It is New Year; that is to say, the rounding of the cycle of
the year. A year is the expression of a cycle (of the sun) but now is the
beginning of a cycle of Reality, a New Cycle, a New Age, a New Century, a New
Time and a New Year. Therefore, it is very blessed.
I wish this blessing
to appear and become manifest in the faces and characteristics of the
believers, so that they, too, may become a new people, and having found new
life and been baptized with fire and spirit, may make the world a new world, to
the end that the old earth may disappear and the new earth appear; old ideas
depart and new thoughts come; old garments be cast aside and new garments put
on; ancient politics whose foundation is war be discarded and modern politics
founded on peace raise the standard of victory; the new star shine and gleam
and the new sun illumine and radiate; new flowers bloom; the new spring become
known; the new breeze blow; the new bounty descend; the new tree give forth new
fruit; the new voice become raised and this new sound reach the ears, that the
new will follow the new, and all the old furnishings and adornments be cast
aside and new decorations put in their places.
I desire for you all that you will have this great
assistance and partake of this great bounty, and that in spirit and heart you
will strive and endeavor until the world of war become the world of peace; the
world of darkness the world of light; satanic conduct be turned into heavenly
behavior; the ruined places become built up; the sword be turned into the olive
branch; the flash of hatred become the flame of the Love of God and the noise
of the gun the voice of the Kingdom; the soldiers of death the soldiers of
life; all the nations of the world one nation; all races as one race; and all
national anthems harmonized into one melody. Then this material realm will be
Paradise, the earth Heaven and the world of Satan become the world of Angels.
(Signed) ‘Adu’l-Baha Abbas
(Star of the West, vol. 2, no. 1, March 21, 1911)[1] Revealed for the American friends in 1906, who had sent Abdu'l Baha a New Year's (March 21st) Greeting.
