The Baha'i Faith: A Short History

by Peter Smith

This authoritative account traces the BahNB'! Faith from its origins in mid-nineteenth-century Iran to the spiritual and social concerns of the present.

Genres: Religion

176 pages, Paperback

First published July 25, 1999

About the author

Peter Smith is a university lecturer and lives in Thailand. Up to now his published books (and most of his academic articles) have been related to Baha'i Studies. He is currently working on a book on early 20th century history.

Reviews

[Min · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an excellent overview of the history of the teachers, expansion, and development of the belief. I enjoyed when the author pointed out the different emphases of each teacher.
It is the first book I have read on this faith that included such a detailed history of the Bab'i faith, and its cultural environment. I am pleased to have a firmer background in the root of the Baha'i history. The author chose important moments to build a concise framework to understand their background. It is written with a detachment that I appreciate especially in religious works that examine a system. This avoids fawning, and glossing over conflicts, or struggles that might smudge reputations.
The inclusion of other sects that budded along the way added another interesting dimension that I had not yet encountered. So often there is an avoidance to discuss these other groups. Also, exploring the global community, and its struggles, and triumph through the decades is interesting to me; albeit, very abbreviated history. The concluding chapter innumerates the key points in time, and development-- a very helpful summary. Following is a helpful chronology, and a list for further reading with bibliography.
I would thoroughly recommend this as an outline for deeper investigation in the growth, and changes made through time, and over distance. It is much friendlier, and approachable than the older histories offered that tend to focus on the miraculous, and faith-driven narratives.

[Adrian Colesberry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting story of a modern, quite secular religion with comfortable secular values. It's origin is more or less contemporary with Mormonism. They do not however have the "you've never heard something so crazy" kind of belief that requires believers to commit with faith (a la, virgin birth, son of god who is three things and one at once, Jesus came to the US and made golden tablets, we're all aliens or have aliens inside us from an ancient volcano explosion in outer space).

The other interesting thing about this religion is it provides a nice model for how religions become pacifistic. This model applies pretty well to the Jewish religion and Quakers as well, if my understanding is correct. The Baha'i were in no way pacifistic to start. In 1844 this guy Bab from Iran basically formed an outgroup of the shayk sect of the shii religion, holding that he himself, Bab, was an incarnation of the hidden Imam. They were brutally crushed in 1850 and he was imprisoned until 1853. When released he had changed his attitude to "We love peace" and the Baha'i religion took on it's modern form of political quietism.

Maybe pacifist societies and religions are just people who've gotten their asses kicked.

[Rickey McKown · Rating 3 out of 5]

In this lightweight volume (159 pages, large font, numerous photos) Dr Smith provides an "insider" treatment of basic introductory material on the Baha'i religion, accurate enough in what he chooses to cover but much more limited in depth and having a noticeably more tepid, "orthodox", tone than his earlier (1987), much fuller, and to my mind, much superior, The Babi and Baha'i Religions: From Messianic Shi'ism to a World Religion. I read this book because it was assigned as a primary text for a Baha'i history course but I would only recommend it for readers wanting a brief sympathetic introduction to the religion.

[Martin Genet · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very clear introduction to the history of the Baha'i Faith. Concise and very informative.