O ye friends of God!
All the people of the world today are workmen of destruction
or ruin. Everyone as though with an axe is striking at the root of the
foundation of humanity. They hold in their hands great implements of warfare
and destruction. Among the greatest is the axe of religious prejudices or
sectarian bias, as well as that of racial bias; another implement of
destruction is the axe of patriotic bias; another is the axe of political
warfare; another implement of ruin is the persistent accumulation of commercial
benefit or profit; another, the love of conquest of new domains, as is also the
enmity, hatred and bigotry among the nations and tribes. These souls are
entirely inadvertent to the relations of the Kingdom of God, deprived of the
relations of Unity, and despaired of the Life Eternal. Although outwardly they
may be extremely civilized, nevertheless they live in darkness.
Now, God has chosen you from among mankind, and has guided
you to the Kingdom, has enlightened your hearts with the love of God, so that
you may be the cause of guidance to these people, in order that you may become
a cause of guidance to the world of humanity. He has appointed you as the
builders of the edifice of true manhood. Consider with what a power of morals
you must arise in order to withstand all vicissitudes. All these people, all
these promoters as workers of warfare and ruin are spreading the deeds of
hatred among nations. Now, consider with what peace and concord you must go
forth in order that you may be capable of overcoming the antagonistic forces.
It is my hope that you may prove yourselves to be the first
servants of the realm of humanity, and the builders of the edifice of Divine
Justice. That you may radiate the light of the Love of God to such an extent as
to be able to remove entirely the gloom and darkness of hatred, bigotry and
enmity from among humanity. Know all mankind of all nations, sects and tribes
as your kith and kin. Consider not their deeds, but only God. Seek your reward
from Him and not from them. Know the aged of all nations as your fathers, the
juveniles as your brothers and the children as your own. No matter what lack of
courtesy or what severe persecution or stern expressions of hate and
unfathomable enmity you receive, you must have no excuse like the following:
"So and so has spoken unkindly about me," "So and so has not
done me justice," -- nay, rather you must have no excuse but live
according to the Divine Teachings, whether humanity prove agreeable or
disagreeable, whether humanity prove hateful or loving, whether it receives you
or casts you out, so that perchance you may be assisted in hoisting the
standard of peace and pitching the Tabernacle of Oneness and solidarity of the
world of humanity -- so that this temporal life may ultimate in the Life Everlasting,
and this darkness of ignorance which has pervaded the whole world may be
converted into the illumination of guidance. So that material man may become
celestial, and the earthly souls become the heavenly souls; that the blind may
become perceptive, the deaf attentive, the ignorant wise, the dead arise, so
that, in fact, the Kingdom of God in the world of humanity may pitch its Canopy
and its Tabernacle in the utmost glory.
- ‘Abdu’l-Baha (From a Tablet; Star of
the West, vol. 5. No. 9, August 20, 1914)
