Dear friends,
The following musical selection: IRFANA– لوح مریم از آثار حضرت بهاالله
Is a special experiential selection of diverse culture: Zoroastrian, Persian, Muhammadan, Sufic, Illuminationistic and Iranian themes… sent to us today from the Baha’i Center in Iran that is firm in the Covenant and is working in concert with myself as guardian.
Today is a good day for the people of planet earth!
Having received a full report from the friends in Iran–we have come to a pitch where we really have no other option than to personally intend to contact the Iranian government shortly with a copy of the Oath of Muhammad–to try to see if they will now recognize the Baha’is Under the Provisions of the Covenant–as Muhammad did the Christian peoples–who are loyal to the living Davidic King, as a different people from the Covenant-breakers in that Country who have been trying to overthrow the government there since the death of Shoghi Effendi and the exile of ‘Abdu’l-Baha’s legally adopted aghsan-son Mason Remey, the first President (W&T, p. 15) of the true Universal House of Justice of Baha’u’llah (www.UHJ.net).
As there has always been a role for the true Christian peoples throughout history under the government of just Islamic rulership according to the Oath of Muhammad–I am sure that the current and future Iranian government will be relieved to see “rule by law” (i.e. the sacred Will and testament of ‘Abdu’l-Baha and his Treatise on Leadership) brought back into the community of the Baha’is in Iran who are pure in heart–and were only unwittingly deceived by Ruhiyyih Khanum, Hasan Balyuzi and the other Covenant-breaking “Hands.”
Baha’u’llah is clear in His own writings (see my letter to the Persian Siyyid: http://www.bupc.org/iran-persian-siyyid.html) that the Nation of Iran should govern itself and protect its own culture, its own traditions and its own ideas. The Revelation of Baha’u’llah is explicit that people should not be coerced to convert to other religions–including the Baha’i religion–but Baha’u’llah says expressly they should be encouraged to deepen in their own faiths and traditions of origin (and in the specific case of Iran from their own indigenous National Cultural Council) and there they will find the root and common spiritual foundations of the Oneness of the tree of Humanity.
This is the real meaning of diversity. Iran (formerly Persia) is a seat of ancient knowledge, intriguing metaphysics, the origin of the Magi who were the first in the universe to recognize baby Jesus, a source of wisdom, culture, and belief–that were the Covenant-breaking “Baha’is” to have their way–would be ultimately irradiated off the face of the earth. Therefore since they violated the Covenant of Baha’u’llah and the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Baha, what choice does the government have–than to be overthrown? Even if these people are acting as deceived puppets for the “Hands”, do not the people of that nation have a right to protect their culture? When some of this issue came up in the home of Dr. Leland Jensen in the 1980s and 1990s about the treatment of the Covenant-breaking “Baha’is” in Iran–Dr. Jensen said that they were not martyrs at all–but this was in fact punishment for breaking the Covenant. Considered from the position of the just government of India, did not they have the right to bust that Covenant-breaking NSA that was a spy ring? I am sure the government of India has much more knowledge than I do about those nefarious activities of that corrupted NSA. In fact the letters I have personally received from India–from both those under the Covenant and the free Baha’is there–unaffiliated–indicated that the actual Baha’is there in India–the pure of heart–were shoved out and persecuted by that corrupt cabal of the NSA there. When the government of India stopped them–the real Baha’is–the true Believers in India were freed from this oppression. As to the real circumstance of the individual cases in Iran or Israel with the “Baha’is” there–I am uniformed–but I can assume that they may be unwitting participants in something they are unaware of–like suicide bombers in the US that play out irrational acts for mislead parties–or even righteous soldiers that join up to protect and serve their Country and then return from foreign wars with suicidal intentions because of what they did or saw there–when it became only really a matter of personal survival. What is painful for me personally is having various solutions to these problems including the solutions and assuagement for those who have trouble living with what they have done. This is NOT the Era of condemnation–but that of transformation and acceptance of the self in all its light and dark aspects. Thus Baha’u’llah letters us that through the power of God we can turn “satanic strength into heavenly power.” We stand on the precipice of this new creation of humanity every night and every day!
“Perplexing and difficult as this may appear, the still greater task of converting satanic strength into heavenly power is one that We have been empowered to accomplish.” (Baha’u’llah, GL, xcix)
I would like the damaging aspects of this transformational epoch to change. This will not happen through suppression or demonization–but through expression and apotheosis. I, for one, would like the situation to be remedied and ameliorated for all the parties concerned. The mainstream group of violators of the Covenant was tied in with the politics of the fall of Iraq, double talk and subterfuge at the UN, and the murder and hanging of Saddam. To what extent are they allied with a subterfuge to destabilize Iran? We can set that and other weighty questions aside… What we do know for a FACT–is that we and those loyal to the Covenant–are free from those aspersions! “Verily we wronged them not but they wronged themselves!” (W&T, p. 9)
Obviously, as I am personally of Iranian ancestry through Zoroaster–I have a personal stake in the preservation of this culture in situ–as did my late friend R. N. Frye–with preserving Iranian culture and heritage without homogenization or dilution different from what the people of Iran and the religious leadership of the majority of the people in that culture would only prefer for their own selves. This is why it is stated at the UN and by international law–the law of nations–that the nations are forbidden to meddle in the internal affairs of the other nations. The principles are certainly upheld by ‘Abdu’l-Baha in the Will and Testament and the Baha’i people are a people of law, a people of the book.
The preservation of culture is true of any peoples. Some are more vulnerable than others to becoming lost to assimilation. If France doesn’t keep its national language as French, its literature, its traditions, and it cultural value systems, yet another form of pluralism and diversity will be lost to the human race. We saw what the imperialists did to the Native American cultures (and certain other indigenous societies), and we see the tensions of multiculturalism. Thus the watchword from the Baha’i perspective is “Unity in Diversity.” When we say Unity–we mean Unity in Diversity. But what do the covenant-breaking “Baha’is” mean when they say Unity: “with Divine Unity for [their] excuse deprived himself and perturbed and poisoned others.” (W&T, p. 12). Thus they have waged a war of unity against all forms of diversity including against the diversity of the living Davidic King himself as well as all the Baha’is under the provisions of the Covenant who are the free Baha’i peoples in the world today.
The diversity of Iran, as well as that of India, Russia, France, Britain, Scotland, the Irish, Palestinians, Israelis, Syrians, the Lebanese, and other cultures needs to be preserved in such a way that individuals of all areas and backgrounds can live with one another as a harmonious family of human kind. In other words: good fences make good neighbours!
“In that day, saith the LORD of hosts, shall ye call every man his neighbour under the vine and under the fig tree.” (Zech. 3:10 KJV)
For a long while now the Iranian people and the Iranian government have remained at one day under attack by the West in the standoff with Iraq and the Russian and US engagements in that area militarily; and then at another day allied with the US and Israel against the Afghanis and Russia when it was atheistic. Now they are allied with US against the ISIL in Iraq, but at odds with Saudis in Yemen, which has simmered down a bit now. The heroine flow into Iran is tragic. Yet now they have allowed American and Western drug aid workers there to help. Are these cultures enemies or allies? Who knows? Look away at your watch and then look back at reality and the situations are reversed again and again. In the middle of these reversals are the innocent peoples of these countries, the young, the sick, the elderly. These are the innocent victims of a lot of wasted time and effort. If Jesus, Muhammad and Moses were all to miraculously appear on the scene armed with a myriad of solutions and benefits–they wouldn’t be crucified, or run out of town or pushed into the sea today–instead they could be sued endlessly in the Federal Courts system and be put on trial until bankrupted and simply live out their full happy lives with one another and under God ignored by a few people (1%) in control of the many, who are bent on material world rulership and control of oil.
Our role as spiritual people and human rights activists–is not to interfere with the internal relations of these countries and not to interfere with international relations. In the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Baha he states explicitly:
“Serve ye the sovereigns of the world with utmost truthfulness and loyalty. Show obedience unto them and be their well-wishers. Without their leave and permission do not meddle with political affairs, for disloyalty to the just sovereign is disloyalty to God Himself.” (W &T, p. 15)
Concerning Iran: this was the stand of Ja’far al-Saddiq and this is why he is the founder of all Sunni and Shi’a groups!
If we are able to negotiate a good standing in Iran–after the spirit of the Oath of Muhammad–for the Baha’is Under the Provisions of the Covenant in Iran–then we also must trust the government of Iran to know what it is doing should our group attempt to become infiltrated by spies like the government in India. The Covenant-breakers in India–and their NSA there–were riddled with political spies that were busted only a few years ago:
“NSA Arrests: In 2006, some former employees of the temple made a complaint to the police that the trustees of the NSA had been involved in various crimes including spying, religious conversion and producing false passports. The trial judge directed the police to arrest nine specific trustees”
Therefore anyone professing to be a Baha’i Under the Covenant in Iran–who is actually using espionage–like the Covenant-breakers in India–will after the fact be found to have removed himself out from under the protection of the Covenant of the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Baha by default. Baha’is who are firm in the Covenant would never even think of practicing such deceits. Our job as Baha’is of the International Community of the Covenant (ICC)–is to strengthen, deepen and preserve the diversity of these other cultures, to guide the people spiritually to fulfilling their own personal destines, and to uphold and support the stabilization of ancient cultures and traditions. Baha’u’llah is explicit in His Book of the Covenant (the Kitab-i-Ahd) that the “governments of the world have been vouchsafed unto them [the leaders of those nations] but the hearts of the people belong to God” That includes the hearts of the leadership. These people will stay in leadership power in as much as their hearts belong to God and they are established upon the seats of just government as public servants of the people. World events will pull down unjust leaders without any help from the Baha’is Under the Provisions of the Covenant. The times they are always ‘a-changin’ as the singer said.
Each new day calls for a new adjustment. The stability of just systems is maintained by allowing for the smooth transition to the innovations of the youth that both deepen our ancient cultures and faiths in what is right, true and good, and expand our future horizons with new green technologies, innovations and higher goals and aspirations. A house is only as strong as its foundation. The foundation is upon the firm rock that is by its very own nature conservatively preserved. While the house itself that exists above ground is in constant need of upkeep, repair, renovation, re-model, painting and adjustments. The “new” in relation to the foundation does not exist without the support of the foundation itself that is conserved. The ultimate freedoms of humanity that is liberated and liberal is the preservation of certain few and specific social agreements that should not be subject to change. These are not only of the negative precepts like “thou shalt not kill”–but the positive values such as “love your neighbor” and even the more perplexing “love your enemy” as yourself–though we don’t have to love the bad things he does to us.
Without a spiritual guidance of the divine wisdom traditions of the world–there simply wouldn’t be any value systems at all anywhere–for everyone would simply do what was right in his or her own eyes alone. The value systems are in fact an interlocking transaction between the individual and the group and the individuals to one another and toward themselves as well as to the personal reality of God Himself. Consider the Golden Rule that is embedded within EVERY Value System of the world: http://uhj.net/the-golden-rule.html
Apparently, therefore some of the leadership values war over peace. In war they can grab power for themselves, and lucre, cash and personal aggrandizement. If only they were greedy for more knowledge, more spirituality, more fellowship, more diversity, more multiculturalism: more musicality, more sciences and more arts! Greed is the desire for more. It only is misused like deadly sin when it is the desire for what is truly undesirable for the person of spiritual orientation. The desire for more education and intentional cooperation is wholly different than the genocidal desire for the destruction of every foreign people and stranger to your own self.
Why wish for more destruction, more damage, more self-calamities? If these are the common values, that oil is more valuable than life itself–then maybe these leaders and industrialists and bankers who value the bottom line being dollars–need to seriously re-evaluate.
In any event, a lot will have to be worked out–but at least we can be open to the idea of the government of Iran modifying its policy toward the people who share our peculiar Baha’i perspectives of the Baha’i community of the Aghsan line of David. In any case, we do follow the golden rule and wish for others only what we would wish for our very own selves.
Those who want control as their value do not simultaneously wish that others should have control too, because if the others had control then the first ones would loose it over to them. On the other hand those who value self-control and rule by law do wish self-control for others for this will allow more freedoms for them. Wishing more freedoms for others means more freedoms for ourselves, up to a point, when the freedoms of the others or the groups are then unjustly impacted. At any rate the spirit of this may be something we should all be able to agree upon as people–but the details and specifics of how that is worked out can’t be from the point of view of people who exist outside the internal affairs of other cultures and people within their own self determination and views. Coming right down to the wire is the most difficult question of all that ‘Abdu’l-Baha raises in Some Answered Questions called the “Right Treatment of Criminals” On the philosophical side what is criminal really? It sounds simple: you might say murder is criminal and a crime. A man robs a store here in the US to get some money to feed his family and he kills someone in the process or a couple of people. He is a murderer. But George Bush kills thousands upon thousands in Gulf War I and II and when they come home they throw a ticker tape parade and hail the man as hero: mission accomplished. What is worse, killing a few or killing millions and destroying generations of families with the wounds of the killing?
Look at it another way: Socrates was put to death as a criminal. Jesus was crucified as a Roman Criminal for insurrection. John was beheaded for speaking against the state as a criminal. Moses had killed a man and was known as a murderer and went into exile to escape the penalty. He returned many years later claiming to have a message from God. If you were in the position of Pharaoh what would you do?
Now all these examples do have something basic in common. For example Socrates was deemed an enemy of the state and a threat to the value system of the ancient Greeks. However Ancient Greece is now gone. What survives from it as far as all the rest of the people are concerned is the works of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle of the school of thought of Socrates that they killed. In the end, in the long run, Socrates didn’t destroy Greek culture he preserved it! We study that culture today in order to understand the origins of our religions, philosophies, and faiths and views today because of Socrates. Plato refers to the Greek gods and to the Trojan War. So now we are forced to read Homer and a whole lot of other things if we really want to be in the know! Movies like the 300 and others now immortalize these ancient cultures, based on true history. Every one enjoys these even today. If it weren’t for the Socrates no one would care. Even if you don’t know this, those who do are still the ones promoting him to you behind the scenes! Why do we care? Because somewhere down the line we decided we are all like Socrates–we have our own views, we think, we question authority– and he is one of us. This is what has happened to Jesus, and Moses, and Muhammad as well. Muhammad wasn’t a Persian. But now he is one of us! He was not Jewish–but though Sufism and Rumi and ibn al-Arabi many Jews and Christians have embraced Muhammad today. He is one of us!
Why study Rome? People are interested in Jesus. The Jewish people remains a minority–yet all the people of the world are interested in their Culture and their Cabala because this is the tradition that Jesus was born to. Jesus didn’t destroy the Jewish culture–He preserved it! He is one of us! What do we want to do about it? We want to preserve the state of Israel–because preserving the state of Israel means preserving the Jewish culture, the Jewish identity, the Jewish people, and therefore preserving Jesus and Muhammad along with them. They are one of us!
In the Bible when the Jewish people were turned against King David and sought to kill him under the orders of King Saul–David–that means beloved–was protected by the Palestinian people. If it wasn’t for the Palestinian people there would be no King David, no Solomon nor Jesus, and no Baha’u’llah and no ‘Abdu’l-Baha because Saul would have killed David. Thus David was sheltered in the Palestinian cities and loved and welcomed by the Palestinian peoples. He is one of Us! Persevering the Palestinian peoples, their cities, their indigenous cultures, their ancient ruins, and respecting their modern beliefs as Christians, Druzes, Muslims, what have you–as governing their own affairs as an independent state–means preserving the Judaism of King David (he is of the tribe of Judah which is where the word Jew comes from), preserving the indigenous history of Jesus, the truth of the love of the prophet Muhammad, the glory of the Fatimid Caliphs, the purity of Saladin, and the history of the Knights Templar and Crusader Christians and Muslims working together for a common goal. They are all one of us!
No one around the world outside of Iranians was really too much interested in Iran until after the coming of the Bab and Baha’u’llah. These Twin Manifestations of God got peoples from all over the world studying and reading academic and scholarly works on abstruse subjects and spiritual traditions from Zoroastrianism to Sufi annihilation in fana and everlasting life in the eternal paradise of baqa all since after the years 1844 and 1863. The Bab and Baha’u’llah didn’t destroy Iranian/Persian culture–they have preserved it! They are one of us!
The attacks of the US against Vietnam allowed for Buddhism to become one of the great traditions in the US. The attacks of China on Tibet allowed for this Buddhism to be spread to American and then re-established in India and Nepal with American support and then allowed for honor and culture in the East of China and Asia. World War Two ended in cementing the ties of Japan with US and allowed for Zen, Amida, and pure-land thought, karate, judo and aikido to become a part of American and Western culture. Then corrupt industrialists sold them a bunch of defunct Nuclear Reactors to poison their waters and lands instead of recycler reactors that make no waste (produce no weapons grade plutonium) and the hotter they burn the better they work–they can’t melt down!
Now the war on Islam is causing a huge leap in the acceptance of the teachings of Muhammad in the West. Children are leaving their homes to fight with ISIS in the war against Assad like expatriates following Hemingway into Spain! The scientists now predict that in 30 short years Islam will be the same size population as Christianity. The world will be divided mostly in half. One-third Christian, and One-third Muslim. In the Book of Revelations it states that altogether two-thirds of all mankind will be killed in the catastrophe (see also Zech. 13:8). Maybe –if we stop and think–the first catastrophe is the catastrophe of the spiritual death most souls may suffer if they blindly join organized religions led by false leaders that have no real connection to either Jesus or Muhammad and beat their drums to war.
‘Abdu’l-Baha has stated that you can’t organize spirituality. Our faith is an unorganized religion. It has no doctrines, dogmas or creeds. But it is not unprincipled! In fact it has twelve of them: http://uhj.net/bahaiprinciples/bahai-12-principles.html
- The Oneness of Humanity
- Independent and Unfettered Investigation of the Truth
- The Foundation of All Religions is One
- Religion Must be the Source of Unity
- Religion Must be in Accord with Science and Reason
- The Equality of Men and Women
- The Removal of All Prejudice: Religious, Racial, Political, etc.
- Universal Peace Upheld by a Spiritual World Government
- Universal Compulsory Education
- Spiritual Solution to the Economic Problem
- A Universal Auxiliary Language
- Universal House of Justice with the living Davidic King as its President
What of Iran?
They have followed suit in the guidance of Baha’u’llah to form a National Religious Council. I hope that Council will be able to preserve its people from external threats while at the same time–not cannibalizing its people alive from the inside–like the Covenant-breaking “Baha’is” group that have expelled almost every intelligent and independent thinker from their ranks since the death of Shoghi Effendi in 1957– http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jrcole/bahai/1999/jssr/bhjssr.htm–or cut their heads off with swords, as in the case of Dr. Daniel Jordan after he had read a copy of The Most Mighty Document in 1982.
http://www.bupc.org/Most-Mighty-Document.pdf
Bahai Leader’s Body Found In New York . – Google News: https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2199&dat=19821021&id=Z5kyAAAAIBAJ&sjid=VugFAAAAIBAJ&pg=6636,4309261&hl=en
What of America? In the Aqdas Baha’u’llah states:
“Hearken ye, O Rulers of America and the Presidents of the Republics therein, unto that which the Dove is warbling on the Branch of Eternity: …Bind ye the broken with the hands of justice, and crush the oppressor who flourishes with the rod of the commandments of your Lord, the Ordained, the All-Wise.” And so for better or for worse America is now the policeman of the world…
Now the solutions to all our problems are very obvious! It is in the minds of our children. The little girl born in Palestine, the little boy born in Sierra Leone in Africa. The children of the Americas, Asia, Europe, Africa, Australia, Islanders and natives of all regions and lands including Israel and Iran the Twin Lands where Two Christs have appeared in 34 AD (as a son) and 1863 AD (as a Father seated upon David’s throne that is to last for ever (Is. 9:6-7).
OUR current generation sure does NOT have the solution to these problems! It doesn’t even have the good sense to stop feeding OUR children–who do have the solution–to the gnashing teeth of the fires of the Moloch of war over oil and religion and on all accounts of vile worthlessness! But if we would only exercise a little more sense–we could cease this war (the war of terror–the world civil war), and allow our children to grow up for one or two generations (a 40 years period) without the baggage and addictions we have inherited from our parents and past generations–so that these children thinking and experiencing better and different than any of us–can go to work when they are adults of a mature age, and solve these problems that we ourselves–as creatures of the half-light–continue to self perpetuate and are obviously–as the FACTS show–incapable of solving in our present states. Think about it?
Also there has been a ruling at the Trademark Board to consolidate the cases concerning cancelling the Covenant-breakers ownership of the name “Baha’i.” If you read this ruling–you will see that hopefully a pro bono attorney will miraculously come to our aid…
http://ttabvue.uspto.gov/ttabvue/v?pno=92057414&pty=CAN&eno=27
We did–and are doing–our best…
Unto God I commend my soul,
Your servant,
Neal.
