[sangkancil] For the Student of Religion

[Vijay Vasudevan <kalvij19@yahoo.com>]

For the Student of Religion

The Bahá'í Faith is the youngest of the world's
independent
religions. From its obscure beginnings in Iran during
the
mid-nineteenth century, it has now spread to virtually
every part of
the world, has established its administrative
institutions in over 200
independent states and major territories, and has
embraced
believers from virtually every cultural, racial,
social, and religious
background. 

The new faith is a distinct religion, based entirely
on the teachings of
its founder, Bahá'u'lláh. It is not a cult, a reform
movement or sect
within any other faith, nor merely a philosophical
system. Neither
does it represent an attempt to create a new religion
syncretistically
by bringing together different teachings chosen from
other religions.
In the words of Arnold Toynbee: 

     Bahaism is an independent religion on a par with
     Islam, Christianity, and the other recognized
world
     religions. Bahaism is not a sect of some other
religion;
     it is a separate religion, and it has the same
status as
     the other recognized religions.2 

Bahá'u'lláh's central message is that the day has come
for the
unification of humanity into one global family. He
asserts that God
has set in motion historical forces that are bringing
about worldwide
recognition that the entire human race is a unified,
distinct species.
This historical process in which, Bahá'ís believe,
their faith has a
central role to play, will involve the emergence of a
global
civilization. 

Entirely separate from this breathtaking vision, the
Bahá'í Faith
holds a particular interest for students of the
history of religion. This
is because the empirical data is so accessible. It
would be difficult
or perhaps impossible to establish precisely the
generating impulses
that gave rise to the birth and development of any of
the earlier
major religions of the world. An explanation of the
nature of the
teachings of the Buddha, the actual events of the life
of Jesus, the
era in which Zoroaster lived and the nature of his
influence, even
substantiating the historical existence of
"Krishna"--all remain
seemingly insoluble problems. The life and person of
Muhammad
are more accessible, but even here controversy exists
on many
matters of vital detail. 

One of the earliest Western historians to become
interested in
Bahá'í history was Edward Granville Browne, a noted
Cambridge
orientalist. It was Browne's view that the then
little-known faith
afforded a unique opportunity to examine in detail how
a new and
independent religion comes into existence. He said: 

     for here he [the student of religion] may
contemplate
     such personalities as by lapse of time pass into
heroes
     and demi-gods still unobscured by myth and fable;
he
     may examine by the light of concurrent and
     independent testimony one of those strange
outbursts
     of enthusiasm, faith, fervent devotion, and
indomitable
     heroism--or fanaticism, if you will--which we are
     accustomed to associate with the earlier history
of the
     human race; he may witness, in a word, the birth
of a
     faith which may not impossibly win a place amidst
the
     great religions of the world.3 

The same point has been made by modern observers from
outside
the Bahá'í community: 

     The Bábí-Bahá'í 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 Bahá'í
Faith is
     the most recent religion. Other religions began
     hundreds or 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--Hinduism,
     Buddhism, Jainism, Taoism, Confucianism, Shinto,
     Zoroastrianism, Judaism, and Christianity--date
back
     thousands of years. The Bahá'í 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 Bahá'í Faith is, therefore, a
religion
     of modern times and is naturally more accessible
for
     study and understanding than the older
religions.4 

Most recently, the intensification of the persecution
of Iranian
Bahá'ís by the Islamic regime in their country has
attracted
international attention. Since it is principally the
religious affiliation of
the victims which has occasioned the attacks, interest
has
increasingly focused on the Bahá'í Faith itself. The
beliefs that
distinguish Bahá'ís from Muslims, particularly, and
the sequence of
historical events that has led up to the current
outbreak, have been
the subject of considerable discussion in Western
information
media. 

For all of the reasons mentioned above, the Bahá'í
Faith is
increasingly included for study in university and
college course
curricula on world religions. The writings of the
founder of the
Bahá'í Faith, together with in-depth expositions by
His appointed
interpreters, are readily available in compilations
published as
English-language translations. Apart from these
primary sources,
literature on the Bahá'í Faith represents two main
types of
secondary material: commentaries by its adherents
written to
educate Bahá'ís and attract support, and a number of
attacks by
antagonists from among the Christian clergy. Neither
type of
secondary source publication can be considered
adequate or
appropriate to the objective exposition of the history
and teachings
of the Bahá'í Faith. 

The study of any religion poses special challenges.
Unlike most of
the phenomena science studies, religion claims to
comprehend
human beings themselves. Religion demands not only
attention, but
ultimately devotion and commitment. So it is that many
religious
thinkers have insisted that there is a fundamental
conflict between
faith and science and that the realm of the former
lies essentially
beyond the explorations of the latter. 

Here the Bahá'í Faith comes to the aid of those who
undertake to
study it. One of the teachings of its founder,
Bahá'u'lláh, is that
God's greatest gift to humankind is reason. Bahá'ís
accept that
reason must be applied to all the phenomena of
existence, including
those which are spiritual, and the instrument to be
used in this effort
is the scientific method.5 `Abdu'l-Bahá, the Son of
Bahá'u'lláh and
the appointed interpreter of his writings, asserted
that: "Any
religion that contradicts science or that is opposed
to it is only
ignorance--for ignorance is the opposite of
knowledge."6 

To an unusual degree, therefore, one who studies the
Bahá'í Faith
finds the subject laid open to examination. The
mysteries one
encounters, like those in the physical universe,
reflect no more than
the recognized limitations of human knowledge. That is
to say, they
do not represent assertions about the natural world
which
contradict science and reason. The minimum of ritual
and the
absence of a priestly elite endowed with special
powers or
knowledge also afford relatively easy access to the
central features
of the Bahá'í Faith. 

Nevertheless, the study of religion is not
paleontology. It is an
examination of living phenomena which must be
penetrated, to the
fullest extent possible, not only by the mind but also
by the heart, if
a clear understanding is to result. The Bahá'í Faith
is a subject
which represents the deepest beliefs of several
million people,
beliefs which govern the most important decisions in
human life, and
for which many thousands of Bahá'ís have accepted and
are today
accepting persecution and death. 






=====
Vijay Saravanen Vasudevan
__________________________________________________
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