Table of Contents to Brilliant Proof
by Peter Z. Easton[1]
Nineteen hundred years ago our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ stood before a
Roman tribunal. The Governor was convinced of His innocency, and proposed to
release Him. The Jews, however, cried out, "Not this man, but Bar-abbas!" "Now
Barabbas was a robber." Thus it was that God's chosen people, they who, for
2,000 years from the time of Abraham on, had been the special recipients of His
grace and mercy, "denied the Holy and Righteous One, and asked for a murderer
to be granted unto" them.
Is this scene being re-enacted before our eyes to-day? In this year of our
Lord 1911, on the 17th day of September, at St. John's, Westminster, an
Archdeacon of the Church of England, a man who bears an honoured name, placed
in the Bishop's chair, in front of the altar, the leader of an Oriental sect,
of whom, in a previous speech, he had spoken in terms of high praise, calling
him "Master." Who is this man? His name is Abbas Effendi. He prefers, however,
to be called Abdul-Bahá, servant of Bahá, his father, who died at Acre, in
Syria, in 1892. In order, therefore, to know what this man represents and
stands for, we must ask, what sort of man was Bahá, the head of this sect,
after whom it is named? A worse than Barabbas betrayer, assassin, and
blasphemer a worthy successor of that long line of Persian antichrists from
the beginning of its history down to the present day. The story is a long one,
and would need more time and space than can here be given to it. In the
accompanying article, "The Babis of Persia," a short sketch is given of the
principle and practice of this antichristian system.
How was it possible that a minister of Jesus Christ could commend such a
faith? Was he ignorant of the true character of the sect? Why, then, did he
commend it? Why, too, was he ignorant? Did he not know that the Church
Missionary Society has had a mission in Persia for forty years, and that he
needed but to inquire from missionaries of the Society in and about London to
know the facts of the case? For over twenty years Professor Browne, of
Cam-bridge, has been writing on this subject. Has the Archdeacon no knowledge
of the damning facts, set forth in his works, in regard to the character of
Bahá? Did he wish to inquire from those in the neighbourhood of Acre? How easy
would it have been to get information from the English and American
missionaries of Syria and Palestine.
Eighteen months ago Archdeacon Wilberforce wrote to Abdul Bahá, saying, "We
are all one, there behind the veil." Is this the teaching of the Word of God?
Does the Apostle say that we should be unequally yoked with unbelievers, that
righteousness hath fellowship with iniquity, light with darkness, Christ with
Bellial, the temple of God with idols? That, indeed, is the teaching of the
pantheism on which Bahá'ísm and all its kindred sects are founded. from the
hoary antiquity of 2,500 years, the beginning of Persian history, comes the
blasphemous declaration, "God and devil yoked together." Men of upright
character are, it is true, welcome to the ranks of these pantheistic sects.
They make excellent stool pigeons. When, however, the deed of hell is to be
done, another kind of man is needed; one whose conscience is seared as with a
hot iron. Not what a man is, but what use can be made of him, is the
determining factor. "Evil is a name of one of the conditions of progress is as
necessary, aye, more so, than what you call good, to your and our elevation to
higher spheres." This idea is carried out in these pantheistic sects, in that
the morally upright members are confined to the outer circle, the children of
the evil one are admitted into the inner sanctuary. Here, then, we have the
much vaunted unity, from which God preserve us.
Archdeacon Wilberforce calls Abdul Bahá, "Master." What about Christ? Does He
teach that we can serve two masters? No. Then the archdeacon must choose whom
he will serve, whether the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ or the
Antichrist, Bahá. He cannot serve both. What say the people of England? Will
they choose this modern Barabbas?
A word as to the bearing of the Archdeacon's declarations upon missionary work
in Mohammedan lands. That work, as is well known, is not easy work. So
difficult indeed is it, that men like Lord Curzon are utterly incredulous that
anything can be accomplished. Surely, then, men who profess to be followers of
our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ above all, those who are looked upon as
leaders in the Church, should do nothing to make that work still more
difficult. Whatever else may be said of the Bahá'ís, it cannot be said that they
are not wise in their generation, quick to use every means, fair or foul, which
will advance their interests. That Abdul Bahá has been greatly encouraged by
what he has seen and heard here in England to persevere in his scheme to make
Bahá'ísm "the universal religion of the world, and the basis of the great
universal civilization that is to be," is evident from his own words. That it
will have a like effect upon his followers, to whom the news will be
transmitted, not in cold English, but in the glowing phrases of Oriental
imagination, cannot be doubted. Like Paul, on the road to Rome, they too will
be encouraged; but it will not be to advance the kingdom of God, but the reign
of Antichrist.
The Babis of Persia
The origin of Babism is to be sought in Persian pantheism, a system which goes
back more than 1,000 years, during which time it has produced many sects, of
which Babism is one of the latest. All these sects hold one fundamental
doctrine, viz., that the murid, or disciple, is to give himself up absolutely,
body and soul, to the murshid, or guide. To say that the murshid is, to all
intents and purposes, in the place of God to the murid is to understate the
matter. When God speaks to us He speaks to us as men, honouring the faculties
of reason, conscience, and will with which He has endowed us. Does anything
claim to be a new revelation, it must meet the demands of the old revelation,
and stand or fall thereby. The pantheistic idea is other than this. Revelation,
conscience, reason, will, are all annihilated. At every moment of existence
there is nothing but absolute power; bare power on the one hand, and absolute
passivity and negativity on the other. The murid is not a man in any true sense
of the term, but mere material, a mere receptacle which is constantly being
created and then taken to pieces, or filled and then emptied. What he is has
nothing to do with the nature of the communications or commands which are made
to him or laid upon him. Judged by ordinary standards, they may be reasonable
or unreasonable, wise or unwise, holy or unholy; but with all this he has
nothing to do. Is he commanded to tell the truth, he tells the truth. Is he
commanded to lie, he lies. Are counsels of wisdom given to him, he carries them
out. Are the wildest vagaries of a madman enjoined upon him, this duty of
obedience is exactly the same. Let me say
First The system is an essentially vicious one, based as it is on the
degradation of the murid, who is robbed of all that makes him a man and reduced
to a mere automaton. The honour and glory of the murshid is built up on the
ruin of the murid. A more perfect contrast to Christianity it is impossible to
conceive. "Because I live," says the Saviour, "ye shall live also" (John xiv.
19). "And the glory which Thou gavest Me I have given them; that they may be
one, even as We are one; I in them, and Thou in Me, that they may be made
perfect in one, and that the world may know that Thou hast sent Me, and hast
loved them as Thou has loved Me" (John xvii. 22, 23).
Second It cannot be reformed, seeing that the first step in the way of reform
is to destroy the system root and branch.
Third Every attempt to carry out the principle of this system has been
fraught with the most terrible evil. The career of Mokanna in the eighth
century, of which we have a true and faithful description in Moore's "Lalla
Rookh," that of Babek in the ninth, and of Karmath in the tenth, both of whom
turned the Oriental world into an Aceldema, or field of blood; more than all,
that of Hassan Sabah and his followers, the Assassins, who for 170 years, from
1090 on, inaugurated a reign of terror compared with which that of the French
Revolution was child's play. These and other instances which might be given,
both in ancient and modern times, amply prove our assertion.
We are now asked to believe that Babism is an exception to the rule, that this
devilish, this Satanic system and no other words can describe it has been
transformed; that the serpent has lost its fangs, and that the wolf has become
the true protector of the sheep. Where, we ask, is the evidence for this
amazing claim? Is it to be found in the blasphemous declarations of Bahá, that
he was not only Christ, but God the Father? Is it to be found in his life,
stained with the basest of crimes? Is the man that attempted to poison his own
brother, whom he had invited to eat with him, the inaugurator of a new
dispensation of peace on earth? And what, forsooth, have we on the other side?
Naught but honeyed words. The wolf arrayed in sheep's clothing ergo, he is not
a wolf. What makes the matter still worse is that no excuse can be pleaded for
this man. He was a cold-blooded villain, not a madman, like the founder of the
Druses, or a deluded enthusiast, such as we may suppose the original Bab to
have been. Good men there are among the Babis, men who have been drawn towards
the system, hoping to find in it truth which they had vainly sought in
Mohammedanism; good, not because of the system, but in spite of it. Xavier was
a holy man, but Jesuitism is anything but holy. We are to remember, moreover,
that in all these pantheistic systems it is only a few who at first are fully
initiated into "the depths of Satan," that it is the policy of the leaders to
keep the multitude in ignorance, and to have some whose pure lives shall serve
to mask their own corruption. In the case of the Assassins, the character of
the sect was not fully exposed to the public view until more than seventy years
after it was founded.
There is no need of wasting any sympathy on the sufferings of the Babis. That
they have suffered terribly is true. That they have endured suffering with
marvellous fortitude and constancy is also true. So, however, it has always
been in the case of these sects. When the infamous Babek, whose rule was to
cause the wives and daughters of his captives to be violated before their eyes,
had his hands and feet struck off, "he laughed and smilingly sealed with his
blood the criminal gaiety of his tenets" (Von Hammer's "History of the
Assassins," p. 27). As teachers and practisers of assassination, the Babis
richly deserve all they have been called upon to suffer.
It is idle to talk about their not interfering with governments, when, in the
eyes of a Babi, there is no government but that of his leader. So long as that
leader is in a state of semi-captivity, the exercise of his authority over
rulers and countries may well slumber, lest he bring down vengeance on his own
head. Let him, however, once become an independent sovereign, and we may then
expect the return of that time when there was no security for sovereign or
people; save as they became the slaves of the most awful despotism which ever
showed itself on earth. More freedom for women! Yes, but from the days of
Mazdak these sects have taught the community of women. The millennium to be
inaugurated is one of absolute science. (Von Hammer, pp. 105, &c.)
After reading this and much other such stuff which finds its way into the
public Press, one wonders how it is that Christian men and women can be so
deceived. Nevertheless, it is true that there is a terrible fascination about
these pantheistic schemes, which does seem for a time at least to rob men of
sight, hearing, and understanding. Unquestionably, too, they contain grand
views of truth, but the pity of it, the horror of it, is that the truth, which
should be so presented as to be uplifting and inspiring, is but the bait upon
the hook to drag down the soul to hell.
Peter Z. Easton
Note:
1 Reprinted from Evangelical Christendom (Sept.-Oct., 1911), pp.
186-88.
