THE ILLEGITIMATE REIGN OF THE "CUSTODIANS" AT THE BAHÁ’Í WORLD CENTER THAT WAS NEVER MEANT TO BE

"How [was this body of the Hands] to assume the reins of authority with no document to support us, other than general theological statements about the Hands?"

The above question posed by Rúhíyyih Khánum,, widow of Shoghi Effendi, first Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith, is found in the introduction of a book titled: "The Ministry of the Custodians" and, while she is referring to the entire body of the Hands, the question is equally applicable to the body of nine Hands of the Cause that the Hands selected from their own number, to direct the affairs of the Faith from Haifa following the passing of Shoghi Effendi in November 1957 upon which they bestowed the appellation of "Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith." In a resolution signed by all the Hands on 25 November, 1957, they stated that "The Custodians shall be deemed to succeed the Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith." As this body is not one of the Institutions delineated in the divinely-conceived and sacred Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, it clearly possessed no legitimacy in the divinely-conceived "Administrative Order which the master-hand of its perfect Architect [‘Abdu’l-Bahá] has fashioned" and therefore was never meant to be. (The last quote is from the writings of Shoghi Effendi.)

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The following prefatory comments are made prior to reviewing the book that recounts the role and activities of the so-called "Custodians of the Bahá’í Faith" who, for a period of some five and a half years following the passing of Shoghi Effendi, arrogated unto themselves, to quote their own words, the "functions, rights and powers in succession to the Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith." With these comments in mind, the reader, and particularly one who may be a non-Bahá’í, will be able to better perceive that this body of the Custodians assumed an authority and role that was never meant to be theirs and by so doing, in effect, treated as null and void those major provisions of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Will and Testament which delineate the role and functions of the highest Institutions of the Bahá’í Administrative Order–a Document that Shoghi Effendi has extolled as being divinely-conceived, and constituting together with the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, Bahá’u’lláh’s Most Holy Book, the immutable, sacred and explicit Holy Text of the Faith. More than this, he has made it clear that the Will and Testament is not to be considered as the Will of only ‘Abdu’l-Bahá but should "be acclaimed as the inevitable offspring resulting from that mystic intercourse between Him [Bahá’u’lláh] Who communicated the generating influence of His divine Purpose and the One Who was its vehicle and chosen recipient [‘Abdu’l-Bahá] and thus as the "Child of the Covenant" the Will of Bahá’u’lláh, as well. Shoghi Effendi further confirmed this dual authorship in the following significant statement in a letter to the believers "throughout the West" found in the book titled: THE WORLD ORDER OF BAHÁ’U’LLÁH (p. 22): "For nothing short of the explicit directions of their Book, and the surprisingly emphatic language of their Will could possibly safeguard the Faith for which they have both so gloriously labored all their lives."

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Shoghi Effendi, the first beloved Guardian of the Faith, passed away while on a visit to London England, on 4 November, 1957. He had but recently appointed, in accordance with the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá the first living Hands of the Cause during his ministry, the last contingent having been appointed by him only a month before his passing making a total number of twenty-seven, Hands of the Cause previously appointed by him having been named posthumously. Twenty six of these Hands, still very much in a state of shock, consternation and mourning following his sudden and unexpected early passing assembled at a conclave in ‘Akká, Israel during the period of November 18^th to 27^th, 1957, apparently anticipating, quite surprisingly, in view of the terms of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, that they would find a will and testament in which Shoghi Effendi had identified his successor in spite of the fact that ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Will clearly states that the Guardian’s successor will be appointed "in his own life-time." For they were to report in their Proclamation issued to the Bahá’í World on the 25th of November that: "On the morning of November 19^th, nine Hands, selected from the Holy Land and the several continents of East and West, with Amatu’l-Bahá Rúhíyyih Khánum (the widow of Shoghi Effendi), broke the seals placed upon the beloved Guardian’s safe and desk and made careful examination of their precious contents. These same Hands, rejoining the other Hands assembled in the Mansion of Bahá’u’lláh at Bahji, certified that Shoghi Effendi had left no heir. The Aghsán (branches) one and all are either dead or have been declared violators of the Covenant by the Guardian for their faithlessness to the Master’s Will and Testament and their hostility to him named first Guardian in that sacred document." (Published in U.S. Bahá’í News No.323, January, 1958.)

They had undertaken this search for a will and testament, as stated above, in spite of the fact that the terms of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá are unequivocal on this matter stating that: "It is incumbent upon the guardian of the Cause of God to appoint in his own life-time him that shall become his successor."

It should have, therefore, been clearly evident to them that Shoghi Effendi would not have appointed a successor by means of a testamentary document to be opened after his passing but would have according to the explicit provisions of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Will, quoted above, made this appointment during his life-time. Certainly it should have been inconceivable to them that Shoghi Effendi would have failed to appoint a successor in view of his writings on the Bahá’í Administrative Order that had consistently stressed the essentiality and indispensability of the Guardianship to the World Order of Bahá’u’lláh and in which he had clearly foreseen, especially in several messages he had sent to the Bahá’í world as his ministry drew to a close that this Institution, described by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in His Will and Testament as the "sign of God" and the "Center of the Cause" would exist as long as the Dispensation of Bahá’u’lláh, itself, endured. Incredible as it may seem, they nevertheless shamelessly ignored the writings of Shoghi Effendi concerning the irreplaceable, essential and promised future role of the Guardianship in the Bahá’í Administrative Order as well as the terms of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá which, as shown above, clearly preclude the Guardian from using a will and testament to appoint his successor. Unmindful as they were of the foregoing, and having found no will and testament left by Shoghi Effendi or moreover, having undertaken no review of the statements or acts of Shoghi Effendi during his ministry that would otherwise have identified his successor, they inevitably failed to discover the clue to the identity of his appointed successor that would have been found in the one and only Proclamation that he had issued during his ministry on 9 January 1951. The Diary of Mason Remey that describes the events at their first Conclave informs us that the Hands hastily concluded on the very first day of their deliberations that the Guardianship had ended, rationalizing this decision on the basis of the doctrine of "Bada" which held that God had changed His Mind about the Guardianship and had decreed that this Institution would be no more. This doctrine of "Bada" with which the Bahá’ís of the West are unfamiliar was first advanced at this Conclave by the ten Persian Hands of the Cause who claimed that it now applied with respect to the continuation of the Guardianship. It is understood that this doctrine had originated in the Muslim world to explain why Muhammad had made changes in His teachings or laws during the course of His Ministry but the Hands conveniently overlooked the fact that Muhammad, unlike them, was a Manifestation of God and therefore revealed these changes as the Mouthpiece of God. The diabolical application of this doctrine first by the Persian Hands to justify the termination of the Guardianship and then with the support of Rúhíyyih Khánum who, in the light of all that she had written about the essentiality of the Guardianship, should have known better, undoubtedly influenced the remaining Hands of the Cause, with the notable exception of two, (one later relenting) to accede to this doctrine and to conclude that the Guardianship had forever ended and to refuse to reconsider this stand when Mason Remey at their second Conclave a year later appealed to them for a reconsideration of this decision.

The 27 Hands of the Cause then issued an "Unanimous Proclamation" on 25 November,1957, (not to be confused with their Proclamation of the same date published in the U.S. Bahá’í News of January, 1958) in which they stated that "in our capacity as Hands of the Cause of God duly nominated and appointed by the Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith . . . and constituting the supreme body of the Bahá’í World Community.

"We nominate and appoint from our own number to act on our behalf as the Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith to exercise–subject to such directions and decisions as may be given by us as the Chief Stewards of the Bahá’í World Faith–all such functions, rights and powers in succession to the Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith, until such time as the Universal House of Justice, upon being duly established and elected in conformity with the Sacred Writings of Bahá’u’lláh and the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, may otherwise determine."

Although a body identified as "Custodians of the Faith" is not called for under the terms of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, it is obvious from the foregoing that they attempted to validate the authenticity of this body by equating it with the body that ‘Abdu’l-Bahá describes in His Will and Testament wherein He states: "The Hands of the Cause of God must elect from their own number nine persons that shall at all times be occupied in the important services in the work of the guardian of the Cause of God and these, whether unanimously or by a majority vote, must give their assent to the choice of the one whom the guardian of the Cause of God hath chosen as his successor."

It will have been noted in the statement contained in those extracts from their Proclamation quoted above, that whereas the Hands have first pointed out that the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá call for the Hands of the Cause to elect from their own number nine persons to be occupied in the important services in the work of the Guardian of the Cause of God, they then state in the same Proclamation that they nominate and appoint from our own number nine Hands "to act on our behalf as Custodians of the Bahá’í Faith" until their sans-Guardian Universal House of Justice, which in the absence of its "sacred head" presiding is but an incomplete, deformed and fallible organization, has, been established and which they, notwithstanding, fallaciously claim, "has been elected in conformity with the Sacred Writings of Bahá’u’lláh and the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá." Later in this review of their book it will be shown that all of the Bahá’í National Spiritual Assemblies of the world were requested by the Custodians to declare in a letter addressed to them their loyalty to this alleged elected body of Custodians of the Faith (although actually appointed) and state that they recognize them as "the supreme body in the Cause" ignoring the fact that the entire body of the Hands had previously applied this same appellation to themselves in their "Unanimous Proclamation" of 25 November,1957, in which they referred to themselves as "the supreme body of the Bahá’í World Community"

It will be recalled that this elected body of nine Hands, prescribed by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in His Testament had not been brought into existence during the ministry of Shoghi Effendi. In fact, as it was not until December, 1951, that he had appointed the first contingent of twelve Hands of the Cause and as it had been only during the closing years of his ministry that he had appointed additional living Hands for a total of twenty-seven Hands, it would have been obviously impractical to extract nine from this number of Hands who at this stage of the Faith were primarily engaged in promoting the Faith throughout the world and bring them to reside in Haifa where the need for this number of Hands to serve under his direction at the World Center was not required at the time. Shoghi Effendi"’s need for assistance at the World Center had obviously been met by his bringing to Haifa to permanently reside there only three Hands of the Cause during the last seven years of his ministry (Mason Remey, Sutherland Maxwell and Leroy Ioas), who together with Rúhíyyih Khánum who had served him in a secretarial capacity for many years, provided him with the specific assistance that he required at this stage in the development of the Faith (e.g. Mason as the architect of the International Archives Building, Sutherland as the architect of the Shrine of the Báb) and to fulfill other specific functions (Mason as President of the International Bahá’í Council and Leroy as its Secretary General engaged on matters of the Faith with officials of the Israeli government). Therefore, it is clear that the body of nine Hands mentioned in the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá was not in residence at the World Center to bear witness to Shoghi Effendi’s appointed successor nor, in fact, was their attestation as to the validity of this appointment required or essential under the circumstances then prevailing. As all spiritually advanced souls know when their end is approaching Shoghi Effendi was very much aware that the end of his ministry was near at hand as early as 1952 (proof of this will be discussed more specifically in later pages). It was imperative, particularly at this period in the development of the Faith when the Bahá’ís were set to embark on a Global World Crusade, that he conceal the terrible prospect of the imminence of his passing from the believers. Yet, he was required under the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to appoint and make known his successor during his life-time (i.e., not by conventional testamentary document to be opened after his passing). Faced with this dilemma it is now clear to us that he devised an ingenious, indirect, and totally unexpected way in which to resolve this dilemma and to appoint his successor in such a way that it would be done openly, while at the same time obscuring his identity from the believers, most of whom, if not all, were erroneously anticipating that his successor would be revealed in a more conventional manner. For had the believers recognized the fact that Shoghi Effendi had chosen a highly distinguished believer who had been one of the earliest believers who had embraced the Faith around the turn of the century, one who had been eulogized in glowing terms by the Master in His Tablets (published in the Star of the West) for his purity of motives and steadfastness in the Covenant, a Hand of the Cause, Architect of three existing Bahá’í Temples, chosen Architect by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá for the future Temple to be built on Mount Carmel, chosen architect by Shoghi Effendi for the future Temple to built in Tihran and architect of the International Archives Building already constructed on Mount Carmel, one to whom ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had made the highly significant promise that "ERE LONG, THY LORD SHALL MAKE THEE A SIGN OF GUIDANCE AMONG ALL MANKIND" (published in "Star of the West" Vol V, No. 19, 2 March 1915), and a man obviously much older than himself, to be his successor, and who, in spite of his advanced age, was destined to outlive him, in order to succeed him, they would have inevitably concluded that Shoghi Effendi in appointing this believer as his successor was actually foretelling his own early demise, a shock that would have been more than the believers could have sustained and one that would have certainly paralyzed them and seriously interfered with their performance of the daunting tasks that lay before them in achieving the goals that had been set for them by Shoghi Effendi in the Ten-Year Global Crusade upon which they were about to embark. Nor could he have confided in Rúhíyyih Khánum the identity of his successor for he knew that she particularly could not have sustained such a shock as she clearly admits in her book about the life of Shoghi Effendi when she wrote: "I could never have survived the slightest foreknowledge of the Guardian’s death . . ." Obviously, aware that the believers were erroneously expecting him to appoint a successor in a conventional manner, as evidenced by the search made by the Hands after his passing for a will and testament left by him, he devised a way to ingeniously conceal the appointment of his successor while at the same time fully complying with the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. This he did by appointing his successor as President of the International Bahá’í Council, or in other words, the appointed embryonic head of what he described as "this first embryonic International Institution" and one destined to gradually evolve, as he outlined in his Proclamatory Cable of 9 January 1951, through several stages, as the Faith, itself developed, until attaining its ultimate efflorescence as the Universal House of Justice. As the appointed "sacred head" of this embryonic body–this embryonic Institution–that Shoghi Effendi had necessarily retained in an inactive state, as a functioning body, during the remaining years of his ministry, he would, following his passing, remain the irremovable head (as long as he lived) as that body evolved through the several active evolutionary stages traced by Shoghi Effendi. As the President of an actively functioning Council, he could be none other than the Guardian of the Faith who in accordance with the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá presides over the Universal House of Justice. In this way, Shoghi Effendi used this "Nascent Institution" as the instrument through which he was able to identify his successor (in his cable of 2 March, 1951) while, at the same time, successfully masking his identity from the believers whom he realized would not perceive the implications of this act. Moreover, in this way, the appointment of his successor had been made "in his own life-time" as required under the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and because this appointment had been made openly (i.e. in a cable sent to the Bahá’í World) there had been no need for a secret ballot of nine Hands resident at the World Center of the Faith to attest to its authenticity. In the future, when the work at the World Center of the Faith has developed to the point where the services of a body of nine Hands will be required to assist the Guardian and a sufficient number of Hands have been appointed by the then Guardian of the Faith to make it feasible for the Hands to elect this body of nine from their own number this body will, under those conditions, obviously be called upon to bear witness in voting their assent to the authenticity of the Guardian’s appointment of his successor. It should be clear from the discussion above that as Shoghi Effendi’s appointment of his successor had been made openly and publicly and as this appointment had preceded by almost a year his appointment of even the first contingent of twelve living Hands of the Cause (announced in his cable of 24 December 1951), the body of nine Hands described in the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had not been present at the World Center, nor had it been necessary or even possible under the circumstances that then prevailed in the Faith for such a body to certify by secret ballot the validity and authenticity of this appointment openly announced by Shoghi Effendi in a cable dispatched to the Bahá’í world almost a full year before the appointment of even the first contingent of twelve Hands of the Cause, one of whom had already been named his successor. It should be clear from the foregoing that this provision of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá was obviously not operable when Shoghi Effendi appointed his successor and, therefore, any argument to the effect that Shoghi Effendi’s appointment of Mason Remey as his successor was not valid because it had not been ratified or approved by the Hands of the Cause as some believers have argued is baseless and incorrect (their "assent" to the choice of a successor not meaning for the reasons explained by Shoghi Effendi in a letter to the believers that they wielded veto authority over his choice). Notwithstanding this fact, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá wisdom of requiring such an assent (applying the meaning given in Webster’s Dictionary: "To admit a thing is true") by the nine Hands who, under the terms of His Will and Testament, will be serving under the Guardian at the World Center in the future when the Guardianship has become a powerful Institution in the eyes of the non-Bahá’í world will certainly be found to be a wise safeguard provided by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to insure the validity and authenticity of the Guardian’s appointment of a successor and to protect the Faith from any false pretender to the Guardianship. As for those who contend that this provision of the Master’s Testament endows the Hands with veto authority over the Guardian’s choice of a successor, the absurdity of such a belief and the falsity of such a contention has been explained in a letter from Shoghi Effendi that may be read by those who persist in making such a contention.

Unfortunately, upon finding that Shoghi Effendi had left no will and testament, the Hands, as well as the Bahá’ís at large, holding as they did to erroneous preconceptions pertaining to and interpretations of the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, led them to believe that the option given the Guardian in that Document to choose "another branch" as his successor, should his eldest son prove unworthy to inherit the Guardianship, meant that only an Aghsán, whom they interpreted to mean a blood relative of Bahá’u’lláh (i.e. not only a son), was eligible to inherit the Guardianship as was evidenced in their proclamation when they stated: "The Aghsán (branches) one and all are either dead or have been declared violators of the Covenant by the Guardian for their faithlessness to the Master’s Will and Testament . . . " and for this reason they go on to say: "no successor to Shoghi Effendi could have been appointed by him . . ." In making this statement it showed that they were obviously unaware of or chose to ignore the fact that Shoghi Effendi had identified the Aghsán on page 239 of "God Passes By" as the sons of Bahá’u’lláh only. Falsely interpreting the terms of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Will in this way, and thereby convinced that Shoghi Effendi had been unable to appoint a successor resulted in their tragic loss of faith in the inviolability and indestructibility of the Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh and in the immutability and immortality of every clause of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. Furthermore, laboring under this conviction, their minds were firmly closed to any alternatives and therefore the Hands inevitably failed to recognize the one whom Shoghi Effendi had appointed as his successor, in the manner described earlier, and then, in their blindness and loss of faith in the Covenant and in the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá made the fateful and tragic decision that the Guardianship of the Faith had forever ended. The Hands then foisted upon the Bahá’í World, initially as a substitute for the Guardianship, the illegitimate body of nine so-called Custodians of the Faith, as discussed above, which, upon its demise in 1963, would be replaced by an elected equally illegitimate sans-Guardian Universal House of Justice as part of a man-made administrative system that included institutions outside the provisions of the divinely-conceived, sacred and immutable provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. Under this man-made and corrupted administrative system the Faith would be without a Guardian as "the Center of the Cause" and "the Guardian of the Administrative Order," without future Hands of the Cause (upon the demise of those that had been appointed by Shoghi Effendi) and without a Universal House of Justice presided over by, and afforded the protection and guidance of the Guardian of the Faith, as the "sacred head" of this supreme legislative organ of the Faith whose presence on that body was essential and indispensable, as explained by Shoghi Effendi in his writings, if it were to be the complete, legitimate and infallible body described in ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Will and Testament.

As planned and announced by the Hands in the proclamation they issued following the first conclave at Bahji, the election of the sans-Guardian Universal House of Justice by the Bahá’í National Spiritual Assemblies throughout the world took place in 1963 and it is this body that has published in 1992 (reprinted with corrections in 1997), the book which is the subject of this review, titled: THE MINISTRY OF THE CUSTODIANS. This book is comprised of a two-page preface and twenty-two page introduction written by the widow of Shoghi Effendi, Amatu’l-Bahá Rúhíyyih Khánum, followed by 433 pages that, include official statements, proclamations, an affidavit, a certification, resolutions, conclave messages, a press release, and declarations made by the Hands as well as correspondence between the Custodians and their fellow-Hands, letters from the Custodians to NSA’s, pledges of loyalty from NSA’s to the Custodians and Ridván messages from the Custodians to the believers all of which have been reproduced from the files that had been maintained by these so-called nine Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith at the World Center of the Faith following the passing of Shoghi Effendi, a patently illicit body, as discussed above, which reigned supreme over the Bahá’í world, with the approval of their fellow-Hands and the Bahá’í National Spiritual Assemblies throughout the world during a period of some five and a half years from November 25, 1957 to June 7, 1963.

Included in the opening pages of this publication is a table that records the names of all of the Hands of the Cause, including the four Hands of the Cause appointed by Bahá’u’lláh and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá during their respective Ministries, the ten names of those appointed posthumously by Shoghi Effendi. This table records the dates of the birth and death of the Hands from which it may be observed that, as of the date of publication of the book, all of the Hands of the Cause have passed away with the possible exception of Ali-Akbar Furútan, born in 1905 and Valíyu"’lláh Varqá, born in 1911, who may be assumed to have either passed away or to be no longer able to function by this time. Therefore, the Institution of the Hands of the Cause that had been designated by Shoghi Effendi in his very last message to the Bahá’í World, before his passing, as "the Chief Stewards of Bahá’u’lláh’s embryonic World Commonwealth" and, as already explained, had been falsely interpreted by Rúhíyiyh Khánum in her introduction to this book to mean that they had become "the ruling and guiding body of the entire Bahá’í world" and characterized by the entire body of the Hands in their "Unanimous Proclamation" of 25 November, 1957 as "the supreme body of the Bahá’í World Community" has already come to an end under their sans-Guardian Faith. One may well ask how any clear-thinking believer, much less the Hands of the Cause, could have come to believe that Shoghi Effendi would have envisaged, as they did, that this Institution delineated in the sacred and immutable Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá would remain in existence but a few years during the embryonic stage of Bahá’u’lláh’s World Commonwealth only to come to an early end as the Hands that he had appointed passed away well before this Commonwealth had emerged from its embryonic stage and this divinely-conceived Institution had attained the plenitude of its powers? Indeed, if the Hands had been more perceptive they may have realized that in Shoghi Effendi’s referral to them as the "Chief Stewards of Bahá’u’lláh’s embryonic World Commonwealth" he had linked the Institution of the Hands inextricably to the future existence of that Commonwealth, an Institution that could not continue to remain in existence without the future existence of the Institution of the Guardianship, as well. For had they recalled the Words of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá concerning the embryo and its development (See page 313 BWF) they may have perceived that in applying His words to the development of their own embryonic Institution they would have perceived that the Chief Stewards were an inseparable part of that Commonwealth and that Shoghi Effendi would not have stated that the Hands were the Chief Stewards of Bahá’u’lláh’s Commonwealth in its embryonic stage had he not envisaged that the Hands of the Cause, would necessarily continue to remain its Chief Stewards through the remaining stages of that Commonwealth’s development until it reached the plenitude of its powers in the Golden Age of the Faith. They then may have also perceived that, for there to be Chief Stewards–Hands of the Cause–in a future fully developed Commonwealth, Shoghi Effendi had, in this indirect way, foretold and promised that the Guardianship would exist in that Commonwealth as well for only future Guardians had the authority to appoint Hands of the Cause.

With these introductory comments in mind let us now review certain additional passages found in Rúhíyiyh Khánum’s introduction to this book which deserve comment before passing on to the main body of the publication.

She maintained that the twenty-seven Hands of the Cause living at the time of Shoghi Effendi’s passing "were suddenly obliged to assume the leadership of the Cause of God pending the time when the Universal House of Justice could be elected on a firm basis," this projected House of Justice, of course, being established according to their plans minus its "sacred head"–the Guardian of the Cause–as prescribed by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in His Will and Testament and therefore incomplete, defective and illegitimate. More importantly, these ill-conceived plans showed that she, as well as the other Hands, had been blind to the fact that the Universal House of Justice had already been created in its embryonic form by Shoghi Effendi years earlier under the temporary title of International Bahá’í Council and had been described by him in his proclamatory cable of 9 January, 1951 as "this first embryonic International Institution." His decision to form this body had been extolled by him as "the most significant milestone in the evolution of the Administrative Order of the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh" since the Ascension of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. Surprisingly, Rúhíyyih Khánum quotes passages from this proclamatory cable but omits the passage wherein Shoghi Effendi states; "Hail with thankful, joyous heart at long last the constitution of International Council which history will acclaim as the greatest event shedding lustre upon the second epoch of Formative Age of Bahá’í Dispensation potentially unsurpassed by any enterprise undertaken since the inception of Administrative Order of Faith on morrow of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Ascension, ranking second only to glorious immortal events asssociated with Ministries of the Three Central Figures of Faith . . . " (the second epoch started in 1946).

How was it possible for the Hands and especially Rúhíyyih Khánum to overlook or ignore an event that Shoghi Effendi had described in such superlative terms as an "historic decision marking most significant milestone in evolution of Administrative Order" and one "which history will acclaim as the greatest event . . . potentially unsurpassed by any enterprise undertaken since the inception of Administrative Order. . ."? And how could they ignore the glowing and unprecedented terms that he had used in acclaiming the establishment of this "Nascent Institution" and an Institution that he had further identified as this "this first embryonic International Institution" and not perceive that he had created unquestionably, nothing less than the Universal House of Justice whose establishment "at long last" in its embryonic form he had now proclaimed?

Having quoted some but not all of the above passages in Shoghi Effendi’s proclamatory cable, Rúhíyyih Khánum goes on to name the officers of the Council appointed by Shoghi Effendi as "Mason Remey, its President, Amelia Collins, its Vice President, Leroy Ioas, its Secretary General and Ugo Giachery, its Member at Large" as well as herself identified by Shoghi Effendi as the "chosen liaison between me and the Council" all of whom were also appointed by Shoghi Effendi as Hands of the Cause some twelve months later on 24 December, 1951 with the exception of Rúhíyyih Khánum, (appointed on 26 March, 1952). Strangely enough, it obviously never crossed her mind to ask herself why it was necessary for Shoghi Effendi to appoint her as the liaison between himself and the Council even though he met the Council members almost every night at the dinner table and could have given them instructions directly at that time. She obviously never realized the significance, as will be discussed below, of her being made this liaison between Shoghi Effendi and the Council or perceived the reason why Shoghi Effendi had never instructed its President, Mason Remey, to activate this Council and preside over it as an actively functioning body during the remaining years of his ministry. Mason Remey has recorded this fact in the diary that he maintained during this period pointing out that Shoghi Effendi had assigned tasks only to individual members of the Council pertaining to the initial functions of the Council as outlined in his cable of 9 January, 1951.

Although Rúhíyyih Khánum quoted the significant passage contained in Shoghi Effendi’s cable of 30 June, 1952 in which he stated that "at long last the machinery of its highest institutions has been erected" and around its most holy Shrines "the supreme organs of its unfolding Order, are in their embryonic form unfolding" she failed, as did her fellow Hands, (with a single notable exception) to perceive that Shoghi Effendi, in this statement, clearly indicated that the Universal House of Justice had "at long last" been established by him, albeit in its embryonic form, and that it was incorrect for the Hands to plan for the premature election of what was to be their headless "Supreme Body" in 1963 at which time they further planned to hand over the "temporary headship of the Bahá’í Faith" that they had usurped in 1957 to this equally illegitmate body.

Nor did Rúhíyyih Khánum cite the several stages through which the Council would evolve in its projected development as outlined by Shoghi Effendi or indicate that it was only the second stage in its development–the International Bahá’í Court–that Shoghi Effendi had made an objective to be accomplished by the end of the Ten Year Crusade (according to the goals outlined in the booklet compiled by Shoghi Effendi titled: "Ten Year International Bahá’í Teaching and Consolidation Plan 1953-1963"). Nor did she point out that Shoghi Effendi had never envisaged that the Universal House of Justice would be established in its final stage of "efflorescence" by 1963, as planned by the Hands, a stage which would by-pass completely the International Court whose establishment Shoghi Effendi had stated was "an essential prelude" to the establishment of the Universal House of Justice, and would rush its "transformation into a duly elected body" by 1961 for only a brief period of less than two years before its election as the sans-Guardian Universal House of Justice in 1963. This speeded-up and fractured evolution of what continued to be a headless and deformed body and its premature election in its final form would, aside from the fact that it was illegitimate, be definitely in advance of the stage of "efflorescence" that Shoghi Effendi had obviously envisaged would only ultimately be realized in the more distant future when the Faith, itself, had reached a considerably more advanced stage in its development.

Returning to the subject of the International Council, Rúhíyyih Khánum did not outline the initial three functions assigned by Shoghi Effendi to the Council, as outlined in his Proclamatory cable of 9 January, 1951. These were: "first, to forge links with with authorities of newly emerged State; second, to assist me to discharge responsibilities involved in erection of mighty superstructure of Báb’s Holy Shrine; third, to conduct negotiations related to matters of personal status with civil authorities."

Shoghi Effendi stated in this same cable that "To these will be added further functions in course of evolution of this first embryonic International Institution . . ." In recognition of this statement by Shoghi Effendi the Custodians added relatively insignificant additional functions which will be listed in later pages of this review that certainly will be readily recognized as completely inappropriate functions for a Council whose establishment as the embryonic Universal House of Justice had been hailed by Shoghi Effendi as "the most significant milestone in evolution of Administrative Order of the Faith" since the inception of that Order. Nor did Rúhíyyih Khánum question, much less perceive, as stated earlier, the reason why Shoghi Effendi had announced that she was the "chosen liaison" between himself and the Council (in his cable, 8 March, 1952) nor did she consider the highly significant implications that were to be found in her acting in this liaison capacity. For by appointing her as a liaison between himself and the Council–the embryonic Universal House of Justice–(symbolically, an umbilical cord relationship to an embryonic body) he was able to preclude the assumption of the Presidency of this embryonic Universal House of Justice, himself which then would have deposed the one whom he had appointed to this position (Mason Remey). This Council, upon its emergence or birth from its then inactive stage into its second and the first active stage projected by Shoghi Effendi as the International Bahá’í Court, would in its relation to the six Bahá’í National Spiritual Assemblies that had themselves become National Bahá’í Courts (as outlined by Shoghi Effendi) exercise authority over them, and attain a stage in the development of the Council that Shoghi Effendi had stated in his cable of 25 April, 1951, would be, as previously mentioned, an "essential prelude to the institution of the Universal House of Justice." ¹ This obviously active stage in the development of the International Council would necessarily have to await the initial establishment of the "six national Bahá’í Courts in the chief cities of the Islamic East, Tihrán, Cairo, Baghdád, New Delhi, Karachi, and Kabul" that Shoghi Effendi had identified in his cable of 8 October, 1952, in which he had launched the "decade-long, world-embracing Spiritual Crusade" and had specified that the International Bahá’í Court (and NOT the Universal House of Justice) would be a goal to be accomplished by the end of this Crusade in 1963. It is clear that only the Guardian of the Faith could assume the Presidency or, in those cases where judicial functions were involved, serve, as it were, as the Chief Judge of this International Bahá’í Court that would be exercising supreme judicial authority over these six subordinate National Bahá’í Courts, applying the Laws of the Aqdas to those Bahá’ís residing in these respective countries (subject to authority to do so first obtained from and granted by the respective national governments of these countries).

At this juncture, it would be desirable to digress for a moment to remind the reader of the following distinction between the roles of the Universal House of Justice and the Hands of the Cause of God as delineated in the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. The Universal House of Justice is the supreme legislative organ of the Bahá’í Administrative Order while, as ‘Abdu’l-Bahá states in His Testament "The obligations of the Hands of the Cause of God are to diffuse the Divine Fragrances, to edify the souls of men, to promote learning, to improve the character of all men and to be at all times and under all conditions, sanctified and detached from earthly things" and, as pointed out by Shoghi Effendi in his cable of 6 April, 1954, they are "destined to assume in the fullness of time, under the aegis of the Guardian, the dual sacred responsibility for protection and propagation of the Cause of Bahá’u’lláh."

It may be seen from the foregoing that the Hands have not been assigned any executive functions by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and therefore it should have been clear to them following the passing of Shoghi Effendi that under the terms of His Will and Testament they had no authority to assume that they "were now the only ones to direct the Bahá’í’s of the world" and that their "paramount, supremely urgent task . . . " "was to ensure that everything connected with the affairs, direction and administration of the Faith was solidly and speedily vested in the Institution of the Hands" as stated by Rúhíyyih Khánum in her introduction to the book under review or that they had the authority to create an illegitimate body–the "Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith"–to assume "temporary headship of the Bahá’í Faith" even convinced as they were that the Guardianship had come to an end with the passing of Shoghi Effendi. This collective "headship" would be short-lived in any case as they envisaged their own demise in this role upon the election of a sans-Guardian Universal House of Justice in 1963, blindly ignoring the fact that this body had already been created in 1951, in its embryonic form, by Shoghi Effendi and that it was this embryonic body that should have been permitted upon the passing of Shoghi Effendi to emerge into an actively functioning body which would then at that time have exercised authority over the existing National Spiritual Assemblies precluding any need for the creation of their illegitimate body of Custodians. Presiding as President of this International Council would have been its irremovable and legitimate head, Mason Remey, who had been appointed by Shoghi Effendi to this position and who, while this body had been retained by Shoghi Effendi until his passing in its embryonic inactive stage, had been the Guardian-to-be but, upon the Council’s assumption of an active role, should then have been recognized as none other than the second Guardian of the Faith. As clear as this should have been to the Hands, if they had still entertained any remaining doubt that the International Bahá’í Council was at the very outset of its formation the highest legislative Institution of the Faith, they would only have had to note Shoghi Effendi’s reaffirmation of this fact in his cable of 30 June,1952, significantly quoted by Rúhíyyih Khánum in her introductory remarks but the tremendous implications of which had been inexplicably overlooked by her, as well as the other Hands, in spite of the fact that he had clearly stated that "at long last the machinery of its highest institutions has been erected" and around its most holy Shrines "the supreme organs of its unfolding Order, are in their embryonic form, unfolding"–these highest institutions and supreme organs being unmistakably none other than the Universal House of Justice (established in his proclamatory cable of 9 January, 1951) and the Hands of the Cause, (the first contingent having been named on 24 December, 1951). To reiterate, had the Hands, upon the passing of Shoghi Effendi, permitted this embryonic Institution that he had already established to become an actively functioning body and assume the same role and functions as they expected their sans-Guardian and hence headless Universal House of Justice to assume in 1963 they would have inevitably come to the realization that, as only the Guardian can preside as the "sacred head" of the Universal House of Justice, Mason Remey who had been appointed by Shoghi Effendi to this position was unquestionably his rightful successor and the second Guardian of the Faith.

It should now be clearly evident that the body of the so-called Custodians established by the Hands was not only an illegitimate body but a completely superfluous one established outside the provisions of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Will and Testament, a Document which Shoghi Effendi has extolled in his writings as the very "Child of the Covenant," the "Charter of the New World Order," "the Heir of both the Originator and the Interpreter of the Law of God" and therefore a Charter that "can no more be divorced from Him Who supplied the original and motivating impulse [Bahá’u’lláh] than from the One [‘Abdu’l-Bahá] Who ultimtely conceived it" and the reason why it should be considered as reflecting the Will of Bahá’u’lláh as much as that of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá who actually penned this sacred Document and why its provisions should be considered as immutable and destined to remain inviolate and operable as long as the Dispensation of Bahá’u’lláh, itself, endures. Moreover, as further affirmation of this fact, Shoghi Effendi has equated the sacredness and immutability of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá with Bahá’u’lláh’s Most Holy Book, the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, stating that they were "inseparable parts of one complete unit."

Before completing comments made by Rúhíyyih Khánum in her introduction to the book let us look at obviously untruthful statements that she made concerning the matter of succession and the devious way in which she falsified the reason why Mason Remey had declared himself Shoghi Effendi’s successsor. She had this to say: "Year after year we could come to no conclusion about whether the Guardianship was closed for the period of this Faith . . . . One of us, Mason Remey, one of the oldest and most distinguished, solved his personal dilemma by concluding that the Bahá’í Faith could not go on without a Guardian and that undoubtedly Shoghi Effendi’s successsor was himself–for various invalid and unprovable reasons, such as that he was one of the earliest, famous believers of the West, had been made a Hand of the Cause by Shoghi Effendi and [appointed by him] President of the International Bahá’í Council. . . . Mason Remey’s activities beginning in 1960, when he ‘proclaimed’ himself the second Guardian, were a profound source of embarrassment to his fellow-Hands who . . . now found themselves obliged to remonstrate with, admonish, warn, expose and finally excommunicate him."

The Hands, of course, had no authority to excommunicate a fellow-Hand as this authority resides only in the Guardian of the Faith according to the explicit provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and moreover this authority had also been retained by Shoghi Effendi with respect to all believers.

With the foregoing in mind, let us consider some of the acts decisions and statements of the Custodians recorded in the book under review that clearly and sadly reaffirm the extent to which they had strayed from the Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh in repudiating both major provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and the acts and writings of Shoghi Effendi.

Believing as they did that the Guardianship had been terminated and as stated by Rúhíyyih Khánum: "All the legal powers at the World Center of the Faith–which had been vested in Shoghi Effendi as the appointed successsor of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá– were left in limbo when he passed away as he himself had made neither a will nor a statement of his intentions" the Hands deemed it necessary to "legally establish the principle that the Guardian held all properties as the Head of the Faith and not as an individual" and they were successful in doing this and "to have this priceless heritage safely placed in the hands of the Custodians."

One of the first acts of the Custodians, acting under the advice of their attorney was to request in a letter dated December 2, 1957, addressed to the 26 National Spiritual Assemblies of the Bahá’í World that they submit a letter to them "recognizing us as the supreme body in the Cause and including the following sentence: ‘We pledge our full support, faith and allegiance to the body of the Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith elected by the Hands of the Cause.’"

It may be noted from the above that the National Spiritual Assemblies were requested to include an untruthful statement in the letters requested from them (of alleged legal value, too) in stating that the Custodians had been "elected by the Hands of the Cause" whereas they had been appointed by them. An interesting review of the letters received by the Custodians in response to their request reflects the following:

• Twenty-one Assemblies declared their loyalty to the Custodians that had been elected.

• Three Assemblies declared their loyalty to the Custodians who they recognized, in a contradictory statement, as being both elected and appointed.

• One Assembly declared their loyalty to the Custodians who had been appointed by the entire body of the "Custodians" obviously meaning to say the entire body of the Hands.

• One Assembly did not include the statement of loyalty requested nor did they include the name of the Custodians in the text of their letter although it had been obviously addressed to them.

Keeping in mind that the Hands of the Cause in their "Unanimous Proclamation" of 25 November had referred to themselves as: "the supreme body of the Bahá’í World Community" and quoted the following: "in accordance with the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, ‘the Hands of the Cause of God must elect from their own number nine persons that shall at all times be occupied in the important services in the work of the Guardian of the Cause of God’" they then made the incongruous statement that "We nominate and appoint from our own number to act on our behalf as the Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith to exercise . . . all such functions, rights and powers in succession to the Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith" thus conferring upon this body a collective Guardianship of the Faith.

A further review of the statements contained in the letters from the Assemblies attesting to their loyalty to the Custodians reveals the degree to which some of them have misstated and greatly exaggerated the role of a body that the Hands had planned would exist only provisionally and which, in fact, would no longer exist, in any case, as a complete body of nine Hands, as incapacitation, inability to serve, or death inevitably overtook them one by one, and less than nine Hands of the Cause remained alive to constitute this body or as the Hands stated in their proclamation: "until such time as the Universal House of Justice, upon being duly established and elected in conformity with the Sacred Writings of Bahá’u’lláh and the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá may otherwise determine." ²

The reader thoroughly familiar with the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and the writings of Shoghi Effendi will note that the Hands, in the quoted statement above, have made a blatantly untrue statement and one designed to give the impression that the sans-Guardian Universal House of Justice they were planning to establish in 1963 is a legitimate body. While the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh do not specifically mention the Institution of the Guardianship, per se, "the verses of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas," as Shoghi Effendi has stated, "clearly anticipate the institution of the Guardianship" while the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá which, according to the writings of Shoghi Effendi, as already discussed, represents the Will of Bahá’u’lláh, as well, requires the Guardian to preside over the Universal House of Justice as its "sacred head." In this capacity, he exercises irreplaceable and indispensable functions, in the absence of which, this institution could not be an infallible body, as emphasized by Shoghi Effendi in his work: "The Dispensation of Bahá’u’lláh." Therefore, it is crystal clear that the sans-Guardian Universal House of Justice that the Hands were planning to establish in 1963 would not be established in accordance with the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and would therefore be unquestionably and indisputably a deformed fallible and therefore illegitimate body aside from the fact that it was also being established in a final stage of development that was premature and far in advance of the time envisaged by Shoghi Effendi.

Let us return to and consider the startling and erroneous statements that were made in some of the letters that the Assemblies submitted in response to the letter from the Custodians in which they recognized this illegitimate so-called "institution" and admittedly temporary body in the following terms:

Surprisingly, the Hands even issued a press release in which they included the same untruthful statement that they had requested the National and Regional Assemblies to make which read in part: "the Hands of the Bahá’í Faith . . . have elected nine of their members to conduct and protect the affairs of the Faith from its World Centre."

The book under review records that, although the entire body of the Hands at the close of their first conclave made the following laudatory statements in their proclamation concerning the International Bahá’í Council, they incredibly failed to perceive that as, in fact, the Universal House of Justice had been actually established in its embryonic form by Shoghi it should have been permitted, following his passing, to emerge from its inactive stage and assume an active role in administering the affairs of the Faith. For they wrote:

"Has not the Guardian, moreover in his mysterious insight into the present and future needs of the Bahá’í community called into being the International Bahá’í Council . . . the institution destined to evolve into the Universal House of Justice."

"As to the International Bahá’í Council, appointed by the Guardian and heralded in his communications to the Bahá’í world, that body will in the course of time finally fulfil its purpose through the formation of the Universal House of Justice, that Supreme Body upon which infallibility, as the Master’s Testament assures us, is divinely conferred." [their "in the course of time" was its establishment in 1963]

Certainly, it was not necessary to schedule the premature election of the Universal House of Justice in 1963 before the International Council could assume under that name active administrative jurisdiction over the then National and Regional Spiritual Assemblies. Instead, as they did not even consider that this role should be assumed immediately by the Council they took it upon themselves, without any authority to do so, as Rúhíyyih Khánum has admitted in her own quoted words in the opening paragraph of this review, to assign this role to an illegitimate body to which they gave the title of "Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith."

It may be noted that the Hands had now conferred the term "Supreme Body" on three bodies simultaneously in their corrupted version of the Bahá’í Administrative Order, namely: the entire body of the Hands of the Cause, the body of the Custodians and the Universal House of Justice none of which ironically deserve this appellation based on the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and the writings of Shoghi Effendi. At the time of this writing, the Custodians have already ceased to exist while the institution of the Hands of the Cause, in their sans-Guardian Faith, will no longer exist with the passing of the remaining two very aged Hands of the Cause, whose life may have already come to an end as this is written, a fact that further shows the fallacy of their referring simultaneously to these two bodies as the supreme institution of the Faith both with a life-expectancy of such brief duration.

In their Ridván message of 1958 the Custodians admit two things: the first being that they were an appointed body and not an elected one and the second that they were given the name of "Custodians" "as a purely legal measure in order to protect the Faith." They might have added the statement made by Rúhíyyih Khánum in her introductory remarks that: "the Hands were able . . . to successfully and legally establish the principle that the Guardian held all properties as the Head of the Faith and not as an individual, and to have this priceless heritage safely placed in the hands of the Custodians."

The above statement was contained in the first Ridván message dispatched by the Custodians "to Annual Bahá’í Conventions" throughout the world. It should be said that this message as well as those Ridván messages dispatched in subsequent years were invariably very well written and obviously written by Rúhíhyih Khánum whose style is unmistakable and authorship also evident as she frequently mentions facts about Shoghi Effendi which would only have been known to her although she was undoubtedly assisted by others in the accumulation of statistical information that pertained to the achievement of the goals of the Ten Year Global Crusade and usually incorporated in the Ridván messages released to the Bahá’í world Of course, it had not been necessary for her to be a member of the Custodians to perform this task. As a member of the International Bahá’í Council she could have done the same had that Council been permitted by the Hands, as it should have been, to assume its rightful active role as the supreme legislative body in the Bahá’í world exercising jurisdiction over the National Assemblies each of which had been assigned responsibility by Shoghi Effendi for achieving specific goals of the Global Crusade.

As additional National Spiritual Assemblies were formed during Ridván 1958, the Custodians, or as they preferred to call themselves "Hands of the Cause in the Holy Land," requested these Assemblies to submit a pledge of loyalty recognizing them as "the supreme body of the Faith" as they had requested the older Assemblies to do in 1957. This time however they revised the requested statement of loyalty from these Assemblies to show truthfully that the body of the Custodians had been "selected" instead of elected.

A brief digression from a review of the book should be made to mention the events that led up to Mason Remey’s condemnation by his fellow-Hands and their ultimate expulsion of him from the Faith as recorded in the book, a nefarious act for which they possessed no authority whatsoever.

As Mason Remey had been summoned by Shoghi Effendi to come to Haifa in 1950 and thereafter make it his permanent home and, moreover, as he had been appointed the President of the International Bahá’í Council by Shoghi Effendi which required his presence at the World Administrative Center of the Faith, it was inevitable that he would be appointed by his fellow-Hands as one of the Custodians of the Faith. But this did not mean that he accepted, in his own mind, this body as a temporary collegial body substituting for the Guardianship of the Faith or that he believed that the institution of the Guardianship had come to an end with the passing of Shoghi Effendi. Quite the contrary, his "Daily Observations" written during the period of some two and a half years that he remained with the body of the Custodians clearly reveals that he repeatedly and consistently appealed to and implored his fellow-Custodians, almost on a daily basis, during this period to reconsider the tragic, ill-considered and hasty decision that had been taken at the first conclave of the Hands to terminate forever the institution of the Guardianship but all to no avail. As a result and greatly frustrated by these fruitless efforts, he decided in 1959 to leave Haifa and return to the United States where he felt that as he would then be away from the pressures of Haifa it would be more conducive to his formulation of appeals to the Hands on the subject of the Guardianship. In due course, he did this very thing in several magnificently written appeals that shall forever remain gloriously inscribed in the annals of Bahá’í history and be extolled by those believers of future Bahá’í generations who read them and who have embraced a Faith in which the Guardianship of the Cause of God has been restored together with the divinely-appointed international institutions in complete accordance with the Bahá’í Administrative Order as delineated by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in His sacred and immutable Will and Testament.

Extracted below is a portion of these "Daily Observations" that poignantly outlines Mason Remey’s reasons for making his decision to leave Haifa which he felt was imperative, critical and vital for the future existence of the Faith:

These "Daily Observations" will also reveal that it was while Mason Remey was travelling aboard ship on his return to the United States that, for the first time, he perceived the way in which he had been appointed by Shoghi Effendi as his successor which because it had not been expected in this manner had remained unrecognized by his fellow-Hands and the Bahá’í world at large who had been erroneously expecting that Shoghi Effendi would leave a conventional testamentary document appointing a successor. Finally, after failing to achieve any results in his written appeals to his fellow-Hands he addressed his Proclamation to the Bahá’í World during Ridván 1960. It was then that the Custodians released the following highly condemnatory cable to all of their fellow-Hands and to all National Assemblies under date of 28 April, 1960, as recorded in the book:

"DEEPLY REGRET NECESSITY INFORM BAHAI WORLD HAND CAUSE MASON REMEY NOW ASSERTING HE IS GUARDIAN FAITH STOP THIS PREPOSTEROUS CLAIM CLEARLY CONTRARY SACRED TEXT CAN ONLY BE REGARDED AS EVIDENCE PROFOUND EMOTIONAL DISTURBANCE STOP CALL UPON BELIEVERS EVERYWHERE JOIN HANDS COMPLETE REPUDIATION THIS MISGUIDED ACTION STOP SHARE THIS MESSAGE FRIENDS."

The Custodians then dispatched a letter to Mason, under date of April 30, 1960, quoting the text of the cable above and informing him that it had been addressed to the Assemblies and to the "Continental Hands."

It is not certain how many National Assemblies received Mason Remey’s proclamation directly from him and therefore had the opportunity to read it (as it would have required a translation in those countries where English was not understood). Certainly there were some Assemblies where its members would have been unable to read it for themselves and discover, as revealed by Mason Remey, the unanticipated manner in which he had been appointed by Shoghi Effendi as his successor and then have judged the validity of this appointment. Ultimately all of the Assemblies, with the exception of the National Assembly of France, were influenced by the highly condemnatory cable quoted above that the "Custodians" lost no time in issuing and rejecting him without further question.

As this writer was President (the term President being used in France instead of Chairman) of the National Spiritual Assembly of France when the Proclamation of Mason Remey was received directly from him, he can attest to the fact that this National Spiritual Assembly, undeterred and uninfluenced by the cable issued by the Custodians denouncing Mason Remey, provided its members the time to carefully re-examine pertinent provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, the writings of Shoghi Effendi and to pray and meditate on this startling news before taking a vote on whether to accept Mason Remey as the second Guardian of the Faith. When the vote was finally taken eight of the members voted to accept him as the second Guardian of the Faith, while one member, incensed by this decision took it upon himself, to immediately absent himself and without the knowledge of the Assembly, to telephone Haifa and report this decision to the Custodians. Subsequently, three of these members succumbed to pressure and fell by the wayside but the President, Secretary and Treasurer and two other members remained steadfast, including General Derakhchan formerly a member of the National Spiritual Assembly of Iran.

As a result, a letter was sent to the "National Spiritual Assembly and the Believers of France" by the Custodians under the date of May 5, 1960, stating that: "The Hands in the Holy Land are sending the Hand of the Cause Abu’l-Qásim Faizi to France, to meet with the National Spiritual Assembly and the Bahá’ís of France and to act on behalf of the Hands for the protection of the Faith in the situation created by Mr. Remey’s unfounded claim." They added that, "He is empowered to take whatever steps may be necessary to carry out these instructions." And, ironically enough, they ended this letter as they did with all of their communications with the phrase, "In the service of the beloved Guardian" as though Shoghi Effendi was still the Guardian and residing in Haifa ignoring the fact that the Guardianship is clearly a function of this world according to the terms of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and emphasized by Shoghi Effendi in his writings and messages. Nevertheless, convinced as they were that the Guardianship had come to an end, the Hands, in the spiritual blindness that possessed them, tragically failed to realize that, in reality, they were guilty of rejecting and denouncing his appointed successor and thereby undeniably leading the believers astray from the Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh and repudiating the most important provisions of its sacred and immortal "Child"–the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá.

On May 28^th the Custodians announced in a letter addressed to the Hands of the Cause and the National Assemblies throughout the Bahá’í World that messages had been received from all National and Regional Spiritual Assemblies "pledging undeviating loyalty to the Institution of the Hands of the Cause" . . . with the exception of the National Assembly of France." They further announced that "a group of five members of the French National Assembly accepted Mr. Remey as the Guardian of the Faith, and the National Assembly informed the believers in France of the advent of a new Guardian." They continued by stating that Mr. Faizi had been sent to France "as their representative, with specific instructions to dissolve the National Assembly and call for a new election if the five members persisted in their dangerous and disloyal course of action." If the reader refers back to the functions of the Hands of the Cause outlined earlier, as delineated in the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, it may be seen that they have no authority over National Spiritual Assemblies much less the authority to dissolve them. Of course, in the sans-Guardian organization that the Hands had substituted for the divinely-appointed System bequeathed to us by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, in which they usurped the functions of the Guardianship, they did not consider themselves constrained in any way by the provisions of His Will.

The lurid details of Mr. Faizi’s efforts and machinations upon his arrival in France may be found in the French section of the Internet Home Page of the present Guardian of the Faith at the following Internet address:

PREFACE.

http://bahai-guardian.com/nsa.france.html.

The above letter of May 28^th from the Hands then continues with an attempt to discredit Mason Remey’s explanation of the manner in which he inherited the Guardianship by not only misquoting what he had to say in his Proclamation but by distorting, as well, the manner in which the Universal House of Justice is constituted as delineated in the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. For this is what they had to say: "Mr. Remey makes the preposterous claim that since the International Bahá’í Council was referred to by our beloved Guardian as the forerunner of the supreme administrative institution of the Universal House of Justice, his appointment or designation by Shoghi Effendi as President of this appointed body meant that he would automatically become the head of the Universal House of Justice when it is elected and therefore is now to be considered as the Guardian of the Faith." His actual statement which is at complete variance with what they have cited above will be quoted after quoting the following further erroneous statement that they made concerning the constitution of the Universal House of Justice to support their fallacious contention that his Presidency of the International Council did not carry over into the other stages of this embryonic body as it evolved and finally became in its efflorescent stage the Universal House of Justice. This is what they wrote: ". . . the beloved Guardian created the International Council as an appointed body, to serve for a temporary period, with functions clearly defined by him and that he announced it would be transformed into a ‘duly elected body."’ Thus the membership and officers of the elected body would be created only by election, not appointment. There is not the slightest indication in any text or message or the beloved Guardian that Mr. Remey’s designation as President of the appointed International Council was any more permanent than that of any other appointed members or officers." The above misleading statement disregards completely the implications of Shoghi Effendi’s Proclamation of 9 January, 1951, and his message of 2 March, 1951, which identifies Mason Remey as the appointed President of the International Bahá’í Council which in its final stage of development as the Universal House of Justice is presided over by the Guardian of the Faith. But what about the intermediary stages as the International Bahá’í Court and the "elected body"? This will be discussed below and it will become evident that Mason Remey had been fully identified as the future Guardian by virtue of his openly announced appointment to this non-elective Office by Shoghi Effendi and therefore required no further written confirmation by Shoghi Effendi, to validate his accession to the Guardianship, as contended by the Hands.

The above statement made by the Hands reveals glaring misstatements, made either through ignorance, lack of understanding, or deliberately to obscure the truth, of the facts based on the written unambiguous words of Shoghi Effendi as found in his historic Proclamation of 9 January, 1951, establishing the Council and in his message to the Bahá’í world of 30 June, 1952:

The International Bahá’í Council appointed by Shoghi Effendi on 9 January, 1951, was no more meant to be a temporary appointment of this institution, as claimed by the Hands, than his appointment of the first contingent of the living Hands of the Cause on 24 December, 1951, for he referred to this Council in his Proclamation as a "Nascent Institution" whose formation was the "most significant milestone in the evolution of Administrative Order of the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh in the course of the last thirty years" (i.e. since the Ascension of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and the inception of the Administrative Order) and as "this first embryonic International Institution," whose constitution he hailed "at long last" as previously quoted as "the greatest event shedding lustre upon the second epoch of the Formative Age of the Bahá’í Dispensation," terms which anyone with even a modicum of intelligence can perceive do not apply to an Institution that will only "serve for a temporary period" as alleged by the Hands.

Having appointed both the International Council and the Hands of the Cause, Shoghi Effendi made the following announcement in his cable of 30 June, 1952: "At the World Center of the Faith, where, at long last, the machinery of its highest institutions has been erected, and around whose most holy shrines the supreme organs of its unfolding order, are, in their embryonic form, unfolding; . . . " These highest institutions that had, at long last, been erected were, of course, none other than the Universal House of Justice and the Hands of the Cause, both in their embryonic form at present, but destined to be born in the future as fully developed institutions exercising the plenitude of their powers simultaneously upon the birth of "Bahá’u’lláh’s embryonic World Commonwealth," itself.

As Shoghi Effendi has indicated in his message that both of these institutions were in their embryonic form let us recall the words of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá wherein He states, "the embryo possesses from the first all perfections . . . in one word all the powers–but they are not visible and become so only by degrees." It should be evident, therefore, from these words of, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá that the appointed Head of the embryonic body of the International Council (i.e., its President, Mason Remey) would not become severed at some point during the embryonic development of the Council but would remain an integral and indispensable part of that body (just as the head of a baby does throughout its development in the womb of the mother) through all the stages of its embryonic development including its final stage of birth as the Universal House of Justice. This irremovable Head appointed by Shoghi Effendi is, therefore, never elected, as maintained by the Hands in their statement, in contrast to the members of this body who, as outlined by Shoghi Effendi, become elected when reaching the third stage of the development of the Council.

The second stage of the Council’s development, as outlined by Shoghi Effendi–the International Bahá’í Court–has been omitted entirely by the Hands in their statement.. And it is this stage in the development of the Council that this writer reminded Rúhíyyih Khánum in his letter to her at Ridván 1988 of Shoghi Effendi’s remarks at the dinner table one evening during his pilgrimage in 1952, when in our presence and that of the other members of the Council who were then permanently residing in Haifa, he had stated: "the present President of the International Bahá’í Council will then become the Judge." It is evident from that statement, too, that it was Shoghi Effendi’s intention that Mason Remey should remain the irremovable Head of the embryonic Council in all of its stages of development and in this definitely active stage, as long as he lived, which would be fully in accord with the Words of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá cited above concerning the development of the embryo.

As for the functions of the International Council, the Hands stated that the functions were "clearly defined by him" which is true and they have been outlined earlier in this review but in his Proclamation he also had stated that "to these will be added further functions in the course of the evolution of this first embryonic International Institution, marking its development into officially recognized Bahá’í Court"–a stage, it may be added, that would necessarily involve the assignment of additional major judicial functions.

With the foregoing comments in mind, let us review what Mason Remey really stated in his Proclamation as opposed to the false misstatement of the Hands. He stated: "The Beloved Guardian chose me to be the President of the Bahá’í International Council that is according to his explanation the President of the Embryonic Universal House of Justice. Therefore I am the President of the Embryonic Universal House of Justice. When this August body becomes the Universal House of Justice, if such being during my lifetime, I will then be the President of the First Universal House of Justice of the Bahá’í Dispensation." This is a completely valid statement and clearly does not include the phrase that the Hands maintained was stated by Mason Remey in his Proclamation, to wit: "that he would automatically become the head of the Universal House of Justice when it is elected . . . " implying that the Presidency would become an elected Office.

The following comment made by the Custodians reiterates an argument that has been used by others to discredit Mason Remey: "Mr. Remey himself signed the Proclamation of the Hands of the Cause in 1957 which contained the definite statement that no successor to Shoghi Effendi could have been appointed by him." Let us consider Mason Remey’s situation but a few weeks following Shoghi Effendi’s passing when all of the Hands had ssembled at Bahji in their first Conclave. Although, as stated in his writings, he had had a flash vision a decade earlier that he was to become the Guardian of the Faith he had not as yet perceived at the time of this Conclave what he perceived, for the first time, only some two and a half years later, that he had become the Guardian coincident with the passing of Shoghi Effendi by virtue of his appointment as President of the International Bahá’í Council–the embryonic Universal House of Justice. He was, therefore, in no position to present any evidence to his fellow-Hands at the first Conclave proving his accession to the Guardianship or, if he had refused to join them in signing their declaration at that time, provide them with his real reason for not signing it that he would be able to substantiate. The last thing, as he has stated in his writings, that he wanted to do in those very traumatic days following the passing of Shoghi Effendi was to create any kind of disunity within the ranks of the Hands of the Cause which would inevitably become known throughout the Bahá’í world and therefore he went along with them in the signing of their proclamation hoping that in time the Hands would reconsider their stand, a stand which he opposed and begged them to reconsider to no avail during their second Conclave a year later, in an appeal that he made to them at that time. This is what he has written about this appeal to his fellow-Hands:

It is crystal clear from the foregoing that Mason Remey never entertained at any time the belief that the Guardianship of the Faith was dead. Moreover, how could he have believed that when he had experienced a flash vision years before, as mentioned in his writings, in which he had seen himself as the future Guardian of the Faith?

In a letter from the Custodians addressed to their fellow-Hands on 15 June, 1960, they informed them that a new French National Assembly had been elected. They asked them "in view of Mason Remey’s position in the Bahá’í World Community during the lifetime of the beloved Guardian" to submit written statements rejecting Mason Remey’s claim to the Guardianship as a matter of record. In a postscript to this letter they mentioned that they had received a visit from the head of the Bahá’í Department of the Ministry of Religions of Israel who told them that Mason Remey had written to the President of Israel, the Minister of Religions, and the head of the Bahá’í Department announcing that Shoghi Effendi in his lifetime appointed him Guardian of the Faith. They concluded from this visit that the "Israel Government appears to appreciate the true situation" and they informed the Hands that "this action makes it even more important to have on record your rejection of the claim." They add that "a letter has been sent to the Ministry of Religions repudiating Mason’s claim and enclosing copies of cables of repudiation from all thirty-one National Assemblies." It should be mentioned that the undersigned visited the Ministry of Religions in Jerusalem and the head of the Bahá’í in October 1961 as Mason Remey’s representative, together with a Lawyer who had recently accepted the Faith in France, and presented documentation prepared by us both attesting to the validity of Mason Remey’s accession to the Guardianship. We were very kindly received by both the then acting Minister of Religions and the head of the Bahá’í Department who expressed the view at that time that they felt the question of the continuation of the Guardianship of the Bahá’í Faith was one that should be resolved within our Faith and that they should not be involved until this had been done. Mason Remey, when informed of their view upon our return, accepted it and seemed content to await the outcome of our struggle within the Faith to attain recognition of his Guardianship.

The Custodians felt that they should now address a letter to all National Spiritual Assemblies under date of July 5, 1960, informing them that the Hands of the Cause had instructed the friends in France at an early stage to "refrain from associating with the former members of the National Assembly there who were active in their support of Mr. Remey." They then stated that they felt: "that the time has come to extend this policy to all individuals who openly support this false claim" and that "the believers everywhere should immediately cease associating, either by direct contact or by correspondence, with anyone who supports Mason Remey’s claim to be the Guardian of the Faith."

Two days later on July 7^th the Custodians addressed a letter, "To the Hands of the Cause of God throughout the World" in which they announced the dates of their next Conclave of the Hands and then took up the matter of the status of the former members of the National Spiritual Assembly of France stating that, "In France, the reconstituted National Assembly has taken action depriving the five disloyal former members of that Assembly of their voting right and membership in that Community." They go on to say, "We wish to report that our representative, Mr. Faizi, recommended expulsion of the disloyal individuals in France, who in his view are suffering from a real spiritual illness. He was joined in this recommendation by Dr. Giachery, but the other two European Hands, Mr. Balyuzi and Dr. Muhlschlegel, did not concur; ³ therefore the European Hands as a body did not recommend expulsion." This letter continues by explaining, "that at our first Conclave a formal action was recorded, giving the Hands in the Holy land the responsibility for expelling people from the Faith, but only on the recommendation of the Continental Hands concerned, after investigation by them. Thus, in the case of the disloyal members of France, the Hands in the Holy Land were bound by the action of the majority of the European Hands in not recommending expulsion at this time." The Custodians were faced with a different problem when it came to dealing with Mason Remey, as a Hand of the Cause, and they admitted this in this same letter when they wrote: "With regard to Mason himself, since we had no instructions covering defection by one of the Hands of the Cause, we have felt that any action in his case beyond the steps already taken should be by the body of the Hands itself . . . and must be referred to the body of the Hands for advice and decision."

Although Hasan Balyusi had written a letter on May 12^th agreeing with his fellow-Hands that Mason’s claim to the Guardianship was unfounded and vehemently condemning those who supported him, he stated to his credit : "I cannot bring myself to accept the thesis that the Hands have the authority to expel anyone for this reason. Where do the Hands obtain their authority to expel anyone from the Community? From the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. [sic] These are the exact words of the Master which I have read and [re]read, and which I quote: ‘My object is to show that the Hands of the Cause of God must be ever watchful and so soon as they find anyone beginning to oppose and protest against the Guardian of the Cause of God, cast him out from the congregation of the people of Bahá . . .’ Perhaps I am mistaken but nowhere else have I found the express authority given to the Hands to expel people for any reason other than opposition to the Guardian. The Hands can and must expel anyone who associates with Covenant-breakers, old and new. They can and must expel anyone who disregards a definite injunction of the beloved Guardian. Such acts constitute opposition to Shoghi Effendi [although he is in the other world] But I am convinced that. . . the Hands have no authority to expel anyone for any other reason . . . By so doing, the Hands will be setting up a new category of Covenant-breakers for which they have no authority, as far as I can see it . . . But at the present time unless you convince me to the contrary, I cannot accept this thesis as resting upon the sanction of the Sacred Text."

Obviously, in view of Balyusi’s comment pointing out that the Custodians would be creating a new category of Covenant-breakers unless it could be proven that Mason Remey and his supporters were, in fact, protesting against Shoghi Effendi, even though it should be added, that he was now in the other world and not the living Guardian to whom fidelity must be shown as enjoined by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in His Will, the Custodians realized that they would have to, in some way, characterize Mason Remey’s claim to be Shoghi Effendi's successor and those who supported him as an act protesting against the Guardian of the Faith. They then proceeded to do this very thing in their letter of July 7^th (written incidentally following the receipt of Balyusi’s letter of May 12^th but which they have inserted in the text of their book prior to recording Balyusi’s letter) apparently in an attempt to disguise the fact they had been set straight on this matter by Balyusi and had in the light of his comments concocted a new definition for Covenant-breaking. For they came up in continuance of their July 7^th letter with a transparently perverted justification for their expulsion of Mason Remey from the Faith with the following ridiculous statement: "To these we wish to add our own view that Mason’s claim and activities in opposition to the decisions and Plans of our beloved Guardian, constitute a protest against the decision of Shoghi Effendi in not appointing a successor to him as the Guardian of the Faith."

It will be recalled that the July 7^th letter from the Custodians was addressed to their fellow-Hands and in continuance of their ludicrous argument that Mason Remey should be expelled from the Faith for protesting against Shoghi Effendi (when in fact he had consistently upheld every clause of his writings as well as those of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá) they quoted passages from the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to support their twisted argument including the following passage in which ‘Abdu’l-Bahá obviously referred to the living Guardian of the Faith when He wrote: ". . . so soon as they [the Hands] find anyone beginning to oppose and protest against the Guardian of the Cause of God, cast him out from the congregation of the people of Bahá and in no wise accept any excuse from him."

The Custodians then asked the Hands, in view of the above, whether they wished "to support the recommendation for immediate expulsion of Mason and announcement of this to the believers" or whether they wished to defer the question until their next Conclave in October 1960. It was on the strength of this request that Balyuzi made his comments quoted above and Dr. Muhlschlegel stated: "At the Brussels conference, as you have been informed, presumably Faizi reported the situation in France. Joel Marangella has been removed as Board member, ⁴ the French National Spiritual Assembly got the suggestion from the Hands to deprive the five disloyal members of the former National Spiritual Assembly of their administrative rights but the Hands did not recommend to the Hands in the Holy Land the expulsion of these five at present." ⁵

The book records only the specific views of three other Hands who recommended to the Custodians the expulsion from the Faith of Mason Remey (Leroy Ioas, Ugo Giachery and William Sears) as well as expulsion of the members of the former NSA of France who remained firm in their support of Mason Remey. There were a considerable number of other believers in France who accepted Mason Remey as the second Guardian but no mention has been made of them. Also, nothing is mentioned of the other believers in the United States such as those in Quincy, Illinois who rallied to the support of Mason Remey. The "Hands in the West" recommended expulsion of Mason Remey whereas the three Hands in Asia (Alá’i,Varqá and Khádem), while not explicitly mentioning expulsion, revealed their own spiritual blindness and consigned themselves to the very fate they predicted for Mason Remey when they stated in their perverted view that Mason’s action "against the Covenant and repudiation of the Will and Testament" had deprived him of the "mercy and bounty of the Blessed Beauty in this world and in the worlds to come."

The Custodians committed their final act of infamy when, in a cable dated, 26 July, 1960, signed, "Hands Faith" addressed to all National Spiritual Assemblies they stated that "ENTIRE BODY OF HANDS. . . ANNOUNCE BAHA’I WORLD MASON REMEY COVENANT BREAKER EXPELLED FAITH" and called upon the friends everywhere to "SHUN MASON REMEY AND ANYONE ASSOCIATING WITH HIM OR ACTIVELY SUPPORTING HIS CLAIMS." They further stated that all National Spiritual Assemblies supported them in their repudiation of Mason Remey which was untrue as the legitimate NSA of France, as previously mentioned, had accepted him upon the receipt and due consideration of his Proclamation as the second Guardian of the Faith.

The above cable was followed up only a few days later with a second cable addressed to all National Spiritual Assemblies, dated August 3, 1960, signed "HANDS FAITH" but obviously composed only by the Custodians in which they equated the acceptance of Mason Remey as the second Guardian by believers at this time with the defections that took place during the Ministries of the Three Central Figures of the Faith and in which they listed not only the names of those cited in the 26 July cable but others whose identity they had now established and announced that these believers as well as all others who supported Mason Remey were considered Covenant-breakers.

The Custodians admitted in a letter dated August 9^th , addressed to their fellow-Hands, in which they included the texts of their July 26^th and August 3^rd cables to the NSA’s as evidence that they had taken it upon themselves to expel both Mason Remey and his supporters from the Faith (naming some of them) as "We felt we could not take the risk of deferring this drastic action until the time when we all meet together . . ." (at their next Conclave). In this same letter, they included a copy of a cable dated July 18^th (addressee not shown) obviously addressed to the Custodians by "Wolcott" Secretary of the National Spiritual Assembly of the United States in which he stated that: "ACTIONS TAKEN THUS FAR BY HANDS HOLY LAND INADEQUATE DEAL DECISIVELY SATISFACTORILY NUMEROUS BELIEVERS ATTRACTED REMEY CLAIM STOP. . . URGE DRASTIC IMMEDIATE ACTION HANDS DECLARING REMEY VIOLATOR SAME FATE ALL THOSE CONTINUING SUPPORT HIM." It may be noted that this cable critical of the actions taken by the Custodians "thus far" had been addressed to the Custodians prior to the cables issued by the Custodians cited above and certainly influenced them to dispatch these cables without prior consultation with their fellow-Hands.

In the Custodians August 3^rd cable, actually composed by the Custodians, issued in the name of "Hands Faith," they mentioned that Shoghi Effendi had stated in GOD PASSES BY that the Faith had been constantly subjected to crises which gave rise to greater victories and in the perverted and twisted meaning they had now given to loyalty to the Covenant in which fidelity to the "Center of the Cause" no longer meant loyalty to the Guardian of the Cause of God but meant loyalty to the Hands and their illicitly created body, they had compared Mason Remey’s so-called defection to the defections that had taken place during the Ministries of the Three Central Figures of the Faith. Little did they perceive or realize that the real crisis in the Faith had been created by them through their violation of the Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh for it was they and their fellow-Hands who had ignominiosly rejected Shoghi Effendi’s successor and, in turn, had led the Bahá’í administrative institutions and believers throughout the world to blindly follow them in this unprecedented world-wide violation of the Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh in which the Guardianship–the "Center of the Cause"–as delineated in the sacred and divinely-conceived Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and the other highest Institutions of the Administrative Order had been either replaced entirely (Hands of the Cause as they died out) or corrupted (a proposed future headless UHJ) in their man-made organization that bore no resemblance to the Administrative Order that had been fashioned by the "master-hand of its perfect Architect."

Significantly, only some three months following issuance of the Proclamation of the second Guardian, this ill-conceived and patently illegitimate body of so-called Custodians was experiencing difficulty in maintaining even a quorum of their number in Haifa, in spite of several substitutions in the original body, for in their letter of 9 August, the Custodians deplored the fact that, "In the midst of this crisis" the absence from Haifa of four of their number, Millie Collins and Leroy Ioas for reasons of health and Rúhíyyih Khánum and Faizi on specific missions. The death of Horace Holley in Haifa who had been brought there as a substitute Custodian together with the illness of Ugo Giachery, Bill Sears, Enoch Olinga and a stroke suffered by Musa Banani further contributed, as they stated, to their difficulties.

On October 15, 1960, a long letter dispatched by the "Hands of the Cause in the Holy Land" to all National Spiritual Assemblies (apparently choosing not to use the term Custodians) cited extracts from the Proclamation of Mason Remey and then refuted what they considered to be false assertions contained therein with not only baseless and amazingly erroneous arguments of their own, but a falsification of the text of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, as translated into English by Shoghi Effendi. Let us consider their arguments as outlined below:

• They quote Mason Remey’s words in his Proclamation wherein he explains that as Shoghi Effendi had appointed him President of the International Bahá’í Council during his life-time and had stated that this was the embryonic Universal House of Justice then he or one of his successors would be President of this divinely-instituted body in its final stage of development. (a four-fold stage of development outlined by Shoghi Effendi, the last three of which would be active stages) And he had further explained that as "He who is the President of the Universal House of Justice is the Guardian of the Faith," these two Offices being one and the same, according to the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, he had become, in this way, Shoghi Effendi's appointed successor. Contributing to the understanding of the foregoing are the words of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, stating that, "the embryo possesses from the first all perfections . . . all the powers," which make it clear that the Head of this embryonic body has all of the powers potentially that will be later fully realized when born into active life and is an inseparable part of this organism and remains so not only while in its prenatal stage but through all the successive stages of its development after birth. Therefore, Mason Remey as the embryonic Head at its conception (that is, when the Council was first appointed by Shoghi Effendi) was then only the Guardian-to-be awaiting birth into active life as the second Guardian of the Faith upon the passing of Shoghi Effendi. Again, to reiterate, what has been before explained, this is the reason why Shoghi Effendi retained the Council, in a prenatal state, as it were, awaiting birth as an actively functioning body following his passing. The Hands displayed their woeful failure to perceive this when they questioned the fact that the Council was a "permanent thing" and stated: "We have not even an intimation in any writing of Shoghi Effendi that the officers of the first appointed International Bahá’í Council would be carried forward into the elected International Bahá’í Council." In this statement they failed to make a distinction between the appointed Head of this body, that is, the Guardian-to-be, who is not subject to the elective process at the time that the other members are elected at such time as the Council’s is transformed into an "elected body" (its third stage) and additionally they omit any reference to the second stage in the development of the Council projected by Shoghi Effendi–the International Bahá’í Court–discussed in some detail earlier. As for the permanence of the Council which they question, they ignore Shoghi Effendi’s cable of 30 June, 1952, previously discussed, which leaves no doubt as to its permanence when he stated: "At the World Center of the Faith, where, at long last the machinery of its highest institutions has been erected, and around whose most holy shrines the supreme organs of its unfolding Order, are, in their embryonic form, unfolding."

• The Hands, in their attempt to further invalidate the assertions that Mason Remey had made in his Proclamation as proof of his accession to the Guardianship, claimed that only an "Aghsán" could inherit the Guardianship interpreting the word "branch" as used by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in His Will and Testament wherein He states that the Guardian, in the absence of a qualified son, may choose "another branch" to succeed him as restricting his choice of a successor solely to an "Aghsán" even though ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had used the word "branch" and not "Aghsán" in this most important provision of His Will. Nevertheless, they contended that ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had meant "Aghsán" and, as evidence of this, cited the names of the sons of Bahá’u’lláh upon whom He had conferred the title of "the Most Great Branch," in referring to the Master, "the Greater Branch," in referring to His second son Muhammad Alí and "the Purest Branch," in referring to His third son and then pretended that Shoghi Effendi was also an "Aghsán" as he had been designated in the Master’s Will as "the Chosen Branch" falsely capitalizing the "C" in "chosen" and the "B" in "branch" and thereby, in order to make their point, deliberately falsifying the text of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Will and Testament, translated into English by Shoghi Effendi soon after his accession to the Guardianship, wherein he had used lower case letters in both words. This authentic text of the Will and Testament is recorded in the 1944 edition published by the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States and Canada having been received from Shoghi Effendi on February 25, 1922, soon after his accession to the Guardianship. The Will and Testament, as translated by Shoghi Effendi, refers to him as the "youthful branch" and the "chosen branch" and NOT the "Chosen Branch" (p.11). Moreover, Shoghi Effendi points out in his work: GOD PASSES BY that the term "Aghsán" refers to the sons of Bahá’u’lláh (p.239). Therefore, unquestionably, Shoghi Effendi, who was the grandson of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, was not an "Aghsán" himself, and their argument that only an "Aghsán" can inherit the Guardianship has no foundation whatsoever. It should be obvious that what is of primary importance and assumes precedence over a blood relationship in the Guardian’s choice of a successor is that his appointee be a spiritual son faithful to the Covenant–that is, a branch of the "Tree of the Covenant" mentioned in "The Master’s Last Tablet to America" (BWF, p.433), a Tree whose Ancient Root is the Manifestation, Bahá’u’lláh, whose "primal branch," as referred to in the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, is the "Center of the Covenant"–"the Most Great Branch"–and whose branches or offshoots of that Most Great Branch are the successive Guardians of the Faith.

• The Hands having quoted a passage from their own Proclamation, as cited above, in which they stated: "that as the beloved Guardian had left no Will and no successor," they further attempted to invalidate Mason Remey’s accession to the Guardianship on the basis that the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá requires that "during the lifetime of the Guardian, nine Hands of the Cause must be elected by their fellow-Hands and give their assent to the choice made by him of his successor." Then, they amazingly ask, "why did he go against the provisions of the Will in this important respect?" In the light of what has already been written in the preceding pages the reader will readily perceive the complete inappropriateness of this question. Whereas, in the Proclamation of the Hands, they claim that the Guardianship had come to an end because Shoghi Effendi had left no Will. They now argued that Mason Remey’s accession to the Guardianship is invalid because "during the lifetime of the Guardian" the body of nine Hands of the Cause elected from their own number did not "give their assent to the choice made by him of his successor" thus, in effect, admitting that for the Hands to have given such an assent to Shoghi Effendi’s choice of a successor, this choice had to have been revealed, as the Will and Testament of the Master clearly prescribes, during the Guardian’s own lifetime and not revealed in a Will to be opened only after his passing. In arguing that their assent had been necessary to validate Shoghi Effendi’s appointment of a successor, they erroneously construed the word "assent" to mean approval of this choice ridiculously inferring that if the incumbent Guardian’s choice of a successor did not meet with their approval, he would have to make another appointment that met with their approval. This obviously could only be made during his lifetime if his first choice of a successor had met with their disapproval and he was then required to make an alternative choice (which according to their interpretation of this clause in the Master’s Will could require even a third choice or more until approved by them). As previously explained, Shoghi Effendi has indicated in a letter that the word "assent," as used in the Master’s Will, should not be construed to mean that the Hands have, in effect, been invested with veto authority over the Guardian’s choice of a successor. It should then be clear how wrong the Hands had been during their first Conclave to have searched for a Will left by Shoghi Effendi naming a successor and it should have come as no surprise that such a search had proved fruitless. And it follows that they had obviously been grievously in error to then hastily conclude that because Shoghi Effendi "had left no Will" he had appointed "no successor." Obviously unaware of Shoghi Effendi’s words on the subject and ignoring the fact that the first contingent of the Hands had been appointed almost twelve months after Shoghi Effendi had appointed his successor by naming Mason Remey President of the embryonic Universal House of Justice and that the body of nine elected Hands, resident in Haifa, who under the terms of the Master's Will give their assent to this appointment had never come into existence during the ministry of Shoghi Effendi, they stupidly accuse Mason Remey of going "against the provisions of the Will" by not receiving the assent of this body of non-existent Hands. Even if this body of nine Hands had been brought into existence prior to Shoghi Effendi’s appointment of his successor and their interpretation of the clause in the Master’s Will was valid, it was completely inappropriate to level it against Mason Remey as it is the incumbent Guardian of the Faith who, in appointing his successor "in his own life-time" under the provisions of the Master’s Will, receives the assent of the body of nine Hands in Haifa (NOT from all of the Hands) to his appointment and not his appointee, in this instance, Mason Remey. Therefore, aside from the fact that the accusation is without foundation, the accusation made by the Hands that Mason Remey’s appointment went against the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá was actually an accusation directed against Shoghi Effendi and not Mason Remey.

Having made the false accusations enumerated above the Hands then announce in this nefarious letter the expulsion of Mason Remey and his supporters from the Faith "because of their Covenant-breaking activities and forbid all association with them."

The Cutodians, in a cable dispatched to all National Spiritual Assemblies on 25 April, 1961, announced the election of nine members of the International Bahá’í Council whose names are listed in the cable, retaining four of the members originally appointed by Shoghi Effendi. If the International Baha’i Council, in the third stage of its development as the "elected body," were to be elected properly, according to the Proclamation of Shoghi Effendi, the National Spiritual Assemblies would vote for only eight members as the President who had been appointed by Shoghi Effendi in January 1951, in its first or embryonic stage, and had remained in that stage only as the Guardian-to-be, would have become the second Guardian upon Shoghi Effendi’s passing, as already discussed, and in its second stage (first active stage) the Head, or, if you will, the Chief Judge of the International Bahá’í Court (this being the reason why Shoghi Effendi had asked Mason in my presence at table one evening when discussing this second stage in the evolutionary stages of the Council: "Mason, are you ready to be a Judge?" ). He, therefore as the Guardian of the Faith, or in the event of his death, his appointed successor, would preside over this body. The Hands obviously realized that if they were to hold an election of the Universal House of Justice by 1963 (a goal not set by Shoghi Effendi as previously discussed) there was insufficient time to establish the International Bahá’í Court that depended first on establishing six National Bahá’í Courts and consequently in their haste skipped over this second stage in the evolution of the Council even though Shoghi Effendi had stated in his cable of 25 April, 1951, that "the formation of the Bahá’í Court" was "an essential prelude to the institution of the Universal House of Justice." The entire body of the Hands initially and then the Custodians both of whom had claimed to be the "Supreme Body" in the Faith and had been accepted as such by the administrative bodies and the vast body of believers had necessarily relegated the International Council to an inferior and almost obscure role. This being the case, they certainly could not now permit this body to assume a prominent role that would have made that Council in any way superior to their own. As they would only recognize the Universal House of Justice as occupying a rank above their own and had set the goal for its establishment in 1963 they therefore had no choice but to bring about the election of this sans-Guardian Council prematurely so that they could call for the even more premature election of a sans-Guardian Universal House of Justice in 1963 which would then supersede them and be acceptable to both themselves and to the believers as the "Supreme Body of the Faith."

If, on the other hand, the Hands had given some careful thought to the judicial responsibility that would have been assumed by the International Bahá’í Council and it had been permitted to evolve into the International Bahá’í Court where it would exercise supreme authority over local Bahá’í Courts in the administration of the Laws of the Aqdas, they would have perhaps perceived, although highly unlikely, entrenched as they were in their new found authority and power, that the International Council was, in fact, "a permanent thing" which they had disclaimed in their letter of 15 October, 1960, to all NSA’s, and not a temporary or a provisional body to be assigned such inappropriate duties as handling the "guiding at Shrines" as listed in "Assignments of the International Bahá’í Council" under date of June 25, 1961. Then they might have realized that this International Court, would no more be capable of properly exercising its judicial authority over Local Courts in Islamic countries, even during this intermediary stage in its development, then it would when becoming the Universal House of Justice, unless the Guardian were presiding as its essential "sacred head" and exercising the essential interpretative authority that was solely his prerogative. It should now be clear that as the word "Justice" implies that the second Guardian would have been, in effect, the Chief Justice, of this legitimately established body that Shoghi Effendi initially created in its embryonic form as the International Bahá’í Council. It was this body that would have then exercised supreme authority over, not only the six National Courts, but over all subordinate Bahá’í administrative institutions instead of the illegitimately created body of Custodians, otherwise identifying themselves as: "The Hands of the Cause in the Holy Land," who had, completely overlooked the tremendous importance and implications of Shoghi Effendi’s establishment of the Council in which the key to the continuance of the Guardianship was to be found and had usurped and arrogated to themselves both the functions that the Council should have exercised and those of the Guardianship.

The Hands having accomplished the improper and premature election of a sans-Guardian International Bahá’í Council then recorded, under date of 25 June, 1961, a list of the "Assignments of the International Bahá’í Council" as follows, the first two of which were contained in Shoghi Effendi’s Proclamation of 9 January, 1951, and listed previously:

• "Forge link with authorities of newly emerged State ( Note: As ten years had elapsed since Shoghi Effendi had made this assignment the use of the phrase "newly emerged State" may be considered less appropriate).

• "Conduct negotiations related to personal status with civil authorities.

• "[Assure] Legal protection of the of the international endowments of the Faith at the World Center and complete, circumstances permitting, of plans made by the beloved Guardian for their extension.

• "Supervision of income-producing properties at the World Center (Note: better stated as, "Supervise income producing properties . . . "

• "Assist the Hands in preparing for the World Congress to be held in Baghdád in 1963 (later changed to London).

• "Assist the Hands in arrangements for the election of the Universal House of Justice.

• "Issue News Letter from the World Center of the Faith.

• "[Assume] Financial responsibility for work at the World Center exclusive of affairs of the Hands of the Faith.

• "Handle guiding at Shrines."

When one considers that Shoghi Effendi, in his Proclamation of 9 January, 1951, had hailed the formation of the International Bahá’í Council as "epoch making," the "most significant milestone in the evolution of the Administrative Order" and "the greatest event shedding lustre upon the second epoch of the Formative Age" as well as an event "potentially unsurpassed by any enterprize undertaken since the inception of the Administrative Order" ". . .ranking second only to the glorious immortal events associated with the Ministries of the Three Central Figures of the Faith," one would think that the Hands would have at least realized that some of the functions assigned, as listed above, were hardly in keeping with an "Institution" whose establishment had been extolled in such glowing and unprecedented terms by Shoghi Effendi.

It may be noted that none of the functions outlined above assigned the Council any responsibility that would relate the Council in any way to National Spiritual Assemblies even though as long ago as July 1, 1952, (more than five years prior to the passing of Shoghi Effendi) its President, Mason Remey, certainly acting under the instructions of Shoghi Effendi and with his approval, addressed a long letter to the National Spiritual Assembly of the United States stating that the Council "wishes to share with the friends news of the progress of the Faith at its World Center and to inform them of what has been done during the past year, under the guidance of the beloved Guardian." This letter of more than six pages was published in Bahá’í News No.258, Bahá’í Year 109, August, 1952, starting on the front page and carrying the caption in large bold letters, "Progress at the World Center" and below that in smaller letters, "A Letter from the International Bahá’í Council" with a large photograph of a model of the Shrine of the Báb occupying half of the page. This letter was signed by "Charles Mason Remey, President" and countersigned by "Leroy C. Ioas, Secretary General," on July 1, 1952, (as shown on page 7 of that issue). Under the subheading of "Embryo of the Universal House of Worship [Justice] " is found the highly significant statement: "On more than one occasion the Guardian has pointed out to the members of the Council that the Charter upon which the Spiritual and Administrative activities of the Faith in Israel rest is the Tablet of Carmel, revealed by Bahá’u’lláh on Mt. Carmel. The "City of God" mentioned in this Tablet, is the Shrine of the Báb, and the "Ark" means the Laws of God, and refers to the Universal House of Justice, the embryo of which is the present International Bahá’í Council, which through successive stages will develop into the Universal House of Justice to be established and function on this Holy mountain."

The Custodians, identifying themselves as "The Hands of the Cause in the Holy Land," have recorded under date of 23 May, 1961, a letter that was sent to "newly elected National Spiritual Assemblies" in which they pointed out that the Hands of the Cause, following the passing of Shoghi Effendi, had as Chief Stewards assumed direction of the affairs of the Faith and that National Assemblies throughout the world had accepted the action taken by them in "their appointment of the body of nine Hands in the Holy Land, known legally as the "Custodians of the Faith" and had then passed resolutions "expressing their approval of this action" and "their recognition of the Custodians as the supreme body of the Bahá’í world." Attaching, as an example, a resolution made by one of the National Assemblies, they requested that a similar resolution be passed by the newly formed National Assembly. Although stating, as quoted above, that the body of the Custodians had been appointed, it will be noted that they asked that the resolution submitted by a new National Assembly include the same untrue statement previously made by National Assemblies that the Custodians had been elected to this body. They also asked the Assembly to recognize them as "the supreme body in the Cause of Bahá’u’lláh." The resolution that they requested the National Assembly utilize in their submission to the Custodians (as found on page 284 of their book) reads as follows:

"We pledge our full support, faith and allegiance to the body of the Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith elected by the Hands of the Cause."

As the year 1963 arrived and the time drew near for the election of their pseudo Universal House of Justice the Hands during their Conclave issued cables on 9 April,1963, to the United States, Iran and London requesting that all believers in the Bahá’í World Commnity be asked to unite their hearts in prayers beginning at sundown on the 21^st of April, the first day of Ridván, beseeching the Blessed Beauty to inspire and guide the delegates (who would be assembled at the home of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in Haifa) to raise up the long awaited august Institution [UHJ] fulfilling the glorious promises of the sacred writings. The Hands duly announced in a cable of 21 April, 1963, that the election of their sans-Guardian and therefore headless Universal House of Justice had been accomplished, referring to it, nonetheless, as that "supreme legislative body ordained by Him [Bahá’u’lláh] in His Most Holy Book" and thus carefully avoiding stating what would have been untrue had they stated that this body had been elected in conformance with the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá–the "Charter of the New World Order of Bahá’u’lláh"–which requires the Guardian to preside as its "sacred head." With the election of this so-called Universal House of Justice the Hands now found themselves with three bodies in existence at the same time, all of which they had identified in their communications as the supreme body of the Faith, as cited below:

• In the Hands’ "Unanimous Proclamation" of 25 November, 1957, they referred to themselves as "the supreme body of the Bahá’í World Community."

• In the Hands’ Proclamation issued at the close of their first conclave (Nov. 18 - 25, 1957) they referred to the Universal House of Justice as "that Supreme Body" upon which infallibility, as the Master’s Testament assures us, is divinely conferred (conveniently omitting the fact that its infallibility is assured only with the Guardian presiding as its "sacred head".)

• In a letter of the Custodians, dated 2 December, 1957, addressed to all National Spiritual Assemblies, they requested these Assemblies submit a letter to them recognizing them as "the supreme body in the Cause."

The Hands never seemed to realize that they had been guilty of the triplication noted above. Even though they had designated the Universal House of Justice as "that Supreme Body" of the Faith as shown above and qualified this designation in the cable cited earlier to read, "the supreme legislative body" of the Faith they were later to designate this body in a cable of 19 May, 1963, as the "SUPREME EDIFICE" and "EXALTED BODY" of the Faith. As such, although not stated, it would be assumed that this body would take over from the Hands administrative supervision of the National Spiritual Assemblies which, although they had not been comparably redesignated at the same time as National Houses of Justice, such a redesignation would have been no less appropriate and premature than it had been for the Hands to prematurely bring into existence in 1963, when the Faith is still the Formative Age, a headless and therefore incomplete and deformed Universal House of Justice completely incapable of functioning properly and infallibly at any stage of its development much less in its final or efflorescent stage of development. Moreover, the Hands were seemingly oblivious of the incongruity of the relationship created by prematurely establishing the Universal House of Justice in its final stage of development or efflorescence while its subordinate bodies–the National Spiritual Assemblies–the majority of which had been but recently formed during the closing stages of the Ten Year Global Crusade were still very much in their infancy and were far from attaining, in their own development, the status of National Houses of Justice.

It was still not clear what role the Hands would retain under this ill-conceived arrangement, and whether they would continue to assume a collegiate Guardianship of the Faith, until they all had died out, (certainly not long beyond the close of the 20^th century) and preserve a false semblance of maintaining the "twin institutions" as described in the words of Shoghi Effendi, or, as further described by him as the "twin pillars that support this mighty Administrative Structure"– the institutions of the Guardianship and of the Universal House of Justice" and these "two fundamental organs of the Will of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá." The answer perhaps was to be found, in their cable as they pointed out that the Universal House of Justice would now "guide the unfoldment of His [Bahá’u’lláh’s] embryonic World Order through the Administrative Institutions prescribed by Bahá’u’lláh, elaborated by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and erected by Shoghi Effendi," a clearly obvious impossibility in the corrupted organization they had substituted for "this most great Order" in which two of the three of the highest Institutions divinely-conceived and delineated in the sacred Charter of that Order were to be no more, the Guardianship and the Hands of the Cause, while its third, their Universal House of Justice, they deluded themselves into believing would effectively function and retain its infallibility although forever deprived of its "sacred head."

With the election of their Universal House of Justice, the body of the Hands found it necessary to alter their relationships between themselves and the "Hands Residing in the Holy Land" (the Custodians) and to reconsider their continued role and functions. Consequently, in a meeting of the Hands in London on May 9, 1963, they issued a "Resolution of the Hands of the Cause of God" in which they assigned only five of their number (instead of the original nine) to the Holy Land, no doubt taking into consideration the fact that their numbers had already diminished (20 signing this resolution instead of 27.) This should have certainly dispelled any formerly held illusion on the part of the believers that this body was the same body of nine Hands of the Cause who, according to the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, work under the Guardian’s direction at the World Center. The Hands in this resolution stated that, "the quorum of the Hands in the Holy Land will be three, two of whom must be from the original five elected to serve in the Holy Land" as there had been four Hands already residing in the Holy Land at the time of Shoghi Effendi’s passing with five more appointed, (and not elected) by the body of the Hands to join them in making up the original body of nine Custodians. They further announced that "In the event of any vacancy occurring in the composition of the Hands in the Holy Land, the body of the Hands will fill such vacancy by election." Did they make the surprising proviso that vacancies should be filled by election to perpetuate the illusion that the original body of nine Custodians had been elected? For, if an election were required to fill a vacancy, they would have to carefully canvass their fellow-hands in advance of any such election to determine their availability because even some of the Hands that had been originally appointed (not elected) to serve as a member of the body of the Custodians had found it difficult, if not impossible to do so, on an uninterrupted year-round basis, for various reasons outlined at the time.

In a cabled Ridván message from the body of the Hands, dated 19 May, 1963, they hail the "triumphant conclusion" of the Ten Year Global Crusade. They state that as Shoghi Effendi had associated "five Hands with the work in the Holy Land in his lifetime" (whose names are not mentioned but they were Rúhíyyih Khánum, Mason Remey, Leroy Ioas, Sutherland Maxwell, Ugo Giachery who, with the exception of Sutherland–architect of the Shrine of the Báb–had been appointed by Shoghi Effendi as members of the International Bahá"’í Council) that "following this pattern five Hands [are] now assigned to the Holy Land thus assuring at all times presence of Hands at the World Center to facilitate International work [of the] institution of the Hands and to assist the House of Justice in any way deemed advisable by that Exalted Body." Of course, this presence of the Hands at the World Center that was felt to be so essential by them and should become even more essential in the years to come, was inevitably destined to soon end under their organization as the Hands had all passed away by the end of the century, with the exception of two, and of these two, only one of them of the original five "elected" to reside at the World Center, perhaps still living as this is written.

A letter from the so-called Universal House of Justice, dated May 26, 1963, addressed, "To the Hands of the Cause of God Residing in the Holy Land," informed them that by the 1^st of September (some 4 months following their election) eight members would be in Haifa.

On June 7, 1963, the following letter from the so-called Universal House of Justice was addressed to the Hands in the Holy Land:

"THE UNIVERSAL HOUSE OF JUSTICE"

As the Hands in the Holy Land had been advised by the members of the so-called Universal House of Justice that they would not arrive in Haifa until the 1^st of September, it is not clear where this body met in the meantime and, based on the decision that they then made at that meeting, advised the Custodians in their letter of June 7^th that this body, which had been identified by the Custodians only some five years earlier, as the "supreme body in the Cause," would, upon the receipt of this letter, cease to exist. Surprisingly, the Custodians in a letter dated seven days later on June 14^th confirmed that, "The actual date of termination of the Custodianship was June 7^th " which was the same date as its dispatch and more than a month after the election of the Universal House of Justice (there being therefore two so-called supreme bodies with their seat in Haifa in existence at the same time).

It may be recalled that in the "Unanimous Proclamation" of the twenty-seven Hands of the Cause of God issued from Bahji, ‘Akká, Israel on November 25, 1957, the Hands had stated: "We nominate and appoint from our own number to act on our behalf as Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith (the names of 9 Hands being listed) to exercise–subject to such directions and decisions as may be given from time to time by us as the Chief Stewards of the Bahá’í World Faith–all such functions, rights and powers in succession to the Guardianship of the Bahá’í Faith." It is clear from the June 7^th letter of the so-called Universal House of Justice to the Hands in the Holy Land, quoted in its entirety above, that this body was now assuming all of the functions, rights and powers that had been originally bestowed upon the Custodians at the outset of their reign by the body of the Hands, which according to the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, are vested solely in the Guardian of the Faith as well as the legislative functions that His Will assigns to that House thus centralizing in a single institution, legislative, judicial and executive functions. In doing this, they had repudiated, not only the words of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in His Will when He stated: "The legislative must reinforce the executive, the executive must aid and assist the legislative body," but the words of Shoghi Effendi as well in the "Dispensation of Bahá’u’lláh" wherein he points out that each of "these two inseparable institutions"–the Guardianship and the Universal House of Justice–"operates within a clearly defined sphere of jurisdiction."

As the account of the unwarranted and illicit reign of the Custodians draws to a close, a last letter addressed by them on June 14, 1963, "To the Hands of the Cause of God" should be reviewed, including the attached copy of a legal document signed by them titled: "DECLARATION BY THE CUSTODIANS" under date of June 7^th, executed on their behalf, that had been prepared in collaboration with their so-called Universal House of Justice and their attorney in Haifa. They state:"Thus action has been taken to terminate the legal entity of the Custodians, in accordance with the language of the original document executed by the Hands of the Cause on November 25, 1957, which provided that the body of the Custodians would continue to exercise their functions subject to such directions and decisions as might be given by the entire body of the Hands until such time as the Universal House of Justice upon being duly established and elected in conformity with the Sacred Writings and the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá may otherwise determine. The actual date of termination of the Custodianship was June 7, 1963. From that date the Hands in the Holy Land will function under the terms of the document approved in London." The above quotation deserves comment on two points. They reiterate that their Universal House of Justice was established, "in conformity with the Sacred Writings and the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá," (a Document that is also sacred) which, in the light of all that has been written in the foregoing, is a statement that is patently false, even to a non-Bahá’í reader, as it is not the Institution delineated in the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá with the Guardian serving as its "sacred head." They, of course, knew this and for this reason combined an untrue statement with a true one in the same sentence to mask the untruth by stating that the Universal House of Justice had been established "in conformity with the Sacred Writings [of Bahá’u’lláh]–a true statement–because in the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh concerning the Universal House of Justice there naturally is no reference to a Guardian presiding over it as its head as ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s sacred Will and Testament, identified by Shoghi Effendi as a part of the explicit Holy Text, had not been revealed, whereas their statement that a Universal House of Justice, though minus the Guardian as its sacred head, had been established in conformity with the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, is patently untrue. The other comment pertains to the obvious fact that the five Hands in Haifa were not willing to leave the affairs in Haifa completely in the hands of their newly elected Universal House of Justice or were the former Custodians ready to completely relinquish the ill-gotten authority that they had exercised since the passing of Shoghi Effendi, as evidenced by the fact that they still clung to the same designation, "HANDS OF THE CAUSE IN THE HOLY LAND" that the Custodians had been using for some time in their communications as though this former body of Custodians, although abolished, had been retained as a sort of quasi-Custodial body of five hands and, in fact, they again used this designation in signing their letter of June 14, 1963, addressed to their fellow-Hands as though nothing had changed seven days after their Custodianship had not only been formally abolished by their Universal House of Justice in its letter of June 7^th but had according to the Declaration made by the Custodians themselves on the same date of June 7^th "ceased to exist."

The last letter appearing in the book is one addressed to their fellow-Hands by the body of five Hands in the Holy Land on June 14, 1963, to which they attach a copy of a "legal document" executed by the Custodians on June 7^th reproduced below in its entirety:

RELEASING ALL THEIR FUNCTIONS, RIGHTS AND POWERS CONFERRED UPON THEM BY THE DECLARATION OF THE HANDS, NOVEMBER 25, 1957, TO THE UNIVERSAL HOUSE OF JUSTICE

Haifa, Israel

June 7, 1963

WE THE UNDERSIGNED, DULY NOMINATED AND APPOINTED AS CUSTODIANS OF THE BAHA'I WORLD FAITH BY THE DECLARATION OF THE HANDS OF THE CAUSE OF GOD MADE AT BAHJI ON NOVEMBER 25^TH, 1957 "to exercise–subject to such directions and decisions as may be given from time to time by us as the Chief Stewards of the Bahá’í World Faith–all such functions, rights and powers in succession to the Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith, His Eminence the late Shoghi Effendi Rabbani, as are necessary to serve the interests of the Bahá’í World Faith, and this until such time as the Universal House of Justice, upon duly established and elected in conformity with the Sacred Writings of Bahá’u’lláh and the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, may otherwise determine" do now declare that the Universal House of Justice was so established and elected by action of the International Bahá’í Convention held at Haifa on April 21^st, 22^nd and 23^rd, 1963 and we hereby release all the said functions, rights and powers which were conferred upon us under the said Declaration of November 25^th, 1957 as determined by the Universal House of Justice in its communication of June 7^th, 1963, and we declare that all the said functions, rights and powers now devolve rightfully and in full accordance with the Sacred Writings of the Bahá’í Faith upon the Universal House of Justice. We make this statement for the full body of the Hands of the Cause of God in accordance with the powers conferred upon us by the Declaration of November 25^th, 1957 and the office of Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith has thus ceased to exist.

HANDS OF THE CAUSE RESIDING IN THE HOLY LAND/P>

[Signed as follows]

Rúhíyyih Rabbani A.Furútan William Sears

Paul E. Haney Djalál Kházeh

To say the least, the above "Declaration" that was drawn up by the attorney for the Custodians is an unusually complex, unnecessarily long and excessively wordy document, not to mention a confusing one, prepared for the stated legal purpose of declaring that the reign of the Custodians had come to an end–this body that had requested all National Spiritual Assemblies in their letter of December 2, 1957, a mere five and a half years earlier, to recognize them as "the supreme body in the Cause . . . elected by the Hands of the Cause." While this Declaration finally clearly admits in the very first sentence that the Custodians had been appointed and not elected, the signatories to this declaration included only four Hands of the original body of nine appointed in their "Unanimous Proclamation" of 25 November, 1957, that the Hands had then pretended was the institution of 9 Hands "elected" from their own number who, in accordance with the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, serve under the Guardian’s direction at the World Center, even though Shoghi Effendi was no longer in this world. Additionally, the signatories to this Declaration include a fifth Hand, William Sears, who was not one of the original nine Custodians appointed in that Proclamation, as erroneously stated on the very first line of the Declaration, and therefore the opening statement of what is purported to be a legal document is untrue. Moreover, they state that with this said "Declaration" they "release all the said functions, rights and powers which were conferred upon us as determined by the Universal House of Justice in its communication of June 7^th." Unlike this long and wordy "Declaration" quoted above, it may be noted that the letter addressed to them on June 7^th by the so-called Universal House of Justice, also quoted above, is a very brief letter of seven lines that makes reference to the several discussions held with the Custodians relative to the transfer of the "functions, rights and powers vested in the Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith by virtue of the Declaration [actually the "Unanimous Proclamation"] of the Hands of the Cause of God made at Bahji on November 25, 1957" on the basis of which "the Universal House of Justice has decided that the office of the Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith ceases to exist" upon the receipt of their letter (apparently received the same day).

Keeping in mind that the above Declaration of the Custodians dated June 7, 1963, and signed as "The Hands of the Cause Residing in the Holy Land " was an attachment to their letter sent to their fellow Hands seven days later on June 14^th signed inconsistently as "The Hands of the Cause in the Holy Land" following their abolishment., the same appellation, incidentally used by them, that they had used during their reign as the so-called Custodians of the Faith, there now remains only a review of the salient points of this letter. Following their referral to their action to terminate the legal entity of the Custodians in the Declaration discussed above and in view of the fact that the "termination of the Custodianship" had taken actually taken place on June 7, 1963, they clarified the continuing functions that were to be retained by the five Hands residing in the Holy Land as those functions that had been outlined "under the terms of the document approved in London" by all of the Hands on May 9^th, (but reflecting no evidence that it had been coordinated with the UHJ) which had stated that, "they will be responsible for coordinating the international work of the institution of the Hands, in relation to the Continental Hands, and to the Universal House of Justice." It is then apparent that this newly created body of five Hands in the Holy Land would be retrieving some of the functions that the Custodians had supposedly surrendered to the Universal House of Justice upon their demise when they stated that the function of coordinating the international work of the Hands, a function that would be rightfully exercised by a living Guardian of the Faith, and which had been exercised by the Custodians during their reign would continue to be exercised by this newly created body of five Hands while retaining their same previous designation as "The Hands of the Cause in the Holy Land." They mention joining the members of the "Universal House of Justice" in meeting "with the head of the Bahá’í Department of the Ministry of Religions in Jerusalem on May 30^th at which time they were shown the originals of a number of communications sent in April and May of this year by Mason Remey to various officials of the Government of Israel, including the President" and "in the one to the Ministry of Religions" asking him to advise him "as to how he could gain recognition by the Government of Israel as the second Guardian of the Faith in successorship to Shoghi Effendi." They also mention receiving from the National Assembly of the United States newspaper clippings published in Santa Fe, New Mexico and in Florida "describing the recent annual convention of the ‘Bahá’ís of the United States under the Guardianship’, which was held in Santa Fe" at which time "a National Assembly of the United States was established . . . and two other national assemblies under the guardianship. . . in Pakistan and India. . ." and stating that, "eventually the Universal House of Justice would be elected by these national assemblies under the hereditary guardianship, with the guardian as its head, in accordance with the Bahá’í sacred writings."

The Hands in the Holy Land were concerned about these developments and expressed "the need for[the] exercise of the utmost vigilance here at the World Center in connection with any possible further moves by Remey or his supporters. Steps have been taken to formally notify the proper officials of the Government of Israel including the Prime Minister, of the establishment of the Universal House of Justice, and that Body is taking steps to strengthen its position with the Government.". . .

"Hands of the Cause in the Holy Land"

Unlike Bahá’u’lláh and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Who have taken their Stations with them to the other World, the Guardians do not take their station with them to that world, therefore it was improper for the Hands to sign a letter stating "In the service of the beloved Guardian" as they did above and frequently in their letters and other communications. Mason Remey has also mentioned this in his "Daily Observations" stating when he was preparing to leave Haifa that he could no longer continue to join the other Hands in signing communications using this phrase that is obviously only applicable to a living Guardian of the Faith.

It was then with this last letter of the "Custodians" that they closed the sorry account of their illicit reign that was never meant to be and a reign that future Bahá’í generations, faithful to the Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh and to the provisions of the sacred and immutable provisions of the Will and Testament penned by the Center of that Covenant, will certainly perceive as having been one of the most tragic episodes in the history of the Faith and unique in that it involved an unprecedented violation of the Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh by the vast majority of believers throughout the world who had been blindly led astray from the Covenant, incredibly as it may seem, by the Hands of the Cause. Sadly enough, as has been shown in the account of the Custodians reviewed above, this tragic crisis in the Faith, following the passing of the first Guardian of the Faith, resulted from an incomprehensible loss of faith in the indestructibility of the mighty Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh and in the immortality of the divinely-conceived "Child of the Covenant"–the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá–by those believers (with one exception) whom Shoghi Effendi had, but a few years before his passing, elevated to the station of Hands of the Cause including, most notably, his widow, Rúhíyyih Khánum who, because of the profound respect with which she was held both by her fellow-Hands and the believers-at-large, was able to strongly influence her fellow-Hands in their acts and decisions as well as the believers and Bahá’í administrative institutions throughout the world to reject the second Guardian of the Faith. Also to be taken into account, was the prestige that the Hands had gained during the closing years of the ministry of Shoghi Effendi that also enabled them, as well, to exert an overpowering influence on the believers and to induce them to accept without question their view that Shoghi Effendi had been unable to appoint a successor and that, therefore, the Guardianship of the Cause of God had come to an untimely end only thirty-six years after the inception of an Administrative Order which, in Shoghi Effendi’s words, had been fashioned by "the master-hand of its perfect Architect" and in spite of his writings describing ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s divinely-conceived and sacred Will and Testament as nothing less than a part of the explicit Holy Text which, together with Bahá’u’lláh’s Most Holy Book, the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, would therefore remain inviolate as long as His Dispensation endured.

Let us then recapitulate the acts and decisions taken by the Hands of the Cause and the illicit body of "Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith" as recounted in the above review of their book which provide incontestable proof that it was they who were guilty of blatantly violating the Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh and not Mason Remey and those believers who supported him as the second Guardian of the Faith. For it was these Hands whose lack of faith in the Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh and the immutability of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá that had caused them to reject the second Guardian of the Faith and had brought on the crisis in the Faith that they falsely attributed to him and to his supporters who, having retained an unwavering faith in that Covenant and its sacred Offspring, had recognized Mason Remey as Shoghi Effendi’s rightful successor. The following are the most significant of these acts and decisions:

• The Hands of the Cause, assembled at their first Conclave in ‘Akká, after the passing of Shoghi Effendi, made their hasty, ill-considered and fateful decision that the Guardianship of the Faith had forever ended and then fallaciously interpreted Shoghi Effendi’s reference to them in the last communication he had addressed to the Bahá’í world before his passing as: "the Chief Stewards of Bahá’u’lláh’s embryonic World Commonwealth, who have been invested by the unerring Pen of the Center of His Covenant with the dual function of guarding over the security and insuring the propagation of His Father’s Faith" as conferring upon them authority to constitute themselves as "the supreme body of the Bahá’í Community."

• The entire body of the Hands of the Cause decided at their first Conclave, without any authority whatsoever to do so under the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, to create a body identified as the "Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith" completely outside the terms of that Will and invested this illicit body with the "functions, rights and powers in succession to the Guardian of the Faith" far in excess of the "dual functions" assigned to them, as cited above, in Shoghi Effendi’s last message to the Bahá’í world in October 1957, dispatched a month before his passing.

• The Custodians reaffirmed the above statement of the Hands that "The Custodians shall be deemed to succeed the Guardian of the Bahá’í Faith" and thereby usurped the functions and role of the Guardian of the Faith which, in effect, placed this body of the Custodians, who later referred to themselves as "the supreme body in the Cause" in a position superior to the Hands who had appointed them.

• The Custodians, endeavoring to bestow authenticity upon their body, attempted to give the impression to the believers that this body of Custodians was the body of nine Hands described in the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá which has been elected from their own number to work under the direction of the living Guardian at the World Center whereas they were, in fact, an appointed body who they pretended was working "In the service of the beloved Guardian" although he was no longer in this world and no longer the Guardian of the Faith.

• The Custodians requested all National Spiritual Assemblies to send a letter to them, "recognizing us as the supreme body in the Cause" and including a sentence containing the following untruthful statement that their body had been elected and not appointed: "We pledge our full support, faith and allegiance to the body of the Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith elected by the Hands of the Cause."

• The Hands of the Cause, including the Custodians, ignoring the significance of Shoghi Effendi’s Proclamation of 9 January, 1951, and failing to realize that in this Proclamation he had actually established in the temporary name of the International Bahá’í Council, but had not established a temporary Institution when he proclaimed the formation of "the embryonic Universal House of Justice," took it upon themselves on the basis of the authority they had usurped and, in their blindness to its importance, to relegate this body to an insignificant role and assign to it, in addition to the remaining two initial important functions which had been assigned by Shoghi Effendi, minor functions that were wholly inappropriate, to say the least, for assignment to this "first embryonic International Institution," whose formation Shoghi Effendi had hailed as the "most significant milestone in the evolution of the Administrative Order of the Faith of Bahá’u’lláh" since the inception of that Order with the Ascension of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and "the greatest event shedding luster upon the second epoch of the Formative Age of the Bahá’í Dispensation." In doing so, and even more importantly, they, as well as their fellow-Hands, further failed to recognize that the President of the Council appointed by Shoghi Effendi, had been none other than the Guardian-to-be during the last six years of his ministry and had become his successor upon his passing. Therefore, it was this Council, presided over by its "sacred head"–the Guardian–instead of the illicitly formed body of Custodians, that should have exercised jurisdiction over subordinate National Spiritual Assemblies and, in its second projected essential stage of development as the International Bahá’í Court, over subordinate National Bahá’í Courts as outlined by Shoghi Effendi.

• The Custodians, understandably shocked that the National Spiritual Assembly of France had accepted Mason Remey as the second Guardian of the Faith and, although lacking any authority under the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to dissolve a National Spiritual Assembly, dispatched one of their Hands to France, "as their representative with specific instructions to dissolve the National Assembly and call for a new election if the five (initially eight) members persisted in their dangerous and disloyal course of action." As these members remained steadfast in their acceptance of Mason Remey’s Guardianship, this was then illicitly done by this Hand and a new illegitimate National Assembly was subsequently elected.

• The Hands found it necessary to give a new definition to Covenant-breaking so that they could declare Mason Remey a Covenant-breaker and in turn those believers who supported him as Covenant-breakers. As the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá explicitly prescribes the sole basis for declaring a believer a Covenant-breaker to be opposition and protestation "against the guardian of the Cause of God," the Hands had to find a way to characterize Mason Remey a Covenant-breaker on the basis that his claim to the Guardianship constituted opposition and protestation, not agaist his Guardianship but against a decision made by Shoghi Effendi before his passing. This is exactly what the Custodians did when they stated: "we wish to add our own view that Mason’s claim and activities in opposition to the decisions and Plans of our beloved Guardian, constitute a protest against the decision of Shoghi Effendi in not appointing a successor to him as the Guardian of the Faith." They then queried their fellow-Hands whether they would support their recommendation for immediate expulsion of Mason Remey on these grounds completely oblivious of the fact that it was they, in their utter blindness, who were guilty of protesting against the living Guardian of the Faith for it was they who had rejected his Guardianship and had thereby broken the Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh.

• As the Hands of the Cause are nominated and appointed by the Guardian of the Faith according to the explicit terms of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, the Guardian is obviously the only one who can remove them from this station. The Hands of the Cause and specifically the so-called Custodians of the Faith, having usurped the functions of the Guardianship, now considered it within their power to expel a fellow-Hand from the Faith as well as the believers, whereas, authority to expel the believers had been solely reserved by Shoghi Effendi to himself during his ministry. As they now considered that they, and apparently the entire body of their fellow-Hands as well, were acting in the capacity of the Guardian of the Faith, they did not hesitate to announce to the Bahá’í world that the "entire body of the Hands" had now labelled Mason Remey a Covenant-breaker and had expelled him and all those who supported him from the Faith. and called upon all the believers to henceforth "shun Mason Remey and anyone associating with him or actively supporting his claims."

• The Hands called for the premature election of their headless sans-Guardian Universal House of Justice by the National Assemblies of the Bahá’í World during Ridván 1963, referring to it in their cables in several terms such as that "EXALTED BODY," that "SUPREME EDIFICE" and that "SUPREME LEGISLATIVE BODY," this latter appellation being particularly inappropriate, in this case, as this disfigured body, minus the Guardian as its "sacred head," would be assuming, perforce, in addition to legislative functions, executive functions as well, rightfully exercised only by the living Guardian of the Faith as the Head of the Faith and the "Center of the Cause" under the terms of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá.

• Coincident with the election of the so-called Universal House of Justice and their presumed assumption of the functions that had been performed by the Custodians since the passing of Shoghi Effendi, the termination of the ministry of the Custodians was announced–this body that had been hailed by one National Spiritual Assembly less than six years earlier, as "the Most Supreme Body in the Bahá’í World Faith" and by another Assembly as "the supreme body in the Cause of Bahá’u’lláh." However, unwilling to surrender completely their control and direction of the affairs of the Faith, these former Custodians were able to convince the newly-formed illicit "Universal House of Justice" that there was still the necessity for five Hands to reside in the Holy Land who, acting as a quasi-Custodial body (my terminology) would continue to identify themselves under the slightly modified designation of "Hands of the Cause Residing in the Holy Land" and therefore, once again, establish another illegitimate body outside the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá who would be "responsible for coordinating the international work of the institution of the Hands, [from their site in Haifa] in relation to the Continental Hands and to the Universal House of Justice," a function, as it pertains to the coordination of the international work of the Hands, properly devolving upon a living Guardian of the Faith.

There is little more to be said to convince an open-minded believer and even the non-Bahá’í enquirer that the reign of the so-called "Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith" was never meant to be according to the sacred and immutable provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and it was this body and the Hands of the Cause who created this body who stand forever condemned for, and guilty of, rejecting Shoghi Effendi’s appointed successor and then corrupting the divinely-conceived Bahá’í Administrative Order penned by the unerring Pen of its "perfect Architect" in their substitution of institutions of their own making and, in their blindness, unmindful of the following admonition found in the Words of the Báb: "Whatever God hath willed hath been, and that which He hath not willed shall not be."

Joel Bray Marangella

22 July, 2000

Note: Emphases have been inserted throughout this document wherever deemed necessary to assist the reader in a better understanding of the facts.

ADDENDUM:(written following a recent discovery of a vitally important message dispatched by Shoghi Effendi in 1951 that provides further incontrovertible evidence that the so-called "Custodians of the Bahá’í Faith" appointed by the Hands of the Cause, following the passing of Shoghi Effendi, were never meant to be).

More than a year following my writing of the foregoing critique of this book the undersigned decided to review the file of the material that had been submitted to the Ministry of Religious Affairs of the State of Israel on behalf of Mason Remey during his visit to Israel in September 1961. For the first time, after all of these intervening years, I read again in this file a pamphlet titled, "World Order Unfolds," that included "Excerpts from Messages of Shoghi Effendi" published by the Bahá’í Publishing Committee of the National Spiritual Assembly of the United States in 1952. To my great surprise and delight I discovered a passage in a lengthy message from Shoghi Effendi dated, 23 November 1951 of paramount importance which I had apparently overlooked myself years ago whose tremendous significance and implications were certainly never perceived by the Hands of the Cause following the passing of Shoghi Effendi as they obviously did not take the time to review any of his historic messages to the Bahá’í World, much less this one, having reached their hasty decision in the very first day of their first conclave in ‘Akká that the Guardianship of the Faith had forever ended. Inexplicably this message had not been included in the Book titled: "Messages to the Bahá’í World, 1950-1957" which I had always assumed included all of Shoghi Effendi’s historic and momentous messages dispatched to the Bahá’í World during the closing years of his ministry when the International Institutions of the Faith were being established by him at the World Center of the Faith. I only wish that this message had come to my attention before writing the above critique as it conclusively and irrefutably proves that the illegitimate body created by the Hands of the Cause following the passing of Shoghi Effendi, outside the provisions of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, to which they gave the appellation, "Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith" flagrantly usurped the role that Shoghi Effendi had intended that the International Bahá’í Council perform, an Institution referred to by him in this message, for the first time, as the "Central Body." For it may be seen from this message that Shoghi Effendi projects the future role of this "Central Body," that had been appointed by him in the Proclamation he had issued some eleven months earlier, to be one in which the International Council would be "directing these widely ramified operations" of the "National Assemblies of the Bahá’í World" at some period during the prosecution of the Ten Year Global Crusade that he had scheduled to commence at Ridván 1953. To direct these operations of the Assemblies the International Council would, upon the passing of Shoghi Effendi, necessarily have to emerge from the inactive state, in which it been carefully retained by Shoghi Effendi during his ministry and its President, Mason Remey, whom he had appointed in 1951 and, until then, been kept in waiting as the unborn embryonic Guardian-to be, rightfully assume his position as the active President of an actively functioning body — the embryonic Universal House of Justice — whose "sacred head" could be none other than Shoghi Effendi’s successor-Guardian of the Faith, under the terms of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá.

To reiterate for purposes of emphasis, it is evident that, for Shoghi Effendi to state in this message that the "Central Body" —the International Bahá’í Council — would be directing the National Spiritual Assemblies in their achievement of the goals of the Ten Year Global Crusade, he had to have foreseen his early passing, as proved by fact that he had clearly predicted in this indirect way, that his passing would take place sometime during that Crusade and that his appointed successor, having then, coincident with his passing, been able to assume the Presidency of an actively functioning Council, would, have, as a result, automatically succeeded him as the Guardian of the Faith. Unfortunately and sadly enough, it is obvious that neither the Hands of the Cause nor any of the believers in the Bahá’í world perceived at the time of Shoghi Effendi’s passing, or at any time subsequent thereto, the tremendous implications that were to be deduced from the active role that Shoghi Effendi had projected for the International Council in this message, a role that both clearly and unquestionably further confirmed the identity of his successor and indirectly foretold his own passing which, in fact, actually took place, as he had foreseen, at the mid-point of that Crusade in November 1957.

Is it not therefore crystal clear and undeniable from the foregoing that Shoghi Effendi’s message of 23 November 1951 proves, without the shadow of a doubt, the following facts of paramount importance:

• That Shoghi Effendi had unquestionably foreseen that his passing would take place during the Ten Year Global Crusade commencing at Ridván 1953.

• That, coincident with his passing, the "Central Body" — the International Bahá’í Council — which he had scrupulously retained in an inactive state during his ministry, would then be able to assume the active role he had projected for the International Council and its President, Mason Remey, appointed by him some seven years earlier accede to the Guardianship of the Faith.

• That the Hands of the Cause, in appointing the so-called "Custodians of the Bahá’í World Faith," had not only created an illegitimate body, outside the provisions of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s divinely-conceived, sacred and immortal Will and Testament but a body which, had shamelessly usurped the role that had clearly been projected by Shoghi Effendi for the International Bahá’í Council, and in so doing, had blinded the Bahá’í World to the fact that Shoghi Effendi, in appointing Mason Remey as the President of this supreme Council, had used the Council as the instrumentality for the appointment of his successor and therefore, these Custodians had, with tragic results for the future of the Faith, actually, in their inexcusable spiritual blindness, flagrantly and undeniably usurped the role of the Guardianship itself.