For long centuries the African Continent, or rather that
great part of it which lies south of the Sahara, remained relatively isolated
from the rest of the world, untroubled and scarcely touched by the surging
conflicts of the nations to the north and east. Now, rapidly emerging into the
main stream of international interest, the African peoples, who were compared
by Baha'u'llah to the black pupil of the eye through which "the light of
the spirit shineth forth," are being swept by the heady enthusiasms of
new-found independence, torn by the conflicting forces of divergent political
interests, their vision obscured by the haze of materialism and the dust of
nationalistic passions and age-old tribal rivalries.
- The Universal House of
Justice (From a message dated 8 February 1970; ‘Messages from the Universal
House of Justice, 1963-1986’)
