Recently, it seems, there have been more articles than usual written about the Baha’i Faith. One from the Huffington Post, is a nice personal opinion about someone who is now investigating the truths about the Baha’i Faith. The article has some very interesting discussion (via comments) at the end of it. It shows several concerns that many people who are or could be investigating the Faith are having.

Another one, from the Wall Street Journal is a brief, but very accurate and current, exploration of the Faith, which contains some of the history of the persecution of the Baha’is, mainly in Iran. The author resides in Haifa, Israel, where the spiritual and administrative centers of the Baha’i Faith are found: the spiritual center because the physical remains of the Bab and Baha’u'llah are kept in Shrines in these properties and the administrative center because the Seat (meeting place) of the Universal House of Justice

Both are very good reads. At this point, I will pause and give you some time to go read them.

…

Reading the collection of blogs found on my favorite RSS reader today, I came accross a cool use of Google Insights for Search (it was new to me, mainly because I didn’t look into it much when it came out). TechCrunch was highlighting the use of this tool to track several Web 2.0 sites/concepts. The maps looked cool so I decided to try a few of my own. Let’s see what insights Google has for the search term: bahai

and

Top Ten Countries (by Search Volume Index)
Iran, Jamaica, Israel, Canada, Kenya, Australia, Bolivia, Panama, New Zealand, Norway

leads me to a few observations:

• Iran and Israel for sure (for reasons mentioned above and more)
• Kenya is a nice surprise (there are clusters in Kenya that are 4% Baha’i by population)
• Australia and Panama both have temples
• Jamaica, Canada, Bolivia, New Zealand, Norway cool!
• Two of the top three countries with largest Baha’i population: US and India didn’t make it, probably due to the normalization. Volume is probably up there, though.

Top Ten Cities (by Search Volume Index)
Vancouver, Chicago, Toronto, Sydney, Seattle, Washington, Melbourne, Los Angeles, Atlanta, San Francisco

San Francisco is #10!! Hmm… If you are from San Francisco and you searched because you are investigating, give me a call, or write at least a comment. We’ll meet up with you! :)

All these cities: it makes a lot of sense. They all are part of A clusters, which means many many prayers and energies are being dispensed to allow the message of Baha’u'llah to reach more and more people.

Thanks for revealing this Google!

I was stumbling-upon (a.k.a. browsing) around the internet earlier today and I found something kinda cool. I reached a website that had some stock photography tagged “bahai”.

One of the pictures stood out to me because I had never seen it before. It is a picture from “Le Petit Journal” (a small magazine?) presumably from France showing ‘Abdul’l-Baha giving a talk around a crowd of people in Constantinople (now Istanbul), Turkey.

The image came from the Mary Evans Picture Library which seems to be a collection of pictures/photos/images from one or two centuries ago.

The title may imply that ‘Abdu’l-Baha is a new prophet of Islam or that ‘Abdu’l-Baha is talking about a new prophet of Islam, Baha’u'llah. The perception at the time in many places around the world and even currently in many textbooks, news articles, essays, etc. is that the Baha’i Faith is a sect of Islam and that Baha’u'llah and maybe even ‘Abdu’l-Baha are prophets of Islam. Though it is correct that Baha’u'llah was raised in the Islam tradition, it is very clear that he came to establish a new and independent world faith. This says it best:

The Bahá’í Faith is a world religion whose purpose is to unite all the races and peoples in one universal Cause and one common Faith. Bahá’ís are the followers of Bahá’u’lláh, Who they believe is the Promised One of all Ages. As you know, the traditions of almost every people include the promise of a future when peace and harmony will be established on earth and humankind will live in prosperity. We believe that the promised hour has come and that Bahá’u’lláh is the great Personage Whose Teachings will enable humanity to build a new world. In one of His Writings, Bahá’u’lláh says:

“That which the Lord hath ordained as the sovereign remedy and mightiest instrument for the healing of all the world is the union of all its peoples in one universal Cause, one common Faith.”

After the passing of Baha’u'llah, ‘Abdu’l-Baha continued to spread the faith his father revealed to humanity throughout the world. In 1911, he went to Paris, France where he gave a series of talks, many of which were recorded and compiled in this book, Paris Talks:

In 1912, he came to the United States where he continued to give talks and to meet with the Baha’i Community that had recently started to grow here.

P.S. I’m back, hopefully to be more constant. BahaiNine has been keeping me busy, be sure to check it out.

During the Tree of Life Project, earlier this month, we were asked to do something artistic during the session on Integrating the Arts. Since I’ve only recently started drumming and don’t know much yet, I decided to write my third poem. I used a whiteboard to start with one word, then selectively erase and write on that word to make new words. The word in ALL CAPS is that word and the rest what I would say:

The EARTH is one country and mankind its citizens.

Can your EAR HEAR this?

Can your HEART feel it?

Can you BEAR to understand it?

Are we BEARINGS in the axles of one wheel?

Are we RINGS on one hand?

Do we BRING joy to the hearts of the SOBBING, the SORROWFUL?

I am SORE from the walking…

I’m SORRY, I wish I could do more.

I WORRY everyday for the WORLD.

It looked better than it reads, and it didn’t look that good anyway. I’ll continue working on it.

That’s number 3. Peace.

Recently at 11pm on a saturday night, a group of us found ourselves in the City at the 200% more-expensive-than-the-rest club: Ruby Skye. It’s a pretty cool place… if you like trance… it turns out the majority of the crew wasn’t a big fan but they all said they had a good time. “It was good to do something different” and “It was good to see you have so much fun jumping around” they said. That’s good enough for me. :)

Anyway, I was reading this About.com interview with Paul Van Dyk, number 1 DJ in the world for 2006 according to DJ Magazine and number 2 at the DJList.com, about his latest album “In Between” which is scheduled to come out on August 14th. He said this about title:

The music came together over a period of two or three years. There have been all these changes - the whole globalization thing, the climate change, and just as much me growing up. This is why it’s called In Between – as in between phases. Every single track has its own little story, and since I traveled all around the world through the timeframe of producing the music, the influences are from all over the world.

I’ve always been a fan of the smooth-sounding beats and incredibly-flowing transitions of trance. This album, I’m sure, will be just as good. Trance music, as expressed by this artist, now reflects some of the changes that this world is going through, that this world is in between phases… It’s so true.

History thus far, with the greed of man at its forefront, has led us to an organization of humans where billions are in poverty and a few thousand have the vast majority of the wealth. At the same time, we’ve seen in the last 50 years huge technological advances. How do we better the world with all this knowledge?

Baha’u'llah has said:

The world is in great turmoil, and the minds of its people are in a state of utter confusion. We entreat the Almighty that He may graciously illuminate them with the glory of His Justice, and enable them to discover that which will be profitable unto them at all times and under all conditions.

Shoghi Effendi, the great grandson of Baha’u'llah, said:

Beset on every side by the cumulative evidences of disintegration, of turmoil and of bankruptcy, serious-minded men and women, in almost every walk of life, are beginning to doubt whether society, as it is now organized, can, through its unaided efforts, extricate itself from the slough into which it is steadily sinking. Every system, short of the unification of the human race, has been tried, repeatedly tried, and been found wanting.

He also said elsewhere:

This will indeed be the fitting climax of that process of integration which, starting with the family, the smallest unit in the scale of human organization, must, after having called successively into being the tribe, the city-state, and the nation, continue to operate until it culminates in the unification of the whole world, the final object and the crowning glory of human evolution on this planet.

Disintegration to integration… Good thing we are optimists. :) For more discussion, join us this Sunday at my place at 7pm.

The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran. I can tell this was one of my dad’s favorite books because he took a fragment from it and used in the words he expressed to my mom during their wedding. Homework for me is to contact my mom and find out what those words were. :)

As for me, well I like this:

And think not you can direct the course of love, for love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course.

“And what of Marriage, master?”

You were born together, and together you shall be for evermore.
…
Love one another, but make not a bond of love:
Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.
…
Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone,
Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.
…
And stand together yet not too near together:
For the pillars of the temple stand apart,
And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.

Related to work:

Work is love made visible.
And if you cannot work with love but only with your distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy…

As my “hermanote” George would say, “What a genius.” :)

To be continued… (when I finish reading)