Marriage Part IV – Remembering God.

“Marry, O people, that from among you may appear he who will remember Me amongst my servants.” Baha’u’llah

The simplicity of the form of the Baha’i marriage ceremony reminds the observers and the betrothed that this marriage is a doorway onto a vast concourse of service in life. The only conditions of the Baha’i marriage ceremony is that the couple, in front of two witnesses, vow to each other, “We will all, verily, abide by the Will of God.”

In the Baha’i Faith, the Will of God is understood as the teachings of Baha’u’llah who is recognized by Baha’is as the Manifestation of God for this age. (Baha’u’llah born 1817, taught that He was the Promised One of all religions, and that His revelation would usher in a great development of humanity spanning 500,000 year, while God will not send another messenger for at least 1,000 years). His teachings are found in around 100 volumes of collected letters and treatises. He wrote a book of laws, Kitab-i-Aqdas (The Most Holy Book) which defines obligatory spiritual acts, social laws and organizational structure that govern the community of the Baha’i Faith. His other writings discuss spiritual issues regarding the nature of the human being, the soul, spiritual development, the purpose behind religious history and His teachings, essential social principles. The teachings in summary and translated texts can be viewed at the International Baha’i website.

As indicated by the teaching of Baha’u’llah above, Baha’i marriage has the purpose of producing children and raising them in family that practices spiritual disciplines: prayer, education in the teachings of Baha’u’llah, and service to Baha’u’llah’s mission. I wrote in part I about the importance of character development in marriage. Nowhere is this more evidently needed than in the building of a family, the unification of an extended family, and the raising of children to the best of their spiritual, intellectual, emotional, and physical capacity. Such children become servants of humanity, givers to humanity and community, and builders of better society.

There is no clergy in the Baha’i Faith. Successful spiritual education comes from the attention parents and all adults in the Baha’i community pay to their own and the children’s spiritual education.

Marriage Part III – Uniting Families

“As We desired to bring about love and friendship and the unity of the people, therefore We made it (marriage) conditional upon the consent of the parents also, that enmity and ill-feeling might be avoided.” Baha’u’llah

The couple who decide that they have enough affection for each other to commit to an eternal bond, shall seek the consent of their parents. This practice has valuable for the progress of society. At its basic level it provides third party advice about the compatibility of the characters and temperaments of two fledgling adults, to those besotted couple. However, rather than being a gatekeeping role on compatable marriages, it points that marriage is a marriage of two families, or more, as the case may be.

This practice places great responsibility on the parents and the couple. Parents who take the spiritual disciplines of Baha’u’llah seriously will know that the development of communication, relationships, and protection of the rights of the individuals in a family, is of the utmost importance for the happiness of people and the building of civilisation.

The ability of young adults to be able to talk with their parents about their intentions for marriage, is essential proof of the strength of character and unity of all parties. The greater responsibility then lies with the parents. From the time their own children are born, these older adults have an urgent responsibility to learn more about their own selves, weaknesses, strengths, and how to divine the characters of others around them, and work in unity with those other characters. The understanding they form about the difficulty of forging unity among the divers characters of a community, will help them provide reasoned advice to their children at the time they wish to marry. They will also be able to forge unity between the other parents and family, regardless of the cultural backgrounds, or alternately recognise key barriers to that unity.

It is the parents responsibility to advise where incompatibilities seem to lie between both the intended couple and between the families. This doesn’t mean consent is not forthcoming. A recognition of the challenges among all parties may be enough to assure all that bonds can be strengthened. But sometimes, even if one parent feels so, the consent may be delayed until more evidence is shown from either the couple or all their parents, that they can form a relationship that cares for the potential new family.

This, then, is the nub of marriage. That in marrying, two people are not just creating a small nest of their own, but are bringing together two families whose core desire is the strengthening of that nest of love, nurturing the nest and its offspring, and supporting the spiritual growth of everyone associated with that nest. When considering that each marriage might produce 3 offspring, who marry into 3 other families, the supportive and unifying responsibilities of parents are significant.

The progress of global civilisation relies on the raising of children in families which are nurturing and spiritually supportive on both sides. Such families will extend their well-being and capacities enormously from generation to generation, across the globe.

Marriage Part II – A fortress of wellbeing

“And when He desired to manifest grace and beneficence to men, and to set the world in order, He revealed observances and created laws; among them He established the law of marriage, made it a fortress of well-being and salvation, and enjoined it upon us…” Baha’u’llah

“Baha’i marriage is union and cordial affection between the two parties. They must .. become acquainted with each other’s character. This eternal bond should be made secure by a firm covenant, and the intention should be to foster harmony, fellowship and unity and to attain everlasting life ….” Abdu’l-Baha

Character development that is important to marriage include: knowing one’s self and that leads to loftiness or abasement; detachment from the vanities of the world, from covetousness and self; honesty; trustworthiness; meeting challenges with maturity. While continuing to perfect these characteristics are life-long challenge, having an idea of the extent of weakness and strengths in these characters will provide a person with a sense of compatibility with another, and a tolerance of other’s weaknesses. Historically family based character training has relied on cultural conventions. These have been quite undermined in the modern era as many of the strongest economic and democratic cultures have been based on the intermingling of racial and cultural groups. The loss of traditions of character training are not all bad, as prejudice was often trained along with social propriety. However, the baby having been thrown out with the bath water, the generations since the 1960’s are increasingly poorly trained in the management of emotion and desire which is essential to a mature character. This is unfortunate for the immediate generations to come into the world, as, even a resurgence of interest in character training of children will be taken up by parents who are very poorly trained themselves. Nonetheless, improvement in marriage as an eternal bond, a firm covenant, a fortress of well-being, requires a great effort in society to build interest among young people in their own character development and the training of their own children’s character.

What is Marriage? An Intro

The teachings of the Baha’i Faith contains wonderful commentary on marriage eg “the marriage of the people of Baha must consist of both physical and spiritual relationship for both of them are intoxicates with the wine of one cup, are attracted by one Peerless Countenance, are quickened with one Life and are illumined with one Light.”

Yet looking across those teachings, marriage becomes much more than the union of a man & a woman. Baha’i teachings suggest that true or ideal marriage is for the progress of a united civilization.

There are 3 main conditions to the ideal marriage:

1. One man & one woman should agree to marry;
2. They should then seek the consent for the marriage from all parents;
3. The marriage agrees that the two submit to the will of God, & to raise children to remember God.

I’ll follow these three conditions in detail in follow-up posts

How to say a big sorry

One of Australia’s most significant political speeches was given this year by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. I reckon this will be a speech that will act as a marker in the history of Australia as in before and after the Apology. Now on youtube from Reconciliation Australia