Missionary Interviews Abdu'l-Baha

A Missionary Interviews Abdu'l-Baha

By John Taylor; 2006 August 7

The interview we are about to focus in on today took place on the 13th of April in the lobby of the Hotel Ansonia, not long after the Master had arrived in America. It was the same day they got news of sinking of the Titanic. Mahmud Zarqani records in his diary that the relieved believers thanked God that the Master had refused their repeated requests to board this wonder of the age on her maiden voyage. Mahmoud records that the Master took a carriage and made a casual remark that helped make me into a town planning nerd,

"On the return to the hotel the carriage drove through the park roads. The Master remarked, 'America will make rapid progress in the future but I am fearful of the effects of these high buildings and such densely populated cities; these are not good for the public health.'" (Mahmud's Diary entry dated Saturday, April 12, 1912)

On a technical note, Mahmoud, making the sort of mistake that was rare until the invention of computers, got his dates one day out of whack for much of their year in America, so this comment may have actually taken place on the day of this interview, or maybe not, I am not sure. Mahmoud describes what the Master said in a similar interview with Christian clergy a few days later:

"In the afternoon the public meeting was at the home of Mr. [Mountfort] Mills. Several clergymen, professors and dignitaries were present. The Master first spoke on the superior power of the human kingdom over nature. Then in another room He spoke to the clergymen about the necessity of a power that will cause spirituality to be victorious over materialism. 'This power', He said, 'is the power of Baha'u'llah. We used that power and thus have succeeded in this great Cause.' The meeting and the attention and joyful devotion of those present gave 'Abdu'l-Baha much satisfaction. In the carriage returning to His hotel, He said,

"I have made the subject of my talks here only one of the principles of the Blessed Beauty. I have not as yet touched upon others of greater importance. It is because I perceive the pulse of the people and the needs of the present circumstances that the confirmations of the Blessed Beauty successively rain down and assist me. These effects that you see are not only the result of addresses but are due to the assistance of the Blessed Beauty. Of course, everyone says that peace is desirable but the power to influence and conform is what is required. The Blessed Beauty is indeed my helper and protector, to the degree that were I, for example, even to make war the subject of my talks, the same effects would become apparent. It is indeed the confirmations of the Blessed Beauty that aid us. Otherwise how would Westerners show such consideration to us Easterners?"

Our interview for today features a less pleasant clash with an opinionated missionary whose mission in life was to refute the Master on His home turf. It is also briefly recorded in his immortal memoir, Portals to Freedom, by the other Christian Minister present, Howard Colby Ives. This is what he recalled, as recounted by Marzieh Gail:

"One minister who came was not friendly. 'Abdu'l-Baha answered all his questions with reserve and patience. The minister asked by what authority Baha'u'llah is placed with Abraham, Moses and Jesus -- and 'Abdu'l-Baha said, 'Today we believe Baha'u'llah to be an educator... If He has opened the doors of human hearts to a higher consciousness, He is a heavenly educator. If He has not accomplished this we are privileged to deny His claim. Then 'Abdu'l-Baha gave the minister an armful of white roses." (Marzieh Gail, Dawn Over Mount Hira, 190; a note explains: Reminiscence, also recorded in Howard Colby Ives, Portals to Freedom, George Ronald, Oxford, 1943)

In any case, the interview in question does not appear in Promulgation, the collection of the Master's talks in America, though some other interviews and question periods are. It only is to be found in Star of the West. The following footnote to the article gives the following background material. I confess I do not know what they mean by His "disqualifying" the interviewer.

NOTE: This interview was prompted by the fact that an article prepared by Rev. S. T. Bixby for publication in the North American Review had been objected to by Baha'is to whom it had been submitted as incorrect and misleading. Although the truth embodied in the words of Abdu'l-Baha completely disprove the erroneous statements, the article in question -- slightly amended, was afterward published. It should also be noted that Abdu'l-Baha in his preliminary setting forth of the historical accomplishment of the Baha'i Movement disqualifies the writer and his motive before a question is asked. Ed.

So, without further ado, here is the text of the interview as it appears in Star of the West.

INTERVIEW AT HOTEL ANSONIA, NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 13, 1912. ABDUL BAHA, REV. J. T. Bixby AND REV. HOWARD COLBY IVES, PRESENT.

From Notes by Howard MacNutt.

(Star of the West, Vol. 3, No. 8, p. 5)

Abdu'l-Baha: The origin of man is one; the consummate intention of all human existence must likewise be one.

The development of a tree is from a seed; the purpose of a tree's existence therefore is to produce a seed. The fruit of man is love and unity, the development of spiritual susceptibilities through the influence and infusion of Divine Love. The union of East and West must be accomplished in the soil of man fortified by the Divine Spirit. This spiritual bond of unity, this power of Divine Love is everlasting. Its appearance in the sod of man is the purpose of his creation.

America is a great instrument for the accomplishment of world unity. No other nation of the world stands in a similar position of influence and responsibility. The fundamental question is the unification of religious belief.

In Persia during the last fifty years a wonderful evidence of such unity has appeared among the various sects and denominations of religionists. What is witnessed in that country is (a matter of) historical account and record which cannot be denied. The accomplishment of a fundamental religious unity in Persia is therefore a nucleus which proves the possibility of universal peace among the world nations.

Consider the kingdom of the animals. There is no strife among them on account of color or creed. If you select a pigeon from Persia, another from Germany, another from France, America and so on, you would find them living together in complete union and love. Because one was American it would not object to its companion from Persia. The birds of white plumage would not shun those of black and brown. They would not notice this difference in color, but would dwell together in peace and harmony. Should we not at least attain to their state and possibility? We have reason; we have consciousness. God has taught us through these channels that we were created for unity and love. The heavenly Prophets have revealed the principles of His Will and Word. Let us live in accord with those principles and thereby live in unity with each other.

When the adherents of the former despotic government of Persia found that this unity and harmony was being accomplished among the followers of Baha'u'llah, they arose in bigotry and persecution against them. The clergy especially perceived that their vocation and means of livelihood were threatened. They persecuted the Baha’is with bitterness and ferocity. They misrepresented this Cause to the Government, saying, "These are the people of rebellion and revolution; these are the enemies of the Shah;" whereas in fact down to the time of the recent revolution in Persia the Baha’is have taken no part whatever in political questions and disturbances. Their clamorous persecutors were the real revolutionists.

These discontents (sic. malcontents?) wanted Constitutional rights and privileges. They were politicians, not religionists. Today there are many political parties in Persia. Notwithstanding the spread of rumors intended to excite prejudice against the Baha’is, unity and love increased among them, for falsehood cannot stand against the onrushing stream of Truth. These enemies said, "The teachings of Baha’u’llah sanction one wife and nine husbands;" "the principles of Baha’u’llah are communistic and proclaim treason against the theories and government." All kinds of false and dangerous reports were circulated until even European travelers passing through the country were influenced to believe them. How different was the reality! While the Baha’is have practical laws upon moral, ethical, civil and governmental questions, their obedience to these laws is always conducive to the uplift, purification and improvement of human conditions and never destructive to the development of individual, community or nation.

Furthermore, the Baha’is consider it more blessed and a greater privilege to bestow than to gain and receive. They believe that bestowing good upon another freely is the greatest means of help to both. This is not the principle and practice of their calumniators who make even religion a source of livelihood. According to Baha’i principles justice and equity in government are not to be attained by force and rebellion against the existing order of things.

The solution of economic questions for instance will not be accomplished by array of labor against capital and capital against labor in strife and conflict, but by (a) voluntary attitude of sacrifice upon both sides. Then a real and lasting justness of conditions will be brought about. If a capitalist is forced to give up a portion of his income and possessions there will be no love in his heart; no permanent benefit in his action. But if it be given in the spirit of the Love of God, everything will be accomplished. As it is now, the forces of labor strike and the capitalist retaliates. If the latter should voluntarily add to the scale of wages love is evident and the greatest good results. Briefly, among the Baha'is there are no extortionate, mercenary and unjust practices, no rebellious demands, no revolutionary uprisings against existing governments.

In Persia Baha'i teachers never accept the slightest coin for their work. This is so noticeably true that when such recompense is refused it is customary to hear the statement "These are Baha'is." This is the strongest proof of the Baha'i principles and their power of accomplishment.

How different are the methods and actions of the clergy and priesthood of Persia, whose demands upon the property and possessions of the people are equivalent to pillage and plunder. For instance, when a man dies, the clergy takes possession of one third his goods and the other two thirds goes to his heirs. Then they accuse the Baha’is of doing this -- whereas, in fact, the followers of Baha’u’llah are forbidden to accept anything whatever from the property of others. The Baha’is are accustomed to give rather than to receive.

[Note from the Editor of Star of the West: In conformity with this principle before the departure of Abdu'l-Baha from the Orient for his visit to this country, a large amount of money contributed by friends here was forwarded to him with the request that he accept it toward defraying his expenses. He returned the money with a blessing, asking the donor to apply it to some philanthropic object. During his stay In this country, his gifts to churches and charity have been many and most generous in amount.]

For instance, ten thousand dollars have been sent to Chicago from the East toward the erection of the Mashrak El Azkar.

Rev. Bixby: Did not Professor Edward Browne, of Cambridge University, England, go to Akka and was he not received there by Baha’u’llah?

A.B. Professor Browne visited the East, interviewed various people and automatically wrote down all he heard. Naturally when he met the enemies of Baha’u’llah he heard nothing favorable. Would you go to the Vatican to hear praises of the Protestants? Would you consult Jewish rabbis as to the reality of Christ? In his first book, Professor Browne praised Baha’u’llah, but the second account, in which he publishes the statements of enemies, is the reverse. His books do not agree.

Rev. Bixby: Is Professor Browne correct in his statement that Abdul-Baha wrote "A Traveler's Narrative"

A. B. The writer of "A Traveler's Narrative" was not one person. It contains a statement of Baha'i principles. If a book was to be written setting forth the essence of Christianity, a number of Christians would come together for that purpose.

Rev. Bixby: Is "A Traveler's Narrative" substantially correct?

A. B. It is an authority.

Rev. Bixby: What is understood to be the relation between the manifestation in Baha'u'llah and the manifestations in Moses, Jesus and others?

A. B. It is one basis, one foundation. Abraham proclaimed the Truth, Moses raised the Standard of Truth. Jesus established the Truth. Can we say that any one of them did not found it? All the prophets have been chosen by God to promulgate The Word. There can be no multiplicity in the Truth itself. The teachings of the Manifestations are of two kinds; first, the Word of God in its outer or material aspect; second, the Word of God in its spiritual or inner significance. The first named is changeable; the second unchangeable. The essential principle of their teaching is spiritual. All the Prophets have come to spread these principles. Each confirms the spiritual utterance of the former and changes the material forms of teachings and ceremonials. For instance, the Ten Commandments revealed by Moses were applicable to the time in which he appeared. They were not applicable to the time of Jesus.

Therefore He abolished and superseded them.

He also abolished certain laws of Moses which were no longer necessary. But this change and renewal is of secondary importance to the Spiritual Reality of the Word in Moses and Jesus, for it is the foundation and it is One and Unchangeable.

Rev. Bixby: Has Baha’u’llah revealed obligatory prayers?

A. B. The mode and requirements of East and West are different. It matters not whether we bend the head in the East or the knee in the West. The purpose of prayer is to come nearer to God to pray from the heart fervently. If the heart is pure, it is beautiful for the tongue to express its ecstasy.

Rev. Bixby: By what authority is Baha’u’llah placed with Abraham, Moses and Jesus?

A. B. Today we believe Baha’u’llah to be an educator of humanity, as Abraham, Moses and Jesus were educators. Are His teachings worthy of serious attention? He originated and proclaimed them. He caused others to believe and follow them. What is the function of a teacher and educator of humanity? By what evidence shall we recognize him? Is it not his power to train and develop, as children are trained at school? Has Baha'u'llah trained the children of humanity? If He has opened the doors of human hearts to a higher consciousness, He is a heavenly Educator. If He has not accomplished this we are privileged to deny His claim and teaching. For the aim and function of an Educator is to train the children of humanity. This is His greatest proof that he has power to uplift humanity. Baha'u'llah either taught higher lessons or did not. If He did, He has fulfilled His claim.

The mission of a physician is to heal sickness and relieve the ailing. When he heals there is no doubt of his ability as a physician. If he cannot heal the sick be is disqualified. We accept the Teachings of Moses, Jesus, Abraham and Adam because unmistakably they came to educate humanity. For example, Moses arose at a time of the lowest ignorance and humiliation of the Hebrew nation. Did He not free them from the bondage of Egypt? Did He not train, educate and organize them as a nation and people. As a consequence of His discipline did they not attain a zenith of power? Yes, unmistakably, up to the time of Solomon. The philosophers of Greece came to Palestine, sat at the feet of the Hebrew sages and were taught by them the fundamental principles of life. Moses produced this result from ignorance and slavery. Can we deny history? Can we deny that He was an Educator?

Rev. Bixby: Has Baha’u’llah done this?

A. B. Yes! In Persia especially He has accomplished this miracle of training and education. Ere long, Persia will attain a high degree of civilization.

Rev. Bixby: Is Mirza Abul Fazl an apostle, prophet or one delegated with special authority?

A. B. We do not have apostles, prophets and special leaders, because all are servants. We have no ecclesiastical order or authority. Mirza Abul Fazl was trained and taught by Baha'u'llah -- His disciple in this sense. He was near to Baha'u'llah; but he has no special station except the station of service.

Rev. Bixby: Were the "Letters of the Living" appointed by the Bab abrogated by Baha'u'llah?

A. B. The "Letters of the Living" were at first eighteen in number. The Bab said, "Go forth and teach others the Message you have received." Among them were some of great ability, who became prominent. Some disappeared. They were not appointed as a secret order. Baha'u'llah did not abrogate their function. As an organization of believers in the Bab it passed away by itself, naturally. The Bab said, "These are the acceptors of my teachings." They had no official station. He did not depend upon them as His clergy. They were servants of the Cause of God. Whoever is near to God is a servant of God.

Rev. Bixby: Did not Subh Ezel occupy an authoritative position?

A. B. Baha'u'llah educated him just as he educated Mirza Abul Fazl and myself. Subh Ezel separated voluntarily. He did not follow his Teacher as we have done. Therefore we do not mention his name. We have no quarrel with those who differ, but are commanded to love them.

Rev. Bixby: How can we receive more from the Teaching of Baha'u'llah than from the Words of Jesus?

A. B. Jesus and the former Prophets laid the foundation of the Cause of God -- the Heavenly Kingdom. But their followers forget and overlook the foundation. Christ said, "Ye must he born again of water and spirit." "As children from the womb, so must ye be born again of Spirit." The essence of His meaning was that those who were taught by Him and became His real followers would become free from world-imperfections; they would become perfect, redeemed from animalism and human passions, transformed into angels; that is to say the earthly would become heavenly. These are the real disciples of Christ. These are real Christians.

Galen, a Greek philosopher, who was pagan and not Christian, writing upon the subject of "Ancient Civilization of Nations," states that "the greatest shaping influences in the civilization of nations are religious principles; and that the effect of Christianity upon the lives and morals of its adherents is a great proof of this statement." Now Baha'u'llah came and brought a new life into the hearts of mankind. He reversed the order of many former teachings. Vast numbers of His followers live in accord with the principles He set forth.

Mirza Abul Fazl for instance, whom you have named, was firmly fixed in his religious belief. Under the influence of Baha'u'llah's words, he arose to serve this Cause. He was thrown into prison two years he was persecuted and driven out of Persia. Under all conditions of distress and suffering, he was thankful and filled with happiness, constantly Serving the Cause of Baha'u'llah.

This is the strongest proof that the Teachings of Baha'u'llah have within them the same power to mould and influence human lives as the Teachings of Jesus. They free the souls of men from world attachments and imperfections. They open the doors in this age of the world to perfection. The Jews admit that Jesus appeared in the world and taught heavenly principles. If Christ had not appeared after Moses the mention of Moses would have been lost. The foundation of Jesus and the foundation of Moses were the same. The foundation of Baha'u'llah is likewise the same as Moses and Jesus. All religion has the same foundation. Furthermore, consider how Baha'u'llah has upraised the standard of Christ in the East in countries and among peoples where there was formerly no mention of Christ's name. He established the truth of the Bible among those who shunned and hated the Bible. They considered it a righteous act to burn and destroy the Book of Christianity. Baha'u'llah has taught them to read the Bible.

Rev. Bixby; Was Christ the Word?

A. B. Baha'u'llah has clearly explained and defined the "Word." Christianity, as explained by its followers, has taught that Christ is the Word and the Son of God. What is the meaning of this? Baha'u'llah has explained that seers and prophets are as letters incomplete in meaning. He shows that human intellects are imperfect, incomplete, but Christ was the All Surrounding Word and synonymous with Perfection. As He contained all Perfections and Attributes He was the Word and this wonderful title was conferred upon Him. But seers, prophets and disciples are as "letters" without complete significance.

Rev. Bixby: Was Baha'u'llah also the Word in the flesh?

A. B. Yes! Because He had all the perfections.

Rev. Bixby: Did Abraham embody the Word?

A. B. We cannot differentiate the attributes of the Word of God we cannot differentiate perfections. Abraham announced the Divine Truth. It is not necessary to lower Abraham to raise Jesus. It is not necessary to lower Jesus to proclaim Baha'u'llah. We must spread the Truth of God wherever we behold it. The essence of the question is that all these Great Messengers came to raise the Divine Standard of Perfections. All of them shine as stars in the same heaven of the Divine Will. All of them give Light to the world.

Rev. Bixby: Did Baha'u'llah fulfill Jesus as Jesus fulfilled Moses?

A. B. Yes! by spreading the renown and glory of Jesus. The aim of Moses, Jesus and Baha'u'llah was to train humanity toward divine perfections. Can we train the world upward by imperfections?

[At the conclusion of this interview Abdul-Baha arose and came toward Rev. Bixby, his arms filled with large white roses. As he placed them upon the bosom of his visitor, literally burying him in them, he said, "These beautiful roses will express to you the love and fragrance of the Baha’i Spirit."]

Escaping the Neutral

Escaping the Neutral Values of Nature

By John Taylor; 2006 August 06

As the sultry dog days of summer plod on relentlessly, like many middle aged men in my position my languid thoughts slowly turn to cannibalism. Probably this is the influence of a book-on-tape I am listening to during my daily table tennis practice, a biography of Christopher Columbus. The now-extinct Carib Indians (from whom is derived the very word "cannibal") indulged in this practice to a shocking degree, even going so far as castrating a prisoner to fatten him up and make him a more choice hors d’oeuvre for a future feast.

This had the perhaps not so surprising effect that all Caribs, even the old women, fought like devils when they encountered foreigners who they suspected might be hostile. They were well aware that a fate far worse than death awaited should they be overcome, dead or alive. Their desperation in battle impressed even the brutes on Columbus's ship, who thought nothing of murder, slavery and rape. One native, not realizing that the men in the strange ship had only the relatively innocent purpose of capturing, enslaving and parading him about Europe as a curiosity, fought so furiously that the Europeans damaged the valuable goods by eviscerating him. Disappointed, they threw him overboard to drown, but he stuffed his guts in place with one hand and with the other began swimming for shore. They recaptured him, tied and bound him, and threw him back to the fishes. This did not stop him either and they were forced to dispatch him by using him for target practice with their crossbows.

So following the principle that it is an ill wind that blows no good, even the most culpable of practice imaginable, cannibalism, can make for fierce warriors. If you had to pick an all star team of all time best soldiers, you would not want to miss the Caribs. As Gibbon noticed, thanks to slavery ancient wars were fought with a ferocity unknown in modern battles. Each soldier knew that he was a valuable commodity and if he was captured his freedom was gone forever. If that is true of slavery, how much more is it of cannibalism, at least as practiced among the Caribs.

But reading about the practice generally, the most interesting thing is how diverse it is. It is done variously as sorcery, as a protein supplement, as a way to steal the energy of an enemy, to "honor" one's ancestors, or to gain the benefit of their experience (so-called endo-cannibalism), and on and on. The Encyclopedia Britannica offers no single explanation as to why the phenomenon occurs:

"There is no one satisfactory and all-inclusive explanation for cannibalism. Different peoples have practiced it for different reasons, and a group may practice cannibalism in one context and view it with horror in another. In any case, the spread of modernization usually results in the prohibition of such practices."

Another interesting aspect is the strange phenomenon of cannibalism denial, which is a first cousin of holocaust denial. Some atrocities are so horrible that those who feel themselves ideologically connected to those who do it often find it comforting to deny that it exists altogether. Anthropologists, who are usually intimately attached to its tribal practitioners, are more prone than most to refuse to accept that cannibalism exists or ever has existed.

Another facet draws my interest, the surprising difficulty of proving exactly why we should not do it. It is an interesting challenge for ethical theory. Mostly we get rid of cannibalism by setting down a blanket taboo, "just do not do it or you will suffer the consequences." We have no choice, because rational arguments "proving" why it is bad at all times and for all occasions is are not as irrefutable as the moralist might think. It is as tricky as trying to prove that alcohol or gambling or doing drugs are bad, just say no. Among the most effective is the natural sense of disgust, a phenomenon that has been documented even among endo-cannibals, who are known to fake it and only pretend to eat an organ of a recently deceased relative.

No matter what you do, good comes out of just about anything, even cannibalism, no matter what the moralist would like to think. Moral choice involves weighing total good with total bad and going over completely to the side that outweighs the other, even when the swing excludes some possible goods. This is why justice has been pictured as like weighing things in a balance, or in the case of the Arabic concept of Adl, balancing a pack on the back of a camel or donkey. The amount of baggage matters less than the fact that it balances out. Suicide, bad almost by definition, can be made useful in some contexts and was shown to be such even in combination with cannibalism, as Herodotus recounts in one of literature's earliest mentions of cannibalism. A general by the name of Cambyses decided to make an attack on a distant African enemy without provisioning his army for a trip across the Sahara,

"So long as the earth gave them anything, the soldiers sustained life by eating the grass and herbs; but when they came to the bare sand, a portion of them were guilty of a horrid deed: by tens they cast lots for a man, who was slain to be the food of the others. When Cambyses heard of these doings, alarmed at such cannibalism, he gave up his attack on Ethiopia, and retreating by the way he had come, reached Thebes, after he had lost vast numbers of his soldiers." (Herodotus, History)

Thus when it is a question of survival, our revulsion for cannibalism is mollified. It would take a hypocritical ethicist indeed to condemn those in desperate circumstances who, like those soldiers, indulge in cannibalism in order to prolong life. At the same time, we list the cannibals among serial killers as the lowest of the low, for they not only kill their victims but have even been known to ... okay, I will not make this any more lurid than I have to. I will only say that their motivation seems similar to what as it was for the Caribs: terrorism. Serial killers inflict as much justified fear on their poor victims and society as they can.

Which brings me around to the only mention of cannibalism in the Writings of the central figures of the Baha'i Faith. This coincidentally (I hope) took place at the Maxwell residence in Montreal on the second of September, 1912. I think it sheds a great deal of light on this question as well as others mentioned, drugs, alcohol, suicide, as well as homosexuality, which I have been discussing in a separate series of essays. The Master said,

"If man himself is left in his natural state, he will become lower than the animal and continue to grow more ignorant and imperfect. The savage tribes of central Africa are evidences of this. Left in their natural condition, they have sunk to the lowest depths and degrees of barbarism, dimly groping in a world of mental and moral obscurity. If we wish to illumine this dark plane of human existence, we must bring man forth from the hopeless captivity of nature, educate him and show him the pathway of light and knowledge, until, uplifted from his condition of ignorance, he becomes wise and knowing; no longer savage and revengeful, he becomes civilized and kind; once evil and sinister, he is endowed with the attributes of heaven. But left in his natural condition without education and training, it is certain that he will become more depraved and vicious than the animal, even to the extreme degree witnessed among African tribes who practice cannibalism. It is evident, therefore, that the world of nature is incomplete, imperfect until awakened and illumined by the light and stimulus of education." (Abdu'l-Baha, Promulgation, 309)

Most modern audiences would stop listening at the mention of the word "primitive," which is no longer considered politically correct. In fact, by and large our thinking about this whole issue is remarkably stupid. We look at the scene before us and block out half the picture with the blinkers of ideological preconceptions. On one hand we idolize the lifestyle of the noble savage, or on the other hand we look down on them and call them all savages. All too often we use the accusation of cannibalism as a way of demonizing the "other," especially the smaller tribes in isolated places. For every documented case of cannibalism there must be dozens made up by whatever propaganda machine is operating fastest at the time. But notwithstanding how frequency lies may be, that is no reason to enter into complete denial, as a neo-Nazi denies Hitler's most lurid but not worst crime (his worst crime was causing WWII, which resulted in far more deaths than his concentration camps).

It is easy in our woolly confusion to miss the Master's point entirely that we can be slaves of nature whether we live in an isolated tribe or an apartment in Paris or New York. There are druggies and cannibals and sex slavery in every place, unfortunately. Until we raise the issue to the plane of slavery to nature, few arguments will have much effect. The facts about what is primitive and what is not are blocked out by blinkers of all shades.

Here is my pet gripe for today. Listening to the story of Columbus and the explorers and colonists following him, it is hard to believe how stupid philosophers are. They read Thomas Hobbes as if he were theorizing in an isolated bubble. But back then these stories of man in the face of brute natural law were fresh in everybody's minds. It was just the way it was. Read Columbus's story and you cannot help but notice that as soon as the mariners left port every rule of civilization behavior, weak and inadequate as they were, went right out the window. The Indians they met were sometimes better, sometimes worse than them, but that is not the point. There were no innocents and no devils, just human beings living in a difficult environment. Hobbes expression "red in tooth and claw" was no outburst of pessimistic cynicism, it was just an observation of how things are whenever you sink into a state of nature. You do not need to plunge into the jungle to sink into a state of ignorant barbarism, just forget to say your prayers. The weeds of ill thoughts will spring up right here at home, in your own head.

Cannibalism springs up in places natural and civilized, and all of us need ongoing education to free ourselves from it, to fear of it, and to nature in general. This principle of eliminating whatever corrupt practices take away from our collective survival chances is enunciated as a general principle in one of Baha'u'llah's Great Being statements:

"O my friend! In all circumstances one should seize upon every means which will promote security and tranquility among the peoples of the world. The Great Being saith: In this glorious Day whatever will purge you from corruption and will lead you towards peace and composure, is indeed the Straight Path." (Tablets, 171)

Cannibalism is a form of corruption that must be expunged completely, in spite of its only being a minor harm in certain narrow, negligible instances. Same thing with drugs, alcohol, homosexuality, all are better of overall as taboo if we consider the long term survival of the human race. As Darwin in effect pointed out below, one slight shift in the total load, one violation of Adl, can topple the camel.

"Extinction follows chiefly from the competition of tribe with tribe, and race with race. Various checks are always in action, serving to keep down the numbers of each savage tribe,- such as periodical famines, nomadic habits and the consequent deaths of infants, prolonged suckling, wars, accidents, sickness, licentiousness, the stealing of women, infanticide, and especially lessened fertility. If any one of these checks increases in power, even slightly, the tribe thus affected tends to decrease; and when of two adjoining tribes one becomes less numerous and less powerful than the other, the contest is soon settled by war, slaughter, cannibalism, slavery, and absorption. Even when a weaker tribe is not thus abruptly swept away, if it once begins to decrease, it generally goes on decreasing until it becomes extinct." (Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, Ch. VII)

Now that we know how little grounds there are for distinctions of race or tribe, now that Western civilization and the planet's ecosystem is in such imminent danger of collapse and extinction, we cannot afford to ignore learning about whatever can shift the load, nor can we flinch from eliminating whatever threatens our common survival.

Materials on the Master's Visits to England and Paris

More Source Materials on the Master's Visits to England and Paris

By John Taylor; 2006 August 05

It is coming up to the time when all good Canadian Baha'is are thinking about the Master's visit to our land. The official days slated for celebrating this great event in our history is late August and early September.

In preparation for this time, I have scanned in some currently written source materials from Star of the West magazine on the Master's trips to England and France.

The first two selections can also largely be found in "`Abdu'l-Baha in London," though while correcting the OCR errors I noticed at least one minor editorial correction of this text that was made in the book version; there may be more.

The article on the Master's visit to Paris is by Mary Ford, a Westerner who spoke Persian and had visited Him in Akka earlier on. This as far as I can see, is unique and not found elsewhere. It is nice introduction to Paris Talks, offering several priceless details about the Master's time there. After this introduction, she collects together partial notes for several Paris addresses of the Master that she had attended. I include here only the first two. For purposes of comparison, I also include a full copy of the full version of the first talk. This she says was recorded separately by Assadu'llah and his notes in Persian formed the basis for Paris Talks, which I believe was translated by Laura Clifford Barney. Ford does not give dates, but the Paris Talk does gives a date: October 21, 1911, which is the day after a day later declared as "UN Day." As far as I can see, the second talk that Ford entitles "The Earth is God's," does not seem to have been included in Paris Talks. As you can see, its wording is very strong, stronger even than in the better known talk of the day before.

"The poor have given their lives to the greed of others."

I end with some background material on this conflict, called by Ford the "Battle of Benghazi." On October 3, 1911, when the Master was still in England, Italian troops had invaded Libya and landed at Tripoli, facing resistance from Libyans and Turkish troops. This attack was an act of naked aggression, an unprovoked colonialist land grab. The Master deplores the violence and bloodshed but avoids making political statements. Recall that only a few months earlier He had stayed for a year not so very far from the site of this battle, in Ramala, Egypt. In spite of the greed and guilt of the Italians, most people in the West sided with them.

ABDU'L-BAHA at Bristol (Star of the West)

(SW, Vol. 2, No. 11, p. 8, 11; reprinted from The Christian Commonwealth of September 27, 1911)

Last Saturday afternoon Abdul-Baha arrived from London with a few friends to spend the week-end at the Clifton Guest House. After a rest he expressed the wish to see the country around Bristol. What impressed him most was the fresh. green of the woods and fields, the spaciousness of the open downs, and the absence of smoke.

He was present at the evening meal and warmly greeted those who had gathered together to welcome him. After commenting upon the peacefulness of the house he contrasted the costliness of material feasts with the pure simplicity of this meal, where the all pervading spirit was that of love and friendship between East and West. There were nineteen at table and on hearing it 'Abdul Baha remarked that nineteen was a good number (held sacred by the Baha'is) and that this meal would go down to posterity as a matter of history. It was afterwards proposed to send to the believers at Teheran a message of united gratitude for the presence of Abdul-Baha, in response to the generous greeting that they had sent on their part to the followers in England. The same evening about eighty friends assembled to listen to the words of the great Persian teacher. Mr. Tudor Pole took the chair and introduced him by a few words on the Baha movement. Abdul-Baha then rose and spoke with impressive dignity, Tamaddon Ul Molk translating:--

The master says that he has come from very far to see you, and that you are very welcome. He praises God that after forty two years of imprisonment for the faith he is able to come to you. Abdul-Baha then continued: "These people are very spiritual, with hearts looking towards God, waiting for the glad tidings. They have come through the power of the Holy Spirit, therefore we thank God. May he send you straightforwardness to guide you to your holy mountains and blessed places; the Truth has come, let its holy springs water you. It is evident that day follows night, and after dawn the sunset. Just as the sun sets and rises and sets again, so Jesus Christ appeared on the horizon of this world like a sun of Truth, bringing light and joy to the whole world. But the people now are not in such close touch with his spirit; their religion and faith are not so strong. The people are searching after material things instead of looking forward to the kingdom. Again God has sent light and truth into the world. The heavenly star has appeared in Persia; a new spiritual illumination is now penetrating throughout the world (the result of Bahau'llah's teaching). The great light shall spread through all lands." Abdul Baha said that our hearts should become as mirrors and be ready prepared for the glad tidings of the dawning at a new age. Jesus Christ said that we should be born again through the spiritual fire and love of God and be baptized by the water of life and the Holy Spirit, that we may obtain everlasting life. Abdul Baha went on to say: "Be very kind and serve every one; become lovers of justice and pray for the whole of mankind; help the poor and the children; heal the sick; shelter the refugees; and be known by your lives as the children of God; so may that sun become the light of the world, casting its radiance upon East and West May the world become a new world; may war and slaughtering cease and the most Great Peace come. God help you to spread this Divine teaching, and to establish everywhere the characteristics of Jesus." He then prayed as follows:

"0 God, these people are your servants; they turn their faces to you to receive the manifestations of your bounty. Brighten all these hearts and bless their souls. Give them new life to follow your teachings. Let them enter into your kingdom, and bestow on them the blessing of the Holy Spirit. Open their eyes to the light and help them to serve mankind. Thou art a powerful giver and merciful. God bless you all.

After asking the people if they were happy he left the room. Tamaddon Ul Molk then gave a short account of the Bahais and the terrible sufferings they had under gone for their faith. He spoke of some of the martyrdoms which he had himself witnessed. Mr. Tudor Pole then spoke of the great Persian lady, a poetess, QurratulAin, of whom an account appeared in The Christian Commonwealth of September 13. After a few questions were asked the gathering closed. Abdul Baha stood in the doorway and shook hands with everyone, wishing them Godspeed.

Sunday being a glorious day, Abdul Baha went driving both morning and afternoon; he walked on the downs, and spoke with many of the little children whom he met. Later he gathered together the servants of the house, spoke to them of the dignity of labour, and thanked them for their work. He then went over the Clifton Guest House, and blessed it as a centre for pilgrims from the West and East, saying tat it would become truly both a guest house and a rest house indeed.

Abdul-Baha returned to London on Monday, and Bristol is the only provincial city that he has visited during his present stay in this country. He leaves England early next week.

Farewell to England (Star of the West)

(SW, Vol. 2, No. 13, p. 4-5; reprinted from The Christian Commonwealth of Oct. 4, 1911.]

NEWS NOTE.

On the morning of Oct. 2nd, Abdul-Baha breakfasted with the Lord Mayor of London at the Mansion House. The Lord Mayor said to him that he considered London to be greatly honoured by having such a guest. The next morning Abdul-Baha left for Paris and is residing in a nice flat taken for a month or so, near the Trocadero and Arc de Triomphe. -Arthur Cuthbert.

FAREWELL TO ABDUL BAHA.

Impressive Meeting in London.

At the invitation of Mrs. Thornburgh-Cropper about two hundred representative people met in the hall of the Passmore Edwards' Settlement, Tavistock Place, last Friday evening to bid farewell to Abdul Baha Abbas on the eve of his departure for Paris. Arriving in London on Monday evening, September 4, he has spent a happy and busy four weeks in our midst. Except for a brief visit to Bristol last week, he remained at 97, Cadogan Gardens. His time was mainly occupied in interviews with people who wished to meet him. These included not a few whose names are household words in this country, and some travelled long distances to see him.

A beautiful spirit prevailed on Friday evening. The atmosphere was very different from that of an ordinary meeting or religious gathering. Everyone present was enriched by the lofty spiritual tone of the proceedings; the notes struck were all in the direction of Brotherhood, unity, peace. While a report of the speeches would give a very inadequate idea of the effect produced, yet they were so well-conceived, so sincere, so exquisitely phrased as to, be all worthy of reproduction. Among others, Ameer Ali Syed wrote regretting his inability to be present, and Archdeacon Wilberforce sent affectionate greetings.

After the Lord's Prayer and prayers for Unity of Baha'u'llah and Gelasius (V. century), Professor Michael Sadler spoke as follows:-

We have met together to bid farewell to Abdul Baha, and to thank God for his example and teaching, and for the power of his prayers to bring Light into confused thought, Hope into the place of dread, Faith where doubt was, and into troubled hearts the Love which overmasters self-seeking and fear. Though we all, among ourselves, in our devotional allegiance, have our own individual loyalties, to all of us Abdul Baha brings, and has brought, a message of unity, of sympathy, and of peace. He bids us all be real and true in what we profess to believe; and to treasure above everything the Spirit behind the form. With him we bow before the hidden name, before that which is of every life the Inner Life! He bids us worship in fearless loyalty to our own faith, but with ever stronger yearning after union, brotherhood, and love; so turning ourselves in spirit, and with our whole heart, that we may enter more into the mind of God, which is above class, above race, and beyond time.

Prof. Sadler concluded with a beautiful prayer of James Martineau.

Mr. Eric Hammond said the Bahai movement stood for unity: one God, one people; a myriad souls manifesting the divine unity, a unity so complete that no difference of colour or creed could possibly differentiate between one manifestation of God and another, and a sympathy so all-embracing as to include the very lowest, meanest, shabbiest of men; unity, sympathy, brotherhood, leading up to a concord universal. He concluded with a saying of Baha'u'llah, that the divine cause of universal good could not be limited to either East or West. Miss Alice Buckton said we were standing at one of the springtimes of the world, and from that assembly ~f representatives of thought and work and love would go out all over the world influences making for unity and brotherhood. The complete equality of men and women was one of the chief notes of Bahai teaching. Sir Richard Stapley pointed out that unity must not be sought in the forms and externals of religion, but in the inner spirit. In Persia there has been such an impulse towards real unity as was a rebuke to this so-called Christian country. Mr. Claude Montefiore, as a Jew, rejoiced in the growth of the spirit of unity, and regarded that meeting as prophetic of the better time to come, and in some sense a fulfillment of the idea expressed by one who fell a martyr to the Roman Catholic faith, Sir Thomas Moore, who wrote of the great Church of the Utopians, in which all varieties of creeds gathered together, having a service and liturgy that expressed the higher unity, while admitting special loyalties. Mrs. Stannard dwelt on what that meeting and the sentiments expressed meant to the East, especially to the women, whose condition it was difficult for the West to understand. Tamaddon-ul-Molk testified to the unifying effect the Bahai movement had had in Persia, and of the wonderful way in which it had spread to America and other countries.

Then "The Master" rose to give his farewell address. An impressive figure, the face rather worn, but the eyes full of animation, he stood for about fifteen minutes, speaking in soft, musical Persian. From time to time he gently stroked his white beard, and with hands extended, palms upwards, he closed with a prayer:-

o noble friends and seekers for the Kingdom of God! God be praised! we see the light of love is shining in the East and the West, and the tent of intercourse is raised in the centre of the world for the drawing together of hearts and souls. The call of the Kingdom has gone all over the world. The annunciation of the world's Universal Peace has enlightened the world's conscience. My hope is that by the zeal and ardour of the pure-hearted, the darkness of hatred, and differences will be entirely abolished, and the light of love and unity will shine more brightly. This world shall become a new world. Things material will become the mirror of the Kingdom, human hearts will meet and embrace each other. The whole world shall become as a man's native country, and different races shall be counted as one race. Then disputes and differences will vanish, and the Divine Beloved will be revealed in the society of mankind. It is because the East and the West are illuminated by the One Sun, all races, nations, and creeds are the servants of the One God. The whole earth is one home, and all peoples are bathed in the ocean of God's mercy. God creates all. He gives sustenance to all. He guides and trains all under the shadow of his bounty. We must follow the example God himself gives us, and do away with all these differences and quarrels. Praise be to God! the signs of friendship are appearing, and a proof of this is that today I --an Easterner-- in the London of the West have received extreme kindness, regard, and love, and I am deeply thankful and happy. I shall never forget this time I have spent with you. I leave you with extreme regret, and with prayers for you, that all the beauty of the Kingdom may be yours.

The translation of the valedictory having been read by Professor Sadler, Abdul Baha closed the meeting by giving his blessing in undulating rhythmic tones.

By the time these lines appear Abdul Baha Abbas will have left our shores, but the memory of his gracious personality is a permanent possession, His influence will be felt for many days to come, and has already done much to promote that union of East and West for which many have long yearned.

With Abdu'l-Baha in Paris, By Mary Hanford Ford

(Star of the West, Vol. 2, No. 13, p. 3)

To one who has visited Abdul-Baha in his prison home at Acca, the delight of seeing him in the western world is almost indescribable. I was not so fortunate as to be with him in London, but I had the good fortune to arrive in Paris shortly after he reached that city, and for two weeks I was able to see him every morning.

He rented his own apartment in Paris, and a little fair, pleasant faced French maid presided over its domestic functions. and answered the bell.

"This is my home and the home of my friends," said Abdu'l Baha, and everyone was admitted here without question, no matter to what cult or nationality he belonged, no matter how shabby were his clothes. A background of Persian men was always present, for all the Persians in Paris apparently camped in the home of Abdul Eaha during his stay there, but besides the Persians there were French, Germans, English, Hindus, and a large sprinkling of Americans, among whom the tall figures of Mr. Woodcock and Mr. Mills were always noticeable.

Abdul-Baha, of course, paid all his own expenses in Paris, and the apartment he rented was a commodious one provided with the best modern conveniences, and containing a great drawing room which could easily accommodate from seventy live to a hundred people.

Here the interested ones gathered every morning between ten and twelve, though it was whispered that even before dawn eager seekers were admitted to private interviews with Abdul-Baha, and naturally those who did not wish to be seen entering his house came in the early hours.

Abdul Baha speaks only the Oriental tongues, but lie understands all that is said in any language, and in Paris his wonderful words were translated by M. Dreyfus into especially perfect French. The lithe company assembled at No. 4 Avenue de Camoens never knew exactly at what time the eagerly expected one wean appear. Sometimes he came joyfully, waving a good morning to all, or best of all, greeting each one with a warm hand clasp. At other times, when there had been bad news from the seat of war in Tripoli, lie would enter with sadness written upon his eloquent countenance, and it was on such occasions that he gave the two little talks on war that I send you.

Sometimes his address was very short but always his presence was so stimulating that no one had the slightest consciousness of disappointment when he arose and left the room. Abdul Baha is like a great magnet drawing together the noblest forces of nations and individuals. He is purely synthetic, not analytic, and his cohering power is enormous he focalizes the temperament of every listener. The stimulus of his presence in this way is something quite indescribable; it must be experienced to be comprehended. But if one did not understand Persian or French, the electric contact with Abdu'l Baha and his marvelous and poetic utterance would be sufficient to transform phlegmatic materialism into spiritual possibility.

The effect of this electric presence was that of clear and prodigious thinking which swept away like cobwebs all trivialities of sect and disunion, and pierced through to the divine harmonies which unite one to God and his neighbor. Everyone who listened to Abdul Baha must have realized that this was no sectarian founder of a cult. This was a spiritually endowed messenger whose message touched all mankind, who came out of his prison to remind men of the mighty lessons God has spoken to lift us out of barbarism and cruelty, from war to peace, and that in this day we must follow even the letter of these heavenly lessons.

So he spoke always of peace, always of conduct, giving to his own followers definitions of their mission which were very positive, and must have sounded a trifle strange to some who perhaps may have retained a slightly sectarian bias, even under the inspiration of this divinely dowered Prophet of Unity.

"You are a society banded together for the increase of friendship among nations and races, and of brotherhood among men," lie said one day, waving his hand toward the circle before him, and constantly he adjured us to realize the privilege that was ours in being first to receive the "Breeze of God" which must always rise in the East and blow towards the West, and which is now floating again from that wonderful Orient into the faces of the expectant Occident.

It was exceedingly interesting to watch the faces of those who came each morning to listen to Abdu'l Baha and observe the gradual but evident change of thought which took place in them so that hard lines gave way before invading gentleness and light irradiated countenances and eyes which previously had considered only material difficulties. I have not time to recall the countless instances of this sort. They were, of course, always intensified by an interview with Abdu'l Baha himself. Sometimes people stayed with him three minutes, sometimes half an hour, for there were many waiting to speak with him. The time of the interview did not matter much and I never shall forget a dear little friend who is cashier of a big business house in Paris. She is devoutly unselfish, and eager only to do her utmost for every one. She had a three minute interview. As she entered, Abdu'l Baha advanced toward her with his hands outstretched.

"Ah, you are aflame! You are alive!" he cried. 'How happy I am. when people come to me who are alive not dead!"

Then he took her hands and said to her just the tender and inspiring words she needed, assuring her that God would always guide her. She was only in his room three minutes, but she came out with a look upon her face I shall never forget.

Each day I was in Paris I went into the big shop where she was cashier, and the lovely look was still upon her face. I am sure it will never leave her.

I send you the striking passages from some of the talks given by Abdul Baha while I was in Paris. My versions are, of course, not complete or perfect. Mirza Assad Ollah, who was present, carefully took down Abdul Baha's words in Persian, and they will no doubt be translated and given us later. My own translations are merely the result of notes taken at the time and are necessarily incomplete. But certain significant words were of great moment and these I always preserved.

The two points Abdu'l-Baha seemed desirous of impressing upon his hearers especially were the fact that man has freed himself from the trammels of material conditions through the use of his spiritual gifts, and that possessing this power he should apply it for good, for the establishing of a perfect civilization, the abolition of cruelty and injustice, and the institution of love as the absolute rule.

To attain this he insisted it is only necessary to think right, and again and again, in various modifications he repeated the wonderful words: "While they make war, you think peace; while they create destruction, you think construction; while they are guilty of cruelty, you think tenderness!"

Talk on the Battle of Benghazi

(SW, Vol. 2, No. 13, p. 4)

I am not happy this morning, I am full of sadness. The news which the paper brought us was such as must fill one with anguish.

Animals fight, and when they fight it is for a cause, an end to be gained.

Men are fighting now, for what? For the ground, our sepulchre, our tomb, our cemetery!

The earth is the first and lowest of terrestrial things created by the Divine Will and it is our tomb, our sepulchre, our cemetery; our death, not our life -- and these men are fighting not for liberty or an ideal, but for ground, for the place of death not life, for a sepulchre, a tomb, a cemetery!

God has never forgotten the world, and no matter how black have been its conditions, there have always been societies established for the cherishing of love and equality and fraternity.

You are a people banded together to increase friendship among nations and races and brotherhood among men. So now, while these men are creating death, you think life, while they are guilty of cruelty, you think tenderness, while they make destruction, you think construction, while they create war, you think peace.

We must hope, we must not despair. We must look forward to the time when war and dissension will disappear, when love and unity will reign, and the light of God will shine upon all banners and into all hearts, and unite them to one another and to Him.

The Earth is God's (SW, Vol. 2, No. 13, p. 5)

There has been another battle today and much blood has been shed. The poor have given their lives as a sacrifice to the greed of others. Men are fighting for the earth -- for land -- and it belongs to no one but God. Kings have fought for it from Charlemagne to Napoleon I, yet they had no right to it. One fought wrongfully to wrest it from another who wrongfully possessed it. All people are merely tenants of God upon the land, yet nevertheless empires have disappeared in the struggle for its possession, and again men are shedding blood for die ownership of mere land.

While man might become a centre for good, for amity, he fights like ferocious beasts for the right to land.

God wishes man to establish just equality, not to transgress laws, to help one another and live together in love. Do what God asks, be the cause of unity and peace wipe out the horrors of war and hatred!

Be ye capable of all good, eager to work for the cause of unity and peace, sacrificing all for this. Be eager to suffer for such an end. Forget yourself, forget personal danger, personal evil and inconvenience. Have no fear of evil to yourself in the great cause of unity and peace. Be dissolved in love, so that you may lose consciousness of everything except the good of all.

The Pitiful Causes of War and the Duty of Everyone to Strive for Peace (Abdu'l-Baha, Paris Talks, pp. 27-30)

October 21st

'Abdu'l-Baha said:

I hope you are all happy and well. I am not happy, but very sad. The news of the Battle of Benghazi grieves my heart. I wonder at the human savagery that still exists in the world! How is it possible for men to fight from morning until evening, killing each other, shedding the blood of their fellow-men: And for what object? To gain possession of a part of the earth! Even the animals, when they fight, have an immediate and more reasonable cause for their attacks! How terrible it is that men, who are of the higher kingdom, can descend to slaying and bringing misery to their fellow-beings, for the possession of a tract of land!

The highest of created beings fighting to obtain the lowest form of matter, earth! Land belongs not to one people, but to all people. This earth is not man's home, but his tomb. It is for their tombs these men are fighting. There is nothing so horrible in this world as the tomb, the abode of the decaying bodies of men.

However great the conqueror, however many countries he may reduce to slavery, he is unable to retain any part of these devastated lands but one tiny portion -- his tomb! If more land is required for the improvement of the condition of the people, for the spread of civilization (for the substitution of just laws for brutal customs) -- surely it would be possible to 29 acquire peaceably the necessary extension of territory.

But war is made for the satisfaction of men's ambition; for the sake of worldly gain to the few, terrible misery is brought to numberless homes, breaking the hearts of hundreds of men and women!

How many widows mourn their husbands, how many stories of savage cruelty do we hear! How many little orphaned children are crying for their dead fathers, how many women are weeping for their slain sons!

There is nothing so heart-breaking and terrible as an outburst of human savagery!

I charge you all that each one of you concentrate all the thoughts of your heart on love and unity. When a thought of war comes, oppose it by a stronger thought of peace. A thought of hatred must be destroyed by a more powerful thought of love. Thoughts of war bring destruction to all harmony, well-being, restfulness and content.

Thoughts of love are constructive of brotherhood, peace, friendship, and happiness.

When soldiers of the world draw their swords to kill, soldiers of God clasp each other's hands! So may all the savagery of man disappear by the Mercy of God, working through the pure in heart and the sincere of soul. Do not think the peace of the world an ideal impossible to attain!

Nothing is impossible to the Divine Benevolence of God.

If you desire with all your heart, friendship with every race on earth, your thought, spiritual and positive, will spread; it will become the desire of others, growing stronger and stronger, until it reaches the minds of all men.

Do not despair! Work steadily. Sincerity and love will conquer hate. How many seemingly impossible events are coming to pass in these days! Set your faces steadily towards the Light of the World. Show love to all; 'Love is the breath of the Holy Spirit in the heart of Man'. Take courage! God never forsakes His children who strive and work and pray! Let your hearts be filled with the strenuous desire that tranquillity and harmony may encircle all this warring world. So will success crown your efforts, and with the universal brotherhood will come the Kingdom of God in peace and goodwill.

In this room today are members of many races, French, American, English, German, Italian, brothers and sisters meeting in friendship and harmony! Let this gathering be a foreshadowing of what will, in very truth, take place in this world, when every child of God realizes that they are leaves of one tree, flowers in one garden, drops in one ocean, and sons and daughters of one Father, whose name is love!

Article from Wikipedia

The Italo-Turkish or Turco-Italian War (also known in Italy as guerra di Libia, "the Libyan war" ) was fought between the Ottoman Empire and Italy from September 29, 1911 to October 18, 1912.

Italy seized the Ottoman provinces of Tripolitania and Cyrenaica, together known as Libya today, as well as the Isle of Rhodes and the Greek-speaking Dodecanese archipelago near Anatolia.

Although minor, the war was an important precursor of the First World War as it sparked nationalism in the Balkan states. Seeing how easily the Italians had defeated the disorganized Ottomans, the members of the Balkan League attacked the Empire before the war with Italy had ended.

The Italo-Turkish war saw numerous technological advances used in warfare; notably the aeroplane. On October 23, 1911, an Italian pilot flew over Turkish lines on a reconnaissance mission, and on November 1, the first ever aerial bomb was dropped on Turkish troops in Libya.

Banghazi (Encyclopedia Britannica)

Also spelled Benghazi, Italian Bengasi city and major seaport of northeastern Libya, on the Gulf of Sidra. It was founded by the Greeks of Cyrenaica as Hesperides (Euesperides) and received from the Egyptian pharaoh Ptolemy III the additional name of Berenice in honour of his wife. After the 3rd century AD it superseded Cyrene and Barce as the chief centre of the region; but its importance waned, and it remained a small town until it was extensively developed during the Italian occupation of Libya (1912-42). In World War II Banghazi suffered considerable damage, and, after changing hands five times, it was finally captured by the British in November 1942.

Banghazi is Libya's second largest city and is an administrative, commercial, and educational centre. It is the site of several national government buildings, as well as the Gar Younis (formerly Benghazi) University (founded 1955). Local industries include salt processing, oil refining, food processing, cement manufacturing, and tanning, brewing, and fishing. Fresh water is provided by one of the world's largest desalinization plants. Benina International Airport is 20 miles (32 km) east of the city. Roads connect Bangh?z? with other Libyan centres on the Mediterranean coast. Pop. (1995 est.) 650,000.

Hillside Housing for Health

Hillside Housing for Health (revision of older material)

By John Taylor; 2006 August

Most new houses built in North America are low-density, high profit "McMansions," built in areas exclusively dedicated to the automobile. Streets are consciously designed to discourage all uses other than driving a private automobile. This policy was long justified by traffic engineers for reasons of safety, but as Jane Jacobs proves, this flies against all the evidence. Worse, by discouraging active lifestyles statistical studies have found that these suburban jungles rob from their inmates at least two years of their expected lifespan. With no reason to walk anywhere, chronic illnesses such as cancer and heart disease are now endemic in areas both rich and poor.

Contrastingly, older streets are broad and tree-lined. Many boulevards, though old fashioned, have become beloved landmarks crowded with pedestrians pursuing a variety of street activities; artists and bosquers ply their trade on the broad sidewalks, children playing boisterous games, bicycle riders and in-line skaters plying their side lanes and boardwalks. These places are, against all expectations, safer and healthier than sprawl, be it urban or suburban. Even crime rates are lower, since the crowded street scene is under close supervision from permanent, concerned residents around the clock. In Italy, whose cities were designed centuries ago, heart disease is half that of the United States, land of super-sized portions, of driving everywhere and entire sub-divisions without sidewalks.

It has been discovered that even small design changes within buildings encourage active choices. One experiment placed elevators into the background and made the door to stairwells more prominent, leading to an attractive well lit space stairway decorated with plants and artwork. These stairs not been used at all, but with these small alterations they soon became crowded. Unnumbered urban planning studies have proven that the inhabitants of older neighborhoods offering a mix of shops and businesses within easy walking distance are 35 percent less likely to become obese.

The neighborhoods in North America with the highest land values invariably have varied and often intense land use. Many used to be considered slums and were slated for demolition before they were gentrified. And for good reason, they are the most interesting as well as the healthiest places to live. Nor are "extreme" landscaping arrangements necessarily less salutary. It is known that in mountain villages, where everything is built along a steep slope, obesity is all but unknown among lifelong dwellers. Yet in every construction project the first thing they do is level the whole area. This removes the character from an area and makes a traveler feel that no matter where he may roam, every place looks like every other.

Hillside housing is designed from the ground up to promote diversity and local character, as well as the health of its inhabitants. Its mound form has inset dwellings built in long rows running east to west. The north side is devoted to human habitations and the south side, facing the sun, to agriculture, greenhouses, solar panels and parks.

Architect Moshe Safdie changed how I imagine the look of the shady face of these proposed hillside developments. The north side of this row housing I had thought of as ordinary apartments above with street level shops, factories and places of business below. Safdie promotes variety, builds cities on hilly land, and his most famous work, Habitat, persuaded me that a jagged facade would be the way to optimize the view for hillside apartments on the north side.

Safdie's Habitat '67 in Montreal, was, according to the Encyclopedia Britannica, a "bold experiment in prefabricated housing ... comprising three clusters of individual apartment units arranged like irregularly stacked blocks along a zigzagged framework." In his book, "The City after the Automobile," he describes how as a young architect he spent many late nights connecting and disconnecting Lego blocks, modeling experimentally how Habitat could provide maximal, equal exposure for each apartment to sun, sky and that spectacular view of the ships plying Montreal's port facility. His final product, the blocky outer super-structure of Habitat made of concrete, looks strange from the outside but those fortunate people living inside it say that from their viewpoint, looking out from their windows and balconies, Habitat approaches the ideal.

I know by personal experience that living in a home with a commanding view of the immediate neighborhood can be a surprisingly effective way to keep depression at bay, bring variety into daily life and increase one's concern about neighbors and neighborhood events. A Habitat-like facade for a mound development would allow equal access to the panorama outdoors for both rich and poor, for temporary and permanent residents alike.

In his later years, as fractal mathematics and chaos theory became the rage, Moshe Safdie latched onto fractals as an explanation of why the final arrangement of his Habitat housing complex looked like as it did. Fractals map the endless, beginingless, puffy, undulating edges of clouds, explain how they can shift and swallow one another. A Habitat apartment complex, Safdie thought, looks as fluid as a fractal and similarly retains its shape whether seen from close up or afar, the same as clouds, galaxies and sandy shorelines.

A hillside development would resemble a fractal even more than Habitat, since it would be literally fluid and dynamic. As with Habitat, dwelling units would be set into permanent niches, plant-lined balconies running up the north side. But, characteristically, these dwelling units would shift from place to place. Modular apartment units of standard size would be transported by rails running inside the building that would connect to trains running underneath the development. A given dwelling unit might move overnight to any location elsewhere in the neighborhood or indeed anywhere in the world.

By and large the ground is not flat, its run up and down hills, and where there are no hills there already, artificial ones are piled up in the early stages of construction by bulldozers. Interspersed are tall lookouts that also function as farmers' silos, heat towers and the bases of wind turbines. Some of the towers have climbing surfaces and slides and waterslides running down their outside face. The street corners between neighborhood blocks are often domed over and devoted to farmer's markets, kiosks and a variety of other uses. Some corner intersections are open to the elements.

Another way hillside housing might promote health is in its "service house" design. These semi-communal housing projects in Scandinavia already include many services only available to a wealthy elite elsewhere. This housing style has been described as,

"a group of independent self-sufficient homes, like any contemporary residential development, but resident families in the neighborhood have access to communal facilities and recreational areas. The community building has a common dining room for all residents and a day care center for children, in addition to other common rooms." (Schoenauer, 460)

Since the mobile living units would contain only a bathroom, bedroom and working space, common rooms in the area would be needed to supplement this limited personal living space. While the hillside housing container would have outside it a small balcony and other personal space, and while a person so inclined could have meals sent in and eat alone, this would be discouraged. Studies have found that people involved in a church or other organization live longer and have fewer mortal health conditions. The hillside community would be designed around the basic need that every healthy, well rounded, sane individual has for a varied, warm social atmosphere. Should one individual not happen to fit into a particular neighborhood social milieu, they would be moved around until a mix congenial to their personality is discovered.

Among the greatest standing threats to human health is vermin, especially rats, which have been estimated to eat or spoil between a quarter to one third of our food supply. Rats spread disease and snack on electrical insulation, thus causing a large percentage of fires, both industrial and domestic. It is recognized that if we could only eliminate waste it would actually be quite easy to eliminate rats. Hillside housing is designed to reduce waste and reduce access to it by disposing of it as quickly as possible.

Thus, hillside meals would be prepared in large, communal but professionally designed kitchens using locally grown produce. Meals are delivered directly by encapsulated pneumatic tubes to the common dining rooms throughout the neighborhood. Uneaten food would immediately be sent back by the same tubes to specially designed composting bins. Garbage would never be allowed to sit and wait for pickup by noisy garbage trucks. Sitting garbage offers tempting meals for rats. Since rats thrive on sewage as well as garbage, toilets using "black box" technology would compost waste on-site, then their soil enhancing product would be sped by pneumatic tube to local gardens, again offering as little access as possible to vermin. Hillside developments, being off the grid, would make use of solar and wind charged batteries -- also delivered by capsulated pneumatic tubes -- in order to reduce the need for power lines and the electrical insulation that rats enjoy eating so much.

As mentioned, the great distinguishing feature of hillside housing is modularity, the ability to move any dwelling, be it a home or a place of business, from any point to any other location overnight. In these neighborhoods houses, shops and places of business would be moved around to maximize the many factors that contribute to a healthy lifestyle, including the amount of exercise required to perform everyday tasks. It is reasonable to assume that with monitored experimentation some mixes and patterns will prove themselves more effective than others. The more attractive shifts and combinations might succeed in doing what is very rare in a static neighborhood; that is, without any particular effort of will, to prompt sedentary citizens to make big lifestyle changes, to become pedestrians, to climb stairs more often and generally move their own bodies from place to place as a matter of course.

I anticipate that even temporary moves that are later reversed could have hidden, unforeseen benefits. For example, moving a barbershop from a ground level stall to a rooftop location for a few months and then back down to the street again might jog the habits of its clientele for the better. Even after they no longer are forced to climb the stairs to the top of the building to have their hair cut, the new habit would be established. They might then be prone to climb the stairs and partake of the upper lookouts from time to time for other reasons, or just to enjoy the view.

What is more, a flexible, shifting arrangement of a hillside neighborhoods would allow for specialization. Neighborhoods surrounding a hospital might find it advantageous to make everything easily accessible and maintain a quiet, low stimulus atmosphere in order to promote healing among the sick, weak and elderly. Another neighborhood might enhance its appeal to the younger crowd by encouraging a more high-stimulus lifestyle; they might sponsor street dances, music festivals and sports events. Another hillside block might work on educational services, another on artistic endeavors, anything under the sun that people value. Real gains would be monitored, assessed, and automatically publicized on the Internet. Permanently raised land values and shared, cooperative ownership would make it in the interest of every resident to support these initiatives. The system would be designed to give sway to industrious families and groups who prove themselves energetic, constructive and unified enough to contribute to such specialization in their neighborhood.

Since we are discussing health, let us imagine that one hillside block built on a hill decides to work on its existing advantages for encouraging an unusually strenuous lifestyle. It would soon gain a reputation for accomplishing weight loss among other residents in the region. The ability to take off fat unconsciously, without conscious effort, is extremely valuable. Right now people in need of weight loss flock to extremely expensive "fat farms," which, like dieting, does not work for long because our daily environment is built to encourage obesity rather than eliminate it.

An obese person living in a hillside designed city need not even be aware of the structural changes that are bringing about his or her loss of weight. They need only stipulate weight loss as a goal at one point in their lives, and sooner or later their apartment would locate itself in a "fat farm" oriented neighborhood. This automatic nature of the process would reduce the present stigma of being singled out for special treatment.

Others, the frail, weak and elderly, for whom too much strenuous daily effort is genuinely dangerous, would find themselves shifting into the differently designed locales built around hospitals. By catering to specialized needs a responsive neighborhood could earn its own increases in real estate values, as well as cashing in on savings from reduced health care costs.

Alliance of Excellence

Marriage Scabs and the Alliance of Excellence, Part II

By John Taylor; 2006 August 02

Yesterday's thoughts on marriage as scab were prompted by this passage
from the Writings of the Bab. I will include it right away, before my
thoughts take me too far afield, again.

"Say, most people have openly repudiated God and have followed the
rebellious wicked doers. Such people resemble those who have gone before
them, upholding every hostile oppressor. Verily no God is there but God;
His is the kingdom of heaven and earth and He is the Clement, the
All-Knowing." (The Bab, Selections, 167)

This struck me having just re-read Introducing Ethics, a capsule story
of thought about what is right and wrong. Ethics is just what the Bab
says, most throughout history have rebelled, repudiated God and
implicated themselves in some kind of tyranny or other. The common
rejection of mankind meant that ethical theory was hardly a burning
issue in most people's minds, but even among thinkers about ethics (not
necessarily the same thing as ethical thinkers, of course) a repeating
cycle is set up in every age.

No sooner do we start to think we know something about what being
ethical means than along comes a cynic, usually an atheist, often also a
homosexual (homosexuality among animals and humans acts as a sort of
rebellion or counterpoise to sexual reproduction), and this fellow
easily demolishes everything. He proves us wrong about what we thought
we knew. You get at various times your Diogenes, your Hume, Freud,
Russell, Derrida, and on and on. Because their criticism seems so
devastating they gain a large following and huge prestige.

In this respect both leader and followers always "resemble those who
went before them...” they forget the big NOTWITHSTANDING at the heart of
belief. They forget Socrates and Socratic Ignorance; they forget the
Book of Ecclesiastes. I recently stumbled across Ecclesiastes in a
keyword search for something or other and I was hooked. What a wonderful
sustained poem recounting over and over the futility of human existence!
I just love it. I could not help it, I read it from cover to cover there
and then. When I get my website going the first thing I am going to do
is make up a little video where I read the text of Ecclesiastes and
accompany it with a photo montage visual accompaniment of local
graveyards, gravestones and funeral processions. Dreary to a
non-believer, to a believer, edifying.

At the same time I am reading Introducing Islam, which includes a large
number of Hadith that I do not recall seeing before. What got me onto
marriage was the following all-round remarkable statement about charity.

"To bring about a just reconciliation between two contestants is
charity, helping a person mount his animal or to load his baggage onto
it is charity, a good word is charity, to remove obstacles in the street
is charity, smiling upon your brother is charity ... sexual relations
with your spouses is charity." (Ziauddin Sardar, Introducing Islam, Icon
Books, Royston, 2004, p. 10)

How the West would have benefited over the centuries had the authority
of this pronouncement been recognized! Having sex with your spouse is
counted by God as a form of charity? What a great way to douse the
flames of sexual passion! Really, if sex had had this kind of divine
sanction in the purview of Westerners I very much doubt that there would
have that tedious swing back and forth, a generation of Puritanism
followed by a generation of sexual "revolution," then back to
"repression" and then liberation again. If we had started off by
understanding legitimate sex to be a form of spontaneous giving, I do
not think that marriage would have become the scab that it did. We would
not have used the shorthand of coverture, legally conflating two people
into one, instead of into more than the sum of the two. We would have
made it into a living, developing institution rather than a dead, filthy
scab.

And getting back to charity, compare the common ambivalence and out and
out dislike of charity that is so common in the West, "I do not want no
charity!," and our assumption that charity must be institutionalized,
planned, laid out, signed, sealed and delivered by an official
registered charity, even the common idea that charity is something you
must do with your wallet. If we had thought of a smile upon a stranger
as a form of charity, corporations like McDonalds could never have
co-opted it with their "smiles are free" and orders to their minions to
wish upon all a big "have a nice day." Compare the hadith quoted above
with Jane Jacobs' great discovery about what makes for life and death in
street life,

"In speaking about city sidewalk safety, I mentioned how necessary it is
that there should be, in the brains behind the eyes on the street, an
almost unconscious assumption of general street support when the chips
are down -- when a citizen has to choose, for instance, whether he will
take responsibility, or abdicate it, in combating barbarism or
protecting strangers. There is a short word for this assumption of
support: trust. The trust of a city street is formed over time from
many, many little public sidewalk contacts... Most of it is ostensibly
utterly trivial but the sum is not trivial at all. The sum of such
casual, public contact at a local level -- most of it fortuitous, most
of it associated with errands, all of it metered by the person concerned
and not thrust upon him by anyone -- is a feeling for the public
identity of people, a web of public respect and trust, and a resource in
time of personal or neighborhood need. The absence of this trust is a
disaster to a city street. Its cultivation cannot be institutionalized.
And above all, it implies no private commitments." (Jane Jacobs, The
Death and Life of Great American Cities, Vintage Books, New York, 1961,
p. 56)

Jacobs is talking about an environment where little acts of charity,
so-called guerrilla or mindless acts of kindness are the rule rather
than the exception, and it does happen where a community is structured
so as to encourage enough contact -- the kind of place, she notes, that
city planners call a "slum" and slate for destruction. But this does not
come about on its own without a thousand smiles and bits of advice and
shared laughs and other spontaneous acts of charity like those that the
Prophet mentions. Many diverse, positive contacts, combined with
goodwill and ethical understanding, all combine to get people to trust,
to do naturally what the Qu'ran inculcates,

"They believe in God, and in the last day, and bid what is reasonable,
and forbid what is wrong, and vie in charity; these are among the
righteous." (Qur'an 3, E.H. Palmer tr.)

In an atmosphere of trust and cooperation you can vie with your
neighbors in charity, just as our corporate brainwashers already vie
with one another in presenting an image of greed as the ideal, just as
they encourage us to vie with our neighbors in being acquisitive
consumers. Long ago we could have protected ourselves with Muhammad's
simple, penetrating protective warnings, like:

"Little but sufficient is better than the abundant and the alluring."
(Hadith)

Crime and lawlessness, the bane of modern street life, as well as terror
in international relations, are the effect of a general decline in trust
between neighbors. We gradually learn through bitter rebuffs not to be
our brothers' keepers, to leave everything to the professionals, to flee
to credentialism, to call the cops or take it to court, or even just to
ignore it and go on a shopping spree to make yourself feel better.
Consider, in the light of this, the following story about Muhammad as a
teen, long before he was raised to the station of Prophet. This
"Introducing Islam" calls "The Pledge."

"One day, a trader from Yemen was cheated of his goods by a group of
Makkans. When the trader asked for help, no one came to his support. So
he wrote a satirical poem and recited it aloud for all to hear. When
Zubair, one of Muhammad's uncles, heard the poem he felt great remorse.
He called a meeting of city's elders and established an order of
chivalry with the declared aim of protecting the oppressed of the city,
local inhabitants or foreign visitors. Young Muhammad became an
enthusiastic member of this organization which was called Hilf al-fudul.
Later he would say: 'I am not prepared to give up the privilege (of
being a member) even against a herd of camels; if somebody should appeal
to me even today, by virtue of that pledge, I shall hurry to his help.'"
(Introducing Islam, 8)

The pledge. Note the power of poetry. For Arabs then and now, poets have
the prestige and influence of rock stars. And the pledge they (some
sources say it was Muhammad Himself who suggested the organization be
founded, others say it was all done by His uncle) started going in the
city streets of Mecca is startlingly close to the vow of a knight to
uphold honor and perform charity to the weak! Is this the origin of the
chivalric code that got Europe out of the Dark Ages into the
Renaissance, and eventually to world hegemony? Right away I furiously
Googled "Hilf al-Fudul" (Alliance of Excellence) but found very little
about this pre-Islamic organization. There is apparently a good article
about it in an Urdu source, but I do not read Urdu. I hit a dead end,
but I will bounce back.

Meantime, consider the idea of competition itself. It is a natural human
impulse. It can be used ethically, or for our general destruction. We
can compete in charity, or we can compete economically or, worst of all,
in war. Greed is inherent not only to commercialism but also to the
militarized mind set. Consider what Aristotle said,

"...in one point of view, the art of war is a natural art of
acquisition, for the art of acquisition includes hunting, an art which
we ought to practice against wild beasts, and against men who, though
intended by nature to be governed, will not submit; for war of such a
kind is naturally just." (Aristotle, Politics)

We can therefore say that a peace economy is the opposite of
acquisitive, it is charity oriented. Its members vie with each other not
just to better one another but mostly because of the natural limits on
our span of life,

"Hasten to do good before you are overtaken by perplexing adversity,
corrupting prosperity, disabling disease, babbling dotage and sudden death."

We vie with one another in order to emulate the peaceful nature of God,
"God is gentle and loves gentleness in all things." (Hadith) Such is a
genteel nature, one whose gentlemanliness upholds chivalric ideals of
good acts for goodness sake, be they small and big, planned or
spontaneous. This is the Order of Excellence, to do whatever we can to
promote goodwill among neighbors and love among spouses and family
members. And we vie with one another in that because charity is a way to
make our lives matter beyond the here and now; charity is our arrow to
infinity.

"When a person dies, his deeds come to an end, except in respect of
three matters which he leaves behind: a continuing charity, knowledge
from which benefit could be derived and righteous offspring who pray for
him." (28)

Coverture, The Marriage Scab

Coverture, The Marriage Scab

By John Taylor; 2006 August 01

Courts in New York and now Washington have rejected legal appeals for legalizing same-sex marriages. They apparently used such lame arguments that gay journalists openly mock them in the press. This is from a recent New York Time opinion piece:

"Washington's judges (found) that limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples furthers procreation, (is) essential to the survival of the human race, and furthers the well-being of children by encouraging families where children are reared in homes headed by the children's biological parents. Children, the decision continues, tend to thrive in families consisting of a father, mother and their biological children. A concurring opinion (read that) due to the binary biological nature of marriage ... only opposite-sex couples are capable of responsible child rearing." <http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/30/opinion/30savage.html?th&emc=th>

Canadian judges have already rejected this last ditch argument for exclusively opposite-sex marriage. After all, most people are reasoning, if heterosexual singles and gays can already adopt, why should children raised in these households not be regarded as legitimate in the eyes of society? What does "legitimate" mean, anyway? Is it legitimate to set up a prejudice against innocent children born out of wedlock? If not, why not eliminate the roots of this injustice by extending wedlock to gays?

Justice, and arguments for justice, cannot be squeezed into a few words. Still, it is pretty clear by now that our idea of legitimacy is, well, far from clear. Like the reasons for marriage, legitimacy has been pared away beyond recognition, like a tree with all its branches but one cut off, and one solitary leaf growing out of that branch. Does it matter much if we lop that last leaf off? Why not? A one-leafed tree is not likely to survive anyway! This tree metaphor is no whim, it is a recurrent image in most if not all world scriptures. I think we have no choice but to stick to it, for the concept of legitimacy is based upon a set of assumptions that work together just like a living organism, a very large organism, a world tree.

Believers defend exclusively heterosexual marriage by saying, in essence, that "God wants it this way." We believe that marriage is a sacred thing, central to the divine Will. This "God" argument is not really an argument. It is an abdication of argument, or, more charitably, a humble delegation of reasoning to a brighter Mind, a higher Authority. Faith holds no claim to understand God or His reasoning. It would be arrogant to claim that we can understand it or ever will. There may be many reasons why God wants it this way, and those reasons may be diverse but they are, I like to think, homogeneous and consistent. I believe we can observe this: God's grouping of arguments acts together as an abiding, growing presence, just like a tree. Holding to that tree, like holding to marriage and having legitimate children, tends to make us fruitful, productive, prosperous and happy.

"Your children will be like olive shoots around your table." (Ps 128:3)

Like a tree, the presuppositions bearing up the only partly understood God arguments live and die organically, as a whole, together, all or none. To believe in God is to hold that His reasons are deeply grounded in the nature of things, as a tree that derives its substance and stability from roots extending down and out into the ground of being. A tree at the same time grows many large branches upwards, each bifurcating into smaller twigs, and at the end of each waves an almost infinite number of leaves, each busy taking in energy from the sun of metaphysical reality. A tree may well bear the loss of a branch or two; judiciously chosen paring can be a healthy thing. Pruning by a skilled gardener will improve a tree's viability. But if you cut off too many branches indiscriminately the tree must die sooner or later.

Western scripture goes further than merely holding that marriage is a sacred bond only between one man and one woman. It furthermore asserts that since whatever harms the tree of being is immoral, homosexuality must be abhorrent in itself. "Abomination" is the word used in the Bible. This implies that God abhors homosexuality itself, again for reasons we cannot honestly claim to wholly understand. Believers are divided as to God's reasoning, as well we might be, considering that He is by nature an unknowable Essence.

Baha'is remove the Old Testament's moral blame (not to mention its death penalty) on gays themselves by holding that homosexuality is an illness or aberration of nature. This tends to remove homophobic prejudice but it no longer gain the gratitude it might have a century ago. Now Gay Pride Day parades are a loudly celebrated annual fixture in most communities. Gays aggressively assert that they are not perverts, they are proud of their sexual orientation. They hold that sex is value neutral, a free lifestyle choice like the choice we make in the morning between one color of shirt or another. Indeed, gayness is only the tip of a strong pry bar in the doorjamb. Outside, waiting to get in, are an infinity of other sexual orientations, transsexuals, bisexuals, transvestites, and on and on. An articulate gay might well say to a Baha'i: You believe in unity in diversity don't you? Well, what is wrong with diversity of sexual expression?

I would like to begin to answer that by citing the following article in full, a mini-history of the decline of marriage in the West. Because of sexual inequality marriage was understood in terms of coverture, making the whole thing into a scab that had to be removed when healthy regeneration had taken place. Here is the story of the scab.

Op-Ed NYTimes: The Heterosexual Revolution

By STEPHANIE COONTZ

Originally Published: July 5, 2005

THE last week has been tough for opponents of same-sex marriage. First Canadian and then Spanish legislators voted to legalize the practice, prompting American social conservatives to renew their call for a constitutional amendment banning such marriages here. James Dobson of the evangelical group Focus on the Family has warned that without that ban, marriage as we have known it for 5,000 years will be overturned.

My research on marriage and family life seldom leads me to agree with Dr. Dobson, much less to accuse him of understatement. But in this case, Dr. Dobson's warnings come 30 years too late. Traditional marriage, with its 5,000-year history, has already been upended. Gays and lesbians, however, didn't spearhead that revolution: heterosexuals did.

Heterosexuals were the upstarts who turned marriage into a voluntary love relationship rather than a mandatory economic and political institution. Heterosexuals were the ones who made procreation voluntary, so that some couples could choose childlessness, and who adopted assisted reproduction so that even couples who could not conceive could become parents. And heterosexuals subverted the long-standing rule that every marriage had to have a husband who played one role in the family and a wife who played a completely different one. Gays and lesbians simply looked at the revolution heterosexuals had wrought and noticed that with its new norms, marriage could work for them, too.

The first step down the road to gay and lesbian marriage took place 200 years ago, when Enlightenment thinkers raised the radical idea that parents and the state should not dictate who married whom, and when the American Revolution encouraged people to engage in "the pursuit of happiness," including marrying for love. Almost immediately, some thinkers, including Jeremy Bentham and the Marquis de Condorcet, began to argue that same-sex love should not be a crime.

Same-sex marriage, however, remained unimaginable because marriage had two traditional functions that were inapplicable to gays and lesbians. First, marriage allowed families to increase their household labor force by having children. Throughout much of history, upper-class men divorced their wives if their marriage did not produce children, while peasants often wouldn't marry until a premarital pregnancy confirmed the woman's fertility. But the advent of birth control in the 19th century permitted married couples to decide not to have children, while assisted reproduction in the 20th century allowed infertile couples to have them. This eroded the traditional argument that marriage must be between a man and a woman who were able to procreate.

In addition, traditional marriage imposed a strict division of labor by gender and mandated unequal power relations between men and women. "Husband and wife are one," said the law in both England and America, from early medieval days until the late 19th century, "and that one is the husband."

This law of "coverture" was supposed to reflect the command of God and the essential nature of humans. It stipulated that a wife could not enter into legal contracts or own property on her own. In 1863, a New York court warned that giving wives independent property rights would "sow the seeds of perpetual discord," potentially dooming marriage.

Even after coverture had lost its legal force, courts, legislators and the public still cleaved to the belief that marriage required husbands and wives to play totally different domestic roles. In 1958, the New York Court of Appeals rejected a challenge to the traditional legal view that wives (unlike husbands) couldn't sue for loss of the personal services, including housekeeping and the sexual attentions, of their spouses. The judges reasoned that only wives were expected to provide such personal services anyway.

As late as the 1970's, many American states retained "head and master" laws, giving the husband final say over where the family lived and other household decisions. According to the legal definition of marriage, the man was required to support the family, while the woman was obligated to keep house, nurture children, and provide sex. Not until the 1980's did most states criminalize marital rape. Prevailing opinion held that when a bride said, "I do," she was legally committed to say, "I will" for the rest of her married life.

I am old enough to remember the howls of protest with which some defenders of traditional marriage greeted the gradual dismantling of these traditions. At the time, I thought that the far-right opponents of marital equality were wrong to predict that this would lead to the unraveling of marriage. As it turned out, they had a point.

Giving married women an independent legal existence did not destroy heterosexual marriage. And allowing husbands and wives to construct their marriages around reciprocal duties and negotiated roles - where a wife can choose to be the main breadwinner and a husband can stay home with the children- was an immense boon to many couples. But these changes in the definition and practice of marriage opened the door for gay and lesbian couples to argue that they were now equally qualified to participate in it.

Marriage has been in a constant state of evolution since the dawn of the Stone Age. In the process it has become more flexible, but also more optional. Many people may not like the direction these changes have taken in recent years. But it is simply magical thinking to believe that by banning gay and lesbian marriage, we will turn back the clock.

Stephanie Coontz, the director of public education for the Council on Contemporary Families, is the author of "Marriage, a History: From Obedience to Intimacy, or How Love Conquered Marriage."