Notes: This brief mini-review was included in the section titled "Recent Arrivals." |
Baha'i Faith in America, The: Origins 1892-1900, by Robert Stockman:
Review
published in Christian Century, 102:28, page 843 1985-09-25
The Bahá'í Faith in America: Origins, 1892-1900, Volume One
Author: Robert H. Stockman
Publisher: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, Wilmette, 1985. 277 pp., $24.95
Review by: anonymous
The claim that the Bahá'í religion made astounding gains in America
because it won 1,500 converts will not impress anyone who knows this
religious landscape, in which so many believe so many things so readily.
What is more impressive is that from this small seed has sprung an
American branch of a growing world religion. Stockman is a Harvard
Divinity School graduate student, a convert to Bahá'í, who is well
equipped to trace its turn-of-the-century origins. There is some drama
here: there were early controversies over the orthodoxy of pioneer Ibrahim
Kheiralla, and struggles for power ensued. Stockman shows how in city
after city a few dedicated people began to hold and spread this faith, and
how some of them succeeded. He presents a gallery of their pictures in
this first volume of what should be a notable historical work.
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