International Convention 2008

Day 2 – 25 April 2008

Another restful night, and after breakfast a visit to Liviu’s mother, Tea, who has been in Israel for many years. Fori has known her for many years and was amazed at how little she has changed. Her welcome and kindness were overwhelming, and made me appreciate the combination of Romania and Judaism in this delightful woman I felt I had known all my life. We then visited Doina and Liviu’s first grandchild, 7-month-old Ben, son of their daughter Orly and her husband, a delightful child, happy and smiling. A true Sabra child, full of life, another thing that I miss very much since I left Israel.

The next stop was a real treat: Abu Hasan’s on Shivtey Israel Street, a real Arab restaurant, serving the freshest hummus, falafels, French fries, hot pepper and garlic sauce, and pita. Bob and David Gregory and Rob Weinberg, eat your hearts out! Abu Hasan’s is a family-run business, and the tables are cleaned and wiped off to make way for the next round of guests, with foods appearing almost instantly after the waiters scream the order at the top of their lungs to the staff preparing the fare. If you walked into this place without someone who knew why they were screaming, you might think they were about to kill each other, and while I could have done without the constant shrieks, the food made up for any other inconvenience.

Apart from missing the Holy Shrines in Haifa and Bahjí, I realize how much I have missed the Holy Land, a land truly blessed by God, a land whose peoples live, fight and die for, a land of contradictions, filled with life, history, religion, the Holy Land for four of the world’s major Faiths: Judaism, Christianity, Islam and the Bahá’í Faith.

International Convention 2008

Day 1 – 24 April 2008

We arrived at Bucharest’s Henri Coandă Airport on Wednesday evening at 6:15 p.m. although our Tarom flight was only due to leave for Tel Aviv at 8:40 p.m. Normally one can get to the airport closer to the departure time, but the terrible traffic in Romania’s capital makes it advisable to give yourself plenty of time to get anywhere these days, especially to catch a flight.

For instance, one friend who visited a few days ago, made her trip home, normally taking about 15 minutes, in three hours.

Our flight was delayed because one of the stewardesses was stuck in traffic, and we had to wait for her to join the rest of the crew. The 2.20 hour trip was uneventful, and we arrived at Ben Gurion Airport just before midnight. I was really surprised that we were no longer taken from the plane to the arrival terminal by bus, as was the case for so many years. A huge, sprawling, new airport serves Israel’s second-most important city, and is of course equipped with the most modern gangways. It took quite a while to walk from the plane to the exit, but everything is welcoming and very tastefully designed. Fori’s friend Liviu met us at the exit and drove us to his and his wife Doina’s home in Southern Tel Aviv. They are originally from Bucharest, salt of the earth, and made Aliyah to Israel in 1975.

We stayed up a few hours talking, and then got some much-needed rest. Israel was in the midst of one of its 50 yearly Hamsin (the Arabic word Hamsin means 50) storms from the desert, and it was very hot, about 37°C. On Thursday, after a lovely breakfast, we drove around the city, which I never got to know very well during my parents’ 21-year-stay in the Holy Land, during which I had the bounty of visiting many times, or my own 10 years living in Haifa. Tel Aviv has developed a lot, with many modern towers and large apartment houses spread throughout the city. It is not unusual in this city to see modern buildings next to an old mosque or traditional Arab house, and it is the melding of the cultures and traditions that makes this country so fascinating to me.

Everywhere are bushes filled with flowers: yellow, red, fuchsia, coral, purple, pale blue, some intertwined for two or three-toned explosions of colour. I realized how much I miss the greenery and flowers, and felt happy to be back by the sea after so many years of being land-locked.

People often ask me where I would go if I could choose any place to live. For a very long time I did not know what to answer, but now I know that if given a choice I would want to be near the water and somewhere where there are many colours. I love colours! I also find the Mediterranean colours of the houses very soothing, rich earth tones, enhanced by the bushes and flowers.

We stopped to see Doina and Liviu’s newest grandchild, a 3-week-old boy, named Amir, son of their son David and his wife. Last night we went to the waterfront, to an ancient and now unused port, transformed into a promenade, where families were gathered for the warm Passover evening. We had excellent frozen yoghurt, something I tasted for the first time years ago in Israel.

Apostasy

Since posting my earlier blog on 24 August 2006, entitled "Abandoning University to Return to High School," I have learned something very interesting. The young Romanian Muslim journalist, who changed her religion in preparation for her upcoming marriage to a Christian Orthodox colleague, has actually been granted this right by virtue of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 18, and the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, Article 9(1), which both state that "everyone has the right...to change his religion or belief." And our young journalist should certainly have this freedom, which the Bahá’í International Community is trying with all its might to obtain on behalf of Bahá’ís in Iran, all denied this very right, in spite of the fact that Iran is a signatory of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

In fact, any Iranian who changes his religion from Islam to the Bahá’í Faith is considered an "apostate," and there have been many forms of punishment throughout the 164-year history of this faith, including execution, imprisonment, loss of employment, to mention but a few.

But let us come back to our young journalist. Had she been Iranian, living in Iran, choosing to change her religion to the Bahá’í Faith, incidentally the one adopted some years ago by her husband-to-be, they would bothhave been found guilty of apostasy, and may have been subject to some form of harsh punishment. Many Iranian Bahá’ís are faced with this accusation today. The former Muslim journalist might even have been offered clemency by the Islamic Revolutionary government, in exchange for recanting the Bahá’í Faith, and returning to her Muslim Faith. Such offers are frequently made by the government to Iranian members of this most recent divine revelation, which spread from that country throughout the world, to become the second most widespread faith, surpassing every religion but Christianity in its geographic reach, in a little over eight score and four years.

It is fortunate for our young journalist that she is not an Iranian living in Iran, as she could be executed for changing her religion from Islam to another faith or belief. Her fiancé would fare much better in Iran as the authorities highly encourage recantation from the Bahá’í Faith.

Abandoning University to Return to High School

I read recently about a Romanian woman reporter who is about to marry a colleague. Hailing from a Turkish family, the 26-year-old grew up a Muslim. But her religious convictions seem to have changed with her engagement, as she has converted to Christian Orthodoxy.

For many who have no qualms about changing religion this may seem somewhat banal. I, for one, cannot understand how a person can change such an important element in life just because (s)he is marrying a person of another religion. The only thing that remains unchanged is that the woman reporter in question will continue to worship the same God. Essentially everything else changes.

According to Bahá’í belief, revelation is progressive, so in fact our former Muslim has taken a major step back in terms of divine revelation. In the Bahá’í writings, the Manifestations who periodically bring God’s Message to guide humanity, including Abraham, Moses, Buddha, Zoroaster, Christ, Muhammad, the Báb, and Bahá’u’lláh, in that order, are much like teachers in a school, of which God is the Headmaster. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, son of the Founder of the Bahá’í Faith, Bahá’u’lláh, and head of the Faith after the passing of his father, explains that “all humankind are as children in a school, and the Dawning-Points of Light, the Sources of divine revelation, are the teachers, wondrous and without peer. In the school of realities they educate these sons and daughters, according to teachings from God, and foster them in the bosom of grace, so that they may develop along every line, show forth the excellent gifts and blessings of the Lord, and combine human perfections; that they may advance in all aspects of human endeavour, whether outward or inward, hidden or visible, material or spiritual, until they make of this mortal world a widespread mirror, to reflect that other world which dieth not.” The lesson plan of each Manifestation is suited to the particular time. Similar to a child moving on to the next class when he has learned enough to help him understand the next course of study, so too are Bahá’ís taught that it is essential for man to move on to a subsequent level of study and understanding when a new Manifestation is sent by God, in this day, Bahá’u’lláh.

So, for this woman to convert to one of the denominations of Christianity after having been raised with the Teachings of Muhammad, is much like someone in 12th grade going back to 11th grade, just because her boyfriend is in the class below. She has benefited all her life from a certain amount of enlightenment in the last year of High School, which should normally lead her to move on to university (in this case the Bahá’í Faith), but she chooses to go back, and she may even choose to remain in 11th grade for many years to come.

What is most interesting in this whole story is that the boyfriend (the male reporter to whom our female reporter is engaged) once considered himself a Bahá’í. In the early years of the Bahá’í Faith in Romania, following the popular uprising in 1989, he, his sister and mother all became members of the Bahá’í Community, participating for some years in all of the activities of this Faith. It is true that they have become inactive in the past few years, for reasons unbeknownst to me. In terms described above, all three had made it to university and could have benefitted from the vast wealth of this course of study. Now it seems that the young man took several steps back, and has somehow influenced his wife-to-be, directly or indirectly, to step back as well. What a shame!

I can but hope for them a “house of stone,” as Romanians are wont to wish their newly-weds, although my sincerest wish is for them and their offspring to find the “path of faith,” this time securely, so that their souls may benefit from enlightenment and true understanding.