The Springtime of the Soul (continued)
Calligraphic work by Mishkín-Qalam
(Reproduced with permission of the Bahá'í International Community)
Some writers attribute this change to the scientific dis- coveries of the 19th century which changed people’s ideas about themselves and their place in the universe, and inspired hope everywhere that with further knowledge man’s religious loyalty and enthusiasm would also in- crease. However, the resist- ance evinced by religious establishments and their re- jection of these discoveries quickly dissipated these hopes and forced people to choose science over the tra- ditions of religion. The result was to deprive people from spiritual life.
Scientific progress was thus transformed into a conflict between reality and en- trenched religious doctrines and traditions. Consequently, intellectuals lost their faith, and gradually other social classes followed suit after having become dismayed by the failure of religion to ad- apt to the new reality and elaborate foundations for a new social order based on accord between science and religion. It did not help that their clerical orders failed to give a good reason for not conforming with science.
For these reasons and before long, new philosophies appeared that considered religions as obstacles in the way of human progress, inasmuch as they inhibit man’s confidence in and reliance on the intellect. These new doctrines proclaimed the individual’s freedom to delineate his own code of character, thus denying the existence of absolute values dictated by any power outside the human mind.
Humankind has had to face this trial because of the powerlessness of religion to unify the disparate components of the various social orders and in absence of a valid alternative capable of unifying these various elements of society and keeping it from decomposition. Nationalism did not prevent the social division that occurred following the appearance of numerous groups, each with its own cultural perspective, formulation of customs and standards of social behaviour.
The social vacuum has thus been filled by the appearance of nationalist movements that have advocated the unity of the people on the basis of their unity of language, or history and culture, instead of their earlier unity which was based on religion. Indeed, nationalism triumphed over the inherited rights of European monarchs thus permitting the creation of the modern state. The same nationalism ultimately brought upon the papacy the loss of temporal power and of its properties in Italy. In a similar manner, in the wake of nationalist uprisings the Islamic Caliphate was annulled and the sultan of Turkey lost all his properties in Eastern Europe, and the Muslim empire was reduced to small independent states.
As a reaction to this radical change, there arose new movements promoting the revival of the role of religion in society and a return to theocratic forms of government, the reestablishment of the Caliphate and the implementation of Shari’a law.
Such pendulum swinging between a belief inspired by the needs of the present and the stipulations inherited from obsolete traditions illustrates the significance of the scientific investigation into the forces behind the birth and flourishing of civilizations and their disappearance. Leading thinkers and social scientists in their published studies: Oswald Spengler (1918), Pitirim Sorokin (1937-41) and Arnold Toynbee (1934-54), for example, looked into civilization as a world phenomenon and traced the march of the human race as a whole. They and other students of macrohistory concluded that there is strong evidence that the rise and fall of civilizations follows a similar pattern regardless of time and place. This conclusion3 suggests that social evolution obeys a universal law similar to natural phenomena.
These scientific views coincide perfectly with the explanations given one hundred years ago by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in the course of His first talks in Paris about the cycle of religion and its resemblance to the cycle of the seasons.
As ‘Abdu’l-Bahá has said, divine wisdom is the greatest virtue of the world of humanity. Divine wisdom means knowing things the way they are in reality. It is necessary that the knowledge possessed by human beings and their awareness of things be through divine wisdom, because there are two kinds of knowledge: conceptual and substantial. For example, we all know there is water, but this knowledge is a mere conception. However, when we drink it our knowledge becomes substantial. This is the reason it is said that true knowledge is reached by substantiation and not conception.4 Thus, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá emphasized the limited influence of human thought in that it cannot influence large portions of humanity, as is the case with the divine word. What is beneficial for human life and what provides civilizations with their creative power is not philosophic theories or fancy slogans, but the successful implementation and trial of the new principles. The examples supplied by history are many:
“God’s chosen Ones have ever initiated a universal motion in the realm of thought that has produced great effects. For example, Abraham, though He was the son of a stone carver, created a new motion in the thinking of man. Moses likewise produced a universal ideological motion amongst men; Christ, though from a poor family, created an unusual and universal motion in the realm of the intellect, such that its force spread over the earth; similarly with Muhammad, who despite the fact he was illiterate had great influence over human thought, and led the Arabs to the most elevated standards of perfection. The Báb too created a universal motion in the realm of thought.”5
It is clear, therefore, that “the Souls supported by the Holy Spirit renew the world, give it new life and illumine the East and the West simultaneously with no limit to effect and power. Thousands of years go by and Their influence is still felt. As to the person who is not confirmed by the Holy Spirit, though he may be very knowledgeable and a founder of a philosophy, his movement is limited. Because of the complete stagnation of theological thinking, the negation of divine wisdom, the pervasion of materialism, the all-enveloping fancies and vain imaginings and the fading of the truth, Baha’u’lláh arose from the horizon of Persia and created a mighty motion in the realm of thought. Persians felt divine emotions, they recognized the new divine wisdom, and their thinking, their state, and their deeds changed entirely. After they had been engrossed in traditions and submerged in the ocean of vain imaginings, they were created anew and received a new life, and the light of knowledge shone.”6
In face of the fierce challenges surrounding human societies everywhere, people would do well to reject the partial solutions represented in those doctrines that have been fabricated by man by means of conceptualization. People should realize that conceptual knowledge has not succeeded in meeting the challenges presently encircling the planet—the by-products of the massive changes in the conditions of the world. The only alternative for us is to reflect on the above statement concerning the substantiation of knowledge through practice, and to go ahead and put into practice the solutions and principles that are now proposed, instead of dismissing them without any exploration solely because certain establishments and leaders advise their followers to ignore them.
Notes
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1. Personal provisional translation from talk of 15 October 1911 as published in the Persian edition of these talks and their Arabic translation: Khutab ‘Abdu’l-Bahá fi Uropá wa Amricá (Addis Ababa: National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of North East Africa, n.d.), pp. 79-80.
2. Ibid., pp. 80-81.
3. Especially those of Sorokin and Toynbee.
4. Personal provisional translation from talk of 6 December 1911 as published in the Persian edition of these talks and their Arabic translation: Khutab ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, p. 209.
5. Ibid., p. 214.
6. Ibid., pp. 214-15.