THE JOURNAL OF BAHÁ’Í STUDIES La Revue des études bahá’íes/La Revista de estudios bahá’ís

Volume 29, number 1-2 Spring-Summer 2019

A Publication of the Association for Bahá’í Studies–North America THE JOURNAL OF BAHÁ’Í STUDIES

LA REVUE DES ÉTUDES BAHÁ’ÍES/LA REVISTA DE ESTUDIOS BAHÁ’ÍS Volume 29 Number 1 Spring-Summer 2019

Contents

3 JOHN S. HATCHER From the Editor’s Desk Still the Most Challenging Issue

7 DERIK SMITH Centering the “Pupil of the Eye”: Blackness, Modernity, and the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh

29 JOHN S. HATCHER Helen Elsie Austin

33 JOHN S. HATCHER Louis Gregory

37 CHRISTOPHER BUCK Alain Locke’s “Moral Imperatives for World Order” Revisited

Poems

2 SHIRIN SABRI Pen and Ink 32 GARY HOGENSEN Viburnum Lantana - The Wayfarer Tree

Illustrations

23 Helen Elsie Austin Copyright © Bahá’í International Community 33 Louis Gregory Copyright © Bahá’í International Community

65 Biographical Notes

Cover: MICHÈLE JUBILEE On All Sides (watercolor and pen, 8.5” x 12”) 2 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

Pen and Ink

SHIRIN SABRI

The work begins with ink made of the lamp’s light, from dark smoke caked on glass, that clear-edged clarity drawn from bright flame; ink soot black, the paper, white. There are other tints—perhaps saffron, the sweet familiarity of her mother’s rice; henna breathed from scented hair; the tender walnut’s bitter skin (sorrow’s shade); swollen galls that blight a budding leaf—all these, ground down to prepare ink, to write. These, or heart’s blood, if there is nothing else.

The pen is readied, hollowed; clogging debris reamed with a long flight feather. The pliant reed lies on the block, ready to be cut, smoothed, pared free of its old self, flexed strength revealed. The nib cries, trills across the sheet, tells of what is lost and sought, scribes upon the page a soaring line, a point, a dot. 3

pernicious attitudes were simply lying From the Editor’s low, temporarily cowed by public dis- Desk approval but just waiting for the right moment and some shift in political dis- course to re-emerge, to give voice to JOHN S. HATCHER their animus, and to demonstrate their bigotry through impassioned words and violent actions. STILL THE MOST CHALLENGING ISSUE It is reasonable to assume that what might seem to be the reawakening of When, in 1938, Shoghi Effendi em- racism is really the increased aware- phatically underscored the necessity ness of what was already extant but of resolving the problem of racism, he merely awaiting a forum—such as made it clear that he was not referring social media—to become reorganized, solely to American society, but even and a resurgent nationalism resulting more explicitly to the American Bahá’í from massive immigration to create a community: “As to racial prejudice, the wider audience for its message. In oth- corrosion of which, for well-nigh a er words, we can presume racism was century, has bitten into the fiber, and never really abolished but merely lying attacked the whole social structure low and waiting for a shift in public of American society, it should be re- sentiment. Consequently, it is clearer garded as constituting the most vital than ever that the solution to racism and challenging issue confronting the is not to ignore it—as if, starved of Bahá’í community at the present stage attention, it will go away when we of its evolution” (Advent 33–34). simply don’t talk about it and, instead, Of course, a decade or so ago we go about our lives as Bahá’ís and good might have thought that notable prog- citizens. Indeed, it becomes clear upon ress in race relations had been made, further consideration of Shoghi Effen- both among American Bahá’ís and in di’s discussion of this theme that all the wider society, and that this cau- races must give vital attention to this tion should no longer be of principal “issue of paramount importance” until concern. But in recent years with the substantive change occurs. He notes re-emergence of nationalism and rac- that “the sacrifices it must impose, ism—emboldened worldwide by con- the care and vigilance it demands, cerns about massive migrations from the moral courage and fortitude it re- countries in the grip of prolonged war quires, the tact and sympathy it neces- and chronic poverty—whatever prog- sitates, invest this problem, which the ress we might have thought we had American believers are still far from accomplished seems to have come un- having satisfactorily resolved, with an done. Or maybe much of that progress urgency and importance that cannot was merely a chimera. Perhaps these be overestimated” (Advent 34). 4 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

To appreciate fully his emphasis to spread about the world—thereby on this issue, we need to realize that acquiring various colors and features all other progress toward creating to adapt to Earth’s different climes— unified communities throughout the our present mandate from Bahá’u’lláh world is necessarily predicated on signifies that our coming together for the recognition that—even as con- a family reunion portends our simul- temporary science confirms—race is taneous re-emergence as a single race a distinction of perception—a social once again. construct not based on any essential And it is rather logical that this difference. It is, as it were, a virulent idea of the racial harmony of human- social fiction capable of undermining kind is not merely some poetic trope and dismantling the very fabric and symbolizing the unity derived from foundation of society. Every social mutual kindness and acceptance we and political experiment to the con- hope to attain as a global civilization. trary—whether as gross as slavery, It seems clear, rather, that as we com- as unjust as apartheid, or as subtle but mingle, intermarry, and, in time, scat- underhanded as prejudicial appropri- ter about the globe freely without the ations for healthcare, education, and present nationalistic, territorial, and other social programs—eventually tribal constraints, we will over time crumbles under the weight of its own quite literally obliterate the more ob- injustice. And why? Because spiritu- vious external distinctions that pres- al verities are not merely personal ently cause us to assign to those who and private axioms—they describe are distinct from ourselves the various the laws of reality, which, when epithets and euphemisms symbolizing violated, reap material and social “the other.” And quite possibly this consequences. blending is a beginning expression From a more encompassing per- of the apparent literalism with which spective, we can appreciate that ‘Abdu’l-Bahá prophesies that during Bahá’ís sincerely believe that this era the efflorescence of this age, “all men in human history—the Dispensation will adhere to one religion . . . will be of Bahá’u’lláh—will usher in the mat- blended into one race, and become a uration and subsequent unification of single people” (qtd. in Shoghi Effendi, humankind so long prophesied by pre- God Passes By 315). This same thought vious divine revelations. Consequently, is reiterated in ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s prayer Bahá’ís are the vanguard tasked with that “the perilous darkness of igno- manifesting that maturity by rehears- rant prejudice may vanish through the ing the practices for establishing a light of the Sun of Truth, this drea- global framework at the personal and ry world may become illumined, this community levels. Or, in terms of the material realm may absorb the rays of anthropological theory of the human the world of spirit, these different col- race as having emerged out of Africa ors may merge into one color and the From the Editor’s Desk 5 melody of praise may rise to the king- Perhaps one of the most power- dom of Thy sanctity” (qtd. in Bahá’í ful statements about the impact of Prayers 114). racism is found in an image used by Of course, we would do well in our ‘Abdu’l-Bahá that is seemingly simple vision of this utopian prophecy to and easy to comprehend, but is packed appreciate that unity implies neither with meaning. In writing to an Afri- sameness nor, on the social level, a can-American Bahá’í, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, dystopian leveling of society where employing a metaphor He elsewhere there is no distinction of appearanc- attributes to Bahá’u’lláh, says the fol- es, capacities, skills, or other forms of lowing: “O thou who art pure in heart, differentiation, whether individually sanctified in spirit, peerless in charac- or collectively. On the contrary, there ter, beauteous in face! Thy photograph will always remain in society—howev- hath been received revealing thy phys- er spiritually advanced it may become, ical frame in the utmost grace and however intellectually enlightened and the best appearance. Thou art dark in similar in racial characteristics—the countenance and bright in character. need for an infinite variety of person- Thou art like unto the pupil of the eye alities, capacities, and interests, even if which is dark in colour, yet it is the we manage to eliminate the vast strat- fount of light and the revealer of the ification derived from circumstantial contingent world” (Selections 114). conditions of appearance, wealth, or As ‘Abdu’l-Bahá notes elsewhere, “the class. blackness of the pupil of the eye is due Even as the National Spiritual As- to its absorbing the rays of the sun, for sembly of the United States recog- if it were another colour—say, uniform- nizes that confronting racism—both ly white—it would not absorb these within and without the Bahá’í com- rays” (Some Answered Questions 49:5). Of munity—is the sine qua non for the course, “light” in the Bahá’í scriptures strategic advancement of the Bahá’í almost invariably symbolizes knowledge community in America and for the or, more aptly, enlightenment. In this progress of American society as a sense, people of color can be seen as whole, so the Journal of Bahá’í Studies providing guidance and insight for the in this issue, and in succeeding issues, body of humankind. And considering is giving due attention to discourses the history of suffering, deprivation, and about race and racism, as well as pay- injustice that African Americans have ing tribute to those African-American been made to endure—and are still ex- Bahá’í scholars and leaders who were periencing—we can well appreciate how at the forefront of making a difference such a history produces a wariness and by daring to confront and overcome a wisdom that are coupled with a deep those forces that might have stifled or comprehension of the subtle underpin- deterred people of lesser caliber and nings that must become the foundation courage. for social justice and racial harmony. 6 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

Toward that end, we begin this is- delivered at a 1944 conference by this sue with a most enlightened and en- distinguished Bahá’í philosopher and lightening discussion by Derik Smith, demonstrates their relationship to, “Centering the ‘Pupil of the Eye’: and possibly their influence by, Locke’s Blackness, Modernity and the Reve- knowledge of Bahá’í teachings. lation of Bahá’u’lláh.” In addition to We have included two of the first in providing expansive examination of an ongoing series of life sketches about this same metaphor, Smith does a su- some of those stellar African-Amer- perb job of dealing with both the his- ican scholars who blazed trails that tory of the problem of racism and, in guide us still. The two individuals we particular, how it has actually become have chosen for this issue are Hand of exacerbated and consolidated in the the Cause of God Louis Gregory and modern age. He notes, “Indeed, it can Knight of Bahá’u’lláh Elsie Austin. be argued that blackness is nothing We also include two powerful sonnets, more, and nothing less, than the stig- “Pen and Ink” by Shirin Sabri and “Vi- ma that modernity has projected onto burnum Lantana” by Gary Hogensen. people deemed to be its most ‘ant- It is also with delight we feature for onymic and problematic others.’” He the first time in our cover art a poi- goes on to explain, “If blackness was gnant and thematically relevant work conjured in modernity’s effort to frag- by Bahá’í artist Michèle Jubilee. ment humanity, and marginalize those bearing its mark, Bahá’u’lláh’s meta- phor alters the meaning of blackness, drawing it to the center of the body of humanity.” Smith then concludes by demonstrating that “Bahá’u’lláh’s specific and explicit refutation of one of modernity’s most hateful and divi- sive social ideologies [racism] is an instructive prescription addressed to all humanity.” Following Smith’s excellent dis- course is an article by Christopher Buck that introduces three particu- lar talks by one of the major figures in African-American history, Alain Locke—a Bahá’í, a Rhodes Scholar, and a major force in bringing about the Harlem Renaissance. In “Alain Locke’s ‘Moral Imperatives for World Order’ Revisited,” Buck presents the speeches 7

de l’œil est un élément profondément Centering the conséquent et distinctif du système trans- formateur social et spirituel énoncé dans “Pupil of the les écrits de la Révélation de Bahá’u’lláh. Eye”: Blackness, Examinant le lien entre le capitalisme, la race et l’histoire intellectuelle, l’auteur Modernity, and met en contexte historique la métaphore transcendante de Bahá’u’lláh et soutient the Revelation of qu’il s’agit d’une réfutation énergique du racisme anti-noir, et donc d’un démantèle- Bahá’u’lláh ment d’une des idéologies centrales de la modernité. En conclusion, l’auteur démontre que l’intégrité et la cohérence DERIK SMITH uniques du système de Bahá’u’lláh pour la création de l’unité et de la justice univer- Abstract selles ressortent à la lumière d’une analyse In the late nineteenth century, Bahá’u’lláh approfondie de la métaphore de la pupille likened people of African descent to the de l’œil. “pupil of the eye” through which the “light of the spirit shineth forth.” This essay ar- Resumen gues that the “pupil of the eye” metaphor En los años posteriores del siglo dieci- is a deeply consequential, distinguishing nueve, Bahá’u’lláh comparó a las personas feature of the transformative social and de decendencia africana a la “pupila del spiritual system laid out in Bahá’u’lláh’s ojo” a través de la cual la “luz del espíri- Revelatio n. Studying the nexus of capi- tu brilla”. Este ensayo argumenta que la talism, race, and intellectual history, the metáfora de la pupila del ojo es una car- essay historicizes Bahá’u’lláh’s elevating acterística profundamente consecuencial metaphor, arguing that it amounts to a y distintiva del sistema social y espiritual- forceful refutation of anti-blackness and mente transformativo presentado en la thus a dismantling of one of modernity’s Revelación de Bahá’u’lláh. Estudiando el pivotal ideologies. Ultimately, the essay nexo del capitalismo, la raza y la historia demonstrates that the unique integrity intelectual, el ensayo historiza la metáfo- and coherence of Bahá’u’lláh’s system for ra elevadora de Bahá’u’lláh y argumenta the creation of universal unity and justice que se debe a una refutación contundente is especially manifest through analytical de anti-negrura, y por lo tanto desmante- contemplation of the “pupil of the eye” la una de las ideologías fundamentales de metaphor. la modernidad. En última instancia, el en- sayo demuestra que la integridad y la co- Résumé herencia únicas del sistema de Bahá’u’lláh À la fin du XIXe siècle, Bahá’u’lláh a com- para la creación de la unidad y la justicia paré les personnes d’ascendance africaine universal están especialmente manifiestas à « la pupille de l’œil » par laquelle « la lu- a través de la contemplación analítica de la mière de l’esprit » brille. L’auteur de cet es- metáfora de la pupila del ojo. sai soutient que la métaphore de la pupille 8 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

For twenty-first century organizers ultimately universalist. Angela Davis and intellectuals addressing issues of explains that, in this approach to so- racial justice, best praxis often involves cial action, “universal freedom is an centering the experiences of those ideal best represented not by those most marginalized by social power who are already at the pinnacle of ra- relations.1 This challenging principle cial, gender and class hierarchies but demands that any project of social rather by those whose lives are most transformation prioritizes the predic- defined by conditions of unfreedom” aments and perspectives of groups (xiv). With racial specificity, Alicia with the least amounts of cultural, Garza succinctly unpacks the tactical social, and economic capital. Prioritiz- logic of the Black Lives Matter move- ing consideration of such groups is of ment that she helped to spark: “When course antithetical to the mainstream Black people get free, everybody gets of social thought and shakes the very free” (“A Herstory”). foundation of hegemonic world or- The strategies of social transfor- der, which is stabilized by systemic mation offered by these racial jus- devaluation of the most marginalized tice activists do not perfectly mirror and the least capitalized. And because those being implemented by Bahá’ís rhetorical and practical attempts to throughout the world. However, the implement this principle predictably rationale of these initiatives that fore- meet strong resistance, those now at ground the predicament of the most the forefront of secular movements marginal ought to pique the interest for racial justice in the United States of followers and students of the uni- and elsewhere are often adamant in versal project of social and spiritual their efforts to call attention to the transformation laid out in the Reve- most marginalized people—people lation of Bahá’u’lláh. Indeed, the ex- who are often black. At first blush this plicit centering of black life called for adamancy can appear parochial, even by some twenty-first century social ethnocentric. (Why must black lives theorists and activists was anticipated matter? Why can’t all lives matter?) by Bahá’u’lláh’s nineteenth-century However, the logic of advocacy imple- emphasis on the special spiritual sta- mented by many of these activists is tion and capacity of black people. In 1 Bonnie and Clayton Taylor are His global Proclamation, pivoting on among those “spiritual activists” who the principle of the “Oneness of Man- have devoted many years of service to the kind,” Bahá’u’lláh accorded “colored Bahá’í Faith and, through that living ser- people” a particularly hallowed and vice, have courageously addressed issues seemingly cynosural position in the 2 of social and racial justice. This essay figurative body of humanity. is “livicated” to the Taylors, to William 2 The “pupil of the eye” metaphor “Billy” Roberts, and to my radiant parents, first appeared in the letters and talks of Magda and Alan Smith. ‘Abdu’lBahá in the early decades of the Blackness, Modernity, and the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh 9

As most observers of race matters of age of the entire human race” in the Bahá’í Faith know, Bahá’u’lláh (Shoghi Effendi, World Order 43, 163). declared that black people were appro- Explications by the Universal House priately comparable to the “black pupil of Justice clarify that “Bahá’u’lláh fa- of the eye” through which the “light vored the black peoples by making a of the spirit shineth forth” (Shoghi specific reference to them” through Effendi, Advent 37).3 This selection of this metaphor (“Letter,” Ridván 153). metaphor, often referred to by Central Bahá’u’lláh’s Revelation offers few, if Figures and Institutions of the Bahá’í any, analogous designations, which Faith, effectively positions blackness isolate and “favor” a racialized subset at the epicenter of a “bold and univer- of humanity. Thus, this specific ref- sal” world-transformative project that erence to black peoples constitutes a involves nothing less than the “coming noteworthy moment in the “wondrous twentieth century when “colored people” System” He elaborated in the nine- was a respectable term for those who teenth century (Kitáb-i-Aqdas ¶181). might today be described as “people of Af- Explanations of the importance rican descent.” With evolving conventions and potential meaning of the “pupil of of language, the term “colored people” the eye” reference have been outlined has fallen out of use and is now evocative by scholars who primarily have exam- of racial and linguistic politics associated ined ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s deployment of the with the mid-twentieth century and earli- metaphor as a means of building an er. In this essay, people of African descent egalitarian, interracial religious com- are sometimes referred to as “colored” in munity in North America during the 4 order to evoke the era in which the “pupil early twentieth century. This essay of the eye” metaphor first appeared. The extends those explorations by propos- essay also uses the term of contemporary ing a number of interpretive possibili- parlance, “black people,” in reference to ties organized around two interrelated the collective that Bahá’u’lláh metapho- claims. First, by giving black people rized as the “pupil of the eye.” a principal position in the figurative 3 Although ‘Abdu’l-Bahá appealed body of humanity, Bahá’u’lláh’s met- to the “pupil of the eye” metaphor in a aphor is reflective of the material re- variety of contexts, its most notable ar- ality that black people were among the ticulation is found in The Advent of Divine principal builders of global moderni- Justice, wherein Shoghi Effendi writes, ty—a reality that has been obscured in “‘Bahá’u’lláh,’ ‘Abdu’l-Bahá moreover has scholarly and lay discourse, but which said, ‘once compared the colored people to is becoming increasingly prominent the black pupil of the eye surrounded by in the work of influential histori- the white. In this black pupil is seen the ans. Second, by favoring black people reflection of that which is before it, and 4 See the important scholarship by through it the light of the spirit shineth Richard Thomas, Christopher Buck, and forth’” (37). Bonnie J. Taylor. 10 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

through the “pupil of the eye” meta- ‘Abdu’l-Bahá—who was Bahá’u’lláh’s phor, Bahá’u’lláh produced a rupture “vicegerent on earth” and the appoint- in racial epistemology of the nine- ed “Interpreter of His mind” (Shoghi teenth century, one that distinguished Effendi, God Passes By 245)—estab- the world-transformative project of lished that His Father used the met- His Revelation from social reformist aphor. On that basis, the “pupil of movements of the era and was critical the eye” designation is considered the to the establishment of the “principle Word of Bahá’u’lláh, an element of a of the Oneness of Mankind—the piv- Divine Revelation unfolded in the lat- ot round which all the teachings of ter half of the nineteenth century. Bahá’u’lláh revolve” (Shoghi Effendi, When exactly in the latter half of World Order 42). Indeed, the special the nineteenth century did Bahá’u’lláh favoring accorded by the “pupil of offer the metaphor? During which pe- the eye” metaphor is an indispensable riod of His ministry? This has not yet element of a System meant to bring been determined. Similarly, it is all but on the Oneness of Mankind in the impossible to precisely delimit the hu- context of a modern era riven by a man collective that Bahá’u’lláh intend- uniquely potent animus directed at black ed to compare to the pupil of the eye. people. That is to say, the anomalous Who exactly are the “colored people” nature of the metaphor—the fact that that Bahá’u’lláh esteems with the met- Bahá’u’lláh seems to have reserved aphor? It may be simply assumed that this exceptional favoring for black all people of African descent are hon- people—highlights the particularly ored by the designation—‘Abdu’l-Bahá virulent role that anti-black ideology evoked the metaphor when address- has played in the constitution of mod- ing African Americans; the Universal ern social and philosophical thought, House of Justice has used it in com- and suggests that anti-blackness is a munications with Bahá’ís on the conti- distinctively ominous impediment to nent of Africa. But if the spiritual re- human oneness. ality of all African-descended people Scholarly engagement with the is described by the metaphor, what is implications of the “pupil of the eye” it that binds this collectivity together? metaphor, and its function in the con- Is it a morphological, phenotypical text of modernity, provokes a number similarity—the presence of visually of preliminary questions and caveats. perceptible markers that in certain To begin, very little is known about geographical contexts once signi- the specific circumstances, rhetor- fied “coloredness” and now signify ical context, or historical moment “blackness,” markers like melanin-en- in which Bahá’u’lláh offered up the dowed skin, specific hair-textures, or metaphor; in His Writings that have facial features? Or, is it a matter of been translated into English thus far, genotype—does genetic composi- the phrase does not appear. However, tion determine whether or not one is Blackness, Modernity, and the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh 11 properly comparable to “the black pu- practices of that collective, but rather pil of the eye”? If Bahá’u’lláh’s meta- the metaphor’s absolute refutation of phor is meant to be understood as the one of the most pernicious constructs articulation of a metaphysical truth of modernity. about a certain group of people, these If it is difficult to offer up a con- questions are worth considering. The crete, static definition of blackness, rich body of scholarship that investi- it is also hard to crisply define the gates the philosophical complexity of phenomenon of “modernity” that has racial and cultural identity illuminates produced race and blackness. Politi- these types of questions, even if it cal scientist Richard Iton furnishes a does not answer them. Because “black- roughshod description of modernity ness” is a social construction that has that is as good as any by describing no definitive biological reality, it can it as “that bundle of cultural, politi- be difficult to say who is black and cal, philosophical and technological who is not, and it is equally difficult iterations and reiterations of the Re- to define black culture. What experi- naissance, the Enlightenment and the ence or biology is shared by a wealthy Industrial Revolution” that has shaped black New Yorker with little melanin, the material world in recent centuries a subsistence farmer in never-colo- (13). There are some aspects of this nized Ethiopia, and an Afro-Iranian “bundle” worth underscoring when fisherman on the coast of the Persian considering Bahá’u’lláh’s “pupil of the Gulf ? There is no immutable black eye” metaphor. One is that although essence transcending time and space. modernity is often (simplistically) As Jamaican-British scholar Stuart linked to the “West,” it has ramified Hall once put it when considering the throughout the world. As one scholar slipperiness of black identity, “We of Iranian history puts it, “The cata- cannot speak for very long, with any clysmic revolution of Western moder- exactness, about ‘one experience, one nity has left virtually no part of the identity’” (225). And yet, for several globe unaffected” (Vahdat xi). Wheth- centuries now, blackness as a racial er or not Western modernity should identifier has been deeply consequen- be regarded as a cataclysm is not tial in many social environments. As pertinent here; however, according to modernity has crept across the globe Iton and many other scholars of race, so too has anti-blackness, an evolving, Western modernity has wrought dev- protean thought regime that works to astation for some because it has always stigmatize those deemed black, wher- created “antonymic and problematic ever and whenever they have been others,” groups of people stigmatized found. Perhaps, then, what is most im- as unworthy of social and civic honor portant about Bahá’u’lláh’s metaphor and protection (13). Indeed, it can be is not the boundary of the collective argued that blackness is nothing more, that it describes, or the socio-cultural and nothing less, than the stigma that 12 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

modernity has projected onto people the qualities of its vehicle—the pupil deemed to be its most “antonymic of the eye—and consequently brings and problematic others.” This is not honor and esteem to a segment of to say that blackness is always and ev- humanity that was subject to some erywhere a stigma, or that those who of the most dishonoring and stig- embrace black identity are embracing matizing discourses of modernity. stigma—rather that, in the context However, before tracing out some of now-global modernity, blackness of the implications of the purely in- is inextricably bound to its origin as strumental purposes of Bahá’u’lláh’s a racial classification meant to facili- nineteenth-century metaphor, which tate the exclusion of “others” from the affiliated black people with spiritual protected community. Whatever else light rather than mortal darkness, blackness may be, in the period since it is important to recognize that the the emergence of modernity it has metaphor was not only an instrument also been an antonym of the sacred that would elevate the social status of community, the sign of the excluded black people. The metaphor was also “other.” Through the “pupil of the instructional: it was the articulation eye” metaphor, Bahá’u’lláh wrestles of some truth that the Manifestation with and radically transforms the of God wanted to teach the world. meaning of a major symbol of moder- Indeed, the instrumental purpose of nity. If modernity conjured blackness the metaphor—an elevated regard to fragment humanity and marginalize for black life—only gains traction if those bearing its mark, Bahá’u’lláh’s the instructional purpose of the met- metaphor alters the meaning of black- aphor is contemplated and accepted. ness, drawing it to the center of the But it must be acknowledged that the body of humanity. precise truth taught through the met- aphor is difficult to pin down. It may THE INSTRUMENTAL AND INSTRUCTIVE be understood that black people are PURPOSES OF THE METAPHOR like the pupil of the eye, but how so? In what way? For the most part, scholars have fig- The literal relationship between the ured the “pupil of the eye” reference vehicle and the tenor of the metaphor as a refutation of chauvinisms as well is apparent—black people have as a means by which Bahá’u’lláh con- more melanin in the skin than other ferred “new racial identity” to black races and are thus darker than other people and furnished an “effective psy- peoples, just as the pupil is darker than chological antidote to the prevailing other parts of the eye. The chromatic racial stereotypes” (Thomas 46; Buck likeness shared by tenor and vehicle 2). This is surely an important social makes the metaphor resonant, but the function of a scriptural metaphor that figuration only becomes instructional imbues its tenor—black people—with when the physiological qualities of Blackness, Modernity, and the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh 13 the pupil are considered. By likening the twentieth century, deliberately black people to a key apparatus encouraged racial pride among in the physiological system that African Americans by suggesting creates vision, Bahá’u’lláh may have that the race’s tormented history had been teaching the world about their conferred upon it a special insight perceptive powers. Christopher Buck and ability. Of course, recognizing has advanced this interpretation, tests and trials as strengthening and suggesting that the metaphor implies spiritually ennobling is not without that black people possess “insight precedent; any number of intellectual into the human condition”—insight and spiritual traditions appeal to this achieved because of collective framework as a mechanism for making suffering (4–5). If this is among the sense of life’s difficulties. Speaking truths that Bahá’u’lláh conveyed in the voice of Divinity, Bahá’u’lláh through the “pupil of the eye” Himself declared that “with fire We metaphor, it bears some similarity to test the gold” (Hidden Words 59), well-known statements of W.E.B. Du and in elaborating this formulation, Bois, one of the foremost American ‘Abdu’l-Bahá explained that “[t] intellectuals of the late nineteenth orment is the fire of test wherein and early twentieth centuries, who in pure gold shineth resplendently” 1902 contended that black people in (Selections 170). Interpretations of the America were “gifted with a second- “pupil of the eye” metaphor that link sight” (7). Du Bois elaborated this distinctive spiritual insight to black claim in his most well-known book, people because they have endured a The Souls of Black Folk (1903), in history of torment take this formula, which he attempted to describe the which can give positive meaning to somewhat mystical essence of the horrible events, and apply it to the African-American experience in his racial collective. In this interpretive era. Thus, interpretations of the “pupil framework, the instrumental purpose of the eye” metaphor that fix upon of the metaphor (elevating the the spiritual perceptiveness of black social status of black people) is people are in keeping with a tradition accomplished when the instructional of African-American thought that purpose of the metaphor (teaching was significantly advanced by Du Bois that black people have spiritual insight and that attempted to alchemize a because of historical suffering) is history of oppression into a source of understood. In its concentration on pride and inspiration. As he would put spiritual insight born out of hardship, it elsewhere in his writings, “Among this interpretation implicitly draws American Negros there are sources from a stream of African-American of strength in common memories thought that flows from Du Bois and of suffering in the past” (Dusk 110). other early twentieth-century black Du Bois, and many following him in historians who sought to make the 14 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

memory of slavery into a point of that may lead toward new interpre- pride rather than a mark of shame.5 tations of the instructive meaning of the “pupil of the eye” metaphor. Just BUILDING MODERNITY as Bahá’u’lláh’s metaphor gives black people a central and vital role in the fig- In recent years, historians have started urative body of humanity, a fresh form to think about New World enslavement of historiography is showing that the of Africans and African-descended story of modernity pivots on the con- people in ways that were intuited by tributions of black people. Indeed, an Du Bois and his contemporaries and influential cadre of twenty-first cen- 5 It should be noted that there is tury scholars, working in a sub-field a limitation to the applicability of an in- dubbed New Histories of Capitalism terpretive model suggesting that black (NHC), are persuasively demonstrat- people possess spiritual insight because of ing that the labor of enslaved black the history of enslavement or colonial op- people was one of the primal catalyt- pression. The particular torment of race- ic forces in the emergence of human based slavery does not figure in the history industrialization and global capitalism of large portions of Africa. Indeed, many in the eighteenth and nineteenth cen- millions of black people have no history turies. In a series of book-length his- of enslavement or colonization in their tories with suggestive titles like Em- genealogical pasts—national territories pire of Cotton: A Global History (2014), such as Liberia and Ethiopia were never The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery fully colonized by Western powers, yet the and the Making of American Capitalism metaphysical implications of the “pupil of (2014), and Slavery’s Capitalism: A New the eye” designation surely extend to black History of American Economic Develop- people bearing these somewhat anomalous ment (2016), these scholars are over- histories. The most precise articulation of turning a tradition of historiography the interpretive model that highlights the that has downplayed the significance spiritual insight of black people as a col- of slavery in the rise of European and lective should not link that insight to any American power in the world and the specific history or political experience, per ensuing efflorescence of global mate- se. However, as the argument below will rial prosperity. For NHC historians, unfold, in the modern world black people who follow in the footsteps of black contend with the unique set of stigmas scholars like the Trinidadian intellec- created by global anti-black ideology. tual and political leader Eric Williams This anti-blackness manifests in myriad and his largely ignored Capitalism and social, political, economic, and cultural Slavery (1944), the lives and labor of formations. Perhaps all black people are black people are not mere addendums endowed with spiritual insight because to the narrative that would explain each and all must contend with the “test” the so-called “Great Divergence” or of anti-blackness. “European Miracle” that occurred Blackness, Modernity, and the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh 15 in the run-up to the nineteenth cen- at the very center of the “process of tury’s Industrial Revolution and the global integration and the ‘takeoff ’ resultant flourishing of technology that gave modern capitalism its funda- and wealth that has since transformed mental structures of production and human societies. Instead, in the chron- consumption” (Beckert and Rockman icle of material development offered 8–9). by the new histories of capitalism, Among the primary proponents black people are the protagonists. This of the NHC movement is Harvard compelling and recently invigorated professor Sven Beckert, who argues narrative insists that the explosion of that the cotton trade was the key- prosperity in the modern world is not stone of the first truly global market, simplistically attributable to Europe- which connected Africa, Europe, the an—and later American—innovation, Americas, and various parts of Asia culture, governance, or advanced legal in the eighteenth century, and that it and property rights systems; rather, it served as “the launching pad for the shows that the expropriative and ex- broader Industrial Revolution” in the ploitative New World plantation com- nineteenth century (xiv). In Beckert’s plex was at the heart of a transforma- telling, the center of the “cotton em- tive social and economic process that pire” moved from the East (in India) to first allowed for the accumulation of the West (in Great Britain) only after vast wealth in European metropoles, Europeans were able to establish an and then sparked the Industrial Rev- economic dominance that was built on olution, which in turn led to the ex- roughly three hundred years of colo- ponential expansion of material de- nial enterprise in the New World. This velopment in the world. The network enterprise—mostly focused on sugar of agricultural plantations that first production—was history-altering and bloomed in the Caribbean basin of the essential to the flowering of not just 1500s and eventually spread through- global capitalism but Western Enlight- out the Americas produced “European enment. It was also totally dependent on capital liberation” but was impossible the labor of those people described by without “African labor enslavement” Bahá’u’lláh as the “pupil of the eye.” (Beckles 777). For a variety of rea- The massive, central role played by sons, histories of global development black people in the material develop- have marginalized the invaluable role ment of the modern world is manifest of African work in the creation of the in one stark figure that is important modern world and its earth-girdling to NHC scholarship: between 1492 economy. But NHC scholarship (which and 1807, four out of every five peo- reiterates marginalized arguments ple who came from the Old World to made long ago by black scholars like the New World were African (Baptist Du Bois and Williams) shows that 41). These 6.5 million people prepared the stolen labor of black people was the land, grew the crops, and built the 16 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

infrastructure that was a necessary in the United States rested upon a precursor to the development of the keen valuation of the enormously nineteenth century’s global cotton productive power of black people who market—a market that grew in leaps toiled in bondage. However distasteful and bounds because of the mecha- it now appears, a weighty truth is felt nized production of textile made from in the lower frequencies of his claim “white gold.” During Bahá’u’lláh’s life- that “slave-labor of the United States, time, the great majority of the world’s has hitherto conferred, and is still most lucrative and arguably most conferring inappreciable blessings on consequential commodity was grown mankind” (Croom 11, emphasis add- and harvested in the United States by ed). Continuing the theme, the edito- black people. rialist argues “that in the dispensation In 1853, the pro-slavery trade jour- of an All-wise Providence, the pecu- nal American Cotton Planter published liar institution of the Southern States an editorial that was mostly about the (slavery), contributes an indispensable economically “overshadowing dimen- support to human progress and pros- sions” of the global cotton trade. The perity” (11). Couched in an apologia editorial was simultaneously nefari- for slavery in the United States, these ous and accurate. Its writer, a staunch arguments advance a core premise of slavery advocate, rightly insisted that NHC scholarship: the rise of modern the cultivation and manufacturing of capitalism and its world-transformative cotton was the commercial bond that effects depended upon unfree black linked Great Britain and the United labor. Perhaps unexpectedly, these States, and that cotton granted these arguments also shed light on a via- nations the most powerful and pro- ble interpretation of the instruction- ductive economies in the mid-nine- al meaning of the “pupil of the eye” teenth-century world. But most metaphor. By according black people important to an assessment of the a central and “indispensable” function instructive purpose of Bahá’u’lláh’s in the figurative body of humanity, “pupil of the eye” metaphor was the Bahá’u’lláh illustrated a material real- editorialist’s implicit acknowledge- ity that was ruthlessly recognized by ment that the operations of the bur- nineteenth-century capitalists in the geoning economic world order would American South, but was—and re- not be possible without black people. mains—“inappreciable” to most. That While ignoring their humanity, and is to say, through the “pupil of the eye” attempting to justify slavery’s system- metaphor, Bahá’u’lláh instructed hu- atic robbery of their life and labor, the manity about a fundamental historical writer nevertheless emphasized black truth: black people played a central, in- people’s central role in the drama of dispensable role in the creation of the the rapidly developing world economy. modern world and were precious con- His unscrupulous defense of slavery tributors to the global prosperity that Blackness, Modernity, and the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh 17 must, someday, redound to the benefit that reflexively called forth the stig- of all peoples. mas. From the sixteenth century on- wards, many leaders of European and ANTI-BLACKNESS AND MODERNITY New World Christendom helped build anti-black ideology through scriptural Anti-black ideology became such a hermeneutics and racialized theologies powerful and important part of mo- that attributed a special sinfulness, or dernity precisely because the stolen la- even soullessness, to black people. But bor of black people was so central to in the development of anti-black ide- the building of the post-1492 world. ologies, the Christian clerics were also Social theories of the West, from joined by their more secular-minded those of Karl Marx to Pierre Bour- rivals—the intellectuals or philosophes dieu, teach that exploitative or un- who were the pioneers of Enlighten- equal power relations always require ment thought. By the time Bahá’u’lláh justificatory narratives (see Bourdieu offered up the “pupil of the eye” met- and Passeron, Reproduction 9–10). The aphor, centering and honoring black massive human exploitation that was people, European and New World the predicate of New World moderni- discourses of anti-blackness were cer- ty had to be reconciled with the moral tainly circulating in His milieu, which frameworks of those who were doing was also alive with its own anti-black the exploiting; as the lives and la- ideology that justified the widespread bors of millions of black people were enslavement of Africans in Qajar Per- robbed through enslavement, there sia, the Ottoman Empire, and else- arose a massive ideological appara- where in the Islamic world. Recog- tus that sought to justify the robbery. nizing the sharp distinction between This multifaceted and thoroughgo- Bahá’u’lláh’s engagement with black ing apparatus, which can be called life and that of the contextualizing anti-blackness, served to vigorously thought regimes of His era produces a debase those “colored people” that deepened appreciation for the novelty, Bahá’u’lláh would eventually uphold independence, and internal coherence as the “pupil of the eye.” of the social theory woven into His The relatively unmitigated, centu- Revelation. The instructive and instru- ries-long exploitation of African and mental purposes of the “pupil of the African-descended people who were eye” metaphor contrast most sharply central to the emergence of moderni- with the anti-black litany produced by ty and global capitalism was justified the avant-garde humanists associat- through the development of an array ed with the Western Enlightenment of stigmas focused on dishonoring that flourished just before the opening black bodies, cultures, minds, and even of the Dispensation of Bahá’u’lláh. souls, with an intensity that matched Although the leading minds of this the massive scale of the exploitation movement were committed to a “new 18 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

understanding of the human condi- to be irrational interpretations of the tion” (Pinker 8)—an understanding Genesis creation story, he concurrent- meant to bring on prosperity, ease ly built up the stigmatization of black- of life, and social amelioration— ness. Writing on African people, Vol- these hugely creative thinkers were, taire would quip, “Our wise men have without exception, promulgators of said that man was created in the image anti-blackness. of God. Now here is a lovely image of It is perhaps ironic that the archi- the Divine—a flat black nose with lit- tecture of modernity’s racism—reli- tle or hardly any intelligence” (Cohen ant on the pseudo-scientific construct 88). This sarcastic attack on both Af- of race—was designed even as the phi- rican humanity and Christian clerical losophes who were seminal to the En- wisdom exemplifies the interconnec- lightenment simultaneously elevated tion of Enlightenment scientism and the epistemic ideal of rationalism and anti-black rhetoric; Voltaire’s effort to putatively empiricist methods of in- advance rational, secular inquiry about quiry. Emerging from these ideals and the origin of man was entwined with methods was much of the intellectual a subjective, degrading description blueprint for conceptions of democ- of black people. Similarly, the trans- racy, egalitarianism, justice, religious formational and widely disseminated tolerance, and freedom of thought that compendium of knowledge known as are frequently associated with the En- the Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné lightenment and that are vital to the des sciences, des arts et des métiers—and contemporary world order. But in the sometimes considered the “first ency- influential writings and heady salons clopedia”—rationalized anti-blackness of seventeenth- and eighteenth-cen- even as it disseminated Enlighten- tury Europe, seminal thinkers like ment ideals that were gaining traction Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Denis Diderot, among the educated classes of the Voltaire, and a legion of lesser-known seventeenth century. The editors of intellectuals were simultaneously dis- the Encyclopédie, Diderot and Jean Le seminating subjective ideas about race, Rond d’Alembert, explicitly set out to most of which were characterized by “change the way men think” and build intense anti-black sentiment dressed a “war machine” of ideas that would in the costumes of rational scientism. subdue what they deemed to be out- While these thinkers quarreled about dated, ossified forms of thought (qtd. the morality of the Atlantic slave in Clark xvii). But as they advanced trade and the enslavement of Africans a steady revolution in Western intel- in the European colonies of the New lectual history, they also helped legit- World, they were essentially unani- imize anti-black chauvinism. The En- mous in their low estimation of black cyclopédie is peppered with a variety of humanity. As Voltaire, for example, references to black people, which range sought to dismantle what he thought from paternalistic to dehumanizing. Blackness, Modernity, and the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh 19

For example, in an entry titled “Ne- which naturally accompanies all our groes, character of Negroes in gener- ideas,—the category of Universality” al,” the Encyclopédie declares that black (97). Which is to say that one of the Africans are “always vicious . . . mostly preeminent thinkers of modernity inclined to lasciviousness, vengeance, felt that black people were not quite theft and lies” (Cohen 72). So it went: human because “[i]n Negro life the anti-black ideology was part and par- characteristic point is the fact that cel of the Enlightenment project—a consciousness has not yet attained viral attachment that spread along to the realization of any substantial with literacy and the social and civic objective existence” (97). American ideas that reshaped Europe and the president Abraham Lincoln seemed to Atlantic and Mediterranean basins in doubt that people of African descent the centuries before the advent of the could ever attain the moral and civic Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh. capacity of whites. Despite hazarding Of course, in the late eighteenth a bloodbath war to end slavery in his century and into the nineteenth centu- nation, he predicted that the black race ry, as Bahá’u’lláh revealed a vision of could never “be placed on an equality global community that reserved a “fa- with the white race” in America (qtd. vored” status for black people, the fire in Kendi 219). Jefferson, Hegel, and of Enlightenment-stoked racism con- Lincoln are only a few representative tinued to burn feverishly. Thomas Jef- figures on the long list of philosoph- ferson, for example, fueled anti-black ical, political, and cultural luminaries sentiment in his Notes on the State of who helped to stigmatize blackness Virginia, which was read widely on while also building the foundations of both sides of the Atlantic and is of- modernity; almost without exception, ten considered a compendium of his the revered intellects of modern social “most cherished ideas and interests” thought contributed to a voluminous (Bernstein 67). In the book, he spec- disparagement of black humanity and ulated that black people were “inferior inculcated a common sense that rele- to the whites in the endowments both gated black life to the lightless base- of body and mind,” heaping a variety ment of a hugely consequential racial of disparagements on the race (qtd. hierarchy. in Bernstein 80). In the 1840s, G.W.F. To underscore the potency of Hegel—frequently thought of as the anti-black ideology, and thus throw “greatest philosopher of the modern into relief the anomalous quality experience” (Dorrien 388)—insisted of Bahá’u’lláh’s refutation of such that “[t]he peculiarly African char- thinking, it is worth noting that in acter is difficult to comprehend.” So the nineteenth century even black difficult that, when it came to Afri- champions of justice could produce cans, Hegel counseled that Europe- rhetoric that implicitly debased black ans ought to “give up the principle people. Although African-descended 20 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

populations produced a range of in- in relation to its nineteenth-century tellectual, artistic, and spiritual con- context, so thoroughly suffused in futations of anti-blackness, important social thought that was axiomatical- black thought-leaders could slip into ly anti-black. Against this backdrop, formulations that tacitly reinforced Bahá’u’lláh’s intervention in the era’s prevailing ideas about black lack. racial discourse amounts to nothing For example, despite being hailed as less than an epistemological rupture— among the fiercest black-authored the introduction of a radical ideolog- condemnations of slavery and racism, ical conception that had hardly any David Walker’s 1829 Appeal to the Co- precedent in the secular or religious loured Citizens of the World emphasizes thinking of His historical moment. the material and spiritual deficits that Archivists would be hard-pressed to oppression has yielded in a black race find a comparable elevation of “col- characterized as “the most wretched, ored people” in the reams of philo- degraded, and abject set of beings that sophical and social writing about race ever lived since the world began” (6). produced in Bahá’u’lláh’s lifetime. And consider that in 1867, Sojourner Truth, the once-enslaved black woman THE NOVELTY AND NECESSITY OF THE who tirelessly advocated for the rights “PUPIL OF THE EYE” DESIGNATION of black people and women in Amer- ica, would publicly testify that “[w] The absolute refusal of anti-black hite women are a great deal smarter, ideology should be considered a and know more than colored women,” distinguishing feature of Bahá’u’lláh’s and that black men do little more than social teaching; it is a notable example “go about idle, strutting up and down” of the coherence in what Bahá’u’lláh (qtd. in Kendi 242). It is not surpris- Himself described as the “wondrous ing that anti-blackness surfaces in the System” laid out in His Revelation rhetorical flourishes of even black (Kitáb-i-Aqdas ¶181). This System leaders of the nineteenth century; it was animated by one “fundamental only indicates the pervasiveness of the purpose,” underscored time and thought patterns that in that era de- again in His voluminous Writings: it graded black life, culture, and capacity. sought to “safeguard the interests and Indeed, in order to be taken serious- promote the unity of the human race, ly, black thought-leaders often had to and to foster the spirit of love and mouth such deprecations in order to fellowship amongst men” (Gleanings gain legitimacy with many audiences. 215). The virulent anti-blackness of The point here is that a proper appre- His world-historical moment was, of ciation of Bahá’u’lláh’s “pupil of the course, antithetical to the “spirit of eye” metaphor is only accessible when love and fellowship” that Bahá’u’lláh that positive centering of the “colored aimed to promote through what some people” of the world is considered scholars have called His “reformist Blackness, Modernity, and the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh 21 movement” (Cole 136). But while Civilization. In it, Saiedi effectively scores of eighteenth- and nineteenth- deconstructs and lays bare the short- century social reformers sought to comings of a strand of scholarship advance the interests of the human that reduces Bahá’u’lláh’s vision to a race even as they endorsed ideologies repackaging of millennial reformist that debased and relentlessly ideas that, according to one commen- stigmatized black people, Bahá’u’lláh’s tator, were “in the air” during the late favoring of “colored people” took hold nineteenth century (Cole 68). Where of prevailing racial epistemology and Saiedi shows the unprecedented quali- turned it on its head. This was not ty of Bahá’u’lláh’s late nineteenth-cen- reform; it was rupture—a rupture that tury thought, scholars like Juan Cole was the prerequisite of any coherent have made efforts to drain it of orig- program ultimately seeking “the unity inality and independence through a of the human race.” The widespread historicizing methodology that figures but tortured logic of social reformist Bahá’u’lláh’s Revelation as essentially movements that sought the betterment a synthesis of European and Middle of humanity and simultaneously Eastern social reform discourse. To promoted or acquiesced to anti-black carry out his project, Cole selectively ideology operated in stark contrast to reconstructs the late nineteenth cen- the logic of Bahá’u’lláh’s mission. In tury ideological milieu which flowed itself, the specific refusal of anti-black about Bahá’u’lláh and searches for mo- ideology distinguishes Bahá’u’lláh’s ments of “intertextuality” that align system from that of contemporaneous Bahá’u’lláh’s Revelation with ideas reform movements; it also speaks to that were prominent among progres- the systemic integrity of the ethics sive thinkers of His era (68). Cole’s of His Revelation, what Nader Saiedi reconstruction of nineteenth-century describes as “the internal coherence of social thought does not include any Bahá’u’lláh’s system” (316). reference to the anti-black ideology Although it represents just one that was endemic among European node in the expansive social and spir- intellectuals and reformers of the era itual system activated in His Revela- and that was particularly pivotal to the tion, Bahá’u’lláh’s especial promotion ideas of one figure whom Cole links of the capacity of black people is an to Bahá’u’lláh: the French political outsized marker of the novelty and and social reformer Henri de Saint-Si- philosophical independence of His mon, whose beliefs about social justice System. Demonstrating this inde- (among other things) gained traction pendence—“the creative, revolution- among European elites in the early ary, and unprecedented character of nineteenth century. Bahá’u’lláh’s spiritual and social vi- While Cole focuses upon “partic- sion”—is one of the central aims of ularly striking” parallels that appar- Saiedi’s ambitious study, Logos and ently conjoin the “peace thought” of 22 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

Saint-Simon and Bahá’u’lláh (136), study, A History of the Intellectual De- Saiedi rightly points out that, al- velopment of Europe, was available in though somewhat progressive in his the Middle East and was approvingly egalitarian principles, Saint-Simon cited in an important Bahá’í treatise,6 was an advocate of European im- Cole highlights the seeming resem- perialism, which hinged on white blance between the Lockean and Jeffer- supremacist beliefs. Saiedi contrasts sonian theories of the state articulated Bahá’u’lláh’s unqualified commitment by Draper and those found in political to the unity of the entire human race theory emerging from the Revelation with Saint-Simon’s advocacy of race of Bahá’u’lláh. But these resemblanc- war in which “Europeans will unite es are rendered incidental in light their forces” to subdue indolent Asians of Bahá’u’lláh’s definitive rejection and “bloodthirsty” Africans (qtd. in of the racist premises that underlay Saiedi 314). Demonstrating that the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century race discourse advanced by Bahá’u’lláh North Atlantic social philosophy and was fundamentally incompatible with that poisoned the work of even a pro- that of Saint-Simon is one of the ways gressive thinker like Draper, who in that Saiedi problematizes Cole’s effort 1867 could declare that, “at the best,” to equalize Bahá’u’lláh’s teachings and the American negro “will never be that of European influencers whose more than an overgrown child” (196). ideas had filtered into the Ottoman As race-conscious philosophers like intellectual context by the late nine- Charles Mills have argued in recent teenth century. However innovative decades, a legion of Enlightenment Saint-Simon was in his theorizing, he thinkers like Draper, Saint-Simon, also subscribed to a run-of-the-mill Locke, and Jefferson built their puta- racism that allowed him to simply tively universal political philosophies excise black people from his concep- on an almost invisible “Racial Con- tion of “mankind,” declaring that “the tract.” According to Mills and others, Negro, because of his basic physical fair-minded analysis of seminal so- structure, is not susceptible, even with cial contract theories of the Western the same education, of rising to the Enlightenment reveals that they rest intellectual level of Europeans” (qtd. upon an “unacknowledged system,” a in Swedberg 147–48). racial contract which tacitly assumes Cole calls attention to another that the rights and liberties guaran- Western intellectual, the American teed by the state to the citizen extend historian John William Draper, whose only to white people—“the people work constituted a “plausible conduit” who count, the people who really are by which the North Atlantic ideals people” (3). Without exception, all the of the social contract and freedom of 6 ‘Abdu’l-Bahá makes reference conscience found their way into Bahá’í to Draper’s work in The Secret of Divine texts (37). Noting that Draper’s major Civilization. Blackness, Modernity, and the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh 23

Western social philosophy that was between anti-blackness in the prover- potentially accessible to Bahá’u’lláh bial West and East is sharpened by a was also underwritten by this racial social taxonomy offered by historians contract system, and yet His vision who distinguish between “slave societ- of spiritual polity bears no sign of it. ies” and “societies with slaves” (Berlin Moreover, Bahá’u’lláh’s System ex- 8). While the anti-blackness of the plicitly rejects the racial (and gender) West was the ideological handmaid of contract that was latent in the theoriz- New World “slave societies” in which ing reformers of the Enlightenment. “slavery stood at the center of eco- The point here is that the chasm be- nomic production” and was the engine tween Western political theory and of enormous wealth production, the Bahá’u’lláh’s vision of social order is anti-black sentiment of Bahá’u’lláh’s perhaps widest and deepest when the Qajar and Ottoman contexts grew racially exclusionary logic of the for- out of “societies with slaves.” In these mer is contrasted with Bahá’u’lláh’s societies, “slaves were marginal to thoroughgoing universalism—and the central productive processes,” the His embrace of the “colored people” institution of slavery was somewhat of the world in particular. porous, and enslaved or formerly-en- slaved people could sometimes ascend THE “PUPIL OF THE EYE” the social hierarchy (Berlin 8). The AND THE AFTERLIVES OF SLAVERY New World slave societies that were almost totally parasitic in their depen- If the “pupil of the eye” designation dence on black labor required a deeper, operated as a radical refutation of more urgent form of stigmatizing ide- the anti-blackness that was essen- ology than did the societies with slaves tial to the Western modernity that that could be found the Islamic world. Bahá’u’lláh engaged in His Revela- Nevertheless, anti-black sentiment tion, this intervention cannot be eas- was certainly a feature of the elite Per- ily attributed to the intellectual or sian matrix in which Bahá’u’lláh was social mores of His Islamic context. raised in the early nineteenth century. Bahá’u’lláh’s geographic and social en- Not only were enslaved Africans—of- vironment was rife with its own forms ten castrated eunuchs—commonplace of racism, which stigmatized black in the households of the Persian no- Africans, who constituted a signifi- bility of the era, but by the time of cant portion of the slave population in Bahá’u’lláh’s birth, this class of Per- nineteenth-century Persia and the Ot- sians was also beginning to emulate toman Empire. However, the virulent, certain European social, cultural and pervasive anti-blackness that crystal- intellectual practices. It would be naïve ized in the modern West differed from to suggest that the well-established the anti-black sentiment that circulat- anti-blackness of Western moderni- ed in the Islamic East. The distinction ty did not influence Qajar Persia and 24 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

the Ottoman territories into which from him his freedom, and this despite Bahá’u’lláh was exiled. the fact that his owner is himself but Considering the presence of black Thy thrall and Thy servant” (qtd. in participants in the Heroic Age of the Universal House of Justice, letter dat- Bahá’í Faith adds important texture to ed 2 September 2014). Asserting that the “pupil of the eye” metaphor and all are “vassals” before God, Bahá’u’lláh deepens its humanity-unifying impli- reflects upon Mubarak’s plea by pos- cations. From the Bahá’í perspective, ing a rhetorical question that exposes Bahá’u’lláh’s acclamation of “colored slavery as a moral absurdity and estab- people” is vested with transcendent, lishes a necessary plank in theological divine authority; yet, that iconoclastic egalitarianism: “How, then, can this pronouncement should also be linked thrall claim for himself ownership of to Bahá’u’lláh’s lived experience in His any other human being?” He then goes father’s household that was populated on to liberate Mubarak in no uncertain by “many colored maids and servants” terms. Bahá’u’lláh’s direct response to (‘Abdu’l-Bahá, qtd. in “Sterling Faith- Mubarak—in which He equates His fulness” 38). In this domestic setting, own earthly condition with that of Bahá’u’lláh’s personal relationships a black man—represents not only a with black people were keen and sub- total disavowal of slavery, but also a stantial. According to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, powerfully illustrative demolition of when Bahá’u’lláh became the head racial hierarchy and a profound ref- of His family, He liberated all who utation of anti-black ideology. In its were considered property in His fa- mid-nineteenth-century context, this ther’s household. However, one black was no small statement. As much as man, Isfandiyár, chose to remain with it was a brief against slavery, the tab- Bahá’u’lláh and remained His willing let for Mubarak was, like the “pupil servant until death (Promulgation 426). of the eye” metaphor, also a lesson in Another black man, Mubarak, who Bahá’u’lláh’s curriculum on the one- was likely enslaved in the household ness of humanity. of Bahá’u’lláh’s sister, sought manu- Yet, it is important to disentangle mission from Bahá’u’lláh, and was sub- Bahá’u’lláh’s abrogation of the in- sequently addressed by Him in terms stitution of slavery from His stand that laid bare His absolute rejection of against anti-black ideology, which is the social institution of slavery in the implicit in His tablet to Mubarak and 1850s. Offered in the voice of a mortal rather explicit in His “pupil of the servant of God, Bahá’u’lláh’s response eye” metaphor. With the revelation of to Mubarak suggests that the enslaved the Kitáb-i-Aqdas in 1873, Bahá’u’lláh man’s request reveals a tragic irony in forbade the trade in slaves, and thus the practice of slavery—Bahá’u’lláh made known that in His Dispensa- declares, “Behold how one slave hath tion ownership of human beings was stood at the door of another, seeking contrary to Divine Will. This law Blackness, Modernity, and the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh 25 was, of course, applicable to all hu- slavery gave life to unprecedented manity—it had no racial specificity; material prosperity, it also birthed a indeed, in nineteenth-century Qajar potent anti-blackness that could not Persia and the Ottoman Empire, en- be extinguished through “mere” abo- slaved people hailed from a variety of lition. But by producing the “pupil of racial and ethnic backgrounds. The the eye” metaphor, which gave favor abolition of legal slavery, which was to those targeted by anti-blackness, a worldwide evolution in the organi- Bahá’u’lláh made it clear that any be- zation of human society (inaugurated lief, institution, or social movement by Republic of Haiti in the late eigh- that was to be compatible with His teenth century), did not address the Word could not abide by the insidious racial ideologies that the institution ideology that grew out of—and out- of slavery produced. This is evident lived—the New World permutation in the history of abolitionism in the of institutionalized slavery. United States. Many of those who The robust, pervasive quality of were instrumental in ending slavery, modernity’s anti-blackness makes it like Abraham Lincoln, did not re- a serious impediment to the develop- nounce anti-black ideology. Once it ment of the loving, equitable, and just was unlinked from the institution of human society that is the ultimate aim slavery, the acceptance and persistence of Bahá’u’lláh’s Divine Revelation. of this ideology gave life to what some He has explained that those aligned scholars have termed the “afterlives of with Divine Will must be driven by slavery” (Sharpe 5). In these afterlives, the desire to “quench the flame of anti-blackness was simply reconfig- hatred and enmity, so that the whole ured so that the harm of social, civ- earth may come to be viewed as one ic, and economic marginalization was country.” In further elucidating His inflicted upon black people through own mission, Bahá’u’lláh states, “The evolved mechanisms that were sanc- Prophets of God should be regarded tioned by the state, even if slavery was as physicians whose task is to foster not. As one scholar puts it, “From this the well-being of the world and its vantage point, emancipation appears peoples, that, through the spirit of less the grand event of liberation than oneness, they may heal the sickness a point of transition between modes of a divided humanity” (Gleanings of servitude and racial subjection” 80). Obviously, the anti-black ideology (Hartman 6). Intransigent anti-black that has infected societies for several racism ensured that in the aftermath centuries is a constituent element of of abolition—in the United States the humanity-dividing sickness that and in national contexts throughout Bahá’u’lláh’s Revelation aims to heal. In the world—black people continued to its most virulent forms, anti-blackness suffer limited life chances and a host has marginalized black life out of exis- of social maladies. As New World tence—that is to say, it promotes social 26 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

conditions in which disregard or dis- comfort or solace for a historically dain for black life is so intense that the burdened people. Bahá’u’lláh’s specif- social and civic body is unperturbed by ic and explicit refutation of one of or even desirous of the elimination of modernity’s most hateful and divisive black people. social ideologies is an instructive pre- Through His “pupil of the eye” scription addressed to all humanity. metaphor, which adamantly centers Surely, the condition of oneness that is black life in the figurative body of global society’s highest and most ur- humanity, Bahá’u’lláh acted as social gent aspiration is impossible without Physician, prescribing a spiritual and the universal internalization of the social concept that must be regarded medicine that Bahá’u’lláh has loaded as something more than a gesture of into the “pupil of the eye” metaphor.

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Cohen, William B. The French Encounter with Africans: White Response to Blacks, 1530 –1880. Indiana UP, 1980. Cole, Juan. Modernity and the Millennium: The Genesis of the Bahá’í Faith in the Nineteenth-Century Middle East. Columbia UP, 1998. Croom, Isaac. “A Memoir.” American Cotton Planter, vol. 1, May 1854, pp. 1–13. Davis, Angela. Foreword. When They Call You a Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir, by Patrisse Khan-Cullors, St. Martin’s Press, 2018, pp. xii–xiv. Dorrien, Gary. Kantian Reason and Hegelian Spirit: The Idealistic Logic of Modern Theology. John Wiley & Sons, 2015. Draper, John William. History of the American Civil War. Harper & Brothers Pub- lishers, 1867. Du Bois, W.E.B. Dusk of Dawn: An Essay Toward an Autobiography of a Race Concept. Oxford UP, 2007. ———. The Souls of Black Folk. Simon & Schuster, 2005. Garza, Alicia. “A Herstory.” The Feminist Wire, 7 Oct. 2014. www.thefeministwire. com/2014/10/blacklivesmatter-2/. Hall, Stuart. “Cultural Identity and Diaspora.” Colonial Discourse and Post-Colonial Theory: A Reader, edited by Patrick Williams and Laura Chrisman, Har- vester and Wheatsheaf, 1994, pp. 227–37. Hartman, Saidiya. Scenes of Subjection. Oxford UP, 1997. Hegel, G.W.F. The Philosophy of History. The Colonial Press, 1900. Iton, Richard. In Search of the Black Fantastic. Oxford UP, 2008. Kendi, Ibram X. Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America. Nation Books, 2016. Mills, Charles W. The Racial Contract. Cornell UP, 1997. Pinker, Steven. Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress. Penguin, 2018. Saiedi, Nader. Logos and Civilization: Spirit, History, and Order in the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh. UP of Maryland, 2000. Sharpe, Christina. In the Wake: On Blackness and Being. Duke UP, 2016. Shoghi Effendi. The Advent of Divine Justice. Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1990. ———. God Passes By. Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1990. ———. The World Order of Bahá’u’lláh:. US Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1991. Swedberg, Richard. “Saint-Simon’s Vision of a United Europe.” European Journal of Sociology, vol. 35, no. 1, 1994, pp. 145–69. Taylor, Bonnie J. The Pupil of the Eye: African Americans in the World Order of Bahá’u’lláh. Palabra Publications, 1998. The Universal House of Justice. Letter dated 2 September 2014. ———. “Letter to the Followers of Bahá’u’lláh in Africa.” Ridván 153. Bahá’í Ref- erence Library. https://www.bahai.org/library/authoritative-texts/the- universal-house-of-justice/messages/19960421_002/1#303502776 28 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

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Alabama, in Texas, and—with Amer- Helen Elsie Austin ica’s involvement in World War I—at the Fort Des Moines, Iowa, Provision- JOHN S. HATCHER al Army Officer Training School. By January 1920, the family had set- tled in Cincinnati, Ohio, where Mary Louise worked at a school named after Harriet Beecher Stowe. It is told that on her first day of high school, after the teacher had read from a textbook that the black race had contributed absolute- ly nothing to civilization but had been created to be subservient to the more fortunate races, Elsie stood up and said: “I was taught in a black school that Af- ricans worked iron before Europeans knew anything about it. I was taught that they knew how to cast bronze in making statues and that they worked in gold and ivory so beautifully that the European nations came to their shores to buy their carvings and statues. That Helen Elsie Austin was born May is what I was taught in a black school.” 10, 1908, to Mary Louise Austin This is how early the character of Elsie and George J. Austin, both of whom Austin manifested itself in what would worked at the Tuskegee Institute and prove to be a lifetime of daring, cour- were friends with Booker T. and Mar- age, and autonomy. garet Washington at the same univer- After graduating from high school sity.1 The family moved several times in 1924, Austin and seven other Afri- because George Austin (a veteran of can-American women students were the Spanish-American War) served as admitted to the University of Cincin- “Commander of Men”2 at schools in nati. Historically, there was limited at- tendance of black students at the uni- 1 Booker T. Washington was an versity, and in the 1920s most of the American educator, writer, and noted African-American women were only speaker. In the latter part of the nine- allowed into the college of education. teenth century and the early part of the twentieth century, he was considered In addition, there were no black facul- by many to be the most prominent Afri- ty; black students could not live in the can-American leader and spokesperson. dormitories, had limited access to the 2 This was a position in the World university pool, and were cautioned by War I period equivalent to contempo- the college administrator to be incon- rary commandants of university ROTC spicuous and to have low expectations. programs. 30 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

Not to be deterred, Austin and the Austin was interested, but she tem- other black female students decided pered her curiosity with caution. For they would go out for everything. two years or so, she carried Bahá’í They also made a solemn vow to finish literature with her, and she attended that first year with honors in some- meetings, impressed particularly by thing. Their success in doing just so prominent African-American lawyer motivated the same college official to Louis G. Gregory and by Dorothy apologize to them. Baker, whose wit, wisdom, and charis- Austin went on to be the first black matic openness helped Austin conquer woman to graduate from the Universi- her cynicism about religion. She final- ty of Cincinnati Law School. She also ly became a Bahá’í in 1934. passed the Indiana Bar as one of only It was also in 1934 that Austin rep- twenty-two black women lawyers ad- resented the National Association for mitted by 1930. In addition to this im- the Advancement of Colored People portant achievement, while working at a hearing regarding the inequity of on her law degree, Austin spent a year school allocations in Ohio. In addition, on the staff of the Rocky Mountain Austin was admitted to plead cases be- Law Review and later earned a place- fore the Ohio Supreme Court, and she ment at the Cincinnati Law Review. In was named to the Board of Trustees 1931, Austin opened a law practice in of Wilberforce University, a histori- Indianapolis, Indiana, and in 1933, she cally black college. co-founded a law firm with Henry J. Over the next few years, she both Richardson, Jr., in Ohio. led private classes on the Bahá’í Faith Over time, Austin had become in- and served on an all-Cincinnati YWCA creasingly incensed about the role of committee. But 1937 was a major turn- religion in dealing with racism. She ing point in Austin’s life and career. approached her father to explain that She was appointed as an assistant at- she was leaning toward becoming an torney general for Ohio. She received agnostic or even an atheist because all an honorary Doctor of Laws degree the religions not only practiced seg- from Wilberforce University because regation but also seemed to be at war of this appointment. She also worked with one another. with the YMCA, and she was appoint- While her father listened with un- ed to a regional committee tasked with derstanding to her frustration, he overseeing the Bahá’í Faith in Ohio, told her that, before she abandoned Michigan, Indiana, and Kentucky. Fi- religion entirely, she might do well to nally, she was honored as an invited investigate the Bahá’í Faith. He knew speaker at a symposium in Cleveland. about the Faith because he had attend- In 1946, Austin was elected to the ed monthly public meetings held by National Spiritual Assembly of the the long-established Cincinnati Bahá’í United States, and later she went on pil- community and had made contact with grimage to Haifa. In 1953, upon Shoghi some of its members. Effendi’s instigation of the Ten Year Helen Elsie Austin 31

World Crusade—the major emphasis from the Foreign Service in 1970. of which was to encourage Western In 1975, Austin chaired the Bahá’í Bahá’ís to pioneer to other countries delegation to the International Wom- to establish the “pillars” for election of en’s Conference in Mexico City, and the Universal House of Justice—the in 1982, she worked with the Phelps- inspired Elsie Austin decided to pio- Stokes Fund in China, inspecting neer to Morocco. At that time, Moroc- schools, businesses, and community co was still a “virgin territory” as far services affecting education and op- as Bahá’í presence was concerned, so portunities for minorities. In 2000, her relocation to that country earned the University of Cincinnati named a her the title of “Knight of Bahá’u’lláh.” scholarship in her honor. She died of While teaching at the American School congestive heart failure on October of Tangier in Morocco, she helped es- 26, 2004, whereupon the Universal tablish Bahá’í communities in northern House of Justice mandated that pubic and western Africa. Austin was then memorial services for her be held at elected to the National Spiritual As- the Houses of Worship in the United sembly of North West Africa, and, as States and Uganda. a member of that institution, she was a delegate to the international conven- SCHOLARSHIP ON ELSIE AUSTIN tion electing the first Universal House of Justice in 1963. The Bahá’í World, volume 33 (2004– In addition to pioneering interna- 2005), honored Austin’s passing with tionally and serving on national bod- a lengthy “In Memoriam.” Yet, so far ies, Austin served on Local Spiritual as we can determine, no extensive bi- Assemblies in five different countries: ography has been published, nor has the United States, Morocco, Nigeria, any major study of her contribution Kenya, and the Bahamas. She also to the advancement of racial equality served as one of the first members and her immense contribution to the of the Auxiliary Board—established spread of the Bahá’í Faith. One hopes in 1954 to assist Hands of the Cause that some capable writer will under- of God—aiding Hand of the Cause take a comprehensive study of her life Músá Banání. During this time, she and contributions. also wrote Above All Barriers: The Story An article by Austin, titled “Faith, of Louis G. Gregory (1955). Protest, and Progress,” was published In 1958, she was appointed exec- in volume 8, number 2, of The Jour- utive director of the United States nal of Bahá’í Studies and is available in National Women’s Council, and from electronic format on the Association 1960 to 1970, she was a Foreign for Bahá’í Studies website. Service officer, serving as a cultural attaché with the United States Infor- mation Agency in Lagos, Nigeria, and later in Nairobi, Kenya. Austin retired 32 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

VIBURNUM LANTANA

The wayfarer tree

GARY HOGENSEN

Darkness streams into daylight, To breath, passions, carnal dreams, All leading to ultimate loss. Our human tide flows ceaselessly From the valley’s rifts, Down mountains, to deserts, Unwavering to seas. Thus doth the wayfarer go

Leaving behind inception with each step, Conception of body and soul— The one meandering to dust, While uncaged, the other soars To the placeless paradise Where beginnings have no end. 33

Gregory attended Fisk Universi- Louis Gregory ty in Nashville, Tennessee, where he studied English literature. He then JOHN S. HATCHER attended the prestigious Howard University in Washington, D.C., re- ceived his Bachelor of Law degree in 1902, and was subsequently admitted to the Bar. When he began work for the United States Department of the Treasury, he met Thomas H. Gibbs, the first to share with Gregory infor- mation about the Bahá’í Faith. After attending a lecture by Lua Getsinger in 1907, Gregory began rigorously studying the religion. Two years later, he felt confirmed in his beliefs, declared himself a Bahá’í, and dedicated himself to the service of his beloved Faith. He wrote to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, who responded by en- couraging Gregory to achieve major accomplishments in race relations, both within the Bahá’í Faith and in the Louis Gregory was born June 6, American community as a whole. 1874, in Charleston, South Carolina, This is why, in 1910, Gregory the child of former slaves who had stopped working as a lawyer and began gained their freedom during the Civil a long and relentless period of service War. His father died when Gregory to the Bahá’í Faith, holding meetings, was only four years old. At seven, he traveling, lecturing about the need witnessed the lynching of his grand- for race unity, and writing articles on father—a widely respected man in the this same theme. Ironically, he had to community—and this event had a pro- give talks either to African-American found effect on Gregory’s life purpose. audiences or, on other occasions, to During his elementary schooling, gatherings of whites, because at the Gregory attended the first Charleston time, racially integrated assemblage public school that was open to both was against social norms and, in some African-Americans and whites. When places, illegal. he graduated, he received the honor of Eventually, Gregory received giving the graduation speech, which a message from ‘Abdu’l-Bahá en- he titled, “Thou Shalt Not Live for couraging integrated meetings. By Thyself Alone.” then, upper-class white Bahá’ís were 34 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

accustomed to racially integrated With the confluence of all these meetings, something ‘Abdu’l-Bahá events, the following year, 1912, was made clear should be the aim of the an annus mirabilis for this remarkable whole Bahá’í community.1 Not satis- young man. In April, he was elect- fied to teach in one area or one com- ed to the national Bahá’í “executive munity, Gregory initiated a major board”—a precursor of the Nation- lecture tour about the Bahá’í Faith in al Spiritual Assembly— and in this the South, visiting such cities as Rich- position he assisted in organizing mond, Virginia; Durham, North Caro- ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s visit to the United lina; Charleston, South Carolina; and States. During this visit, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá Macon, Georgia. thanked Gregory for his many efforts, It was around this time that and brought about an incident that is Gregory also began to participate long remembered for its symbolism in the budding Bahá’í administrative and social impact. While in Washing- order. In 1911, he was elected to ton, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá attended a reception Washington’s Working Committee held by the Persian chargé d’affaires of the Bahá’í Spiritual Assembly, and the Turkish ambassador. On that the first African-American to serve occasion, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá took it upon in that position. In March of the Himself to move the place-names at same year, Gregory sailed from the large table so that Louis Grego- New York to go on pilgrimage at ry—the only African-American pres- the request of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Whom ent—was seated at the head of the he met in person, together with table, next to Himself. the future Guardian of the Faith, In September of this same year, Shoghi Effendi. It was also during Gregory and Mathew married, be- this pilgrimage that ‘Abdu’l-Bahá coming the first Bahá’í interracial cou- encouraged Gregory and Louisa ple in the United States. During their Mathew, a white Englishwoman who many travels together, they received was also a pilgrim, to get to know a range of vastly different reactions, each other. Their meeting marked the especially since interracial marriage beginning of a blessed relationship was either illegal or unrecognized in destined to shake one of American a majority of states. Nevertheless, by society’s most pernicious prejudices. December 1916, Gregory had traveled 1 For this and other specific ref- to fourteen of the sixteen southern erences, see Gayle Morrison, To Move states, speaking primarily to student the World: Louis G. Gregory and the Ad- audiences—a herculean effort that vancement of Racial Unity in America (US Gregory repeated the following year, Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1982) and Louis when he set off on a second speaking Venters, No Jim Crow Church: The Origins tour. of South Carolina’s Bahá’í Community (Uni- At the end of the First World War, versity Press of Florida, 2015). the Ku Klux Klan’s activities resulted Louis Gregory 35

in an increase in lynchings in South Williams, an African-American Bahá’í Carolina. Despite this danger, Grego- from New York City. ry was determined to be active in the It was during this same period wider community as well. He helped that—inspired by guidance from found chapters of the National Associ- ‘Abdu’l-Bahá—Gregory instigated the ation for the Advancement of Colored first “Race Amity Conference,” which People (NAACP) in South Carolina in was held in May 1921 in Washington, 1918, and many of the initial orga- D.C. The following year, Louis nizers of the NAACP were Gregory’s Gregory became the first African- personal acquaintances. American to be elected to the National After the remaining letters contain- Spiritual Assembly of the United ing ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Tablets of the Divine States and Canada, a body to which he Plan arrived, 2 Gregory was elected to would be successively elected in 1922, a Bahá’í committee focused on prop- 1924, 1927, 1932, 1934, and 1946. agating the Faith in the American In 1924, Gregory toured the South. Gregory decided the best way country for a number of speak- to respond to this mandate was a two- ing engagements, including one in pronged approach. First, he presented which he shared the stage with fel- the teachings of the Bahá’í Faith on low African-American Bahá’í and race to social leaders and to the gen- prominent thinker of the then-de- eral public. Second, he initiated a more veloping Harlem Renaissance, Alain extensive trip that lasted from 1919 LeRoy Locke. In the 1930s, Gregory to 1921, often accompanied by Roy helped start a Bahá’í study class during 2 Tablets of the Divine Plan a brief visit to Atlanta. He then stayed collectively refers to 14 letters (tablets) in Nashville for a time, to respond to written between March 1916 and March inquirers from Fisk University who 1917 by `Abdu’l-Bahá to Bahá’ís in the eventually helped found Nashville’s United States and Canada. Included in first Local Spiritual Assembly. multiple books, the first five tablets were Continuing his efforts and in printed in America in Star of the West - obedient response to Shoghi Effendi’s Vol. VII, No. 10, September 8, 1916, and call for Bahá’ís to fulfill the goals of all the tablets again after World War I ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Tablets of the Divine in Vol. IX, No. 14, November 23, 1918, Plan, Mr. and Mrs. Gregory traveled before being presented again at the Ridván to Haiti in 1934.The couple taught the meeting of 1919. Because of the difficulty Bahá’í Faith to local Haitians, though in communication during World War I, the government of Haiti asked them These tablets were sent incrementally, to leave because of tensions between contained in fourteen letters written and Haiti and the American government. sent between March of 1916 and March Wherever he was needed, Gregory of 1917 by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to Bahá’ís to the went, especially throughout the Amer- United States and Canada. ican South. For example, in 1940, 36 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

when the Atlanta Bahá’í communi- Rising Bahá’í generation in African ty was struggling over integrated continent will glory in his memory meetings, Gregory was among those and emulate his example. Advise hold assigned to resolve the situation. Sim- memorial gathering in Temple in to- ilarly, in early 1942, Gregory spoke at ken recognition of his unique position, several black schools and colleges in outstanding services” (Citadel of Faith West Virginia, in Virginia, and in the 163). Carolinas. He also served on the first Assembly Development Committee, BIBLIOGRAPHY whose goal it was to support the pro- duction of materials for the growth of The research on Louis Gregory is the Bahá’í Faith in South and Central plentiful and rich with moving vi- America. gnettes from the life of this remark- Finally, in 1944 and 1945, Gregory, able soul. Most prominent among now in his seventies, traveled through these works is the substantial biogra- five southern states where articles phy by Gayle Morrison, To Move the about him received public and press World: Louis G. Gregory and the Ad- attention. His talks and work on the vancement of Racial Unity in America Race Amity conventions, organized by (US Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1982). Bahá’ís, would appear in a variety of More recently, Janet Ruhe-Schoen has newspapers. published a fine description of Grego- In December 1948, Louis Grego- ry’s teaching work titled Champions of ry suffered a stroke. Louisa’s health Oneness: Louis Gregory and His Shining was also in decline, so they stayed at Circle (US Bahá’í Publishing Trust, their home on the grounds of Green 2015). Finally, as cited above, there is Acre Bahá’í School in Eliot, Maine. It significant discussion of Gregory’s was there that Gregory died, at age work in South Carolina in Louis Ven- seventy-seven, on July 30, 1951. On ters’ history No Jim Crow Church: The August 6, 1951, Shoghi Effendi sent Origins of South Carolina’s Bahá’í Com- the following cable to the American munity (University Press of Florida, Bahá’í community: “Profoundly de- 2015). plore grievous loss of dearly beloved, noble-minded, golden-hearted Louis Gregory, pride and example to the Negro adherents of the Faith. Keenly feel loss of one so loved, admired and trusted by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá.” In this same message, he adorned Gregory with the posthumous mantle of “Hand of the Cause of God”: “Deserves rank of first Hand of the Cause of his race. 37

dixième session annuelle de l’Institut des Alain Locke’s relations internationales, en 1944. Il fait valoir que Locke a articulé un message “Moral en trois volets: 1) le racisme, bien qu’il Imperatives for s’agisse d’un enjeu américain, n’est pas un problème propre à ce pays; 2) le racisme World Order” a des conséquences bilatérales et multi- latérales (notamment économiques) au Revisited niveau international, et 3) trois « impéra- tifs moraux » — promouvoir l’unité des races, des religions et des nations, tant aux CHRISTOPHER BUCK niveaux local que mondial — sont des ob- jectifs primordiaux dans la recherche de la paix mondiale. Abstract History offers a review of past events in a Resumen quest for contemporary relevance, where La historia ofrece una revisión de eventos hindsight can serve as a source of insight pasados en una búsqueda por la relevan- into present-day social paradoxes and di- cia contemporánea, donde la comprensión lemmas. The present essay revisits three retrospectiva puede servir como una fuen- public speeches by distinguished Bahá’í te de percepción de paradojas sociales y philosopher, Alain Locke, presented at dilemas del presente día. Este ensayo revi- the Institute of International Relations’ sa tres charlas públicas por el distinguido Tenth Annual Session in 1944, and argues filosofo bahá’í, Alain Locke, presentadas that he articulated a three-part message: en la Décima Sesión Anual del Instituto (1) racism, although an American prob- de Relaciones Internacionales en 1944, lem, is not purely a domestic issue; (2) y argumenta que él articuló un mensa- racism has bilateral and multilateral con- je con tres partes: (1) el racismo, aunque sequences (especially economic) in the in- un problema Americano, no es puramente ternational context; and (3) three “moral un asunto doméstico; (2) el racismo tiene imperatives”—of promoting the unity of consecuencias bilaterales y multilaterales races, religions, and nations, both locally (especialmente económicas) en el contexto and globally—are primary objectives in internacional; y (3) tres “imperativos mo- the quest for world peace. rales”—de promocionar la unidad de las razas, las religiones y las naciones, tanto Résumé local y globalmente—son objetivos pri- L’histoire permet de revoir des événe- marios en la búsqueda de la paz mundial. ments du passé dans une quête de perti- nence pour aujourd’hui, une rétrospective pouvant alors être une source de com- préhension de paradoxes et dilemmes Winner of the National Book Award sociaux actuels. Cet essai reprend trois 2018 for Nonfiction and of the discours publics prononcés par l’éminent 2019 Pulitzer Prize in the biography philosophe bahá’í Alain Locke lors de la category, The New Negro: The Life of 38 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

Alain Locke, is sure to rekindle schol- Martin Luther King, Jr.” (Harris and arly and popular interest in Alain Le- Molesworth 1). Dr. King himself, at roy Locke (1885–1954). The author, the Poor People’s Campaign Rally in Jeffrey C. Stewart—professor of Black Clarksdale, Mississippi, on March 19, Studies at the University of Califor- 1968, declared: “We’re going to let nia, Santa Barbara—asserts: our children know that the only philo- sophers that lived were not Plato and Locke’s vision remains a curious Aristotle, but W.E.B. Du Bois and Alain blend of pragmatism (“psalms Locke came through the universe” (7). will be more effective than ser- Alain Locke was a public figure of mons”) in converting the heart some stature and consequence who is of the oppressor to empathize once again—or still—influencing the with the oppressed, religious discourse on race. consciousness (a blend of Chris- To his credit, however, Professor tianity and his Bahá’í faith), mild Harris has been vocal about, and ap- Afrocentrism (a return to an Af- preciative of, Alain Locke’s Bahá’í rican past as a non-Western basis identity, both in public lectures as well of a Black modernism), and phil- as in print. For instance, he includes osophical idealism. (542) two of Alain Locke’s essays originally contributed to the Bahá’í World vol- Interestingly, “Stewart downplays umes,1 whereas Charles Molesworth’s Locke’s involvement with the Bahá’í anthology of Locke’s oeuvre is bereft Faith, giving it only a few paragraphs of any mention whatsoever of his of attention in a 944-page book” Bahá’í essays. The present writer has (Smith). Such short-shrift given to tried to fill this void in Locke schol- Locke’s Bahá’í identity and discourses arship, yet the Bahá’í dimension of is part of an ongoing reluctance on Locke’s life and thought remain mar- the part of many Locke scholars to ad- ginalized and undervalued. Therefore, equately acknowledge, accept, address, throughout the remarks and analysis and integrate the Bahá’í dimension of that follow, occasional references to Locke’s life and thought. Locke’s Bahá’í context will be offered Stewart’s cursory treatment of the as an added dimension in an overarch- Bahá’í dimension of Locke’s life and ing framework of analysis. thought is similar to that of Locke’s Locke’s framing of the American biography by Leonard Harris and racial crisis—and the wide range of Charles Molesworth (although not problems that racism precipitates and to the same degree), who rightly perpetuates—is still relevant today, as distinguish Locke’s historical sig- such problems have not been resolved nificance overall as “the most influ- and persist, albeit in reconfigured ways. ential African American intellectual When the Institute of International born between W.E.B. Du Bois and 1 See Works Cited, infra Alain Locke’s “Moral Imperatives for World Order” Revisited 39

Relations held its Tenth Annual Ses- edited volume, The Philosophy of Alain sion from June 18–28, 1944, in Oak- Locke: Harlem Renaissance and Beyond. land, California , World War II had set At this prestigious event, which the world aflame, and the conflagra- attracted elites from the world over, tion was still raging. World peace was Locke’s series of presentations appear but a dream, and seemed as elusive as to have been well-planned and execut- ever. Thinkers, academics, educators, ed. After all, this was a golden opportu- and others concerned with this issue nity to convey a key social message, by would meet, from time to time, in ad way of formal public discourse, to this hoc, confabulatory “think tanks,” to ex- assemblage of prominent individuals amine possible ways of bringing about and leaders of thought. In so doing, a lasting global peace. Locke presented a three-part message, This conference was one such to wit: (1) racism, although an Amer- event—a place to confer—yet it ican problem, is not purely a domes- achieved no definitive consensus or tic issue; (2) racism has bilateral and notable outcome. Although high-pro- multilateral consequences in the inter- file back then, the Institute of Inter- national context; and (3) three “moral national Relations’ “Tenth Annual imperatives”—of promoting the unity Session” is now a mere footnote in of races, religions, and nations, both history. So why is it valuable to revisit locally and globally—are primary ob- this event today? Because the message jectives in the quest for world peace. of one of its outstanding presenters— Not only does Locke present racism Bahá’í philosopher Alain Locke—is as as an American problem domestically, relevant as ever. but as an issue with global ramifica- Over the course of two days (June tions. Doubtlessly influenced by his 20–21), Alain Locke presented three beliefs as a Bahá’í, Locke contends papers: “Race: American Paradox that establishing world peace is con- and Dilemma;” “Race in the Present tingent on race unity by eliminating World Crisis;” and “Moral Impera- racial prejudice and the establishment tives for World Order.” Summaries of of race unity, interracial harmony (i.e. these three papers were published in a ideal race relations) goes beyond erad- proceedings volume.2 “Moral Impera- icating prejudice, which is only the tives for World Order,” however, was first step. reprinted by Leonard Harris in his Little is known about the specific 2 Summary of Proceedings: Institute circumstances that drew Locke to this of International Relations, Mills College, conference; presumably he was invited Oakland, California, June 18 to 28, 1944. as a guest speaker. No doubt he en- (Courtesy of Janice Braun, Library Direc- joyed lecturing on topics that he con- tor & Special Collections Librarian Mil- sidered important. As a public intellec- haud Archivist, and Director, Center for tual—and particularly as a prominent the Book, Mills College, October 1, 2018.) “race man” (a common catchphrase at 40 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

the time) or spokesperson for African “Alain Locke’s Philosophy” 30–41)— Americans—Locke took every oppor- to which other forms of democracy tunity to promote minority rights, may be added, such as “Intellectual especially those of the oppressed “Ne- Democracy.”4 By expanding, even gro” race. While he pursued a lifelong universalizing, the concept of democ- interest and vocation in promoting racy, Alain Locke adroitly linked race African American art as a cultural am- relations and minority rights with bassador of what was called the “New America’s professed ideals of equality. Negro Movement,” whose mission it He, moreover, forged dynamic connec- was to eradicate negative racial stereo- tions between racial, social, and world types,3 Alain Locke spoke far and wide democracy. on these issues of the widest social So it comes as no surprise that concern—issues that were (and still Locke’s three conference presentations are) both domestic and international were equally interconnected and ex- in scope. pansive. The Institute operated under Locke can be credited with inter- the auspices of the American Friends nationalizing the race “problem”—re- Service Committee (a Quaker orga- framing it as not simply a domestic nization) and the Oakland Institute issue, but one with repercussions in of International Relations committee the international arena—and strate- as well. Although these conferences gically connecting it with the issue of were annual events, the 1944 session democracy. His recasting of the race is the only one that Locke himself is issue was a key strategy, inasmuch as known to have attended and present- America has always seen itself as a ed at (“Institute of International Re- champion for democracy. In appealing lations Holds 10th Meeting”). Alain to democracy, Locke sought to broad- Locke was one of nineteen featured en its definition and scope, in order to speakers—listed as “The Faculty”— more fully democratize democracy and with short biographical notices. The “Americanize Americans,” as Locke impressive credentials of Locke are wrote (Buck, Alain Locke 239). In so stated as follows: doing, he developed a complex theory of democracy with at least nine dimen- Professor of Philosophy at sions: (1) Local; (2) Moral; (3) Politi- Howard University, vice-president cal; (4) Economic; (5) Cultural (Carter Association of Adult Education, 117–19); (6) Racial; (7) Social; (8) Spir- 1934–36; president editor “Plays itual; and (9) World Democracy (Buck, of Negro Life”; co-editor “When 3 For a more detailed treatment, 4 Personal communication, Janice please refer to my article, “New Negro Braun, Library Director & Special Col- Movement” in the Encyclopedia of African lections Librarian Milhaud Archivist, and American History, edited by Leslie Alexan- Director, Center for the Book, Mills Col- der and Walter Rucker. lege, October 2, 2018. Alain Locke’s “Moral Imperatives for World Order” Revisited 41

Peoples Meet”; Rhodes Scholar at available as to how many copies were Oxford 1907–10; Ph.D. Harvard actually published. University 1918; member: An- Of Alain Locke’s three lectures, thropological Society, Ethnolog- “Moral Imperatives for World Or- ical Society, Negro Academy, Phi der” was subsequently republished by Beta Kappa, Academie des Sci- Temple University Press (Philosophy ences Coloniales, Negro Society of Alain Locke 151–52) and then again for Historical Research. (“Final by Oxford University Press (Works Program”) of Alain Locke 555–56). The latter volume, however, does not credit the On the morning of Tuesday, June source. Locke’s two other lectures are 20, Alain Locke presented his formal published here for the very first time, lecture, “Race: American Paradox and courtesy of Mills College.5 As for the Dilemma.” Locke’s other two pre- Proceedings volume itself, this appears sentations were featured as “Evening to have been printed from a typescript, Lectures” (“Final Program”). No in- rather than a typeset original, indicat- formation is available on how many ing that this proceedings volume was attended. According to the conference more of a souvenir than an academic brochure (“Final Program”), there publication for wide distribution. The were twelve “Round Table” sessions editors of this volume were Clarice as well, in addition to the individu- Hubert and Cynthia Reynolds. Tom al presentations. This session of the Hunt, Executive Secretary of the lo- Institute of International Relations cal “Institute Committee” in Oakland, should be seen within its American contributed the one-page “Preface.” historical context. The year 1944, Hunt states, in part: when World War II was raging in full force, was also part of the “Jim Crow” In presenting this report of the era of legally enforced segregation in proceedings of the 10th annual the United States. So this prestigious Institute of International Rela- event was all the more significant for tions, we must again apologize publicly featuring a “Negro” speaker. for the extended delay in its Boldly announcing its special guest appearance. speaker, Alain Locke’s photograph Each lecture and Roundta- appeared in the Institute’s brochure ble report, with a few excep- (“Final Program”). tions, has been read, corrected, Whether as abstracts or complete 5 Permission granted, courtesy of texts, the conference presentations Mills College. (Courtesy of Janice Braun, were published in a Summary of Pro- Library Director & Special Collections Li- ceedings. This slender volume appears brarian Milhaud Archivist, and Director, to have been privately published by Center for the Book, Mills College, Octo- Mills College, but no information is ber 12, 2018.) 42 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

and approved by the lecturer or 314, 381), the truth of the matter is roundtable leader concerned. Ed- that Locke was fully engaged with itorial form and exact choice of the pressing issues of his day and words, however, remain an Insti- age. Locke’s talks themselves appear tute responsibility. . . . to have had a certain logical order The Institute hereby express- and progression. The first one, “Race: es formal thanks to the editors, American Paradox and Dilemma” note-takers, typists, and proof- (Summary 9–10), presents the domes- readers, many of whom volun- tic problem in America itself. “Race in teered long hours to make the the Present World Crisis” (Summary Summary possible. (Hunt) 13–15) expands the issue, extending the ramifications of racism to the lev- Additional copies of the Summa- el of international relations and trade, ry of Proceedings were offered for sale thereby adding an economic dimension (Hunt). This Proceedings volume is and incentive for the resolution of this a primary source of information for problem. The last, “Moral Imperatives what took place within the Tenth An- For World Order” (Summary 19–20) nual Session itself, including Locke’s offers solutions at the level of prin- three presentations. ciple. What follows are descriptions, In “Race: American Paradox and with highlights, of each of Locke’s Dilemma,” Alain Locke was the sole three presentations. speaker in the venue. That evening, for “Race in the Present World Crisis,” Alain Locke’s lecture was followed by “RACE: AMERICAN PARADOX Ernest Price’s. For his Wednesday eve- AND DILEMMA” ning lecture, the title, “Moral Impera- tives for World Order,” was shared by In this lecture, Alain Locke describes four presenters: Alain Locke, Leslie the problem of racism in America as Schaefer, Rabbi William Stern, and a “paradox,” a polite euphemism for Harry Silcock (Summary 19–22). what really was a flagrant contradic- Alain Locke’s three lectures (as pre- tion between professed American ide- sented in summary form in Proceed- als and lived social reality, which was ings) were not his most rhetorically a far cry from fulfilling those ideals. In eloquent, but they were nonetheless developing a stark contrast between directly representative of Locke’s es- social precept and practice—mapping sential message to America and the the considerable social distance be- world. Locke was a significant public tween the ideal and the real—Locke figure who had something meaning- represents the problem of racism as ful to say. He was a deep thinker. Al- a national issue for America at large, though, by some accounts, he appeared not simply a regional problem intrin- to be somewhat aloof (Stewart 301, sic to the American South. He uses the Alain Locke’s “Moral Imperatives for World Order” Revisited 43 metaphor of a “growing cancer” that American soldiers abroad had seen has “spread to all parts of the coun- the world, fought together, protected try.” This cancer of racism has metas- each other, and eventually achieved tasized and threatens the body politic an internationally and socially signif- of America. Characterizing racism as icant victory when World War II end- a “cancer” draws attention to the ur- ed. Locke knew that America would gency of the problem at hand. Racism never be the same after the war was contradicts the fundamental American over. Even though slow to come, such value of “equality” and is, therefore, a change was inevitable. At home, he threat to American society. notes the array of “certain conces- Alain Locke speaks directly to his sionary steps in improved race rela- audience in “California and on the tions”—“changes” that were “made West Coast” in declaring that the mainly the interest of the war.” problem of racial and ethnic prejudice Looking ahead, Alain Locke pre- affects “Orientals as well as Jews and dicts that if the problem of racial others” and is a social crisis of “in- prejudice is not solved, or at least creasing force” in that part of Ameri- significantly mitigated, then America ca. This is a “major national issue both “will have the race problem intensified morally and socially.” In other words, not only nationally but with an inter- the problem is both individual and na- national spotlight upon it.” In other tional, not just regional in nature. words, the whole world will be watch- In 1944, American forces abroad, ing America—and its reputation will fighting in World War II, represented be tarnished in the arena of interna- a cross-section of the country’s demo- tional opinion unless and until Amer- graphics, including “black and white, ica resolves its longstanding racial Jew and Gentile,” which is to say vir- crisis. Thus the racial problem no lon- tually all Americans. Seeing necessi- ger stands in splendid isolation. Locke ty as the mother of social progress, represents African Americans as not Locke anticipates a significant social only “the largest minority group,” but change after the war effort is over. also the “oldest minority in terms of “Millions of young men” will return, residence.” It would appear that in he declares, and this signal demo- consideration of his audience and graphic fact is expected to have a great of the topic at hand, Locke chose, impact on American society. It is well on this occasion, to disregard the known that the experience of travel pre-Columbian Indigenous peoples abroad often broadens the outlook of who are the original inhabitants of the traveler, as Mark Twain famous- the Americas, decimated to minority ly said: “Travel is fatal to prejudice, status due to colonialism. bigotry and narrow-mindedness, and Throughout this lecture, Locke uses many of our people need it sorely on the words “paradox,” “dilemma,” and these accounts” (Twain 650). “problem” more or less synonymously. 44 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

A problem obviously demands a solu- That evening, Locke did, in fact, tion. After framing the problem, the talk about the problem of race riots solution that Locke offers is primarily in America. He referred to the Detroit social in nature, recognizing the lim- Race Riot of 1943—exactly one year itations of legislation: “The solution earlier, June 20–21, 1943—when two needs more than an even-handed en- days of rioting by both blacks and forcement of the Constitution. There whites left thirty-four dead (twen- must be added equality and economic ty-five African Americans and nine opportunity; the White [sic] popula- whites), and nearly 700 injured, wreak- tion must experience changed atti- ing such havoc as to cause an estimated tudes and practices which are outside two million dollars-worth of damages the Constitutional provisions set up in property destroyed or looted, before for equality.” In other words, in order federal troops—some 6,000 service- to effect social reform, “public opinion” men, in tanks, armed with automatic must be seen as a key social dynamic, weapons—were called to the scene to and therefore must be addressed. restore order (Capeci, Jr., and Wilker- When Alain Locke talks about son 16). Locke matter-of-factly declares: the “education of public opinion,” he “It took less than forty-eight hours for knows full well that he is speaking to news of race riots in Detroit to reach influential educators who, if persuaded the radios of the enemy.” The Detroit by his message, can then do their part race riots not only shocked Ameri- in progressively informing the Amer- ca, but drew international attention, ican public of both the racial problem including condemnation in the form and its solution, and of the necessity of anti-American propaganda. Locke to go beyond the status quo, which will could just as readily have also cited not foreseeably remain the same, but the Los Angeles “Zoot Suit Riots” that will only get worse if the situation is broke out in Los Angeles, California, not proactively improved. This moral on June 3, 1943 (Chiodo 1–14), nearly imperative is also a social imperative. a year prior to Locke’s talk, which per- Without saying so explicitly, Alain haps may have been more vivid in the Locke appears to be telling his audi- minds of his largely Californian audi- ence that the present racial crisis, if it ence. Locke’s audience was left with a persists and remains unchecked, will clear sense of the problem, but with eventually lead to “bloody” outcomes, no stated solution, except that the unless counter-measures are taken— measures to be taken needed to affect that is, “if strife is to be averted” and social change beyond legislation itself, “conflict” avoided. It is almost as if he which is of limited effect. is predicting what is foreseeable, if not This necessity is illustrated by the inevitable—outbreaks of race riots, in fact that Locke lived to see the land- which the streets of American cities mark Supreme Court decision, Brown would run with blood. v. Board of Education (decided May Alain Locke’s “Moral Imperatives for World Order” Revisited 45

17, 1954), shortly before his death on morning session. In this lecture, Alain June 9, 1954. Brown v. Board of Edu- Locke turns his audience’s attention cation was limited in scope, in that it to the global situation in his opening only struck down school segregation; statement: it did not end the wider problem of racial segregation and its inherent in- There is no panacea or worldwide equality. While the Civil Rights Bill of solution for the American race 1964 did fill some of the gaps in public problem. But whatever solutions accommodations, yet interracial mar- we can make will undoubtedly riage was not guaranteed as a right contribute to the further integra- until 1967 and housing discrimination tion of the nations of the world, remained legal until 1968—with con- will tend to make us world citi- sequences that affect the present day. zens, or in other words, brothers, So Brown v. Board of Education was a in addition to making our democ- beginning, not an ending, in the ongo- racy more consistent and effec- ing—and seemingly never-ending— tive. (Summary 13) quest for racial equality in America. What Locke told his audience Clearly, Locke does not mean to was all too true: Federal anti- imply that no solutions exist. It is for discrimination laws, such as the Civil this reason that Locke speaks of “solu- Rights Act of 1964, can only go so far. tions” in the plural, and reminds his Laws, at most, may have some effect audience: “In this hemisphere slavery in prohibiting and/or redressing came first, and then followed labor instances of actionable racial slavery.” Locke cites one instance, the discrimination. But for the prevalence “bracero” question, which was news- of racism in American society, such worthy at that time (although he does laws would theoretically not have not use this specific term). been necessary in the first place. Yet, Braceros were legally contracted such laws, though stopgap measures Mexican seasonal laborers, or migrant at best, were slow in coming. Laws do workers, who crossed the US-Mexico not change hearts. Legislation alone, border to work in Texas—primarily cannot bring about the sea-change on farms and railroads—and in other necessary to eradicate the “cancer” of Southwestern border states as well. racism in American society. That was In these states, exploitatively low Alain Locke’s message back then—and wages and deplorably poor working is his message today. conditions were the norm, rather than the exception. During World War “RACE IN THE PRESENT WORLD CRISIS” II—and under pressure by Mexico, seeking better treatment for its cit- The evening session, in a themat- izens—efforts to regulate the influx ic sense, was a continuation of the and employment of braceros led to 46 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

bilateral agreements that permitted cotton ones; they had no first-aid migrant workers to be employed in kits; they had inadequate bathing the United States on a contract basis. facilities, inadequate sanitation, Despite its ups and downs, the bilat- and overcrowded conditions; and eral U.S.-Mexico Bracero Program they were charged one dollar ev- lasted from 1942 to 1964. ery two weeks for lodgings, which Locke was keenly aware of discrimi- the employer refused to show on nation suffered by the braceros, and al- the payroll slips. (59; see also luded to their plight to prove his point Guglielmo 1212–37) that racism entailed serious ramifica- tions for international relations, espe- These charges were brought before cially US–Mexico relations, in which the Texas Good Neighbor Commis- prejudice had immediate economic sion. With this background in mind, and political consequences, triggering this is what Locke had to say about the a diplomatic crisis that had to be re- bracero question generally: solved, however imperfectly. To char- acterize the problem that Locke was Such international pressure can referring to, historian Johnny McCain and will come. Texas and the summarizes a note, dated September 8, Southwestern states have set their 1943, submitted by the Mexican For- behavior on the most reactionary eign Office to the American Embassy, of Southern racial practices in outlining major grievances by brace- their handling of the Mexicans ros employed by the Texas and Pacific who come across the border to Railway at Monahans and at Midland, do seasonal work. The Mexican Texas. In McCain’s words: government took this as an insult, and is, today, insisting that unless The braceros in question com- better treatment be given to the plained bitterly of discrimination. Mexican laborers by the states They contended that they were and assurance given through the denied entrance to public places State Department that they be of entertainment, were not per- decently received, that they will mitted to sit at tables in refresh- not be allowed to come across the ment parlors or to purchase items borders. (Summary 14) there except by using the service entrance, and could not patronize By internationalizing the problem barbershops or other places of of racism, Alain Locke could persuade service except in areas almost in- his audience that eliminating prejudice accessible to them. On the matter in favor of practicing equality not of unequal treatment, they com- only was the way to resolve the Amer- plained that they had straw mat- ican “paradox” mentioned earlier, but tresses while the Americans had was also a necessary step in bolstering Alain Locke’s “Moral Imperatives for World Order” Revisited 47

America’s declining “moral authority” I have come to have a profound in terms of “social democracy.” As admiration for brothers and sis- Professor Guy Mount has observed, ters of the Bahá’í Faith. I’ve ac- “Locke’s reference to Russia’s social tually met Dizzy Gillespie and he, policy, which he characterized as a of course, one of the great artists ‘clearer moral appeal in the matter of of the 20th century, was of Bahá’í her policies and practices of race,’ was Faith, and talked over and over a telling observation.” Mount further again about what it meant to him. notes: Alain Locke, of course, probably one of the greatest philosophic Locke clearly saw “labor slavery” minds of the middle part of the as having replaced chattel slavery 20th century, was also of Bahá’í as the ideal means of production Faith, the first Black Rhodes for the American capitalist class. scholar and chairman of the Locke’s observation was uncan- philosophy department at How- ny and largely true to fact: at ard University, for over 42 years. that time in history, the Soviet What I’ve always been taken by is Union did have a “clearer moral the very genuine universalism of appeal in the matter of her poli- the Bahá’í Faith, one of the first cies and practices of race” when religious groups to really hit rac- compared to the United States, by ism and white supremacy head on, any objective standard. The Le- decades ago. By decades, I mean ninist party line on race, in fact, many decades ago and remain attracted many African American consistent about it. … intellectuals, including Locke, to When you think about it, I socialism in general and to the mean, Bahá’í was integrated before Communist Party’s social plat- the YMCA and the YWCA . . . , form in particular, and was a pri- even prior to the Community Par- mary reason why so many people ty, which is the first secular insti- of color around the world were tution to integrate with blacks and drawn to communism and formed whites and reds. . . . revolutionary anti-colonial strug- When you talk about race and gles along these lines. (Mount) the legacy of white supremacy, there’s no doubt that when the That is why the Bahá’í emphasis on history is written, the true histo- promoting racial equality and harmo- ry is written, the history of this nious race relations was so progres- country, the Bahá’í Faith will be sive, as Professor Cornel West has one of the leaven in the American publicly stated: loaf that allowed the democrat- ic loaf to expand because of the anti-racist witness of those of 48 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

Bahá’í Faith. So that there is a real extremely important to Locke. After sense in which a Christian like all, his 1918 Harvard dissertation was myself is profoundly humbled focused on the philosophy of values. before Bahá’í brothers and sisters As an instance of this social evo- and the Dizzy Gillespies and the lution in the religious context, Locke Alain Lockes and so forth.” (West) offers an example from the Bible. His reference to human sacrifice (“report- Having framed America’s racial cri- ed Biblically when sacrifice to God sis not only as regional, but national meant the sacrifice of a human being”) and international in scope, Locke then probably harks back to Exodus: “And proposes some solutions in his third the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, and final presentation. “Sanctify unto me all the firstborn, whatsoever openeth the womb among the children of Israel, both of man “MORAL IMPERATIVES and of beast: it is mine” (13:1). Alain FOR WORLD ORDER” Locke’s subsequent reference to the substitution of an animal for the first- Throughout his three lectures, Locke born son probably has in mind Exodus consistently refers to World War II 13:13, in which a father could “redeem” as “today’s world crisis.” In the open- his “firstborn” son by substituting an ing paragraph of his third lecture, he animal in the son’s stead. However, implies a dynamic linkage between the parallel commandment in Exodus ”universal human brotherhood” and 22:29 provides for no animal substitu- world peace, based upon the widest tion whatsoever: “Thou shalt not delay possible “loyalty.” Loyalty, in fact, is to offer the first of thy ripe fruits, and one of Alain Locke’s most important of thy liquors: the firstborn of thy social and philosophical terms of ref- sons shalt thou give unto me.” erence. In this lecture, Locke speaks The “next stage” of the Jewish prac- of three “corporate” ideas and entities: tice and understanding of the mean- the nation, race, and religion (which ing of sacrifice, according to Locke, Locke refers to as “sect”). On national- was “an offering of a pure and contrite ism, taken to its extreme, Alain Locke heart,” a reference to the biblical pas- comments: “Nationality now means sage: “For thou desirest not sacrifice; irresponsible national sovereignty.” else would I give it: thou delightest Indeed, the “politically expansive na- not in burnt offering. The sacrifices of tion,” as Locke puts it, was one of the God are a broken spirit: a broken and major causes of World War II. a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not Alain Locke then speaks of social despise” (Psalm 51:16–17). It would evolution, which he describes as a seem that Locke used the analogy of “process of evolution by progressive religious evolution as a metaphor for enlargement of values.” Values were social evolution, more broadly. Alain Locke’s “Moral Imperatives for World Order” Revisited 49

True to his earlier thinking, Locke Here, Alain Locke’s professed redefines race, “not in the fascist, Bahá’í ideals are in evidence, although blood-clan sense,” but as “a common indirectly so. At this time in American culture and brotherhood.” He then history, while the world was still in the states: “Cultural superiority of one throes of a global conflagration, it was race is only an expression of arbitrary probably not expedient to directly cite loyalty to that which is our own. Con- the relevant Bahá’í principles and cor- fraternity of culture will have to be responding Bahá’í scriptures. In my put forward as what race can mean, previous works, I have suggested that and [as] an ideal of the parity of rac- there is a certain synergy between es and cultures.” Here, the word “pari- Locke’s faith and his philosophy (Buck, ty” is another favorite term frequently Alain Locke: Faith and Philosophy 2 and found in Locke’s essays and speeches, passim). Such synergy may also be by which he meant equality, eliminat- in evidence here, and will be further ing evaluations of inferior or superior demonstrated later in this paper. status. Returning to his religious refer- PUBLICITY ences, Locke then takes Christianity to task for paradoxically professing On Sunday, June 18, 1944, the Oakland the inclusivist doctrine of “the father- Tribune published an article announc- hood of God and the brotherhood of ing the event, “Decisions Now Shape man,” while insisting on an exclusivist Peace Theme of Lecture Series,” doctrine that holds that “only one true which states, in part: way of salvation with all other ways leading to damnation.” This shows “Race in the Present World Crisis” Locke to be a religious universalist, as is the topic for the opening lecture well as a cultural pluralist, cosmopoli- tomorrow evening at 8 o’clock tan and internationalist—all of which when Alain Locke, professor of were perfectly consonant and resonant philosophy at Howard Univer- with his Bahá’í identity. Locke famous- sity in Washington D.C., will be ly concludes: “The moral imperatives the speaker. Poet, Rhodes scholar of a new world order are an inter- at Oxford and a Ph.D. from Har- nationally limited idea of national vard, Dr. Locke is also co-editor sovereignty, a non-monopolistic and of “When Peoples Meet.” (38) culturally tolerant concept of race and religious loyalties freed of sec- On Wednesday, June 21, 1944, Nan- tarian bigotry.” This statement is as cy Barr Mavity, a reporter for the same profound as it is formulaic—operating newspaper, quoted Locke in her story, as a categorical imperative, global in “Relocation Japs Split on U.S. Loyalty, scope, universal in its humanity, and Official Says.” She writes: socially progressive in nature. 50 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

RACIAL DILEMMA to be a much more sophisticated the- Alain Locke, professor of phi- orist who saw racism as a set of in- losophy at Howard University, stitutions and state-based practices presented the problem of racial rooted in a deep set of global histor- minorities as at once “the paradox ical processes, and not as fundamen- and the dilemma of America.” tally a problem of the heart.” Mount “The paradox of America is concludes that Locke, “saw racism as that we profess the democratic multifaceted (and thus inclusive of equality of men, which in practice personal biases) yet rooted, first and we flagrantly deny,” he said. “The foremost, in deep structural problems problem is no longer sectional, that, as he points out, are beyond the intensified by wartime shifts in bounds of the Constitution to correct population with accompanying and remedy. Locke is not simply talking changed group relationships. about changing hearts, but changing “The war, it is true, has also the very structures of society that brought certain concessions, such were protected by the Constitution.” as enlarged employment oppor- tunities for Negroes, increased CONCLUSION unionization, and advanced tech- nical training and education. But These three speeches represent Locke no thinking Negro can feel secure at a critical moment in American and that these concessions will be world history and in his own intellec- permanent. tual development. In “Race: American “Unless racial equality is recog- Paradox and Dilemma,” Locke speaks nized as basis [sic: basic] and im- not only of “true democracy,” but of portant in post-war planning, the “equality and economic opportuni- [race] problem will be intensified ty”—something he elsewhere refers not only nationally but with an in- to as “economic democracy” (Buck, ternational spotlight upon it.” “Alain Locke’s Philosophy” 34–35). This evening’s program on Here, Locke’s notions of economic “Moral Imperatives for a World opportunity and economic democracy Order” will include as speakers, (leading, in due course, to equality) in addition to Shaffer, Prof. James contemplate actual democracy in the Muilenberg of the Pacific School workplace: “Locke argues that the of Religion and Prof. Alain Locke economy should be run democratical- at Howard University. (12) ly—and not dominated and dictated by those endowed with capital” (Mount). Locke did not view racism primarily In “Race in the Present World Crisis,” as a set of individualized personal fail- Locke speaks more definitively of ings caused by ignorant thoughts. As democracy in three dimensions—ra- Mount notes, “Locke showed himself cial, social, and world democracy. In Alain Locke’s “Moral Imperatives for World Order” Revisited 51

“Moral Imperatives for World Order,” There is no doubt that Locke’s “moral Locke also advocates “moral and spiri- imperatives for world order” are still tual brotherhood,” which he elsewhere relevant today. characterizes as “moral democracy” In a most useful overview of and as “spiritual democracy.” For Locke’s contribution at this confer- Locke, “democracy” is basically synon- ence, Professor Derik Smith affirms, ymous with such terms as “equality,” “Perhaps most noteworthy are Locke’s “parity,” and “reciprocity.” keen efforts to internationalize domes- Alain Locke was a leading African- tic race issues of the United States. American “race man,” as well as a Locke’s impulse to speak about race in champion of American democracy, transnational terms—amplified by the and a “world citizen” above and venue of his presentation—represents beyond all else. His cosmopolitan a significant contrast to mainstream outlook is not so lofty an ideal as to contemporary race discourse in the be remote and inert, but is grounded United States, especially as it pertains in practical realism. His immediate to African Americans” (Smith). Revis- attention is focused on the problem of iting Locke’s three presentations at the race, which was then—and is now— Institute of International Relations’ the most pressing issue at hand. At conference will repay the effort, as his the same time, Alain Locke operates message remains as relevant to social on higher intellectual levels without discourse as ever. losing touch with what was happening Alain Locke discovered the Bahá’í “on the ground.” In his three Faith, which he joined in 1918, because speeches, taken together, presented its principles validated all that he stood at the Institute of International for. Locke had been a Rhodes Scholar Relations’ Tenth Annual Session at the University of Oxford between that took place at Mills College in 1907–1910, where he was an active Oakland, California (18–28 June member of the Oxford Cosmopolitan 1944), Alain Locke pragmatically Club. Understandably, the Bahá’í prin- proposes that any real solution to ciples regarding racial equality and the racial crisis implicates three universalism crystallized what Locke “moral imperatives”—promoting had already come to realize in his own the unity of races, religions, and thinking. This dynamic interplay be- nations—which are prerequisite tween his personal perspectives and objectives in the quest for world his discovery of the Bahá’í teachings peace. These three moral imperatives, brought forth a synergy that con- if faithfully and effectively pursued, firmed, nurtured, and sustained his can achieve a significant degree of personal philosophical and public aca- social transformation, both locally demic endeavors henceforth. and globally, by advancing the unity of races, religions, and nations. 52 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

APPENDIX I individual peoples and nations.. . . It constitutes a challenge, at SYNERGY BETWEEN LOCKE’S FAITH once bold and universal, to out- AND PHILOSOPHY worn shibboleths of national creeds—creeds that have had The synergy between Locke’s faith their day and which must, in the and philosophy becomes apparent after ordinary course of events as a close comparison between Locke’s shaped and controlled by Provi- public discourse and the Bahá’í texts dence, give way to a new gospel, themselves, as the following parallels fundamentally different from, and between Alain Locke’s “Moral Imper- infinitely superior to, what the atives for World Order” (1944) and world has already conceived. . . . open letters by Shoghi Effendi, com- It represents the consumma- piled in The World Order of Bahá’u’lláh tion of human evolution—an (1938), amply illustrate: evolution that has had its earliest beginnings in the birth of family Realism and idealism should be life, its subsequent development combined in striking [sic: striv- in the achievement of tribal soli- ing] for a World Order. Skeletal darity, leading in turn to the con- ideals of universal human broth- stitution of the city-state, and ex- erhood have been in the world for panding later into the institution a long time and we are further of independent and sovereign from tribal savagery and its trib- nations. (Shoghi Effendi 42–43) alisms because of these ideals. But they are but partial expressions Both Alain Locke and Shoghi Ef- of what we hope to make them fendi demonstrate that time-honored mean and what today’s world cri- ideas and ideals of human oneness sis demands. (Locke 19) have a long history. We began as trib- al in origin, national in evolution, and The principle of the Oneness of global in nature, leading to what both Mankind—the pivot round which thinkers refer to as a “world order.” all the teachings of Bahá’u’lláh Thus, Alain Locke and Shoghi Effendi revolve—is no mere outburst both view the concept of human one- of ignorant emotionalism or an ness as an ever-widening ideal, as a expression of vague and pious function of social evolution. hope. Its appeal is not to be mere- ly identified with a reawakening Loyalty to corporate unity is a of the spirit of brotherhood and necessary loyalty to something good-will among men, nor does larger than the individual in order it aim solely at the fostering of to unite men. However, the tradi- harmonious cöoperation among tional ideas and values associated Alain Locke’s “Moral Imperatives for World Order” Revisited 53

with human group loyalties are are and have been seeds of con- now hopelessly inadequate as a flict and division among men ev- foundation for a larger society erywhere—loyalties that were and impose limitations on a more originally meant to bring people comprehensive human society. In together. How can we give them the transformation of these val- up? One great and fundamental ues we need something bigger way of giving up something that and more understanding. (Locke is vital is to find a way to trans- 19–20) form or enlarge it. (Locke 20)

The Faith of Bahá’u’lláh has While preserving their patriotism assimilated, by virtue of its cre- and safeguarding their lesser loy- ative, its regulative and ennobling alties, it has made them lovers energies, the varied races, nation- of mankind, and the determined alities, creeds and classes that upholders of its best and truest have sought its shadow, and have interests. While maintaining in- pledged unswerving fealty to its tact their belief in the Divine or- cause. It has changed the hearts igin of their respective religions, of its adherents, burned away it has enabled them to visualize their prejudices, stilled their pas- the underlying purpose of these sions, exalted their conceptions, religions, to discover their merits, ennobled their motives, cöordi- to recognize their sequence, their nated their efforts, and trans- interdependence, their wholeness formed their outlook. (Shoghi and unity, and to acknowledge Effendi 197) the bond that vitally links them to itself. This universal, this tran- The concept of loyalty—especially scending love which the followers of “loyalty to loyalty” (based on prag- of the Bahá’í Faith feel for their matist philosopher, Josiah Royce)—is fellow-men, of whatever race, central to Locke’s philosophy. Both creed, class or nation, is neither writers speak of the “transforma- mysterious nor can it be said to tion”—i.e. expansion and universal- have been artificially stimulated. ization—of formerly limited outlooks It is both spontaneous and genu- and allegiances. ine. (Shoghi Effendi 197)

These basic corporate ideas con- Here, Locke speaks of “larger loyal- cern (1) the nation as a political ties,” while Shoghi Effendi comments corporate idea, (2) the race as a on “lesser loyalties.” “Larger loyalties” cultural corporate idea, and (3) the and “lesser loyalties” are complemen- sect as a spiritual corporate idea. tary. They can either coexist, or con- These larger loyalties, however, flict. Taking both statements by Alain 54 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

Locke and Shoghi Effendi together, tribe, of city-state, and nation it is clear that “larger loyalties” are have been successively attempt- transformations of “lesser loyalties,” ed and fully established. World when political and parochial interests unity is the goal towards which spiritually mature to become cosmo- a harassed humanity is striving. politan in nature and function. Broadly Nation-building has come to an speaking, both writers view loyalties end. The anarchy inherent in as corporate in nature—whether na- state sovereignty is moving to- tional, racial, or religious (or other). wards a climax. A world, growing Such loyalties will be limited in scope, to maturity, must abandon this unless and until they are universalized: fetish, recognize the oneness and wholeness of human relation- Nationality now means irre- ships, and establish once for all sponsible national sovereignty. the machinery that can best incar- We must give up some of this nate this fundamental principle of arbitrary sovereignty in order its life. (Shoghi Effendi 202) to prevent war, to get fellowship among nations, to erase conflict “Nationality”—by which Locke boundaries which are potential means “national sovereignty”—is “ar- battle-lines. We must work for bitrary” and “irresponsible”—parallel enlargement of all our loyalties, to Shoghi Effendi’s characterizations but most particularly this one,— of “state sovereignty” as a “fetish” of the sovereign selfjudging [sic] due to its inherent “anarchy” with politically expansive nation. . . . respect to the demands and require- We must consider race not in the ments of international relations, fascist, blood-clan sense, which which are far beyond those of the also is tribal and fetishist, but era of “nation-building,” which “has consider race as a common cul- come to an end.” ture and brotherhood. Cultural superiority of one race is only an This process of evolution by pro- expression of arbitrary loyalty to gressive enlargement of values that which is our own. Confrater- can be illustrated by the stages nity of culture will have to be put reported Biblically when sacrifice forward as what race can mean, to God meant the sacrifice of a and [as] an ideal of the parity of human being. This was changed races and cultures. (Locke 20) to the substitution of an animal in the place of a man. Fundamental- Unification of the whole of man- ists must have said if we give this kind is the hall-mark of the stage up, that will be the end of sacri- which human society is now ap- fices; but instead, there was more proaching. Unity of family, of meaning to the act and when [sic: Alain Locke’s “Moral Imperatives for World Order” Revisited 55

“then”] the next stage took sacri- Revelation with which each has fice to the still more meaningful been entrusted must, as a result level of “an offering of a pure and of this process of evolution, contrite heart.” . . . necessarily differ, their common We must in the third place consid- origin, their essential unity, their er religion as having many ways identity of purpose, should at no leading to salvation. The idea that time and under no circumstanc- there is only one true way of sal- es be misapprehended or denied. vation with all other ways leading That all the Messengers of God to damnation is a tragic limitation should be regarded as “abiding in to a Christianity which professes the same Tabernacle, soaring in the fatherhood of God and the the same Heaven, seated upon the brotherhood of man. How fool- same Throne, uttering the same ish in the eyes of foreigners are Speech, and proclaiming the same our competitive blind, sectarian Faith” must, however much we missionaries! If the Confucian may extol the measure of Divine expression of a Commandment Revelation vouchsafed to man- means the same as the Christian kind at this crowning stage of its expression, then it is the truth evolution, remain the unalterable also and should so be recognized. foundation and central tenet of It is in this way alone that Christi- Bahá’í belief. Any variations in anity or any other enlightened re- the splendor which each of these ligion can indicate [sic: vindicate] Manifestations of the Light of its claims to Universality; and so God has shed upon the world bring about moral and spiritual should be ascribed not to any in- brotherhood. (Locke 20) herent superiority involved in the essential character of any one of Incontrovertible as is this truth, them, but rather to the progres- its challenging character should sive capacity, the ever-increasing never be allowed to obscure the spiritual receptiveness, which purpose, or distort the principle, mankind, in its progress towards underlying the utterances of maturity, has invariably manifest- Bahá’u’lláh—utterances that have ed. (Shoghi Effendi 166) established for all time the abso- lute oneness of all the Prophets, In the above passages, both Alain Himself included, whether be- Locke and Shoghi Effendi speak of longing to the past or to the fu- religion in progressive, evolution- ture. Though the mission of the ary terms. Locke gives two exam- Prophets preceding Bahá’u’lláh ples from the history of religion: the may be viewed in that light, evolution of the notion and practice though the measure of Divine of sacrifice from human sacrifice, to 56 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

animal sacrifice, to spiritual sacrifice What else could these weighty by means of “an offering of a pure words signify if they did not and contrite heart” (Psalm 51:17 and point to the inevitable curtailment Matthew 9:13); and the functional of unfettered national sovereign- equivalence of Christian and Con- ty as an indispensable preliminary fucian moral concepts—presumably to the formation of the future alluding to Jesus’s formulation of the Commonwealth of all the nations “Golden Rule”6 and Confucius’s teach- of the world? (Shoghi Effendi 40) ing on “reciprocity.”7 Similarly, Shoghi Effendi’s discourse on Bahá’u’lláh’s Here, Locke’s concept of “an in- teachings on what Bahá’ís refer to as ternationally limited idea of national the “oneness of religion” speaks to a sovereignty” resonates with Shoghi “process of evolution” that explains Effendi’s idea of “the curtailment the historical distinctiveness among of unfettered national sovereignty.” the world’s religions—in which the For both men, this notion of limit- Bahá’í Faith represents the “crowning ed national sovereignty is, in Locke’s stage of [humanity’s spiritual] evolu- words, one of the “moral imperatives tion,” while emphasizing “their com- of a new world order.” Shoghi Effendi mon origin, their essential unity, their describes this new order more specif- identity of purpose.” ically as “the formation of the future Commonwealth of all the nations of The moral imperatives of a new the world.” world order are an internation- As I hope this section demon- ally limited idea of national sov- strates, cosmopolitan and Bahá’í ide- ereignty, a non-monopolistic and als co-habited, corresponded, and culturally tolerant concept of coalesced inside Alain Locke’s mind race and religious loyalties freed and heart. Thus the synergy between of sectarian bigotry. (Locke 20) Alain Locke’s faith and philosophy was intensely and dynamically reinforcing, making Locke’s famous statement ac- 6 “Therefore all things whatsoever cord with the Bahá’í teachings in both ye would that men should do to you, do ye the words he chose and the meaning he even so to them: for this is the law and the intended: “The moral imperatives of a prophets” (Matthew 7:12; see also Luke new world order are an international- 6:31). ly limited idea of national sovereign- 7 “Zigong asked, “Is there a single ty, a non-monopolistic and culturally saying that one may put into practice all tolerant concept of race and religious one’s life?” The Master said, ‘That would loyalties freed of sectarian bigotry.” be “reciprocity”: That which you do not desire, do not do to others’” (Analects 15.24. See also 5.12 and 12.2). Alain Locke’s “Moral Imperatives for World Order” Revisited 57

APPENDIX II keep up with what I hope will be the enlightened attitudes of this young- RACE: AMERICAN PARADOX er generation from its new experi- AND DILEMMA ences in international groups [sic] relationships. Tuesday Morning, June 20 [1944] It is true that certain concessionary steps in improved race relations have The paradox of America is that basi- been taken here at home as a result of cally we profess a democratic equality the war. There are increased employ- of men wich [sic] in practice we so ment opportunities for Negores [sic], flagrantly deny. This prejudice and increased labor unionization, increased lack of equality is the growing can- technical training and education. cer which threatens our American These changes have been made mainly Democracy. It is no longer a sectional in the interest of the war, however, and problem having spread to all parts of it is important that these group rela- the country. It threatens our basic dec- tionships go forward from here on and larations of equality and so impedes not recede to where they were when development of true democracy. the war started. In California and on the West Coast Unless racial equality is recog- you would have this dilemma of mi- nized as basic and made important in nority groups treatment even if you the post-war planning we will have had no Negroes here. The problem of the race problem intensified not only Orientals as well as Jews and others is nationally but with an international becoming one of increasing force. But, spotlight upon it. The American Ne- with the Negro issue added, the prob- gro presents the most paradoxical lem becomes a major national issue problem. The Negro is the largest both morally and socially. Fortunately minority group, approximately one it has become the increasing concern tenth [sic: one-tenth] of the popula- of small groups throughout the coun- tion is excluded from proper Ameri- try, especially since war conditions can privileges and standards of liv- have caused such large shifts of popu- ing. The oldest minority in terms of lation and this inevitably has changed residence, it has assimilated American group relationships. culture more widely in proportion to Also as a result of the war, millions its numbers than any other group. of young men, black and white, Jew Negroes speak the same language, and Gentile, have been taken out of have the same religion, the same mo- our country for a great international res as the White [sic] population. The experience—one which will have its White population must realize this effect when they return. The rest of paradox and reverse its attitudes and the population will have to stretch do something about it. Around the the attitudes and practices in order to Negro centers the question of our 58 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

moral sincerity about democracy, and RACE IN THE PRESENT WORLD CRISIS our basic national honesty concerning the equality of men. We will not be Tuesday Evening, June 20 [1944] truly democratic unless we solve this dilemma. There is no panacea or worldwide solu- The solution needs more than tion for the American race problem. an even-handed enforcement of the But whatever solutions we can make Constitution. There must be added will undoubtedly contribute to the equality and economic opportunity; further integration of the nations of the White population must experience the world, will tend to make us world changed attitudes and practices which citizens, or in other words, brothers, are outside the Constitutional provi- in addition to making our democracy sions set up for equality. The education more consistent and effective. The for- of public opinion in such respect lags mula of the chosen people is as old as greatly. There is a vicious conspiracy civilization. The Chinese had it but it for example to prevent the proper re- was different from our modern version porting of progress of the minority of the idea. They preferred to be exclu- groups especially for the Negro, so sive and have others let them alone. But that the public is not being psycholog- we proceed not by being consistently ically prepared for the progress which exclusive, but by trying to make people is inevitable nor for the choice which over on our culture pattern [sic] and must be made. The choice is whether then, instead of sharing our society we will have a bloody or peaceful path with them, boss them around. A differ- of progress for this mass movement ence exists then between the modern of minority groups which are here and and the ancient ideas of a chosen peo- here to stay. This must be understood ple. The Anglo-Saxons have a particu- if strife is to be averted. And so there larly virulent case of this modern kind is a choice between progressive and in their imperialistic attitude of racial mutually cooperative ways of solving superiority and dominance. the dilemma or of continuing ways There will not be any peace or jus- which irritate and cause conflict. If tice in the world until we get over that this generation of young people solves kind of superiority which makes us that problem within a reasonable time want to and insist upon making other it will have paid its right tribute to people like ourselves. The crux of the democracy and will have met success- peculiar dilemma in this type of social fully the challenge of the present in- policy and practice is the paradox of ter-group crisis. (Summary 9–10) wanting to make people over, not re- specting their group individualities, while denying them real fraternity and equality in their relationships with the majority group. Alain Locke’s “Moral Imperatives for World Order” Revisited 59

The colonial world we must re- dominating group, who have a frozen member is almost 100 percent non- system with vested interests in the white. Imperialism of the white race customs of discrimination. has brought about the present tempo- New perspectives can be made rary and unstable domination of the sufficiently real and vital in general whites over the non-whites. Our coun- public opinion to force enlightened try has many people here by virtue change. Some of these new interests of such imperialism and colonialism, are Pan-Americanism, a policy not even though we are not supposed to hatched just for the present world practice empire building. The Negroes crisis, though accelerated by it. The are not the only group of this char- Good Neighbor policy has tried quite acter, but ten percent of the North successfully to reverse our dollar di- American people is Negro or mulatto. plomacy, but we have not yet extended The majority of the Caribbean and the it with sufficient force to make it 100 greater part of South America is even per cent effective. When large num- more Negro or Negroid; fourteen per bers of Caribbean and South Amer- cent [sic] of the entire hemisphere. ican populations come in increasing The nearer you come to the tropic number to America or turn to Amer- zone the higher the percentage of ica for guidance, the only reservation black and mixed-blood populations. those people have to make when they In the Caribbean, the Negroes con- look at the scene is the North Ameri- stitute forty-six per cent. Indian and can attitude towards race. Our foreign Hindu populations are there, too. Latin frontier of race is much more serious American views towards race are less than the domestic. Only in terms of a extreme and more humane from the disavowal and discontinuance of color individual point of view, but as to eco- prejudice can we have sound and se- nomic exploitation, the Latin world is cure relations with most of the coun- nearly as guily [sic: guilty] as the An- tries to the south of us. glo-Saxon world. The Latin is guilty Our racial practices give us a bad of injury without insult, whereas the name in the world at large and rob us Anglo-Saxon world is guilty of both of the moral authority, the confidence, the injury of exploitation and the in- cultural respect and prestige which sult of racial prejudice. we should command as a democratic In this hemisphere slavery came nation. When business men [sic] and first, and then followed labor slavery. statesmen find that the approval and The status of the subjugated people respect of these nations depends on must be raised. Two of the greatest our treatment of racial problems, we obstacles in the race problem today are shall see racial democracy as a prac- the lack of confidence on the part of tical necessity for the effectiveness of the minority in the dominating group, the Pan-American trade programs and and the tradition and attitude of the American economic leadership. These 60 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

conservative groups will then come to the rest of the world. Trade is apt to see some very grave and immediate go to Russia from the Asiatic and Af- reasons for changing American stan- rican countries in favor to us because dards and practices in the matter of she is Asiatic, she is nearer, and she has race. clearer moral appeal in the matter of Such international pressure can and her policies and practices of race. The will come. Texas and the Southwest- non-white populations in the world ern states have set their behavior on will become increasingly informed the most reactionary of Southern ra- about Russia’s thoroughgoing social cial practices in their handling of the and racial democracy and will force us Mexicans who come across the border to reform our American practices and to do seasonal work. The Mexican concepts of race. government took this as an insult, and Thus the situation of race is one of is, today, insisting that unless better the most intense and serious of pres- treatment be given to the Mexican la- ent-day America with grave interna- borers by the states and assurance giv- tional consequences. Aside from these en through the State Department that economic considerations, we must face they be decently received, that they the call to this higher more democrat- will not be allowed to come across the ic patriotism, and to higher allegiance borders. It took less than forty-eight to world democracy. The real threat hours for news of race riots in Detroit and competition of Russia is not, as to reach the radios of the enemy. so often thought, that of a conflict of Traditionally the American posi- economic systems, capitalism versus tion has been for generations a great communism, but the moral threat and moving ideal of the world. Oppressed competition of the nation that more people have found refuge here. Now thoroughly and consistently pictures we are faced with the taunt that we [sic: practices] social and racial de- are asking others to practice social mocracy by treating all human beings democracy on a higher plane than as equals. (Summary 13–15) we ourselves do. We have less moral authority to deal with England and MORAL IMPERATIVES her colonial issues because of our ap- FOR WORLD ORDER proach to the Negro and Jewish prob- lems. We will eventually need to de- Wednesday Evening, June 21 [1944] pend for world trade upon the Asiatic populations which will be raising their Realism and idealism should be standards of living and then trading combined in striking for a World with us. Order [sic]. Skeletal ideals of uni- Russia’s industrial output will be versal human brotherhood have been for a short time consumed internally in the world for a long time and we and then she will have products to sell are further from tribal savagery and Alain Locke’s “Moral Imperatives for World Order” Revisited 61 its tribalisms because of these ideals. progressive enlargement of values But they are but partial expressions of can be illustrated by the stages report- what we hope to make them mean and ed Biblically when sacrifice to God what today’s world crisis demands. meant the sacrifice of a human being. Loyalty to corporate unity is a nec- This was changed to the substitution essary loyalty to something larger of an animal in the place of a man. than the individual in order to unite Fundamentalists must have said if we men. However, the traditional ideas give this up, that will be the end of and values associated with human sacrifices; but instead, there was more group loyalties are now hopelessly in- meaning to the act and when [sic: adequate as a foundation for a larger then] the next stage took sacrifice to society and impose limitations on a the still more meaningful level of “an more comprehensive human society. offering of a pure and contrite heart.” In the transformation of these values We must consider race not in the we need something bigger and more fascist, blood-clan sense, which also is understanding. tribal and fetishist, but consider race These basic corporate ideas concern as a common culture and brotherhood. (1) the nation as a political corporate Cultural superiority of one race is idea, (2) the race as a cultural corpo- only an expression of arbitrary loyal- rate idea, and (3) the sect as a spiritual ty to that which is our own. Confra- corporate idea. These larger loyalties, ternity of culture will have to be put however, are and have been seeds of forward as what race can mean, and conflict and division among men ev- [as] an ideal of the parity of races erywhere—loyalties that were origi- and cultures. nally meant to bring people together. We must in the third place consider How can we give them up? One great religion as having many ways leading and fundamental way of giving up to salvation. The idea that there is something that is vital is to find a way only one true way of salvation with to transform or enlarge it. all other ways leading to damnation Nationality now means irresponsi- is a tragic limitation to a Christiani- ble national sovereignty. We must give ty which professes the fatherhood of up some of this arbitrary sovereignty God and the brotherhood of man. in order to prevent war, to get fellow- How foolish in the eyes of foreigners ship among nations, to erase conflict are our competitive blind, sectarian boundaries which are potential bat- missionaries! If the Confucian expres- tle-lines. We must work for enlarge- sion of a Commandment means the ment of all our loyalties, but most same as the Christian expression, then particularly this one,—of the sover- it is the truth also and should so be eign selfjudging [sic: self-judging] recognized. It is in this way alone that politically expansive nation. Christianity or any other enlightened This process of evolution by religion can indicate [sic: vindicate] its 62 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

claims to Universality [sic]; and so bring about moral and spiritual brotherhood. The moral imperatives of a new world order are an internationally limited idea of national sovereignty, a non-monopolistic and culturally tolerant concept of race and religious loyalties freed of sectarian bigotry. (Summary 19–20)

WORKS CITED

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pi, Pre-Washington Campaign,” St. Paul Methodist Church, March 19, 1968. (Unpublished speech.) Manuscript Collection, No. 1083, Subseries 11.2, Martin Luther King Speaks program files, 1967–1985, Box 612, Folder 22, Manuscript 68#40C, page 7. Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library (MARBL), Emory University. Locke, Alain. The Philosophy of Alain Locke: Harlem Renaissance and Beyond, edited by Leonard Harris. Temple UP, 1989. ———. (1) “Race: American Paradox and Dilemma”; (2) “Race in the Present World Crisis”; and (3) “Moral Imperatives for World Order” (including discussion of remarks by Alain Locke, Leslie Schaefer, Rabbi William Stern, and Harry Silcock). Summary of Proceedings: Institute of International Relations, Mills College, Oakland, California, June 18 to 28, 1944, edited by Clarice Hubert and Cynthia Reynolds, Mills College, 1944, pp. (1) 9–10; (2) 13–15; and (3) 19–20, respectively. (Courtesy of Janice Braun, Library Director & Special Collections Librarian Milhaud Archivist, and Director, Center for the Book, Mills College, October 1, 2018.) Per- mission to reprint the summaries of Alain Locke’s three presentations granted, courtesy of Janice Braun, Library Director & Special Collec- tions Librarian Milhaud Archivist, and Director, Center for the Book, Mills College, October 12, 2018. (Edited by Christopher Buck, based on digital scans kindly provided by Mills College.) ———. “The Moral Imperatives for World Order,” Summary of Proceedings, Insti- tute of International Relations, Mills College, Oakland, CA, June 18–28, 1944, 19–20. (Edited by Christopher Buck, based on digital scans kindly pro- vided by Mills College.) Reprinted in Buck, The Philosophy of Alain Locke, p. 143 (Introduction) and pp. 151–52. ———. “Moral Imperatives for World Order.” The Works of Alain Locke, edited by Charles Molesworth. Oxford UP, 2012, pp. 555–56. ———. The Works of Alain Locke, edited by Charles Molesworth. Oxford UP, 2012. ———. “The Orientation of Hope,” The Bahá’í World: A Biennial International Record, Volume V, 1932–1934, Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1980 [1936], pp. 527–28. ———. “Unity through Diversity: A Bahá’í Principle,” The Bahá’í World: A Bi- ennial International Record, Volume IV, April 1930–1932. Bahá’í Publishing Committee, 1933. Mavity, Nancy Barr. “Relocation Japs Split on U.S. Loyalty, Official Says.” Oakland Tribune, Wednesday, June 21, 1944, p. 12. (Courtesy of Steven Kolins, independent researcher, October 6, 2018.) McCain, Johnny M. “Texas and the Mexican Labor Question, 1942–1947.” The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, vol. 85, no. 1, July 1981, pp. 45–64. Mount, Guy. Personal correspondence with the Editor of The Journal of Bahá’í Studies. 20 November 2018. 64 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

Shoghi Effendi. The World Order of Bahá’u’lláh. Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1991 [first published in 1938]. Smith, Derik. Personal correspondence with the Editor of The Journal of Bahá’í Studies. 2 February 2019. Stewart, Jeffrey C. The New Negro: The Life of Alain Locke. Oxford UP, 2018. Summary of Proceedings: Institute of International Relations, Mills College, Oakland, California, June 18 to 28, 1944, edited by Clarice Hubert and Cynthia Reynolds. Mills College, 1944. Twain, Mark. The Innocents Abroad, or, the New Pilgrims’ Progress. American Pub- lishing Co., 1871. West, Cornel. “Towards Oneness.” www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbEDC8wAWiI. 65

recently, has he dared venture into the Biographical arcane world of the poet. Information MICHÈLE JUBILEE is a multidisciplinary artist and illustrator, and holds a Bach- elor’s of Fine Arts Degree in both Art History and Visual Arts from the CHRISTOPHER BUCK (PhD, JD), attorney University of British Columbia. Her and independent scholar, is the author work explores themes of authenticity, of several books, including: God & the relationship between material and Apple Pie (2015), with an introduction spiritual existence, and individual vs. by J. Gordon Melton (Distinguished collective human experience. Engaged Professor of American Religious in many ongoing projects, Michèle History, Baylor University); Religious seeks to find and create spaces for ele- Myths and Visions of America (2009, vated discourse and inquiry, often ex- “an original contribution to American ploring the human body as a metaphor studies,” Journal of American History, and poetic language. June 2011); Alain Locke: Faith & Phi- losophy (2005); Paradise & Paradigm (1999); Symbol & Secret (1995/2004); SHIRIN SABRI is a poet, writer, and a Religious Celebrations (co-author, 2011); teacher at Townshend International and of chapters in such books as: The School in the Czech Republic. Her po- Bahá’í Faith and African American His- ems have appeared in various journals, tory (2019); ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Journey West and in 2018 she published Remem- (2013); and The Wiley-Blackwell Com- brance Suite: A Sonnet of Sonnets. Her panion to the Qur’an (2006/2017). essay “The Purpose of Poetry” was published in the Journal of Bahá’í Stud- ies and her children’s novel The Pinck- GARY HOGENSON’s long career has elhoffer Mice was published in 1992. been one of numbers and formulas. Her children’s history The Incompara- For a quarter of a century his world ble Friend: The Life of Bahá’u’lláh Told was Finance, including eighteen years in Stories was published in 2006, and of service in Haifa. Engineering and volumes of Companions of the Crimson technical assignments in the U.S. and Ark were published in 2016 and 2018. Latin America where he pioneered, She is currently contributing to the consumed the other half of his work- Choral Tales Project. ing life before turning to words and writing. His work has been published in Odet, the literary journal of Safety DERIK SMITH is an Associate Profes- Harbor, Florida and he was the 2018 sor in the Department of Literature First Prize winner for prose in the at Claremont McKenna College. His Romeo Lemay Writing Contest. Only work focuses on African-American 66 The Journal of Bahá’í Studies 29.1-2 2019

literary culture, with a particular in- terest in poetry. He also teaches and writes about representations of black- ness in American visual arts and music. His essays on poetry, film, and social theory appear in a variety of scholarly journals, and he is the author of Robert Hayden in Verse: New Histories of African American Poetry and the Black Arts Era. THE JOURNAL OF BAHÁ’Í STUDIES LA REVUE DES ÉTUDES BAHÁ’ÍES/LA REVISTA DE ESTUDIOS BAHÁ’ÍS Volume 29 Number 1-2 Spring-Summer 2019 Publications Mail Registration No. 09448

EDITOR John S. Hatcher POETRY EDITOR Peter E. Murphy EDITORIAL COORDINATOR Nilufar Gordon EDITORIAL COMMITTEE Roshan Danesh, Nilufar Gordon, Mehran Kiai, Pierre-Yves Mocquais, Bahhaj Taherzadeh

French translation: Louise Mailhot and Juliette Goudreau Spanish translation: Nuriyeh McLaren

The Journal of Bahá’í Studies (USPS #013-468) is published by the Association for Bahá’í Studies–North America. The views expressed in this Journal are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the opinions of the Editorial Board or Executive Committee of the Association for Bahá’í Studies, or authoritative explications of Bahá’í teachings.

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© Association for Bahá’í Studies 2019. All rights reserved. Many articles published in The Journal of Bahá’í Studies allude to the institutions and central figures of the Bahá’í Faith; as an aid for those unfamiliar with the Bahá’í Faith, we include here a succinct summary excerpted from http://www.bahai.org/ beliefs/bahaullah-covenant/. The reader may also find it helpful to visit the official web site for the worldwide Bahá’í community (www.bahai.org) available in several languages. For article submission guidelines, please visit http://bahai-studies.ca/ the-journal-of-bahai-studies-submission-guidelines/.

ABOUT THE BAHÁ’Í FAITH

The Bahá’í Faith, its followers believe, is “divine in origin, all-embracing in scope, broad in its outlook, scientific in its method, humanitarian in its principles and dynamic in the influence it exerts on the hearts and minds of men.” The mission of the Bahá’í Faith is “to proclaim that religious truth is not absolute but relative, that Divine Revelation is continuous and progressive, that the Founders of all past religions, though different in the non-essential aspects of their teachings, “abide in the same Tabernacle, soar in the same heaven, are seated upon the same throne, utter the same speech and proclaim the same Faith” (Shoghi Effendi).

The Bahá’í Faith began with the mission entrusted by God to two Divine Messengers— the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh. Today, the distinctive unity of the Faith They founded stems from explicit instructions given by Bahá’u’lláh that have assured the continuity of guidance following His passing. This line of succession, referred to as the Covenant, went from Bahá’u’lláh to His Son ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, and then from ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to His grandson, Shoghi Effendi, and the Universal House of Justice, ordained by Bahá’u’lláh. A Bahá’í accepts the divine authority of the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh and of these appointed successors.

The Báb (1819-1850) is the Herald of the Bahá’í Faith. In the middle of the 19th century, He announced that He was the bearer of a message destined to transform humanity’s spiritual life. His mission was to prepare the way for the coming of a second Messenger from God, greater than Himself, who would usher in an age of peace and justice.

Bahá’u’lláh (1817-1892)—the “Glory of God”—is the Promised One foretold by the Báb and all of the Divine Messengers of the past. Bahá’u’lláh delivered a new Revelation from God to humanity. Thousands of verses, letters and books flowed from His pen. In His Writings, He outlined a framework for the development of a global civilization which takes into account both the spiritual and material dimensions of human life. For this, He endured 40 years of imprisonment, torture and exile.

In His will, Bahá’u’lláh appointed His oldest son, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá (1844-1921), as the authorized interpreter of His teachings and Head of the Faith. Throughout the East and West, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá became known as an ambassador of peace, an exemplary human being, and the leading exponent of a new Faith.

Appointed Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, His eldest grandson, Shoghi Effendi (1897-1957), spent 36 years systematically nurturing the development, deepening the understanding, and strengthening the unity of the Bahá’í community, as it increasingly grew to reflect the diversity of the entire human race.

The development of the Bahá’í Faith worldwide is today guided by the Universal House of Justice (established in 1963). In His book of laws, Bahá’u’lláh instructed the Universal House of Justice to exert a positive influence on the welfare of humankind, promote education, peace and global prosperity, and safeguard human honor and the position of religion.