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"O Kings of the earth! (Baha'u'llah said, ) Give ear unto the Voice of God... intoning the words: 'There is none other God but He, the Mighty, the All-Powerful, the All-wise.'... Fear God, O concourse of kings, and suffer not yourselves to be deprived of this most sublime grace. Fling away, then, the things ye possess, and take fast hold on the Handle of God, the Exalted, the Great. Set your hearts towards the Face of God, and abandon that which your desires have bidden you to follow, and be not of those who perish." (80:1) Baha'u'llah then tells them of the martyrdom of the Bab by the unjust and cruel divines of Persia. He holds them one and all responsible for this crime and requires that they make amends for it. He demands that they follow that which He speaks unto them, with their hearts, and calls on them to arise and set themselves towards the Holy Court of God (80:2) Baha'u'llah made it clear that He was going to establish the Kingdom of God throughout the world; but He did not ask the kings to give Him any aid whatsoever in the task. What He did ask was that they should consider that their glory consisted in obedience to God, not in the width of their dominions; that they should rule their subjects with the utmost nicety of justice, should regard the poor among them as a particular trust from God; that they should reduce taxation and heal their dissensions till they were able to do without armies and their expensive upkeep except for police purposes (80:3) Unless they obeyed the directions.. He warned.. calamities, heavy and many, would descend upon them from every direction; they would not be able to escape but would be caught and overwhelmed. (80:4) This call, however, was immediately and with disdain rejected by the kings, one and all (81:3) By an act of forgiveness Baha'u'llah made to the Christian kings of Europe a further offer. He addressed to the Emperor Napoleon III of France, to Pope Ix, to Queen Victoria and to Czar Alexander, individual letters in which He asked of them their aid in establishing God's Kingdom among the nations. Napoleon was at the moment the most powerful and brilliant of the European sovereigns and to him Baha'u'llah offered the leadership in this great undertaking. He called on Napoleon to introduce the new Revelation and told him that the clergy who held to the old worship and refused the new would be as fallen stars and lose their status and authority. He revealed to Napoleon several of the great new principles of the new Faith.. He stated that His own mission was to regenerate and to unify the whole human race, which was to be regarded as one soul in many bodies.. monks were to leave their monasteries, to marry and mingle with the life of the people; and celibacy was not and never had been approved by the Almighty. (81:4) At the same time He told Napoleon that he had shown insincerity and insolence; retribution was pursuing him and if he delayed in obeying.. he would be utterly humiliated and overthrown and would lose everything (82:2) Napoleon's rejoiner was a contemptuous refusal. Within a year he was defeated as Sedan and lost his empire and his throne (82:3) Baha'u'llah announced to Pope Pius Ix "He Who is the Lord of Lords is come, " and he who is the Rock (meaning Peter), crieth out "Lo, the Father is come, and that which ye were promised in the Kingdom is fulfilled." He bade him "Arise in the name of thy Lord, the God of Mercy, amidst the peoples of the earth, and sieze thou the Cup of Life with the hand of confidence, and first drink thou therefrom, and proffer it then to such as turn towards it amongst the peoples of all faiths... sell all the embellished ornaments thou dost possess and expend them in the path of God... Abandon they kingdom unto the kings, and emerge from thy habitation... speak forth the praises of thy Lord betwixt earth and heaven." (82:4) Baha'u'llah added an appeal couched in language of the warmest love and longing to the followers of Christ, urging them to recognize and flock into the Kingdom of God which others were already entering though they had not the first right to it (82:5) The Pope ignored the letter altogether, and the following year.. was by force deprived of the temporal rule which he had refused to surrender voluntarily, and became the prisoner of the Vatican (83:1) Thus the year 1870 may be regarded as marking the disruption and decline of Western civilization (83:2) To Queen Victoria Baha'u'llah revealed that the Gospel prophecies were fulfilled in His advent and He offered her a prayer exquisitely tender in its feeling which she might use in turning to Him as He admonished her to do. He commended her for two measures which had been recently adopted in the spirit of the new age, one the stoppage of the slave-trade, the other the extension of the franchise. He wrote at some length to her on the divine art of government, trading historically the causes of its failure and indicating that it was now in a dangerous condition (83:3) Through her He sent a reprimand to the kings for refusing the Most Great Peace and urgently advised them to adopt the Lesser Peace which would in some degree better their condition (83:4) His fourth letter, addressed to Czar Alexander Ii was couched in warm language and He advised the Czar to arise and make known this Cause to the nations of the world (83:5) It is reported that Queen Victoria, on reading His letter, remarked, "If this is of God, it will stand. Otherwise it can do no harm." But neither she nor any of the other Christian rulers turned to Him, nor paid any heed whatever to His counsels (83:6) He remarked of them that they were intoxicated with pride, unable to see what was best for their own material interest, much less to recognize so stupendous a Revelation (84:1) Baha'u'llah had now been rejected by all the rulers of the world and His removal to 'Akka cut Him off completely from active touch with world affairs. It should be noted, however, that in exiling Him to 'Akka, the Holy Land, the Sultan had fulfilled the ancient prophecy to the effect that the Lord of Hosts would give His Revelation there and thus made it impossible for anyone to say that Baha'u'llah had fulfilled the prophecy of His own free will (84:2) Baha'u'llah's trust in the Christians and in their support of His teachings never weakened. Towards the end of His life He wrote the Holy Tablet (Lawh-i-Aqdas), an important work addressed to them in which He rebukes them for their slowness in recognizing Him, promises He will be faithful and pours forth a succession of enthusiastic beatitudes on the Christians, who will turn to Him with loving hearts and serve His Faith.
(84:3)
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