“Bahá’í administration, indeed, proceeds from the text of Bahá’u’lláh; the contribution made by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá was to define and expound the principles established by Bahá’u’lláh, as the contribution of the Guardian of the Cause is to apply them to the Bahá’í community throughout the world. This latter fact is made clear not only by the contents of the letters of Shoghi Effendi which constitute the body of this volume [Bahá’í Administration], but also by circumstances under which the successive letters were issued.” (Horace Holley, Secretary of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States and Canada, 30 November 1927)

The course will study Shoghi Effendi’s selected messages (1922-1932) to the North American Bahá’í Community entitled BAHA’I ADMINSTRATION. These messages define “the essential principles on which the local and national institutions of the Bahá’í Faith are based. Written during the first ten years of the Formative Age of the Faith, the messages also offer insight into the Faith’s growth and illustrate poignantly the great burden Shoghi Effendi shouldered as the Guardian of the Cause of God while guiding the fledgling Bahá’í community. As part of the Faith’s primary literature, these messages form the fundamental text and crucial guide to understanding and implementing Bahá’í Administration.”

The letters written by Shoghi Effendi to the North American and western Bahá’í communities between 1929 and 1936 are sometimes referred to as the world order letters and were first published as The World Order of Bahá’u’lláh (1938). Prior to 1929, the messages sent by the Guardian to the Bahá’ís of North America, published as Bahá’í Administration, concentrated on the internal establishment and development of the Bahá’í Administrative Order, fundamental features such as the proper functioning of Local and National Spiritual Assemblies, the establishment of the Bahá’í Fund, and other essentials found in the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and the Kitáb-i-Aqdas.

However, in the world order letters, Shoghi Effendi turned his vision outward to survey the world and its response to “Bahá’u’lláh’s stupendous Revelation.” Horace Holley, who edited the collection, gave the broad aim of these letters this way: “These later communications unfold a clear vision of the relation between the Bahá’í community and the entire process of social evolution under the Dispensation of Bahá’u’lláh.” By rejecting its promised “World Redeemer,” and His new divinely-appointed new world order, the old world order cannot be sustained and collapses beneath its own weight. The process of rebirth and unification is being accomplished through the aegis of the divine institutions which Bahá’u’lláh has established, institutions which carry his life-giving teachings to the world. This is the central “dual phenomenon” of our time.

Through a series of eight two-hour lectures, participants will more closely examine this process. In its Ridvan message of 2003, the Universal House of Justice drew the attention of the Bahá’í world to the world order letters, “to respond effectively to the challenges posed by the spread of distress and dismay” caused by accentuating world conflict. In offering this course, the Furutan Academy hopes to fulfill that purp ose.

(Please note that “The Dispensation of Bahá’u’lláh,” the sixth letter, will not be included in this series of lectures, but will be offered as a separate course at another time).

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