Baha’i Rants

Previous member of the Universal House of Justice Peter Khan has passed away today. Over the years we’ve discussed Khan’s extremist viewpoints more than a few times. He was also a key player in Alison Marshall’s expulsion as well as the UHJ member with the portfolio of Asia sent to pummel into submission the New Zealand Baha’i community when they balked at her treatment by the institutions.

Below is the message from the UHJ:

We grieve at the sudden passing of our dearly loved former colleague Peter J. Khan, whose many years of service in the Holy Land, concluded so recently, are still fresh in our memories. By any measure, his was a remarkable life, one of earnest striving, of unbending resolve, of unflinching dedication to principle, and of constancy of effort. Discovering the Faith in his early youth, he had an unbroken record of outstanding service that included membership of the National Spiritual Assembly of Australia, of the Auxiliary Board for Propagation in North America, of the Continental Board of Counsellors in Australasia, and of the International Teaching Centre and that culminated in his election to the Universal House of Justice on which body he served for twenty-three years. His considerable intellectual gifts manifested themselves in every aspect of his service to the Cause of God: in his stalwart defence of the Covenant, in the exemplary manner in which he discharged his manifold administrative duties, in his acquainting generations of youth with the transforming vision of Shoghi Effendi, in his championing the advancement of women, in his diligent attention to the stewardship of the Faith’s material resources, and in his presentations of the verities of the Cause with uncommon eloquence and endearing humour to unnumbered audiences–lifting hearts, stimulating minds, galvanizing spirits. The Faith of God has lost a distinguished servant.

Our condolences are extended to his beloved wife Janet, his collaborator and devoted companion. We shall offer ardent prayers at the Sacred Threshold that his illumined soul may be joyously received in the Abha Kingdom and immersed in the ocean of divine grace. We call upon the friends to hold befitting memorial gatherings in his honour throughout the Baha’i community, including in all the Houses of Worship.

The Universal House of Justice

Peter Khan was a member of the UHJ from 1987 to 2009 (when he retired):

On the heels of the conference in Canada, Intellectual Othering & the Baha’i Question in Iran, Center for Studies on New Religions (CESNUR) held its international conference in Taipei, Taiwan.

Among the papers presented was “Baha’i and Subud dissent: Developments in the 2000′s” by Bei Dawei. The paper compares and contrasts the recent dissident community developments among the two distinct religious traditions. Since I’m ignorant of the Subud community and theology, I’ll highlight the Baha’i relevant sections:

Baha’i dissent in the 2000′s can be read as a continuation of the “internet wars” of the late 1990′s. At this time, the Baha’i administration either pressured to resign, or actively disenrolled, a number of Baha’i intellectuals associated with the online Talisman discussion list, for disagreeing with the received line on certain controversial issues. These included the faith’s opposition to homosexuality (and the strained scriptural interpretation upon which the policy is based); the exclusion of women from the Universal House of Justice (the same observation applies here); the shunning of “covenant-breakers”; the requirement that any proposed publications on the faith be submitted to regional censorship boards (“Baha’i review”); and an electoral system which favors incumbents. All of these touch on more fundamental issues of infallibility and institutional authority—against which the dissidents invoke the equally core Baha’i values of the independent investigation of truth, the elimination of all kinds of prejudice, the equality of men and women, and interreligious harmony. At the risk of oversimplifying a complex web of alliances and animosities, the rift between reforming liberals (many of them academics) and pro-administration conservatives widened, amidst mutual accusations of betrayal. In 1999 the Universal House of Justice complained of a “campaign of internal opposition to the Teachings,” and warned Baha’is not to hold their faith to the materialistic standards of secular scholarship.

Following are some major developments of the 21st century:

Indiana University (Bloomington) anthropologist and sometime Baha’i dissident Linda Walbridge died in 2002. She and her husband, Middle Eastern Studies professor John Walbridge (also of IUB), had both resigned during the Talisman affair, and largely abandoned the field of Baha’i Studies for other research.

University of Michigan history professor Juan Cole—the most prolific Baha’i academic during the 1990′s, who likewise resigned from the faith during the Talisman affair—turned his attention to other, arguably more important Middle Eastern topics after 9-11. Of his 29 papers in the field of Baha’i Studies, only two were published during the early 2000′s; these took on a frank and even scathing tone, now that he was no longer constrained to submit his work to Baha’i review. Besides Talisman, Cole and John Walbridge were also the organizers of H-Bahai, a now-inactive academic discussion list and online journal, the last of whose Occasional Papers in Shaykhi, Babi, and Baha’i Studies appeared in 2003.

2005 saw the publication of two significant academic works which proved unexpectedly controversial within the faith (though not, apparently, outside it): William Garlington’s The Baha’i Faith in America (Praeger), which pro-administration critics felt devoted excessive attention to Baha’i dissent (as opposed to, say, the fifty-year history of the construction of the House of Worship in Wilmette, Illinois); and Sen McGlinn’s Church and State: A Postmodern Political Theology (self-published), which discusses the nature of the future global political order, i.e. whether it is to be a theocracy. McGlinn’s incidental description of himself as a “Baha’i theologian” attracted official rebuke, on the grounds that the faith has no clergy. He has since been disenrolled by the administration, for reasons which were never made public, but which seem likely to involve his published views. (Garlington had resigned during the 1980′s.) Also in 2005, the U.S. National Spiritual Assembly ordered a partial boycott of Kalimat Press (founded in Los Angeles, 1978 by Anthony Lee and Payram Afsharian), an independent publisher of Baha’i books known for its academic works, such as the Studies in the Babi and Baha’i Religions series (eighteen volumes). At issue was Kalimat’s promotion of scholarly books by Cole, Garlington, McGlinn, and Abbas Amanat.

In 2007, Moojan Momen’s article “Marginality and Apostasy in the Baha’i Faith“, for the Elsevier journal Religion (no. 37, pp. 187-209) attempted to analyze—none too charitably—the psychological motivations of seventeen unnamed (but readily identifiable) dissidents. Twelve of these display a “preoccupation with their campaign against the Baha’i community” which, according to the abstract, “brings to mind Max Scheler’s description of the apostate as ‘engaged in a continuous chain of acts of revenge against his own spiritual past’.” Momen’s article inspired a wave of online rebuttals, in addition to the four which appeared in the journal itself. At one point I contemplated writing a paper about the controversy; on reflection, however, I can hardly improve upon the various responses which have already appeared, and which also serve to convey something of the personalities involved. Suffice it to say that—like the old joke about psychologists being crazier than their patients—Momen often seems to resemble the objects of his diagnosis. His description of the apostate worldview as a “dark mirror image” of mainstream Baha’i experience, would be equally applicable to his perception of them. His suspicion of their alliances, slanders, and planned subversions ignores factional behavior on the part of the Baha’i administration, not to mention his own role as cat’s paw. He accuses his apostates of Nietzschean ressentiment, but at no point considers whether their complaints are justified—talk of apostate “narratives” and “mythology” obscures the important question of whether the dissidents have their facts right. By contrast, many of his apostates have been models of fair-minded critique, and have pointedly sought out common ground. Finally, having gone to so much trouble to achieve academic publication, Momen complains that dissident views have found their way into scholarly presses and journals, where they now risk confusing non-expert readers into thinking of the Baha’i religion as a cult. All this calls to mind another psychological term: projection.

Outside of academia, discussion involving dissidents is especially likely to found on Yahoo groups (especially Talisman9, begun in 1999 as a successor to Talisman), Usenet / Google groups (e.g., talk.religion.bahai), and the message boards at Beliefnet.com. During the 2000′s, Baha’i dissidents have created a number of personal blogs and websites; of these, only Sen McGlinn’s (from 2004) compares with those of Cole and the Walbridges in term of academic quality. Karen Bacquet (Karen’s Thoughts, from 2004) and Alison Marshall (Meditations on Baha’u'llah, from 2007) emphasize devotional reflections, though each has posted material more directly critical of the administrative order. (Bacquet has also published two academic journal articles in this vein.) Baha’i Rants (from 2005), by an anonymous writer called “Baquia” (not to be confused with Bacquet), is relatively strident—recent articles have questioned financial statements made by the Canadian National Spiritual Assembly, and the administrative favor accorded to Dr. Hossain Danesh, a Canadian psychiatrist earlier forced to abandon his medical practice due to accusations of sexual misconduct. Blogposts by all these writers regularly feature on Baha’is Online (created by Steve Marshall in 2004), a Baha’i news aggregator which often links to material from dissident sites, or of interest to dissidents. These sites—along with several others run by non-believing ex-Baha’is (e.g. Dan Jensen’s Idol Chatter, Priscilla Gillman’s Baha’i the Way) — can be understood as mutually reinforcing, judging from their mutual links and comments.

Overall, the paper is accurate regarding the Baha’i community. The only criticism I would offer is that it is merely descriptive and fails to add value by providing any significant insight into the trend we’ve seen so far or to project it into the future to venture a hypothesis or prediction.

For those interested, the complete paper can be read here.

The University of Toronto, in conjunction with the Foundation for Iranian Studies and the Toronto Initiative for Iranian Studies, is sponsoring a conference about the Baha’is in Iran.

The conference will take place July 1-3rd 2011 and offer an array of speakers, many of which should be familiar already to the readers of this blog: Abbas Amanat, Moojan Momen, Payam Akhavan, Muhammad Afnan, etc.

Here is the synopsis of the conference’s topic:

As a genuinely Iranian intellectual and religious movement emerging in the mid-nineteenth century, the Baha’i Faith has encountered relentless and sustained repression and scapegoating in the country of its origin. Exploring various aspects of the Baha’i Question in Iran over the past century and a half, the scholars participating in this international conference will critically reflect on a wide range of issues related to the similarities and differences of Shi’i Islam and Baha’i Faith, the role of Baha’is in Iranian cultural and intellectual life, and the fact of their continued repression and intellectual Othering.

Since a prominent Baha’i blogger will be attending, hopefully we can read about the experience soon after the conference. If you’re in the Toronto area or can travel and are interested to attend, the cost is minimal ($100 Canadian) – Registration.

The event’s facebook page also contains more information, including many videos of the upcoming presenter’s past speeches and related research.

UPDATE: You can view the videos of the conference presentations here, both in translated English as well as the original Persian.

By now you’ve no doubt learned about the recent raids on the Baha’i Institute Higher Education by Iranian government authorities. This resulted in the confiscation of teaching materials as well as the arrest of several Baha’is serving as faculty. Sen wrote about this almost immediately after it occurred: Many searches and 14 arrests of BIHE faculty.

In case you’re not familiar with the BIHE, it was setup as a result of the systematic persecution of Baha’is in Iran. Part of the organized persecution of the Baha’i community is the Iranian government’s explicit policy to exclude Baha’is from the education system. As the BIHE’s website explains:

In 1987, after failed attempts to persuade the government to admit qualified Bahá’í students to Iranian universities, the Bahá’í community of Iran rallied its forces and expertise and established the Bahá’í Institute for Higher Education (BIHE)…. Professors and researchers in Iran who had been discharged from their universities and colleges for no reason other than their membership in the Bahá’í faith dedicated themselves to the BIHE project that has evolved from a compensatory institution to a university with academic standards not only on par with the Iranian public university system, but also equaling the standards adopted by universities in the West.

Sadly, this is not the first time that the Iranian government has raided and interfered with the activities of the BIHE. There were similar raids in the 1990′s and again in 2001/2.

Since the malicious intents of the Islamic Republic of Iran is clear, one alternative is to implement a different model. If the BIHE operated as an online education platform instead of an offline, real world decentralized one, it would be much more difficult to curtail. This way there is nothing to confiscate since the servers which contain all the necessary data are in a centralized location outside the purview of the Iranian regime. An example of this model already gaining traction is the Khan Academy.

Baha’i students could use a VPN to tunnel into servers and bypass any Iranian internet security that may prevent them access. This would also prevent hacking/eavesdropping by the authorities. For an extra layer of security the site can be anonymized via an .onion TLD (and accessed via TOR). Yes, there’s more to the internet than just http: IRC, torrents, usenet, etc. There is a whole darknet out there.

Of course, not all disciplines being taught at the BIHE will be compatible with an online teaching format, however many will. As well, the added advantage is that students can take courses even if they are geographically isolated.

Even if implemented, such countermeasures run headlong into Iran’s recent plans to close their internet off completely. Currently, as with many other countries in the Middle East, Iran has restricted access to thousands of sites. Many of these are popular ones you may use without a second thought everyday (twitter, youtube, facebook, etc.). But that doesn’t mean that Iranians can’t get around the restrictions.

In fact, ways to circumvent the Islamic firewall are well known. Just recently, Houshang Fanaian, a Baha’i living in Iran was sentenced to 4 years in prison for his activities on facebook. Ironically, Iran is putting in place such monitoring and censorship with the software and hardware sold to it by US companies such as Secure Computing Corp., Juniper Networks, and Fortinet.

As if by coincidence, just as news arrives of Iran’s intentions to heavily restrict internet access, a report from the United Nations declares unfettered and universal access to the internet a human right:

Given that access to basic commodities such as electricity remains difficult in many developing States, the Special Rapporteur is acutely aware that universal access to the Internet for all individuals worldwide cannot be achieved instantly.

However, the Special Rapporteur reminds all States of their positive obligation to promote or to facilitate the enjoyment of the right to freedom of expression and the means necessary to exercise this right, including the Internet.

Hence, States should adopt effective and concrete policies and strategies –- developed in consultation with individuals from all segments of society, including the private sector as well as relevant Government ministries -– to make the Internet widely available, accessible and affordable to all

Obviously if Iran is successful in isolating itself and forming its own massive ‘intranet’ instead of being connected to the same internet that you and I use, the countermeasures suggested above for the BIHE are useless.

Another obstacle is the cost of internet access in Iran. If you are connecting to an online site to learn via video and other rich content, you will need a high speed ADSL (or equivalent) connection. That is rather expensive in Iran. A 2 Mb connection costs the equivalent of $400 US per month. In Europe or North America the cost is less than a tenth of that.

Ultimately, the best of the worst options is for young Baha’is in Iran to leave and pursue productive and happy lives elsewhere. The continuing human rights abuses of the IRI regime will not stop and attempts to adapt and survive will in the end be nothing more than a cat and mouse game leaving the community harried and exhausted.

There are many countries that would be happy to provide a new home to Baha’is. Many are taking the offer and saying “Farewell to Iran” every day. To the young Baha’is in Iran that are able to leave but may be reluctant because of feelings of doubt about the West or perhaps due to nationalistic loyalty I’d like to remind Baha’u'llah’s words:

Let not a man glory in this, that he loves his country; let him rather glory in this, that he loves his kind.