-
Beyond Congregational Prayer – O God My God My Beloved My Heart’s Desire
We are so used to the idea that a religious leader stands in front of a congregation delivering a sermon or carrying out religious rituals, that it is difficult to imagine what religion might be without these things. As we have seen previously, Bahá’u’lláh abolishes all forms of clergy in the Baha’i Faith. Among the reforms Bahá’u’lláh introduces is the abolition of all forms of congregational prayer, except in the case of the prayer of the dead. Virtually all religious “ritual” is also abolished. What does religious life look like in the absence of such patterns and institutions? The question implies changes in the life of the individual, community and…
-
The Secret Mission of Sulayman Khan
The terrible news that the Bab was to be executed in Tabriz had reached Bahá’u’lláh in Tehran. He knew just the man for a daring mission to rescue the Bab: Sulayman Khan. Courageous and strong and himself a leading native of Tabriz, if anyone could rescue the Bab, it would be Sulayman Khan. Doors would open to him that would not open to others. The mission had to be carried out in absolute secret and quickly. It was 630 miles to Tabriz and the road there traversed deserts, wilderness and fields before climbing steadily over a mountain pass and then on into the hills in which Tabriz is found. The…
-
Sacrifice
The concept of sacrifice is integral to religion. Like other religious concepts it has undergone transformation over the ages. The concept of sacrifice was integrally connected with religious ritual. For example, animal sacrifices were widespread in ancient times. The practice gave way in Judaism (after destruction of the Temple) and in Christianity and other faiths to new ritual practices. For Christianity, the theme of sacrifice becomes focussed on the cosmic cycle of life, death and rebirth, much as in the ancient Egyptian myth of Isis and Osiris. Of Christ’s sacrifice Bahá’u’lláh writes: Know thou that when the Son of Man yielded up His breath to God, the whole creation wept with a great weeping. By sacrificing…
-
Healing
Healing has a deep connection with the work of the messengers of God. We may, for example, think of the many stories and parables of healing that are recounted in the Gospels. However, while the healing of the individual – physical or spiritual – can be involved, it goes far beyond that. The individual can only truly be whole and healed when society itself is in a condition of well-being. Healing is so integral to Bahá’u’lláh’s mission that he uses the metaphor of “Divine Physician” to convey insights into the process he is unfolding. Thus he writes: We can well perceive how the whole human race is encompassed with great,…
-
Trees of Meaning
Trees are a recurring metaphor in Bahá’u’lláh’s writings and the Baha’i writings more generally. Here are a few examples. Trees are a metaphor for transformation of the human heart. Incline your hearts, O people of God, unto the counsels of your true, your incomparable Friend. The Word of God may be likened unto a sapling, whose roots have been implanted in the hearts of men. It is incumbent upon you to foster its growth through the living waters of wisdom, of sanctified and holy words, so that its root may become firmly fixed and its branches may spread out as high as the heavens and beyond.[1] They stand as a…
-
Effie Baker – Photographer of the Birth of a World Faith
What if photography had existed 2000 years ago and St Paul or St Peter had commissioned a woman to travel to Palestine to compile a photographic archive of all the sites associated with the birth of Christianity? What would our understanding of Jesus be like? In the 1930’s, a task very like this fell to a diminutive Australian woman: Effie Baker. Effie Baker was born in 1880. In her teenage years her aunt gave her a camera: a No 2A Folding Autographic Brownie. For Effie, as a student of the Ballarat East School of Arts, photography was an emerging art-form. An art which she practised together with other arts such…
-
The Fire Tablet
The Fire Tablet, written by Bahá’u’lláh, begins as a lament. Its name is echoed in its opening verses: … the hearts of the sincere are consumed in the fire of separation: Where is the gleaming of the light of Thy Countenance, O Beloved of the worlds? The Fire Tablet was written towards the end of 1871 when Bahá’u’lláh and his closest followers were still imprisoned in the city of Akka. It is in the form of rhyming couplets in three parts. In the first part, Bahá’u’lláh speaks of human suffering. Each verse refers to a form of suffering and searches for divine assistance. For example: Calamity hath reached its height:…
-
The Execution of the Bab
The Bab was in a cell in the barracks of Tabriz. He had already been condemned to death by the Amir Kabir, Persia’s highest official. The death sentence was sanctioned by the religious authority of high clergy. Now it just remained for the sentence to be carried out. Although death approached, the Bab was dictating a letter to one of his followers: Siyyid Husayn. The guards interrupted to take the Bab to his execution. He assured them that until he had completed what he had to say, no power on Earth would be able to prevent him doing so. Nonetheless they determined to take him out. With the Bab went…
-
Plan B – The Lesser Peace
* * * As noted previously, Bahá’u’lláh wrote to kings and rulers. He did not expect them to accept his proclamation of messianic fulfilment. Indeed he knew they would not. In his message to Queen Victoria he sets out an alternative for the world’s rulers: an alternative he refers to as the Lesser Peace. Now that ye have refused the Most Great Peace, hold ye fast unto this, the Lesser Peace, that haply ye may in some degree better your own condition and that of your dependents. O rulers of the earth! Be reconciled among yourselves, that ye may need no more armaments save in a measure to safeguard your territories and dominions.…
