Posted by Jonah on September 13, 2101 at 19:29:58:

In Reply to: please don't post these pilgrims posted by tom peters on September 13, 2101 at 14:32:11:

I'm sorry, Tom. I know these are difficult to read. But they have always been available, and have been online here for many years. They've been indexed by every internet search engine, and reposted at other websites.

As with all primary-source accounts, pilgrims' notes vary considerably in their reliability. Some of the least reliable ones have already been left off of this site due to their low accuracy. Others, however, can be regarded as historically fairly reliable, especially when independently corroborated by other notes.

Further, these statements do fairly accurately represent Baha'i thought which is contained in fully authoritative texts. Shoghi Effendi's World Order of Baha'u'llah expressly predicts them in a section called "The Fire of Ordeal" on 46-47 (and many other places in this book). His Promised Day is Come also discusses the meaning of these events, though without the specificity, on pages 200-202 (122-124 in older editions). As difficult as these texts are to read, they are things Baha'is must come to fully accept and understand. Similar predictions and warnings are given in Advent of Divine Justice 11, 13-14, and 81-82, and Citadel of Faith 125-26. While many of these texts were in fact written before the Second World War, Shoghi Effendi nonetheless repeated them again *after* the war and confirmed that the time of the final crisis -- which would bring about the real unity of nations -- had not yet come; see for example Messages to the Baha'i World page 103, "Portentous Prophecies," which was written in 1957.

However, I do think you're right that sensitivity requires a certain degree of censorship right now. I've removed the bulletin board posting which compiled these notes. We can discuss the meanings of this at a later time. Now is a time to heal, and I certainly erred in posting them now. Thank you for calling my attention to it.

-Jonah Winters

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