…it is
illuminating indeed to view the Nineteen Day Feast in the context in which it
was conceived. It is ordained in the "Kitáb-i-Aqdas" in these words:
"It hath been enjoined upon you once a month to offer hospitality, even
should ye serve no more than water, for God hath willed to bind your hearts together,
though it be through heavenly and earthly means combined". It is clear,
then, that the Feast is rooted in hospitality, with all its implications of
friendliness, courtesy, service, generosity and conviviality. The very idea of
hospitality as the sustaining spirit of so significant an institution
introduces a revolutionary new attitude to the conduct of human affairs at all
levels, an attitude which is critical to that world unity which the Central
Figures of our Faith laboured so long and suffered so much cruelty to bring
into being. It is in this divine festival that the foundation is laid for the
realization of so unprecedented a reality.
- The Universal House of Justice (From
a letter dated August 27, 1989)
