# The Baha'i Faith: A Future-Oriented Religion

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> Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Arthur Lyon Dahl, The Baha'i Faith: A Future-Oriented Religion, bahai-library.com.
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> 
> The Baha'i Faith:
> 
> A Future-Oriented Religion
> 
> Arthur Lyon Dahl
> published in Future Generations22:1, pp. 15-17
> 
> Geneva, Switzerland: 1997
> 
> The Bahá'í Faith, founded in Persia in the mid-nineteenth
> century but now established around the world as the second most geographically
> widespread religion after Christianity, is remarkable among the major religious
> traditions for the emphasis it places on future society and the influence
> of present actions on future generations. It explicitly appeals to those
> who care for the future of the human race, and aims to build a new world
> fit for our descendants. (1)
> The concept of an evolutionary progression over time is fundamental
> to the Bahá'í perspective. For example, all the major religions
> are seen as steps in a progressive revelation of Divine Will, with each
> renewing the fundamental spiritual truths of all religion, while bringing
> social teachings adapted to the needs of its particular time and place.
> The teachings of Bahá'u'lláh are seen as the most recent
> step in this progression, providing guidance to resolve the particular
> challenges of today and to lay the spiritual foundations for a coming world
> civilization. Thus for Bahá'ís, there is no exclusivity or
> finality in religion, and further Divine teachers are expected, at intervals
> of roughly one thousand years, as necessary for our continuing social and
> spiritual evolution.
> In the Bahá'í view, just as nature is marked by many cyclical
> phenomena, such as seasons and life cycles, so has society seen the rise
> and fall of many past civilizations, accompanying the gradually increasing
> scales of social organization and unity from the family to the nation.
> Today, we are experience the difficult transition from a world of sovereign
> nation states to a unified world society. Our suffering is like the birth-pangs
> of a new civilization. Bahá'u'lláh wrote over a hundred years
> ago: "Soon will the present-day order be rolled up, and a new one spread
> out in its stead." (2) The world is in fact experiencing
> the end of a long cycle of religious prophecy about the future and the
> beginning of a cycle of fulfilment, which the Christians refer to as the
> coming of God's kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. This cycle, the fruit
> of the physical unity of the human race, which Bahá'u'lláh
> anticipated and which science and technology are now making possible, will
> extend for at least 500,000 years. We are, in a sense, in the final stages
> of the turbulent adolescence of the human race, on the verge of our collective
> adulthood and maturity. As the institutions of a divided world collapse,
> and the material philosophies that have dominated our century demonstrate
> their failure to bring happiness and well-being to the majority of humanity,
> Bahá'ís see it as essential to lay new moral and spiritual
> foundations for the civilization that will inevitably be born out of this
> period of turmoil, and that will guarantee a better life of justice and
> peace for future generations.
> The Bahá'í community condemns in no uncertain terms the
> short-sightedness and moral bankruptcy of our present society, referring
> to our callously abandoning "starving millions to the operations of a market
> system that all too clearly is aggravating the plight of the majority of
> mankind" and our "inability... to exorcise the spectre of war, the threatened
> collapse of the international economic order, the spread of anarchy and
> terrorism, and the intense suffering which these and other afflictions
> are causing to increased millions", and calling to account "those who preach
> the dogmas of materialism, whether of the east of the west, whether of
> capitalism or socialism." (1)
> There is also in the Bahá'í teachings a clear vision of
> the future society that is already taking embryonic form even as the old
> order collapses. "Unification of the whole of mankind is the hall-mark
> of the stage which human society is now approaching. Unity of family, of
> tribe, of city-state, and nation have been successively attempted and fully
> established. World unity is the goal towards which a harassed humanity
> is striving. Nation-building has come to an end. The anarchy inherent in
> state sovereignty is moving towards a climax. A world, growing to maturity,
> must abandon this fetish, recognize the oneness and wholeness of human
> relationships, and establish once for all the machinery that can best incarnate
> this fundamental principle of its life." (3) To achieve
> this, a series of evolutionary steps are envisaged, from the relatively
> rapid agreement on a political peace between nations, through the gradual
> spiritualization of societies around the world, to the achievement of a
> world commonwealth and the flowering in centuries to come of a rich and
> diverse world civilization in a golden age, before the continuing development
> of new potentials and the inevitable loss of momentum and deterioration
> in any human system require another process of spiritual renewal.
> There are too many concrete proposals in the Bahá'í Writings
> concerning the pattern for future society to be able to cite more than
> a few here. Bahá'u'lláh called for a federated world government
> with the means of collective security and decision-making necessary to
> prevent war between nations and to manage the resources of the planet for
> the benefit of all peoples. This would be balanced against a decentralized,
> organic social and administrative structure that would encourage human
> diversity, responsibility and individual initiative. He said the nations
> should agree on an international auxiliary language to facilitate communications
> and understanding between all peoples. He called for a spiritual solution
> to economic problems, with the elimination of extremes of wealth and poverty,
> equality of men and women, and the harmony of science and religion. He
> emphasized the importance of marriage and the family, because it is within
> the family that children are first educated. There is such emphasis on
> the importance of universal education for future generations that, if there
> are insufficient means to educate all the children, then preference should
> be given to educating girls, because they will then be able to pass on
> their knowledge to their own children, and the progress of future generations
> will be more rapid.
> Bahá'u'lláh warned a hundred years ago about the hazards
> to the planet of too much material development. "The civilization, so often
> vaunted by the learned exponents of arts and sciences, will, if allowed
> to overleap the bounds of moderation, bring great evil upon men...." (4)
> Environmental problems and their future consequences are thus of major
> concern to Bahá'ís, who appreciate the relationships and
> interdependence of all created things and the importance of preserving
> the ecological balance of the planet. (5) One of the
> major responsibilities of a future world society will be to organize the
> economic resources of the world, tap and fully utilize its raw materials,
> and regulate the equitable distribution of its products. It is no wonder
> that a recent statement of the Bahá'í International Community
> calls for a determined campaign to implement Agenda 21, the action plan
> for sustainable development adopted at the United Nations Conference on
> Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. (6)
> It is natural in this context that Bahá'ís see their individual
> efforts as directed towards improving the world that future generations
> will inherit. For each Bahá'í, religion is not only a means
> to his or her own spiritual perfection and refinement of character, but
> also a means of service to others in contributing to an ever-advancing
> civilization. The central focus of life is not self-interest, but the good
> of the whole, both present and future. In fact, it is the central spiritual
> impulse of all religion, turning away from the self in love towards the
> unknown outside of us, that provides the real motivation for human progress
> (rather than the invisible hand of cumulative self interest so central
> to western economics). By learning to love rather than fear the unknown,
> an individual is motivated to explore the unknown potential in his or her
> own self, to appreciate the unknown possibilities and qualities in others,
> and to push forward the frontiers of science, technical invention and social
> progress. The golden rule of all religious traditions is extended in the
> Bahá'í Faith to preferring others to oneself, in the recognition
> that the good of any part depends on the good of the whole. Bahá'u'lláh
> likened humanity to a human body, where the suffering of any one member
> or organ is the suffering of the whole. This sense of justice and solidarity
> with others applies both in space and in time, such that Bahá'ís
> will willingly make present sacrifices for the benefit of the future.
> The central focus of the Bahá'í teachings is thus on providing
> the spiritual foundations for the oneness of humankind, with the abolition
> of all forms of prejudice and appreciation of our unity in diversity. This
> oneness extends not only to the geographic, racial and cultural diversity
> of humanity in space, but to the temporal diversity of our progression
> into the future. All peoples are challenged to draw on their collective
> inheritance to take up, consciously and systematically, the responsibility
> for the design of their future, a future whose beneficiaries must be all
> of the planet's inhabitants. (7)
> The highest station that an individual can achieve is that of service
> to others. As generations are educated in this way, altruism will increasingly
> replace the self-centredness of today. The logical implication of this
> Bahá'í moral and ethical perspective is that the present
> generation, and particularly those individuals and societies that are wealthy,
> should voluntarily sacrifice some of their immediate advantages, restrain
> their appetites, and share of their wealth to ensure a stable and productive
> future for humanity on this planet. This future should be seen as sustainable
> over half a million years, equivalent to at least 20,000 future generations.
> While it may take centuries to see the full fruits of this fundamental
> transformation in human society, those alive at present have a moral and
> spiritual obligation to live in ways that advance the realization of this
> future vision.
> 
> REFERENCES
> 1. Universal House of Justice, The
> Promise of World Peace. Haifa, Israel, Bahá'í World
> Centre, 1985.
> 2. Bahá'u'lláh, Gleanings from the
> Writings of Bahá'u'lláh. Wilmette, Bahá'í
> Publishing Trust, 1990. IV, p. 7.
> 3. Shoghi Effendi, The World Order of Bahá'u'lláh.
> Wilmette, Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 1938. p. 202
> 4. Bahá'u'lláh, Gleanings from the
> Writings of Bahá'u'lláh. Wilmette, Bahá'í
> Publishing Trust, 1990. CLXIV, p. 342-343.
> 5. Conservation of the Earth's Resources, A
> compilation of extracts from the Bahá'í Writings prepared
> by the Research Department of the Universal House of Justice, Bahá'í
> World Centre. London, Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 1990.
> 6. Bahá'í International Community, Turning
> Point for All Nations: A Statement of the Bahá'í International
> Community on the Occasion of the 50th Anniversary of the United Nations.
> New York, Bahá'í International Community, 1995.
> 7. Bahá'í International Community, Office
> of Public Information, The Prosperity of Humankind.
> Haifa, Bahá'í World Centre, 1995.
> 
> * Arthur Lyon Dahl has a Ph.D in Biology from the University
> of California, and is presently Deputy Assistant Executive Director, Environmental
> Information and Assessment, United Nations Environment Programme. He is
> the author of many publications including Unless and Until: A Bahá'í
> Focus on the Environment. The views expressed are the author's own
> and do not necessarily reflect those of the United Nations Environment
> Programme.
> 
> METADATA
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> Views15889 views since posted 1997; last edit 2025-01-30 09:21 UTC;
> 
> previous at archive.org.../dahl_bahai_future_oriented;
> URLs changed in 2010, see archive.org.../bahai-library.org
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> — *The Baha'i Faith: A Future-Oriented Religion (Used by permission of the curator)*