Baha’i Faith and the Construction of Social Reality: How do Baha’is Translate the Word of God into Practice? By: Shahla Mehrgani A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Sheffield Faculty of Arts and Humanities School of English/SIIBS December 2017 To My Fellow Stay-at-Home Bahá’í Scholars in Shiraz ACKNOWLEDGEMENT Education is a journey that is worth a lifetime traversing. Hard to believe that my journey has come to an end. This journey would have never been started without the sacrifices of the brave and noble souls of the Institute for Advanced Baha’i Studies under the circumstances called “Education under Fire”. I am beholden to my supportive, understanding, and loving husband; without whose sacrifices; I couldn’t even imagine starting this long journey. With great appreciation, I shall acknowledge my son, who has grown up watching me study and juggle with family and work. I want to offer my special gratitude to my beloved mother and my concerned and compassionate little brother who always encouraged and supported me with their emotional and material sources. I owe them for all my accomplishments. I have been blessed with educated, kind and wise friends who have rendered assistance to me during the entire period of my project, to whom I will be grateful forever. Without the Irfan Colloquium along with my generous sponsor, I would have never been able to even dream of such day, so I express my deep and sincere appreciation to them. I cannot even begin to thank my supervisors, Dr Katie Edward and Dr Matthias Benzer the way they both deserve. To you, enormous thanks are due for all your support during this beautiful period of my life. ABSTRACT In this thesis I focus attention on the Baha’i Process of community-building within its periodic context. Towards this aim, I answer the question of how Baha’is translate the word of God into practice to construct their social reality. This project takes a constructionist approach and applies Peter Berger’s conceptual framework to interpret Baha’i scriptures. This study also takes an ethnographic methodology that includes semi-structured interviews as well as observations to study the lived experience of the Bahá’ís in Sheffield. I demonstrate that the stability of the Bahá’í community-building efforts was maintained from 1934 up until 1996. Nonetheless, since 1996, radical shifts have happened in the Bahá’í community, regarding the aims and the means of the community building. In this research I have identified the shifting period of the community-building among the Bahá’ís as deconstruction. The study verifies the changes in community-building have been radical enough to change the nature of the community from an international, institutionalized community into various, similar, local communities spread all around the world. Accordingly, an institutional community aiming to establish a New World Order through the institutes of the Bahá’í Administrative Order is turning into an individual-centred community aiming for the betterment of the world through starting from the neighbourhoods. The study adds to Berger’s conceptual framework for the social construction of reality by introducing the notion of “deconstruction”. Through this research, I will also enrich the literature of the sociology of religion regarding studying Baha’is constructing their desired community based on their interpretations of their holy writings. Keywords: Constructionism, Bahá’í Faith, Community-building, Deconstruction Figures and tables Figure 5.1. ............................................................................................................................... 96 Table 10.1. ............................................................................................................................. 202 TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction……………………………………………………………………………………1 The Baha’i Administrative Order……………………………………………………………...9 Literature Review…………………………………………………………………………….23 Philosophical Foundations, Methodology, and Methods…………………………………….59 The Faith and World –Construction………………………………………………………….84 Externalization…………………………………………………………………………….....99 Objectivation………………………………………………………………………………..108 Internalization……………………………………………………………………………....130 Deconstruction ………………………………………………………………………..……146 The Fieldwork Findings…………………….…….………………………………….……..161 Discussion……………………………………………………..……………………………213 Conclusion………………………………………………………………………………….234 Bibliography………….…………………………………………………………………….241 1. INTRODUCTION The Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh, whose supreme mission is, none other but, the achievement of this organic and spiritual unity of the whole body of nations, should, if we be faithful to its implications, be regarded as signalizing through its advent the coming of age of the entire human race. It should be viewed not merely as yet another spiritual revival in the ever-changing fortunes of mankind, not only as a further stage in a chain of progressive Revelations, nor even as the culmination of one of a series of recurrent prophetic cycles, but rather as marking the last and highest stage in the stupendous evolution of man’s collective life on this planet. The emergence of a world community, the consciousness of world citizenship, the founding of a world civilization and culture—all of which must synchronize with the initial stages in the unfoldment of the Golden Age of the Bahá’í Era—should, by their very nature, be regarded, as far as this planetary life is concerned, as the furthermost limits in the organization of human society, though man, as an individual, will, nay must indeed as a result of such a consummation, continue indefinitely to progress and develop (Effendi, 1991, p. 163). In this thesis, I study the Bahá’í1 community-building activities in Sheffield. I study the evolution of the Faith2 from the words in the scriptures into concrete social realities. Community-building is a part of the efforts of the Bahá’ís to establish a new society based on Baha'u'llah’s teachings. These teachings emphasise the oneness of humanity; independent, unfettered investigation of the truth; religion as the source of unity; harmony between science and religion; the equality of men and women; universal peace upheld by a world government guided by spiritual principles; universal compulsory education; and a universal auxiliary language (Esslemont, 1980). Community-building activities include attending the Feast as a part of the Bahá’ís contribution to the Bahá’í Administrative Order; voting for the members of the Local Spiritual Assembly; teaching the Faith; devotional sessions; study circles; children’s classes; and junior youth classes. Bahá’ís are a “sociologically interesting group” (McMullen, 2000, p. 2). Religious practice among the Bahá’ís is based on their perception of the scriptures (Bahá’u’lláh, 1862). There 1 http://www.bahai.org.uk/ 2 In this thesis, whenever I mean the Baha’i Faith, I write it in capital letters and when it means faith in general, it will appear according to its place in the sentence. 1 are numerous scriptures in the Bahá’í Faith, which have constantly been released since its revelation in 1844. Bahá’ís read their scriptures individually, share their perceptions together, and put their final understandings and interpretations into practice. Hence, the scriptures, as well as Bahá’í individual and collective interpretations, are crucial for understanding their activities and behaviours. Paul Lample (2009) writes: “collectively, we receive the gift of the Word of God, and through its application we are to raise the Kingdom of God on earth; that is, we are to gradually contribute to the building of a new social order that is shaped by the truths of the Revelation of Bahá’u’lláh” (Lample, 2009, p. 3). Bahá’ís construct their community in accordance with their evolving understandings of the Bahá’í scriptures, which has been an ongoing process (Effendi, 1936). According to the evolving nature of the Bahá’í Faith and the Bahá’ís’ community-building activities, this thesis builds on Peter Berger’s theory of the social reality of religion by applying his conceptual framework to community- building within the Bahá’í community of Sheffield, both through their sacred scriptures and their activities. Peter Berger (1967) theorised the role of religion in community-building activities by introducing the process of nomization, which he defines as the establishment of a sacred order for a religious community. He also outlined the three stages of the process of nomization: externalization, objectivation, and internalization (Berger, 1967, pp. 3-4). This thesis will demonstrate the different stages of the establishment of the Bahá’í community based on the Bahá’ís’ interpretations of their scriptures based on Berger’s conceptual framework (1967). Berger and Luckmann’s work (1966) is amongst the most highly regarded texts in the social constructivist tradition (Collin, 1997). Despite the significance of Berger’s research, there are few works in the field related to his theory, per se. On the contrary, Berger is mostly recognized for his notions of secularization and desecularization. By comparison, the number of works that draw upon his other notions is not considerable, neither theoretically nor 2 empirically. Berger (1967) suggests that religion is fundamental to world-building activities. “World-building” in sociological terminology means constructing a society. This definition is related to the social constructionist