Antipodean Bahá’í Studies

Baharieh Rouhani Ma’ani is developing a name as a writer to watch. Here is the publisher’s description: Women of the Middle East in the 19th century are generally absent from the pages of history. Even their names are not recorded. They have no voice. They are invisible. The women closest to the twin Manifestations, the Báb and Bahá’u'lláh, are especially enigmatic. What were they like as children? What was it like to live in the family of the Manifestation of God? What did they think about the new Revelations from God? How did they respond to the suffering and persecution that came upon them? So little is known. Baharieh Ma‘ani decided to rectify this. Her task was formidable. There is little published about these women and documents are rare. Over two and half decades she worked to gather all the known information about the women whose lives were intertwined with those of the Manifestations of God for this age ־ mothers, wives, sisters, daughters. Looking beyond published sources, she was given permission by the Universal House of Justice to consult original documents in the Bahá’í International Archives and to make provisional translations of more than 50 Tablets, letters, memoirs and papers not previously published in English, many never before published in any language. The result is an engaging and readable book that provides a unique and intriguing insight into the lives and circumstances of the women who played such important yet unseen roles in shaping the early history of the Bábí and Bahá’í religions. Mrs Ma‘ani has made the invisible visible. Expected in Feb 2009, Hardcover, 448 pages, price yet to be announced. The book Leaves of the Twin Divine Trees is published by George Ronald

Meanwhile from Canada comes a full length biography, titled Take My Love to the Friends The Story of Laura R. Davis, according to the publisher, Chestnut Park Press,  this biography describes her part in establishing the Bahá’í Faith in Toronto and in Canada.  Some signal early events are told for the first time: Martha Root laying the foundation of the Faith in Toronto in 1919, Jenáb-i-Fádil, a Persian scholar, and Canadian artist Marion Jack making consolidating visits in the 1920s and, in 1939, Americans Mabel and Howard Colby Ives setting the keystone in the edifice of the Faith in Toronto. Events of national significance are reflected in Laura’s participation in the teaching committees of the 1940s, her election to the first National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Canada in 1948, and her involvement with young participants of the counterculture of the late 1960s. Pilgrimage to the Holy Land in December, 1954 renewed and strengthened Laura’s dedication to the Cause of Bahá’u'lláh with Shoghi Effendi’s parting words, “take my love to the friends”, becoming the raison d’être of the rest of her life. Laura intuitively understood Bahá’u’lláh’s teaching that “deeds, not words,” should be our “adorning”. She hosted weekly firesides in her home for forty years and made hundreds of travelling teaching trips in Canada and abroad. Blind to social status or colour, she enriched countless lives through her kindness and love. And, decades before service in outside organizations was a common practice among Bahá’ís, Laura volunteered in social, cultural, and humanitarian organizations. All these dimensions, as well as her humour, sense of adventure and perseverance, make Laura a role model for present and future generations of Canadians. The book is to be published in March 2009.