The Promulgation of Universal Peace

visited. When ‘Abdu’l-Bahá sailed from New York on 5 December 1912 He had completed one of the most strenuous teaching journeys in all recorded history, the more remarkable because it was accomplished by a man of sixty-eight Whose health was broken by long years of deprivation and imprisonment. He left behind Him a band of believers whom, though scattered and separated by long distances, His patient and persistent efforts had welded into a nascent Bahá’í community.

The Promulgation of Universal Peace is a compilation of many of the talks ‘Abdu’l-Bahá gave during His visit to the United States and Canada, talks that expounded the principles of the Bahá’í Faith as promulgated by Bahá’u’lláh. Time and time again, to all who came to listen, Bahá’ís and non-Bahá’ís alike, He spoke of the equality of men and women, the harmony of science and religion, the need for universal education and a universal language, the independent investigation of truth, the oneness of God, the oneness and continuity of the Prophets of God, the oneness of mankind, and the elimination of prejudices of all kinds—all essential for the universal peace that Bahá’u’lláh came to bring, and that gives the book its theme and title.

Though The Promulgation of Universal Peace is a compilation of talks and, therefore, not strictly speaking a work by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, yet is has a unique “style” of its own and a unique place in His collected writings and talks. His Will and Testament, written in three sections, provides the authority for the Administrative Order of the Bahá’í Faith and ensures its integrity and unity. The Secret of Divine Civilization is a treatise on the general state of modern civilization. A Traveler’s Narrative chronicles the early history of the Bábí and Bahá’í faiths. Memorials of the Faithful contains ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s remembrances of seventy-nine early Bahá’ís, all bound by their love for Bahá’u’lláh. Some Answered Questions is perhaps closest in format to The Promulgation of Universal Peace—a series of discourses on a variety of topics. But Some Answered Questions was shaped by questions put to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. In The Promulgation of Universal Peace ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, for the most part, chose the topics—chose them with care and determination, sometimes even with deliberate repetition. For He had come to the West, not as a tourist, but as an emissary, as it were, of His father. Upon His arrival in New York He stated that “It is my purpose to set forth in America the fundamental principles of the revelation and teachings of Bahá’u’lláh.”