– 8 –

– 8 –

Personalities Subordinated

11 April 1933

I greatly value the Tablets addressed to Sarah Farmer⁶ and I thank you for having sent them to me. Will you kindly send me a few more copies of the Study Guide to Nabíl’s narrative⁷ and of the reprint of the Declaration of Trust,⁸ copies of both of which I wish to distribute among those who are deeply interested. Your letters of March 31 and 30th, written on behalf of the assembly have just reached me. Concerning the removal of believers I feel that such a vitally important matter should be given the most serious consideration and preferably be referred to the National Assembly for further consideration and final decision. We should be slow to accept and reluctant to remove. I fully approve and wholeheartedly and unreservedly uphold the principle to which you refer that personalities should not be made centers around which the community may revolve, but that they should be subordinated under all conditions and however great their merits to the properly constituted Assemblies. You and your co-workers can never overestimate or overemphasize this cardinal principle of Bahá’í Administration.