Truth, Love, Justice, and the Unification of Humankind

Truth, love, and justice constitute the building blocks of any lasting civilization. Without those foundational realities, our cultures not only fail to hold us together, but drive us apart. 

When our perceptions of these essential powers of life have been perverted by prejudice and self-interest, we tend to use them as weapons of division and destruction rather than as tools for healing and construction. 

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Reality is one, which means that reality should bring us together, not force us apart. However, historically we have stubbornly held on to a limited and faulty sense of truth, love, and justice, refusing to fairmindedly consider others, and to criticize and condemn those who do not see things our way. 

Clearly, we need to change how we see, feel, and act in our world. 

The more we can get our passions and egos out of the way and allow our higher sense of reason, compassion, and judgment come into play, the more we will be able to see how our previous conceptions were erroneous and adjust our thoughts, feelings, and actions to align more closely with reality. This challenge requires great personal effort and moral courage to fairmindedly consider our limitations and other’s viewpoints. It also requires the spiritual attributes of patience, forbearance, and tolerance. Everyone benefits when we arise to meet this challenge. 

The first step in realigning our view of reality requires that we begin seeing ourselves as one people created by one Creator to live together in peace and harmony. Baha’u’llah revealed: “O well-beloved ones! The tabernacle of unity hath been raised; regard ye not one another as strangers. Ye are the fruits of one tree, and the leaves of one branch.”

We must not allow misguided, powerful, and self-interested parties to break us apart and set us against one another, otherwise we will all suffer – including those who may appear to gain. These power-seeking elements play to our lower animal instincts and our human prejudices for their own advantage. They conceive of reality as a struggle between an “us” and a “them,” appealing to our own self-interests and biases to advance their own agendas. By dividing us into competing groups, they create the conditions for increasing their own power, control, and domination. 

As our drive for survival is an enduring and innate aspect of our natures, when reality is framed in those terms, we tend to sacrifice higher needs and aims for it. This theme has repeated itself countless times in human history. We can look to the 20^th century for examples – the two world wars, the cold war, and the many other wars and conflicts were all based on an “us versus them” worldview, and presented as an existential crisis to both sides. That is why both sides fought so hard and were so destructive — they perceived the survival of their people and way of life depended on it. 

What a colossal waste! How many lives, potentialities, and resources were not only wasted, but directed toward destroying others based on manufactured falsehoods, hatreds, and wrongs? How would our world be different today if we instead had directed our energies toward establishing firmer foundations for truth, love, and justice – and to bettering our material and social conditions, and the welfare of all humanity? 

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By creating a narrative of the “other” who threatens us or our way of life, or who hates us or treats us unfairly, we can in turn feel justified in threatening, hating, and attacking them. It then becomes a battle of us against them for survival, with each side seeing itself as the righteous party. In the end, all are harmed and no one benefits, though one party may emerge the apparent “winner.” 

We sacrifice truth, love, and justice in the name of survival – even though the only way we can ensure our survival is by forging unity. Shoghi Effendi, the Guardian of the Baha’i Faith, wrote:

Unification of the whole of mankind is the hall-mark of the stage which human society is now approaching. Unity of family, of tribe, of city-state, and nation have been successively attempted and fully established. World unity is the goal towards which a harassed humanity is striving. Nation-building has come to an end. The anarchy inherent in state sovereignty is moving towards a climax. A world, growing to maturity, must abandon this fetish, recognize the oneness and wholeness of human relationships, and establish once for all the machinery that can best incarnate this fundamental principle of its life. 

We must be on our guard regarding those who use the guise of truth, love, and justice to peddle the opposite. They can lead whole nations astray and create the conditions for further conflicts and catastrophes. They divide people into rival groups, valorizing some and demonizing others. They seek power and dominance in politics, public opinion, religion, and other social spheres. They rarely make their intent clear, but rather appeal to their followers’ unfounded beliefs and interests.