RELIGION • BAHÁ’Í HISTORICAL BAHÁ Í DICTIONARY ’ OF THE Praise for the First Edition A D A “The bibliography is among the best of its kind, and the many appendixes help the M FAITH S reader with detailed information. The dictionary is readable and comprehensive to the O general reader. As an introduction to the religion, it serves as a gathering place for the N data.” —American Reference Books Annual “A useful source of information about people active in the Bahá’í religion, the Persian D H terms it uses abundantly, and its basic ideas.” —Quest magazine I CI S TT Growing out of the teachings of the Báb, who introduced the idea of the coming of a IO O great prophet (the one promised in the scriptures of all the world’s major religions), O R N F I the Bahá’í Faith was founded by Bahá’u’lláh when, in 1866, he publicly declared that TAC he was the One the Báb had prophesized. This second edition of Historical Dictionary HRA EYL of the Bahá’í Faith presents a general historical overview of both Bábí and Bahá’í reli- B gions and a theological overview of the Bahá’í Faith, from its inception in the middle of the 19th century to the present. It presents biographical details of the Founders A and Central Figures as well as numerous leaders and pioneers, basic principles and precepts, and aspects of the organization and its administration. H With photographs, a list of acronyms, a chronology, an introductory essay, a bibliog- Á raphy, hundreds of cross-referenced dictionary entries on nearly every aspect of the religion, and appendixes listing the genealogy of the Founders, statistical information, ’ and lists of apostles, disciples, Hands of the Cause, Knights of Bahá’u’lláh, and more Í than 930 believers, this book is an fundamental reference tool for the Bahá’í Faith. F HUGH C. ADAMSON served for 11 years as the secretary general of the National A Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’í in the United Kingdom and is a Bahá’í of 35 years. He currently lives and teaches in the United States, where he is active in dealing with I T interfaith relations and action against racism. H For orders and information please contact the publisher SCARECROW PRESS, INC. A wholly owned subsidiary of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200 ISBN-13: 978-0-8108-5096-5 Lanham, Maryland 20706 ISBN-10: 0-8108-5096-6 1-800-462-6420 • fax 717-794-3803 HUGH C. ADAMSON www.scarecrowpress.com Cover photo of the Shrine of the Báb on Mt. Carmel, Haifa, Israel Cover design by Allison Nealon HD Bahai Faith_LITHO.indd 1 9/6/06 2:54:14 PM Historical Dictionary of the Baha'9 ' Faith 1 Second Edition Hugh C. Adamson Historical Dictionaries of Religions, Philosophies, and Movements, No. 71 The Scarecrow Press, Inc. Lanham, Maryland Toronto Oxford 2007 SCARECROW PRESS, INC. Published in the United States of America by Scarecrow Press, Inc. A wholly owned subsidiary of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 www.scarecrowpress.com PO Box 317 Oxford OX2 9RU, UK Copyright O 2007 by Hugh C. Adamson First edition, 0-8108-3353-0, published in 1998 All rights resewed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available Library of Congress Cataloging-in-PublicationD ata Adamson, Hugh C. Historical dictionary of the BahA'i Faith 1 Hugh C. Adamson. - 2nd ed. p. cm. - (Historical dictionaries of religions, philosophies, and movements ; no. 71) Includes bibliographical references. ISBN-13: 978-0-8108-5096-5 (hardcover : alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0-8108-5096-6 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. Bahai Faith-History-Dictionaries. I. Title. BP327.A33 2006 297.9'3034~22 2006020839 @'"The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences-Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSIINISO 239.48-1992. Manufactured in the United States of America. For my dear departed and very much missed friends: Badieh, Charles, Fuad, Jeffrey, Meheranghiz, Mildred, Muhammad-R&ollih, and Philip. Heroes and heroines all . . . They "made a mark among those enduring traces which the mind of the Master perceived." Also for Lynda and Lois. In extolling the unprecedented potential of the twentieth century, the beloved Master averred that its traces will last forever. Seized with such a vision, the mind of the alert follower of the Blessed Beauty must undoubtedly be astir with anxious questions as to what part he or she will play in these few fleeting years, and as to whether he or she will, at the end of this seminal period, have made a mark among those enduring traces which the mind of the Master perceived. -The Universal House of Justice, Ridvan Message 155 (1998), "To the Bahh'is of the World" Contents Series Editor's Foreword Preface vii The Epochs of the Formative Age xii Chronology Introduction THE DICTIONARY Appendixes 1. Genealogy of Bahi'u'llhh 2. Genealogy of 'Abdu'l-Bahii 3. Genealogy of the Bbb 4. Kinship Listing of the Baha'u'llhh 5. Letters of the Living 6. Apostles of Bahb'u'llhh 7. Disciples of 'Abdu'l-Baha 8. Hands of the Cause of God (by Contingent) 9. First Five Auxiliary Boards 10. Knights of Bahb'u'llhh 11. Members of the International Bahii'i Council 12. Members of the Universal House of Justice (1963-2005) 13. Obituaries 14. Badi Calendar 15. Statistics 16. Martin Sheil Letter Notes Bibliography About the Author Series Editor's Foreword Only a little more than a century and a half old, the Baha'i Faith has grown vigorously, with more than 5 million members. Its geographic expansion is even more impressive, with adherents living in nearly every country and territory in the world. The Baha'is consider that their religion is in the chain of ongoing progressive revelation, with Juda- ism, Christianity, Islam, and other theistic and nontheistic faiths. They also actively address many present-day issues, such as democracy, racial and sexual equality, economic development, environmental protection, human rights, and peace. But the Baha'i Faith is not as well known as it should be. This substantially updated and expanded historical dictionary will bring knowledge of the religion to outsiders while allowing believers to deepen their understanding. Both an introduction entitled "The Epochs of the Formative Age" and the chronology provide a timeline of the faith as a whole and of its components. The preface and introduction provide a general framework. But the crucial section is the dictionary, with several hundred entries on founders, leaders, and pioneers; many of the faith's basic principles and precepts; aspects of organization and administration; and significant his- torical events. Finally, there are a number of appendixes containing sta- tistical information and a substantial bibliography for M e rr eading. Hugh C. Adamson wrote this second edition; the first edition was coauthored by Adamson and Philip Hainsworth, who passed away in 2001. Adamson is the former secretary-general of the National Spiri- tual Assembly of the Baha'is of the United Kingdom and has written extensively about the subject. He currently lives in the United States, where he teaches and is active in promoting interfaith relations and action against racism. Jon Woronoff Series Editor Preface A new edition of a book allows an author to correct errors and supple- ment previous materials with new and updated entries-and for this I am grateful! It is important to note, however, that this is a work of secondary (as opposed to primary) research and that discrepancies in source materials will, almost invariably, be repeated herein. The Bahh'i Faith came into being in the middle of the 19th century with a well-recorded and voluminously documented history-"in the full light of history," so to speak. Therefore, I have had great difficulty in choosing exactly what to include and what to exclude. I have tried to cover as many of the major and important aspects of the Bahh'i Faith as are known to me. Nevertheless, the nonencyclopedic nature of this work means that some topics will be missing, whether by choice or simple oversight. This is a historical dictionary, and history is about people. Sadly, a great many people who have contributed significantly to the historical development of the Bahb'i Faith have been excluded due to the limits of space. The choice of whom to include and whom to leave out was difficult, and ultimately only a representative sam- pling of "eligible" people could be included. The appendixes (added since the first edition) will hopefully offer some compensation to those left As a general rule, people now living are excluded- despite their many outstanding contributions to the development of the Bahb'i Faith; the sole exception is the single remaining living Hand of the Cause of God, 'Ali Muhammad Varqh. Also, in an effort to conserve space, I have made no attempt to provide a comprehensive review of the lives, teachings, family, and sufferings of the three Central Figures of the Bahb'i Faith (the Bhb, Bahh'u'llhh, and 'Abdu'l-Bahh) or Shoghi Effendi (the Guardian of the Bahh'i Faith)-since these details can be easily obtained from a growing number of publications now readily available. (A bibliogra- phy of major works dealing with their lives and teachings is, however, included.) An overview of the major historical events relating to Their lives and the evolution of the Bahb'i Faith can also be found in the five viii PREFACE sections of the chronology: "The Bhb and Bahh'u'llhh," "The 'Abdu'l- Bahh," "The Guardianship," "The Chief Stewards of the Ministry of the Custodians (Interregnum)," and "The Universal House of Justice." While not definitive, this chronology should nonetheless assist research- ers and readers alike in identifying major historical events and pointing to source documents relating to them. The restriction of textual entries to essential details has permitted entries on many more of their fol- lowers than would otherwise have been possiblesouls who rendered service to the Bahh'i Faith throughout their Baha'i lives and in so doing significantly influenced the historical development of the Bahh'i Faith. Of particular note are entries on the 50 Hands of the Cause of God. If these and other entries appear slightly hagiographic in nature, it is because they are. Perhaps the reader will indulge me in this breach of academia's current preference for methodological atheism in research matters relating to religious subjects, as a great many of the 20th-century personages mentioned were known both to me and to the coauthor of the first edition personally, and their characters and services are all the more cherished for that. Readers will quickly realize that the body of this work is replete with quotations from Bahh'u'llhh, 'Abdu'l-Bahh, and Shoghi Effendi. There are two reasons for choosing this method of presentation. First, in His Will and Testament, Bahh'u'llhh (Kitlb-i-'Ahd) appointed His Son 'Abdu'l-Bahh as the sole Interpreter of His Words (see BA~~U'LLAHW,IL L AND TESTAMENT OF). 'Abdu'l-Bahh, in turn, in His Will and Testament, appointed His grandson Shoghi Effendi the "Guardian" (Head) of the Baha'i Faith and the sole inter- preter of matters not already pronounced on by Bahh'u'llhh or Himself (see 'ABDU'L-B&, WILL AND TESTAMENT OF; THE GUARD- IANSHIP). This means that "authoritative" statements on the mean- ing of Bahh'u'llhh's utterances can be found only in the Writings of Bahh'u'llhh (i.e., His own interpretation of passages of Scripture) or the commentaries of 'Abdu'l-BahB and Shoghi Effendi. As such, interpreta- tion of BahB'i Writings is forbidden to everyone else. Naturally, anyone may hold an opinion as to the meaning of any given passage, but indi- vidual Bahh'is have no right to insist on the correctness of their position. Presenting the words of Bahh'u'llhh, 'Abdu'l-Bahh, and Shoghi Effendi in combination with the elucidations of the Universal House of Justice throughout this dictionary will provide access to authoritative meaning rather than speculative opinion. Second, the use of quotations throughout gives readers immediate access to source materials, thereby allowing them to decide whether PREFACE ix they want to access the originals for further contextual analysis; the vast majority of these have reference pointers to original English-language sources. This should provide researchers and general readers with spe- cific access to both primary and secondary sources, with minimal addi- tional research. The source referencing system used is a numbered list style, which works as follows: [3:41 refers to page 4 of citation number 3 in 'Wotes," which follows the dictionary. The use of Bahi'i terminology, such as Cause for Bahi'i Faith, dec- laration for conversion/acceptance, and Mission for the duties assigned by God to His Manifestation, permeates the text. Unless the meaning is truly obscure, I have avoided separate entries or repetitive explanations of such terms. The bibliography has been revised to reflect a number of new com- mentaries that have been published since the first edition in 1998. Hope- fully this will prove valuable to both academic researchers and casual browsers alike. As with the previous edition, the bibliography contains a section on autobiographies and biographies that contain a wealth of personal historical information that will assist researchers in their under- standing the historical development of the Bahb'i Faith (given that this is often the only public source of such information). Given the rise in usage of the Internet and World Wide Web, a number of official Bahi'i web URLs and FTP sites are provided for those wish- ing to access Bahii'i materials via that media. The Bahi'i World Centre operates an FTP site fiom which all the English-language Bahi'i Sacred Writings can be downloaded at no cost (http://library.bahai.org/serv/ iIpc.htm1). The site also contains a large number of other materials. Since the publication of the first edition, a number of new Bahi'i software research programs have been developed. Without a doubt the best of those currently available is Ocean. Indeed, it is hard to exag- gerate the importance of this new research tool. It is fieeware and can be downloaded fiom http://bahai-education.org/ocean~S.i gnificantly, it provides searchable access not only to a considerable number of Bahi'i texts but also to Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Isliimic, Judaic, Sikh, Tao, and Zoroastrian texts (in English as well as Spanish, French, German, Russian, Dutch, and Portuguese). As with the previous edition, I remain indebted to the Universal House of Justice for their consent to the reproduction of the unpublished article entitled "The Epochs of the Formative Age," which appears in the fiont matter of this book, preceding the chronology. I have updated this to include further epochal developments occurring in the years since the publication of the first edition and strengthened it by adding a number
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