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The Problem of Authority |
The different religious communities have failed to unite in
the past, because the adherents of each have regarded the
Founder of their own community as the one supreme authority,
and His law as the divine law. Any Prophet Who proclaimed
a different message was, therefore, regarded as an
enemy of the truth. The different sects of each community have
separated for similar reasons. The adherents of each have accepted
some subordinate authority and regarded some particular
version or interpretation of the Founder’s Message as the
One True Faith, and all others as wrong. It is obvious that while
this state of matters exists no true unity is possible. Bahá’u’lláh,
on the other hand, teaches that all the Prophets were bearers
of authentic messages from God; that each in His day gave the
highest teachings of all are essentially in harmony, and are
parts of a great plan for the education and the unification of
humanity. He calls on the people of all denominations to show
their reverence for their Prophets by devoting their lives to the
accomplishment of that unity for which all the Prophets labored
and suffered. In His letter to Queen Victoria He likens
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the world to a sick man whose malady is aggravated because
he has fallen into the hands of unskilled physicians; and He
tells how the remedy may be effected:—
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That which the Lord hath ordained as the sovereign
remedy and mightiest instrument for the healing of all the
world is the union of all its peoples in one universal
Cause, one common Faith. This can in no wise be
achieved except through the power of a skilled, an all-powerful
and inspired Physician. This, verily, is the truth,
and all else naught but error.—Gleanings from the Writings
of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 255.
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