Once again in the cycle of time, we arrive at the month of June, the sixth month of the Gregorian calendar, which symbolizes light in various dimensions. June marks the official beginning of summer and contains the one day (June 21) having the longest period of daylight. Also, Nur (meaning light in Arabic) the fifth 19-day month of the 19-month Baha’i calendar, falls each June 5.
How frequently have we heard the old adage, “knowledge is light,” and how ironic that the month of light is the month of graduations from every academic level as well as the month of weddings, the beginning of a different light shed on a totally different lifestyle than that of living single. Whenever entering a dark room, I am still reminded of an analogy I once heard that knowledge of the arrangement of furniture within any dark room is comparable to having the light on in it. And likewise, the more knowledge one acquires on any given subject, the more light is shed upon it. Bright ideas also for ages have been portrayed by cartoonists as a light bulb flashing on in one’s head. Yet the brighter the light of physical, scientific, and technological knowledge acquired, the greater and more obvious becomes the realization of how much we do not know, especially of our spiritual reality overshadowed by the impending darkness of materialism.
As we find ourselves becoming submerged in such darkness, let us not forget: “It is better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.”
“Behold the candle, how it gives its flame. It weeps its life away drop by drop to give its light.” The thought of these Baha’i lyrics symbolically occurred to me as several of us addressed the small group assembled recently at the candlelight vigil in a downtown plaza, organized by Pearl Fu in commemoration of the victims and survivors of China’s most recent devastating earthquake. “Ye are the angels if your feet be firm. Be steadfast as the rock that no earthly storm can move…” the lyrics continue.
Such indomitable faith is currently being evidenced worldwide through interviews with a Baha’i couple in the midst of the quake area (still experiencing recurring tremors) that National Public Radio is keeping in touch with on a daily basis. The university where the couple was teaching has subsequently been closed and is currently being used to house over 300 orphaned children which the calm couple is emotionally stabilizing to the extent that they have appeared through e-mail joyfully singing songs of unity while displaying the epitome of the power of the light of unity, hope, and faith.
“O, ye lovers of God.” We are reminded in the Baha’i Writings, “Make firm your steps in His cause in such wise that ye shall not be shaken, though the direst of calamities assail the world. By nothing, under no conditions, be ye perturbed… So powerful is the light of unity that it can illuminate the whole earth.”
