It is my fervent hope that those believers who have retained their faith
in the indestructibility of the Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh
and in the sacredness and immutability of the Will and Testament of’Abdu’l-Bahá
and hence the immortality of the divinely-conceived institutions delineated
therein will, as they study the documentation available on this site,
discover and realize the following:
That Shoghi Effendi faithfully appointed his successor "in his
own life-time"as required under the terms of the Will and Testament
of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá but he had to make this appointment at
the time, for good reason, in such a veiled manner that it would be obscured
from the believers.
That the identity of Shoghi Effendi’s appointed successor, tragically
enough, remained veiled from the believers following the passing of Shoghi
Effendi due to erroneous preconceived ideas and interpretations concerning
the manner in which he would appoint his successor.
That Shoghi Effendi issued the one and only Proclamation of his ministry
on 9 January 1951 constituting the embryonic Universal House of Justice
as "this first embryonic International Institution" and
stating that history will acclaim it as "the greatest event
shedding lustre upon the second epoch of the Formative Age of the Bahá’í
Dispensation"
That notwithstanding the superlative terms in which he had hailed
the formation of the embryonic Universal House of Justice and the projected
plans for its development, as announced in this same Proclamation, this
"Nascent Institution" was never permitted, following the
passing of Shoghi Effendi, to exercise its jurisdiction over the then
"nine vigorously functioning national administrative
institutions" cited by him and was illicitly replaced by a headless
(i.e. sans-Guardian) body in 1963.
That the the believers, following the passing of Shoghi Effendi, failed
to perceive the momentous significance that attached to and the implications
to be found in Shoghi Effendi’s appointment of the President of the
embryonic Universal House of Justice, temporarily titled in its first stage
of development as the International Bahá’í Council as Presidency of
the Universal House of Justice and Guardianship are synonymous terms.
That Shoghi Effendi had purposely retained the International Bahá’í
Council as an inactively functioning body during the remaining years of
his ministry so that he could use it as the instrument for the appointment
of his successor.
That only as a result of the Proclamation of the second Guardian of
the Faith issued at Ridván 1960 and the clear explanations that he
provided did a few of the believers who had retained an unwavering faith
in the Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh rejoice in the news
and understanding that came with this Proclamation and recognize as completely
valid the manner in which he had been appointed the rightful appointed successor
to Shoghi Effendi and realize why Shoghi Effendi had not used a testamentary
document to appoint his successor, as had been erroneously anticipated by
the Bahá’í world, as it would clearly have been contrary to the provisions
of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá.
That the Bahá’í Administrative Order has been blatantly corrupted
by the self-appointed leaders of the Faith following the passing of Shoghi
Effendi and their abandonment of the Guardianship as all of the divinely-conceived
international institutions of the Bahá’í Administrative Order delineated
in the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá (i.e. the Guardianship,
the Hands of the Cause and a UHJ with the Guardian presiding as its "sacred
head") have been replaced by man-made institutions completely outside the
provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá
That a sans-Guardian and therefore a headless, fallible and illicitly
formed Universal House of Justice has been established by those who have
abandoned the Guardianship of the Faith as the central single authority
of the Faith in place of the Twin Institutions of the Administrative Order
prescribed in the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá where
the Guardian is designated as "the Center of the Cause,"
the interpretive function is exercised exclusively by the Guardian of the
Faith and the executive and legislative functions are clearly performed
separately by these institutions.
That the second Guardian of the Faith has faithfully appointed
his successor and the Guardianship continues to exist as a living Institution
as delineated in the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá
– the Charter of the World Order of Bahá’u’lláh
and a Document identified by Shoghi Effendi as nothing less than a part
of the explicit Holy Text – with the assurance that the highest institutions
of the Bahá’í Administrative Order have been preserved
intact and uncorrupted in their divinely-conceived perfection and glory
for both the believers of this day and for future generations of Bahá’ís
in the ages to come of the Dispensation of Bahá’u’lláh.
Joel Bray Marangella
Third Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith
28 August 1998