Baha’i Prisoners in Iran; No, not a Hunger Strike

A Baha'i tablet for the fast

They observe everything for the Love of God. They even fast in prison for the love of God.

For Baha’is the love of God is supposed to be at the center of every breath they take. March 2-20 is the period of fast in the Baha’i calendar.

An old Baha’i friend who has spent some years of his precious life in the prisons of the Islamic Republic of Iran shared with me. We were imprisoned for being guilty of love for Baha’u’llah and practicing the Baha’i principle of love for all humanity. Practicing the Baha’i principles of independent investigation of truth, love of one universal God is our crime. He told me how he and his Baha’i friends would get up at dawn to say prayers and have a bit of cheese and bread with tea for breakfast to begin the fast in the prison. He said, that was the sweetest fast periods ever in his life.

For the 30 years of the Islamic Regime’s rule in Iran, many Baha’is have been arrested and put behind bars in most desolate prisons in Iran for being lovers of one loving God, who shines His light on one single family of humanity. Baha’is believe that the one universal God is like the sun we turn to every day for light and life and God’s Messengers, such as Abraham, Moses, Zoroaster, Buddha, Krishna, Jesus, Muhammad, The Bab and Baha’u’llah, are God’s perfect mirrors. These Manifestations of God have the privilege of surrendering their will completely to the Divine Will and only reflecting His command, His knowledge, His love, His wisdom, His power, and all His attributes. They have been the real examples of nothingness and absolute obedience.

Because the station and honor of these luminous souls was to serve as the perfect mirrors of the One and only Luminous Creator, they were and are all equal in their Divine station but not the same in what they revealed to address the needs of humanity of their time. Their differences is very much like the way parents appear different in the eyes of their children at different stages of parenthood. Children experience different reflection of their parents in different stages of their growth and the nature of parent child relationship changes as the maturity of the child evolves. The mother is always the same mother but the way she relates to her one year old is different from the way she treats the same child at age 16 or 45, and rightfully so.

This profound teaching of Baha’u’llah explaining to a maturing humanity the oneness of the station of all the messengers of God is fundamental in how religion is designed to serve as a most effective unifier of all humanity. The one and only Creator wishes to see His own attribute of oneness to appear in the mirror of His creation. Therefore Baha’u’llah teaches, God is one, Man is one and all the religions are one.

Oneness of humanity, Baha’is believe, is already a reality but humanity has to be awaken to it and govern its conduct based on this spiritual law. We know of a  similar law in the world of nature. In the wold of nature composition is life and decomposition is death.

The global scene is a witness to the violations of the law of oneness of all humanity and how urgently we need to address the crisis of ignorance of the law of oneness before we destroy the whole earth. The darkness that has enveloped the earth today will all be dispersed the moment humanity is awakened to the light of unity and oneness and begins to govern it affairs based on the knowledge of this principle.

The period of fast is a special time for Baha’is all over the world to pray that humanity will awaken to the reality of its oneness and reap the benefit of this truth. “So powerful is the light of unity that it can illuminate the whole world”, teaches Baha’u’llah.