He [Moses] gathered Israel’s scattered tribes into the
shelter of the unifying and universal Word of God, and over the heights of
union He raised up the banner of harmony, so that within a brief interval those
benighted souls became spiritually educated, and they who had been strangers to
the truth, rallied to the cause of the oneness of God, and were delivered out
of their wretchedness, their indigence, their incomprehension and captivity and
achieved a supreme degree of happiness and honor. They emigrated from Egypt,
set out for Israel’s original homeland, and came to Canaan and Philistia. They
first conquered the shores of the River Jordan, and Jericho, and settled in
that area, and ultimately all the neighboring regions, such as Phoenicia, Edom
and Ammon, came under their sway. In Joshua’s time there were thirty-one
governments in the hands of the Israelites, and in every noble human
attribute—learning, stability, determination, courage, honor, generosity—this
people came to surpass all the nations of the earth. When in those days an
Israelite would enter a gathering, he was immediately singled out for his many
virtues, and even foreign peoples wishing to praise a man would say that he was
like an Israelite.
(‘Abdu’l-Baha, ‘The Secret of Divine Civilization’)
