Sad to say, because I know and in the past knew some very decent Bahais, the Bahai religion is a totally artificial one created by the British to divide the clergy in Iran back in the 19th Century, who had begun to join together against the British.
No longer classified documents from the British Foreign Office include letters from their equivalent of our State Dept. to the British Ambassador in Iran with instructions to find someone to (simplistically) claim to be the 12th Imam and as such split the Mullahs and “divide and rule”.
The instructions also suggested that “followers” should be rewarded with cash amounts and this has become an embedded part of joining the Bahai faith.
(I witnessed others and was offered this inducement myself but turned it down since I had no intention to become a Bahai)
There are lots of other somewhat unsual aspects as to how close a family member you can marry and various efforts to “modernize” Islam (the greatest reason for being considered as apostates by traditional Moslems) but I am not here to criticize the Bahai faith. Only to underline that it was not a religion of “faith” but created for political reasons by the British.
The Bahai followers have their religious and “legal” councils to whom they turn to resolve matrimonial, family and social matters and are generally tightly knit into their communities.
IMHO If it works for them to become better human beings, then why criticize it? We cannot all reach the perfection
of Jesus and even there, how often have you noticed people insist “my Jesus is better than your Jesus”?
I get it all the time.
I’m not criticizing Bahai at all. I just noted the the earliest (within hours) reports mentioned Bahai, and I hadn’t heard of it.
Thank you for the background. Bump.