Century of Light

ory of the Cause. It will continue to occupy this focal place in the life of the Faith throughout the coming centuries. In important respects Shoghi Effendi may be said to have extended by an ad

held firmly, during the period of its greatest vulnerability, in the grip of one who had been prepared fo

Effendi early accepted the implications of the fact that the Universal House of Justice could not come into existence until a lengthy process of administrative development had created the supporting structure of Natio

of 'Abdu'l-Bahá would be paralyzed in its action and would be powerless to fill in those gaps which the Auth

o the Faith-a record which, like that of his Grandfather, is open for posterity to review and assess- contains, as he assured the Bahá'í community would be the case, no action on his part that would in any degree "infringe upon the sacred and prescribed domain"

eirs of his own, and the other branches of the Holy family had violated the Covenant. The Bahá'í Writings contain no guidance in s

deliberate upon all problems which have caused difference, questions that are obscure and matters that a

of his successor or successors in the hands of the Body alone authorized to determine the matter. Five months after it came into e

tion ... the Universal House of Justice finds that there is no way to appoint or to l

read widely the published works of historians, economists and political thinkers, such research could do no more than supply raw materials that his inspired vision of the Cause must then organize. The confidence and courage required in mobilizing a heterogeneous community of believers to undertake tasks that were, by any objective criteria, far beyond their capacities, could be found only in the

th which Shoghi Effendi analyzed political and social processes in the early stages of their development, and the mastery with which his mind encompassed a kaleidoscope of events, both current and historical, relating their implications to the unfolding Will of Providence. That this work of the intellect was ca

sibility that one or more successors might have followed in the institution Shoghi Effendi embodied. We obviously cannot penetrate the mind of God. What is clear and undeniable, however, is that, through his interpretive authority, the structure of the Administrative Order, as well as the course t