Concerning thy question whether all the souls enjoy eternal
life: Know thou those souls partake of the Eternal Life in whom the Spirit of
Life is breathed from the Presence of God and all beside them are dead without
Life, as Christ hath explained in the texts of the Gospel. Any person whose
insight is opened by God seeth the souls in their stations after the
disintegration of the bodies. Verily they are living and are subsisting before
their Lord and he seeth also the dead souls submerged in the gulfs of
mortality.
Then know thou verily all the souls are created according to
the nature of God and all are in the state of (unconscious) purity at the time
of their births. But afterwards they differ from one another insofar as they
acquire excellencies or defects. Nevertheless, the creatures have different
degrees in existence insofar as the creation goes, for capacities are
different; but all of them are good and pure (in their essence) then afterwards
they are polluted and defiled. Although there are different states of creation,
yet all of them are beneficial. Glance thou over the temple of man, its members
and its parts. Among them there are the eye, ear, nose, mouth, hands and
fingers. Notwithstanding the differences between these organs, all of them are
useful in their proper spheres. But if one of them is out of order, there is
need of a remedy and if the medicine does not heal, then the amputation of that
member becomes necessary.
- 'Abdul Baha (From a Tablet, Star of the West, vol. 6,
no. 19, March 2, 1916)
