the cause of unity and unity is the source of order in the world.”

[Page 319]WITH OUR READERS

MANY groups of thoughtful people are keenly aware that the various forms of racial and class prejudices existing today are a real danger threatening social and economic life. In his article “Racial and Group Prejudice” Dr. Joseph Lander gives us a careful analysis of the causes and efiects of this disease which must be understood before applying a remedy. Dr. Lander is‘ a ‘practicing physician in Cincinnati, Ohio. This articlé is reprinted from Opportunity—Joumal of Negro Life,

with the permission of the author and the publishers.

Duart Brown attacks this problem of prejudice from a somewhat diflerent angle but with equal emphasis on its dangers in his article, “The Anatomy of Prejudice". Mr. Brown has contributed both prose and verse to W orld Order during the last two years. In the September issue we printed his “Parable of the Nine Springs”. This contribution comes from Palo Alto, California.

More about race prejudice and some of its fruits is given in the review of Black Metropolis by Eleanor S. Hutchens. In the February, 1946, number of World Order was a review of Bahá’í World Faith by Mrs. Hutchens. She has recently been appointed by the National Spiritual Assembly as one of the editors of World Order. Her home is in Palos Heights, Illinois.

Maye Harvey Gift, who contributes “Two Facets of One Gem,” Cox compiled and edited that book. is known among Bahá’ís and others who use the valuable compilation Race and Man as one who with Alice Mrs. Gift has also made many contributions to World Order. “Unchallengeable Victory” which was printed in our May, 1942, issue is excellent reading for today. Mrs. Giit’s home is in Peoria, Illinois.

This month’s editorial, “The Guardian”, is contributed by Kenneth Christian. It is a loving tribute to the Guardian of our Faith whose guardianship marks its twenty-fifth anniversary this year.

Is a world wherein justice, plenty and opportunity for all reign simply an idle dream? Robert Reid in his “Utopia?” gives the Bahá’í answer to this question. There are others who realize that the vision of the goal must precede action. For example, Arthur E. Morgan in his book entitled Nowhere Is Somewhere says “When men cease to build utopias it will be either because they are all dead, in spirit if not in body—or else because life is so good that they cannot imagine it to be better.” And he adds, “The trouble with human society has not been too much attention to utopias, but too little." Those who read Robert, Reid’s article thoughtfully and study further the plan of Bahá’u’lláh’s New World Order will realize that this plan differs from all others in that

319

[Page 320]320

it comes from a higher source than man’s mind. A previous contribution from Mr. Reid entitled “The New Age” appeared in our March, 1946, number. His home is in Me boume, Australia. '

Another new contributor to W arld Order is N. M. F iroozi of Geneva, New York. “The Price of Peace”, he tells us, was first presented as a public talk in Rochester, New York. Mr. F iroozi’s letterhead tells us that he is an interior decorator. He has given

courses about Muhammad and Islém at the Green Acre and Louhelen Bahá’í Schools.

“Pioneer Journey—Peru” is Virginia Orbison’s third contribution telling of her pioneer work in South America. “Pioneer Journey—Paraguay” appeared in the June, 1945, W orld Order and “Pioneer Journey —Bolivia” in December, 1945.

i I it

On the subject of racism to which three articles in this number are devoted we have received from one of our readers an interesting column clipped from the St. Paul Recorder, the Negro weekly newspaper published in St. Paul, Minnesota. The column was dated Birmingham, Alabama and written by Robert Durr. He tells of a recent visit of Miss Lillian Smith to Birmingham and of her lectures there and discusses the question of segregation. We quote his closing paragraphs:

“Working to build the kind of man we must have when we have done away with race segregation and the discrimination, I recommend the pattern for a future society as out WORLD ORDER

lined and promulgated by the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States and Canada. I find that the Bahá’í, even in the deep South, are the only group which includes persons of all races with various religious backgrounds who are building the type of men and Women to live, love, worship and work on the basis of total equality. These people seem to know where they are going—what the world tomorrow must be like, if‘ we are to live, grow and be happy.”

I 4} 'I

The spirit of .Bahá’u’lláh’s New Age makes an appeal to those of all ages, children, youth, adults and the aged, all whose minds are open and spirits awake. An eleven year old, Patsy George of Moncton, New Brunswick, composed the following verses when she had learned about

the Bahá’í Faith:

The night was dark,

The Light appeared,

The gate was opened wide.

The Bdb proclaimed His Message

true,

T hat all the world abide.

Chorus. Come, come, all creeds and races, Justice will be ours today.

No longer will our brothers suficr, In poverty and shame. '

The world now has a guardian To save the Faith from schism, So unity will be our aim,

W hen truth is realism.

—THE EDITORS

[Page 321]













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[Page 322]

' Wéfils of Bahá’u’lláh

Elnéofibfad {Over the. Nme-Entr'ancgs of the

Home af:_ Worship.i‘17iimétté§;.Illinois ‘

1. The earth is but one country, and man-.

kind its citizens.

’ The best beloved of all things in My light

is Justice; turn not away therefrom if thou desirmt Me.

My love 18 My stronghold; he that entercth

j therem" 18 safe and secure.

,5,

Breathe not the sins of others so long as 7 thou art thyself a sinner.

Thy heart 13 My home; sanctify it for My desoént. '

6. I have made death a messqnge‘x of joy to

thee; wherefore dost thou grieve?

77. Make mention of Me on My earth that in l . _ >

My heaven I may remember thee.

0 rich ones on earth! The poor in ygur midst are My trust; guard ye My trust. ‘

The source of all learning is the; knowledge. of God, exalted h‘c His glory;

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