Thief in the Night, or, The Strange Case of the Missing Millennium
Author: William Sears
Published by: George Ronald, Oxford, 1961
Review by: Anonymous (name on file)
[Note: this is a message posted by an individual Bahá'í
to an Internet discussion list in 1998, as part of a discussion concerning
inerrancy and the writings of the Hands of the Cause. It attempts
to put William Sears' book Thief in the Night into context with
regard to the historical development of the Bahá'í community
and Bahá'í studies. The author, who consented to its
publication, prefers to remain anonymous.]
William Sears was one of the most gifted communicators and dedicated
servants the Cause has known. His book
Thief in the Night, which was
written as a detective-type story, was largely based on ideas found in and
adapted from Seventh-Day Adventist literature, notably the book
Our Day
in the Light of Prophecy by W.A. Spicer, a book that is now quite dated.
Several of the other sources used by Sears are culled from the same work. In
this way Sears correlated the Bahá'í Faith with selected
beliefs and interpretive ideas already held by a segment of the Christian
population. Many of the errors that occur in
Thief in the Night are
due to the fact that Sears relied upon his Christian sources without
checking them, and this we can assume because he felt his audience (i.e.,
Christians) accepted the arguments. I think he would have been surprised to
find Bahá'ís today religiously holding to these arguments even
after Christians had mostly abandoned them. Although its prophetic arguments
are often problematic and it does contain numerous errors,
Thief in the
Night nonetheless presents many basic Bahá'í principles
and teachings effectively and accurately.
Unfortunately other Bahá'í authors assumed that Sears'
information was correct and copied ideas from it, giving them added
attention and currency in the community. The absence of critical thought and
independent investigation of truth among Bahá'í authors does
not serve the community well. It perpetuates unnecessary mistakes and gives
critics more opportunities. This is just another reason why the Association
of Bahá'í Studies needs to be supported. There is no
compelling reason for Bahá'ís to canonize the earliest efforts
of its authors, and it is worth noting that in time other early
Bahá'í books have been replaced by more accurate or
contemporary works. Even before
Thief in the Night there were other
books about prophecy now long out of print and largely forgotten.
It may be that
Thief in the Night has been one of the most effective
or persuasive books available, but unfortunately there are no scientific
data supporting such a theory about it or any other Bahá'í
book. For years it was the most extensive secondary Bahá'í
book regarding prophecy. Because of George Townshend's obvious credentials
he was much more qualified to write such a book, but he never did.
Bahá'ís seeking to present the faith to Christians had few
other options fitting this description, so we can understand why so many
copies were sold to Bahá'ís over the last 37 years.
Christians have tens of thousands of books about prophecy, whereas today
Bahá'ís still have only a few to choose from. As the
Association of Bahá'í Studies develops we can hope that more
individuals — persons with qualifications, for example, like Stephen
Lambden — will write and expand the scope of Bahá'í
literature concerning biblical themes and subjects. When that happens, and
if the community is blessed again with a communicator as gifted as William
Sears, then that communicator will have a body of credible and
well-researched Bahá'í literature to draw upon —
something William Sears unfortunately did not have. It is to William Sears'
credit that he did as well as he did given the circumstances and sparse
resources available to him and that he had the courage and commitment to do
his best despite the limitations confronting him. The Bahá'í
community needs both scholars who can reach educated people (both religious
people and those who are not) and persons who can effectively communicate to
people who are not academics. Presently there are very few
Bahá'í scholars giving any real attention to biblical and
Christian studies.
Problems in
Thief in the Night are not confined to ideas at variance
with modern scholarship and contemporary biblical studies, but are on a more
fundamental level. Sears appears, for example, to have relied solely on a
surface reading of the King James Version of the Bible, i.e., he was reading
the archaic English from a modern perspective and without the benefit of
commentary on the original Hebrew and Greek. This caused him to
misunderstand the meaning and to infer things that are not apparent in the
manuscript evidence. Such misunderstanding caused mistakes that extend to
matters that indicate a general lack of familiarity with major biblical
themes and terminology. And this is one reason why even Christians without
scholarly backgrounds can see problems in the book. That is, even a person
familiar with only the King James Version would not make some of the errors
made by Sears. They may therefore reject the arguments in the book not
because they are blind to the truth or hard hearted, but because it lacks
credibility in their eyes for justifiable reasons. One of the reasons for
some of the problems in the book is also because William Sears appears to
have been unacquainted with sound scholarly methodology. In particular, he
failed to review his documents and evidences in a manner that would have
prevented some of his misunderstandings about the meaning and significance
of the documents. I would not argue that this makes him irresponsible,
though, since he was an entertainer by profession, not a trained
scholar.
It is also worth keeping in mind that books such as
The Prophecies of
Jesus do not depart from Sears' approach on account of adopting secular,
scholarly views.
Prophecies of Jesus, like
Thief in the Night,
holds to the view that the Bible is inspired. Secular and religious
scholars, given as they are to diverse opinions, would find objectionable
ideas in both books.
Prophecies of Jesus was an attempt to present a
more updated and thoroughly researched presentation of Bahá'í
writings relating to the prophecies of Jesus. It draws not mainly on secular
religious studies but quite deliberately emphasizes a wide spectrum of
sources respected by conservative Christians. Thus far, there is no
secondary Bahá'í book written with the aim of presenting the
faith to secular scholars specializing in critical biblical studies.
If we attempt to create the impression that all the books written by
Bahá'í authors — including books written by Hands of the
Cause — are without errors, minor or significant, then every time a
person finds an error, he or she will feel misled and deceived. If, on the
other hand, it is assumed that all such secondary books may contain errors
like any other books, then we can openly advise people to read, with
critical minds, not just one opinion about the Bahá'í Faith,
but as many as they like. That is, we can offer all such books as merely the
opinions of the authors rather than
the last word on the
truth.
Personally, I think it is to the credit of the Bahá'í
community if the friends feel able to openly discuss the merits and flaws of
secondary Bahá'í literature. If the world understands that it
is a Bahá'í methodology to deny all errors or conceal them,
than it simply indicates that one cannot rely on information obtained from
Bahá'í sources. In order for the community to have credibility
in the eyes of critical thinkers there must be freedom in the
Bahá'í community to point out errors without being censored.
This is particularly important with regard to peer review, that is, that
persons qualified within a given field of study be allowed to openly
critique each other's work both before and after publication. This process
means that writers and readers gain from the critical review of experts and
specialists. For example, imagine if a scholar publishes opinions and
findings about a new drug, but none of the scholar's peers felt free to
criticize the article. If this were to happen, then the author who writes in
good faith fails to benefit from the collective wisdom and knowledge of
others — as do people using the new drug. It would mean that ideas
could circulate without being corrected and without alternatives being
offered. It would be hard for a society governed by such attitudes to
advance. Open consultation and independent investigation of truth are
essential to the advancement of knowledge. Constructive criticism is
essential to progress.
There are a number of books available that can be used to present the
Bahá'í Faith to Christians. Bahá'ís are not
limited to
Thief in the Night or
Prophecies of Jesus. Although
it is not a catalog of prophecies, I'm surprised that George Townshend's
work
The Heart of the Gospel was not mentioned as another
alternative. At this point in Bahá'í history, a
Bahá'í might consider introducing a number of available works
to a seeker, pointing out the merits of each and even offering critical
thoughts. The seeker can then decide for his or her own self what type of
book he or she would like to read. Increasing the diversity of approaches
and opinions available in secondary Bahá'í literature will
increase the range of persons to which the Bahá'í community
will be able to reach. It will also dilute the tendency to uncritically
attribute too much authority to any one author's opinions — and that's
a good thing.
Which is better: to only hear about errors in Bahá'í
literature when non-Bahá'ís discover and point them out, or to
have Bahá'ís themselves discover them first and freely point
them out? Surely most Bahá'ís would not want to think that the
only way they will get a critical assessment of the quality of a
Bahá'í publication is when a non-Bahá'í points
it out to them. That would basically mean that if you want to know what's
going on you couldn't rely on a Bahá'í to tell you.