An historical analysis of critical transformations
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9. A universal auxiliary language 10. Universal peace upheld by a world government9 These principles which are put forth as Baha’u’llah’s essential teachings, however, express only the outward, social form of the faith’s concerns and do not reveal the inner religious side of the faith, which is built around Baha’u’llah as God’s spokesman for the modern age. Marcus Bach, sympathetic interpreter of the faith, appropriately maintains that the Baha’i concept of mankind’s reconciliation to God through Baha’u’llah “places a much deeper perspective and implication on the Baha’i movement than a mere socially activistic program for world union.”10 Alessandro Bausani, professor of Persian literate and Islamistics at Rome Univer- sity, and himself a Baha’i, writes: The Baha’i Faith declares itself a religion. Though its doctrines are so simple that some have taken it for a philoso- phical or humanitarian movement, the history of its founding and of its first historic period belies such an interpretation.11 The early history of this faith is bathed in the blood of some 20,000 martyrs who gave themselves in utter devotion to the Bab, the martyr- prophet, who foretold the coming after him of a greater one, whom Baha’is identify with Baha’u’llah. The Baha’i faith, indeed, in a religion which centers in devotion to a person believed to be God’s manifestation for the modern age; it demands unreserved acceptance of his person as God’s latest revelation to the world and requires absolute submission to his every word and command. Dahl’s definition of the Baha’i faith is good, inasmuch as it touches the points elaborated on above and as it focuses on the religion’s aims. For one, however, who has no prior acquaintance with the religion, and in the light of the above discussion, the following definition may be given: The Baha’i faith is a world religion founded in Persia in the middle of the nineteenth century A.D. which centers around the Persian seer, Baha’u’llah, as God’s manifestation for the modern age and which aims, by being obedient to Baha’u’llah’s teachings, to bring about the unity of all races, nations, and creeds of men in one world government and one common faith. REASONS FOR STUDYING THE BAHA’I FAITH After the definition of Baha’i, a second question emerges: Why study the Baha’i faith? Is the religion worthy of the time and effort required for the writing of a doctoral dissertation on it? Could not one spend his time more profitably on some other subject? Actually, rather than being a subject on the periphery of vital concerns, it may be regarded as a subject of central importance, not only for the student of the history of religions but for anyone interested in world problems and proposals for their solution. Ernst Klienki, president of the Esperanto Society of Germany, said in his address delivered in Danzig in Esperanto on July 30, 1927:
‘Abdu’l-Baha are worthy to be regarded among the highest Lights of all times, even by those who are not able to accept the religious part of their teachings.12
following reasons. Its Imposing Claims The Baha’i faith, first of all, “by its stupendous claims compels attention.”13 It claims that the prophets of all true religions of the past have foretold the coming of Baha’u’llah and the golden age which would be ushered in by his coming. This claim is based on the word of Baha’u’llah himself, who declared:
claimed as the Purpose and Promise of all the Prophets of God, and the most cherished Desire of His Messengers, hath now, by virtue of the pervasive Will of the Almighty and at His irresis- tible bidding, been revealed unto men. The advent of such a Revelation hath been heralded in all the sacred Scriptures. Be- hold how, notwithstanding such an announcement, mankind hath strayed from its path and shut out itself from its glory.14 Baha’is maintain that, as the Jews were blinded from accepting Jesus as the Messiah because of their preconceived ideas about the Messiah and about how the prophecies concerning him were to be interpreted, Christians are guilty of rejecting Baha’u’llah as the returned Christ because of preconceived interpretations of New Testament prophecies concerning Christ’s return and the events connected with his coming. If Jesus has returned in Baha’u’llah, then that event is the most singularly important event since the ministry of Jesus of Nazareth, and for Christians to fail in recognizing him would be their most grievous sin.
a student in the Divinity School at Vanderbilt University, testifies: I met Baha’i for the first time as a freshman in college. During these four years of search I, like almost every other Christian, refused to consider seriously the claims of Baha’u’- llah as the Promised One. The truly frightening thing is that Christian leaders simply refuse even to consider the claims of Baha’i. They are willing to study for years the detailed as- pects of the Bible, historical and contemporary theological literature, and the history of the Christian church; yet they refuse to consider even the possibility that the claims of Baha’u’llah might be true.15 Hatcher mentions his study in the thought of such philosophers and theologians as Søren Kierkegaard, Karl Jaspers, Gabriel Marcel, Jean-Paul Sartre, Richard Niebuhr, Nels Ferré, and Paul Tillich and refers to his having been privileged “to know and talk with some of the greatest leaders of Christianity in the United States and, to some extent, in the world,”16 through his college experience and through participation is religious activities, but he confesses:
way comparable to the Baha’i Revelation either in the dynamic qualities of the Spirit or in the satisfaction of the intellect. When one finds such deep and lasting satisfaction in an age so fraught with error and anxiety, he can do nothing else but follow it. Indeed, he would be a fool to do otherwise! I pray that I may be able to say, as other Baha’is have said, “And it some- thing else comes along which is more satisfying than this, then I will follow it.” This is indeed the spirit of truth.17
that in him is to be found the solution to the world’s ills. When men put into action his teachings, then the world’s millennium will become a reality, peace in the world will be achieved, and men will be able to live in harmony and unity with one another in one great world brotherhood. The religions of the world, moreover, will become united under the banner of Baha’u’llah. George Craig Stewart exclaims: “Of all the fantastic dreams that men have ever dreamed this religion is the most ambitious.”18 Certainly, other religious have had great dreams and other religious figures have claimed to be the return of Christ, but Baha’u’llah’s claims are not so easily dismissed. The faith has proved to some extent its ability to unite in its cause the members of various religions creeds and backgrounds, and this diversity in unity is evident in many Baha’i gatherings. Part of the Baha’i success is due to the fact that Baha’is accept other religions’ founders as true messengers of God and their sacred books as authentic. Edward G. Browne, professor at Cambridge University who devoted a good portion of his life to the study of the early history of the Babi-Baha’i movement, related that he had often heard Christian ministers express wonder at the extraordinary success of Babi missionaries, as contrasted with the almost complete failure of their own”19 in Muslim lands, Browne believed the reason for this was that Western Christianity is “more Western than Christian, more racial than religious,”20 but also because the Babi propagandist admitted, while the Christian missionary rejected, the prophetic function of Muhammad and the divine inspiration of the Qur’an.21 What Browne observes as true of the Babi propaganda among Muslims is true also of the Baha’i approach to other religions of the world. The Baha’i accepts the divine founding of each religion, denies only its finality, and points to its fulfilment in the Baha’i revelation.
religion which arise from time to time, gaining a small following among a certain class but having no real rootage and failing to make any lasting impression. The Baha’i faith has demonstrated its vitality and its seriousness by inspiring its members to suffer martyrdom by the thousands, to leave family and friends in fostering the faith in distant lands, and to work courageously and tirelessly against difficult odds, and it has been successful in attracting to its banner a large host of men and women from a variety of cultural and religious back- grounds, social standings, and intellectual capacities. Various persons testify to the strange power of the Baha’i spirit when it is encountered. Professor Browne, mentioned above, made two trips to Persia and was in intimate contact with the members of the movement. He wrote: Persian Muslims will tell you often that the Babis bewitch or drug their guests so that these, impelled by a fascination which they cannot resist become similarly affected with what the aforesaid Muslims regard as a strange and incomprehensible madness. Idle and absurd as this belief is, it yet rests on a basis of fact stronger than that which supports the greater part of what they allege concerning this people. The spirit which pervades the Babis is such that it can hardly fail to affect most powerfully all subjected to its influence. It may appal or attract: it cannot to ignored or disregarded. Let those who have not seen disbelieve me if they will; but, should that spirit once reveal itself to them, they will experience an emotion which they are not likely to forget.22
“this strange enthusiasm, this spiritual hashish … sent men to martyrdom with smiles on their faces and joyous ecstasy in their hearts.”23
the high praise lavished upon the new faith by non-Baha’is. The adherents of a religion might naturally praise it highly and see great prospects for its future, but when non-Baha’i, many of distinguished merit, speak of the Baha’i faith in the terms they do, one’s attention may properly be aroused. Robert E. Speer, for some forty-six years the secretary of the Board of Foreign Missions, Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A., a world traveller familiar with religious currents of the time, said of the Babi religion: “It is one of the most remarkable movements of our day.”24 Edward G. Browne, who translated various Baha’i works into English, called the Babi-Baha’i movement ‘the greatest religious movement of the century”25 and a system “whatever its actual destiny may be” which “is of that stuff whereof world-religions are made.”26 Herbert A. Miller of the sociology department, Ohio State Univer- sity, wrote: “What will be the course of the Baha’i Movement, no one can prophesy, but I think it is no exaggeration to claim that the progress is the finest fruit of the religious contributions of Asia.”27 A Christian theologian. Nels F. S. Ferré, admits: “I have been surprised at the depth and devotional character of the best in Baha’i scriptures as presented, for instance, in Townshend’s The Promise of All Ages.”28
sity of Iowa, an authority on numerous small or little known religious groups, says of the Baha’i religion: “Wherever I have gone to research the faith called Baha’i, I have been astonished at what I have found.”29 He mentions his astonishment when he visited the Baha’i World Center in Haifa, Israel, and stood on Mt. Carmel in the shadow of the golden-domed Shrine of the Bab and his equal astonishment at the Baha’i “Nine Year Plan” projected for the years 1964-1973. He then says: But most of all. I am continually intrigued by the Baha’i people, close to a million of them representing the basic cultural and ethnic groups around the world and embracing obscure and little known localities in far-flung lands where even Christianity has barely gone. … I have met they in the most unexpected places, in a war-torn village in southeast Asia, in African cities, in industrial Mexico, in the executive branches of big industry in Iran, in schools and colleges on foreign campuses, in American cities and villages, wherever people dream of the age-old concept of the brotherhood of man and the fatherhood of God, somewhere in the unfolding rapture of the phrase, the Baha’is are there.30
amid the fast-moving, technological currents of the modern world, the historian, Arnold Toynbee, suggests something of the potential of the Baha’is when he observes how the Christian faith went largely unobserved, and little esteemed, by the cultured elite when it was only a century old:
Christian Era the Christian Church loomed no larger, in the sight of an Hellenically educated dominant minority, than the Baha’i and Ahmadi sects were figuring in the sight of a corresponding class in a Westernizing World mid-way through the twentieth century.31
elements of existing religions have little chance of capturing mankind’s imagination and allegiance because such attempts are made partly for utilitarian rather than religious reasons, such as the Emperor Akbar’s attempt in India and the Roman Emperor Julian’s attempt, but Toynbee says:
travelling northwards out of the city, I pass the Bahai temple there, I feel that in some sense this beautiful building say be a portent of the future.32 Such recognitions by non-Baha’i scholars of the importance and possible destiny of the Baha’i faith as a significant religious influence in the modern world require that the faith be given careful attention.
well read in the writings of Baha’u’llah and ‘Abdu’l-Baha, whose books he frequently perused at his bedtime reading hour.”33 Stanwood Cobb asks:
derived from these readings in the Baha’i literature? Or was there already a plan forming in his own soul which these writings con- firmed and strengthened?34
in his plans for the League of Nations was influenced by Baha’u’llah, that the steps toward world understanding might be the result of Baha’u’llah’s mystical presence, and that the development of the United Nations might be the substance of the imposing shadow cast by the Persian seer.35 Such recognition accorded to the faith by non-Baha’is is of a quality to indicate that the Baha’i story is deserving of serious study. Its Approximation to Christianity Another reason for studying the Baha’i faith, particularly for Christians and those in the Western part of the world, is its approxima- tion to Christianity. “No religion,” one writer observes, “shows more strange parallels to Christianity.”36 William A. Shedd, Christian mis- sionary in Persia, reported: “For the most part the ethical ideals are Christian.”37 When Edward G. Browne visited Persia in 1887-88, he was “much touched by the kindliness”38 of the Baha’is. When he mentioned this to his Baha’i companion, the latter responded by saying that the Baha’is were nearer in sympathy to Browne than were the Muslims:
you it is only by overcoming their religious prejudices. But we are taught to regard all good men as clean and pure, what- ever their religion. With you Christians especially we have sympathy. Has it not struck you how similar were the life and death of our Founder (whom, indeed, we believe to have been Christ Himself returned to earth) to those of the Founder
upon us are in many respects like those which you follow.39 Browne observed that few of the Muslims were conversant with the Chris- tian Gospels, whereas the reverse was true of the Baha’is, many of whom, he noted, “take pleasure in reading the accounts of the life and death of Jesus Chrisf.”40 Unlike many Muslims who believe that the Qur’an teaches that Jesus did not die on the cross,41 Baha’is accept the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ sacrificial death on the cross, and whereas Muslims refuse to regard Christ as more than merely a prophet or teacher from God, Baha’i profess him to be indeed the Son of Cod, a perfect manifestation of deity. Regarding the similarities between the ministry of Jesus Christ and that of the Bab, Shoghi Effendi, great-grandson of Baha’u’llah, elaborated an follows:
alone offer a parallel to the Mission and death of the Bab, a parallel which no student of comparative religion can fail to perceive or ignore. In the youthfulness and meekness of the Inaugurator of the Babi Dispensation; in the extreme brevity and turbulence of His public ministry; in the dramatic swift- ness with which that ministry moved towards its climax; in the apostolic order which He instituted, and the primacy which He conferred on one of its members; in the boldness of His challenge to the time-honored conventions, rites and laws which had been woven into the fabric of the religion He Himself had been born into; in the role which an officially recognized and firmly entrenched religious hierarchy played as chief instigator of the outrages which He was made to suffer; in the indignities heaped upon Him; in the suddenness of His arrest; in the inter- rogation to which He was subjected; in the derision poured, and the scourging inflicted, upon Him; in the public affront He sustained; and, finally, in His ignominious suspension before the gaze of a hostile multitude—in all these we cannot fail to discern a remarkable similarity to the distinguishing features of the career of Jesus Christ.42
persecution to which they were subjected, in their religion’s power to effect progressive social change and to inspire its followers to self-sacrifice and martyrdom, the Babi movement reminds one of essen- tial features of early Christianity.
a stepping stone in reaching the Muslims with the Christian gospel. An early notice in The Missionary Review of the World reported that the new teaching has opened the door to the Gospel as nothing else has done. Bible circulation is almost doubled every year. It is com- puted that in many towns and villages half the population are Babis. This is a clear indication that the people of Persia are already, in large measure, wearied with Islam, and anxious for a higher, holier, and more spiritual faith. Almost all through the country the Babis are quite friendly to Christians. The rise of this faith is in a large measure due to the spread of the Gospel, the best of their doctrines are borrowed from it, while they openly reverence our Scrip- tures and profess to be ready to reject any opinion they may hold when once proved to be contrary to the Bible.44 As late as 1925 Jules Bois wrote: “It is quite possible that Bahaism has a mission to pacify and spiritually quicken races and tribes which we have so far been unable to evangelize.”45 If Muslims could be won to an acceptance of the mission of Jesus as a divine revealer of God, perhaps they could eventually be won to a full acceptance of Christianity. This expectation, however, seems to have been premature, for instead of the winning of Baha’is to the gospel, Baha’is began winning converts from Christianity. Robert P. Richardson, a strong critic of the Baha’i religion, observed that “although so recent, this religion has spread from its birthplace, Persia, to the furthest ends of the earth”46 and noted with alarm that “Christians by the thousands have deserted the banner of Jesus for that of Baha’u’llah.”47 Christian converts to Baha’i, however, do not feel that they are deserting Jesus for Baha’u’llah but are reaching out to Jesus in his second coming. Just as Christians believe that if the Jews had actually believed Moses they would have believed in Jesus (John 5:46), so Baha’is believe that true Christians will accept Jesus in his returned form in Baha’u’llah. The Baha’i faith thus becomes, in Baha’i thought, a truer form—the modern form—of Christianity. Firuz Kazem- zadeh, an eminent Baha’i and a professor of history at Yale University, in a recorded commentary on one of Baha’u’llah’s writings, says: “The Baha’i Faith … encompasses all the previous faiths and is organically linked with them. … The Baha’i Faith is Christianity today; the Baha’i Faith is Islam today.”48 Because of the Baha’i approximation to Chris- tianity, Samuel G. Wilson, Christian missionary to Persia, felt it necessary to stress that the Baha’i faith is “a distinct religion” from Christianity.49 Since the Baha’i ethics also are similar to those in Christianity, the switch to Baha’i is an easy transition for some Christians. Be that as it may, the Baha’i approximation to Christianity affords another reason for studying this remarkable religion. Its Appeal to the Modern Age A further reason for studying the Baha’i faith is its appeal to many people in the modern age. Charles W. Ferguson, in his book The Confusion of Tongues, wrote that “no cult bears a gospel better suited to the temper of our times than the Baha’i.”50 Indeed, Baha’is believe that the Baha’i message is God’s word to the present age just
way to the people of those former ages. Part of God’s message through previous prophets, such as the requirement of love to God and man and the °Golden Rule,” is eternal and is restated by succeeding prophets. But another part of the prophet’s message is directed to the special needs of the time. It is at this point that the prophet employs his divine authority to annul previous laws and to issue new ones commen- surable with the requirements of the new age. Baha’is feel, therefore. that in Baha’u’llah’s teachings are to be found those divine laws, principles, and requirements which speak with special force to the present, modern age. Whether or not one subscribes to this religious philosophy, it is true that many of the Baha’i teachings deal with burning issues of the time, and this explains in part the Baha’i appeal to the modern age. The Appeal to Modern Issues The Baha’i teaching concerning race speaks to the current racial problem. The Women’s Liberation Movement finds a friend in the Baha’i teaching of the equality of the sexes. The threat of nationalism, the problem of war, the hope for a durable peace, the efforts at inter- national cooperation and arbitration by a “United Nations” tribunal, the modern friction between science and religion, the language barrier, the problem of poverty, the scandal of religious plurality—all of these burning issues of the modern period are dealt with (and the Baha’is would say, find their solution) in the Baha’i revelation.
many of the major problems and issues of the age than has the Baha’i World Faith. Arthur Dahl explains: The Faith recognized that the major problem of our age is the resolution of a series of deeply ingrained conflicts which are interrelated and penetrate various levels of society: con- flicts between ideologies, nations, religions, races and classes. Such conflicts, when combined with the weapons of annihilation our age has produced, threaten the future of civilization as we know it. They .redirect the efforts of science and technology at a time when man is on the verge of discovering the mysteries of interplanetary space and harnessing new sources of power. They consume an inordinate proportion of our productive energies, and divert attention from the conquest of our natural enemies: ignorance, disease, hunger.51 Dahl continues: What is needed is a new spiritual approach which will at once reconcile the basic contradictions in major religions beliefs, be consistent with modern scientific and rational principles, and offer to all peoples a set of values and a meaning to life that they can accept and apply. To meet this need the Baha’i World Faith presents a challenging set of teachings, founded on the concept of progressive revelation.52
relevant to the modern world, Baha’is feel they have already a gospel which speaks relevantly to the modern age in God’s latest revelation to the world. Why, the Baha’is ask, should one seek to make a reve- lation which was directed to a previous age applicable to a later period, when God already has vouchsafed to modern men and women his new message which is specifically designed for the new age? Baha’is have for years been directing their energies toward certain modern problems which some segments of the Christian church, for example, are only now confessing their guilt in having encouraged.53 This helps explain the appeal today of Baha’i over against more traditional forms of religious expression in the West. The Appeal is a Modern Ecumenical Age The Christian Ecumenical Movement of the twentieth century has been widely acclaimed as a tread which future historians may recognize as “the most significant event of the twentieth century.”54 Henry P. Van Dusen, long time president of Union Theological Seminary in New York and a leader in the Ecumenical Movement, notes that for eighteen centuries the Christian Church affirmed the ideal of the unity of the church but contradicted that ideal in practice, that only in recent times has the church fulfilled Christian profession by actively working for Christian unity, and that it is in this latter sense that the Ecumenical Movement is a new and significant modern event.” Van Dusen further notes that the church actually was somewhat slow in responding to centripetal forces in the world at large, but he then observes that the centripetal forces in the world’s life were superficial and ineffectual. Their end product is two global conflicts and humanity mortally lacerated and impotent. As I have earlier ventured to suggest, future historians may single out as one of the most significant features of this age the fact that, while the centripetal trends within Christendom originated in part from broader centripetal tendencies within the general culture, they continued with even more determined effort and significant result after the general cultural drift had suffered radical reversal and more powerful centrifugal forces than the earth had ever before witnessed were loosed upon mankind. It has been precisely while the nations have been falling apart that the leadership of the Christian churches of the world has been drawing closer and closer together.56 The Ecumenical Movement within Christianity no doubt has been one of the major events of modern times, but Floyd H. Ross says: “The great issue of the hour is not Christian ecumenism but human ecumenism.”57 It is to this larger ecumenism that the Baha’i faith addresses itself. The Baha’is are concerned not simply with union within the existing religions but with the union of all the religions in one faith and the union of all people in one universal brotherhood. The Baha’is, thus, represent a gigantic ecumenical movement. In an age when the distances which separate peoples and cultures of the world grow smaller every day, when events in one part of the world dramatically affect the entire globe, when the threat of total annihilation endangers all life forms on earth, and when man constantly searches for better and more effective means toward world understanding and cooperation, the worldwide Baha’i ecumenical program marks one more reason for this faith’s appeal to men and women of the modern age.
“secular” world.58 However much some Christians may think these descrip- tions have been overplayed, the reality remains. Edmund Perry writes:
the norms of Christian behavior do not as formerly dictate the morals of Western culture. Indeed, Christian faith, the Church and Christian behavior have become quite unacceptable to the vast majority of folk in the West. Bishop Lesslie Newbigin has aptly characterized this loss of the Church’s power and influence in the West by the phrase “the breakdown of Christen- dom.”59
levant but a number of notable persons within the Church have left it in recent times because of its irrelevance to modern man. James Kavanaugh, the “modern priest” who took a look at his “outdated church”60 and later decided to leave it, noted that “the most significant religious experiences are taking pleas outside or in spite of the institutional Church.61
world finds it intransigent and obsolete. It is hard to “go through channels” when the “channels” are more a vested interest than a reflection of an honest search for faith. A man can only abandon the institution and search for God on his own or with a few friends.62 Without arguing for or against the merits of Kavanaugh’s evaluation of the institutional church, it is sufficient for the present purpose to point out that the search for God outside the institutional church, of which Kavanaugh speaks, is being carried on by an increasing number of modern men and women, from the youthful “Jesus freaks” to experienced churchmen and trained theologians.63 Kavanaugh’s indictment of the institutional church is quite similar to what the Baha’is are saying, but instead of looking at only one segment of the modern religious world—the Roman Church, as Kava- naugh did—the Baha’is have taken a look at Christianity as a whole and also at Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam and other religions and find them all outdated and irrelevant to the modern age. In Baha’i thought, all religions go through an inevitable process of development and deterioration. For a time each religion continues to develop and to make a significant impact on the world but eventually begins to depart from the pure teachings of its founder and thus starts a decline in which it continuously loses its spiritual power and its relevance to the world. At an appropriate point, God sends a new revelation to renew and revitalize the religion and to make it better applicable to the religious and social needs of the time. This revelation of God is continuous and progressive, determined by the world’s needs and by man’s ability to receive new revelation. The various religions are created because the followers of one revela- tion refuse to accept the succeeding one and continue instead to adhere to the prophet who brought the revelation with which they are familiar. To the Baha’is, therefore, since God has sent his latest revelation through Baha’u’llah, all previous revelations and the religions which have been built around them have become obsolete, except for the eternal laws which deal with matters such as love, kindness, justice, and humility, and these are restated in the Baha’i revelation. The messages of previous prophets relating to religious institutions (rituals, .sacraments, ordi- nances, religious laws pertaining to prayer, fasting, and pilgrimages) and laws directed to social needs are superseded.
empty religious practices and teachings designed only to perpetuate the religious establishment regardless of whether or not it makes any mean- ingful contribution to society, the Baha’i faith, which claims to have no clergy or ordinances and a minimum of dogma but an important social message, makes a definite appeal. Marcus Bach points out that the “many Americans” who “were ready to accept Baha’u’llah as the mouthpiece of God” were “not people whom the churches had passed by; some of them had passed up the churches, feeling that creeds and sects were narrow and confing.”64 Its Fertility for Insights into Religious Development Another important reason for studying the Baha’i faith is the insight it may provide in studying other religions, in tracing and understanding the developments which religions experience. To focus today on the birth and rise of a world religion which is so close to one’s own day at such an early stage in its development may reveal
religions of the past. James T. Bixby remarks: To understand the source and nature of our own Christian religion there is no light so priceless as that which is supplied by studying at close range the rise and develop- ment of a new faith in our own age and among these Oriental peoples, where the Gospel of Christ originated.65
not always conclude that what is true of one is necessarily true of all others; but every religion as an historical and social phenomenon also shares certain common features with other religions, else one could not speak of the general category of “religions.” Every religion, for example, originates within a particular historical context, and it passes through certain stages of development and disintegration. Every religion possesses a body of “sacred” literature, which is regarded by the religion’s adherents as set apart from other literature in a special way. Scholars seek, in making critical investigations into religious development, to distinguish in a religion’s literature the various levels of tradition. Information on the development of the literature, dogma, and practices from a religion of such recent origin could provide valuable insights into developments which have taken place in older religions.
difficult is a lack of unamended or unaltered material written in the earliest stage of the religion’s development. Existing documents were written almost always at a later stage in the religion’s development when later reflection and interpretation has already begun. The assurance that a document portrays the original events and doctrines of a religion is difficult to obtain, and Edward G. Browne says that it
early records pass within a short time after their compilation into the hands of strangers, who, while interested in their preservation, have no desire to alter them for better or worse. That this should happen at all obviously requires a very unusual combination of circumstances. So far as my knowledge goes, it never has happened save in the case of the Baha’i religion; and this is one of the facts which invest the history of this reli- gion with so special an interest.66 The Babi-Baha’i movement provides the historian of religion with invaluable sources for studying its origin and development as with no other religion. There are at least two reasons for this. First, the religion is the most recent world faith. Other religions began hundreds and thousands of years ago. Of the so-called eleven major, living religions of the world, only Islam (seventh century A.D.) and Sikhism (sixteenth century A.D.) are centuries old; the others—Hin- duism, Buddhism, Jainism, Taoism, Confucianism, Shinto, Zoroastrianism, Judaism, and Christianity—date back into the thousands of years. The Baha’i faith originated only in the last century (1844 A.D.), and only since 1963 has it reached possibly the last phase of its formative development, which incidentally makes the present time most appropriate for making a study of that development. The Baha’i faith is, thus, a religion of modern times and is naturally more accessible for study and understanding.
is because its origin coincided with the development of interest by Western scholars in the scientific and critical study of religion. James Arthur Gobineau and Edward G. Browne were two scholars who took an academic and scientific interest in the religion, and the material they collected and their observations of the movement have placed all succeeding students of the faith in tremendous debt to them. Edward Browne, for example, had a number of interviews with Baha’u’llah, him- self, the founder of Baha’i. He, moreover, talked with and corresponded with a number of leaders and laity in the movement and gained much valuable information.67
regarding the origin and early development of the movement remain unresolved, but the information which is available is considerably more than is available concerning the rise of any other major religion. As such, the Baha’i faith is important not only for its own significance but for the insights it say provide in understanding the manner in which other religions are born and develop.
remarkable growth and extension around the world. Since its birth in 1844, the faith has spread from Persia to all parts of the world and is called quite appropriately today the Baha’i World Faith. The faith is reporting spectacular successes in more recent years. When William Miller wrote his first book on Baha’i, published in 1931, he said: All impartial observers of Baha’ism in Persia are agreed that here in the land of its birth this religion, which once showed promise of capturing all Central Asia, is now steadily losing ground. Few converts are being made, many of the Baha’i leaders of yesterday have openly proclaimed their de- fection from the movement, and some have written able books exposing the errors which they formerly laboured to propa- gate. It is only a matter of time until this strange move- ment, like Manichaeism and Mazdakism before it, shall be known only to students of history.68 That description was written in the early 1930s. Much has happened since then. Miller, himself, was to note later, in 1940, that the number of Baha’i spiritual assemblies and the number of voting members had doubled in the decade from 1926 to 1936.69 John Elder, in a review of Iran’s spiritual situation, wrote in 1948:
movement. When, some twenty years ago, one after another of their own leaders turned against the faith, and wrote devastating expo- sés of the intellectual fallacies and moral perversions that characterize the movement, there were many of us who felt that Bahaism was in its death throes.70 But Elder notes that the year 1944, the centennial of the Bab’s decla- ration, was the signal for increased propaganda and that many Baha’is at great personal sacrifice obeyed Shoghi Effendi’s call to scatter forth in evangelistic efforts.71 Edward B. Calverly, in 1955, remarked: “The Baha’i cause two decades ago was decreasing in influence in Iran, but is, at present, experiencing remarkable vitality.”72 Frank S. Mead reported that “since 1963, there has been a marked growth in member- ship.”73
but they do publish periodically information on the number of countries opened to the faith, the number of spiritual assemblies and Baha’i groups around the world, and other information. A look at the mis- sionary extension of the Baha’is in countries and territories during the periods of the faith’s successive leaders reveals the rapidly developing outreach of Baha’i influence. During the Bab’s ministry (1844-1850), Babis could be found in Persia and Iraq. By the end of Baha’u’llah’s ministry (1892), Baha’is had penetrated into fifteen countries, and when ‘Abdu’l-Baha passed away (1921), an additional twenty countries had opened to the faith.74 The period of spectacular extension, however, began under the able administrative direction of Shoghi Effendi, guardian of the faith from 1921 until his death in 1957. At the time of Shoghi Effendi’s passing, Baha’is had penetrated into 254 countries and dependencies.75 Most of this extension occurred after 1953, when Shoghi Effendi launched the “Ten Year International Baha’i Teaching and Consolidation Plan.” Achieve- ments during this decade (1953-1963) included the following: the num- ber of countries and territories where Baha’is reside more than doubled (from 128 in 1953 to 259 in 1963); the addition of 220 languages into which Baha’i literature is translated and printed more than tripled the previous figure; the number of national spiritual assemblies (the national governing bodies) quadrupled (forty-seven were formed in this period); seven new Baha’i publishing trusts were established; three new Baha’i temples were built (in Frankfurt, Germany; Sydney, Australia; and Kampala, Uganda, Africa);76 and the acquisition of forty-six new temple sites more than quadrupled the original goal of eleven. This Ten Year World Crusade was climaxed in 1963 by two impor- tant events: (1) the election by the members of fifty-six national spiritual assemblies convened at the Baha’i World Center in Haifa, Israel, of the first Universal House of Justice, composed of nine men, forming the highest administrative body in the Baha’i faith, and (2) the convening of the first Baha’i World Congress in London, in England, where more than 6,000 Baha’is from around the world gathered for the
commemorating the centenary of Baha’u’llah’s declaration of his mission.79
Year Plan” to be concluded in 1973. Goals for this period, which were set for the world Baha’i community and for each of the national assemblies, included raising the number of national spiritual assemblies from the sixty-nine in 1964 to a total of 108, increasing the number of local assemblies to over 13,700, raising the number of localities where Baha’is reside to over 54,000, adding four new Baha’i publishing trusts (one each in Brussels, Belgium; Rome, Italy; Karachi, Pakistan; and Tunis, Tunisia) to the then existing number of eight; and increasing the number of languages into which Baha’i literature is translated by 133 more languages, bringing the total to around 500 languages.80 Goals for the continental United States (excludes Alaska) included establish- ing 600 new local assemblies and 3,000 additional localities in which Baha’is reside.81 The reported growth of Baha’i membership in the United States within this period is fantastic. The 62nd annual National Baha’i Convention held in Wilmette, Illinois, April 29-May 2, 1971, for example, reported that Baha’i membership doubled within the past one-year period. Some 20,000 new believers, mostly blacks in the rural South, were recruited, as well as hundreds of Spanish-speaking people and a good number of American Indians.82 In a one-south period, 9,000 converts were won in a thirteen-county “teaching conference” based in Dillon, South Carolina. The Christian Century observed that most of these converts are blacks but noted that “young whites, too, are attracted to the Baha’i religion, which emphasizes peace and eradiation of racial prejudice.”83 From the few hundred centers in thirty-five countries in which Baha’is could be found when ‘Abdu’l-Baha passed away in 1921, the Baha’i faith has expanded today to more than 46,000 centers in more than 300 countries, islands, and territories of the world. The remark made by a Protestant minister to Marcus Bach that “if these Baha’is ever get going, they may take the country by storm” may be coming true today.84 Such remarkable expansion of the Baha’i faith requires that it be given dili- gent attention. REASONS FOR STUDYING THE BAHA’I TRANSFORMATIONS Various facets of the Baha’i faith might be written about, but the present study will focus on the Baha’i transformations. Why write on the Baha’i transformations, and what is meant by the expression “Baha’i transformation”? Although the term “transformation” has been used in reference to a few major changes which have occurred in the religion, and although it is acknowledged by both Baha’is and non-Baha’is that great changes have taken place within the religion over the years, the expres- ion “transformation” is not generally used in discussions and, thus, requires some definition or explanation.
changes in the Baha’i faith which have significantly altered previous forms of the faith. The thesis of the present work is that the Baha’i
succeeding head of the religion. Each successive leader of the movement has had to face and overcome opposition to him by those who charged him with overstepping his legitimate authority and introducing changes in the religion contrary to its essential character. To whatever extent these charges are true or false, whether the succeeding leaders actually contrived to produce alterations in the faith or resigned themselves to an unavoidable cadence of events, the end result was that within each successive leader’s ministry there occurred in the religion a transfor- mation of a highly critical nature, producing inner turmoil, causing notable—if not schismatic—departures from the new authority, and neces- sitating new adjustments by the faith’s adherents. Baha’i transformations are important for at least three reasons: (1) because they fora a characteristic feature of the Baha’i faith, (2) because they provide a key to a proper understanding of the religion, and (3) because they throw light on some subsidiary questions in the study (4) of the faith. Characteristic Feature of the Faith All religions to some extent go through dramatic alterations in the course of their history. Kirtley F. Mather, Harvard University professor, once wrote:
ment and modification of the theological and philosophical concepts which it cherishes, because no great religion could possibly be stationary. It must be moving forward, keeping abreast of the ever-moving current of human thought.85
its almost 2,000-year history. Its earliest form was radically different from its form after it became an established religion within the Roman Empire. Likewise, the nature of Christianity after the Reformation was significantly altered from its previous form, The Ecumenical Movement, the Jesus Revolution, the modern charismatic revival, the church’s efforts to minister in a secular society are all important trends which could dramatically alter tomorrow’s form of the Christian faith. Although all great religions undergo evolutionary alterations, both in their theologies and institutional structures, the Baha’i faith in particular has experienced extraordinary changes within a short 130-year span, in its evolution to its present stage of development, so much so that this evolutionary development marks a characteristic feature of the faith. Edward G. Browne, writing in 1910, said: “Few religions have undergone so rapid an evolution in the course of sixty-six years (A.D. 1844-1910) as that founded by Mirza ‘Ali Muhammad the Bab.”86 No less spectacular have been the developments in the religion since Browne made that statement in 1910. Prefaces to revised Baha’i literature aptly illustrate the Baha’i awareness and acknowledgment of this evolutionary process. The Preface to the 1937 edition of J. E. Esslemont’s popular introduction to the faith, Baha’u’llah and the New Era, first published in 1923, calls attention to the fact that “the author’s views, some of them written prior to 1921 [when Baha’u’llah’s son and successor in the faith, ‘Abdu’l-Baha, passed away] no longer on certain aspects of the subject correspond to the evolutionary character of the Faith.”87 The Preface to the 1970 revised edition of that same work is not overstating the case when it mentions that since the 1937 edition “the diffusion and development of the Baha’i Faith … have been tremendous.”88 The Preface to the 1966 edition of Horace Holley’s Religion for Mankind, first published in 1956, indicates:
work, no alterations in his text have been introduced, but the reader will be able to appreciate, by reference to this editorial note, the continuing evolution and dynamic growth of the Faith of Baha’u’llah since 1956.89
of the new developments had taken place.90 The year 1963, when the first Universal House of Justice was elected, marked a new epoch in the faith’s history. These prefaces all point up the significant fact of the faith’s evolutionary character. Each stage in this development is connected with the ministries of the faith’s succeeding leaders. Shoghi Effendi, Baha’u’llah’s great-grandson and successor to ‘Abdu’l-Baha, speaks of the four major periods of the Baha’i era’s first century, corres- ponding to the ministries at the Bab, Baha’u’llah, ‘Abdu’l-Baha, and the development of the Administrative Order, as “progressive stages in a single evolutionary process.”91 These stages are characterized by transformations of the religion, and their consistent reappearance in each stage marks a significant feature of the Baha’i faith. Key to Understanding the Faith The Baha’i transformations actually provide an important key to understanding the Baha’i religion. Without a clear perception of the issues involved in the transformations and their effects upon the religion, one runs into various problems and seemingly irreconcilable features in his study of the faith. With such a characteristic evolu- tion occurring in the religion, literature on the faith—both Baha’i and non-Baha’i—soon becomes obsolete on certain matters. While perhaps giving an accurate picture of the faith at the time it was written, earlier literature often gives a totally misleading or inaccurate presentation of the faith from the standpoint of its present teachings and policy. For exempla, often repeated statements that a Baha’i may be a member of the Baha’i community while retaining his membership in another religious faith or denomination, which earlier was a prime, non-Baha’i criticism of the faith, is totally inaccurate concerning present-day Baha’i policy, which requires complete severance from one’s previous religious affiliation. The problem of studying and properly understanding the Baha’i faith is increased by the reprinting and revising today of books originally published during earlier stages of the faith’s evolution. Samuel Graham Wilson’s Bahaism and Its Claims, for example, reproduced in 1970 by AMS Press, New York, while having some merits recommending its reproduction today, was nevertheless first published in 1915, while ‘Abdu’l-Baha was still alive, and therefore reflects an early stage of Baha’i development. To take one instance, Wilson’s statement that “to all intents and purposes, the Bab is as much as
Baha’i. Revisions by Baha’is of popular Baha’i books, as noted above, run into difficulties and require notice in the prefaces about the continuing evolution of the faith. In spite of these notices and in spite of revisions in the texts, these volumes give evidence of having been composed in the atmosphere of previous periods in the faith’s history. Knowledge of the Baha’i transformations enables one to study the literature on the faith with a minimum of confusion. The reader may assign the various books and articles to their respective periods in the faith’s evolution and evaluate then from the standpoint of the total evolutionary process. The literature thus becomes important in depicting the state of the faith at the time of its writing without being regarded as descriptive of the faith’s present development. Awareness of the Baha’i transforma- tions thus helps the student avoid possible confusion caused by contradic- tions between earlier and later written material and between literature which takes the transformations into account and literature which does not. Illumination on Subsidiary Questions The Baha’i transformations, moreover, throw light on some sub- sidiary questions is the study of Baha’i. For one thing, they help explain some tensions which presently exist in the faith, tensions which have resulted from the transformations. The reason for these resulting tensions is that Baha’is sometimes carry over into the next evolutionary stage teachings and attitudes from a previous period which contradict the teachings or policies of later periods. Tensions exist,
llah. Is the Bab primarily a forerunner of Baha’u’llah or primarily an independent prophet? Does the Baha’i faith begin with the Bab or with Baha’u’llah? Are the Babi and Baha’i religions distinct faiths or are they different stages of the same religion? Tensions exist, moreover, between broad and narrow definitions of what constitutes being a Baha’i. May one who has never even heard the name of Baha’u’llah be a Baha’i because he is a lover of humanity, or is no one entitled to this name who is not an enrolled member of the Baha’i organization? The Baha’i trans- formations help answer these questions and explain other Baha’i tensions. Another question the study of Baha’i transformations helps to illuminate is whether or not schism has occurred in the Baha’i religion. A conflict within the religion has occurred in connection with each transformation the religion has undergone. Non-Baha’i observers and critics often speak of schism within the movement, yet Baha’is con- tinuously insist that conflicts have occurred in the faith but not schism and that the Baha’i religion, unlike all other religions, is divinely safeguarded from schism by the unique provisions vouchsafed to the reli- gion by its inspired leaders. The question is immensely important, for the Baha’i religion claims to be God’s instrument to bring about the ultimate unity of mankind. But if the faith cannot maintain unity and harmony within its own household, how can it expect to bring peace and unity to the whole world? Does the Baha’i religion present modern man with the paradox—if not the irony—of a religion aspiring to unify the whole of mankind which itself has split into various contending factions? A study of the Baha’i transformations, the conflicts they aroused in the religion and the effects they produced, will help to clarify this important question. PLAN OF WORK The purpose of the present study will be to trace and analyze the basic transformations which have occurred in the Baha’i World Faith in its short 130-year history with a view toward ascertaining the character of the religion and its present state of development and clarifying and explaining various matters which remain confusing and contradictory without a clear understanding of the Baha’i evolutionary transformations. The study’s primary concern will be neither to prove nor disprove the faith’s claims and teachings, neither to condemn nor to exonerate, but to present a statement of those issues which, for good or bad, have shaped the religion over the years into its present stage of development.
introductory matters; part two treating the period of the faith’s three central figures—the Bab, Baha’u’llah, and ‘Abdu’l-Baha—a period called by the Baha’is the “Heroic Age”; and part three focusing on what Baha’is call the “Formative Age,”93 when the faith’s administrative order unfolds. The distinction between these two periods of the faith’s history is so marked that the faith in the latter period will be referred to in this study as “modern Baha’i,” the form of the faith as organized and defined by Shoghi Effendi. The religion’s doctrinal statement, historical understanding, and organization structure as established by Shoghi Effendi remain basically intact today, except for the important modification discussed in Chapter VII. The term “modern Baha’i” is appropriate, therefore, in designating the faith today as heir to the labors and literature of Shoghi Effendi. So distinct is modern Baha’i from the faith’s previous forms that literature on the faith by both Baha’is and non-Baha’is written before Shoghi Effendi’s transformation or which fails to take into account that transformation is presenting a now outdated, pre-modern form of the religion and should not be regarded as descriptive of present-day Baha’i teaching and policy. For example, most of the major non-Baha’i books, as those of Samuel Graham Wilson, Bahaism and Its Claims (1915, reproduced 1970), John R. Richards, The Religion of the Baha’is (1932), and Edward G. Browne, published in the late 1800s and the early 1900s, as valuable as they may be for treating the faith’s early development, were written before the modern Baha’i period or during its early phases and thus do not take into account the complete Shoghi Effendi transformation nor far-reaching develop- ments since Shoghi Effendi’s passing in 1957. William McElwee Miller’s new volume, The Baha’i Faith: Its History and Teachings (1974), revises and updates his earlier study, Baha’ism (1931), thus helping to meet a need from the non-Baha’i perspective far a modern statement of Baha’i faith and practice. These earlier works should be read and evaluated in the light of the later transformations in the religion. In Parts Two and Three, covering the faith’s history, a chapter will be devoted to each period of the faith in which a major transform- tion occurs. Since the transformations were affected by the various leaders in the faith during their successive ministries, the chapters thus will be divided according to the ministries of the religion’s leaders.
(1) the respective leader’s life. (2) the leader’s teachings, and (3) the transformation in the religion which the events of that life and those teachings effected, with emphasis on the opposition it aroused, the tensions in the faith it produced, and the adjustments it necessi- tated. These concerns will not always be clearly distinguished in the discussions since they overlap at points. Some of the Bab’s teachings, for example, have a direct bearing on the events of his life, and these events, such as his trial and execution, cannot be understood fully without recourse to his teachings. Similarly, the transformation effected by Baha’u’llah cannot be separated from his teachings which constitute the essence of much of that transformation. The three con- cerns, therefore, are not entirely exclusive and will not always be distinguished but will be in the background of thought as the discussions progress. Briefly defined, the transformations to be dealt with in the present study, growing out of the transforming character of the Babi religion (Chapter III), are Baha’u’llah’s transformation of the Babi religion into the Baha’i faith (Chapter IV); the transformation of the Baha’i faith into a more Western and socially oriented religion, as effected by ‘Abdu’l-Baha, son and appointed successor of Baha’u’llah (Chapter V), the transformation of the faith from a small, loosely knit, inclusive religion into a tightly organized, precisely defined, exclusive world faith, as effected by Shoghi Effendi, grandson and
formation from a religion under the guardianship of an appointed, living descendant of Baha’u’llah to a religion directed by a body of nine elected officials whose term of office is temporary (Chapter VII). Although all the major periods in the faith’s history will be dealt with in discussing the successive transformations, the work, almost needless to say, will not attempt to give a complete history of the Baha’i religion. Various important, historical matters which do not touch on the development of the Baha’i transformations, as important or interesting as they may be to a full understanding and appreciation of Baha’i history, will fall outside the scope of the present study. Nor will a full or systematic statement of Baha’i teaching be attempted. The treatment of such history and teachings as have bearing on the Baha’i transformations, however, should enable the reader to gain a basic grasp of Baha’i history and teachings so that he can explore with profit and understanding further aspects of the truly amazing religion of Baha’i. NOTES TO CHAPTER I
2 One Universal Faith (Wilmette, Ill.: Baha’i Publishing Trust, n.d.). Pamphlet with unnumbered pages. 3 Arthur Dahl, Baha’i: World Faith for Modern Man (Wilmette, Ill.: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1960), p. 3. The text of this pamphlet also is printed in The Baha’i World: An International Record, XIII (Haifa, Israel, The Universal House of Justice, 1970), pp. 1174-80. 4 Edward G. Browne, “Babiism,” Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th ed., III, 95. 5 Samuel Graham Wilson, Bahaism and Its Claims (New York: Fleming H. Revell Co., 1915), p. 35. 6 Hamid Algar, Religion and State in Iran 1785-1906: the Role of the Ulama in the Qajar Period (Berkeley, University of California Press, 1969), p. 137. 7 These three points are modifications of W. Kenneth Christian’s points in the pamphlet Basic Facts of the Baha’i Faith (Wilmette, Ill.: Baha’i Publishing Trust, n.d.): “First, Baha’is live in more than two hundred countries of the world. … Second, the Baha’i Faith develops world-mindedness. … Third, the Baha’i Faith offers a clear pattern of world order.” Unnumbered pages. 8 John G. Wishard, Twenty Tears in Persia (New York: Fleming H. Revell Co., 1908), p. 163. 9 Listed in Baha’i Teachings for a World Faith (Wilmette, Ill.: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1943), p. 3, in William Sears, Convincing Answers (Wilmette, Ill.: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1962, p. 4, and in various other Baha’i publications, 10 Marcus Bach, Strangers at the Door (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1971), p. 88. 11 Alessandro Bausani, “The Religious Crisis of the Modern World,” World Order, II (Spring, 1968), 13. 12 Ernst Klienke, “The Cultural Principles of the Baha’i Movement,” trans. by Martha Root, The Baha’i World, A Biennial Inter- national Record, III (New York: Baha’i Publishing Committee, 1930), p. 268.
13 Jean Masson, “The ‘Bahai Revelation’: Its Western Advance,” The American Review of Reviews, XXXIX (Feb., 1909), 214. 14 Baha’u’llah, Gleanings from the Writings of Baha’u’llah, trans. by Shoghi Effendi (rev. ed.; Wilmette, Ill.: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1963), p. 5, and Baha’i World Faith, Selected Writings of Baha’u’llah and ‘Abdu’l-Baha (2d ed.; Wilmette, Ill.: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1956), p. 9. 15 William S. Hatcher and Thomas L. Thompson, Power to Renew
Trust, 1965), p. 9. 16 ibid., p. 6. 17 ibid., p. 8. 18 George Craig Stewart, “The New Persian Temple in Illinois,”
19 Myron H. Phelps, Life and Teachings of Abbas Effendi, with an Introduction by Edward Granville Browne (New York: G. P. Putman’s Sons, 1904), p. xi. 20 ibid., p. xii. 21 ibid., p. xv. 22 Edward G. Browne, ed. and trans., A Traveller’s Narrative
and Notes (Cambridge: The University Press, 1891), pp. xxxviii-xxxix. 23 E. S. Stevens, “Abbas Effendi: His Personality, Work, and Followers,” The Fortnightly Review, LXXXIX, N.S. (June 1, 1911), 1067. 24 Robert E. Speer, Missions and Modern History (New York: Fleming H. Revell Co., 1904), p. 121. 25 Edward G. Browne, “Babiism,” in The Religious Systems of the
26 ibid., p. 333. 27 Herbert A. Miller, “Religion in Asia,” World Unity, ed. by John Herman Randall (Dec., 1930), p. 187. 28 Nels F. S. Ferré, Strengthening the Spiritual Life (London: Collins, 1956), p. 54. 29 Bach, Strangers at the Door, p. 74. 30 ibid., pp. 75-76. 31 Arnold Toynbee, A Study of History, VIII (London: Oxford University Press, 1954), p. 117. 32 Arnold Toynbee, Christianity among the Religions of the
33 Stanwood Cobb, Security for a Failing World (Washington, D.C., Avalon Press, 1934), p. 112. 34 ibid.
35 Marcus Bach, “Baha’i: A Second Look,” The Christian Century LXXIV (April 10, 1957), 449, 36 E. E. Kellett, A Short History of Religions (Baltimore, Mary- land: Penguin Books, 1962), p. 362. 37 William A. Shedd, “Bahaism and Its Claims,” The Missionary
38 Edward G. Browne, A Year amongst the Persians (3d ed.; London: Adam and Charles Black, 1950), p. 235. 39 ibid.
40 ibid., p. 235n. 41 The Muslim belief that Jesus did not die on the cross is based on an interpretation of a passage in the Qur’an which reads: “They slew him not nor crucified, but it appeared so unto them; and lo! those who disagree concerning it are in doubt thereof; they have no knowledge thereof save pursuit of a conjecture; they slew him not for certain, but Allah took him up unto Himself” (4:157-58). Various interpretations of these verses are given today by both Muslims and Christians. The traditional Muslim view is that some substitute, Judas Iscariot or some other, actually died on the cross in the “appearance” of Jesus. The more probable interpretation is that the Qur’an is deny- ing any Jewish victory in Jesus’ crucifixion since Jesus willingly laid down his life. Geoffrey Parrinder calls attention to a possible parallel to these verses in Surah 8:17 in reference to the Muslims who were taking credit for victory at Badr: “Ye (Muslims) slew them
Barnes and Noble, Inc., 1965, p. 120). Ultimately the victory was the work of God. Similarly, the crucifixion was the work of God, who “gathered” (3:55; 5:117) Jesus to himself. Cf. Julius Basetti-Sani, “For a Dialogue between Christians and Muslims,” The Muslim World, LVII, No. 3 (July, 1967), p. 192. 42 Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By (4th printing, Wilmette, Ill.: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1957), pp. 56-57. 43 Among the “abominations” charged against the early Christians were infanticide, cannibalism, and incest (see Henry Bettenson, ed., Documents of the Christian Church [New York: Oxford University Press, 1960], p. 4). The charge of cannibalism was based on a misunderstanding or distortion of the Lord’s Supper. Similarly, among charges against the Babis were that they held their wives and possessions in common, allowed the drinking of wine and other immoralities forbidden in Islam, asserted that a woman could have nine husbands, and gave enchanted dates or tea to those visiting them which caused them to become Babis (see Edward G. Browne, ed. and trans., The Tarikh-i-Jadid or New History of Mirza ‘Ali Muhammad the Bab, by Mirza Husayn of Hamadan [Cambridge University Press, 1893], p. 25 and Appendix II, p. 322). The charge that the Babis allowed a woman to have nine husbands was based erroneously on Babi-Baha’i numerology which assigned a special importance to the numbers nine and nineteen. 44 “Babism in Persia,” The Missionary Review of the World, II, N.S. (Jan., 1898), 55. 45 Jules Bois, The New Religions of America, III—Babism and Bahaism,” The Forum, LXXIV (July, 1925), 10. 46 Robert P. Richardson, ‘The Persian Rival to Jesus, and His American Disciples,” The Open Court, XXVIII (No. 8), No. 711 (Aug., 1915), p. 460. 47 ibid. 48 Firus Kazemzadeh, “A Commentary on ‘Epistle to the Son of the Wolf,’” Cassette tape (Wilmette, Ill.: Baha’i Publishing Trust). 49 Wilson, Bahaism and Its Claims, p. 35. 50 Charles W. Ferguson, The Confusion of Tongues (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, Doran & Company, Inc., 1925), p. 231. 51 Dahl, World Faith for Modern Man, p. 3. 52 ibid., pp. 4-5. 53 The more recent Chicago “Declaration of Evangelical Social Concern,” as one case in point, confesses the failure of evangelicals to demonstrate “the love of God to those suffering social abuses,” deplores the historic involvement of the church in America with racism and the conspicuous responsibility of the evangelical community for perpetuating the personal attitudes and institutional structures that have divided the body of Christ along color lines,” urges the promotion of a “more just acquisition and distribution of the world’s resources,” acknowledges the need to “resist the temptation to make the nation and its institutions objects of near religious loyalty,” and acknowledges “that we have encouraged men to prideful domination and women to irresponsible passivity” (For the text of the “Declaration,” see Christianity Today, XVIII, No. 6 [Dec. 21, 1973], p. 38). The Chicago Declaration is similar to various social-concerns statements issued by Christian denominations over the past seven or eight years. 54 Henry P. Van Dusen, World Christianity: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow (New York: Abingdon-Cokesbury Press, 1947), p. 69; John Dillenberger and Claude Welch, Protestant Christianity Interpreted through Its Development (New York, Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1955), p. 301.
55 Van Dusen, World Christianity, pp. 68-69. 56 ibid., pp. 177-78. 57 Floyd H. Ross, “The Christian Mission in Larger Dimension,” in The Theology of the Christian Mission, ed. by Gerald H. Anderson (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Co., Inc., 1961), p. 214. 58 See, for example, Harvey Cox, The Secular City: Secularization and Urbanization in Theological Perspective (rev, ed.; New York: The MacMillan Co., 1966), Lesslie Newbigin, Honest Religion for Secular Man (London, SCM Press Ltd., 1966); Colin William, Faith in a Secular Age, Fontana Books (London: Collins, 1966). 59 Edward Perry, The Gospel in Dispute: The Relation of Chris-
and Co., Inc., 1958), p. 1. 60 Kavanaugh is the author of A Modern Priest Looks at His Out-
tutional church, Kavanaugh has written The Birth of God (New York: Tri- dent Press, 1969) in which he takes an additional step and looks at “the entire religious tradition of the Western World” and finds that “the religious phenomenon has affixed itself to our entire culture and has deprived man of the freedom that is his right and the maturity that is the hope of the world” (p. 8).
Trident Press, 1967), p. viii. 62 ibid. 63 Among notables who have left the institutional church or its ministry are the following:
gian, for sixteen years Professor of Dogmatic Theology at St. Edmund’s College in England, author of Theology for Today (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1961) and other works, editor of The Clergy Review, who candidly presents his reasons for leaving the Church in his volume A Question of
phrase from Harvey Cox, Davis has chosen and suggests for all Christians an attitude of “creative disaffiliation” (A Question of Conscience, p. 266, citing Cox, The Secular City, p. 230), which in Davis’ thought may or may not entail renunciation of one’s denominational membership but does require a recognition that “existing social structures of the Churches are inadequate and obsolete,” that they are “limited in func- tion, relative in value and essentially changeable” (A Question of Con- science, pp. 266-67). (2) The controversial Bishop James A. Pike, whose career included serving as head of the Department of Religion at Columbia University, Dean of New York City’s Cathedral of St. John the Divine, and Bishop in the Diocese of California, the author of numerous books, staff member of the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions, for some ten years chairman for the California Advisory Committee to the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, and a teacher in three law schools and three theological seminaries, was the focus of heresy proceedings in the Protestant Episcopal Church (see William Stringfellow and Antony Towne,
later resigned as Bishop of California, and established the Foundation for Religious Transition, renamed alter his death the Bishop Pike Foundation, to aid others leaving the ministry of the institutional church. Bishop Pike held that “the growing disenchantment with the Church does not mean diffidence toward questions about ultimate meaning,” for he notes that the “more people conclude—rightly or wrongly—that the Churches have been “tried and found wanting,” the greater is the extent of searching via extra-ecclesiastical avenues” (Pike, If This Be
humorous How to become a Bishop without Being Religious (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Co., Inc., 1965), Charles Merrill Smith served for many years in Bloomington, Illinois, and later as minister of the First Congregational Church, Montclair, New Jersey. His humorous spoof at the religious profession turned out to be more serious than he may have intended, for Smith has since left the ministry, devoting himself now to writing and lecturing. In a section entitled “Do You Blame Me for Quitting the Ministry?” (addressed to God) in his book How to
his frustration in serving as a minister, his sense of futility, and his growing conviction that what he was doing was not very important anymore. “When a fellow feels this way,” he says, “the only honest thing to do is quit” (p. 134, Bantam edition). He compares the churches as now organized to a 1932 Duesenberg. It was and still is, he says, a handsome automobile, comfortable to ride in, mechanically way ahead of the times, but it was expensive to buy, the upkeep was horrendous, and it was awfully big. Smaller and cheaper automobiles drove the Duesen- berg out of business. Today a Duesenberg is not bought for its original purpose of transportation but as a status symbol, an expensive toy. Smith says: “My suggestion is to let the people who want Duesenberg religion and are willing to pay for it go right on playing with the expensive Christian toy. After all, it’s a free country, and they can’t hurt anybody very much. But please send a revelation to some new Amos or Isaiah to call the community of faith to its true vocation” (pp. 45-.6). Baha’is believe that these searches for God outside of the tra- ditional religious structures can end in Baha’u’llah, in whom God has, as Smith prays for, sent another revelation in a new prophet.
Merrill Co., 1946), pp. 190-91. 65 James T. Bixby, “What Is Behaism?,” The North American Review, Vol. 196, No. DCLXXIX (June, 1912), 835. 66 Edward G. Browne, ed. and trans., The Tarikh-i-Jadid or New
bridge: University Press, 1893), pp. xi-xii. 67 Browne’s information is scattered through a number of impor- tant articles in journals and encyclopedias and in his introductions, notes, and appendices to his translations of Baha’i literature and in other material. No one has attempted to systematize Browne’s material. He would often correct or add to previously given information. H. M. Balyuzi, an eminent Baha’i, whose father was one of Browne’s correspon- dents, has written a significant study from the Baha’i standpoint of Browne and his writings and activities pertaining to the faith. 66 William McElwee Miller, Baha’ism: Its Origin, History and
69 William McE. Miller, “The Bahai Cause Today,” The Moslem World, XXX (Oct., 1940), 389. 70 John Elder, “The Spiritual Situation in Iran,” The Muslim World, XXXVIII (April, 1948), 107. 71 ibid.
of Religious Knowledge, ed. Lefferts A. Loetscher (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1955), I, 104. 73 Frank S. Mead, Handbook of Denominations in the United States (4th ed.; New York: Abingdon Press, 1965), p. 32. 74 Hands of the Cause Residing in the Holy Land, comp., The Baha’i
75 Baha’i World, XIII, 342. 76 The Baha’i temple in Wilmette, Illinois, was dedicated on May 2, 1953.
77 Hands of the Cause, The Baha’i Faith 1844-1963, pp. 7-8. 78 This twelve-day period is the Baha’i Feast of Ridvan, which annually commemorates Baha’u’llah’s declaration of his mission. 79 D. Thelma Jackson, comp., Your Role in the Nine Year Plan (Wilmette, Ill.: Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1909, p. 12; and J. E. Esslemont,
1970), p. 234. 80 Universal House of Justice, Wellspring of Guidance: Messages
A letter from the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha’is of the United States through its secretary, Glenford B. Mitchell, September 19, 1974, to the author provides some information on present Baha’i growth, “… there has been a tremendous increase in the number of National Spiritual Assemblies, localities where Baha’is reside and in the number of Baha’i schools and other institutions during the past year. For example, the number of National Spiri- tual Assemblies now totals 115 with 16 more to be established within the next five years.” 81 Jackson, Your Role in the Nine Year Plan, p. 18. 82 “Baha’is Report Increased Assemblies, Doubling of Membership in the U.S.,” The Christian Century, LXXXVIII (May 19, 1971), 616. 83 “Baha’i Faith Makes Gains among Rural Blacks in Southern U.S.,”
84 Bach, “Baha’i: A Second Look,” p. 449. 85 Kirtley F. Mather, Science in Search of God (New York: Red Label Reprints, 1918), pp. 34-35. 86 Edward G. Browne, ed., Kitab-i-Nuqtatu’l-Kaf, Being the Earliest History of the Babis Compiled by Hajji Mirza Jani of Kashan between the years A.D. 1850 and 1852 (Leiyden: E. J. Brill; London: Luzac & Co., 1910), p. xlvii. 87 Esslemont, Baha’u’llah and the New Era, 3d ed., revised, p. v. This edition contains the Prefaces to the 1937 and 1950 editions. 88 ibid., p. ix. 89 Holley, Religion for Mankind (1st American ed.: Wilmette, Ill.; Baha’i Publishing Trust, 1966), p. 6. The first edition of this work was published in 1956 by George Ronald, London, England. 90 ibid. 91 Shoghi, God Passes By, p. xv. 92 Wilson, Bahaism and Its Claims, p. 15. 93 Shoghi, God Passes By, p. xiii. Yüklə 2,06 Mb. Dostları ilə paylaş:
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