THE MISSION OF THE PROPHETS
The Right Criterion to Judge
THE view that most of the messengers of God did not succeed in achieving their goal is mistaken. It is often stated that only a minority of the messengers of God actually established a system based on their Message while most of them could not go beyond the mere proclamation of the truth. This is taken to mean that they failed to establish truth on earth.
But such views are far from the truth. How was it possible for the messengers of God to have failed in the task assigned to them while God was at their side? The question of their failure just does not arise. The reason being that such a conception is misguided. The real fault lies in choosing the wrong criterion in judging the mission of the Prophets, which is, the degree to which they brought about a social and political revolution. This is the criterion by which mortals judge the success or failure of a man or group. By this token, those prophets who brought about political revolution would be considered successful and those who did not would be considered failures.
The prophets were sent to convey to the people the word of God in its pure form and it was to be presented in the best possible way
This is not, however, the right way to judge the mission of the prophets. Their mission was simply proclamation of the truth. In no sense were they meant to establish a system. The prophets were sent to convey to the people the word of God in its pure form and it was to be presented in the best possible way.
They had to convey it in such a way that the congregation would fully understand the message and would bear witness to having been shown the true path—whether or not the message was accepted by them. When a prophet fulfilled these two conditions, he had fully discharged his responsibility.
When this standard of judgement is adopted, we find that all of the Prophets fully succeeded in achieving their goal, since each of them did his utmost to carry out the duty assigned to him—that of proclamation of truth. The prophets spared no effort in conveying the will of God to their nations. So much that their congregations were never left with the excuse that they had not been shown the way. They could never come before God, pleading their ignorance.