World Order/Volume 3/Issue 9/Text

From Bahaiworks

[Page 319]

VIEWING THE WORLD AS AN ORGANISM

WORLD ORDER

DECEMBER 1937


PART AND COUNTERPART • • • • DALE S. COLE

TILL DEATH DO US PART • • • M. N. CARPENTER

SEVEN VALLEYS • • • G. TOWNSHEND

DIVINE EDUCATION • • • ALICE SIMMONS COX

NEW LIFE FROM WITHIN • • MME. CHIANG KAI-SHEK


PRICE 20c


[Page 320]

CONTENTS OF THIS ISSUE

DECEMBER 1937 VOLUME 3 • NUMBER 9


A NEW VIRTUE • EDITORIAL ................................................................. 321

PART AND COUNTERPART • DALE S. COLE .................................. 323

TODAY’S SUPREME GIFT • POEM • HAROLD HUNT ............. 326

TILL DEATH DO US PART • M. N. CARPENTER .................................... 327

A PRAYER • POEM • MICHAEL D’ANDREA ......................................... 333

THE NEW CREATION, VI • ALICE SIMMONS COX ....................... 334

THE SEVEN VALLEYS BY BAHÁ’U’LLÁH • G. TOWNSHEND ............. 341

EAST AND WEST • AGNES ALEXANDER .......................................... 345

DR. INAZO NITOBE • ILLUSTRATION ............................................ 346

NEW LIFE FROM WITHIN • MME. CHIANG KAI-SHEK ........................... 347

SOUL, MIND AND SPIRIT • ‘ABDU’L-BAHÁ ........................... 354

CONFLICTING WORLD VIEWS • HORACE HOLLEY .............. 356


Change of address should be reported one month in advance.

WORLD ORDER is published monthly in New York, N. Y., by Ihe Publishing Committee of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States and Canada. EDITORS: Stanwood Cobb, Marjory Morten and Horace Holley. BUSINESS MANAGER: C. R. Wood. PUBLICATION OFFICE: 135 East 50th Street, New York, N. Y. EDITORIAL OFFICE: 119 Waverly Place, New York, N. Y.

SUBSCRIPTIONS: $2.00 per year, $1.75 to Public Libraries. Rate to addresses outside the United States, $2.25, foreign Library rate, $2.00. Single copies, 20 cents. Checks and money orders should be made payable to World Order Magazine, 135 East 50th Street, New York, N. Y. Entered as second class matter, May 1, 1935, at the post office at New York, N. Y., under the Act of March 3, 1879. Contents copyrighted 1937 by BAHÁ’Í PUBLISHING COMMITTEE.

December 1937, Volume 3, Number 9


[Page 321]

WORLD ORDER

Title registered at U. S. Patent Office

DECEMBER, 1937, VOLUME THREE, NUMBER NINE


A NEW VIRTUE

EDITORIAL

WHEN we try to think of the new virtues that ‘Abdu’l-Bahá tells us will be added to human qualities in this new age, we are at first in as great a quandary as though we tried to imagine unknown colors,—to stretch the rainbow beyond ultra-violet, below infra-red.

The spectrum of our virtues, as of white light, is formed of seven bands, the seven cardinal virtues of Plato and the Church fathers. Obviously, these seven could never have been spread to cover all of human goodness, any more than the seven colors of the rainbow could be made to meet all our growing aesthetic needs. Both groups are, rather, ancestral forms, so to speak. From the prismatic colors sprang all the hues that we now know. And around the seven cardinal virtues grew a large family, including some step-children, such as humility and Cinderella patience; and some attendant qualities, too, that serve to add grace and order to the setting of good conduct and morality. We know this host at least by name and they have seemed to sum up all of human excellence.

But can we really know human qualities without studying them in relation to the whole course of evolution? In that vista we see that whenever a demand is made on heart and spirit through widening responsibility and relationships a new characteristic is called into being. New conditions call forth new powers to meet them. These untried powers must be constrained, [Page 322] guided and controlled. So qualities develop to maintain spiritual equilibrium. Presently a standard is measured, a new moral value is set up,—a virtue comes to life.

In each Prophetic Day man has transcended the limits of his yesterdays and entered a new dimension of character. The vast changes that followed these successive revelations summoned qualities latent in the race. In every dispensation at least one new predominant virtue has characterized a way of life under the aegis of the Prophet. Through the teaching and example of Jesus charity and forebearance shaped the efforts of his followers. Under the standard of Muhammad acquiescence and submission marked the character of the believers, who adopted an attitude of affirmation toward life sharply contrasting with the negative outlook of the idolaters and the speculative aloofness of the philosophers.

Now we move again in the light of such a Day.

WHAT are the objective changes that are transforming man’s life in this New Day? What unknown conditions has he entered that demand an extension of consciousness and expression of this awareness? If a traveler out of the past should visit us now, he would marvel at an unfamiliar planet, circled by a sound in a fraction of a second, spread small and flat to our bird’s-eye view from the sky. He would see man striding over the earth in seven-league boots of his own making, laughing at barriers, confusing climates as he plunges into the desert with his heels still wet with melting snow. He would find a world strangely, newly knit together; seas and continents laced in communication; all the peoples of the sphere living in undreamt of proximity.

And he would not only find the world comprehensible as a unit but he would be able to view it as a giant organism in which every living creature is a cell; some waking to realize their relation to the whole body, others alive to their intimate creative kinship with one another, a few conscious at once of their unity and of the part they play in the life of the whole.

Plato said that if he could find a man who knew the one in the many and the many in the one he would follow him as a god. There are those today who have taken that step in consciousness. The next step is to be moved by this knowledge to action. So will a new virtue be born.

M. M.


[Page 323]

PART AND COUNTERPART

DALE S. COLE

TWO great worlds or spheres of experience are the mediums in which the drama of human life takes place. One of these is the familiar physical world and the other the “extra-physical” or spiritual. The boundary between the two is not always clearly defined.

Scientific accomplishment has pushed investigation into the very border-lands of the unknown and hidden. Beyond these frontiers speculations point to undiscovered wonders, speculations which can and are being expressed as probable laws in the language of mathematics. But just as any existing tongue is inadequate to describe some events in human experience, so is our skill with known mathematical expressions insufficient, and symbols must be employed to convey some great physical conceptions which deal with the very large and the very small. It seems that the real meaning behind some of these unknown quantities can only be a spiritual one, for no explanation based on purely physical learning is complete. This suggests, as in fact ‘Abdu’l-Bahá taught, that the physical and spiritual worlds are as part and counter-part.

SINCE this is evidently true, there should be examples and analogies in the physical world, the substance and working of which we have, in a measure, learned to understand, which should help us to apprehend the less familiar and much more subtle spiritual worlds.

One of the commonest yet most baffling phenomena of the physical world is that of ferro-magnetism. Some substances are very magnetic and others scarcely at all. For many years a quite understandable explanation has been offered. Perhaps this is really not exact, for magnetism is a more complex effect than has been supposed. The question whether this explanation is now correct or not, need not detract from its suggestiveness.

In brief, a magnetic substance, such as iron, is thought or assumed to consist of particles, each particle a tiny magnet possessing the ability to become magnetized. Only when all of these particles are magnetized and possess a north and a south pole and are so oriented that their like poles point in the same direction, is the whole substance magnetized and capable of exerting magnetic effects. This is a state of organization. When the whole substance is not magnetized, these tiny internal magnets point [Page 324] in all directions, their unit forces cancelling each other, and the piece of material does not evidence magnetic effects. This is a state of random disorganization.

This state of random disorganization can be changed into one of systematic organization, by magnetizing the material, that is, by subjecting it to the influence of a magnetizing force from without itself. The material then retains this organization and is capable of exerting a force proportional in general to the cumulative forces of all the tiny magnets within acting in concert, and in the same direction. When magnetized, the small particles seem to acquire a common purpose, and working cooperatively do many things, which in a state of disorganization, and lack of common aim, they are entirely unable to do.

Possibly substances do not consist of tiny magnets and probably the change takes place within the atom, but the conversion from a state of random disorganization to one of organization does take place, whatever the actual mechanism may be. And this change is dependent upon an influence being impressed upon the substance, but also permeating it, an influence which rearranges, organizes, directs and brings about a new state of being in the substance endowing it with capacities and powers which it did not before possess.

The analogy is, of course, quite obvious. Consider individuals in the human world, members of groups, families, villages, societies and nations. Collectively, they form a substance analogous to a physical material. Individually they are the tiny particles or magnets. The substance is made up of aggregates of many individual particles.

In collective life today, whatever may be the unit of consideration, village, city, state, nation or world, is there not apparent a state of disorganization, of lack of cooperation, of undirected common effort, of nullifying effects of differing viewpoints— a lack of common purpose? The general tendency is one of divergence rather than convergence, of dissociation rather than association, of competition rather than cooperation, dispersion of effort rather than synchronous action.

No thinking person will maintain that the substance of human society is incapable of organization and cooperative endeavor. There have been and are too many examples to the contrary. A group becomes united instantly when it is faced with a great danger. People unite within a nation when at war. Men band together and organize for all sorts of measures, and history records many instances of success. The achievements of all of these bandings together are contingent upon having a common purpose, and all concerned exerting their efforts unidirectionally, and also of there being some essentially spiritual drive or urge.

Individuals may have been influenced by some pressing need to work together. Whatever the circumstances, there has been impressed upon them a consciousness of a necessity to be dealt with, or of a benefit to be gained. This consciousness is, in a sense, a magnetizing influence, [Page 325] which orients the individuals concerned, directing and synchronizing their thoughts and actions.

In the complex situation of the hour, nations are organizing the individuals within them for common aims and purposes, within nations groups are organizing to bring about desired reforms, all of which is so complex and conflicting that the situation approaches chaos.

These associations of aim and effort are all for definite purposes, but they concern only actions of parts of the great substance of human society. Nowhere outside the Bahá’í Faith is there any expressed intent or any concerted effort to apply similar methods to the whole substance of society. Just as individuals are organized within nations to accomplish certain things, so must these nations be polarized within the whole world, to bring about the unfoldment of the Divine Civilization, and this can only be accomplished by impressing upon the substance of world society some influence powerful enough to “magnetize” it into a consciousness of the oneness of the substance and the necessity of harmonious living.

This influence exists, it is the Power of the Holy Spirit. When individuals, groups and nations become conscious of this power they become susceptible to its influence, as a world organizing, directing and synchronizing spirit, destined to unfold the Divine Civilization.

Human susceptibility to this power requires a spiritual consciousness. This arises in the individual and works upwardly and outwardly through groups and nations. Consciousness of the existence and potency of this power is the first step in the process of “spiritual magnetization,” which evolves into orientation, direction, cooperation and all the benevolent effects of cumulative, unified effort towards a common goal. It involves acquiring a knowledge of God, a knowledge which presages the unfoldment of His Divine Civilization in which is included all of those blessings which contribute to the progress and betterment of life and of living.

With so clear an analogy as magnetism before us in the physical world it should not be too difficult to acquire the requisite spiritual consciousness at least to a workable degree. This acquisition however, is one of the Bounties of God. To some it comes intuitively, to others as a result of study and discipline. Two great and indispensable aids to it are prayer and meditation.

Once humanity, in whatever groups associated, fulfills the conditions, the power becomes operative immediately and beneficently. In order for it to become operative on a world scale, as it must, individuals within groups, and groups within nations, must become susceptible through spiritual consciousness. This places a great responsibility on the individual as the “tiny magnet” within the substance, where the action arises and begins, whose unit force, however small, must be added to the unit forces of other similar tiny magnetizable particles, ere the substance of the group can exert, as a whole, an integrated force towards a common end. And the unit forces of groups within nations must be added to the unit forces [Page 326] of similar groups within other nations, ere a national endeavor can be integrated with that of others. This is what is meant by unified action. It is now indicated as a positive necessity.

The power of the Holy Spirit can and will bring organization out of the random disorganization in human affairs, (individual, national and international) when a spiritual consciousness of God’s Divine Plan, voiced for this time by Bahá’u’lláh, permeates the “magnetizable” substance of humanity.

(To be concluded)




TO-DAY’S SUPREME GIFT

HAROLD HUNT

Leave the human realm,
escape this madness,
ascend to the heights of nobility,
and see there no differences.
In the human realm all is darkness and strife,
in the heavenly world of the revealed Word of God,
is the glorious light of Oneness.
May all attain to the power of flight through the
mystic realm of God,
through faith and deeds, prayer and meditation.
May the spirit of God in silent commune
be wafted over all,
in order that the supreme gift,
the consciousness of the oneness of the world of mankind,
and the oneness of the heavenly realm of the Messengers
be vouchsafed to the hopeless, disordered creatures.
May the spirit of Abraham, of Moses,
of Christ, of Muhammad,
of Buddha, of Laotze,
of Bahá’u’lláh, be with those who are consciously
striving for a more enlightened mankind,
and a Just Order founded on the revealed Word of God.


[Page 327]

TILL DEATH DO US PART

M. N. CARPENTER

ONE evening in 1667, Samuel Pepys, “returning home to find his wife vexed by his absence . . . ‘did give her a pull by the nose and some ill words’”; in consequence of this the lady “followed him to the office in ‘a devilish manner’, so that he had to take her ‘into the garden out of hearing, to prevent shame’”. On another occasion, obliged by an acquaintance to attend church when he had been on his way to what the biographer calls “a more secular appointment,” Pepys stayed there “‘in pain,’ consoling himself by turning his perspective glass on ‘a great many very fine women’ in the congregation, with which and sleeping he ‘passed away the time till sermon was done. . . .’”. Domestic scenes naturally resulted. Mrs. Pepys, “burning a candle in the chimney piece into the small hours . . . made night a torment with her reproaches.” Pepys went down on his knees “to pray to God . . . alone in my chamber . . . I hope God will give me the grace more and more every day to fear Him, and to be true to my poor wife!” Not long afterward, however, we find Mrs. Pepys threatening her husband with red hot tongs. Eventually she settled her problem by passing away.[1]

Subtracting tongs and candle—and perhaps the prayer—the Pepys’ family relationship continues to be repeated in millions of current households across the planet. We are today more than ever victims of a worldwide maladjustment between the sexes, a disorder resulting in unnecessarily broken hearts and in a lamentable misapplication of psychic energy. The world’s work is being carried on by individuals whose attention is to a dangerous degree concentrated on the turmoil in their domestic relationships; unavoidably, current humanity is distracted from its task of building a new civilization, by the tremendous disturbances in present-day emotional life. Although, lacking a uniform standard of behavior, human beings are at odds in all their dealings today, the man-woman situation is probably the most embroiled of the lot; certainly the inharmony between the sexes is the most popular trouble in the world.

Like other phases of life in the “Machine Age,” sex inharmony can perhaps clearest be observed in the United States, where for territorial and chronological reasons—for the expanse and quantity of the phenomena presented, and their relative isolation [Page 328] from the past—our current civilization is easily read. Studying the situation in the United States one gathers that lack of factual sex equality is responsible for much of the suffering at present so noticeable. The woman problem is somewhat analogous to that presented by any minority group—to that, let us say, of the Negro in the United States, or of the minority peoples in the Balkans; like these, women come birthmarked, born to redundant struggle. Women are treated not as individuals, but as women. Compare, for example, the regulations referring to men and women students in the average coeducational institution—practical freedom for the former, elaborate laws and punishments for the latter; or compare the low salary paid a woman with the high one paid a man for identical work. In courtship it is the man who establishes whether the marriage shall take place or not; to paraphrase, woman disposes but man proposes. It is woman who is expected to be physically attractive, not man—to spend hours in the Dante-esque torment of a beauty parlor, while public opinion derides the man who devotes more than a few minutes of the day to his personal appearance. In the average home, it is woman who does the menial tasks.

“Truth is the name we give to errors grown hoary with the centuries,” said Spinoza, and the Vaertings quote him to this effect in their classic, “The Dominant Sex.”[2] Anyone who believes that woman belongs in a sphere predetermined by traditional notions on the respective roles of the sexes, should in fairness refer to the work of these and similar investigators. According to the above anthropologists, one sex or the other has been dominant down the ages; moreover “. . . the contemporary peculiarities of women are mainly determined by the existence of the Men’s State, and . . . they are accurately and fully paralleled by the peculiarities of men in the Women’s State.”[3] The authors show, for example, that where women were dominant, men remained in the home, engaged in house work and caring for the children; they spent much time in self-beautification, “curled the hair and the beard, wore plenty of gold ornaments, and were diligent in the care of the teeth and the finger-nails;”[4] their youth was highly valued, whereas the age of a woman was of no great importance, and they were physically the weaker sex, for “. . . the women of the Women’s State have very different physical aptitudes from those possessed by the women of the contemporary Men’s State. Where woman rules, she is no less superior to man in bodily capacity than man is superior to woman in this respect where man holds sway.”[5] Menial tasks were left to the men, while even the army was recruited from the women, and even the Fall was attributed to a man, he having tasted of forbidden fruit. Descent was reckoned through the mother, money was controlled by women. In courtship woman was the aggressor; Robert Briffault tells of “a love poem of the period of Rameses II, addressed, as was usual in Egypt, by the lady to her beloved. The former opens her heart thus: ‘O my beautiful friend! My desire is to become, as [Page 329] thy wife, the mistress of all thy possessions!’”[6] We learn from the same authority that the chief provision of an Egyptian marriage contract was, “‘If I leave thee as husband because I have come to hate thee, or because I love another man, I shall give thee two and a half measures of silver. . . .’”[7] and further, “Where, as in Thebes, the domiciles of husband and wife were sometimes separate, the man might find himself in danger of starving. He accordingly took the precaution to stipulate that the wife should ‘provide for him during his lifetime, and pay the expenses of his . . . burial.’”

Pleasant as it is for the feminist to remember past grandeurs, to think of Zenobia or of Queen Tomyris who conquered Cyrus, or even to contemplate the new and still unrepresentative groups of women achieving contemporary prominence—we should bear in mind that authorities warn us against either type of monosexual rule. Paul Bousfield even says: “. . . as long as there is any sex dominance such a thing as world peace may be psychologically impossible”[8] this because there is a tendency to displace primitive desires for power from one sphere to another. The Vaertings conclude, “It is absolutely essential that humanity should discover ways and means for the permanent realization of the ideal of sex equality, and for the permanent prevention of either type of monosexual dominance. In default, the millenniums that lie before us will be no less wretched than those which are now drawing to a close.”[9]

Modern sex equality implies monogamy, not the verbal monogamy to which the West has long been accustomed, but that defined by the Vaertings as involving “premarital chastity in both sexes; and faithfulness after marriage in the case of both parties.”[10] Incidentally these investigators believe that monogamy “is only impossible where monosexual dominance prevails,”[11] and that “. . . in human beings the monogamic trend is stronger than the polygamic.”[12] The general practice of monogamy doubtless presupposes an environment entirely other than that in which we now live. Today our food, our music, our books, our clothing, the stage, the museum, even the billboards along our streets, tend to forestall a monogamic system. Authorities such as Bousfield urge drastic changes: “Non-differentiation in clothing, in education, in general treatment, is an essential factor in equality . . . it is important that the exclusive male and female names should be discontinued . . . A revised idea of courtesy on a non-sexual basis is essential.”[13] Bousfield likewise inveighs against such practices as modern dancing, the pairing off of men and women partners at table, the exclusive personal adornment of either sex, and other social factors based on sex differentiation. Views of this type are not popular with our average college-bred intellectual, whose own theories, however, are apparently unsuited to present-day needs, if one is to judge by the divorce records and by the emotional suffering so clearly visible in the educated classes today.

Monogamy, it should be remembered, is generally speaking a modern institution. When Muhammad appeared, [Page 330] He found polygamy universally practised; Moses had imposed no definite limit on the number of wives a man might have, and polygamy was not formally prohibited among the Jews until the eleventh century, A.D.; numerous Christian emperors, members of the clergy, nobles, were polygamous, the commoners following their example. Since the institution (of concubinage) was permitted and regulated in the Old Testament with a ‘Jahveh said unto Moses,’ early Christianity, bound by its literal interpretation of Scripture, found it difficult to abolish it. Concubinage was actually sanctioned by the Synod of Toledo in 400 A.D., and was not actively suppressed as social impurity until the fifth Lateran Council in 1516.[14] Briffault tells us: “Muhammad, who in the ecclesiastical imagination of the Middle Ages was credited with having invented . . . polygamy, confirmed, in reality, the general tendency of advancing economic development by reducing the permissible number of legitimate wives to four.”[15]

As a matter of fact, Muhammad taught monogamy; He made the marrying of a plurality of wives conditional on their being treated with justice, and showed that a man could not act with justice toward more than one wife. However, even the briefest acquaintance with source materials will convince one that strict monogamy has existed heretofore chiefly as an ideal, and even today, the only difference between Eastern and Western polygamy would seem to be that the Eastern variety is simultaneous, the Western progressive.

Currently in most parts of the globe the husband is dominant, and the happy marriage is almost a museum piece. A state of tension, resulting from woman’s dissatisfaction with the limited scope allowed her by tradition, and from her resentment against the privileges which her husband has arrogated to himself, is set up in countless families, and it is well known that a child reared under such conditions may be psychically maimed for life. Some authorities, indeed, believe that the family—so often a reluctant amalgam of uncongenialities —is doomed to extinction, but surveys show that institutional life is unsuited to the proper development of the child, and the family unit is found to be most in accord with natural requirements; it is obvious, however, that with women emerging to equality, the family will be greatly altered in future; the ideal will be reached when neither parent is dominant.

A vast accumulation of literature— its very bulk proving that something is wrong with the holy state—exists on the subject of contemporary marriage. From Judge Lindsay to Léon Blum, to the Iranian intellectual who blithely insists that marriage is about to disappear altogether, every other thinker urges a solution. The man in the street asks whom he is to believe. According to Bahá’í doctrine, the standard of behavior is set in every dispensation by the spiritual Educator of the time; this is not didacticism, but description, for it is Moses, it is Christ, it is Muhammad who have founded civilizations that have endured for centuries; it is Beings such as these who are the law-makers; who [Page 331] do not compel, but who induce, obedience.

Studying Judaism, Christianity, and Islám—which according to the Bahá’í teachings are essentially one, representing, like the other great Faiths, like the Bahá’í Faith itself, successive expressions of the will of God—we find that the condition of woman gradually improved, until, under Islám, she achieved rights and privileges previously beyond her reach in a Men’s-State environment. Under the Muslim code the woman is not her husband’s possession but enjoys rights as an independent human being; she acts regarding herself and property without intervention of husband or father, has a definite share in inheritance, can sue debtors in the open courts, is treated with consideration in the matter of divorce. Aside from the nature of these and the other Qur’anic laws referring to woman, their very number, as compared with the few laws regarding woman in the Old and New Testaments, is highly significant. Muhammad could be called the first modern feminist. He decreed respect for woman and gave her a legal status which women of the West are only now attaining—this at a time when her position was anything but favorable. Of woman in the Christian world, Amír-‘Alí points out that “Father after Father wrote on the enormities of women . . . Tertullian calls women ‘the devil’s gateway . . . the deserter of the divine law, the destroyer of Gods image—man.’ Chrysostom, says Lecky, ‘interpreted the general opinion of the Fathers when he pronounced women to be “a necessary evil . . . a desirable calamity, a domestic peril, a deadly fascination, a painted ill”’”—and adds: “the rise of Protestantism made no difference in the social conditions, or in the conception of lawyers regarding the status of women.”[16] The Muslim attitude toward gender is summed up in these lines from the thirty-third chapter of the Qur’án: “Verily the Moslems of either sex, and the true believers of either sex, and the devout men, and the devout women, and the men of veracity, and the women of veracity, and the patient men, and the patient women, and the humble men, and the humble women, and the alms-givers of either sex, and the men who fast, and the women who fast, and the chaste men, and the chaste women, and those of either sex who remember God frequently; for these hath God prepared forgiveness and a great reward.”

One of the signs by which we recognize that phenomenal Being, the Manifestation of God, is that His teachings are opposed to the desires of His time. Muhammad breaks the idols which are the pride of the Quraysh; Bahá’u’lláh shatters many an idea that the world has long worshipped; one of these is the idea of masculine superiority. In decreeing sex equality Bahá’u’lláh attacks a fundamental concept of society, a concept the tenacity of which psychologists are only beginning to understand. “. . . man,” says a recent investigator, “finds pleasure in all ideas of woman as a ‘weaker vessel’ . . . any slight weakness which is already hers is greatly exaggerated . . . he carries her little bag or her parcel—not because [Page 332] she is too weak to do any of these things for herself, but because it produces in him a feeling of difference and superiority. . . . He hates the idea that she should compete on equal terms with him at his work. . . .”[17]

“It is not to be denied,” ‘Abdu’l-Bahá tells us, “that in various directions woman at present is more backward than man, also that this temporary inferiority is due to the lack of educational opportunity. . . . In the vegetable world there are male plants and female plants; they have equal rights. . . . In the animal kingdom we see that the male and the female have equal rights. . . . In the world of humanity we find a great difference; the female sex is treated as though inferior. . . . This condition is due not to Nature, but to education.”[18] Elsewhere He says: “I will mention another cause of dissension: the lack of equality between man and woman. Bahá’u’lláh has named this as a great cause of discord and division among humanity, for so long as humanity remains unequally divided as male and female in right and importance, no amity or unity can be established. . . . God has created man and woman equal as to faculties; He has made no distinction between them. Woman has not reached the level of man in human accomplishment because of lack of education. The education of man has been of one kind and of woman another. If education were equal and similar, these two . . . would be equal in attainment.”[19]

In the Bahá’í system, marriage is made difficult at the outset. While in some parts of the United States a three-day delay has proved beneficial in preventing unwise marriages, a much more effective check is provided by the Bahá’í teaching that the consent of all four parents involved is prerequisite to the union. One reason for this law is that the whole purpose of the Bahá’í Cause is to establish world harmony, and a marriage that tends to alienate a number of people necessarily obstructs this. In practice it has been found that this law provided an enduring basis for married life, stressing as it does the importance of the marriage as related to the group. The law applies whether or not the parents are Bahá’ís. While marriage is made difficult, divorce— permissible in exceptional cases—is easily obtained, its main prerequisite being a year of separation. “The thing which is lawful, but disliked by God, is divorce,” said Muhammad, and the Bahá’í attitude is similar in this respect. The emphasis in the Bahá’í law is on the careful selection of a mate and on the importance of perpetuating the marriage.

Another feature of Bahá’í marriage is that the procreation of children is its “sacred and primary purpose.”[20] The childless marriages now popular in the West are viewed with anxiety by many leading thinkers.[21] They involve too little responsibility; they lack solidity; husband or wife is apt at any moment to fold his tent like the Arabs and as silently steal away. Whatever the further consequences of the childless marriage—economic, social, physical—it is unquestioned that this system tends to popularize divorce, and that divorce constitutes a serious break in the community.[22]

[Page 333] LIKE his health, an individual’s happiness is the concern of the group. Bahá’ís believe that in the World Order which is forming within our contemporary chaos, the individual’s happiness will be assured by equal opportunities for the sexes, strict monogamy, love marriages motivated by the desire to further the interests of the community. The reader is reminded that according to the teaching of Bahá’u’lláh, our modern world is capable of developing as facts, through the power of the Bahá’í Faith coupled with scientific knowledge and equipment, the hopes and dreams of the past; hopes and dreams that hitherto were realized only in germ.


  1. Drinkwater, J.; Pepys, His Life and Character, pp. 160-164.
  2. Vaerting, Mathilde and Mathias, The Dominant Sex.
  3. Ibid., p. 18.
  4. Ibid., p. 91.
  5. Ibid., p. 76.
  6. Briffault, R., The Mothers, p. 279.
  7. Ibid., p. 278.
  8. Bousfield, P., Sex and Civilization, p. 253.
  9. The Dominant Sex, p. 225.
  10. Ibid., p. 57.
  11. Ibid., p. 56.
  12. Ibid., p. 59.
  13. Sex and Civilization, pp. 206-208.
  14. W. F. Bade, The Old Testament in the Light of Today, pp. 52-53.
  15. Sex and Civilization, p. 255.
  16. Ameer-Ali, The Spirit of Islam, pp. 356, 357.
  17. Bousfield, P., op. cit., pp. 157, 159.
  18. The Wisdom of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, pp. 149, 150.
  19. Bahá’í Scriptures, p. 351.
  20. Shoghi Effendi, The Unfoldment of World Civilization, p. 28.
  21. for example, Carrel, A., Man the Unknown, p. 22.
  22. Dell, F. Love in the Machine Age, p. 68.




A PRAYER

MICHAEL D’ANDREA

Last night before I went to sleep,
I knelt beside my little bed
And thanked the Lord with fervent prayer,
For all the blessings that He had shed
On me from day to day.
Last night I longed to clasp Him there;
But held a crucifix instead,
And, O, the symbol made me weep;—
Before that good night prayer was said,
Once more I learned to pray.


[Page 334]

THE NEW CREATION

ALICE SIMMONS COX

VI. DIVINE EDUCATION

ALL of individual human experience, however blind may appear the search for truth, is, from the beginning of the embryonic period until the soul recognizes the most recent Manifestation of God as the appointed Educator of mankind, a process of development under the direction of God, the Supreme Educator. It is a time of preparation for the birth of the soul into that higher spiritual realm for which it was originally created.

In the same way generic man, always of the human species, has evolved from one form to another, traversing the mineral, vegetable and animal levels in his progress toward the time when the physical combination of elements would permit the manifestation of hidden human capacities of the soul. From the very beginning of creation, which, abstrusely, Bahá’u’lláh states knew no beginning and will have no end, man was thus “in the image and likeness of God.” The ultimate purpose of each great, universal cycle, such as that which began with Adam and reaches glorious culmination in Bahá’u’lláh, has been the manifestation of the mental and spiritual potentialities of man. The ultimate purpose of individual sojourn on earth is, in microcosm, as the growth of the generic soul to its destined maturity. “Then . . . will the Trust of God, latent in the reality of man, emerge, as resplendent as the rising Orb of Divine Revelation, from behind the veil of concealment, and implant the ensign of its revealed glory upon the summits of men’s hearts.”[1]

“Man in the world of existence has traversed certain degrees,” ‘Abdu’l-Bahá explains, “until he has arrived at the world of manhood. In every degree he has attained capacity for advancement to the next degree.”[2]

“When the body of man is perfected,” he continues, “physical evolution comes to an end, since nature does not seek to build a higher form than that of man. But the evolution of spirit continues until reason, the mental powers, and the emotional capacities are evolved in it.”[3]

The period of education following the attainment of human consciousness and its unfolding faculties makes use of contacts with the world outside the soul that were not possible in the kingdoms of mineral, plant and animal expression. Inherent love forces [Page 335] are sublimated above the level of chemical attractions, tropisms and instincts into desire and will for the function of controlling operations that relate to environment. Mental insight gives the soul power over the natural forces of the lower worlds, both within and without the body. To the physical environment, which once served as the only means of education, God’s wisdom at this stage adds mental, moral and spiritual factors that will influence the reality of man, slowly improving his knowledge, attitude, desires, actions. Through all evolution God’s spirit emanating to the world in the forms of creation provides the educational surroundings for the human soul. Only through His Divine Messengers, however, can man receive spiritual education, for they alone can create a perfect moral and spiritual environment, a surrounding atmosphere of highest Love and Knowledge. Although moral and spiritual teachings may become distorted as they are retaught by followers of a Prophet of God, originally they always proceed from the pure and perfect Word of Revelation.

WHILE the physical universe as a whole is a revelation of God’s Names and Attributes, the soul of man, yet a prisoner within its human perceptive powers, unaided by the penetrating Light of a Spiritual Sun, is incapable of sufficiently understanding the signs of God in creation to gain a fulness of knowledge. For this reason man perceives imperfection and evil in a universe designed by a perfect Creator. Wasted life, even on the animal level, a cruel struggle for existence, extremes of poverty and wealth, calamities resulting from rampant forces of wind and sea, flood and famine,—these and a myriad other disturbances of a desired state of well-being appear to travelers, seekers, students of life, at some stage of the journey as signs of the absurdness of faith in an All-Merciful, Loving God.

“We are all aware,” Edwin Markham has been quoted as saying, “that there is something wild in the world —glance at the newspaper with its catalogue of murders, poverties, and cruel luxuries. Still there is something in me that makes me believe that there is a Purpose stirring in all this tumult of nature and history. Perhaps life will be seen to have reason and symmetry when looked at from some watchtower in Eternity.”[4]

When we investigate the universe from the heights of illumined understanding we will come to know that there is absolute order and perfection of plan, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá declares. What a difference it makes in the progress of a soul, psychologically, to believe God is evolving as humanity evolves toward a greater integration,—or to know God is eternally Supreme in His Kindness, His Wisdom, His Design for His creation! All phenomena and relationships are subject to one universal law, writes Bahá’u’lláh. Not the apparent law of nature is this, but the law of God,—the law of love expressing on every level as it gives life to the relatively passive factors of creation. The Names and Attributes of God of which Love is the center and the circumference are each creative [Page 336] in nature, finding expression in some infinitesimal part of an integrated creation. The word is made flesh in a cosmic sense. Comprehension of the unity of this manifest Word in the outer world, a unity which includes the stature of the human soul—the spirit level of creation —is the same as attainment to a knowledge of the Manifestation of God, but possible only through His Revelation. Because man cannot without spiritual birth read the signs of the universe in their wholeness, though by means of his rational spirit he may comprehend the visible things of creation, such Revelation is granted by God as the door to an understanding of life. Beyond this no man can go. The Manifest Name of God summons all peoples to this door of understanding and progress. It is the ancient Tree of Life, “beyond which there is no passing.”[5]

BAHÁ’U’LLÁH gives a considerate answer to the soul that is still unaware of the wisdom of God’s decrees and must cry out in its suffering, “Why do things have to be as they are? Why need we search and endure, be confined and limited in our little selves? Why must the Divine Essence remain Unknowable? Why can’t we be perfect expressions without the difficult process of education? Even if I were a puppet without freedom, I’d rather be so—I think!” (How foolishly our souls would choose! How blindly do we revolt! But by God’s gift to us of capacity for “knowing Him and of reflecting the greatness of His glory,” He rescues the desiring soul from the “wretchedness of ignorance.”[6])

“My calamity is my Providence,”[7] God asserts through Bahá’u’lláh’s Revelation, thus eliminating for all who believe in Him, the restlessness and bitterness that arise in times of distress. While disaster due to the ignorant or wilful breaking of law on our own part is not so very difficult to understand, the consequences suffered through the disorders of the social structure, the upheavals of nature, and the passions of others are more difficult to view with tranquillity and trust. One ray of Divine Wisdom Browning caught when He wrote:

“Then welcome each rebuff
That turns earth’s smoothness
rough
Each sting that bids nor sit nor
stand but go!
Be our joys three-parts pain!
Strive and hold cheap the strain;
Learn, nor grudge the throe!”

God also teaches through the reward of happiness, even when it is the sign of only temporal pleasures won. “Whatever man undertakes he achieves some result, whether through statesmanship, commerce, agriculture, science, etc.”, says ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. “He receives a compensation for his efforts.”[8] The degree of happiness that results is a divine confirmation that he has at least applied one law of his being,—he has exerted inherent powers to a fuller degree than before. Such happiness for a time gives wings to the human spirit and is an encouragement to the heart to fix its eye on more difficult endeavors as soon as a natural growing dissatisfaction with the incomplete gains already made brings to light a new and deeper desire. [Page 337] This process continues in the life of an earnestly seeking soul until it attains the everlasting exhilaration of living in harmony with the divine laws of spiritual progress. Round by round each worldly attraction accompanied by its ultimate pain of disappointment serves as a lead.

This is why love of thing, person or truth must always precede the sacrifice required for the realization of any objective. And so, in the fulness of Manifestation, each Prophet of God first touches hearts with the joyous awakening powers of Love. The new creation in human hearts begins because the Christ, Muhammad, Bahá’u’lláh, first loved us and thereby imparted a ray of love and happiness to human hearts. This law must be understood and called into use on all levels of human association if the reformers of the world wish to succeed in establishing brotherhood. So intangible, yet so significant is this power, that words spoken to accomplish cooperative ends are ineffective if they do not transmit to the listener a sense of uplift approaching a new experience of joy,—if they do not come from a personality integrated and illumined by universal love.

WERE man created originally as a perfect expression of Divinity, for which there need be no process of learning, he would partake of the attributes of God, as a Manifestation of Divine Glory, and thus would not be man. The station of Manifestation, however, is a focal point of creative power, the first Expression of Divine Will, the Word in its wholeness, from every letter of which new physical creation is always being born with man as its highest point of evolution. Thus the circle of creative life is never stayed and there must be man as we know him as a part of the eternal creative process. He is an emanation of God’s Will.

“If there was a time when God did not manifest His qualities, then there was no God, because the attributes of God presuppose the creation of phenomena,” ‘Abdu’l-Bahá explains. . . , “There must always have been a creation. . . . The attributes that we discover one by one—these attributes themselves necessarily anticipated our discovery of them. Therefore, God has no beginning and no ending; nor is his creation limited as to degree. Limitations of time and degree pertain to created things, never to creation as a whole. The effulgence of God cannot be suspended. The sovereignty of God cannot be interpreted.”[9]

Man as a reality has ever existed and must, by nature of all creation, make effort to develop his potentialities. When at last he attains spiritual education he is happy in this degree. To further understand the essence of creative wisdom is not possible for men, who are forbidden entrance into the primary world of God, where the Command of Love is “Be,” and “it is.”

Whatever is necessary for the purification of the hearts of men, that is the plan of the Divine Educator. Those who are the children of earth, preparing for future enlightenment, must step by step be taught that “the world is like unto a mirage which has the shadow of water. The athirst [Page 338] make abundant efforts in its search, but, when reaching it remain deprived and portionless.”[10] Not until the realities behind the physical form of created things and the truths behind the events of the world are viewed in the spiritual Sunlight brought by a Prophet-Educator does the universe as a whole become for man a revelation and manifestation of love, unity, justice, and truth—even ultimately vanishes as an object of adoration in the greater Beauty of its Creator which it reveals. “What hath become (then) of the creation and the manifestation thereof?” Bahá’u’lláh mystically asks. “Whither are gone all created things, whether seen or unseen? . . . Lo, the entire universe hath passed away! Nothing remains except My Face, the Ever-abiding, the Resplendent, the All-Glorious?”[11] God is seen God, Sovereign of the universe. All else appears as nothing before Him; while at the same time every living thing in creation reveals in itself a singular beauty as its own reflection! “Great is thy blessedness, O earth,” Bahá’u’lláh exclaims, “for thou hast been made the footstool of thy God and been chosen as the seat of His mighty throne. . . . We have called into being a new creation as a token of our grace unto men.”[12] In the new life of man that comes with the Education of Bahá’u’lláh the whole earth rejoices, for in the rise of man to fulfil his destiny the world itself finds its own soul manifest. All creation has received of the new life from God.

Until these heights of consciousness are attained by the individual, the faithful soul nevertheless can be in a degree happy in God’s decree: “Be thou content . . . for my work is perfect and My command is binding. Question it not and have thou no doubt.”[13]

EFFORT—that ceaseless effort on the part of the human soul which Bahá’u’lláh warns is required for the development of intrinsic capacity —is in reality a priceless resource itself. Through it man finds it possible to turn in search and supplication, first to the familiar things of experience, to parents, teachers and friends, and ultimately to the Unknown God who becomes to the consciousness of the resolute ones, ever more near and dear. This particular type of effort should cease when the Manifest Source of all Truth has been found. “What would it profit any man to strive after learning when he hath already found and recognized Him Who is the Object of all Knowledge?” Bahá’u’lláh exclaims.[14] When love and loyalty to God have begun the spiritualizing process of integrating all the awakened faculties of man, education becomes a way of developing those capacities toward the ideal of the Perfect Manifestation. Effort precedes the point where a soul catches a glimpse of the station of the Manifestation,—a fragrance, as it is, of His Beauty. Thereafter progress is continued mainly through attraction. The sense of blind struggle is eliminated. “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you.” The law operating is that of love on the plane of divine consciousness, drawing up into its own Life the soul [Page 339] of man as the phenomenal sun brings into bloom the lilies that “toil not, neither do they spin.”[15] Liberated from wasted effort of trial and error search, uplifted by a sense of real assurance which begets courage and peace of soul, strengthened, as well as attracted in body and mind by the influx of love’s creative spirit, men so blessed can go forward to great discoveries and finer lives on every plane of their earth living. The discord of mind and heart, of intellect and desire, and the fear of defeat, vanish in the unifying atmosphere of a genuine and illumined love for God. Divine ideals constitute the standard for achievement. Divine ordinances light the way for action even before the human mind can see the details or the wisdom of the course revealed.

THIS final reward of effort, it may be well to recall, is far greater in measure than the effort expended. Man does not have the capacity to attain spiritual knowledge if unaided. The human capacity is that of turning attention to the fountain-head of Spirit. If, then, it is not justice but mercy from God that accomplishes this step in illuminating the human soul, it is also through mercy that God saves man from the utter discouragement that would come before the goal is reached. Were man to realize the greatness of his distance from God and the consequent darkness and impotence of his soul, he could not find courage or faith to continue his journey, Bahá’u’lláh explains. Through the instrumentality of creation, which provides rewards on all levels of experience, God encourages man to climb ever higher. Momentarily—it may be a day, or a year,—imperfect assurance satisfies. Only further experience can disclose the imperfections. The time has come in the affairs of men when all may have the experience of touching the hem of a new Master’s robe, of catching the fragrance of His Words, of learning the beauty of His new standards for the human race.

After men have recognized God’s Messenger, the process of education to develop them after the pattern of Perfect Manifestation must be an unending one. No man can become his own Prophet, encompassing Infinite Knowledge.

The approach to truth provided by the Manifestation of the age, does, for the time at hand, give opportunity for guidance that is perfect in relation to the given cycle of Revelation. Viewed from the perspective of progressive cycles of Revelation by means of which God tells His Will to men at certain intervals, the message of each Prophet is relative, proportioned to the age in which the Prophet appears; but understood from the standpoint of the requirements of the specific era, the Books of Revelation are not only Divine Truth, but are also Divine Counsel and Standard, perfectly designed to meet the station of the capacity of men for the duration of the new dispensation. Although man may never look out upon life with the eye of absolute perfection, he can today with the Word of Bahá’u’lláh adequately meet the needs and the desires of his being. In accordance with his degree of renunciation he can find “the way, the truth and the life” [Page 340] for himself and his fellow men. Forever limited in a sense by his station in creation, such a man, nevertheless, with his faculties of “personality” spiritually illumined, will discover that in truth he is “gazing with the eye of God upon a universe where he will perceive within every atom a door that leadeth him to the station of absolute certitude. He will discover in all things the mysteries of divine Revelation and the evidence of an everlasting Manifestation.”[16] He will find in himself all the degrees and stations of creation, and know that in the Manifestation of a Prophet is the perfect Goal toward which his own evolution moves. The true purpose, therefore, for Revelation is that man, through love and praise of these dawning-points of God’s Beauty, may be enabled “to ascend unto the station conferred upon their own inmost being, the station of the knowledge of their own selves.”[17]

So important are the teachings of God in this Day that should mankind in general, now with ample capacity to learn the lessons of spiritual regeneration, fail therein, continuing to rivet attention and faith on impartial truths and hopeless cures, the forces of catastrophe must soon overtake civilization of both Occident and Orient. It is not at a crossroads our people stand, but on the quicksands of futile endeavors. No amount of pulling by the bootstraps can lift us from orthodoxies, prejudices, materialisms, injustices and greeds.

In past centuries God’s eternal laws of love, mercy, justice, cooperation, oneness, order, were not so steadily or so widely enforced as they are being today. Dire calamity did not face a whole world if men and nations here and there were still in ignorance or disobeyed the highest recognized laws of human society. Today the Educator of men holds all to a finer standard, a higher destiny and He is preparing all so they need not fail.

The education which Bahá’u’lláh gives to the world is not alone in the realm of spiritual law but also in definite application of that law to the organization and relationships of society. The waters of His Spirit shall cover and refresh the earth of man’s political, economic, social and cultural desire and the Sun of His Knowledge shall brighten the heavens of world ideals. He foretells victory to come in the creation of a better world community when there shall bloom in the ancient Garden of Eden the fairest civilization mankind has known.


  1. Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 67.
  2. Bahá’í Scriptures, par. 645.
  3. Idem, par. 789.
  4. Stidger, Edwin Markham, p. 212.
  5. Gleanings, p. 301.
  6. Idem, pp. 77-78.
  7. Hidden Words.
  8. Divine Philosophy.
  9. The Bahá’í World, Vol. IV, p. 122.
  10. Gleanings, p. 328.
  11. Idem, p. 29.
  12. Gleanings, p. 30.
  13. Hidden Words.
  14. Gleanings, pp. 176-177.
  15. Matt. 6
  16. Kitab-i-Iqán, p. 196.
  17. Gleanings, pp. 4-5.


[Page 341]

THE SEVEN VALLEYS BY BAHÁ’U’LLÁH

G. TOWNSHEND

A MEDITATION

O MY Lord, how many and how diverse are those holy melodies which Thou hast chanted to the wayward heart of man, summoning him to Thy dear presence, singing of the joys of eternal reunion, drawing him to the shrine of perfect Beauty.

Sometimes in tones more sweet, more thrilling than any mortal utterance Thou speakest as a father or a lover, wooing the heart of man which Thou hast created for Thyself to leave its forlorn plight of isolation.

Now Thou comest to man, openest to him the Hidden Way, tracest out its progress, stage by stage and step by step, and makest Thyself his companion, animating him, urging him onward, cheering his heart with words of love and courage.

This is for every man the one and only way that leads onward and ever onward to the fulfilment of destiny and of every desire. All other soul-paths soon or late close in and end, and leave the traveler in utter loss, unable to proceed or to return.

There is no goal anywhere but Thee, O my Lord; and no rest save in journeying to Thee!

In comparison with this spiritual journey to Thee, that path of life on which all men set forth at birth is but a mockery and a cheat. Disappointment and decay and loss reign over it. They who have trusted to it fill the air with mourning and woe. “Vanity of vanities” they cry, “all is vanity:” “a short blossoming, a long withering;” and at the last they are left to “mere oblivion, sans teeth, sans eye, sans taste, sans everything.” Every step means the shortening of a measured life. For every man the journey ends not in meeting but in parting. And the deepening shadow of an assured and complete futility falls along the entire length of the path to its beginning.

Thou, my Lord, openest another way, a way hidden from unspiritual eyes, a way which travels far from the land of shadows and of age and leads through ever-growing light to realms of eternal peace and wisdom and undying love.

On this journey to Thee every movement is an everlasting gain, every effort is an immortal victory and that clear Paradise which is to be the traveler’s goal is never wholly hidden but pours its fragrance far down all Thy Seven Valleys to sweeten the toils of the seeker’s way.

[Page 342] Thou warnest us it is no easy enterprise. We all travel towards Thee through the same country towards the same Heaven and have the same Guide. But each of us must trace out his particular path little by little with his own eyes and tread it to the end mile after mile, inch by inch, upon his own feet. He cannot accomplish the journey nor travel forth upon it without pain; nor can he so much as find the beginning of the path without patience.

THOU art veiled from Thy servant, O my companion, and the entrance to the true path is hidden likewise. Though he knows it not, Thy servant’s own self-love has woven this veil; and much is to be done, much to be suffered, ere he can see the door Thou hast opened before him.

Urged by an inborn need, Thy servant seeks blindly self-satisfaction in this activity and that. He follows in the train of the world, grasping at what he sees others grasp at. He becomes lost among wayward inclinations, among diverse examples and a multitude of counselors. There is no realization of desire in this; only disappointment and disillusion. The vision—the truth—of Something out of the plane of this activity abides with him—holds him. Its influence grows more distinct. This is of Thy Mercy, O Lord, which reaches through every veil! Thy servant knows of a surety there exists a Hidden Reality, and that with which he busies himself is a shadow-life. The stars, the seas, the lonely mountains, the quiet of the countryside, with one voice of ecstasy tell him of that Beauty which eludes him in human life. For lack of knowledge of Thee, my Lord, in ignorant love he makes the wilderness his home. But lo! he is rebuked by the sense of a greater beauty—the beauty of holiness. In the Sacred Writ of ancient days he reads of Beings who walked this earth of ours, full of love for all mankind, and spread about them a glory that outlasts the centuries and even at this distance of time makes all the splendor of dawn and day and night seem temporal and poor. These are the Prophets of Beauty, the Guardians of Perfect Truth, the Messengers to man of deathless Reality.

What, O Mighty Ones, is this earth whereon you walked, this mortality you shared? What is the wisdom of sorrow and wrong and mutability? Where is our deliverance—and why is there a Prison-house from which to be delivered? What is this “Knowledge of God” of which you speak as the great attainment of spiritual man, as the opening of mysteries, the end of illusion and ignorance?

Thy servant seeks for one who has this knowledge and would, if heaven permit, impart it to him.

Years pass; and he finds none.

Thy servant seeks for one who desires this knowledge and who will not rest till he find it. How precious would be a mortal companion in this search!

He tries many openings. Disappointment follows disappointment. He is baffled; and again baffled. He seems to be more completely at a loss, more near to desolation than ever, when lo! in a moment, almost unawares he finds Thee.

[Page 343] A MOMENT of all moments!

At first it was but an echo that came from far away. There is no voice like the voice of the True One; nor is there any intonation of any voice like that of His!

In rapture, transported with delight, Thy servant answered that remote call.

“Child of the darkness that wandered
in gloom but dreamed
of the light
Lo, I have seen thy splendor ablaze
in the heavens afar
Showering gladness and glory and
shattering the shadows of
night
And seen no other star.
“Thy words are to me as fragrances
borne from the gardens of
heaven,
Beams of a lamp that is hid in the
height of a holier world,
Arrows of fire that pierce and destroy
with the might of the
levin
Into our midnight hurled.
“Weak and unworthy my praise.
Yet as from its throbbing
throat
Some lone bird pours its song to the
flaming infinite sky
So unto thee in the zenith I lift
from a depth remote
This broken human cry.”

Happiness wrapped Thy servant about, and his mind passed through opening doors of truth from wonder to wonder.

It is as though the few stray filaments of light which had pierced the gloom and saved it from utter darkness now strengthened one by one and slowly spread seeking perchance to join the edges of their rays and to combine at last to make one ocean of all-encompassing light.

By slow degrees there were revealed the outline and the perspective of the land wherein Thy servant dwelled and wandered. He watched and thought and measured and marveled. Change after change came upon him. The old loveliness and sanctitude that had seemed the utmost and the highest lost its supremacy; lost its sufficiency. A great Beauty dawned. A sovereign Glory outshone lesser Thrones. Thy servant’s restless heart no longer wandered in uncertainty; it turned from reflected lights to the one source of light.

How little had he within that hall of blackness known of the realities that lay about him all his life! How unimaginably rich and vast this earth and heaven which the Dawn brings out of the Unseen! And this Thy servant, what is he in the midst of it, O Lord!

How little (as he bathed his thoughts in that increasing glory) how little did he grasp the meanings that were unfolded before him! How blind was he to opportunities Thou offeredst him! How deaf to Thy answer to his prayers!

IS he wiser now? What ancient darkness reigns yet in Thy servant’s heart steeping his thoughts in error? What illusions still dim and distort his vision? What false affections numb his soul?

Far off the scene grows clear, but not the path at hand. He presses forward and misses the way and stumbles; and recovering presses on. Well [Page 344] has it been said, O Lord, that the path to Thee is narrow as a hair and sharp as a sword. . . Has light, too, its rhythms and its waves?

Now again it seems to brighten. Ah, it is one thing to greet a dawn that rises on the distant horizon; it is another to welcome it when it stands in fire on your own threshold. It is one thing to dream and to admire; it is one thing to applaud those who challenged terror and with unblenched cheek walked through the horrors of the Pit; it is another to recognize that Truth’s sanctuary is guarded eternally by walls of flame through which no doubt or fear can ever pass alive.

Thy servant must go on. He cannot do otherwise. Sooner or later everyone who worships Truth and Thee must face the searing fire. But from him whose heart loves only Thee, the flames will bend back.

And when the Seven Valleys are traversed to the end; and the Goal is won and Thy Paradise attained, what will remain for any servant of Thine, but to begin his journey again and travel on and on for ever through infinitudes of wisdom and love, passing from light to fuller light, from Truth to further Truth, from Beauty to a more perfect Beauty?


[Page 345]

EAST AND WEST

THE WISDOM OF INAZO NITOBE

AGNES ALEXANDER

THE late Dr. Inazo Nitobe, one of the most determined supporters of the principle of a League of Nations, united the East and West by his marriage to an American and his adoption of the Quaker faith. The ideal of his life was to interpret the Orient to the peoples of the West. His career as internationalist began in 1912 when he served in America as an exchange professor under the auspices of the Carnegie Peace Foundation. For seven years beginning 1919 he held the post of Under-Secretary General of the League of Nations.

During 1931 and 1932, Dr. Nitobe contributed daily to a Japanese newspaper, and the following paragraphs have been selected from those contributions.

“It is a pitiful error of young people to look upon loneliness as synonymous with gloom and bitterness. They have not touched the essence of loneliness, which is light and sweetness.

“It is true that when we are alone, we feel weak. Man by himself is weak —but no man is really strong, who feels strong on account of others’ presence and help. If strong he wishes to be, let him face the world all alone.

“Human life is a training in and for strength. Born weak, man must grow in strength and his last moments must be a triumph over weakness and cowardice, albeit he leaves the world alone.”

“History is still unsatisfactory as a record of human progress. It is a calendar of the days that are past. It takes you through a silent avenue of tombs. It is a poor record of the struggles that took place in the souls of the men, whose achievements adorn its pages.

“History is not biography and hence has no use for individuals. It is not psychology and hence does not care for motives and ideals. This is true and for these reasons, is History in the hand of specialists, lifeless, soulless—a description of the body from which the divine spark has fled.”

“Pure gold is admired for its beauty, but is too soft for practical use. We should not call those metals base, which enable gold to withstand harder wear and tear.

“A virtue standing by itself is apt to fall into vice. It must be fortified by kindred virtues or be balanced by unrelated ones.

“Meekness, unalloyed by fortitude, is liable to be weak. Bravery, unmixed [Page 346] with docility, is prone to be tough. The dove’s innocence must be coupled with the wisdom of the serpent.”

“The good that we do is infinitely better than that done by others. The evil that we do is never so bad as that which others do.

“The good that we do rests mostly with or within us—so also the evil.

“Each time we count the good we do, it grows less and smaller. The contrary is also true. Each time we discount it, it increases in size and improves in quality. We do better if we do not dwell on it. The best thing for us to do, is to forget the good we have done.

“One who does good without knowing it, is goodness itself.”

“Is there not more than enough good sense and good will around us that could be made available for the benefit and happiness of the race? For this we must apply a method, which, however marvelous it may prove to be, cannot depend on the presence of hatred and jealousy, envy and covetousness, vanity and ambition.

“These are weaknesses of the human mind, and any scheme or device that utilizes them will never make our life, private or public, economic or political, any better than at present.”

“Science and engineering are forging a new world at a rate bewildering to lawyers and politicians. These lag far behind in the intellectual march, seeking safety in old formulas, while those go on, trampling upon ancient forms and formalities.

“Unless a new terminology comes into vogue, which will denote new relationships and evaluations introduced in our immediate social surroundings, lawyers and politicians will continue to be muddled in their brains. Or, will they fade out of existence, as have the sorcerers and necromancers? And if they stay as they are, will they be called by other names—charlatans or busybodies?

“New facts are discovered faster than are the relations between them or their relations to man explained.

“A citizen of any well ordered society enjoys freedom of action. The insurance of such freedom is the chief characteristic of an advanced state. But an undisciplined citizen exercises license in the name of liberty, little considering that this has its laws and limitations.

“The enjoyment of civil rights and political liberty is a small part of human privileges, of which the greatest is the freedom of the spirit.”


[Page 347]

NEW LIFE FROM WITHIN

MME. CHIANG KAI-SHEK

ONE thing that society asks of the Church is that it shall show men how to meet the pressing problems of their day. In the midst of a poisoned social atmosphere a strong religious faith should act not merely as a gas mask to protect its wearer, but it should also be as a cleansing breeze that gradually changes and purifies the dwelling places of men.

We are met here to consider the relationship of the Church to its present environment in China; to remind ourselves that the Church can no longer stand apart from the development of modern China. The whole of the Chinese nation is on the march. The Church must march with it. Beacon after beacon is being lighted across the country, warning the people that they must arise to attack the strongly entrenched social evils of our day, and to help usher in the new order of things. The bugle call of the New Life Movement is sounding clearly in the dawn of China’s new day.

I. It is a Call to Move Forward and to Endure.

One critic of the New Life Movement has said, “The real question of the masses is one of livelihood, and the New Life Movement has done nothing about it.” I want to pass that challenge on to you, that together, we might share its responsibility.

In the summer of 1933 I received an invitation to join a discussion group at Kuling on the subject of Christians and Communism. At that time I found Christians willing to discuss these problems of livelihood in a rather academic way, and I became convinced that somehow we should be more practical in the application of our faith. The National Christian Council later cooperated with the Government in organizing eleven rural experiment centers in Kiangsi where young men and women from Christian and other colleges might take the lead in studying and trying to solve some of the most pressing needs of the farmers. It has been a source of great satisfaction to the Generalissimo and myself that the Church has united with us in the rehabilitation of recovered communist areas. We hope this is merely a beginning in this great field of improving the life of the people.

Perhaps one reason why the Church has been slow to engage in this work of rural reconstruction is on account of the hardships involved. At such a time as this we should honestly face the fact that we have not accustomed [Page 348] ourselves to enduring hardness as good soldiers of Jesus Christ. In this we are weak. In the words of the Prophet, “We are at ease in Zion.”

As my husband and I have traveled over many provinces we have met devoted missionaries, living far away in the interior, bringing new life to the communities that they touch. We have been astonished at the absence of talented modern-educated Chinese men and women, either supporting these heroic missionaries, or carrying on similar activities in like-needy areas. Is it possible that modern trained Chinese Christians lack the stuff of which missionaries are made? Are we in the position of accepting all the benefits of the Christian faith without caring to accept the responsibilities and the hardships?

At the very heart of our faith is hardship, endurance, suffering—a cross. Without them there cannot be any Christian faith. I have frequently heard the Generalissimo remark that Christ, as a young man, willingly gave up his life for the cause, and that we shall not be able to solve our own great problems until more of us are ready to do likewise. That is why he feels that Christianity is a revolutionary faith, and that every man of faith, in such a world as ours, should be a revolutionary.

If my observations are correct, and you care to accept my suggestion, I think this is the time and place to go into the question as to whether or not we are ready to endure all that may be involved in being good soldiers of Jesus Christ, engaged not in some rearguard action, but in the main battle of our day. In this age of grim necessity, when the utmost qualities of men and of nations are on trial, to have a robust Christian faith means that we will never give in. This age will be changed in the proportion that our faith, personality, and enthusiasm soak into it. Just as we deduce the value of medicine from its effects, so we appraise the quality of our faith from its moral effect upon ourselves, and upon society.

What we need today is to feel certain about the call of God and to make some decisions at the price of our comfort, and if need be, of our necks. Perception and action must go together. We are called to translate our faith into the life of our day.

Like the sleeping beauty in the castle, surrounded by high hedges of thorns, China has at last been awakened to live in a new and wonderful world of progress. In this new world the Church has a large place to fill, providing that it is willing to move forward and to endure.

II. The New Life Movement is a Call to Closer Cooperation.

One singular thing about our Christian faith is that it is not merely a social creed, but a revelation from God. There is no such thing as revelation of itself, for revelation consists always of the fact that something is revealed to us. In our day God is revealing Himself anew in the needs of society, and impressing upon us the need for social action on our part. Let the younger churches of the East, and the older churches of the West, unite in a grand effort to bring New Life to the people of the towns and the villages. As in response to the seasons, [Page 349] the trees have borne their fruit and the fields their grain, so the New China has responded to seasonable cooperation from the churches of the West.

I wish, on behalf of the Generalissimo and myself, to voice an invitation to still closer cooperation through the activities of the New Life Movement.

One of the outstanding examples of cooperation between Church and Government is to be found in Kiangsi. Not merely the Lichwan experiment, but ten other welfare centers have been organized under the leadership of Chang Fu-liang, the National Christian Council Rural Secretary on leave for this purpose. Visitors have often remarked that they see little difference between Lichwan and the other ten centers, now under the Ministry of Industry. How could there be any difference when they all embody the same Christian ideals of service, and have the same leadership?

Neither in Lichwan, nor in the ten other welfare centers, have we attempted to reconstruct rural life in a way that is peculiar to Christians. Rather have we attempted to discover methods that may be readily used by anyone interested in the welfare of the people.

The Church has demonstrated that it is willing to loan some of its men for work in this vast field of rural reconstruction, the edge of which we have scarcely touched. The Kingdom of God is real indeed when it can be brought down to life in the villages of war-torn Kiangsi.

Yet another place where Church and Government have been developing cooperation is in the health plans for the Nation. The first public health body in China, the Council on Health Education, was carried on for years under Christian auspices. Now that its functions have been largely taken over by the Government there are many gaps in the national health program that mission and church hospitals can fill. I am glad to know that the National Christian Council has a medical secretary assigned to this work of cooperation.

This spring the Central Health Administration at Nanking had four thousand dozen tubes of small-pox vaccine available for use in country districts. The New Life Movement was appealed to, through its medical advisor, Mrs. Shepherd, and she immediately arranged with local New Life Movement Associations in a few of the provinces to cooperate with mission hospitals, schools, and country churches in conducting vaccination campaigns in nearby villages. Health authorities have not yet perfected their machinery for reaching all the neglected areas, and, until they have, here is one place where the church is still able to serve the people. One-fourth of the available vaccine has been applied for, and is now being distributed. Sixty thousand people are being vaccinated through the combined efforts of government health stations, New Life Movement Associations, hospitals, schools and churches.

In Canton a Women’s Prayer League of one thousand members is being formed, all of whom pledge themselves and their families to pray daily for China and her leaders. This [Page 350] is one of the most practical forms of patriotism and one that will go far toward bringing about a strong spiritual unity. The New Life Movement urges that such Prayer Leagues be formed in every church throughout the country.

The Minister of Railways, Mr. Chang Kwang-ngau, is fitting up a special railway coach called “New Life on Wheels” that will travel over as many lines as possible, spending some time in centers large and small. It will be equipped with movies, and other forms of visual education, that can be used on the streets and in halls and chapels. See that your church cooperates with this unit when it comes to your locality. You can secure its schedule by writing to the New Life Movement Headquarters, Nanking.

Such cooperation need not overconcern itself with correct doctrines and pious aspirations, but with China’s ancient heritage, with sacrifice, and love for our fellows in His name.

Christianity has been correctly styled as materialistic, because in Christian lands have developed most of the modern scientific inventions which today go to make life longer and more comfortable. Other nations, such as ancient Greece, have given us the elements of physical science, but only in Christian countries have these sciences fully developed and become the common possession of all. In China we are rapidly introducing these modern ways of living to our people, and they are accepting them without question. The Apostle Paul dignified the whole physical life of man when he said “Know ye not that your bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit. . . .?” A more comfortable physical life is desirable for all, and not merely for the privileged few. Surely it is one of the responsibilities of the followers of Christ to see that “New Life” is put within the reach of all.

The status of women has been raised wherever the Christian faith has become known. Not so long ago, mission schools in China had to offer girls free tuition and spending money to induce them to accept a modern education. It is to the lasting credit of the missionaries that they used every means to get girls to study. Now these trained women are at the heart of many of the movements working to improve the living conditions and the status of their sisters throughout the provinces. Their faith is already in action. Let us carry our cooperative program, between New Life and the churches, for the improvement of the life of women and children, into every village and hamlet throughout the land. The Christian Church throughout the world is rich in finances and in consecrated, enthusiastic youth. Let us concentrate some of these resources upon the great need of our day.

The Chairman of the Kiangsi Provincial Government, General Hsiung Shih-hui, is just beginning a comprehensive program to improve the life of women and girls throughout the province. Under the able direction of Mrs. Chu Hsiung-tze these activities include complete cooperation with churches and social agencies within the province. When General Hsiung Shih-hui was in Peiping last year he [Page 351] asked some women members of the faculty of Yenching University to assist him in drawing up plans for this work, which he now refers to as his “threefold cooperative plan.” The first is cooperation with highly trained women, the second is cooperation with the churches and social agencies already at work in Kiangsi, and the third is cooperation with the Women’s Advisory Committee of the New Life Movement Headquarters. Evidently he is counting heavily upon the resources of the Church to make this ambitious undertaking of value to the nation in its struggle to improve the lot of women.

There are always those, even amongst our own people, who are afraid that cooperation with the government will not succeed. A prominent church social worker has been severely criticized by her own group for spending so much time and energy cooperating with the Women’s New Life Committee of the Provincial Government. We oftentimes lose sight of the fact, that, through well thought-out cooperation and service, everybody benefits. The church stands to benefit most of all from an enlightened prosperous community, and in my opinion, no enlightened community can afford to be without a church.

When we were desperately in need of college trained women to actually live in the Communist recovered villages of Kiangsi we appealed to Ginling College. The President Dr. Wu Yi-fang, Chairman of the National Christian Council, (whom I have asked to read these remarks) in consultation with other members of the faculty, has sent us qualified, unselfish hard-working graduates who are a credit to that already famous institution. We now say, “If Ginling College recommends a graduate for rural work, don’t ask any questions, tell them to send her immediately.”

Many educational institutions under the direction of Christians have contributed greatly toward bringing New Life to thousands of students. The low cost of administration and the high quality of work in Christian schools, often maintained under difficult circumstances, have all left their mark upon the nation. In the matter of education let us not “grow weary in well doing” and give up with our work just half-completed. The Generalissimo and I both feel that a religious faith is essential to a well rounded life. Without it education is incomplete. The nation is in great need of leaders, in all walks of life, who have Christian ideals of service, and who live up to them.

The Y.M.C.A. and the Y.W.C.A. have been in the front line of leadership and have slowly, through the years, been pressing upon us the necessity of a change in our manner of living. These two Associations are considered one of our greatest aids in giving youth a zest for New Life.

We must constantly remind ourselves that Jesus’ respect for personality did not stop with an interest in individuals. He was deeply concerned with the welfare of society, and talked incessantly about the Kingdom of Heaven, wherein dwelleth righteousness and justice for all.

The Chinese people have always displayed a profound respect for personality, and have been severely criticized [Page 352] by visitors for giving much time and thought to courtesies and “face.” Much of life is regulated by the requirements of custom, and the necessity for maintaining dignity. Offence must not be given, wherever it can be avoided. The ideal society, according to the genius of our race, is the “Golden Mean,” the middle of the road. All manner of extremes are to be avoided.

The totalitarian state will not meet with much response in China so long as it continues to exalt the state at the expense of the individual, and to crush personality in its fanatical drive toward establishing authority. The New Life Movement has definitely rejected all forms of regimentation as being opposed to the principles of Dr. Sun Yat-sen and as betraying the Chinese people into the hands of those, who, in their innermost souls, respect not personality, and the rights of individuals and groups.

The Chinese people have always had a mind of their own and will continue to think for themselves. They can cooperate only with those who understand their culture, their sense of justice, and their love of freedom. Chinese society has within itself the germ of a new life, but it needs direction and a deeper religious faith. The new China will arise upon foundations already laid by our ancestors, and not upon the current “isms” of our age.

III. The New Life Movement Is A Call To Assist In The Regeneration of A Nation.

Because of the trend of world events, in some circles there is a tendency toward discouragement, but our Christian faith will cease to be faith when we can no longer believe in the regeneration of a nation. The primary interest of Christianity is not systematic knowledge, known as theology, nor yet philosophy, though it may include these, but the relation of a personal faith to the men and women around us. One thing we must do is to find the point of contact between our faith and contemporary life. The need of our times should determine our perspective.

God, who all down through history has spoken to men through revelation, can, through His Holy Spirit, speak to us here. When He speaks we will know, for it will both convince the mind and satisfy the heart. In discovering the need for regeneration, and the resources at hand for meeting this need, we shall be drawn and carried along as on the crest of a great flood. As we proceed the details of our task will be made clear and comprehensive.

Two striking things about Christ are that He lived what He preached, and He had faith that could remove mountains. We shall need both of these qualities in increasing measure if we are to carry through this breathtaking venture of pointing the way to a new social order. The New Life Movement asks us to live up to the highest principles known to man, and to move forward in faith. Both call for positive action on the part of individuals and society, and are well within the realm of our Christian experience.

I am pleased to see that on the program at these meetings there is a main [Page 353] topic of the “CHURCH AND ITS RELATIONS,” and that under this heading you have included the New Life Movement. I am offering these few thoughts as my contribution toward the discussion of this important subject.

With reference to the regeneration of the nation, as I have intimated, important changes in the life of the people of China must come within the system given to us by our Late Leader, Dr. Sun Yat-sen. The Founder of the Chinese Republic was a man of faith and action. He had within his soul a burning passion for the uplift of the people who toil. Beyond the slightest trace of doubt, he walked in the steps of the Master. He lived in faith, and died in faith, leaving to us the task of completing the more important stages of the revolution.

The most important factor in reconstruction is the spiritual renewal of the people, and the improvement of their character. We cannot create the social life of the people, history has a long start on us in that, but it is within our power to regenerate it, and wholly transform it by breathing into it a new soul.

The beginning of the Christian life is really a “radical and permanent moral change wrought in the spiritual nature,” and commonly referred to as the New Birth. “A change in the growing purpose, reformation of habits and life, and continuation by the Holy Spirit of new ways of living,” this is New Life from within and the right place to begin the regeneration of a nation. In a very large measure this part of reconstruction is pre-eminently the work of the Church. Then let us do it together, the New Life Movement and the Church.


Address at Eleventh Annual Meeting of the National Christian Council of China, Shanghai, May 5-11, 1937.


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SOUL, MIND AND SPIRIT

‘ABDU’L-BAHÁ

Question—What is the difference between the mind, spirit, and soul?

Answer—It has been before explained that spirit is universally divided into five categories: the vegetable spirit, the animal spirit, the human spirit, the spirit of faith, and the Holy Spirit.

THE vegetable spirit is the power of growth which is brought about in the seed through the influence of other existences.

The animal spirit is the power of all the senses, which is realized from the composition and mingling of elements; when this composition decomposes, the power also perishes and becomes annihilated. It may be likened to this lamp: when the oil, wick, and fire are combined it is lighted, and when this combination is dissolved, that is to say when the combined parts are separated from one another, the lamp also is extinguished.

The human spirit which distinguishes man from the animal is the rational soul; and these two names— the human spirit and the rational soul —designate one thing. This spirit, which in the terminology of the philosophers is the rational soul, embraces all beings, and as far as human ability permits discovers the realities of things and becomes cognizant of their peculiarities and effects, and of the qualities and properties of beings. But the human spirit, unless assisted by the spirit of faith, does not become acquainted with the divine secrets and the heavenly realities. It is like a mirror which, although clear, polished, and brilliant, is still in need of light. Until a ray of the sun reflects upon it, it cannot discover the heavenly secrets.

But the mind is the power of the human spirit. Spirit is the lamp; mind is the light which shines from the lamp. Spirit is the tree, and the mind is the fruit. Mind is the perfection of the spirit, and is its essential quality, as the sun’s rays are the essential necessity of the sun.

This explanation, though short, is complete; therefore reflect upon it, and if God wills, you may become acquainted with the details.

THE PHYSICAL AND SPIRITUAL POWERS

IN man five outer powers exist, which are the agents of perception, that is to say, through these five powers man perceives material beings. These are sight, which perceives visible forms; hearing, which perceives audible sounds; smell, which perceives odors; taste, which perceives foods; and feeling, which is in all [Page 355] parts of the body, and perceives tangible things. These five powers perceive outward existences.

Man has also spiritual powers: imagination, which conceives things; thought, which reflects upon realities; comprehension, which comprehends realities, memory, which retains whatever man imagines, thinks, and comprehends. The intermediary between the five outward powers and the inward powers, is the sense which they possess in common, that is to say, the sense which acts between the outer and inner powers, conveys to the inward powers whatever the outer powers discern. It is termed the common faculty, because it communicates between the outward and inward powers, and thus is common to the outward and inward powers.

For instance, sight is one of the outer powers; it sees and perceives this flower, and conveys this perception to the inner power—the common faculty—which transmits this perception to the power of imagination, which in its turn conceives and forms this image and transmits it to the power of thought; the power of thought reflects, and having grasped the reality, conveys it to the power of comprehension; the comprehension, when it has comprehended it, delivers the image of the object perceived to the memory, and the memory keeps it in its repository.

The outward powers are five: the power of sight, of hearing, of taste, of smell, and of feeling.

The inner powers are also five: the common faculty, and the powers of imagination, thought, comprehension, and memory.


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CONFLICTING WORLD VIEWS

HORACE HOLLEY

AS the war of 1914-1918 recedes, the conviction deepens that the historic meaning of that bitter conflict is that it brought about a general unsettlement of human affairs. That frenzied outburst of relief which all shared on the day of Armistice was the greatest of illusions. The ending of war illumined the passion for peace but vastly enlarged the causes of future disturbance. Far from settling any fundamental issue, the war actually terminated the epoch during which public policy rested on the assumption that immediate political or economic needs could be fulfilled by disregarding the spiritual truth concerning humanity and civilization.

This meaning becomes clear by comparison of the fundamental difference between the social problem prior to the war and that established since the war.

The nations prior to 1914 had each their internal, domestic social problems, represented by the strife of organized groups. These competitive groups, whether of class, race or creed, were animated by irreconcilable aims. Nationalism was a chariot drawn by untamed horses only partly obedient to the driver’s whip. The existence of the state, however, depended upon sufficient compromise to prevent the outbreak of actual civil war. The shifts of party government, the rapid interchange of domestic policy between conservative and radical, each hoping for a final victory, and by that hope made unwilling to demand a decision that might jeopardize the structure of the state in relation to other states,—these non-military revolutions served to create the necessary compromise and relieve an otherwise explosive tension. The supreme necessity for maintaining the state preserved the precarious balance of contending domestic parties until the post-war period in which we now are.

The characteristic of the present period is that the irreconcilable aims formerly compelled to compromise by the superior power of the state—the aims formulated and organized only in terms of internal, domestic parties —have become sovereign states themselves. This is the essential truth to be realized: that the compulsion to compromise has in this epoch been removed from those competitive class programs and purposes existing hitherto only as component parts of one surrounding and superior national state. The political map of the current period contains powerful states each of which is nothing but a pre-war [Page 357] class philosophy come to fulfilment in terms of military as well as legal and financial power. The seeds of dissension sowed since the breakdown of feudalism have become towering trees.

This fundamentally altered world situation, with its emphasis on unchecked collective will and concentrated collective action, represents the very finality of struggle. No superior sovereignty exists any longer with capacity to compel even discussion of the relative merits of these conflicting philosophies. In assuming sovereignty, their ideas, their methods and their purposes have become unresponsive to the rational habit and to the practice of collective consultation. The limitations of historic wisdom have been cast aside, along with any ethical standards which might have had influence when the parties to the struggle felt themselves, to some degree at least, members of a common social household. The ill feeling between an employer and his employees living in the same village sixty years ago could be suppressed by the police; it could be removed by honest personal discussion; it could be mitigated by mutual standards of patriotism or of religion. That same ill feeling, organized as competitive sovereign states, commanding not merely the police but the army and navy, loyal only to its own avowed aim of supremacy, has passed utterly beyond human control. Here lies the difference between the world of yesterday and of today. Yesterday there existed the opportunity for reconciliation and understanding—the opportunity to find a truth and a policy larger and more inclusive than any and all partisan platforms; today, the decision for final struggle has already been cast. Peace will not come to earth until these warring fragments of humanity we call nations have through agony realized the need for a world sovereignty, an all-surrounding, unified society possessing not merely superior power but supreme truth. For the nature of these conflicting class philosophies is that of the simple and primitive hatreds, jealousies and fears which have tormented the race since the dawn of time. He-who-has and he-who-has-not, he-who-builds and he-who-destroys, he-who-shares and he-who-shares-not, these are the types of discord which now advance to the final challenge. The situation which arose in every village, then in every city, then in every nation, repeats itself again, but this time it involves the entire world.

IT is only when a social trend becomes fulfilled that one can understand the relation of its earlier phases to the main movement. The criticism of the parliamentary process, for example, is clearly based on two different conditions. In itself, that process was the sole method by which a society at all mature could adjust the rival pressure of internal groups. The deliberation of a legislative body representing all groups can not be entirely satisfactory to any one group or party seeking exclusive influence. Now that some of these exclusive interests have attained sovereign power, their legislative problem has changed from compromise to action. Moreover, the parliamentary process [Page 358] in all countries tended to concern itself more with perfecting the technic of compromise and relieving the strains of a restless, unbalanced political economy than with solving the fundamental issues reflected in party strife. In failing to remove these issues, the process itself became discredited. The view arose that there are better forms of government than those which rest legislation upon discussion and majority vote.

The trend is open to even more fundamental analysis than one considering government only in terms of its form and structure.

For in reality it was not a political failure when legislatures found it impossible to reconcile the claims of capital and labor or bring other sources of internal strife to a permanent truce. The failure was spiritual, caused by the lack of any paramount motive for unity more forceful than the motives for strife, and by lack of any clear vision of what a balanced and truly progressive civilization might be. The pre-war legislative process was carried on in an ethical twilight, for the light of truth had set.

This spiritual failure, the antecedent cause of every social collapse, was emphasized by the fact that churches, as well as classes, constituted political parties in many countries and employed the same kind of pressure to secure their ends. Religion in its purity is the creator of those fundamental bonds which make human association possible in terms of peaceful deliberation. The rupture of those bonds has always been the historical evidence that the spirit of religion has ebbed away. In place of a social unity making for peaceful progress, we have only that false unity in which people are fused for war.

The underlying spiritual failure is likewise indicated by the degree to which the economic and political aims of aggressive nations are today justified by philosophies of history, philosophies of race and psychologies of behavior and adaptation, all of which tend to reduce human nature to a materialistic and physical level lower than the idealism inspired by true faith. Modern aggression has not only achieved new governmental forms which magnify action at the expense of deliberation and thought but also inner values which stultify the teachings of the founders of religion. The individual, if he be still free to choose his world outlook, can apparently select any one of a number of social philosophies claiming to explain past, present and future history and clarify the nature of human existence; and with his selection, find himself part of an organization intending to establish its standard of values upon the rest of the world by sheer force.

THIS attitude, that a social philosophy, although asserted as truth, must nevertheless command the resources of compulsive power, can only be regarded as the very degradation of man. Human nature can plunge no deeper into the abyss, can retreat no farther from its spiritual inheritance than such dragging of truth after the chariot wheels of militarism. The aggressiveness of such public policy in relation to foreign affairs can only be measured by the aggressiveness it has already exercised at [Page 359] home. A materialistic society can only concentrate its force for attack by suppressing or corrupting the human nature of its own members. It removes all real distinction between war and revolution, for its whole existence is of the essence of war.

THE post-war period, consequently, can only be of brief duration. It stands in the position of climax to a long historic trend away from true religion. It represents the struggle of localisms each claiming to be the one universal world view. It has lost the binding element which makes for human association. Its civilization is artificial, lacking mind and heart because it lacks a conscious soul. The pattern of life has been lost, and no human power can supply the pattern of a unified world. Foreseeing such a condition, Bahá’u’lláh declared: “Members of the human race! Hold ye fast by the Cord which no man can sever. This will, indeed, profit you all the days of your life, for its strength is of God, the Lord of all worlds. Cleave ye to justice and fairness, and turn away from the whisperings of the foolish, them that are estranged from God, that have decked their heads with the ornament of the learned, and have condemned to death Him who is the Fountain of Wisdom. My name hath uplifted them to lofty grades, and yet, no sooner did I reveal Myself to their eyes than they, with manifest injustice, pronounced the sentence of My death. Thus hath Our Pen revealed the truth, and yet the people are sunk in heedlessness.

“Whoso cleaveth to justice, can, under no circumstances, transgress the limits of moderation. He discerneth the truth in all things, through the guidance of Him who is the All-Seeing. The civilization, so often vaunted by the learned exponents of arts and sciences, will, if allowed to overleap the bounds of moderation, bring great evil upon men. Thus warneth you He who is the All-Knowing. If carried to excess, civilization will prove as prolific a source of evil as it had been of goodness when kept within the restraints of moderation. Meditate on this, O people, and be not of them that wander distraught in the wilderness of error. The day is approaching when its flame will devour the cities, when the Tongue of Grandeur will proclaim: ‘The Kingdom is God’s, the Almighty, the All-Praised!’”

How fatally this militarized civilization contrasts with that meekness of the early Christians who, fortified only with an inner assurance, pressed forward through the cruel oppressions of a collapsing Rome until its ways had been left behind and their unity formed the nucleus of the future Europe!

Religion, indeed, when truly understood, consists of no mere catalog of rites and rituals, but is the creator of the motives which civilization can only dimly reflect. The relationship of religion to society is that of cause to effect. The condition of religion at any given time is the true and sole criterion of what the condition of the society will be in a few generations. A living faith animates the body of the people with the power to progress in unity and order. The religious [Page 360] community can solve the problems of human relations without cleavage, for its instinctive spirit knows how to refer such problems to a higher standard acceptable to all. But when a society deteriorates to the point of actual rebellion among its members, that moribund condition is the sign that the animating spirit exists no more. Such a society can only be regenerated by the return of the mysterious spirit of faith whose movements no institution or social body can control.

Humanity is in desperate need of the veritable world outlook raised high above the clash of those social philosophies which now claim universality but in fact are sectarian and partisan in nature. Proceeding from a limited view of man’s innate being, they carry forward to the bitter end an inherent incapacity to produce a living and organic human society, excluding as they do the very foundation of man’s life, its relation to God. Therefore, once more, the captains and the kings depart, and the soul of the meek and faithful aspires to a realm of spiritual power.


The first article in a symposium on the subject of The World Outlook.




THE passionate and violent happenings that have, in recent years, strained to almost the point of complete breakdown the political and economic structure of society are too numerous and complex to attempt, within the limitations of this general survey, to arrive at an adequate estimate of their character. Nor have these tribulations, grievous as they have been, seem to have reached their climax, and exerted the full force of their destructive power. The whole world, wherever and however we survey it, offers us the sad and pitiful spectacle of a vast, an enfeebled, and moribund organism, which is being torn politically and strangulated economically by forces it has ceased to either control or comprehend. The Great Depression, the aftermath of the severest ordeal humanity had ever experienced, the disintegration of the Versailles system, the recrudescence of militarism in its most menacing aspects, the failure of vast experiments and new-born institutions to safeguard the peace and tranquillity of peoples, classes and nations, have bitterly disillusioned humanity and prostrated its spirits. Its hopes are, for the most part, shattered, its vitality is ebbing, its life strangely disordered, its unity severely compromised.—SHOGHI EFFENDI.


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EDITORIAL PURPOSE

• WORLD ORDER MAGAZINE seeks to mirror forth the principles revealed by Bahá’u’lláh for the renewal and unification of society. These principles it recognizes as the impetus and the goal of all the influences making for regeneration throughout the world. It feels itself a part of the new world community coming into being, the commonwealth of mind and spirit raised high above the conflicts, the passions, the prejudices and the violences marking the passing of the old order and the birth of the new. Its aim is to maintain a meeting-place consecrated to peace, where minds touched with the spirit of the age may gather for calm and dispassionate discussion of truth. The scope of its content is best defined in the following summary of the Bahá’í Faith:—

• “The Bahá’í Faith recognizes the unity of God and of His Prophets, upholds the principle of an unfettered search affer truth, condemns all forms of superstitions and prejudice, teaches that the fundamental purpose of religion is to promote concord and harmony, that it must go hand-in-hand with science, and that it constitutes the sole and ultimate basis of a peaceful, an ordered and progressive society. It inculcates the principle of equal opportunity, rights and privileges for both sexes, advocates compulsory education, abolishes extremes of wealth and poverty, exalts work performed in the spirit of service to the rank of worship, recommends the adoption of an auxiliary international language, and provides the necessary agencies for the establishment and safeguarding of a permanent and universal peace.”


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TOWARDS THIS GOAL OF A NEW WORLD ORDER, DIVINE IN ORIGIN, ALL- EMBRACING IN SCOPE, HUMANIIY MUST STRIVE