Materials Provided by the Bahá'í World Centre on Universal Auxiliary Language

by Abdu'l-Bahá, Shoghi Effendi, and Universal House of Justice

1. Cover letter

15 August 2002

Transmitted by email [address redacted]:

Mrs. ..., U.S.A.

Dear Bahá’í Friend,

The Universal House of Justice has received your email dated 28 July 2002, and referred it to our Department for response. In answer to your request for materials on universal auxiliary language and universal language, we are providing for your use two documents which address these general concepts, namely, an extract from a Research Department memorandum dated 7 July 1994, and its attachment entitled “The Principle of an International Auxiliary Language”. You may also find of interest the enclosed documents “International Auxiliary Language”, providing references to this topic in the Bahá’í writings, and “Bahá’í World Centre Library: A Partial Bibliography of Published Works on an Auxiliary Language”, which lists some papers by Bahá’ís on this subject.

Regarding your request for guidance on translating the Bahá’í Writings, we trust that the Research Department’s memorandum dated 25 July 2002, and its accompanying enclosures, which were previously sent to you by email [online here], will provide ample information on this topic.

You have asked that email attachments be sent to you in a form other than Portable Document Format (PDF), such as Microsoft Word format. As it is the practice for communications from the Bahá’í World Centre to be sent in only two formats, namely, plain text (ASCII) and PDF, we regret that we are unable to provide electronic copies of the above documents in any other form.

We hope that you will be able to glean adequate information from these materials to assist you in your endeavors to make a presentation at the upcoming Association for Bahá’í Studies conference.

With loving Bahá’í greetings,
Department of the Secretariat

Enclosures

Attachment - Extract from a Research Department memorandum dated 7 July 1994
Attachment – The Principle of an International Auxiliary Language
Attachment – International Auxiliary Language
Attachment – Bahá'í World Centre Library A Partial Bibliography of Published Works on an Auxiliary Language 3 September 1991

2. Extract from a Research Department memorandum dated 7 July 1994

3. The Principle of an International Auxiliary Language

4. International Auxiliary Language (References in the Bahá'í Writings)

INTERNATIONAL AUXILIARY LANGUAGE

‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s talks on this subject are found as follows:

Paris Talks pp. 155–157
Promulgation of Universal Peace (1982 ed.) 60–61, 182, 232–233, 300, 318, 434–435

Star of the West
Vol. III, no. 3, pp. 23-24 Message to the Esperantists, 25 April 1912
Also vol. XI, no. 18, p. 304
Vol. III, no. 19, p. 5 Report of comments made to the president of the Esperantists of England
Vol. IV, no. 2, pp. 34–36 Address delivered in Edinburgh on 7 January 1913
Vol. IV, no. 2, pp. 36–37 Address delivered in Paris on 12 February 1912

The following references are to be found in other Bahá’í Writings:

Gleanings (U.S. ed.) pp. 249–250
Epistle to the Son of the Wolf 138
Tablets of Bahá’u’lláh 22, 68, 89, 127, 165–166
Bahá’í World Faith 288
Tablets of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Vol. III 596
God Passes By 211, 218
World Order of Bahá’u’lláh 203

5. Bahá'í World Centre Library: A Partial Bibliography of Published Works on an Auxiliary Language (3 September 1991)