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Of course man's individual relationship to God and to his neighbour is central to the New Testament, and here the law of love applies. But the order determined by the principle of justice, regarding which Jesus was basically for maintaining the 'status quo' (Matt 5:17), was surrendered to the secular realm when Paul declared not only ceremonial but also judicial law cancelled (Romans 10:4). And when the Christians had to establish themselves in the world after Constantine, they took their law from pagan Roman law and later from pagan natural law with Christian elaborations and interpretations. "You cannot govern" with the Gospel (Luther), you cannot solve the problems of our society with individual kindness and love. Concepts of a binding order are not valid for Christians, as a Protestant theologian has clearly acknowledged: "The problem of kindness could once be presented in the parallel of the Samaritan who helps the man fallen among thieves. But today the kindness of the individual is simply annulled by the lack of kindness of the group. Millions have fallen among thieves, and the kindness of individuals, even of many individuals, can make no difference to that. Love of one's neighbour has become a world-wide political problem. Moral appeals to individuals, however well meant, are not enough and individual kindness all too easily become an alibi for group cruelty. Can a man remain human in an inhuman system? The moral questions of our time can no longer be answered by individual counsels or commandments. The New Testament has, as it were, a blind spot here. For the most part, it leaves us on our own" (Wolfgang Kratz). This is the reason why all the well-intentioned Christian peace movements and efforts achieve so little. But where the New Testament is silent, Baha'u'llah offers the solution; a new, unified world order, and therewith the redemption not only of individual man but of the whole of mankind. The transformation of the individual, his sanctification (not justification), his turning to God, is just as much a central theme of the Baha'i Faith as it is of all other religions. But redemption here is not confined to the personal God-man relationship, nor solely to the question addressed in his totality, as an individual and also as a "political animal." Divine Providence is concerned, too, with human society and its order, of which Baha'u'llah demands the total transformation, according to the divine law he proclaimed. The Baha'i Faith has a theocratic goal: the realization of God's will on this planet.
(68:2)
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