Persecution of Baháʼís

And in his letters to the principal rulers of the states of Europe, he invited them to join him in establishing religion and universal peace.

From this time, the Bábis who acknowledged him became Baha'is.

The Sultan then exiled him, AD 1868, to Akka in Palestine.

where he composed the greater part of his doctrinal works and where he died in AD 1892, May 29th.

Let your ambition be the achievement on earth of a heavenly civilization.

I ask for you the supreme blessing that you may be so filled with the vitality of the heavenly spirit that you may be the cause of life to the world.

The Baha'is must work hard with heart and soul to bring about a better condition in the world.

November 19th How joyful it is to see such a meeting as this, for it is in truth a gathering together of heavenly men.

In some respects, I should have preferred a manifesto representing the lofty views of the present head of another Society of Friends, the Baha'i Fraternity.

Peace on earth has been the ideal of the Barbies and Baha'is since the Barb's time, and Professor E.G. Brown has perpetuated Baha'u'llah's noble declaration of the imminent setting up of the Kingdom of God, based on universal peace.

But there is such a thrilling actuality in the manifesto of the disciples of George Fox that I could not help availing myself of Mr. Isaac Sharp's kind permission to me to reprint it.

It is, indeed, an opportune setting forth of the eternal riches which will commend itself now as never before to those who can say, with the grandfather in Tagore's poem, I am a jolly pilgrim to the land of losing everything.

Very different, it is true, is the Mohammedan legend.

It states that Ali Muhammad was present at Karbala for the death of the Master, that he came to an understanding with members of the school, and that after starting certain miracle stories, all of them proceeded to Mecca to fulfill the predictions which connected the Prophet Messiah with that holy city, where with bared saber he would summon the peoples to the true God.

This will, I hope, suffice to convince the reader that both the Sufi order and the Shaykhite sect were true forerunners of Bábism and Baha'ism.

He will also readily admit that, for the Sufis especially, the connection with a church of so weak a historic sense was most unfortunate.

And that's, again, we're going back to this kind of radical kind of love that is our job as humans, that is our job as Christians.

as LDS, as Baha'is.

And the other stuff is nonsense.

It's funny because this Christian friend of mine talks about like all this, all this focus on sex and premarital sex and gender and sexual orientation and whatnot.

Mm

... and the new government did not think highly of a lot of people, including, uh, the, the Baha'is of Iran.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.So the 1980s became very difficult.

In some respects, I should have preferred a manifesto representing the lofty views of the present head of another Society of Friends, the Baha'i Fraternity.

Peace on earth has been the ideal of the Baha'is and Baha'is since the Baha'i's time, and Professor E.G. Brown has perpetuated Baha'u'llah's noble declaration of the imminent setting up of the Kingdom of God based on universal peace.

But there is such a thrilling actuality in the manifesto of the disciples of George Fox that I could not help availing myself of Mr. Isaac Sharp's kind permission to me to reprint it.

It is indeed an opportune setting forth of the eternal riches which will commend itself now as never before to those who can say with the grandfather in Tagore's poem, I am a jolly pilgrim to the land of losing everything.

But unavoidable also was the anti-Islamic reaction, as represented especially by the order of the Sufis.

We may hope that both action and reaction may one day become unnecessary.

That will depend largely on the Baha'is.

It is time, however, to pass on to those precursors of Ba'ubism who were neither Sufites nor Zoroastrians, but who, nonetheless, continued the line of the national religious development.

In some respects, I should have preferred a manifesto representing the lofty views of the present head of another Society of Friends, the Baha'i Fraternity.

Peace on earth has been the ideal of the Barbies and Baha'is since the Barb's time, and Professor E.G. Brown has perpetuated Baha'u'llah's noble declaration of the imminent setting up of the Kingdom of God based on universal peace.

But there is such a thrilling actuality in the manifesto of the disciples of George Fox that I could not help availing myself of Mr. Isaac Sharp's kind permission to me to reprint it.

It is indeed an opportune setting forth of the eternal riches which will commend itself now as never before to those who can say with the grandfather in Tagore's poem, I am a jolly pilgrim to the land of losing everything.

Very different, it is true, is the Mohammedan legend.

It states that Ali Muhammad was present at Karbala for the death of the Master, that he came to an understanding with members of the school, and that after starting certain miracle stories, all of them proceeded to Mecca to fulfill the predictions which connected the prophet Messiah with that holy city, where with bared saber he would summon the peoples to the true God.

This will, I hope, suffice to convince the reader that both the Sufi order and the Shaykhite sect were true forerunners of Ba'abism and Baha'ism.

He will also readily admit that, for the Sufis especially, the connection with a church of so weak a historic sense was most unfortunate.

I'm just saying, people are just more aware of everything.

I know Baha'is.

I'm a Baha'i, and Baha'is were persecuted for so long.

Now I do shows, and I have people come up to me and say, because we knew the Baha'is were being persecuted, and we did nothing because we were scared.

But you were some of the best people.

The people most Iranian, the most patriotic were the Baha'is.

And they come in a party.

I said, you don't have to apologize to me.

The notion that rights don't come from laws and don't come from the government, but come from the Creator, that's what the Iranian government believes.

It's a theocratic regime that bases its rule on Shia law and targets Sunnis, Baha'is, Jews, Christians, and other religious minorities.

And they do it because they believe that they understand what natural rights are from their Creator.

So the statement that our rights do not come from our laws or our governments is extremely

You all agree with those principles.

We want respect for Christians and Baha'is and everybody in Iran and Kurds and Azeris and Baluch.

Everybody's part of the future of Iran.

We're not picking anybody here.

We're here day or night, ready whenever you need help, because a great trip starts with the right support.

I venture to remark that the favourite name of the Bahá'ís among themselves is Friends.

The ordinary name Bahá'í comes from the divine name Bahá, glory of God, so that Abdol Bahá means servant of the glory of God.

One remembers the beautiful words of the Latin collect, Qui servire regnare est.

I shall return to this presently.

Meanwhile, suffice it to say that though I entertain the highest reverence and love for Bahá'u'lláh's son, Abdol-Bahá, whom I regard as a Mahatma, a great-souled one, and look up to as one of the highest examples in the spiritual firmament.

I hold no brief for the Bahá'í community, and can be as impartial in dealing with facts relating to the Bahá'ís as with facts which happen to concern my own beloved mother church, the Church of England.

I shall first of all ask how it came to pass that so many of us are now seeking help and guidance from the East, some from India, some from Persia, some, which is my own case, from India and from Persia.