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Wednesday
May 16, 2001

God's messenger to humanity

In response to "Bahaullah schizophrenic", all prophets and founders of major religions before the Holy Prophet Muhammad have promised of a golden age when Unity, Peace and Justice will eventually rule the earth. Each religion and its followers are awaiting according to their holy texts and traditions a second coming. Jews await the "Lord of Hosts" , Zoroastrians await the coming of Shah Bahram, Christians await the Messiah and Moslems await the Qaim, (Imam Zaman). Muhammad was the "LAST" Prophet of this PROPHETIC cycle. He was the last to prophecise the coming of the promised one. It seems all humanity is awaiting This Promised ONE from God.

Bahá'u'lláh as God's Messenger to humanity for this completes a cycle of Divine Messengers to humanity Who have progressively revealed to the world principles, morals, and laws, but prophesies Himself that more Messengers will come in the future and that He is not the last. As a cure for growing moral and social disorder, He offered a vision of a united human race and laid down the steps to be taken in order to achieve this.

With the rise and influence of the the Babi-Bahai message; In the late Nineteenth century of Iran many of Islam's top clergy and scholars, some after years of fierce opposition accepted The Baha'i claim. The most notable of these was Mirza Abol-Fazl Golpaygani who before becoming a Baha'i was considered Iran's foremost Islamic scholar. He for years opposed the claims of Bahá'u'lláh as messenger of God. Mirza AbolFazl gave up his cleric's station and traveled extensively in Iran teaching the new faith; he was imprisoned several times. Later he went to Alexandria, Egypt teaching at the Islamic world's foremost school of learning. In early 1900's he traveled to New York, where he lectured on the Baha'i faith. He is recognized as the foremost Baha'i Scholar, because of his vast knowledge of both The Holy Quran and its relationship and references to Bahá'u'lláh and His writings.

Before him,most of the first nineteen followers of the Bab who heralded the coming of Bahá'u'lláh were people like Mulla Husayn Bushrui, Mulla Aliya-i-Bastani, Mulla Khuda-Bakhshi-Quchani, Siyyid Husayn-Yazdi, Mulla Mahmud Khu'i, Mulla Jalili-i-Urumi, Mulla Ahmad-ibdal-i-Maraghai, Mulla Baqir-Tabrizi, Mulla Yusif-i-Ardibili. In the years following 1844, 30,000 followers of the new faith were massacred by the state. These were devout Moslems who saw through the depths to which their religion had sank and had the faith and the vision despite the suffering they had to endure to embrace something that has today millions of followers from every race and religion on the planet.

When Bahá'ís say that the various religions are one, they do not mean that the various religious creeds and organizations are the same. Rather, they believe that there is only one religion and all of the Messengers of God have progressively revealed its nature. Together, the world's great religions are expressions of a single unfolding Divine plan, "the changeless Faith of God, eternal in the past, eternal in the future."

Mr Cyrus's comments: "Bahaullah was not a prophet, he was just a schizophrenic with his delusions and hallucinations and some naive people believed him and follow him." are not well researched, because these " delusions and hallucinations" seem to make sense to most fair-minded people, especially in contrast to the practical relevance of Islamic teachings (as enforced by the Taliban in Afghanistan and by the Islamic Republic in Iran) to the needs of a global society.

Faryar Mansuri

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