The Unfoldment of World Civilization: Bahá’u’lláh’s warning to Sultán ‘Abdu’l-’Aziz: “Set before thine eyes God’s unerring Balance and, as one standing in His presence, weigh in that Balance thine actions every day, every moment of thy life.”

September 8, 2025

Bahá’u’lláh’s warning to Sultán ‘Abdu’l-’Aziz: “Set before thine eyes God’s unerring Balance and, as one standing in His presence, weigh in that Balance thine actions every day, every moment of thy life.”

To Sultán ‘Abdu’l-’Aziz, the monarch who decreed each of Bahá’u’lláh’s three banishments, the Founder of our Faith, while a prisoner in the Sultán’s capital, addressed these words: “Hearken, O king, to the speech of Him that speaketh the truth, Him that doth not ask thee to recompense Him with the things God hath chosen to bestow upon thee, Him Who unerringly treadeth the Straight Path …Set before thine eyes God’s unerring Balance and, as one standing in His presence, weigh in that Balance thine actions every day, every moment of thy life. Bring thyself to account ere thou art summoned to a reckoning, on the day when no man shall have strength to stand for fear of God, the day when the hearts of the heedless ones shall be made to tremble.”

- Shoghi Effendi (‘The Unfoldment of World Civilization’)

From Ruhiyyih Khanum

In 1936 he wrote The Unfoldment of World Civilization; once again, as he so often did, Shoghi Effendi links this to the passing of 'Abdu'l-Bahá. It was a further exposition of the state of the world, the rapid political, moral and spiritual decline evident in it, the weakening of both Christianity and Islam, the dangers humanity in its heedlessness was running, and the strong, divine, hopeful remedy the teachings of Bahá'u'lláh had to offer. Important and educative as these wonderful letters of the Guardian were they provided, in their wealth of apposite quotations from Bahá'u'lláh's own words which the Guardian had translated and lavishly cited, spiritual sustenance for the believers, for we know that the World of the Manifestation of God is the food of the soul. They also contained innumerable beautifully translated passages from the beloved Master's Tablets. All this bounty the Guardian spread for the believers in feast after feast, nourished them and raised up a new strong generation of servants in the Faith. His words fired their imagination, challenged them to rise to new heights, drove their roots deeper in the fertile soil of the Cause. (Ruhiyyih Khanum, ‘The Priceless Pearl’)