International Force
Authoritative Writings[edit]
- Gleanings, sec. 117, 119
- Secret of Divine Civilization, pp. 64-71 (essentials from 64-66)
- World Order of Bahá'u'lláh pp. 191-194
Documents discussing[edit]
When there is an International Force, Bahá'ís may participate in it (but for now, in its absence, Bahá'ís should apply for exemption from military duties necessitating the taking of life)[edit]
"...It is true that Bahá'ís are not pacifists since we uphold the use of force in the service of justice and upholding law. But we do not believe that war is ever necessary and its abolition is one of the essential purposes and brightest promises of Bahá'u'lláh's revelation. His specific command to the kings of the earth is: 'Should any one among you take up arms against another, rise ye all against him, for this is naught but manifest justice.' (Tablet to Queen Victoria, 'The Proclamation of Bahá'u'lláh', p. 13) The beloved Guardian has explained that the unity of mankind implies the establishment of a world commonwealth, a world federal system, '...liberated from the curse of war and its miseries ... in which Force is made the servant of Justice...' whose world executive 'backed by an international Force ... will safeguard the organic unity of the whole commonwealth.' This is obviously not war but the maintenance of law and order on a world scale. Warfare is the ultimate tragedy of disunity among nations where no international authority exists powerful enough to restrain them from pursuing their own limited interests. Bahá'ís therefore ask to serve their countries in non-combatant ways during such fighting; they will doubtless serve in such an international Force as Bahá'u'lláh envisions, whenever it comes into being."
- (From a letter written on behalf of the Universal House of Justice, September 11, 1984: Peace, in Lights of Guidance, no. 1429)
"As there is neither an International Police Force nor any immediate prospect of one coming into being, the Bahá'ís should continue to apply, under all circumstances, for exemption from any military duties that necessitate the taking of life. There is no justification for any change of attitude on our part at the present time."
- (On behalf of? Shoghi Effendi, Directives from the Guardian, p. 148)
Significance of development of international peace-keeping forces (e.g., as shown in (first) Gulf War)[edit]
"Significantly, it was also on the initiative of a political leader of one of the Western hemisphere nations which had been addressed by Bahá'u'lláh, that His summons to collective security — first reflected in the nominal sanctions voted by the League of Nations against Fascist aggression in Ethiopia — was at long last given practical effect. In November 1956, Lester Bowles Pearson, then External Affairs Minister and later Prime Minister of Canada, secured the creation by the United Nations of its first international peacekeeping force, an achievement which won its author the Nobel Prize for Peace.[93] The full nature of the authority contained in such a mandate would steadily emerge as a major feature of international relations during the second half of the century. Beginning with the policing of agreements worked out between hostile states, the principle of collective action in defence of peace gradually took on the form of military interventions such as that of the Gulf War, in which compliance with Security Council resolutions was imposed by force on aggressor factions and states."
- (Bahá'í World Centre, Century of Light, 2001, p. 72)
