One of the reasons I decided to become a member of the Baha’i Faith organization was that I wanted to participate in Feast, the Baha’i worship service and community business meeting that takes place every nineteen days. At first, this was interesting, but soon the novelty wore off. I slowly began to realize that being a Baha’i is a very different thing for a member than for a “seeker,” and that official membership in the Baha’i Faith calls for an enormous dedication of time and energy to administrative matters. This would not be such a big deal if it weren’t for the fact that Baha’i administration is treated with an almost idolatrous reverence. Community issues are discussed according to a ritualistic process of “consultation,” often preceded by reciting scriptures about the glory of the Baha’i administrative order and the appropriate methods of institutional decision-making. Month after month at Feast, we listened to droning tape-recorded messages from the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha’is of the United States, telling us about the latest plans of their institution, the “Four Year Plan” of the Universal House of Justice and all its implications for our lives, the constant need for more financial donations (Baha’i institutions are always running huge deficits and begging for money), and fervent exhortations for members to “teach” the faith to more people and bring about “Entry By Troops” (a prophecy of mass conversion of the public to the Baha’i Faith). When I was elected to be an officer of the college Baha’i club, I ended up spending several extra hours per week on long, drawn-out club leadership meetings where few real decisions were made, but many passages of Baha’i scripture were often recited about consultation procedures, institutional order, infallibility of the Baha’i administration, and the sacrosanct Covenant of obedience to the Baha’i system. All this obsession with administrative ritual and a fawning attitude toward Baha’i leaders and institutions smacked of Communism, and it frustrated me that the supposedly open-minded and free-thinking religion I had joined was so dominated by a focus on obedience and procedure rather than real spirituality. Sometimes it seemed almost as if the Baha’i administrative order was viewed as the equivalent of God Himself!
Though my faith in Baha’u’llah’s prophethood and his basic principles of religious and racial unity remained strong, over time I began to realize that the overarching message of the Baha’i Faith was not what I had originally thought. Instead of open minds, the Baha’i Faith closed people’s minds once they belonged to it. Instead of tolerance and respect for differences of opinion, the Baha’i Faith demanded absolute agreement with its scriptures and leadership on everything. One could not be considered a good Baha’i if one ever said, “I don’t agree with [fill in the blank] that was written in such and such text or was stated by the UHJ.” To say such a thing would bring accusations of “weakness in the Covenant,” which is a veiled threat of losing the love and friendship of the community if one’s views do not soon change to conform to the approved position. Since the Baha’i holy writings and institutions took positions on virtually every issue imaginable, one essentially had to turn over ownership of one’s own mind to the Baha’i Faith. I was a religious studies and philosophy major, and when I decided I wanted to research the Baha’i connection to Christianity and write a book introducing the Baha’i Faith to Christians, I was informed that anything published by a Baha’i must go through a rigorous process of administrative “review” (i.e. censorship) by a special committee of Baha’i leaders, to make sure every word written conformed to the official viewpoints on all issues. As a university student who was considering pursuing a doctorate and professorship in religious studies, I was shocked to learn that even academic articles written by Baha’is must go through this censorship process. I found out there were Baha’i scholars who actually had to resign their membership in the Baha’i organization just so that they could publish their work, because they had somewhat different interpretations and understandings of the religion of Baha’u’llah, and the things they wanted to write had been censored. So much for scholarly integrity; doctrinal purity trumps all other considerations among the Baha’is.
Nevertheless, I did go ahead and attempt to write an introduction to the Baha’i Faith for Christians. In the process of studying the Baha’i Faith in a rigorous academic way in order to write a comprehensive book that would present the religion accurately, I discovered some problems in the history and development of the religion I had never before encountered. (More about this also in the next section of this page.) I knew that attempting to discuss these problems rationally with Baha’i authorities would lead only to indoctrination attempts or discipline, for I explored some of the official Baha’i arguments and found them very weak, and I knew they were indefensible. My manuscript was already 90% finished and I had put in hundreds of hours of work on it. But I was realizing that I no longer wanted to promote the Baha’i Faith to Christians or anyone else — I was disturbed and disgusted by the way Baha’is with different views about their faith were silenced, slandered, and even excommunicated. I was beginning to fear this could happen to me, I was angry, and I was starting to lose my faith. I did not even bother to share my feelings openly with other Baha’is, because I knew enough about Baha’i culture to know that this would be pointless. Through my own personal experiences and by reading the websites of several Baha’i reformers, I had discovered that the Haifa-based Baha’i Faith organization is in some ways a cult-like group, denying its members basic rights such as freedom of speech, the press, and association. Contrary to the Baha’i public image of tolerance and open-mindedness, behind the scenes the Baha’i leaders are running their religion in a spirit of institutional authoritarianism. Here are a few good resources to get you started as you investigate the truth beyond Baha’i propaganda:
- The Baha’i Faith & Religious Freedom of Conscience. Baha’i reformer Frederick Glaysher has put together an extensive collection of sources documenting the hijacking of Baha’ism by extremists who are intolerant of alternative viewpoints and free expression by Baha’is.
- Juan Coleis a professor of Middle Eastern history at the University of Michigan who is a Baha’i reformer and has been involved with the Unitarian-Universalist church. He was forced to resign from the Baha’i Faith under threat of shunning due to differences of opinion about certain issues in the religion and its organization. Baha’is are sometimes discouraged by their leaders from reading anything he has written — even his popular book on the origin of the Baha’i faith, Modernity and the Millennium — simply because it is by the prominent heretic Juan Cole. (I myself was warned against reading it.) He maintains a page of Documents on Baha’i History and Thought which includes a number of reform-oriented texts. Definitely read his two most controversial articles:
- The Baha’i Faith in America as Panopticon. Systematic spying, reporting, discipline and social control of Baha’i members by Baha’i religious institutions.
- Fundamentalism in the Contemporary U.S. Baha’i Community
- Karen Bacquetis an unenrolled Baha’i. She believes in Baha’u’llah but not the organization claiming to represent him. Among her many articles, here are some of the most interesting ones:
- Alison Marshallis an excommunicated Baha’i. On her website she shares her religious views and describes how she was forcibly expelled from the Baha’i Faith.
- Baha’i Leaders Vexed by On-Line Critics. An article by ex-Baha’i religious author K. Paul Johnson that appeared in Gnosismagazine in 1997. A summary of the controversy over the Talisman discussion group, a liberal Baha’i email list started by several reform-minded Baha’i scholars. Baha’i administrative officials repressed free speech on the list by interrogating and threatening its members, which culminated in discipline and excommunication or resignation of several prominent Baha’i intellectuals including Juan Cole and Indiana University professor Linda Walbridge. Johnson was an active participant in the original Talisman list, which was shut down only to be reborn later in a new form that is less controversial and grudgingly tolerated by the Baha’i institutions.
- A Modest Proposal: Recommendations Toward the Revitalization of the American Baha’i Community. This article was to have been published in Dialoguemagazine, a liberal Baha’i periodical, but it never appeared in print. The editors submitted it for “review” (in-house official Baha’i prepublication censorship) to the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha’is of the United States, and actually met with two members of that body. At the Baha’i National Convention in April 1988, the authors and editors were condemned for even thinking about publishing such a document. The editors, heartbroken, ceased publication of Dialogue.
- Baha’i Angstand Brave New World are humorous sources of Baha’i satire and more.
If you are a Baha’i questioning your religious beliefs, a “seeker” or somebody interested in the Baha’i Faith, it might be a good idea to talk with various people about the religion and their experiences in it. Since there aren’t very many Baha’is around in most towns, and those who do openly talk to you about their faith are often the most hard-core followers, it is helpful to go to an online discussion group to get a more balanced perspective from many believers, ex-Baha’is, and others. Also, Baha’is are typically shy about answering questions that might make their religion look bad or cause them to be reported and disciplined by the Baha’i administrative order. Many ordinary Baha’is are not even aware of some of the more difficult issues you might want to ask about. On the internet, you can meet Baha’is willing and able to discuss even the hard questions and provide you with alternative perspectives, either under the cloak of anonymity or publicly with the courage of their convictions. Some online Baha’i message boards are heavily moderated and censored by Baha’is appointed by the administrative order to prevent challenges to their views. Find a forum where real dialogue and different points of view about the Baha’i Faith are permitted, such as the forums listed below.
