One Common Faith | Page 8

"Through the Teachings of this Day Star of Truth", Bahá'u'lláh
explains, "every man will advance and develop until he ... can manifest
all the potential forces with which his inmost true self hath been
endowed."(13) As humanity's purpose includes the carrying forward of
"an ever-advancing civilization",(14) not the least of the extraordinary
powers that religion possesses has been its ability to free those who
believe from the limitations of time itself, eliciting from them sacrifices
on behalf of generations centuries into the future. Indeed, because the
soul is immortal, its awakening to its true nature empowers it, not only
in this world but even more directly in those worlds that lie beyond, to
serve the evolutionary process: "The light which these souls radiate",
Bahá'u'lláh asserts, "is responsible for the progress of the world and the
advancement of its peoples.... All things must needs have a cause, a
motive power, an animating principle. These souls and symbols of
detachment have provided, and will continue to provide, the supreme
moving impulse in the world of being."(15)
Belief is thus a necessary and inextinguishable urge of the species that
has been described by an influential modern thinker as "evolution
become conscious of itself".(16) If, as the events of the twentieth
century provide sad and compelling evidence, the natural expression of
faith is artificially blocked, it will invent objects of worship however
unworthy--or even debased--that may in some measure appease the
yearning for certitude. It is an impulse that will not be denied.

In short, through the ongoing process of revelation, the One Who is the
Source of the system of knowledge we call religion demonstrates that
system's integrity and its freedom from the contradictions imposed by
sectarian ambitions. The work of each Manifestation of God has an
autonomy and an authority that transcend appraisal; it is also a stage in
the limitless unfolding of a single Reality. Because the purpose of the
successive revelations of God is the awakening of humankind to its
capacities and responsibilities as the trustee of creation, the process is
not simply repetitive, but progressive, and is fully appreciated only
when perceived in this context.
In no sense can Bahá'ís profess to have grasped at this early hour more
than a minute portion of the truths inherent in the revelation on which
their Faith is based. With reference, for example, to the evolution of the
Cause, the Guardian said, "All we can reasonably venture to attempt is
to strive to obtain a glimpse of the first streaks of the promised Dawn
that must, in the fullness of time, chase away the gloom that has
encircled humanity."(17) Apart from encouraging humility, this fact
should serve also as a constant reminder that Bahá'u'lláh has not
brought into existence a new religion to stand beside the present
multiplicity of sectarian organizations. Rather has He recast the whole
conception of religion as the principal force impelling the development
of consciousness. As the human race in all its diversity is a single
species, so the intervention by which God cultivates the qualities of
mind and heart latent in that species is a single process. Its heroes and
saints are the heroes and saints of all stages in the struggle; its
successes, the successes of all stages. This is the standard demonstrated
in the life and work of the Master and exemplified today in a Bahá'í
community that has become the inheritor of humanity's entire spiritual
legacy, a legacy equally available to all the earth's peoples.
The recurring proof of the existence of God, therefore, is that from time
immemorial He has repeatedly manifested Himself. In the larger sense,
as Bahá'u'lláh explains, the vast epic of humanity's religious history
represents the fulfilment of the "Covenant", the enduring promise by
which the Creator of all things assures the race of the unfailing
guidance essential to its spiritual and moral development, and calls on

it to internalize and give expression to these values. One is free to
dispute through historicist interpretations of the evidence the unique
role of this or that Messenger of God, if that is one's purpose, but such
speculation is of no help in accounting for developments that have
transformed thought and produced changes in human relationships
critical to social evolution. At intervals so rare that the known instances
can be counted on one's fingers, the Manifestations of God have
appeared, have each been explicit as to the authority of His teachings
and have each exerted an influence on the advance of civilization
incomparably beyond that of any other phenomenon in history.
"Consider the hour at which the supreme Manifestation of God
revealeth Himself unto men", Bahá'u'lláh points out: "Ere that hour
cometh, the Ancient Being, Who is still unknown of men and hath not
as yet given utterance to the Word of God, is Himself