Bahá’í
Pilgrimage – a personal perspective.
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Day 3, Wednesday: Dawn prayers at the two Shrines (no formal programme, only individual silent prayers). Breakfast at the pilgrim reception centre (by now most of us have been to the shops and got our food supplies stored in the fridges and cupboards, using the plastic boxes provided) and time for socialising. Then back to the guest house for lunch (they agreed yesterday that we could have lunch instead of breakfast today). Met at the 19th terrace for a tour of the upper terraces, and heard in the introduction that the extra 18 terraces are in memory of the Letters of the Living collectively, the 10th terrace being the original one on which the Shrine of the Báb is built. The city of Haifa organises tours of the terraces for the general public, and reckons that, with over 8,000 visitors per week, they are the top tourist attraction in the whole of Israel. The upper tour actually starts at the 17th terrace, which is reached by a path from an assembly area a few yards to one side of the 19th terrace, since the 19th terrace is open to the general public (and often used for wedding photographs) while the 18th terrace has both gates locked to form a buffer zone between the 19th and the 17th. Well, photos cannot do justice to the terraces, you just have to see them for yourself! The upper terraces are all different in various ways, whereas the only obvious difference from a photo is the alternating straight and curved steps. Whereas the public tours end at the road between the 11th and 10th terraces, we turned right along the arc to the ITC (International Teaching Centre) building. In the vast reception hall (room for over 1,000 people) we were served tea and biscuits, then we went into the auditorium and were introduced to 8 of the 9 ITC members who were available on that day and heard a summary of their work. There were ear-pieces for simultaneous translation into various languages, which were useful for at least German and Russian on this occasion. The 8 ITC members then spread themselves around the reception hall and we were invited to go to any of them for whom we had a question. I asked one for the words and music of the lullaby she had sung the evening before, and she kindly wrote out the musical score for me before I left. Mr.Furutan gave us a talk based on the words of Bahá’u’lláh: “Teach ye the Cause of God, O people of Bahá, for God hath prescribed unto every one the duty of proclaiming His Message, and regardeth it as the most meritorious of all deeds.” (Gleanings CXXVIII, paragraph 10, UK 1949 edition p.277.) I am not allowed to relate the details of the talk, since it was made clear later that pilgrim notes are for personal use only, and individual opinions not supported by text from the Writings could lead to disunity. A member of the Universal House of Justice then gave us a talk, mostly about being aware in our hearts that we are in the presence of Bahá’u’lláh (text “We behold you…” in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas). |
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