The Bahai Temple

Note the temple in under wraps as they are refurbishing it for seismic 

 

We took a few days and went up north to Haifa, this is home to the Bahai World Centre.  This place is stunningly beautiful with water gardens and flowers everywhere, it has 18 terraces, said that there is one terrace for each of his deciples, each side is identical to the other.

Since its birth in 1844  Bahai has become the worlds second-most widespread religion.  The Bab,Siyyid Ali-Muhammad  1819-1850 was a young merchant in Persia when he announced in 1844 that he had been sent by God to prepare humanity for a new age and the imminent appearance of another Messenger, even greater than himself.  Because of his challenging teachings, which called for spiritual and moral renewal, the Bab was publicly martyred in 1850.  The Bahai consider Bab to be an independent messenger of God and the Herald of Baha u llah, the Found of the Baha i Faith. Then in 1817-1892 Mirza Husayn-Ali  followed, a Persian nobleman who took the title Baha'u'llah, Arabic for "The Glory of God".  because of his religious teachings he was imprisoned and banished from Persia with His family and a small group of followers.  They arrived in Acre in 1868, then a prison city under Ottoman rule, condemned to perpetual confinement. (no wonder the world as a whole is terrified to be true to themselves, history shows that we have been killed for it in the past) While in confinement he spent his time documenting the teachings he received from God which are now housed in the "library" at the Bahai site in Haifa.  This was of course the messenger that Bab was referring to.

This place is the holiest place on earth for Bahais and the point toward which they turn in prayer each day.  This is where the Bahais would come on their pilgrimages, it is said that the prophet forbid anyone who is Bahai to live in Israel, he never gave the reason, so people can only come to Israel for short periods of time to learn and help out, I found it so interesting that there are no Bahais in Israel, but whats even more interesting is that you will see that the volunteers at the gardens and temples are from all religions of the world..  One other fact that he said was that no Bahai will ever get into any political conflict, thats why the seem so secretive, but they are not they are keen to spread their Love and teachings of their faith.

If the way they look after their gardens is any indication on how they treat themselves and our world we are in for a real treat, its breathtakingly beautiful here.

We watched a short movie on the history and teachings of the Bahai faith, it was very moving and brought me to tears on two occasions.  I think I am fickle because everytime I learn about a new religion I feel like I want to join. Really the truth is that they are all the same, at their core, the teachings are all the same, Love one another as you yourself wished to be loved,  perhaps thats the worlds problem, we have not been taught how to love ourselves let alone anyone else.   What does it mean to really LOVE?

This is a photo of a photo in our hotel as the temple was covered at our time of visit

Bahia Beliefs are as follows:

-Abandonment of all forms of prejudice

-Full equality between the sexes

-Recognition of the common source and essential oneness of the Worlds Great Religions

-Elimination of the extremes of poverty and wealth

-Universal compulsory education

-Right and responsibility of each person to search independently for truth

-Establishment of a world federal system

-Recognition that faith must be consistent with reason and that science and religion should be in harmony

Who could argue with that!