history and teachings of the Faith, react
critically to unfamiliar views. This has already been covered in
statements made by the Universal House of Justice itself, for example that
on pages 88-89 of "Wellspring of Guidance". As you point out in your
letter, divine Revelation is infallible and proceeds from an
all-encompassing knowledge of the Truth, but when individual Baha'is
attempt to apply Sacred Texts to any specific problem or situation they do
so using their own minds which are of limited understanding. Thus, just as
people can differ from one another in their use of reason in making
deductions from available evidence, so they can also differ in their
understanding and application of a passage of divine Revelation. The
Baha'i principle of the harmony between science and religion requires, as
you say, that a Baha'i scholar must use his intelligence to arrive at a
solution of a specific problem if there is an apparent conflict between a
Sacred Text and other evidence; and also he must accept the fact that some
problems may defy his comprehension....

By conveying the comments of the Research Department on the ... Seminar(3)
the House of Justice did not intend to imply that there was only one valid
methodology for Baha'i historians to follow. It merely wished to alert
Baha'i scholars to the dangers that are inherent in the paths that some of
them are following at the present time. Historical research is largely a
matter of evaluating evidence and deducing probabilities. Historical
evidence, moreover, is always fragmentary, and may also be accidentally
erroneous or even intentionally fabricated. The House of Justice realizes
that you are fully aware of this, but it stresses the point because it
does not see how a Baha'i historian can in all honesty claim to be a
faithful believer on the one hand and, on the other, challenge in his
writings the veracity and honour of the Central Figures of the Faith or of
its Guardian.

The fact that the Faith, as the Guardian states, "enjoins upon its
followers the primary duty of an unfettered search after truth", should
reassure any aspiring Baha'i historian that there can be no question of
any requirement to distort history in the so-called "interests" of the
Faith. On the contrary, the combination of profound faith and freedom of
thought is one of the great strengths of the Baha'i religion. It does,
however, place a great responsibility upon Baha'i historians to put
forward the