Baha'u'llah & the New Era 1970 - J. Esslemont
 <<   <-   >   >>
Page 35 of  177

Baha'u'llah, on the other hand, announces that He is the Promised One of all these Prophets - the Divine Manifestation in Whose era the reign of peace will actually be established. This statement is unprecedented and unique, yet it fits in wonderfully with the signs of the times, and with the prophecies of all the great Prophets. Baha'u'llah revealed with incomparable clearness and comprehensiveness the means for bringing about peace and unity amongst mankind. (35:1)

[Terrible Events]
It is true that, since the advent of Baha'u'llah, there have been, until now, war and destruction on an unprecedented scale, but this is just what all the prophets have said would happen at the dawn of the "great and terrible Day of the Lord," and is, therefore, but a confirmation of the view that the "Coming of the Lord" is not only at hand, but is already an accomplished fact. According to the parable of Christ, the Lord of the Vineyard must miserably destroy the wicked husbandmen before He gives the Vineyard to others who will render Him the fruits in their seasons. Does not this mean that at the coming of the Lord dire destruction awaits those despotic governments, avaricious and intolerant priests, mullas, or tyrannical leaders who through the centuries have, like wicked husbandmen, misruled the earth and misappropriated its fruits? (35:2)

There may be terrible events, and unparalleled calamities yet awhile on the earth, but Baha'u'llah assures us that erelong, these fruitless strifes, these ruinous wars shall pass away, and the 'Most Great Peace' shall come." War and strife have become so intolerable in their destructiveness that mankind must find deliverance from them or perish. (35:3)

"The fullness of time" has come and with it the Promised Deliverer! (35:4)

His Writings
The Writings of Baha'u'llah are most comprehensive in their range, dealing with every phase of human life, individual and social, with things material and things spiritual, with the interpretation of ancient and modern scriptures, and with prophetic anticipations of both the near and distant future. (35:5)

The range and accuracy of His knowledge was amazing. He could quote and expound the Scriptures of the various religions with which His correspondents or questioners were familiar, in convincing and authoritative manner, although apparently He had never had the ordinary means of access to many of the books referred to. He declares, in Epistle to the Son of the Wolf, that He had never read the Bayan, although in His own Writings He shows the most perfect knowledge and understanding of the Bab's Revelation. (The Bab, as we have seen, declared that His Revelation, the Bayan, was inspired by and emanated from "Him Whom God shall make Manifest"!) With the single exception of a visit from Professor Edward Granville Browne, to whom in the year 1890 He accorded four interviews, each lasting twenty to thirty minutes, He had no opportunities of intercourse with enlightened Western thinkers, yet His Writings show a complete grasp of the social, political and religious problems of the Western World, and even His enemies had to admit that His wisdom and knowledge were incomparable. The well-known circumstances of His long imprisonment render it impossible to doubt that the wealth of knowledge shown in His Writings must have been acquired from some spiritual source, quite independent of the usual means of study or instruction and the help of books or teachers (35:6)

Get Next Page

  Baha'u'llah & the New Era 1970
  Citation Source List
: see