Features

View of the Bab by Marco Abrar

The following article has been compiled by the Birmingham Bahá'í Community:

The Bahá'í faith is the youngest of the world's independent religions. Baha’u’llah, the Founder of the Bahá'í faith taught around 150 years ago that humanity was one single race and that the day had come for the world to become unified in one global society.

The increasing discord, violence and wars in the world today, Baha'u'llah, says, are a result of prejudice, whether racial, national, or of class or creed. The abolition of prejudice of all kinds will in time give rise to a new global civilisation. Humanity is a single people with a common destiny. It is only when it understands its essential oneness that the world’s problems can be solved.

Baha'u'llah wrote:

"The well-being of mankind, its peace and security, are unattainable unless and until its unity is firmly established."

How did the Bahá'í Faith start?

The founder of the Bahá'í Faith, Baha’u’llah was born in 1817 to a noble family in Iran. Because of His teachings, Baha’u’llah was sent into exile for forty years. The last place to which he was exiled was Akka, now in Israel, where he passed away in 1892. Bahá'ís believe that Baha’u’llah is the latest in a line of Manifestations from God that includes Abraham, Krishna, Moses, Buddha, Zoroaster, Christ and Muhammad.

Shrine of the Bab at sunset by M Abrar

Today the Bahá'í Faith is the second most widespread of the world’s religions with six million followers in 235 countries and territories throughout the world. It embraces people from more than 2,100 ethnic, racial and tribal groups.

What do Bahá'ís believe?

Bahá'ís believe in the oneness of God, the fundamental oneness of all Religions and the oneness of humanity.  Baha’u’llah proclaimed that all the world’s religions represent one “Common Faith”, which throughout the ages has been renewed and progressively unfolded to humanity.

Teachings of the Bahá'í faith include the need for every individual to make an independent investigation of reality and not blindly follow tradition, the essential harmony between science and religion, universal education and the equality of men and women.

Universal House of Justice by M Abrar

What do Bahá'ís do? 

Bahá'u'lláh calls for the transformation of both the individual and the organisation of society. His teachings demand both an inner transformation of the individual and a transformation of present society to one founded on cooperation, compassion and justice.  Around the globe, Bahá'ís are united by a common outlook that holds to high inner moral standards and a commitment to serving the wider community.

Principles of the Bahá'í faith

• Oneness of God
• Oneness of humankind
• Oneness of religion
• Independent investigation of truth
• Universal peace
• Religion should be the source of unity
• Religion is progressive
• Harmony between religion and science
• Peaceful consultation as a means for resolving conflicts
• Universal education
• An international auxiliary language
• Elimination of all forms of prejudice
• Equality of men and women
• Abolition of extremes of wealth and poverty

The Individual 

Spiritual Growth

Bahá'ís see the purpose of life as being to undergo spiritual transformation and growth. Baha’u’llah counsels each human being to “'Possess a pure, kindly and radiant heart”.  Bahá'ís believe that it is the purpose of religion to bring about such personal transformation and to promote true nobility in all human beings.

Gathering for a feast

Prayer and Meditation

Bahá'ís pray daily. They also read from Bahá'í Holy Scriptures and those of other Faiths, and meditate on them in order to understand them more deeply. They strive daily to bring their actions in accordance with the teachings of the Bahá'í Faith.  Baha’u’llah exhorts His followers to ‘bring themselves to account each day’.

Service to Humanity

Baha’u’llah taught that transformation in the individual is not an isolated process dependent on living a solitary or ascetic life, or one that is solely for the purpose of one’s own self-fulfilment.  Rather, for Bahá'ís, the process of one's individual development and fulfilment is tied to devoting one's energies to the betterment of humankind and serving the needs of the community and the larger society.

Work as Worship

Bahá'ís believe that work in the spirit of service to humanity is a form of worship.

Community

There are no priests or clergy of any kind in the Bahá'í Faith. Bahá'ís in all countries around the world conduct their own worship, be it private or communal and organize their own community life. Baha’u’llah proclaimed a unique system of administration in which each individual is given responsibility and there is grass-roots involvement in community decision-making.

Devotional Gatherings

Inspiration, rejuvenation, motivation, purpose and meaning all are essential ingredients of a worthwhile life, yet there appears little time in people’s lives to pursue these objectives. Bahá'ís believe that the Word of God, revealed to man in the Scriptures of all religions, has the power to inspire and rejuvenate the soul, and to renew one’s sense of purpose. Therefore, Bahá'ís throughout the world host devotional gatherings in homes and community centres.

Centre for the study of texts by Marco Abrar

Bahá'ís believe that prayer and reading of the Bahá'í writings and other Scriptures create an environment of unity and harmony. For many, whether members of the Bahá'í Faith or not, these gatherings become a refuge from the discordant and grinding aspects of everyday life.

Moral and Spiritual Education

Bahá'í teachings place great emphasis on the education and training of children and youth in morals and values. Children and youth are encouraged to develop a strong sense of purpose, empowering their own transformation and leading them to contribute to the advancement of society.

Bahá'ís believe that moral, spiritual, and values-based training for children and youth is essential in order to nurture these capacities. Bahá'í communities sponsor moral education classes for children of all backgrounds. These classes seek to develop essential virtues such as trustworthiness, honesty and justice in children and build a strong moral framework that will assist children to achieve excellence in the material, intellectual and spiritual aspects of life.

Birmingham Bahai Youth weekend

Collective Study for Individual and Social Transformation

Bahá'ís are actively engaged in developing knowledge, skills, and spiritual insights that enable them to be effective contributors to personal and social transformation. Presently, most such collective learning takes the form of “study circles”—a local, collaborative, self-directed learning process being undertaken by Bahá'í communities around the world. All are welcome to these classes, regardless of their ideas or beliefs. The study circles broadly focus on studying our spiritual reality and our individual role in the progress of society, to better understand our purpose in life and the way to improve our own lives and the lives of those around us.

Grassroots Involvement

The administration of the Bahá'í faith is based on local, national and international elected bodies. The involvement of all individual members in decision-making is considered very important and in each local community grass-root consultation occurs regularly in meetings held every Bahá'í calendar month.

Social and Economic Development

The Bahá’í Faith is committed to the processes of social and economic development, to the establishment of human rights, the promotion of the equal status of women and men, and moral development. The Bahá'í communities’ involvement in global social and economic development projects, and its contributions as a non-governmental organisation  to the United Nations have received much attention.

Houses of Worship

Bahá'í Houses of Worship are open to all peoples. There is one in each continent. Although their architectural styles differ widely, features common to all of them include having nine sides and a central dome.  These features symbolize the diversity of the human race and its essential oneness.

Birmingham families meet to celebrate

Devotional programmes are simple, consisting of prayers, meditations, and the reading of selections from the sacred Scriptures of the Bahá'í Faith and other world religions.

The Bahá'í Faith in the UK and Birmingham

The Bahá'í faith was established in the UK over 100 years ago. Initially a small community of Bahá'ís was formed in the London area. Abdu’l-Bahá, the son of Baha’u’llah and exemplar of Bahá'í life, visited major cities in Britain in 1911 and then again in 1912-13, creating a considerable impact. He was knighted by the British government in 1920 for his services to humanity during the war years.

His grandson, Shoghi Effendi, was studying at Balliol College, Oxford when, on the passing of his grandfather in 1921, he became the Guardian of the Bahá'í faith. Shoghi Effendi died in London in 1957.

British Bahá'í’s of international fame include environmentalist Richard St. Barbe Baker and potter, Bernard Leach. The first Bahá'í in Birmingham, John Ludlow Marshall, was a tinsmith from Scotland, who had come to the city with his family around 1900. The first Bahá'í public meeting in Birmingham was held in Paradise St. during the war years and occasional meetings were held in Sutton Coldfield. In 1947, the first local administrative body of the Bahá'í Faith in Birmingham was formed. 

Today the local community of Birmingham continues to work for the principles of social transformation and unity. The Birmingham Bahá'í community runs regular devotional meetings, study circles, children’s classes and local introductory meetings on the Bahá'í faith.

Pictures of the Bahá'í holy places in Israel are courtesy of Marko Abrar - BahaiPictures.com