January 12. On this date in 2006, the Universal House of Justice
,
"the authority of letters written on behalf of Shoghi Effendi...there
is no justification for summarily dismissing the authoritative guidance
contained in this body of correspondence."
Below the following PDF, see also a copy of this article in HTML.
Contents:
Introductory letter
Memorandum: Letters written on Behalf of the Guardian
Letters Written on Behalf of Shoghi Effendi
Status of Research Department Memoranda
Bahá'í Writings Based in Fact?
12 January 2006
Dear __
We have received an email letter of 23 July
2005 from Mr. __...[Personal information omitted]... It would be
appreciated if you would convey the following information and the
enclosed item to Mr. __...[Personal information omitted]... Enclosed you
will find a memorandum prepared by the Research Department that should
be of assistance to him in resolving his questions. In addition to this
information, the Universal House of Justice has asked that we provide
the following comments to be conveyed to him.
With regard to your
questions about the authority of letters written on behalf of Shoghi
Effendi, particularly those sent from the Holy Land during the latter
part of his ministry, there is no justification for summarily dismissing
the authoritative guidance contained in this body of correspondence. If
concerns arise in relation to specific messages or topics addressed,
clarification can be sought from the Universal House of Justice.
As to your question
concerning when a matter is referred to the Research Department, this is
determined by the Universal House of Justice depending on the nature of
the inquiry. For example, in reply to questions regarding
interpretation of the Text or the findings of general scholarship, the
Research Department would provide references from the authoritative
texts and offer comments that assist inquirers to draw their own
personal conclusions. Other questions that require a decision on a
specific case, consideration of general policies, or elucidation of
obscure matters would, after consultation by the House of Justice, be
referred to the Department of the Secretariat for reply.
Finally, you ask whether
Bahá'ís should accept all statements in the Writings as based in fact,
unless there is an explicit reference to a particular statement being
conditioned on other information. It should be clear from the examples
provided in the memorandum of the Research Department that there are
some cases where passages from the Writings affirm specific facts and
other cases where passages conform to the beliefs of particular peoples.
It is, therefore, necessary for the reader to determine the meaning of
statements that are not explicit by applying sound hermeneutical
principles found in the Teachings. While there is often room
for a range of personal interpretation on
such matters, and a degree of ambiguity will invariably exist in some
cases, usually a common understanding is formed, which will change over
time should additional evidence come to light. Differences of personal
opinion about the meaning of the Text should not be allowed to create
discord or wrangling among the friends.
With loving Bahá'í greetings,
Department of the Secretariat
Enclosure
MEMORANDUM
To: The Universal House of Justice
Date: 12 January 2006
From: Research Department
Letters written on Behalf of the Guardian
In an email letter of 23 July 2005 addressed
to the Universal House of Justice, Mr. __ poses a number of questions
concerning the degree of authority to be accorded to the letters written
on behalf of Shoghi Effendi and to the memoranda prepared by the
Research Department, and he enquires whether all statements in the
Writings should be accepted as being "based in fact, unless explicitly
stated as being conditioned on other information". The Research
Department has studied the issues raised by Mr. __, and we offer the
following comments.
Letters Written on Behalf of Shoghi Effendi
Reference is made to statements on the
Internet which apparently infer that the Guardian discontinued the
practice of reviewing all letters written on his behalf when the amount
of correspondence increased. Mr. __ seeks confirmation of the fact that
Shoghi Effendi continued to review all letters written on his behalf
until the end of his life. The Research Department sets out below the
only information it has, to date, been able to locate on this subject.
In a postscript appended to a letter dated 7
December 1930, written on his behalf to an individual believer, Shoghi
Effendi described the normal procedure he followed in dealing with
correspondence written on his behalf:
I wish to add and say that
whatever letters are sent in my behalf from Haifa are all read and
approved by me before mailing. There is no exception whatever to this
rule.
Given the Guardian's categorical assertion, it follows that any
"exception" to "this rule" would require his explicit permission. For
example, in the latter years of his ministry, Shoghi Effendi assigned to
the Hand of the Cause Leroy Ioas the special responsibility for
monitoring the progress of the goals of the Ten Year Crusade. In
implementing this specific function, Mr. Ioas worked under the close
supervision of the Guardian; however, not all of his letters–for
example, those simply requesting information about the goals–were viewed
by Shoghi Effendi before being transmitted.
Mr. __ also enquires about the relative
degree of authority associated with letters written on behalf of Shoghi
Effendi. He indicates that he is puzzled by a statement in a letter
written on the Guardian's behalf, which indicates that such letters are
"less authoritative", especially since he presumes that Shoghi Effendi
would have reviewed these letters prior to their being sent out. It
seems likely that the statement referred to by Mr. __ is contained in
the following extract from a letter dated 25 February 1951 written on
behalf of the Guardian to a National Spiritual Assembly. It is suggested
that a careful reading of this statement, which is cited below, will
resolve the concern raised by Mr. __. The extract states,
Although the secretaries of the Guardian
convey his thoughts and instructions and these messages are
authoritative, their words are in no sense the same as his, their style
certainly not the same, and their authority less, for they use their own
terms and not his exact words in conveying his messages.
(25 February 1951 to the National Spiritual Assembly of the British Isles)
Note that the letters written on behalf of the Guardian are also
described as being "authoritative". No additional information has, to
date, come to light on this subject.
Status of Research Department Memoranda
Mr. __ raises a number of issues concerning
the authority of memoranda prepared by the Research Department and
wishes to know whether "believers could resubmit their questions, if
they felt it necessary to have a more 'authoritative' answer than the
Research Department could provide". We cite, below, an extract from an
English translation of a letter dated 26 January 2003 in Persian,
written on behalf of the Universal House of Justice to an individual
believer, which contains guidance pertaining to some of the issues
raised by Mr. __:
According to the guidance
of the House of Justice, letters received at the Bahá'í World Centre are
sent to various Departments, according to their topic. For instance,
all the letters related to the Research Department are sent to that
Department so that, with the guidance of the House of Justice,
appropriate responses could be prepared which are then sent out through
its Department of the Secretariat.
In response to your
question, it should be said that while the answers from the Research
Department are prepared according to the instructions of the House of
Justice, they should be regarded as opinions of that Department. These
views, although quite useful and helpful in illuminating and clarifying
the issues or questions at hand, should not be regarded as being as
authoritative as the guidance and pronouncements of the Universal House
of Justice. The House of Justice has decided that material prepared by
the Research Department should be sent out unchanged to the recipients,
as it would like the friends to consider and study the material with
great diligence. Of course, accepting the comments and opinions of the
Research Department does not hinder the friends from using their own
judgement in understanding and explaining issues. The personal
understandings of the Bahá'ís in these cases are, of course, respected
in their own right.
Bahá'í Writings Based in Fact?
Mr. __ expresses the view that in order to
develop "a coherent unity of thought among believers" it is necessary to
resolve the issue concerning whether "Bahá'ís should accept all
statements in the Writings as based in fact, unless explicitly stated as
being conditioned on other information". He elaborates his point by
referring to statements in the Writings of Bahá'u'lláh and 'Abdu'l-Bahá.
For example, he notes that in "The Promulgation of Universal Peace"
1 the
1
See "The Promulgation of Universal Peace: Talks Delivered by
'Abdu'l-Bahá during His Visit to the United States and Canada in 1912",
rev. ed. (Wilmette: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 1982, 1995 printing), p.
365 and p.
404.
Master indicates that the Pentateuch prescribes "the cutting off of
the hand of the thief". In this regard, he asks if Bahá'ís are "to
confidently accept that this was in fact ... the law (and subsequently
lost to the scriptures), or that 'Abdu'l-Bahá was merely doctrinally
infallible, and that the essential point was the principle He was trying
to convey". He, thus, seeks clarification of a statement in a letter
dated 3 June 1982 written on behalf of the Universal House of Justice
that appears on a Web site. This letter distinguishes between the nature
of the infallibility of 'Abdu'l-Bahá and of the Guardian as it relates
to "subjects not pertaining to the Faith". The extract in question is as
follows:
2. There is nothing in the Writings that
would lead us to the conclusion that what Shoghi Effendi says about
himself concerning statements on subjects not directly related to the
Faith also applies to 'Abdu'l-Bahá. Instead we have assertions which
indicate that 'Abdu'l-Bahá's position in the Faith is one for which we
find "no parallel" in past Dispensations. For example, Bahá'u'lláh, in
addition to His reference to the Centre of His Covenant as the "Mystery
of God", states that 'Abdu'l-Bahá should be regarded as God's "exalted
Handiwork" and "a Word which God hath adorned with the ornament of His
Own Self, and made it sovereign over the earth and all that there is
therein". And from Shoghi Effendi we have the incontrovertible statement
that the Guardian of the Faith while "overshadowed" by the
"protection'' of Bahá'u'lláh and of the Báb, "remains essentially
human", whereas in respect of 'Abdu'l-Bahá Shoghi Effendi categorically
states that "in the person of 'Abdu'l-Bahá the incompatible
characteristics of a human nature and superhuman knowledge and
perfection have been blended and are completely harmonized".
By way of introduction we wish to note that
the statements of 'Abdu'l-Bahá referred to by Mr. __ are from the
Master's published talks. It was the custom that, as He delivered these
talks, His words were written down in Persian, and the words of the
translator were taken down in English, bringing the reliability and
accuracy of the translations and the transcriptions into question. As a
consequence, the authority of most talks and verbal utterances of
'Abdu'l-Bahá is not the same as that accorded to His written Text. This
principle and the general status of such compilations as "The
Promulgation of Universal Peace" and "Paris Talks" are elaborated in the
following extract from a letter dated 9 March 1977 written on behalf of
the Universal House of Justice to an individual believer:
Among the utterances of
'Abdu'l-Bahá, foremost is the compilation of His immortal talks entitled
"Some Answered Questions". The original of this important compilation
is preserved in the Holy Land; its text was read in full and corrected
by 'Abdu'l-Bahá Himself. The translation, although not perfect, was
considered by the Guardian to be adequate for the time being; in due
course it will be thoroughly checked and improved, of course.
Unfortunately, 'Abdu'l-Bahá did not read and authenticate all
transcripts of His other talks, some of which have been translated into
various languages and published. For many of His addresses included in
"The Promulgation of Universal Peace" and "Paris Talks", for example, no
original authenticated text has yet been found. However, the Guardian
allowed such compilations to continue to be used by the friends, and the
Universal House of Justice has indicated that the same ruling applies
to "Star of the West". In the future each talk will have to be
identified, and those which are unauthenticated will have to be clearly
distinguished from those which form a part of Bahá'í Scripture. This
does not mean that the unauthenticated talks will have to cease to be
used–
merely that the degree of authenticity of every document will have to be known and understood.
With regard to the two references in "The
Promulgation of Universal Peace", to the punishment in question, the
first appears in a talk dated 12 October 1912 and the second in a talk
of 8 November 1912. The World Centre does not have a Persian transcript
for the 12 October talk but the Persian transcript for the second talk
is published in "Khitábát". Study of this transcript reveals that the
Persian version does not correspond to the English translation, and the
reference to the punishment in question does not occur.
2
In this instance, it seems to us that the apparent association of the
punishment in question with the Torah and Jewish law may well be an
artifact of the unreliability of the English transcript of the talk in
which it occurs.
As to Mr. __'s request for further
clarification concerning the implications of the statement concerning
the degree of 'Abdu'l-Bahá's infallibility contained in the letter dated
3 June 1982 written on behalf of the Universal House of Justice and
which is cited earlier in this memorandum, it is suggested that Mr. __
might find it useful to study the complete letter from which the passage
of interest is drawn, since the letter contains additional elucidation
about the nature of divinely conferred infallibility. Another useful
resource is Shoghi Effendi's comprehensive explanation of the uniqueness
of the station of 'Abdu'l-Bahá that appears in "The Dispensation of
Bahá'u'lláh".
3
Additional questions are raised concerning
the historical accuracy of statements by Bahá'u'lláh and the Master. For
example, Mr. __ mentions Bahá'u'lláh's references to the period in
which Empedocles and Pythagoras lived and asks whether Bahá'í's believe,
"as a matter of faith that modern historians are wrong on these points,
or again, that the doctrine alone is infallible".
4
To assist Mr. __ in thinking about these issues, we call to his
attention the guidance contained in the following extract from a letter
dated 3 November 1987, written on behalf of the Universal House of
Justice to an individual believer. The letter states,
The Universal House of
Justice has received your letter of ... and has directed us to convey
the following in response to your question about Empedocles and
Pythagoras referred to in the Lawh-i-Hikmat.
In a Tablet written in
response to questions raised about this Tablet, 'Abdu'l-Bahá clarifies
the perspective toward statements made by Bahá'u'lláh in the
Lawh-i-Hikmat which differ from the current concepts of western
historians. The Master states that histories of the times before
Alexander the Great are very confused and that when the subject came
under scholarly discipline in later times the greatest difficulty was,
and still is, experienced in giving dates with any certainty. He further
points out that the Words of Bahá'u'lláh are the standard and that the
statements made in the Tablet of Wisdom are in accordance with certain
of the historical records of the East.
2 "Khitábát, Talks of 'Abdu'l-Bahá" (Hofheim-Langenhain: Bahá'í-Verlag, 1984), see p. 615.
3
See, particularly, "The World Order of Bahá'u'lláh: Selected Letters"
(Wilmette: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 1991, 2004 printing), pp.
131-
139.
4 See "Tablets of Bahá'u'lláh revealed after the Kitáb-i-Aqdas" (Wilmette: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 1988, 2005 printing), p.
145.
In reference to the
specific passage in the Lawh-i-Hikmat regarding Empedocles and
Pythagoras being contemporaries of David and Solomon, the following is
an excerpt from a letter written on behalf of the Guardian to an
individual believer who enquired about this passage:
We must not take this
statement too literally; "contemporary" may have been meant in Persian
as something far more elastic than the English word.
(15 February 1947)
It is noteworthy that at
both the beginning and end of this section of the Tablet, Bahá'u'lláh
indicates that He is quoting "some accounts of the sages". These would
have been the historical accounts familiar to the person whom He is
addressing in the Tablet. The fact that Bahá'u'lláh makes such
statements for the sake of illustrating the spiritual principles that He
wishes to convey, does not necessarily mean that He is endorsing
their historical accuracy. In this connection it is interesting to note
the answer given by the beloved Guardian's secretary on his behalf to a
question about the "fourth heaven" mentioned in the Kitáb-i-Íqán. The
translation of the passage is as follows:
As to the ascent of Christ
to the "fourth heaven" as revealed in the glorious Book of Íqán, he [the
Guardian] stated that the "fourth heaven" is a term used and a belief
held by the early astronomers. The followers of the Shí'ah sect likewise
held this belief. As the Kitáb-i-Íqán was revealed for the guidance of
that sect, this term was used in conformity with the concepts of its
followers.
