UK Bahá’í News Update
GC-33028
6 September 2018
18 Asmá’ 175 BE
Click here to download PDF of this update
Contents
- New feature for releasing sacred Bahá’í Writings launched
- Holy Day permission letters
- Podcasts: Out of Exile, a light to the world
New feature for releasing sacred Bahá’í Writings launched
A new feature of the online Bahá’í Reference Library, anticipated in the Riḍván message of the Universal House of Justice, has become available. Passages, prayers and Tablets – that are being translated and prepared for publication at the Bahá’í World Centre – are now to be released online when they become available.
Some 109 new items are now available through the new facility, in English translation and their Persian originals. These include:
• Additional Prayers revealed by Bahá’u’lláh Link PDF
• Additional Prayers revealed by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá Link PDF
• Additional Tablets, Extracts and Talks by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá Link PDF
• Compilation: Give Me Thy Grace to Serve Thy Loved Ones Link PDF
The Reference Library has also been updated with substantial enhancements to the site, including a new design for reading texts, a more powerful search tool, and a download format for electronic publication.
Holy Day Permission Letters
Mindful that work and schooling should be suspended on nine of the Bahá’í Holy Days, the National Spiritual Assembly has prepared letters that could be used to request the necessary time off work or school, in order to assist the friends observe this significant Bahá’í principle:
The days pertaining to the Abhá Beauty (Bahá’u’lláh) and the Primal Point (the Báb), that is to say these nine days, are the only ones on which work connected with trade, commerce, industry and agriculture is not allowed. In like manner, work connected with any form of employment, whether governmental or otherwise, should be suspended. (‘Abdu’l-Bahá, in The Bahá’í World, Vol.VII, p.537)
Regarding children: at fifteen a Bahá’í is of age as far as keeping the laws of the Aqdas is concerned—prayer, fasting, etc. But children under fifteen should certainly observe the Bahá’í Holy Days, and not go to school, if this can be arranged, on these nine days. (Letter from the Universal House of Justice to all National Spiritual Assemblies, dated 28 January 1966)
Two letters are attached here – one for employers and one for schools – with the dates for the Holy Days for the coming year, which the friends are free to use at their own discretion.
Podcasts: Out of Exile, a light to the world
Exactly 150 years ago, Bahá’u’lláh arrived in the Holy Land, the last banishment in a series of exiles decreed by two monarchs. The Bahá’í World News Service is releasing a series of podcasts about the 150th anniversary of Bahá’u’lláh’s arrival in the Holy Land.
The first explores the context of Bahá’u’lláh’s banishment to Akká, His departure from Edirne, and the curious history of Akká and Haifa. http://news.bahai.org/story/1281/
The second focuses on the events that immediately followed Bahá’u’lláh’s arrival in Akká. http://news.bahai.org/story/1282/
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