The rare qualities of the Greatest Holy Leaf

Bahíyyih Khánum

Sublime observations on the life of the most prominent woman of the Bahá'í Dispensation, Bahíyyih Khánum (also known as the Greatest Holy Leaf), daughter of the Blessed Beauty, Bahá'u'lláh.

"If she found you troubled she would not discuss your difficulties and try to solve your problems. You forgot them. Confusion and complexity were dissolved in her warm clarity."

"When we begged her to tell us of the scenes of tumult and outrage that crowded her childhood or of the long hardship in exile and imprisonment, she would not try to recreate in part that drama too great for any telling, or even to bring to the surface an episode out of the troubled past. She would simply allow to emerge from her still depths some living impression, some poignant detail, and so move you with this glimpse that you felt all the seasons of her grief and the full measure of her pain..."

          (From A Tribute to Bahíyyih Khánum by Marjorie Morten)

Source: http://is.gd/h4PFT
PDF-version: http://www.claricomm.com/Bahiyyih_Khanum_Tribute.pdf
Hat tip to Brent Poirier at http://bahai-storytelling.blogspot.com/2010/10/magnificent-character-greatest-holy.html

A Compilation of writings on the Greatest Holy Leaf is available here and here.

Photo accessed here.

The rare qualities of the Greatest Holy Leaf

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Community building

Welcoming people to a devotional meeting in Tuvalu

The vision: 

To bring together 

men and women eager to improve material and spiritual conditions in their surroundings... [Souls who long] to shed the lethargy imposed on them by society and work alongside one another in their neighbourhoods...to begin a process of collective transformation.

How to achieve it? 

By 

[persisting] in efforts to learn the ways and methods of community building in [such] small [neighborhood] settings", utilizing the "[specific] activities that drive this process...—

• meetings that strengthen the devotional character of the community; 
• classes that nurture the tender hearts and minds of children; 
• groups that channel the surging energies of junior youth; [and] 
• circles of study, open to all, that enable people of varied backgrounds to advance on equal footing and explore the application of the [Baha'i] teachings to their individual and collective lives.

(The Universal House of Justice, Ridván 2010 Message. View here.)

Photo copyright Bahá'í International Community. View here.

Community building

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Remembrance--the application of knowledge

Seeking insights through study

Every experience we have can imbue us with new insights. But what are the purposes of the insights gained? Surely they are given us to be applied - notably, according to Bahá'u'lláh, for the betterment of the society in which we live and for the benefit of all may cross our path.

In order to apply this new knowledge, we need to translate it into modes/schemes of practical action (i.e., to 'operationalize' them). This, I imagine, should ideally become a habit we make ourselves - to ever be on the lookout for creative means by which we can put these insights to the test, so to speak, in real-world situations.

How long can we wait before applying them? Clearly, any delay puts us at risk of forgetting them, allowing these fleeting 'gifts of the spirit' to slip from our minds and become lost in oblivion. 

The best way to grasp an idea and strengthen our knowledge of a thing is, as is known, by teaching and demonstrating it to others. Interestingly enough, however, and well worth noting in this regard, is that our attitude in, and motive for sharing our knowledge influences directly the learning outcome both for ourselves and for our hearers. According to the Holy Books, unless our motive be to serve God, our every endeavor will be without result. The spirit that's required is thus described in the Qur'án: "We nourish your souls for the sake of God; We seek from you neither recompense nor thanks." (76:9)

In the words of 'Abdu'l-Bahá:--

If one teaches one whom he loves because of his love for him, then he will not teach one whom he loves not; and that is not of God.  If one teaches in order to derive the promised benefit to himself, this too is not from God.   If he teaches because of God's Will that God may be known -- and for that reason only -- he will receive knowledge and wisdom, and his words will have effect -- being made powerful by the Holy Spirit -- and will take root in the souls of those who are in the right condition to receive them.  In such a case the benefit to the teacher in growth is as ninety percent compared to the ten percent of gain to the hearer, because he becomes like a tree bearing fruit through the power of God.

('Abdu'l-Bahá, cited in Star of the West - source is here)

As to the imperative to ourselves study, then apply the knowledge gained, a letter written on behalf of Shoghi Effendi states:--

He urges you to study deeply the teachings, teach others, study with those [believers] who are anxious to do so, the deeper teachings of our Faith, and through example, effort and prayer, bring about a change.

(Letter written on behalf of Shoghi Effendi. #1323 in Living the Life)

'Abdu'l-Bahá's thus appeals to us to let words be followed by action:--

Put into practice the Teaching of Bahá'u'lláh, that of kindness to all nations. Do not be content with showing friendship in words alone, let your heart burn with loving kindness for all who may cross your path. ...

[L]et your manner be sympathetic. Let it be seen that you are filled with universal love. When you meet a Persian or any other stranger, speak to him as to a friend; if he seems to be lonely try to help him, give him of your willing service; if he be sad console him, if poor succour him, if oppressed rescue him, if in misery comfort him. In so doing you will manifest that not in words only, but in deed and in truth, you think of all men as your brothers.

What profit is there in agreeing that universal friendship is good, and talking of the solidarity of the human race as a grand ideal? Unless these thoughts are translated into the world of action, they are useless.

The wrong in the world continues to exist just because people talk only of their ideals, and do not strive to put them into practice. If actions took the place of words, the world's misery would very soon be changed into comfort.

('Abdu'l-Bahá, Paris Talks, p. 16)

What, then, of remembrance? Couldn't one say, in a sense, that all we experience and do in life is but various means by which we may remember the One True God? Hence the need for action, that we may fulfill the purpose of our lives on this earth.

Now is the time, O ye beloved of the Lord, for ardent endeavor. Struggle ye, and strive. And since the Ancient Beauty was exposed by day and night on the field of martyrdom, let us in our turn labor hard, and hear and ponder the counsels of God; let us fling away our lives, and renounce our brief and numbered days. Let us turn our eyes away from empty fantasies of this world's divergent forms, and serve instead this pre-eminent purpose, this grand design. ...

Let us not consent that the splendors of the Sun of Truth should ever fade and disappear. These are the admonitions of God, as set forth in His Holy Books, His Scriptures, His Tablets that tell out His counsellings to the sincere. ...

('Abdu'l-Bahá, Selections, p. 276)

Photo Copyright Bahá'í International Community. View here.

Remembrance--the application of knowledge

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Recognizing potential, encouraging it

In 1992, more than 27,000 Bahá'ís from some
170 countries assembled in New York City for the Second
Bahá'í World Congress, which commemorated the
centennial of Bahá'u'lláh's passing.

'Abdu'l-Bahá's hope - for those endowed with capacity. This, to be realized through "the oneness of human world-power, the love of God."

A few days ago I arrived in New York, coming direct from Alexandria. On a former trip I traveled to Europe, visiting Paris and London. Paris is most beautiful in outward appearance. The evidences of material civilization there are very great, but the spiritual civilization is far behind. I found the people of that city submerged and drowning in a sea of materialism. Their conversations and discussions were limited to natural and physical phenomena, without mention of God. I was greatly astonished. Most of the scholars, professors and learned men proved to be materialists. I said to them, "I am surprised and astonished that men of such perceptive caliber and evident knowledge should still be captives of nature, not recognizing the self-evident Reality."

The phenomenal world is entirely subject to the rule and control of natural law. ... but man has proceeded to break this law, free himself from this rule and bring them forth into the realm of the visible. Therefore, he is the ruler and commander of nature. Man has intelligence; nature has not. Man has volition; nature has none. Man has memory; nature is without it. Man has the reasoning faculty; nature is deprived. Man has the perceptive faculty; nature cannot perceive. It is therefore proved and evident that man is nobler than nature.

If we accept the supposition that man is but a part of nature, we are confronted by an illogical statement, for this is equivalent to claiming that a part may be endowed with qualities which are absent in the whole. For man who is a part of nature has perception, intelligence, memory, conscious reflection and susceptibility, while nature itself is quite bereft of them. How is it possible for the part to be possessed of qualities or faculties which are absent in the whole? The truth is that God has given to man certain powers which are supernatural. How then can man be considered a captive of nature? Is he not dominating and controlling nature to his own uses more and more? Is he not the very divinity of nature? Shall we say nature is blind, nature is not perceptive, nature is without volition and not alive, and then relegate man to nature and its limitations? How can we answer this question? How will the materialists and scholastic atheists prove and support such a supposition? As a matter of fact, they themselves make natural laws subservient to their own wish and purpose. The proof is complete that in man there is a power beyond the limitations of nature, and that power is the bestowal of God.

In New York I find the people more endowed with spiritual susceptibilities. They are not mere captives of nature's control; they are rising out of the bonds and burden of captivity. For this reason I am very happy and hopeful that, God willing, in this populous country, in this vast continent of the West, the virtues of the world of humanity shall become resplendent; that the oneness of human world-power, the love of God, may enkindle the hearts, and that international peace may hoist its standards, influencing all other regions and countries from here. This is my hope.

('Abdu'l-Bahá, The Promulgation of Universal Peace, p. 16-18. Talk delivered 15 April 1912 at Home of Mountfort Mills, New York)

Photo by Paul Saughter. Copyright Bahá'í International Community - view here.

Recognizing potential, encouraging it

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Emerging voices: Target, respond passionately against "politics of division, fear"

This Observer editorial from Guardian.co.uk says it right about what's needed to counter the worldwide trend towards increased religious intolerance and xenophobia (what it calls "the politics of division and fear"):--

Burning the Qur'an: All faiths must fight against the forces of bigotry

We should not tolerate the antics of people such as Pastor Jones
________________________________________

Those who admire [the American] nation's historical commitment to the rights of man find it distressing to see the burning of holy books and the banning of houses of worship creeping into political discourse.

That distress should be a warning against complacency [in] Britain [, which] is not immune to virulent Islamophobia, as the English Defence League and the British National party prove. Elsewhere in Europe, mainstream politics is struggling to accommodate popular unease about a growing and visible Muslim minority. In France and Spain, this manifests itself as illiberal secularism, with bans on Islamic dress; in Switzerland, it shows up as a prohibition on minarets; and across the Continent opposition to Turkish membership of the EU is laced with anxiety about a mass mingling of Muslims and Christians that might ensue.

...What defines [these trends] is an angry, defensive reaction against an imagined threat to identity: national, secular or Christian.
This is the politics of division and fear and it demands a response, equivalent in passion, from the politics of solidarity and hope.

Read the full article here.


Dicta:

The recrudescence of religious intolerance, of racial animosity, and of patriotic arrogance; the increasing evidences of selfishness, of suspicion, of fear and of fraud; the spread of terrorism, of lawlessness, of drunkenness and of crime; the unquenchable thirst for, and the feverish pursuit after, earthly vanities, riches and pleasures; the weakening of family solidarity; the laxity in parental control; the lapse into luxurious indulgence; the irresponsible attitude towards marriage and the consequent rising tide of divorce; the degeneracy of art and music, the infection of literature, and the corruption of the press... —these appear as the outstanding characteristics of a decadent society, a society that must either be reborn or perish.

(Shoghi Effendi, World Order, 187-88)

Saddened by the continual strife amongst believers of many confessions and wearied of their intolerance towards each other, I discovered in the Bahá'í teaching the real spirit of Christ so often denied and misunderstood: Unity instead of strife, Hope instead of condemnation, Love instead of hate, and a great reassurance for all men.

(Queen Marie of Rumania, Quoted in Shoghi Effendi, World Order, 93)

Image source is here.

Emerging voices: Target, respond passionately against "politics of division, fear"

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Turn of the wheel

Imbibing the moment

Every day is a fresh day
beckoning a new fragrance
to nostrils conditioned to inhale it
from the sundry manifestations
of life's swiftly changing visage.


- A.B.
(On the occasion of a loved one's anniversary)

Dicta:

Verily the most necessary thing is contentment under all circumstances; by this one is preserved from morbid conditions and lassitude.    

(Bahá'u'lláh, quoted in Bahá'u'lláh and the New Era 108)

Anybody can be happy in the state of comfort, ease, health, success, pleasure and joy; but if one will be happy and contented in the time of trouble, hardship and prevailing disease, it is the proof of nobility. ...

[T]his earthly world is narrow, dark and frightful, rest cannot be imagined and happiness really is non-existent, everyone is captured in the net of sorrow, and is day and night enslaved by the chain of calamity; there is no one who is at all free or at rest from grief and affliction. Still, as the believers of God are turning to the limitless world, they do not become very depressed and sad by disastrous calamities—there is something to console them; but the others in no way have anything to comfort them at the time of calamity. Whenever a calamity and a hardship occurs, they become sad and disappointed, and hopeless of the bounty and the mercy of the Glorious Lord.    

('Abdu'l-Bahá, Tablets 263-4)

Never lose thy trust in God. Be thou ever hopeful, for the bounties of God never cease to flow upon man. If viewed from one perspective they seem to decrease, but from another they are full and complete. Man is under all conditions immersed in a sea of God's blessings. Therefore, be thou not hopeless under any circumstances, but rather be firm in thy hope.

('Abdu'l-Bahá, Selections #178)

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Turn of the wheel

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Life as rhythm

 
Here a video I enjoyed, followed by a commentary on it from the perspective of its being a work of art. It touches on a theme I have been reflecting over recently - that of seeing life as a rhythm that one needs to tune into - the rhythm of success, work and effectiveness in the path of God. On this path there can be no misstep; one will always be guided! All that matters is the effectiveness - essentially the rhythm - of one's actions in service to humanity. "Time does not stop, does not wait," writes the Universal House of Justice,

With every passing hour a fresh affliction strikes at a distracted humanity. Dare we linger? ...

[O]ne thing above all else is necessary: to act, to act now, and to continue to act.

Our heartfelt plea at the Holy Threshold on behalf of us all is that we may be... richly confirmed in whatever we do towards meeting the urgent aim of the... Plan at so fate-laden a moment in human history.

(Ridván message 155 B.E./1998, §§15-17)

Bahá'u'lláh, moreover, states, "[H]esitate not, though it be for less than a moment, in the service of His Cause." (Gleanings 43)


My challenge has been, in part, to view my actions not as disjointed service projects performed in separate chunks of time-periods, but as part of a larger continuum of service where all the different actions are integrated and connected, without the disjunctive pauses (as in excessive/frequent meditation breaks) in between.

It has much to do with having trust (that one is on the right course and is doing the right thing) and letting go (of any fears of inadequacy and of my feelings of unworthiness). Now, let's see where this can lead us! Here the video:--

On the video as Art - some thoughts

Life (and everything in it) is a creation, a work of art so to speak, and can, as art, necessarily only be judged by its own merits, on its own terms. This goes for the video as well. Each person will see something different in it.

Art consists of a constellation of elements, arranged in a particular/inviolable way. If dismembered, if one element of this complex entity is removed, is it any longer the original art?

Art is art. One element cannot be taken from it and analyzed out of context. It's a constellation. Every word in existence carries an infinitude of spiritual meaning. When combined in a certain way, the beauty/meaning of the individual words enhance the beauty/meaning of the others. 'Abdu'l-Bahá says, "All art is a gift from the Holy Spirit." He also says that evil doesn't actually have any independent existence (it is only the absence of goodness/beauty/art, if you will).

Since all creation, every life, every expression and every creative product is a unique piece of art - infrangible - our challenge lies in recognizing each as an independent such existence and finding the beauty/meaning in it, however strange/untrue/gnarled it may appear on the face of it (with certain exceptions, of course, such as hatred, oppression, discrimination, inequality, war, drug-abuse, murder, genocide, etc., or sheer carelessness, for that matter, which are all anathema to the Spirit).

Here are some passages from the Writings that may relate to this theme:

Gazing with the eye of God, [the true seeker] will perceive within every atom a door that leadeth him to the stations of absolute certitude. He will discover in all things the … evidences of an everlasting Manifestation.

(Bahá'u'lláh, Iqan 196)

It is related that His Holiness Christ--May my life be a sacrifice to Him!--one day, accompanied by His apostles, passed by the corpse of a dead animal. One of them said: 'How putrid has this animal become!' The other exclaimed: 'How it is deformed!' A third cried out: 'What a stench! How cadaverous looking!' But His Holiness Christ said: 'Look at its teeth! How white they are!' Consider, that He did not look at all at the defects of that animal; nay, rather, He searched well until He found the beautiful white teeth. He observed only the whiteness of the teeth and overlooked entirely the deformity of the body, the dissolution of its organs and the bad odour.

"This is the attribute of the children of the Kingdom. This is the conduct and the manner of the real Bahais (Baha'is)..."

('Abdu'l-Bahá, Tablet to Dr. Skinner, in Lights of Guidance #312)

[I]n the world of existence two persons unanimous in all grades [of thought] and all beliefs cannot be found. ‘The ways unto God are as the number of the breaths of [His] creatures’ is a mysterious truth, and ‘To every [people] We have appointed a [separate] rite’ is one of the subtleties of the Qur’án."

('Abdu'l-Bahá, Narrative 91-2)

Eagle sculpture in the gardens outside the Shrine of the Báb

Photo Copyright Bahá'í International Community. View here.

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Life as rhythm

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