Bahá'u'lláh and the New EraEsslemont, J. E. (John Ebenezer)
Religion
Bahá'u'lláh and the New Era
Esslemont, J. E. (John Ebenezer)
Bahai Faith; Bahá'u'lláh, 1817-1892
One of the fundamental teachings of Bahá’u’lláh is that true science and
true religion must always be in harmony. Truth is one, and whenever
conflict appears it is due, not to truth, but to error. Between so-called
science and so-called religion there have been fierce conflicts all down
the ages, but looking back on these conflicts in the light of fuller truth
we can trace them every time to ignorance, prejudice, vanity, greed,
narrow-mindedness, intolerance, obstinacy or something of the
kind—something foreign to the true spirit of both science and religion,
for the spirit of both is one. As Huxley tells us, “The great deeds of
philosophers have been less the fruit of their intellect than the
direction of that intellect by an eminently religious tone of mind. Truth
has yielded herself rather to their patience, their love, their
single-heartedness and self-denial than to their logical acumen.” Boole,
the mathematician, assures us that “geometric induction is essentially a
process of prayer—an appeal from the finite mind to the Infinite for light
on finite concerns.” The great prophets of religion and science have never
denounced each other. It is the unworthy followers of these great world
teachers—worshipers of the letter but not of the spirit of their
teaching—who have always been the persecutors of the later prophets and
the bitterest opponents of progress. They have studied the light of the
particular revelation which they hold sacred, and have defined its
properties and peculiarities as seen by their limited vision, with the
utmost care and precision. That is for them the one true light. If God in
His infinite bounty sends fuller light from another quarter, and the torch
of inspiration burns brighter than before from a new torchholder, instead
of welcoming the new lights they are angry and alarmed. This new light
does not correspond with their definitions. It has not the orthodox color,
and does not shine from the orthodox place, therefore it must at all costs
be extinguished lest it lead men astray into the paths of heresy! Many
enemies of the Prophets are of this type—blind leaders of the blind, who
oppose new and fuller truth in the supposed interests of what they believe
to be the truth. Others are of baser sort and are moved by selfish
interests to fight against truth, or else block the path of progress by
reason of spiritual deadness and inertia.
Persecution of Prophets
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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