Africanity, Womanism, and Constructive Resilience: Some Reflections

by Layli Maparyan

About: According to the Bahá’í Writings, the Black people of the world can be compared to the pupil of the eye, through which “the light of the spirit shineth forth.” We are “dark in countenance,” yet “bright in character,” potentially the “fount of light and the revealer of the contingent world” (‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Selections 78:1). According to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, “the blackness of the pupil of the eye is due to its absorbing the rays of the sun” (Some Answered Questions 49:5). Shoghi Effendi, quoting ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, recalls that "Bahá’u’lláh once compared the colored [Black] people to the black pupil of the eye surrounded by the white,” and “[i]n this black pupil is seen the reflection of that which is before it and, through it, the light of the spirit shineth forth.” (Advent 37)