All religions have millennial prophecies in which “the end
of the world” is proclaimed for a future time.
Many also mention a millennial rule of order and justice also for the
future.
Baha’is believe that the foretold times have arrived and
that “the old world order” is dying, even as the new world order is emerging. That is, the old accepted way in which the
world functions, the separation of the human world into ‘sovereign nations’, the
separation of races, of classes, and economic systems of advantage, are all
being fast eroded. In their place new
systems are gradually evolving, and are often overlooked because of their
immature forms.
The United Nations, or a similarly purposed organisation,
must gradually evolve from its current condition to a world governing body that
properly embodies the following characteristics:.
“A world executive,
backed by an international Force, will carry out the decisions arrived at, and
apply the laws enacted by, this world legislature, and will safeguard the
organic unity of the whole commonwealth. A world tribunal will adjudicate and
deliver its compulsory and final verdict in all and any disputes that may arise
between the various elements constituting this universal system.”
(Shoghi
Effendi, The World Order of Baha'u'llah, p. 203)
The creation and evolution of the Internet surely fulfills
this further part of the prediction,
written in the 1930s.
“A mechanism of world
inter-communication will be devised, embracing the whole planet, freed from
national hindrances and restrictions, and functioning with marvelous swiftness
and perfect regularity.”
(Shoghi
Effendi, The World Order of Baha'u'llah, p. 203)
The imminent collapse of the economic system is foreseen by
many, though they are often labelled as doomsayers. However, an economic system
largely proclaiming to be the “free market”, yet where possible, the participants
subvert regulations and politicians to stamp out fair competition and increase
profits, and with a monetary system based on continuous rapid expansion where
the capital largely does not exist requiring the constant enlargement of debt,
cannot provide stability nor endure much longer.
So while this system is in its death throes, where is the new
system in its infancy, to replace the old financial order? Baha’u’llah, founder
of the Baha’i Faith, proclaimed that one world currency is needed. Might not
that currency be one of the digital ones being devised, such as Bitcoin? How
else will the nations be persuaded to relinquish their separate, age-old
currencies? Bitcoin is associated in peoples’ minds with crime and pornography,
but that was also the accusation against the Internet a couple of decades ago,
yet people now would not be without this system of communication and information. Who knows what will develop from these
systems given ten, twenty years?
But where is the economic system to replace the
multinational corporations dominating the world economic system and its
politics, and to utilise a new currency system? Even as world-embracing systems
such as Twitter and Facebook have rapidly evolved on the Internet, so systems
will evolve linked with digital currency, the Internet, and mobile phones.
Indeed mobile phone technology is starting to revolutionize the fortunes of
ordinary people in the Third World, and linked with digital currency, their
problem of a lack of banking facilities will be addressed. In the west now, we have the new technology of
Peer to Peer Lending, creating an alternative to conventional banking.
Some balance is
already being created in Third World economics through Micro-financing. Often
micro-financing is directed towards the women, bringing an important principle
into play, namely equality of men and women. This principle, announced by
Baha’u’llah, is indispensable to producing a just, stable world system.
Interestingly, there are other technologies being invented
in the West, which seem destined to bring equity to the world, such as solar
power. This technology, though of benefit to western countries, is immediately
revolutionary to the Third World. All benefits of new technologies, however,
can be reduced or undone by political and social instability.
Unless the world system becomes more equal between east and
west, there can be no long-term stability for any country in the world.
(Inspired foresight by
Baha’u’llah and Shoghi Effendi, opinions by Keith Mitcherson)
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