Reflections on the Place of Politics in the Baha'i Faith

This has ended up really long, possibly because it's such a huge topic, but here goes.

One of the more perplexing practices for Baha'is to follow is non-participation in politics. Many people don't understand how a religion that is so focused on issues of social justice can deliberately avoid running for office, campaigning for or against particular candidates, or get involved with organizations that are too "divisive." One might wonder how Baha'is expect to realize their dreams of social equality, cooperative governance, demilitarization, and enduring peace without engaging with the institutions most influentially involved in dealing with these issues.

My response to this common concern can be articulate a such:

that politics, as matters of state, is of central concern for the Baha'i faith. Politics is repressed by Baha'i communities, not so as to eradicate it, but to protect it from colonization by the social forces it seeks to challenge. Baha'is withdraw, only so that they can expand, consolidate, strategize, and organize for a time when the community can act far more effectively than at the present moment.


There is an odd assumption that the best time for political action is ASAP. Ask anybody involved in the major parties what goals their particular party has for the nation 50 years down the road, and chances are it will be indistinguishable from their goals two years down the road if you even get an answer. It should come as no surprise then that as a nation we have lost all sense of vision and purpose in our collective life. The ideological malaise can be felt anytime one turns on the news and finds more coverage of campaign strategy than of campaign issues. This isn't how you run a country.

True governance looks to the roots of any community issue. It does not assume that all the world needs is a little tweaking here and there. True governance examines the fundamental ways that we relate to ourselves and the people and world around us. How did we get here? Where are we going? To take this broad of a perspective is an endeavour so profound and so encompassing that religion is the only name that can do it justice. No other word can approach the broad scope of inquiry and still capture its necessary embodiment in individual and communal practice.

What this means is that Baha'i political activity doesn't focus on the tip of the iceberg, but rather on more fundamental issues in the spiritual life of the community, e.g. how to approach conflict, how to relate spiritually to wealth and power, how to relate to people understood as being religiously, racially, economically, or sexually different from oneself. By focusing on these basic spiritual concerns the Baha'i community takes a long term perspective on effecting change on these issues. The fundamental means for this is expanding and consolidating the community towards the end of mobilizing larger numbers of people in service to the world.

One interesting example of this principle in action is the series of events a century ago that inspired it in the first place.

Following the Babi revolts at Zanjan, Nayriz, and the Shrine of the Shaykh Tabarsi Baha'u'llah took a consistant stance against armed resistance to government. His followers were instructed not to work against the government but rather to focus on the spiritual upliftment of the people. At the time this did not mean non-participation in politics. In fact, Baha'is remained atleast as involved in politics as anyone else during this period. This changed though during the course of the Iranian Revolution of 1905. With the formation of a parliament Abdu'l Baha at first encouraged Baha'is to campaign on behalf of their co-religionists running for office. But as it became clear that the new government would be dominated by the Shia clergy, who were the faith's bitterest opponents, Abdu'l Baha withdrew the community from the new government altogether so as to focus on teaching efforts.

Had Baha'is become a player, however small, in Iranian politics Abdu'l Baha might have spent the rest of his life trying to influence the Iranian legislature, especially if immediate social reform was an item high on the Baha'i agenda. Instead though, the community's resources were directed towards spreading the faith and rearing its administrative institutions, especially in the United States. The payoff came, and is still coming today, with the subsequent expansion of the faith to nearly every nation on earth spearheaded largely by the American Baha'i community two generations later. Baha'is still have barely made a dent in influencing native Iran. But the emergence of an extremely well integrated and coordinated global community has greatly expanded the faith's potential for social change, if not now then in the future. The faith could use all of this for social action in the short term or that could be deferred so as to continue efforts to multiply the spiritual and human resources at its disposal. Clearly, there is a place for short term social action in Baha'i communities. But generally, it is not allowed to impede on the more far-sighted goal of the faith: to develop the spiritual, human, and institutional resources that are capable of effecting social change.

This process will continue until the time is ripe, when Baha'is will focus more and more of their energies towards healing an ailing world. What shape that will take is hard to tell. But when they do that generation will stand on the shoulders of giants. God willing, the efforts of contemporary Baha'is will allow them to be those giants. In time the seeds sown today will produce a rich harvest. And if Baha'is play their cards right the energy that supports future generations will be far more effectively employed on efforts in the future than if those same energies had gone directly towards social and political change today.