May 6

…Bahá’u’lláh, fifty years ago, expounded this question of universal peace at a time when He was confined in the fortress of ‘Akká and was wronged and imprisoned. He wrote about this important matter of universal peace to all the great sovereigns of the world, and established it among His friends in the Orient. The horizon of the East was in utter darkness, nations displayed the utmost hatred and enmity towards each other, religions thirsted for each other’s blood, and it was darkness upon darkness. At such a time Bahá’u’lláh shone forth like the sun from the horizon of the east and illumined Persia with the lights of these teachings.

Among His teachings was the declaration of universal peace. People of different nations, religions and sects who followed Him came together to such an extent that remarkable gatherings were instituted consisting of the various nations and religions of the East. Every soul who entered these gatherings saw but one nation, one teaching, one pathway, one order, for the teachings of Bahá’u’lláh were not limited to the establishment of universal peace. They embraced many teachings which supplemented and supported that of universal peace. 

- ‘Abdu’l-Baha  (From the First Tablet to the Hague, 17 December 1919; revised translation under the direction of the Universal House of Justice, available at the online ‘Baha’i Reference Library’ site of the Baha’i World Center)