So much for Islám and the crippling blows its leaders and institutions
have received—and may yet receive—in this, the first century of the Bahá’í
Era. If I have dwelt too long on this theme, if I have, to a
disproportionate degree, quoted from the sacred writings in support of my
argument, it is solely because of my firm conviction that these
retributive calamities that have rained down upon the foremost oppressor
of the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh should rank not only among the stirring
occurrences of this Age of Transition, but as some of the most startling
and significant events of contemporary history.
Both Sunní and _Sh_í’ih Islám had, through the convulsions that had seized
them, contributed to the acceleration of the disruptive process to which I
have previously referred—a process which, by its very nature, is to pave
the way for that complete reorganization and unification which the world,
in every aspect of its life, must achieve. What of Christianity and of the
denominations with which it stands identified? Can it be said that this
process of deterioration that has attacked the fabric of the Religion of
Muḥammad has failed to exert its baneful influence on the institutions
associated with the Faith of Jesus Christ? Have these institutions already
experienced the impact of these menacing forces? Are their foundations so
secure and their vitality so great as to enable them to resist this
onslaught? Will they, as the confusion of a chaotic world spreads and
deepens, fall in turn a prey to their violence? Have the more orthodox
among them already arisen, and, if not, will they arise, to repel the
onset of a Cause which, having pulled down the barriers of Muslim
orthodoxy, is now advancing into the heart of Christendom, in both the
European and American continents? Would such a resistance sow the seeds of
further dissension and confusion, and consequently serve indirectly to
hasten the advent of the promised Day?
To these queries we can but partly answer. Time alone can reveal the
nature of the rôle which the institutions directly associated with the
Christian Faith are destined to assume in this, the Formative Period of
the Bahá’í Era, this dark age of transition through which humanity as a
whole is passing. Such events as have already transpired, however, are of
such a nature as can indicate the direction in which these institutions
are moving. We can, in some degree, appraise the probable effect which the
forces operating both within the Bahá’í Faith and outside it will exert
upon them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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