salam,

آقا من انگلیسیم صفره و موضع شما رو در وبلاگتون نفهمیدم. شما کجای مخالفت و مجادله و چمیدونم دشمنی و دوستی با بهاییت هستین؟ برای مام روشن کنید
خیلی ممنون از لطف شما البته اگه فارسی بلدین
اگه بلد نیستی که خب نمیتونی این متنو بخونی

TNX

Salam,

een weblog az yekee Bahai hast, baleh, vali harfha keh eenja dareed mikhooned rajabeh cheezha degar’am hast. Fekrnakonam Baquia farsi baladeh man’ ham mibakhsham farsi nanivishtam. Beshtar’een sohbat dar een weblog rojebeh seemayih Baha’i ast.

آقا من انگلیسیم صفره و موضع شما رو در وبلاگتون نفهمیدم. شما کجای مخالفت و مجادله و چمیدونم دشمنی و دوستی با بهاییت هستین؟ برای مام روشن کنید
خیلی ممنون از لطف شما البته اگه فارسی بلدین
اگه بلد نیستی که خب نمیتونی این متنو بخونی

TNX

ANDREW: Does this also apply to the UHJ on Mt. Carmel? I would think it must.

BRENDAN: When I said ‘wherever’, I meant ‘wherever’. I don’t agree with everything the House says. That’s the main reason I was refused my card…

“I always enjoy your posts, but it seems like you’re out to pick a fight today.”

I think it’s unfortunate you’ve chosen to place that construction on my critique of the statements I responded to in my previous post. You are imputing a motive which was not present. I don’t buy it. You also appear to have missed the main points of my response, which addressed issues of adherent demographics, valuation of sectarian diversity, denominational organization, and the nature of religious unity.

“The reason I called the fragmentation of Remeyite factions ‘typically, pathetically human’ was primarily in reference to the fact that they all dislike one another.”

I don’t believe this to be the case, but what if it were? One could validly argue that since the adherents of the mainstream, Haifan tradition seem to dislike the “Remeyite factions,” their behavior is equally “typically, pathetically human.”

“Each believes it is right and that all the other groups are wrong. Such certainty that you have the answers and everyone else doesn’t is sad wherever it manifests itself.”

Does this also apply to the UHJ on Mt. Carmel? I would think it must.

“Another sad, all-too-human tale. And one you should study before dismissing what anyone says as mere prejudice.”

Nice try, Brendan, but again, you’re imputing a motive which was not present. I didn’t characterize what anyone said as “mere prejudice,” I questioned the basis for making an assumption of mental illness, the presence of which requires a clinical diagnosis. It seems that the only way some are making an assumption of Remey’s presumed mental illness is through his behavior as reported by his detractors: hardly a sound basis for assessing someone’s character, let alone his mental state. None of the points you list justifies such an assessment.

Robert Clifton writes:

“The Remeyite divisions do get along, they communicate with each other, and unlike the UHJ group any person from any group is welcome at others gatherings of any sort.”

This has been my observation as well, hence my critique of any suggestions to the contrary.

I find it very interesting (quite fascinating, really) that one may cavalierly dismiss non-Haifan Baha’i movements as splintered, factional; one of their leaders as mentally ill and in spiritual error, i.e., not “turned toward the truth”; filled with resentment (or is that ressentiment?); promoters of division, etc., with apparent impunity: whereas any critique of these assertions is seized upon as evidence that one wishes to “pick a fight.” Astonishing, really, but not, perhaps, surprising.

I didn’t wish to “pick a fight” with anyone, but neither did I wish to let accusation and innuendo go unchallenged, something which seems to pass as acceptable discourse on many Baha’i forums. Since at this point I think I’ve acquired a fairly clear appreciation of how Baha’i dynamics play out in these exchanges, I’ll refrain from making any further comment on this. I’m in agreement with what Robert has written on the matter, and I hope he continues to post. I won’t.

Robert Clifton

I always enjoy your posts, but it seems like you’re out to pick a fight today. You’ve read my works, you know I’m not against religious diversity *per se*. The reason I called the fragmentation of Remeyite factions “typically, pathetically human” was primarily in reference to the fact that they all dislike one another. Each believes it is right and that all the other groups are wrong. Such certainty that you have the answers and everyone else doesn’t is sad wherever it manifests itself.

As for the question of Remey’s mental illness/senility, I suggest you investigate further before dismissing what Eric says. But for now, consider this.

1. Remey was very old when he broke away from the Haifan Baha’i Faith.
2. Shoghi Effendi’s death was a very stressful event for all of the Hands of the Cause, Remey was not the only one who seems to have suffered psychologically from the loss of the Guardian and the lack of a will.
3. The majority of Remey’s own followers soon decided he was not *compos mentis* and began to follow Joel Marangella as their guardian, against the protestations of the still-living Remey.

Another sad, all-too-human tale. And one you should study before dismissing what anyone says as mere prejudice.

Brendan

“I agree with Gerald’s characterization of Remey’s later followers. They are splintered and tiny in comparison to the masses of people (including myself) who recognize the UHJ as the legislative leadership of the Baha’i Faith.”

The NSA Reply Memorandum to the OBF Response to Motion for Rule to Show Cause states that “the Baha’i Faith has no denominations whatsoever” and that any “so-called organizations” consist of “a few misinformed people in a corner of the Internet … exceedingly small in scale.” Ah, the numbers game …

When, on another forum, I suggested to a Baha’i National Convention delegate that membership numbers provided by the “mainstream, Haifan tradition” might be (in the words of one “apostate”) “grossly exaggerated, manipulated, and so far from reality that only the delusional or uninformed would believe them to be true,” he responded by writing:

“Better a few good men who know why they joined and can be relied on than a herd of people who blow away with the first gust of cold wind.”

The assumption underlying this argument is that it’s acceptable for the “mainstream, Haifan tradition” to eventually become “small in scale,” provided it attracts “a few good men,” but it’s not acceptable for non-Haifan Baha’i movements to have only “a few good men,” because there are “no denominations whatsoever” in the Baha’i Faith. In other words: I’m okay, you’re not okay, but that’s okay, because you don’t exist … because you’re “Covenant-breakers.” How sad.

“He was a wonderful Hand of the Cause, and I suspect mental illness played a role in his behavior later in life.”

Upon what basis do you make this dismissive assertion? Do you have any evidence aside from conjecture or innuendo in support of your suspicion? This reminds me of the characterization of a certain Baha’i “apostate” as “benign but paranoid”: a backhanded compliment that simultaneously praises and diminishes.

“I like to assume that of everyone who has died, that they turned toward the truth in the final moments.”

Whose truth would that be, and who might enforce it? Is his truth of less worth than your truth or my truth?

Brendan Cook writes:

“It’s sad to hear how completely the Remeyites splintered — all these little factions, each resenting the other, each certain of knowing the Way, the Truth, and the Light. What a typically, pathetically human story.”

I submit that uniformity of organization under the banner of visible unity is merely a façade of unity. In their book “Victims and Values,” Amato and Monge have argued that “in the period preceding the Reformation, theological diversity and a whole horizon of reform movements sharply questioned and openly contradicted every phase of church authority and practice.” Fredrica Thompsett has written that “in the Reformation, there were various traditions” that “mirrored the diversity of early Christianity,” while Mojtaba Mahdavi has noted that “the Reformers shifted the basis of religion from an authoritarian and hierarchical epistemology (in which the truth was available only to a very small number of people) to an essentially democratic one.” You seem to regard the creation of “little factions” as “typically” pathetic, while I see these “little factions” as part of a vital efflorescence of diversity, particularity, and creative activity, however fraught or compromised.

“They don’t want to create division by proposing a new center of authority, and they certainly don’t want a following.”

This seems to presume the sole and exclusive legitimacy of a single authority or interpretation, and that “division” is a necessary corollary of any deviation from it. However, unless one’s concept of unity is a purely utilitarian one, there is no inherent contradiction between a lack of institutional cohesiveness and “unity in Christ” or, in this case, “unity in Baha’u'llah.” The Sufi scholar Fleur Nassery Bonnin has said that unity only exists at the esoteric or spiritual level of each religion; religion is like a fruit that contains the husk and the kernel: so often we have seen the outer mistaken as the whole. She has also said that individual transformation and consequently the unity of religions takes place primarily in the spiritual dimension. Indeed, from this perspective, the “mainstream, Haifan tradition” is itself a faction of the Baha’i Faith.

In his “Studies in Honor of the Late Hasan M. Balyuzi,” Moojan Momen
writes:

“Wilhelm Herrigel was the founder of the Bahai World Union. Only a few Baha’is followed him, and when he died in 1932, many of them returned to the Baha’i community.”

This seems to privilege the idea that there is only one (legitimate)
Baha’i community: it is “the” Baha’i community. In other words: the members of the Bahai World Union were not members of “the” Baha’i community; only those Baha’is who are members of the “Baha’i International Community” are “real” Baha’is, in the same sense that only those Catholics who are in complete obedience to Rome are real Catholics. But Anglicans and members of the Utrecht Union beg to differ, as do I.

In fact, the Bahai World Union remains in existence to this day, and has members in Germany, Russia, Israel, India, Dubai, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Canada, Australia, and the United States. Perhaps its members enjoy only a “personal fantasy in isolation,” but as John Roger Barrie has pointed out, playing the numbers game as a criterion of gauging success “is a function of commercialism, which demands that products be sold to the greatest numbers of people. But in the world of spiritual values, the numbers game holds no meaning whatsoever.”