God Passes By Part 20

The first act of His ministry had been to unfurl the standard of Baha'u'llah in the very heart of that Republic. This was followed by His own prolonged visit to its sh.o.r.es, by His dedication of the first House of Worship to be built by the community of His disciples in that land, and finally by the revelation, in the evening of His life, of the Tablets of the Divine Plan, investing His disciples with a mandate to plant the banner of His Father's Faith, as He had planted it in their own land, in all the continents, the countries and islands of the globe. He had, furthermore, acclaimed one of their most celebrated presidents as one who, through the ideals he had expounded and the inst.i.tutions he had inaugurated, had caused the "dawn" of the Peace antic.i.p.ated by Baha'u'llah to break; had voiced the hope that from their country "heavenly illumination" may "stream to all the peoples of the world"; had designated them in those Tablets as "Apostles of Baha'u'llah"; had a.s.sured them that, "should success crown" their "enterprise," "the throne of the Kingdom of G.o.d will, in the plenitude of its majesty and glory, be firmly established"; and had made the stirring announcement that "the moment this Divine Message is propagated" by them "through the continents of Europe, of Asia, of Africa and of Australasia, and as far as the islands of the Pacific, this community will find itself securely established upon the throne of an everlasting dominion," and that "the whole earth" would "resound with the praises of its majesty and greatness."

That Community had already, in the lifetime of Him Who had created it, tenderly nursed and repeatedly blessed it, and had at last conferred upon it so distinctive a mission, arisen to launch the enterprise of the Ma_sh_riqu'l-A_dh_kar through the purchase of its land and the laying of its foundations. It had despatched its teachers to the East and to the West to propagate the Cause it had espoused, had established the basis of its community life, and had, since His pa.s.sing, erected the superstructure and commenced the external ornamentation of its Temple. It had, moreover, a.s.sumed a preponderating share in the task of erecting the framework of the Administrative Order of the Faith, of championing its cause, of demonstrating its independent character, of enriching and disseminating its literature, of lending moral and material a.s.sistance to its persecuted followers, of repelling the a.s.saults of its adversaries and of winning the allegiance of royalty to its Founder. Such a splendid record was to culminate, as the century approached its end, in the initiation of a Plan-the first stage in the execution of the Mission entrusted to it by 'Abdu'l-Baha-which, within the s.p.a.ce of seven brief years, was to bring to a successful completion the exterior ornamentation of the Ma_sh_riqu'l-A_dh_kar, to almost double the number of Spiritual a.s.semblies functioning in the North American continent, to bring the total number of localities in which Baha'is reside to no less than thirteen hundred and twenty-two in that same continent, to establish the structural basis of the Administrative Order in every state of the United States and every province of Canada, and by laying a firm anchorage in each of the twenty Republics of Central and South America, to swell to sixty the number of the sovereign states included within its...o...b..t.

Many and diverse forces combined now to urge the American Baha'i community to strong action: the glowing exhortations and promises of Baha'u'llah and His behest to erect in His name Houses of Worship; the directions issued by 'Abdu'l-Baha in fourteen Tablets addressed to the believers residing in the Western, the Central, the North Eastern and Southern States of the North American Republic and in the Dominion of Canada; His prophetic utterances regarding the future of the Ma_sh_riqu'l-A_dh_kar in America; the influence of the new Administrative Order in fostering and rendering effective an eager spirit of cooperation; the example of Martha Root who, though equipped with no more than a handful of inadequately translated leaflets, had traveled to South America and visited every important city in that continent; the tenacity and self-sacrifice of the fearless and brilliant Keith Ransom-Kehler, the first American martyr, who, journeying to Persia had pleaded in numerous interviews with ministers, ecclesiastics and government officials the cause of her down-trodden brethren in that land, had addressed no less than seven pet.i.tions to the _Sh_ah, and, heedless of the warnings of age and ill-health, had at last succ.u.mbed in I?fahan. Other factors which spurred the members of that community to fresh sacrifices and adventure were their eagerness to reinforce the work intermittently undertaken through the settlement and travels of a number of pioneers, who had established the first center of the Faith in Brazil, circ.u.mnavigated the South American continent and visited the West Indies and distributed literature in various countries of Central and South America; the consciousness of their pressing responsibilities in the face of a rapidly deteriorating international situation; the realization that the first Baha'i century was fast speeding to a close and their anxiety to bring to a befitting conclusion an enterprise that had been launched thirty years previously. Undeterred by the immensity of the field, the power wielded by firmly entrenched ecclesiastical organizations, the political instability of some of the countries in which they were to settle, the climatic conditions they were to encounter, and the difference in language and custom of the people amongst whom they were to reside, and keenly aware of the crying needs of the Faith in the North American continent, the members of the American Baha'i community arose, as one man, to inaugurate a threefold campaign, carefully planned and systematically conducted, designed to establish a Spiritual a.s.sembly in every virgin state and province in North America, to form a nucleus of resident believers in each of the Republics of Central and South America, and to consummate the exterior ornamentation of the Ma_sh_riqu'l-A_dh_kar.

A hundred activities, administrative and educational, were devised and pursued for the prosecution of this n.o.ble Plan. Through the liberal contribution of funds; through the establishment of an Inter-America Committee and the formation of auxiliary Regional Teaching Committees; through the founding of an International School to provide training for Baha'i teachers; through the settlement of pioneers in virgin areas and the visits of itinerant teachers; through the dissemination of literature in Spanish and Portuguese; through the initiation of teacher training courses and extension work by groups and local a.s.semblies; through newspaper and radio publicity; through the exhibition of Temple slides and models; through inter-community conferences and lectures delivered in universities and colleges; through the intensification of teaching courses and Latin American studies at summer schools-through these and other activities the prosecutors of this Seven-Year Plan have succeeded in sealing the triumph of what must be regarded as the greatest collective enterprise ever launched by the followers of Baha'u'llah in the entire history of the first Baha'i century.

Indeed, ere the expiry of that century not only had the work on the Temple been completed sixteen months before the appointed time, but instead of one tiny nucleus in every Latin Republic, Spiritual a.s.semblies had already been established in Mexico City and Puebla (Mexico), in Buenos Aires (Argentina), in Guatemala City (Guatemala), in Santiago (Chile), in Montevideo (Uruguay), in Quito (Ecuador), in Bogota (Colombia), in Lima (Peru), in Asuncion (Paraguay), in Tegucigalpa (Honduras), in San Salvador (El-Salvador), in San Jose and Puntarenas (Costa Rica), in Havana (Cuba) and in Port-au-Prince (Haiti). Extension work, in which newly fledged Latin American believers were partic.i.p.ating, had, moreover, been initiated, and was being vigorously carried out, in the Republics of Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Panama and Costa Rica; believers had established their residence not only in the capital cities of all the Latin American Republics, but also in such centers as Veracruz, Cananea and Tacubaya (Mexico), in Balboa and Christobal (Panama), in Recife (Brazil), in Guayaquil and Ambato (Ecuador), and in Temuco and Magellanes (Chile); the Spiritual a.s.semblies of the Baha'is of Mexico City and of San Jose had been incorporated; in the former city a Baha'i center, comprising a library, a reading room and a lecture room, had been founded; Baha'i Youth Symposiums had been observed in Havana, Buenos Aires and Santiago, whilst a distributing center of Baha'i literature for Latin America had been established in Buenos Aires.

Nor was this gigantic enterprise destined to be deprived, in its initial stage, of a blessing that was to cement the spiritual union of the Americas-a blessing flowing from the sacrifice of one who, at the very dawn of the Day of the Covenant, had been responsible for the establishment of the first Baha'i centers in both Europe and the Dominion of Canada, and who, though seventy years of age and suffering from ill-health, undertook a six thousand mile voyage to the capital of Argentina, where, while still on the threshold of her pioneer service, she suddenly pa.s.sed away, imparting through such a death to the work initiated in that Republic an impetus which has already enabled it, through the establishment of a distributing center of Baha'i literature for Latin America and through other activities, to a.s.sume the foremost position among its sister Republics.

To May Maxwell, laid to rest in the soil of Argentina; to Hyde Dunn, whose dust reposes in the Antipodes, in the city of Sydney; to Keith Ransom-Kehler, entombed in distant I?fahan; to Susan Moody and Lillian Kappes and their valiant a.s.sociates who lie buried in ?ihran; to Lua Getsinger, reposing forever in the capital of Egypt, and last but not least to Martha Root, interred in an island in the bosom of the Pacific, belong the matchless honor of having conferred, through their services and sacrifice, a l.u.s.tre upon the American Baha'i community for which its representatives, while celebrating at their historic, their first All-American Convention, their hard-won victories, may well feel eternally grateful.

Gathered within the walls of its national Shrine-the most sacred Temple ever to be reared to the glory of Baha'u'llah; commemorating at once the centenary of the birth of the Babi Dispensation, of the inauguration of the Baha'i era, of the inception of the Baha'i Cycle and of the birth of 'Abdu'l-Baha, as well as the fiftieth anniversary of the establishment of the Faith in the Western Hemisphere; a.s.sociated in its celebration with the representatives of American Republics, foregathered in the close vicinity of a city that may well pride itself on being the first Baha'i center established in the Western world, this community may indeed feel, on this solemn occasion, that it has, in its turn, through the triumphal conclusion of the first stage of the Plan traced for it by 'Abdu'l-Baha, shed a lasting glory upon its sister communities in East and West, and written, in golden letters, the concluding pages in the annals of the first Baha'i century.

Retrospect and Prospect

Thus drew to a close the first century of the Baha'i era-an epoch which, in its sublimity and fecundity, is without parallel in the entire field of religious history, and indeed in the annals of mankind. A process, G.o.d-impelled, endowed with measureless potentialities, mysterious in its workings, awful in the retribution meted out to every one seeking to resist its operation, infinitely rich in its promise for the regeneration and redemption of human kind, had been set in motion in _Sh_iraz, had gained momentum successively in ?ihran, Ba_gh_dad, Adrianople and Akka, had projected itself across the seas, poured its generative influences into the West, and manifested the initial evidences of its marvelous, world-energizing force in the midst of the North American continent.

It had sprung from the heart of Asia, and pressing westward had gathered speed in its resistless course, until it had encircled the earth with a girdle of glory. It had been generated by the son of a mercer in the province of Fars, had been reshaped by a n.o.bleman of Nur, had been reinforced through the exertions of One Who had spent the fairest years of His youth and manhood in exile and imprisonment, and had achieved its most conspicuous triumphs in a country and amidst a people living half the circ.u.mference of the globe distant from the land of its origin. It had repulsed every onslaught directed against it, torn down every barrier opposing its advance, abased every proud antagonist who had sought to sap its strength, and had exalted to heights of incredible courage the weakest and humblest among those who had arisen and become willing instruments of its revolutionizing power. Heroic struggles and matchless victories, interwoven with appalling tragedies and condign punishments, have formed the pattern of its hundred year old history.

A handful of students, belonging to the _Sh_ay_kh_i school, sprung from the I_th_na-'A_sh_'ariyyih sect of _Sh_i'ah Islam, had, in consequence of the operation of this process, been expanded and transformed into a world community, closely knit, clear of vision, alive, consecrated by the sacrifice of no less than twenty thousand martyrs; supranational; non-sectarian; non-political; claiming the status, and a.s.suming the functions, of a world religion; spread over five continents and the islands of the seas; with ramifications extending over sixty sovereign states and seventeen dependencies; equipped with a literature translated and broadcast in forty languages; exercising control over endowments representing several million dollars; recognized by a number of governments in both the East and the West; integral in aim and outlook; possessing no professional clergy; professing a single belief; following a single law; animated by a single purpose; organically united through an Administrative Order, divinely ordained and unique in its features; including within its...o...b..t representatives of all the leading religions of the world, of various cla.s.ses and races; faithful to its civil obligations; conscious of its civic responsibilities, as well as of the perils confronting the society of which it forms a part; sharing the sufferings of that society and confident of its own high destiny.

The nucleus of this community had been formed by the Bab, soon after the night of the Declaration of His Mission to Mulla ?usayn in _Sh_iraz. A clamor in which the _Sh_ah, his government, his people and the entire ecclesiastical hierarchy of his country unanimously joined had greeted its birth. Captivity, swift and cruel, in the mountains of a_dh_irbayjan, had been the lot of its youthful Founder, almost immediately after His return from His pilgrimage to Mecca. Amidst the solitude of Mah-Ku and _Ch_ihriq, He had inst.i.tuted His Covenant, formulated His laws, and transmitted to posterity the overwhelming majority of His writings. A conference of His disciples, headed by Baha'u'llah, had, in the hamlet of Bada_sh_t, abrogated in dramatic circ.u.mstances the laws of the Islamic, and ushered in the new, Dispensation. In Tabriz He had, in the presence of the Heir to the Throne and the leading ecclesiastical dignitaries of a_dh_irbayjan, publicly and unreservedly voiced His claim to be none other than the promised, the long-awaited Qa'im. Tempests of devastating violence in Mazindaran, Nayriz, Zanjan and ?ihran had decimated the ranks of His followers and robbed Him of the n.o.blest and most valuable of His supporters. He Himself had to witness the virtual annihilation of His Faith and the loss of most of the Letters of the Living, and, after experiencing, in His own person, a series of bitter humiliations, He had been executed by a firing squad in the barrack-square of Tabriz. A blood bath of unusual ferocity had engulfed the greatest heroine of His Faith, had further denuded it of its adherents, had extinguished the life of His trusted amanuensis and repository of His last wishes, and swept Baha'u'llah into the depths of the foulest dungeon of ?ihran.

In the pestilential atmosphere of the Siyah-_Ch_al, nine years after that historic Declaration, the Message proclaimed by the Bab had yielded its fruit, His promise had been redeemed, and the most glorious, the most momentous period of the Heroic Age of the Baha'i era had dawned. A momentary eclipse of the newly risen Sun of Truth, the world's greatest Luminary, had ensued, as a result of Baha'u'llah's precipitate banishment to 'Iraq by order of Na?iri'd-Din _Sh_ah, of His sudden withdrawal to the mountains of Kurdistan, and of the degradation and confusion that afflicted the remnant of the persecuted community of His fellow-disciples in Ba_gh_dad. A reversal in the fortunes of a fast declining community, following His return from His two-year retirement, had set in, bringing in its wake the recreation of that community, the reformation of its morals, the enhancement of its prestige, the enrichment of its doctrine, and culminating in the Declaration of His Mission in the garden of Najibiyyih to His immediate companions on the eve of His banishment to Constantinople. Another crisis-the severest a struggling Faith was destined to experience in the course of its history-precipitated by the rebellion of the Bab's nominee and the iniquities perpetrated by him and by the evil genius that had seduced him, had, in Adrianople, well nigh disrupted the newly consolidated forces of the Faith and all but destroyed in a baptism of fire the community of the Most Great Name which Baha'u'llah had called into being. Cleansed of the pollution of this "Most Great Idol," undeterred by the convulsion that had seized it, an indestructible Faith had, in the strength of the Covenant inst.i.tuted by the Bab, now surmounted the most formidable obstacles it was ever to meet; and in this very hour it reached its meridian glory through the proclamation of the Mission of Baha'u'llah to the kings, the rulers and ecclesiastical leaders of the world in both the East and the West. Close on the heels of this unprecedented victory had followed the climax of His sufferings, a banishment to the penal colony of Akka, decreed by Sul?an 'Abdu'l-'Aziz. This had been hailed by vigilant enemies as the signal for the final extermination of a much feared and hated adversary, and it had heaped upon that Faith in this fortress-town, designated by Baha'u'llah as His "Most Great Prison," calamities from both within and without, such as it had never before experienced. The formulation of the laws and ordinances of a new-born Dispensation and the enunciation and reaffirmation of its fundamental principles-the warp and woof of a future Administrative Order-had, however, enabled a slowly maturing Revelation, in spite of this tide of tribulations, to advance a stage further and yield its fairest fruit.

The ascension of Baha'u'llah had plunged into grief and bewilderment His loyal supporters, quickened the hopes of the betrayers of His Cause, who had rebelled against His G.o.d-given authority, and rejoiced and encouraged His political as well as ecclesiastical adversaries. The Instrument He had forged, the Covenant He had Himself inst.i.tuted, had ca.n.a.lized, after His pa.s.sing, the forces released by Him in the course of a forty-year ministry, had preserved the unity of His Faith and provided the impulse required to propel it forward to achieve its destiny. The proclamation of this new Covenant had been followed by yet another crisis, precipitated by one of His own sons on whom, according to the provisions of that Instrument, had been conferred a rank second to none except the Center of that Covenant Himself. Impelled by the forces engendered by the revelation of that immortal and unique Doc.u.ment, an unbreachable Faith (having registered its initial victory over the Covenant-breakers), had, under the leadership of 'Abdu'l-Baha, irradiated the West, illuminated the Western fringes of Europe, hoisted its banner in the heart of the North American continent, and set in motion the processes that were to culminate in the transfer of the mortal remains of its Herald to the Holy Land and their entombment in a mausoleum on Mt. Carmel, as well as in the erection of its first House of Worship in Russian Turkistan. A major crisis, following swiftly upon the signal victories achieved in East and West, attributable to the monstrous intrigues of the Arch-breaker of Baha'u'llah's Covenant and to the orders issued by the tyrannical 'Abdu'l-?amid, had exposed, during more than seven years, the Heart and Center of the Faith to imminent peril, filled with anxiety and anguish its followers and postponed the execution of the enterprises conceived for its spread and consolidation. 'Abdu'l-Baha's historic journeys in Europe and America, soon after the fall of that tyrant and the collapse of his regime, had dealt a staggering blow to the Covenant-breakers, had consolidated the colossal enterprise He had undertaken in the opening years of His ministry, had raised the prestige of His Father's Faith to heights it had never before attained, had been instrumental in proclaiming its verities far and wide, and had paved the way for the diffusion of its light over the Far East and as far as the Antipodes. Another major crisis-the last the Faith was to undergo at its world center-provoked by the cruel Jamal Pa_sh_a, and accentuated by the anxieties of a devastating world war, by the privations it entailed and the rupture of communications it brought about, had threatened with still graver peril the Head of the Faith Himself, as well as the holiest sanctuaries enshrining the remains of its twin Founders. The revelation of the Tablets of the Divine Plan, during the somber days of that tragic conflict, had, in the concluding years of 'Abdu'l-Baha's ministry, invested the members of the leading Baha'i community in the West-the champions of a future Administrative Order-with a world mission which, in the concluding years of the first Baha'i century, was to shed deathless glory upon the Faith and its administrative inst.i.tutions. The conclusion of that long and distressing conflict had frustrated the hopes of that military despot and inflicted an ignominious defeat on him, had removed, once and for all, the danger that had overshadowed for sixty-five years the Founder of the Faith and the Center of His Covenant, fulfilled the prophecies recorded by Him in His writings, enhanced still further the prestige of His Faith and its Leader, and been signalized by the spread of His Message to the continent of Australia.

The sudden pa.s.sing of 'Abdu'l-Baha, marking the close of the Primitive Age of the Faith, had, as had been the case with the ascension of His Father, submerged in sorrow and consternation His faithful disciples, imparted fresh hopes to the dwindling followers of both Mirza Ya?ya and Mirza Mu?ammad-'Ali, and stirred to feverish activity political as well as ecclesiastical adversaries, all of whom antic.i.p.ated the impending dismemberment of the communities which the Center of the Covenant had so greatly inspired and ably led. The promulgation of His Will and Testament, inaugurating the Formative Age of the Baha'i era, the Charter delineating the features of an Order which the Bab had announced, which Baha'u'llah had envisioned, and whose laws and principles He had enunciated, had galvanized these communities in Europe, Asia, Africa and America into concerted action, enabling them to erect and consolidate the framework of this Order, by establishing its local and national a.s.semblies, by framing the const.i.tutions of these a.s.semblies, by securing the recognition on the part of the civil authorities in various countries of these inst.i.tutions, by founding administrative headquarters, by raising the superstructure of the first House of Worship in the West, by establishing and extending the scope of the endowments of the Faith and by obtaining the full recognition by the civil authorities of the religious character of these endowments at its world center as well as in the North American continent.

A severe, a historic censure p.r.o.nounced by a Muslim ecclesiastical court in Egypt had, whilst this mighty process-the laying of the structural basis of the Baha'i world Administrative Order-was being initiated, officially expelled all adherents of the Faith of Muslim extraction from Islam, had condemned them as heretics and brought the members of a proscribed community face to face with tests and perils of a character they had never known before. The unjust decision of a civil court in Ba_gh_dad, instigated by _Sh_i'ah enemies, in 'Iraq, and the decree issued by a still more redoubtable adversary in Russia had, moreover, robbed the Faith, on the one hand, of one of its holiest centers of pilgrimage, and denied it, on the other, the use of its first House of Worship, initiated by 'Abdu'l-Baha and erected in the course of His ministry. And finally, inspired by this unexpected declaration made by an age-long enemy-marking the first step in the march of their Faith towards total emanc.i.p.ation-and undaunted by this double blow struck at its inst.i.tutions, the followers of Baha'u'llah, already united and fully equipped through the agencies of a firmly established Administrative Order, had arisen to crown the immortal records of the first Baha'i century by vindicating the independent character of their Faith, by enforcing the fundamental laws ordained in their Most Holy Book, by demanding and in some cases obtaining, the recognition by the ruling authorities of their right to be cla.s.sified as followers of an independent religion, by securing from the world's highest Tribunal its condemnation of the injustice they had suffered at the hands of their persecutors, by establishing their residence in no less than thirty-four additional countries, as well as in thirteen dependencies, by disseminating their literature in twenty-nine additional languages, by enrolling a Queen in the ranks of the supporters of their Cause, and lastly by launching an enterprise which, as that century approached its end, enabled them to complete the exterior ornamentation of their second House of Worship, and to bring to a successful conclusion the first stage of the Plan which 'Abdu'l-Baha had conceived for the world-wide and systematic propagation of their Faith.

Kings, emperors, princes, whether of the East or of the West, had, as we look back upon the tumultuous record of an entire century, either ignored the summons of its Founders, or derided their Message, or decreed their exile and banishment, or barbarously persecuted their followers, or sedulously striven to discredit their teachings. They were visited by the wrath of the Almighty, many losing their thrones, some witnessing the extinction of their dynasties, a few being a.s.sa.s.sinated or covered with shame, others finding themselves powerless to avert the cataclysmic dissolution of their kingdoms, still others being degraded to positions of subservience in their own realms. The Caliphate, its arch-enemy, had unsheathed the sword against its Author and thrice p.r.o.nounced His banishment. It was humbled to dust, and, in its ignominious collapse, suffered the same fate as the Jewish hierarchy, the chief persecutor of Jesus Christ, had suffered at the hands of its Roman masters, in the first century of the Christian Era, almost two thousand years before. Members of various sacerdotal orders, _Sh_i'ah, Sunni, Zoroastrian and Christian, had fiercely a.s.sailed the Faith, branded as heretic its supporters, and labored unremittingly to disrupt its fabric and subvert its foundations.

The most redoubtable and hostile amongst these orders were either overthrown or virtually dismembered, others rapidly declined in prestige and influence, all were made to sustain the impact of a secular power, aggressive and determined to curtail their privileges and a.s.sert its own authority. Apostates, rebels, betrayers, heretics, had exerted their utmost endeavors, privily or openly, to sap the loyalty of the followers of that Faith, to split their ranks or a.s.sault their inst.i.tutions. These enemies were, one by one, some gradually, others with dramatic swiftness, confounded, dispersed, swept away and forgotten. Not a few among its leading figures, its earliest disciples, its foremost champions, the companions and fellow-exiles of its Founders, trusted amanuenses and secretaries of its Author and of the Center of His Covenant, even some of those who were numbered among the kindred of the Manifestation Himself, not excluding the nominee of the Bab and the son of Baha'u'llah, named by Him in the Book of His Covenant, had allowed themselves to pa.s.s out from under its shadow, to bring shame upon it, through acts of indelible infamy, and to provoke crises of such dimensions as have never been experienced by any previous religion. All were precipitated, without exception, from the enviable positions they occupied, many of them lived to behold the frustration of their designs, others were plunged into degradation and misery, utterly impotent to impair the unity, or stay the march, of the Faith they had so shamelessly forsaken. Ministers, amba.s.sadors and other state dignitaries had plotted a.s.siduously to pervert its purpose, had instigated the successive banishments of its Founders, and maliciously striven to undermine its foundations. They had, through such plottings, unwittingly brought about their own downfall, forfeited the confidence of their sovereigns, drunk the cup of disgrace to its dregs, and irrevocably sealed their own doom. Humanity itself, perverse and utterly heedless, had refused to lend a hearing ear to the insistent appeals and warnings sounded by the twin Founders of the Faith, and later voiced by the Center of the Covenant in His public discourses in the West.

It had plunged into two desolating wars of unprecedented magnitude, which have deranged its equilibrium, mown down its youth, and shaken it to its roots. The weak, the obscure, the down-trodden had, on the other hand, through their allegiance to so mighty a Cause and their response to its summons, been enabled to accomplish such feats of valor and heroism as to equal, and in some cases to dwarf, the exploits of those men and women of undying fame whose names and deeds adorn the spiritual annals of mankind.

Despite the blows leveled at its nascent strength, whether by the wielders of temporal and spiritual authority from without, or by black-hearted foes from within, the Faith of Baha'u'llah had, far from breaking or bending, gone from strength to strength, from victory to victory. Indeed its history, if read aright, may be said to resolve itself into a series of pulsations, of alternating crises and triumphs, leading it ever nearer to its divinely appointed destiny. The outburst of savage fanaticism that greeted the birth of the Revelation proclaimed by the Bab, His subsequent arrest and captivity, had been followed by the formulation of the laws of His Dispensation, by the inst.i.tution of His Covenant, by the inauguration of that Dispensation in Bada_sh_t, and by the public a.s.sertion of His station in Tabriz. Widespread and still more violent uprisings in the provinces, His own execution, the blood bath which followed it and Baha'u'llah's imprisonment in the Siyah-_Ch_al had been succeeded by the breaking of the dawn of the Baha'i Revelation in that dungeon.

Baha'u'llah's banishment to 'Iraq, His withdrawal to Kurdistan and the confusion and distress that afflicted His fellow-disciples in Ba_gh_dad had, in turn, been followed by the resurgence of the Babi community, culminating in the Declaration of His Mission in the Najibiyyih Garden.

Sul?an 'Abdu'l-'Aziz's decree summoning Him to Constantinople and the crisis precipitated by Mirza Ya?ya had been succeeded by the proclamation of that Mission to the crowned heads of the world and its ecclesiastical leaders. Baha'u'llah's banishment to the penal colony of Akka, with all its attendant troubles and miseries, had, in its turn, led to the promulgation of the laws and ordinances of His Revelation and to the inst.i.tution of His Covenant, the last act of His life. The fiery tests engendered by the rebellion of Mirza Mu?ammad-'Ali and his a.s.sociates had been succeeded by the introduction of the Faith of Baha'u'llah in the West and the transfer of the Bab's remains to the Holy Land. The renewal of 'Abdu'l-Baha's incarceration and the perils and anxieties consequent upon it had resulted in the downfall of 'Abdu'l-?amid, in 'Abdu'l-Baha's release from His confinement, in the entombment of the Bab's remains on Mt. Carmel, and in the triumphal journeys undertaken by the Center of the Covenant Himself in Europe and America. The outbreak of a devastating world war and the deepening of the dangers to which Jamal Pa_sh_a and the Covenant-breakers had exposed Him had led to the revelation of the Tablets of the Divine Plan, to the flight of that overbearing Commander, to the liberation of the Holy Land, to the enhancement of the prestige of the Faith at its world center, and to a marked expansion of its activities in East and West. 'Abdu'l-Baha's pa.s.sing and the agitation which His removal had provoked had been followed by the promulgation of His Will and Testament, by the inauguration of the Formative Age of the Baha'i era and by the laying of the foundations of a world-embracing Administrative Order. And finally, the seizure of the keys of the Tomb of Baha'u'llah by the Covenant-breakers, the forcible occupation of His House in Ba_gh_dad by the _Sh_i'ah community, the outbreak of persecution in Russia and the expulsion of the Baha'i community from Islam in Egypt had been succeeded by the public a.s.sertion of the independent religious status of the Faith by its followers in East and West, by the recognition of that status at its world center, by the p.r.o.nouncement of the Council of the League of Nations testifying to the justice of its claims, by a remarkable expansion of its international teaching activities and its literature, by the testimonials of royalty to its Divine origin, and by the completion of the exterior ornamentation of its first House of Worship in the western world.

The tribulations attending the progressive unfoldment of the Faith of Baha'u'llah have indeed been such as to exceed in gravity those from which the religions of the past have suffered. Unlike those religions, however, these tribulations have failed utterly to impair its unity, or to create, even temporarily, a breach in the ranks of its adherents. It has not only survived these ordeals, but has emerged, purified and inviolate, endowed with greater capacity to face and surmount any crisis which its resistless march may engender in the future.

Mighty indeed have been the tasks accomplished and the victories achieved by this sorely-tried yet undefeatable Faith within the s.p.a.ce of a century!

Its unfinished tasks, its future victories, as it stands on the threshold of the second Baha'i century, are greater still. In the brief s.p.a.ce of the first hundred years of its existence it has succeeded in diffusing its light over five continents, in erecting its outposts in the furthermost corners of the earth, in establishing, on an impregnable basis its Covenant with all mankind, in rearing the fabric of its world-encompa.s.sing Administrative Order, in casting off many of the shackles hindering its total emanc.i.p.ation and world-wide recognition, in registering its initial victories over royal, political and ecclesiastical adversaries, and in launching the first of its systematic crusades for the spiritual conquest of the whole planet.

The inst.i.tution, however, which is to const.i.tute the last stage in the erection of the framework of its world Administrative Order, functioning in close proximity to its world spiritual center, is as yet unestablished.

The full emanc.i.p.ation of the Faith itself from the fetters of religious orthodoxy, the essential prerequisite of its universal recognition and of the emergence of its World Order, is still unachieved. The successive campaigns, designed to extend the beneficent influence of its System, according to 'Abdu'l-Baha's Plan, to every country and island where the structural basis of its Administrative Order has not been erected, still remain to be launched. The banner of Ya Baha'u'l-Abha which, as foretold by Him, must float from the pinnacles of the foremost seat of learning in the Islamic world is still unhoisted. The Most Great House, ordained as a center of pilgrimage by Baha'u'llah in His Kitab-i-Aqdas, is as yet unliberated. The third Ma_sh_riqu'l-A_dh_kar to be raised to His glory, the site of which has recently been acquired, as well as the Dependencies of the two Houses of Worship already erected in East and West, are as yet unbuilt. The dome, the final unit which, as antic.i.p.ated by 'Abdu'l-Baha, is to crown the Sepulcher of the Bab is as yet unreared. The codification of the Kitab-i-Aqdas, the Mother-Book of the Baha'i Revelation, and the systematic promulgation of its laws and ordinances, are as yet unbegun.

The preliminary measures for the inst.i.tution of Baha'i courts, invested with the legal right to apply and execute those laws and ordinances, still remain to be undertaken. The rest.i.tution of the first Ma_sh_riqu'l-A_dh_kar of the Baha'i world and the recreation of the community that so devotedly reared it, have yet to be accomplished. The sovereign who, as foreshadowed in Baha'u'llah's Most Holy Book, must adorn the throne of His native land, and cast the shadow of royal protection over His long-persecuted followers, is as yet undiscovered. The contest that must ensue as a result of the concerted onslaughts which, as prophesied by 'Abdu'l-Baha, are to be delivered by the leaders of religions as yet indifferent to the advance of the Faith, is as yet unfought. The Golden Age of the Faith itself that must witness the unification of all the peoples and nations of the world, the establishment of the Most Great Peace, the inauguration of the Kingdom of the Father upon earth, the coming of age of the entire human race and the birth of a world civilization, inspired and directed by the creative energies released by Baha'u'llah's World Order, shining in its meridian splendor, is still unborn and its glories unsuspected.

Whatever may befall this infant Faith of G.o.d in future decades or in succeeding centuries, whatever the sorrows, dangers and tribulations which the next stage in its world-wide development may engender, from whatever quarter the a.s.saults to be launched by its present or future adversaries may be unleashed against it, however great the reverses and setbacks it may suffer, we, who have been privileged to apprehend, to the degree our finite minds can fathom, the significance of these marvelous phenomena a.s.sociated with its rise and establishment, can harbor no doubt that what it has already achieved in the first hundred years of its life provides sufficient guarantee that it will continue to forge ahead, capturing loftier heights, tearing down every obstacle, opening up new horizons and winning still mightier victories until its glorious mission, stretching into the dim ranges of time that lie ahead, is totally fulfilled.

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