Month: November 2020

When I thought of doing this personal blog, with most posts probably being about some aspect of the Baha’i Faith or about trying to be a minimally decent Bahá’i, it occurred to me that this may not make much sense to others without some explanation. But a Revelation is a huge thing, and I fear each post turning into a descending maze of footnotes to other footnotes. So it’s only fair to at least put a minimal summary here and some links. This is only as I personally understand things; there is nothing official here.

Before I start fumbling around, the crucial source of information is the actual Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, the Báb, and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá:

https://www.bahai.org/library/authoritative-texts

Within that site, the Hidden Words is short and yet deep, and the Kitáb-i-Íqán (Book of Certitude) is the source for what I’ve written below, which is the concept of “progressive revelation”. Both are by Bahá’u’lláh.

Some sites that are unofficial blogs (and better than this one) include:

Bahai Teachings
Baha’i Blog
Sifter of Dust, a new one

To me the best way to explain it is by way of analogies, and actually the physical world lends itself to comparisons, which I think is by design:

“Say: Nature in its essence is the embodiment of My Name, the Maker, the Creator. Its manifestations are diversified by varying causes, and in this diversity there are signs for men of discernment. Nature is God’s Will and is its expression in and through the contingent world.” (Lawh-i-Hikmat = Tablet of Wisdom)

The purpose of life is to grow spiritually, develop our potential, “carry forward an ever-advancing civilization”, and to be of service to others (which is actually more rewarding than being served by others). This world is a school. Our body is the horse we ride for now.

There are 3 stages in this: Our time in the womb, our time in this physical world, and our time in the next world (non-physical, “heaven”). And there may be more than 3, we’ll have to find out. In each stage we need to prepare for the next one. If a kid fails to grow arms in the womb, they’ll be at a disadvantage after birth. Similarly, we’ll be hampered if we fail to acquire now the virtues and perception we will need in the next world.

A school needs a teacher, and each major religion was founded by a Messenger from God, a “Manifestation”. Their teachings (not just words, but by example and by spiritual energy released) help people and society, but over time gets forgotten, distorted, dispersed, calcified like an old tree in winter. So a renewal and update is needed, which on the average is every 1000 years or so (“springtime” by analogy).

Disputing which major religion is the “true” one is somewhat like arguing over which chapter in a book is the true one.

The Manifestation for this time is Bahá’u’lláh (1817-1892). His biography is a whole topic itself. The Báb (meaning ‘gate’) (1819-1850) was His forerunner and also a Manifestation, thus only partly analogous to John the Baptist in the Bible. There will be more Messengers in the future.

Over time, societies are ready for more advanced understanding, building on what was taught in the past. The Manifestation teaches to the capacity of the people of that time; this does not mean their own ability/knowledge is more than previous ones, just that they are able to reveal more of it. Just as in an ideal school, the first-grade teacher knows as much as the college teacher, but will not overload the young children with more than they can understand.

Another aspect to these seeming differences is that it’s hard to explain things if the audience doesn’t yet have the vocabulary or the concepts, and if this is new knowledge, very likely our language won’t “hold it” very well. Look at the first verses of the Christian gospel of John: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. … And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us …” Does anyone reading this now think “Word” is being used in its everyday meaning here?

Side note: There is a Baha’i physicist who studied ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s Tablet of the Universe for hints about physics, based on the belief that ‘Abdu’l-Baha knew more than the language of that time could express, and it does read that way to me– One Physicist’s first Look at Abdu’l-Baha’s Tablet of the Universe.

So, we believe the Baha’i Faith contains the latest and most relevant (not the only) education from God, coming at a critical time in human evolution. The world is now small enough that we have to realize our essential unity, eliminate prejudice and the disparity between rich and poor, form a world federated (grassroots, not authoritarian) government to solve problems individual nations can’t, eliminate war, [… lots more…], and basically grow out of adolescence to be a functional adult human race.

After a recent spiritual faceplant, for a while I felt ashamed to be calling myself a Bahá’í after such a failure. And it’s not as if I haven’t been given time to learn.
But then I remembered that a common metaphor for the Manifestation is that of a physician:

Every divine Manifestation is the very life of the world, and the skilled physician of each ailing soul. (Abdu’l-Bahá)

And you see the same metaphor in the gospels, where Christ is walking along and all the sick people suddenly get up and follow Him.
When I was a new Bahá’í many of us referred to ourselves as “children of the half-light”, i.e. we of this generation could never fully shake our origins.
But the goal for now is to keep on trying:

Let each morn be better than its eve and each morrow richer than its yesterday.
— Bahá’u’lláh

Several years ago one of the African refugee families that we were helping had a daughter, and they named her Deborah after my wife. At that time one of our Bahá’í friends told us about this story from Star of the West, June 1932: “There was glad rejoicing when Baha’u’llah from ’Akka sent these parents a Tablet (a letter) about this new babe … Baha’u’llah wrote:

O Vargha! It is for thee to chant in both ears of this little one three times: Verily, thou hast come by the Command of God! Thou hast appeared to speak of Him, and thou hast been created to serve Him Who is the Dear, the Beloved! “

I found this touching, because it affirms that each person coming into this world is welcome and has a purpose, no matter how much we worry about the state of the world they’re entering right now. I remembered this when watching a talk by Hooper Dunbar on YouTube (unfortunately I can’t remember which one) where he discusses suicide, and made a point that stuck with me — some people might think suicide is OK because they should be able to make their own decisions about their own life, but that this is not true — that we can choose what we do in this life, but we are not to choose when we leave any more than when we enter. Taking a life is wrong, no matter whose life it is. He compared normal death to arriving at a banquet in the next world, whereas a suicide arrives at the banquet but there is no place ready for them yet, because they arrived at the wrong time. But there is the same theme of being welcomed in both transitions from one world to the next, and I like that. (disclaimers: unauthoritative, old translation [but I like it], etc.)