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Severance
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Pages 76-77
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Severance
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Devotion to God implies also severance from everything
that is not of God, severance, that is, from all selfish and
worldly, and ever other-worldly desires. The path of God may
lie through riches or poverty, health or sickness, through
palace or dungeon, rose garden or torture chamber. Whichever
it be, the Bahá'í will learn to accept his lot with "radiant
acquiescence." Severance does not mean stolid indifference to
one's surroundings or passive resignation to evil conditions;
nor does it mean despising the good things which God has
created. The true Bahá'í will not be callous, nor apathetic nor
ascetic. He will find abundant interest, abundant work and
abundant joy in the Path of God, but he will not deviate one
hair's breadth from that path in pursuit of pleasure nor hanker
after anything that God has denied him. When a man becomes
a Bahá'í, God's Will becomes his will, for to be at variance with
God is the one thing he cannot endure. In the path of God no
errors can appall, no troubles dismay him. The light of love
irradiates his darkest days, transmutes suffering into joy, and
martyrdom itself into an ecstasy of bliss. Life is lifted to the
heroic plane and death becomes a glad adventure. Bahá'u'lláh
says:--
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He that hath in his heart even less than a mustard seed
of love for anything beside Me, verily he cannot enter My
Kingdom. -- Súratu'l-Haykal
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O Son of Man!
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If thou lovest Me, turn away from thyself; and if thou
seekest My pleasure, regard not thine own; that thou
mayest die in Me and I may eternally live in thee.
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O My Servant!
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Free thyself from the fetters of this world, and loose
thy soul from the prison of self. Seize thy chance, for it
will come to thee no more. -- The Hidden Words.
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