The Baha’i World News Service has just announced the launch of a wonderful new site about the life of Baha’u'llah, Founder of the Baha’i Faith, in pictures and text.

A new Web site featuring photographs that help viewers experience the life of Baha’u'llah has been launched by the Baha’i International Community.

Some of the photographs have not been published before, and many of them have had only limited distribution.

Douglas Moore, director of the Baha’i International Community Office of Public Information, explains:

The purpose of the Web site is to provide illustration of Baha’u'llah’s life through photographs of places and artifacts and relics associated directly with Him. We’ve tried to bring together a unique collection of photos, many of them not generally available, so that you get a better sense of Baha’u'llah’s life and the time period in which He lived.

Baha’u'llah’s room in Takur, Mazindaran. Photo by Effie Baker, ca. 1930

Baha’u'llah’s story (He lived from 1817 to 1892) is quite remarkable, linking as it does a deep and abiding spirituality, religion and modernity. Baha’u'llah lived in a society that seemed buried in the past, but He Himself addressed the very questions that are at the heart of the challenges facing the world in the 21st century. And Baha’u'llah’s own experience, encompassing as it does imprisonment, torture, exile, poverty, bereavement, reflects what so many have suffered and continue to suffer in the modern age. Despite His often bitter and heart-rending suffering. Baha’u'llah was renowned for the extraordinary loving-kindness, forgiveness and wisdom that He showered on all He met.

Do visit www.bahaullah.org, whether you are a Baha’i or not. But please note there is no picture of Baha’u'llah Himself on the site. This is deliberate. There is a photograph of Baha’u'llah in the International Baha’i Archives at the Baha’i World Centre, but it is treated with extreme reverence by Baha’is and viewing the photo is a very special part of the Baha’i pilgrimage experience. Baha’is do not publish it, nor do they reproduce it.

[Pictures in this post are ©Baha'i International Community]

Technorati Tags: Baha’i, Bahai, Baha’u'llah, Bahaullah, Baha Allah, Iran, Middle East, 19th century, history, religion

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