| From: "brentmreed" Date: Wed Dec 19, 2001 5:52 pm Subject: How are We Different that the Other Baha'is? Dear members: Some of you may wonder how the Baha'is who support Jacques Soghomonian, the Guardian of the Baha'i Faith, are different than the mainstream Haifa administration supporters. Below is my answer to that question: Our group is convinced that Shoghi Effendi - even up until the year of his death - was intending for the continuation of the Guardianship, and believed that there was no way for the Baha'i Faith to exist without the succession of Interpreter-Guardians. He made several very clear statements to indicate that this is so. I have posted these statements numerous times in the past, and so have the Orthodox Baha'is - who also share the same conviction. We simply refer to ourselves as Baha'is, since it is our conviction that our group - as small as it is - represents the actual Faith of Baha'u'llah, that is still in existence on this planet. The way we see it, the other adherents to the Revelation of Baha'u'llah, like those who are loyal to the Haifa administration, the Orthodox, and the BUPC, are supporting "man-made" systems that operate outside of the actual legal definition of the Baha'i Faith, but we understand that each group sees itself as being representative of the genuine unmutilated Faith of God. Plus, many, if not most of these people are very sincere in their Faith, and abhor doing anything that would harm the Covenant, but they do not realize that they are in error. How has this happened? Simply stated, after the death of Shoghi Effendi, the Hands of the Cause, through their actions which violated the Covenant, began to piece together a new mutilated form of the Baha'i Faith. They did the best that they could considering that they had to create some form of the Baha'i Faith that lacked a Guardian - even though Shoghi Effendi himself stated: "Divorced from the institution of the Guardianship the World Order of Baha'u'llah would be mutilated and deprived of that hereditary principle which, as 'Abdu'l-Baha has written, has been invariably upheld by the Law of God. "Without such an institution the integrity of the Faith would be imperiled, and the stability of the entire fabric would be gravely endangered. Its prestige would suffer, the means required to enable it to take a long, an uninterrupted view over a series of generations would be completely lacking, and the necessary guidance to define the sphere of the legislative action of its elected representatives would be totally withdrawn. Even though the Hands were aware of these and other clear statements by Shoghi Effendi about the necessity of the continuation of the Guardianship, they sought advice from their attorneys, and very gradually introduced this false form of the Baha'i Faith upon the majority of the membership worldwide through the assistance of the National Spiritual Assemblies (except for the NSA of France), who also plugged into their new mutilated creation. This mutilated system grew and developed, and was taught to people who were craving for the truth, who assumed they were joining the Faith of Baha'u'llah. They in turn raised families devoted to what they thought was the Baha'i Faith. They were all taught that the "others" were violators of the Covenant and were spiritually contagious, and that they should avoid them and their literature at all costs. Over the past forty years there has been little contact among the various groups claiming to be the Baha'i Faith. Now, we have arrived at our present situation. A small group of faithful believers who represent the true Faith of Baha'u'llah, along with the living exiled Guardian of the Baha'i Faith, Jacques Agop Soghomonian, have very little resources with which they can use to penetrate the decades of conditioning done to the people of the world by the Haifa-based administration. The teaching efforts of the followers of the true Faith of the Lord of the Age have been seriously harmed by the baleful effects of decades of malicious slander, and half- truths and disinformation about us and the Guardians. We and the Guardians have been severed from the World Center, severed from our families and friends, and from the once great community of which we were a part. After the Hands destroyed the 1st International Baha'i Council - the embryonic Universal House of Justice - created by the first Guardian, declared an end to the Guardianship, led the revolt against Mason Remey, the 2nd Guardian, and isolated the rest of the believers - until the advent of the Internet - from any possibility of researching the post 1957 history of our Faith for themselves, the small band of true Baha'is and their Guardian exist without administrative institions. The 2nd Guardian abolished the 2nd International Baha'i Council in the 1960's because of serious problems with the Administrative Order caused by a lacking in the spiritual maturity of some of the believers. The succeeding Guardians have not felt it is the time to reestablish this institution yet. We of course recognize all of the Laws of the 'Aqdas. But, from our point of view, there is no need for us to focus on all of the Laws of the 'Aqdas, which are laws intended for a different type of future civilization, as well as some which are intended for a Baha'i community with greater numbers of believers and resources. We are not in this position. Teaching is difficult for reasons that have already been explained, but we are all nevertheless enthusiastic teachers of our Faith. Although there is a precedent in our Faith for shunning those who have been DECLARED COVENANT BREAKERS BY THE GUARDIAN, the Guardian understands that we are dealing with another type of problem that is quite different from the covenant-breaking problems of the past. It is his wish that we make every effort to befriend all of the followers of Baha'u'llah - avoiding polemics - with the hope that they might incline their minds and hearts to consider fairly the evidence that we can provide to prove our position, while he asks that we avoid discussion with those who are opposed. I hope that this helps you understand us better. Light and blessings to you, Brent Reed |