In A Blue Haze:
Smoking and Baha'i Ethics

by Udo Schaefer

Prague: Zero Palm Press, 1997
original written in German.

start page

All chapters

---

Translated from the original German language edition: Ethische Aspekte des Rauchens. Ein Beitrag zur Bahá'í-Ethik Bahá'í Verlag, Hofheim 21993 by Michael H. Machado and Dr. Craig Volker This translation © Zero Palm Press 1997 Orandum est, ut sit mens sana in corpore sano Juvenal, Satirae X

---

Contents Preface Smoking as a Social Problem On the Difficulty of Dealing Ethical Questions No Explicit Smoking Prohibition On a Bahá'í Doctrine of Duty On our Duty towards Others On our Duty towards Ourselves A Digression: On Purity and Cleanliness in Religious History 'Abdu'l-Bahá's Judgement Bibliography Footnotes

---

Preface to the English translation

From the favourable reception of the original German edition, it would appear that readers have appreciated the primary purpose of this study. That is, this is not really a treatise about smoking as such. Instead, the emotionally charged subject of smoking was simply chosen as a focus of this first attempt to define certain aspects of Bahá'í ethics.

The revelation of Bahá'u'lláh is marbled rather than systematic. In this it resembles the Qur'án. Its moral goals, values, commandments, and prohibitions, as well as its multitudinous appeals and admonitions to a virtuous life, and its warnings against a life of lust, passion, and vice are diffused throughout the entirety of the Writings of Bahá'u'lláh. This moral direction serves to redeem the individual as well as society as a whole. Its aim is the methodical development of an entire way of life rather than the mere uplifting of an individual believer. In the end the transformation of norms of behaviour into concrete action requires an analytic, systematic, and methodic presentation of this new hierarchy of values. This is because only a systematic perspective can reveal the defining characteristics of this hierarchy and show how each particular value relates to, and is limited by, the tension within the hierarchy. Similarly, only a systematic perspective of the hierarchy of values can reveal the relative importance of each value within that hierarchy.

Questions about the foundations of this moral system, the clarification of its fundamental ideas, the discussion of the cognizability of moral norms and the role of reason, as well as the search for underlying principles to concrete moral values are all matters for the normative science of ethics. Until now Bahá'í ethics have only rarely been the subject of academic research and presentation. While writing the first German edition of this treatise, I had no idea that it would be a type of preparatory exercise for the introduction to the fundamentals of Bahá'í ethics which I wrote originally for an encyclopaedia, now in preparation as a monograph to be published by George Ronald. I would refer those with a deeper interest in the subject to that book.

I am very much indebted to Michael H. Machado and Dr. Craig Volker, without whose translation this English edition could not have been presented to the public. I wish also to express my sincerest thanks to Mrs. Hildegard Becker for reviewing Michael Machado's raw translation, to Mrs. Lynda Adamson for polishing the text, to my editor Bonian Golmohammadi for his suggestions, and to my wife Sigrun for her time-consuming work in looking up authoritative English quotations for this translation and in preparing a camera-ready version of the text on computer.

In quotations from the Writings of the Báb, Bahá'u'lláh and 'Abdu'l-Bahá, the numbers which appear refer to the paragraph in the English-language edition unless a page number is given.

U. S.
Autumn 1996

Chapter 1

Smoking as a Social Problem

Smoking does not satisfy any basic human need such as eating and drinking. It is an artificial desire to increase one's feeling of comfort and pleasure. Therefore, only humans smoke; animals do not. Of course, there is no objection to fact that it is an "artificial" and not a "natural" need. Neither fine cuisine, nor listening to music, nor any of the arts is "natural". They are all needs of a higher kind that have become a part of culture, and it is to culture that the chairman of the German Federation of Cigarette Manufacturers^[1] Günter Wille, appeals. He sees culture legitimatising smoking: "Smoking is part of culture."^[2] But it is not that easy. Many atrocities hiding behind the halo of culture are repugnant by any objective moral standards; as examples we only need to cite the killing of new-born girls in ancient Arabia or China, the burning of widows in India, or the female circumcision and infibulation still practised in large parts of Africa.

For most of our evolution, people survived without smoking. However, it seems that as early as the time of the Roman Empire people smoked. This was not tobacco, of course, which was not yet known by Europeans, but rather cyprus grass, coltsfoot, and lavender. They smoked more for therapeutic reasons than for pleasure. The first Europeans who brought the smoking of tobacco to Europe were sailors who had accompanied Columbus on his voyages to the "New World". There the smoking of tobacco was widespread amongst almost all of the indigenous peoples of North America except those in the Arctic regions. For the most part this was for ritual purposes.^[3] Among Europeans tobacco was used initially in Spain, and was seen more as a medicine than a stimulant. In the sixteenth century tobacco was grown as an ornamental plant in French gardens where it was considered a panacea against the plague, toothache, gout, colic, and tetanus. Smoking was introduced to England by Sir Walter Raleigh in 1586, where it soon spread to all classes of society. The "drinking of tobacco",^[4] as it was then called, migrated via Holland and France across the Rhine. During the Thirty Years' War it was spread all over central Europe, especially by Swedish soldiers. There were, however, numerous prohibitions made against it, for example by the Czar in 1634, or by Sultan Amurat IV in 1610. The punishment for violating the Czar's edict was the loss of one's nose. Sultan Amurat's edict went further in that smoking was a capital offence. Frederick the Great prohibited smoking in the streets in 1764, oddly enough because it was considered a fire hazard. With the medical application of pulverised tobacco, the Spanish, French, and Portuguese created a new stimulant, snuff. Compared to snuff, smoking was slower in finding disciples.

Most often a pipe was used for smoking. It was only after the Crimean war, when the English and French had become acquainted with the Oriental cigarette, that cigarette smoking became more popular. The first factory in Germany to produce cigarettes was established in 1862 in Dresden with seven employees. After the First World War tobacco products became mass consumer items. Smoking became an accepted habit practised by all classes of society. Tobacco became a popular drug, with the tobacco industry a powerful sector of the economy. Every year 14,6 billion marks are spent by German citizens. On average, every adult in the world smokes a thousand cigarettes per year.^[5]

Tobacco smoking has always been perceived as something which does not afford the same pleasure to those who are passively affected by it, who "suffer" it, as to those who actively indulge in it. As early as the seventeenth century there were handbills against the smoking of tobacco because of its annoying nature. King James I of England wrote a polemic pamphlet^[6] against the "stinking weed", which is amusing and worth reading even today. It caused a tremendous stir across the country, but could not put a stop to the habit of smoking which had already gained far too much ground. A clerical writer by the name of Tesauro wrote in his "Philosophia Moralis" published in the 17th century: "What a shameless spectacle it is when people stick a convoluted horn into their mouth stuffed with that sooting and fuming filth, the hellish vapour of which they suck up through the gullet to thrust it out through the nose, just as the steeds of Diomedes and the bulls of Jason snorted sparks and flames through the nostrils."^[7]

Goethe had a violent aversion to this habit: "Smoking makes one stupid; it turns one incapable of thinking and rhyming. Also, it is only for loafers, for people who are bored, who sleep one third of their lives, waste the other third with eating, drinking or other necessary or unnecessary things, and although saying vita brevis, don't even know what to do with the last third. For such lazy Turks, the loving intercourse with pipes and the cosy spectacle of smoke-clouds that they blow into the air is profound entertainment because it helps them pass the hours..." Goethe thought that "smoking goes along with the drinking of beer, which cools down the heated palate" and he was afraid that if this habit continued as it appeared it would, "after two or three generations it will become obvious what the beer bellies and puffing rascals have made of Germany.... And what is the cost of this horror! Now already twenty five million Taler go up in smoke... And not a hungry person is fed and not a naked one clothed. What could be done with this money! Intrinsic in smoking is also an utter discourtesy, an impertinent unsociability. Smokers raise a stench far and wide and suffocate every honest human being who is unwilling to smoke for his own self-defence. Is anyone then capable of entering a smoker's room without a feeling of nausea? And who ever can remain therein without perishing?"^[8]

There are various reasons why smoking has increasingly become a problem and why it has become discredited over the past few decades. The first is the strong increase in the number of people using it. The age at which the habit of smoking is picked up is dropping and is now below ten years of age. During the seventies, a permissive and opportunistic educational system oriented towards an anti-authoritarian model promoted this trend through the establishment of smoking rooms or smokers' corners in schools, from an educational point of view a terribly wrong decision which many would like to reverse today. According to a report by the Institute for Preventive Pneumology^[9] in Nuremberg, one out of ten boys has experimented with smoking before the age of six. Among ten year olds, sixty percent of the boys and half of the girls have tried smoking.^[10] In addition, the emancipation of women was accompanied by the adoption of behavioral patterns which were initially "masculine", in particular smoking. The slogan "The German woman does not smoke" may have prevailed during the Third Reich, but today's smokers are mainly recruited from the ranks of young girls, a development that is accompanied by an alarming number of women dying of lung cancer.^[11]

In addition, the growing recklessness of many smokers who see it as their inalienable human right to smoke anywhere at any time without having to ask permission, has resulted in the fact that fewer and fewer non-smokers are willing to tolerate their behaviour. However, an awareness of the problem has only emerged since it has become known what an enormous public health, threat smoking represents^[12] and what an economic strain it puts on health insurance companies as a whole^[13]. Smoking is no longer accepted as a matter of course. The mood has changed.^[14] It has been recognised that smoking is part of the environmental problem. At the first European tobacco conference in 1988 in Madrid the World Health Organization (WHO) passed a "Charter against Tobacco" which states "air free of tobacco smoke is an essential part of our basic right to healthy and unpolluted air."^[15]

In the United States, where 350,000 annual deaths are attributed to smoking, the protection of non-smokers has advanced considerably. Smoking is prohibited on all domestic flights as well as in public transport, taxis, libraries, banks, restaurants, and public buildings. Those who want to smoke in the Pentagon, one of the largest buildings in the world, can at best do so only in the restroom. Smoking has become taboo in many circles in the USA and can result in social ostracism. It is increasingly more the behaviour of the lower classes. This is due in part to an aggressive anti-smoking campaign, for instance, buttons carrying the slogan: "Kissing a smoker is like licking an ashtray!" More and more companies prohibit smoking. Many hire only non-smokers. Only about 26% of the US population smokes.^[16] In most East European countries there are strict regulations for the protection of non-smokers. In 1993, France prohibited smoking in all public buildings, in public transportation, and even in restaurants.

By contrast, Germany with its 150,000 nicotine-related deaths every year^[17], appears liberal. Owing to generous party donations from the cigarette industry, most members of parliament rarely think of legal restrictions. Education is relied upon, as if that were enough to provide even a modest protection for non-smokers! In the fall of 1985 the German tobacco industry elected Norbert Blüm, the pipe smoking Minister for Social Affairs, as advertising spokesman of the year by coining the phrase: "Free smoke for free citizens."^[18] No wonder that the spokesman of the German Federation of Cigarette Manufacturers commends Germany for being "one of the most tolerant societies around". Nevertheless, in the interest of protecting non-smokers, public authorities and ministries have considerably restricted smoking in public buildings and offices. Moreover, there are a number of legal decisions today which guarantee a smoke-free workplace for the non-smoker. One can expect that urgently needed legal restrictions will be introduced at a faster pace at the European Community level than they will be in Germany itself.

The tobacco industry opposes these trends with an annual advertising budget of DM 300 million in Germany alone. They emphatically challenge the health hazards of smoking, which are scientifically supported by the results of more than 30,000 studies, and they demand tolerance from non-smokers. The chairman of the German Federation of Cigarette Manufacturers, Günter Wille, saw smoking as an "enjoyment" and the anti-smoking campaign as "a patronising attempt by 'know-it-all' ascetics who would deny adult citizens the right to choose the wrong kind of pleasure"^[19]. Wille died of cancer in 1993 at the age of 51.

It is impudence for smokers to appeal to the tolerance of non-smokers with the argument that smokers are among the most tolerant people in the world since no smoker has ever complained about someone else not smoking. Thieves might use the same abstruse logic to lament the absence of tolerance in their victims. In a way, one could say this is like comparing apples to oranges: it compares an annoying, jeopardising, and obviously harmful behaviour to mere inconsequential inaction.

In any case, the issue of smoking is a highly controversial social problem. It is difficult to de-emotionalise discussions about smoking when we all make judgements according to our own personal involvement: smokers because they want to smoke unrestrictedly, non-smokers because they insist on the right to unpolluted air.

Among Bahá'ís, this problem has hardly been discussed, even though it does exist. This ethical deficit only occurred to me recently while reading 'Abdu'l-Bahá's Law-i-Dukhn, known as the "Tablet of Purity". In this text we find the following sentence: "On receipt of this missive, the friends will surely, by whatever means and even over a period of time, forsake this pernicious habit. Such is my hope."^[20] After more than seventy years this hope is still unfulfilled. Hence, it is high time to examine this topic.^[21]

From this Tablet, it is evident that the Bahá'í view on smoking is negative. One could content oneself in referring to this text alone for the Bahá'í stance. But 'Abdu'l-Bahá has only discussed smoking in the context of a single, although substantial, aspect: that of "purity". Simply presenting this moral value more fully and further elucidating its importance from the point of view of religious history would be a fascinating task that might lead to a better evaluation of this value and its rank in the hierarchy of values, and in the final analysis to a deeper understanding of the Bahá'í Faith itself. But there are a number of other approaches which urgently want consideration in this context and which show that smoking is ethically far more questionable than it appears at first sight. This topic provides an opportunity for delineating the structure of Bahá'í ethics.

Chapter 2

On the Difficulty of Dealing Ethical Questions

1. The question of whether a certain behaviour is permitted or prohibited, good, evil, or neutral, is a question of ethics. A Bahá'í who wants to know how to act in a given situation, will begin by turning to his conscience, and since this has been formed by the revealed Word, to the Scripture, i.e. the sum of the Writings of Bahá'u'lláh and the authoritative interpretations of 'Abdu'l-Bahá and Shoghi Effendi. What might appear to be self-evident for every religious person is not necessarily so, as we shall shortly see.

Today the presentation of concrete ethical standards has become problematic in our society. Certainly, the highest ethical values in the Bahá'í Revelation, the love of one's neighbour and of all humanity, or the cardinal virtue of justice, are sure to meet with approval. One can agree to these highly abstract values without having to commit oneself to changing any patterns of everyday life. However, when it comes to assessing actual everyday behaviour affecting one's own self, especially when it comes to prohibitions, irritation can set in quickly.

The Bahá'ís are living in this society and are influenced by the prevalent ways of thinking whether they want to be or not, and in this society, thinking in moral categories is becoming more and more unfashionable. Many people are unaccustomed to it. To many it seems increasingly questionable that there should be such things as rigid norms and unalterable duties which unequivocally state what should or should not be done. This is concomitant with the decay of religion and the resulting erosion of the Christian value system.^[22]

In many parts of the world morality, called an "honourable form of stupidity"^[23] by Friedrich Nietzsche, has not only lost its general binding force but also its self-evident importance and is actually seen by many as a kind of stupidity. It has largely disappeared from everyday speech and is almost only used with an ironical undertone. A person who maintains moral points of view is considered a "morality apostle", with whom no one wants any interaction. This is evident in political discussions or in talk shows on television where interlocutors are admonished, for God's sake not to moralise. Especially in regard to so-called "social fringe groups" (criminals, social outcasts, prostitutes, drug addicts, homosexuals) or on the issue of abortion one should kindly refrain from any moral approach whatsoever. Persons who fail to do so disqualify themselves, exposing themselves as Pharisees and die-hard reactionaries. This process of "demoralisation" began with sociology; how far it has already spread can be seen by the semantic cleansing of our language, which bans the use of all terms that might hold any moral reproach.^[24]

Of course, Bahá'ís do not think that way. Experience with these issues shows, however, that they often have similar feelings, which is not surprising in this social climate. Therefore, a person presenting ethical demands and thus drawing an ideal of humanity "in light of which one's own everyday existence fails a thousandfold"^[25], is easily suspected of affectations or insincerity by being a moralist, a hell-and-brimstone preacher, as well as by violating the cardinal norm that prohibits self-righteousness. Self-righteousness is a distorted form of righteousness. According to Confucius the self-righteous are "the spoilers of morals."^[26] They were frequently and uncompromisingly rebuked by Bahá'u'lláh^[27] even as He praised the truly righteous, "well is it with the righteous that mock not the sinful, but rather conceal their misdeeds"^[28]. When someone uses the pretext of moral responsibility to scrutinize commonly accepted social norms of behaviour, isn't that person preoccupied with the faults and sins of others? In the end, doesn't such a person violate the imperatives of his or her own ethics?

If this were the case, it would actually be totally inadmissible to be concerned with Bahá'í ethics, which as in all religions do make up a substantial part of our theology. However, we are not dealing here with a specific individual's unique and personal behaviour, but rather with abstract human behaviour. And to judge this behaviour in the abstract is not only permissible, but imperative, since God's Book is the "unerring Balance" "in which all who are in the heavens and all who are on the earth are weighed"^[29], through which "truth shall be distinguished from error"^[30]. At a time "when no man knoweth how to discern light and darkness or to distinguish guidance from error"^[31], we are challenged to reflect what our duties are, whether certain ways of acting, accepted or disputed in society, are permitted or prohibited. How else could we then accomplish the task which 'Abdu'l-Bahá defined in a prayer: "to refute what is vain and false" and "to establish the truth"^[32]?

In other words, this is not a case of a non-smoker passing judgement on smokers, nor of someone self-righteously condemning the sins of others. It is the attempt to question our normative ethics on a controversial issue "without wrath and zeal"^[33]. The smokers among the readers may find this to be an occasion to reconsider their habit. Reason^[34], as our daily experience shows, is only a weak motivating force. Otherwise the overwhelming evidence against smoking would have caused it to disappear a long time ago. Perhaps Bahá'ís, upon seeing in how many ways they are living in contradiction to divine norms if they smoke, will be motivated to give up smoking more out of that insight than because of medical reasons alone.

2. Before proceeding with the rest of my thesis, I would like to share an instructive experience. If one sets out to write a contribution on such a topic which, as far as I can ascertain, has not been done previously, it is advisable to examine other literature as well. There are many sensible people writing about relevant socio-political issues and it is most valuable to know what others, for example theologians, philosophers, or social scientists, have thought and written on the subject. We will not get any Bahá'í perspectives from them, but we might find some mental impetus, at least of a methodical nature.

In this case however, all attempts to get hold of such literature have failed. There is a vast amount of medical literature on smoking, an abundance of literature from the psychological, even pastoral, viewpoint, but there is no literature that sheds any light on ethical or moral-theological aspects. The German Federal Department of Youth, Family, and Health^[35] and also the German Central Office for Addictions^[36] were unable to provide any literature relevant to the subject. Even the Evangelical Central Office for Current Issues in the World^[37], an agency of the Protestant Churches in Germany, and the Catholic Academy of Bavaria^[38] were unable to help me. The research director of the Protestant Academy in Baden^[39] let me know that my inquiry made him painfully aware that he could provide me only with some very general reference material on the social costs of smoking and its harmfulness.

Dietmar Mieth, professor of Catholic moral theology at the University of Tübingen, finally confirmed to me that there are no ethical studies on smoking. His letter is informative:

"But I shall gladly tell you why there is no ethical study on smoking: what is ethically correct is decided through the consequences of one's actions. If these consequences are predominantly negative, as is the case today with smoking, there is nothing left to discuss ethically. At most, the question of the urgency in quitting needs to be resolved. But this is more a question of motivational psychology than of ethics."

The letter shows that today's Catholic moral theologians no longer begin their ethical reflection with the revealed Word and ecclesiastical traditions. They start with the facts. Thus, the criterion is no longer the divine will, the set of norms given by divine legislation, but rather reality.^[40] Here it becomes apparent what moral theology has come to; a moral theology which for almost two millennia conveyed the guide-lines of Christian ethics and extended them into the most intimate areas of life, has fallen under the pressure of the social sciences to proclaim the "autonomy of morality" at the end of the second millennium, to declare that there is no such thing as substantive Christian morals, and that only reason is capable of telling us the difference between good and evil.^[41]

A Bahá'í is guided by the set of norms and values given by Bahá'u'lláh. He is the divine Law-giver who, like Moses giving humanity the law on Mount Sinai, has redefined the norms of morality and furnished them with new power for commitment.^[42] Therefore, the starting point for every reflection on ethical questions is His scripture. It is to this scripture that we shall now turn.

Chapter 3

No Explicit Smoking Prohibition

1. A legal prohibition of smoking is not to be found in the Writings of Bahá'u'lláh. In the Book of Laws, the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, we find the prohibition of intoxicating drinks and opium, but nothing is said about smoking. Since Islamic sharí'a has already established the evident principle that what is not explicitly prohibited is allowed^[43], from this silence we must infer that smoking is permitted and not prohibited. This assumption is confirmed even more so when we learn that the Báb had explicitly prohibited smoking^[44] and that the law of the Bayán, which was in force for only a short period of time^[45], was subsequently abrogated by Bahá'u'lláh^[46] except for those laws which He specifically incorporated into the Kitáb-i-Aqdas^[47]. Because the prohibition of smoking in the Bayán was not included in these laws, this prohibition was abrogated by Bahá'u'lláh.^[48] There is no further discussion of this matter. Neither in the appendix to the Kitáb-i-Aqdas (Questions and Answers) nor in the Tablets revealed after the Kitáb-i-Aqdas^[49] can any reference to smoking be found.

Bahá'u'lláh confirms this in a Tablet written on His behalf to an individual believer by His amanuensis^[50]:

"No ordinance hath been revealed in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas about the hookah^[51]. The One True God, exalted be His glory, by reason of His consummate wisdom and for the protection of His servants hath not made mention of this matter, so that the beloved of God may not become victims of tyranny^[52]. However, the Blessed Tongue hath been heard to state that children should be brought up from the beginning in such wise as to avoid addiction to it. Beyond this, no other utterance was heard from Him on this subject. The friends, one and all, are in these days enjoined to follow the provisions of the Most Holy Book, and, not to commit acts which cause separation and tumult among the people."^[53]

In his Tablet of Purity 'Abdu'l-Bahá elucidated the situation:

"The Báb, at the outset of His mission, explicitly prohibited tobacco, and the friends one and all abandoned its use. But since those were times when dissimulation^[54] was permitted, and every individual who abstained from smoking was exposed to harassment, abuse and even death, the friends, in order not to advertise their beliefs, would smoke. Later on, the Book of Aqdas was revealed, and since smoking tobacco was not explicitly forbidden there, the believers did not give it up. The Blessed Beauty, however, always expressed repugnance for it, and although, in the early days, there were reasons why He would smoke a little tobacco, in time He completely renounced it, and those sanctified souls who followed Him in all things also abandoned its use."^[55]

The question not infrequently asked is why Bahá'u'lláh prohibited the drinking of alcoholic beverages but did not also prohibit smoking, the health risks of which are not inferior to those of alcohol. We shall return to this question later. At this point we need only note that smoking is prohibited during the fast.^[56]

2. That a certain conduct is not explicitly prohibited and thus eo ipso evil, does not mean of course, that it is ethically neutral and consequently unobjectionable. Many kinds of behaviour may not be specifically prohibited, but may nevertheless be incompatible with ethical demands. The only behaviour which is strictly forbidden is that which, according to divine wisdom, is so harmful to the growth of the individual or society that it cannot be accepted under any circumstances. The classical prohibitions such as "thou shalt not kill", "thou shalt not steal", "thou shalt not commit adultery", and "thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour"^[57], protect our highest interests, namely life and limb, property, and judicial integrity. Without this ethical minimum, no civilised society can survive.

This view finds confirmation in a passage in the Tablet of Purity which states:

"Some of these prohibitions were absolute, and binding upon all, and whoso transgressed the given law was abhorred of God and anathematised by the believers. Such, for example, were things categorically forbidden, the perpetration of which was accounted a most grievous sin, among them, actions so loathsome that it is shameful even to speak their name. But there are other forbidden things which do not cause immediate harm, and the injurious effects of which are only gradually procured: such acts are also repugnant to the Lord, and blameworthy in His sight, and repellent. The absolute unlawfulness of these, however, hath not been expressly set forth in the Text."^[58]

Chapter 4

On a Bahá'í Doctrine of Duty

1. Ethical duties, i.e. to do or to avoid something, are the result of all normative values, of the sum total of all the many virtues to be found in the Writings of Bahá'u'lláh. We must therefore examine every behaviour (even if it is not explicitly prohibited) with respect to the sum total of all these virtues, so that we can ascertain whether this specific behaviour is in conflict or in harmony with the duties we find there.

As is the case in law, in ethics concrete behaviour must be subsumed under norms. This indispensable subsumption is not possible without exegesis since the application of a norm presupposes its comprehension. The sense and purpose of a norm, the ratio legis, must be clear as well as its relationship to other norms in the hierarchy of values. Furthermore, one must examine other implications, such as the extent of its limits.

In the Synopsis and Codification of the Laws and Ordinances of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas the "prohibition of interpretation" is enumerated^[59] which has led many to the assumption that in the community of Bahá'u'lláh there are no interpretations aside from those of 'Abdu'l-Bahá and Shoghi Effendi. Is this a religion without exegesis?

This conception is obviously based on a misunderstanding of what "interpretation" is. Exegesis is a methodical search for meaning without which the Word of God would be inapplicable and pointless. Every proclamation of the Faith that goes beyond pure quotation, every translation into another language, even reflection about the revealed Word, the search for meaning in pectore, is ultimately exegesis. Prohibiting this would be equal to prohibiting thinking, and nothing would be more contrary to the Purpose of God than the intellectual castration of His believers.

Interpretations by the believers are not at all forbidden. In fact, they "constitute the fruit of man's rational power"^[60]. However, Bahá'u'lláh has monopolised authoritative interpretation by transferring it to 'Abdu'l-Bahá in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas^[61] and the Kitáb-i-Ahd^[62]. 'Abdu'l-Bahá in turn designated Shoghi Effendi as the authoritative interpreter of Scripture in His Will and Testament. Establishing an auctoritas interpretativa simultaneously implies the exclusion of any other interpretation that claims authority. In his Law-i-Ittid (Tablet of Unity) Bahá'u'lláh abolished the institution of the clergy.^[63] Thus, there is no separate class of divines in the community of Bahá'u'lláh who, such as the 'ulamá' in Islam, expound religious law with binding authority.

Beyond this the Kitáb-i-Aqdas does not contain a general prohibition of interpretation, but merely the prohibition of any interpretation of a verse that "altereth its obvious meaning" and perverts "the Sublime Word of God"^[64]. This is actually a matter of course since such an interpretation contrary to "clear meaning" is neither allowed in jurisprudence^[65] nor in theology^[66]. Yet it is a prohibition which is legitimate enough in view of historical experience. Thus the Kitáb-i-Aqdas presents an outer limit for its interpretation within which believers have a right to state their own opinions and have the freedom to express them as long as no claim to authority is made.^[67]

2. In this context we should remind ourselves that the establishment of the World Order of Bahá'u'lláh which is identical to the advent of the "Kingdom of God on Earth", means that all private and public life shall be brought in accord with the demands of the new revelation. In this respect the Bahá'í Faith resembles Judaism and Islam more than it does Christianity because it places more emphasis on right conduct than on the wording of both dogmatic speculations and sterile mysticism. Hence we have orthopractice rather than orthodoxy. As of yet, a doctrine of religious duties, comparable to, for example, the sharí'a in Islam, has not begun to appear in even a rudimentary form. This means that we are moving in virgin territory if we try to proceed in systematic categories.^[68]

To begin with, duties are something we have towards God^[69] and towards others. But we may also consider the duties we have toward ourselves. Such duties are, so to speak, the prerequisites for a meaningful life. They correspond, not to a short-sighted, but rather to an enlightened, self-interest, that is to the true self-interest of a human being. In the religious ethics of values, the resulting duties are based on the divine Revelation. In the final analysis moral values and duties are not based on reason. Behind them stands the authority of the divine Law-giver. All duties, including those towards ourselves, are simultaneously owed to God, otherwise they would not really be binding.^[70]

Chapter 5

On our Duty towards Others

1. Bahá'u'lláh called courtesy "the prince of virtues";^[71] that smoking in the presence of others without their consent is rude and discourteous should require no further discussion. In the past if young people did not learn proper etiquette at home (not to smoke when entering someone else's home or room), at least they would learn it during their dancing lessons. Today hardly anyone seems aware of this common courtesy any more. Otherwise there would be no need for stickers in offices to confront visitors who smoke. But most of all, the commandments of justice^[72], love of one's neighbour^[73], compassion^[74], and looking after the interest of others before one's own^[75], all have in common the obligation to do our neighbours no wrong, to avoid annoying them and, above all, not to harm them.

To begin with, smoking in the presence of others is annoying. It is rare to find non-smokers who do not mind if someone smokes in their presence or especially in their homes. That smoking is most often accepted should not deceive us to conclude that it is not perceived of as annoying by those who do not smoke. Often it is tolerated out of courtesy. In most cases people just lack the courage to express their annoyance. After all, until recently smoking was considered socially acceptable behaviour. Those who opposed smoking risked being accused of intolerance, and the lack of tolerance for any behaviour is one of the worst sins in our society. That is how it is today: it is not the person who smokes in someone else's home without asking permission who is seen to be discourteous, but the person who fails to show enough tolerance and who asks others to refrain from smoking.

Smoking is a kind of violence. The passive smoker is compelled to inhale something he detests. But it is not only the inhalation. As can be seen after every visit to an inn, the annoying thing about smoke is that it remains in one's clothes, underwear, even in the hair, so that in the end one is "smoked" like a herring and forced to change, and air one's clothes and wash one's hair. Smoking in a non-smoker's home leaves smoke in the curtains, cushions, and carpets so that non-smokers are left with a home still smelling like a chimney for days afterwards. Today smokers hardly seem to be able to realize that all this is an extremely unpleasant encroachment on others. They have lost this sensitivity because for them, being enveloped in smoke is simply normal.

At a workplace shared with non-smokers, smoking is a serious imposition: the non-smokers are forced to spend a substantial part of their day breathing smoke-filled air instead of fresh air (which is already contaminated enough these days). What smokers do to their families, to so many children, is even worse. Even babies and infants are permanently exposed to their parents' smoke.^[76] How often do we see cars in which the smoking father drives the family around. Smoking in a car in the presence of others is probably the greatest assault against non-smokers. It is equal to bodily injury.

2. This takes us to another aspect: smoking is not only an annoyance but also a danger. Passive smoking, as has been scientifically proven, is a great health risk. "Involuntarily inhaled tobacco smoke claims far more lives than all environmental pollutants combined", says the director of the Toxicologic Institute of the University of Tübingen, Professor Dr. Heribert Remmer.^[77] Babies, infants, and school children of smoking parents suffer a significantly higher degree of respiratory diseases than others. The risks of heart attacks and cancer, especially lung cancer, are demonstrably higher for involuntary co-smokers, even though the nicotine stress of active smokers is about 200 to 300 times the level of passive smokers. It has been found that this astonishing result is due to the fact that passive smokers are forced to inhale secondary fumes originating from the ash tray as well as those of the cigarette held in someone else's hand. These fumes contain approximately a hundredfold concentration of volatile substances present in the main smoke.^[78] Remmer estimates that in Germany the number of deaths due to lung cancer induced by passive smoking is 1200 annually. The renowned British epidemiologist Doll attributes half of the cases of lung cancer in non-smokers to passive smoking.^[79]

As has been known for a long time, the most severe damage from smoking is suffered by life which is still developing. The foetus of a smoking mother also smokes through the blood circulation supply. Newborns whose mother smoked during pregnancy or while being nursed, are significantly lighter in weight, smaller, develop slower, and are far more susceptible to respiratory infections than other children.^[80] Studies have revealed that suffering from secondary smoke during pregnancy coincides with an even higher risk of foetal malformation than if the mother smoked herself. Thirty percent of pregnant women are passive smokers.^[81] Expectant mothers who smoke not only risk the health, but also the intelligence of their offspring. In a study of pre-school children, American scientists found that the average intelligence quotient (IQ) of children of smoking mothers was lower than that of nonsmoking mothers. The higher the cigarette consumption, the lower the IQ of the children.^[82]

No matter how one looks at it, the only explanation for these smokers' behaviour is manifest egoism. Smokers, aside from harming themselves, do not control their passion when it comes to annoying or harming others, even others who are in need of special protection such as embryos and infants. Persons acting in such a way are not at all willing to relinquish their pleasure. In weighing a (supposed) increase in the quality of life against the basic rights of others, these smokers decide in favour of their own self-interest, as if perverting Friedrich Schiller's quotation: "The good man thinks of himself [until the] last."^[83] Those who do not subordinate their pleasure to the legitimate interests of others act selfishly, and self-love and selfishness is a cardinal sin in all religions^[84], the conquering of which is the task of every person. As Bahá'u'lláh impressed upon his followers:

"Renounce thyself^[85] ... Forget your own selves, and turn your eyes towards your neighbour^[86] ... Burn away, wholly for the sake of the Well-Beloved, the veil of self with the flame of the undying Fire, and with faces joyous and beaming with light, associate with your neighbour^[87] ... Arise, O people, and, by the power of God's might, resolve to gain the victory over your own selves."^[88]

3. Another aspect in relation to consideration towards others concerns the follow-up costs of smokers' self-inflicted damage.^[89] This cannot be elaborated upon at length here. It is not necessary to dwell on the heavy financial burden smokers impose on society. A large number of premature deaths and an even larger number of premature disabilities of people no longer able to join the work force are caused by smoking. The burden on pension funds is especially high because of disability pay and support for dependants. Health insurance companies must also cover tremendous sums for doctors' fees and medications. The burden is placed on and, in the end carried by, all persons who pay premiums. For the general public to be liable for those who indulge in harmful behaviour against themselves contradicts the whole concept of social justice. Those illnesses (or accidents, e.g. by hang-gliding!) caused by self-induced or self-harming behaviour should be covered by the victims themselves. Individual blame must not be socialised. Current discussion on the introduction of an originator principle into the health insurance system is therefore quite appropriate.

From the stand-point of Bahá'í ethics, forcing the general public to pay for the consequences of irresponsible and self-damaging behaviour is untenable because it violates the well-being of society as a whole, to which Bahá'ís owe their highest allegiance. Persons who are called upon to dedicate themselves "to the service of the entire human race", "to promote the best interests of the peoples and kindreds of the earth"^[90], to serve wholeheartedly "the public interest"^[91], "the common good"^[92], and to place their own interest last^[93], would display a substantial ethical deficiency if their smoking habit caused harm to society as a whole. They would also violate justice, which according to Bahá'u'lláh is "the essence of all that We have revealed for thee"^[94], "the best beloved of all things"^[95], and "the most fundamental amongst human virtues"^[96].

Chapter 6

On our Duty towards Ourselves

The issue of smoking has profound ethical consequences because of one's own duties to oneself. These are based on the universal premises underlying the purpose, the exalted station, and the noble destiny of man, as well as the purpose of life, the relationship of the individual to the world (especially in terms of the value given to the body and its physical health) and, finally, the explicit ordinances that guide an individual along the "Straight Path" to the sublime goals one is expected to pursue.

1. The starting point for our following observations is the recognition that, according to the testimony of Bahá'u'lláh, man is "the noblest and most perfect of all created things"^[97], "created ... rich"^[98], and chosen to be God's "mirror"^[99]. We find the biblical notion of man being created in the image of God in the Hidden Words:

"Veiled in My immemorial being and in the ancient eternity of My essence, I knew My love for thee; therefore I created thee, have engraved on thee Mine image and revealed to thee My beauty."^[100]

As 'Abdu'l-Bahá testifies, a natural consequence of this view is that man should be "striving by night and day and resting not for a moment" that this divine image may "illumine the mirror of the human heart"^[101].

Man is the only being to partake of the spiritual world^[102], and the only creature to be able to exercise conscious control over physical nature. All of creation "is subject to the laws of nature", "man alone, by his spiritual power, has been able to free himself, to soar above the world of matter and to make it his servant"^[103]. However, humanity was not only endowed with ability, but also given the task to rise above the physical world, to be sanctified from the world, to turn potential nobility into real nobility and to set out on a journey towards an infinite perfectibility that reflects man, likeness to God: "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect."^[104]

This task, to free oneself from attachment to the world, permeates through all the Writings in the Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh, especially in His mystical Works, The Hidden Words and The Seven Valleys. A few selected quotations:

"O friends! Abandon not the everlasting beauty for a beauty that must die, and set not your affections on this mortal world of dust^[105] ... and approach Me not with lifeless hearts, defiled with worldly desires and cravings^[106] ... Up from thy prison ascent unto the glorious meads above, and from thy mortal cage wing thy flight unto the paradise of the Placeless^[107] ... O My Servant! Free thyself from the fetters of this world, and loose thy soul from the prison of self. Seize thy chance, for it will come to thee no more^[108] ... Didst thou behold immortal sovereignty, thou wouldst strive to pass from this fleeting world^[109] ... Wherefore must the veils of the satanic self be burned away at the fire of love, that the spirit may be purified and cleansed and thus may know the station of the Lord of the Worlds^[110] ... Then we must labour to destroy the animal condition, till the meaning of humanity shall come to light^[111] ... O friend, the heart is the dwelling of eternal mysteries, make it not the home of fleeting fancies; waste not the treasure of thy precious life in employment with this swiftly passing world. Thou comest from the world of holiness, bind not thine heart to the earth; thou art a dweller in the court of names, choose not the homeland of the dust."^[112]

And again the admonition:

"Cleanse from your hearts the love of worldly things ... Disencumber yourselves of all attachment to this world and the vanities thereof. Beware that ye approach them not, inasmuch as they prompt you to walk after your own lusts and covetous desires, and hinder you from entering the straight and glorious Path."^[113]

The attitude required by this view of existence is not one of ascetic denial of the world, nor of mortification of the flesh. This is unmistakably clear from the context of these admonitions. By "the world" is meant "your unawareness of Him Who is your Creator". Thus, the world is assigned a relative status. It must be subordinated to the love of God. This is the explanation of the explicit statement that

"God hath ordained every good thing, whether created in the heavens or in the earth, for such of His servants as truly believe in Him"^[114].

2. This view about the purpose of man's creation, his ontological station, and the appropriate attitude to the world corresponds to the often repeated commandment of detachment^[115] on one hand, and to Bahá'u'lláh's verdict on lust,^[116] corrupt desires,^[117] evil passions,^[118] and hedonism on the other:

"We, verily, have commanded you to refuse the dictates of your evil passions and corrupt desires."^[119]

In the hour of death, man should "ascend, in the utmost purity and sanctity and with absolute detachment, to the throne of the Most High"^[120]. The Hidden Words say:

"Let it now be seen what your endeavours in the path of detachment will reveal."^[121]

So fundamental is this goal that here the individual's journey towards God is called the "path of detachment". Bahá'u'lláh assures us:

"He hath chosen out of the whole world the hearts of His servants, and made them each a seat for the revelation of His glory"

and combines it with the urgent admonition:

"Wherefore, sanctify them from every defilement, that the things for which they were created may be engraven upon them."^[122]

The warnings that individuals should not surrender to their lusts and passions, the warning against hedonism^[123], the life-style of modern man, the utopia of a life in luxe, calme et volupté, as Baudelaire defined it^[124], are so frequent that it must suffice here to quote only a few. One of the most impressive is found in The Hidden Words:

"Alas! Alas! O lovers of worldly desire! Even as the swiftness of lightning ye have passed by the Beloved One, and have set your hearts on satanic fancies. Ye bow the knee before your vain imagining, and call it truth. Ye turn your eyes towards the thorn, and name it a flower. Not a pure breath have ye breathed, nor hath the breeze of detachment been wafted from the meadows of your hearts. Ye have cast to the winds the loving counsels of the Beloved and have effaced them utterly from the Tablets of your hearts, and even as the beasts of the field, ye move and have your being within the pastures of desire and passion."^[125]

The Qur'án reprimands the soul "who hath made a God of his passions"^[126], and in the Kitáb-i-Íqán Bahá'u'lláh speaks of those who "like the bats of darkness" occupy themselves with nothing "except to pursue the transient things of the world"^[127]:

"Obstruct not the luminous spring of thy soul with the thorns and brambles of vain and inordinate affections^[128] ... Deliver yourselves from your evil and corrupt affections^[129] ... They that follow their lusts and corrupt inclinations, have erred and dissipated their efforts."^[130]

At this stage smokers will object that lust and passion are referred to only in an abstract sense and they will ask how in the world these could be even remotely related to smoking. When it is said:

"Will ye be content with that which is like the vapour in a plain, and be willing to forego the Ocean Whose waters refresh, by virtue of the Will of God, the souls of men?"^[131],

it is surely not an explicit discussion of the vapour emanating from tobacco but rather a metaphorical comparison of the attractions of this world to those of heaven. And when it is said in the verse quoted above:

"Not a pure breath have ye breathed"^[132],

this is not really a reference to a smoker's breath, but rather to most people's attachment to the world in general.

But the norms of morality are never concrete. They are always general and abstract, meaning that they are binding for everyone and they are truly detached from concrete instances. In applying a norm it is always necessary to find out which concrete behaviour falls under a particular norm and which does not. The starting point is always the text and the purpose of the norm, the ratio legis.

Is "smoking" one of the "corrupt inclinations" reprimanded by Bahá'u'lláh which results in a misspent life? I think we have no choice but to designate such a harmful habit as smoking as "corrupt". It is "corrupt" because it ruins one's own health, the foundation of life, while risking the health of others. However, we will leave aside the aspect of physical health for now and first turn to the problem of addiction.

3. It has long been a known fact that nicotine is an addictive substance^[133]: "The smoking of tobacco is not only seen as the most important avoidable cause of illnesses and death ..., but also as one of the most frequent psychotoxical addictive misbehaviors of man."^[134]

We must distinguish between smokers who are not addicted, smoking only occasionally, and addicted smokers. The latter are the ones who cannot get away from tobacco and who need help. The criteria for determining addictive behaviour in smokers are compulsory smoking, nicotine hunger, deep inhalation, and frequent automatic reaching for a cigarette: "Addictive smokers cannot live without cigarettes and feel uncomfortable even after a short period of abstinence."^[135] Unequivocal signs of an addiction are repeated, unsuccessful attempts either to quit or to reduce substantially the consumption of tobacco, withdrawal symptoms, and the continued consumption of tobacco despite serious physical damage which is aggravated by smoking, and of which the smoker is aware.^[136] Withdrawal symptoms always appear when an addictive substance is taken over a long period of time and the body has adapted to it.^[137]

Regular consumption of addictive substances bears the risk of physical dependence, not to mention psychological addiction. Those who smoke regularly and habitually, run a high risk of becoming addicted.

Quite aside from smoking, addiction has become a mass phenomenon, the escape syndrome of a society in which religious obligations, moral values, and the transcendent foundations of society are withering. People flee from duties, responsibilities, spiritual values, and sacrifice into fun and pleasure. Aside from drug, medication, and alcohol addiction there is a wide range of other addictions from gambling obsession to bulimia and the addictive consumption of videos and rock music.^[138]

Addiction is a human phenomenon. An animal will not become addicted by itself. The addictive behaviour of humans is a result of the human condition. A human being has no species-specific limitations to the satisfaction of needs: "Man is characterised by a disposition for surfeit"^[139] as well as a tendency towards refinement and luxury. The ancient Greeks spoke of pleonexia^[140], insatiability, to which meden agán is the answer: "Nothing to the extremes", the commandment of moderation so emphasised in Bahá'u'lláh's hierarchy of values^[141].

A person who puts a life of pleasure first^[142], who claims a general "human right to intoxication"^[143], who on principle "follows his momentarily prevailing natural impulses, who allows himself to be directly and completely determined by them, misses an altogether happy life and thus acts deeply unreasonably. His needs and passions lead a life of their own in the face of which every effort of education, reflection, and control remains paralysed. In a life of pleasure, man submits himself to his instincts and passions"^[144]. Such a person acts, as Aristotle appropriately expressed in his Nicomachean Ethics, "slavishly"^[145].

If individuals indulge in their pleonexia, their insatiability, lusts, and passions to the extent that they lose control and are finally completely dominated and thus addicted, they act contrary to the purpose of their creation, which is to free themselves from the bonds of the material world and to be "perfect, even as your Father which is in Heaven is perfect"^[146]. A worse attachment to the nether world, a more pernicious kind of slavery than addiction is inconceivable. A person who has become the slave of passions and lusts is completely dominated by the material world and incapable of becoming free "from the fetters of this world"^[147]. Such a person resembles the bird of which Bahá'u'lláh says that it wants to rise up "through the immensity of the heavens" and yet "impelled to satisfy its hunger, it turneth longingly to the water and clay of the earth below it, and, having been entrapped in the mesh of its desire, findeth itself impotent to resume its flight to the realms whence it came"^[148].

Even religiously committed persons are in constant danger of falling into the temptations of this world and of selling their birthright for a pottage of lentils^[149], surrendering the "everlasting beauty" "for a beauty that must die" and to set their "affections on this mortal world of dust"^[150]. That is why hardly an issue turns up in the prayers revealed by Bahá'u'lláh and 'Abdu'l-Bahá as often as does the plea for assistance that the believers may be detached and sanctified "from the transitory things of this world"^[151], that they may be saved "from whatsoever may be abhorrent unto Thee", and from every "corrupt desire"^[152]:

"Make us ... following Thy command, and leaving our faded delights to seek Thy good pleasure^[153] ... Break off from me the shackles of this nether world^[154] ... Enable us to conquer self and overcome desire. O Lord! Deliver us from the bondage of the material world."^[155]

A person who has become addicted risks missing the purpose of being. From this perspective it becomes clear that an addiction provoking behaviour such as smoking is a "corrupt" inclination, because it hampers one's spiritual and moral development.

4. Now let us consider the question why Bahá'u'lláh abrogated the Báb's smoking prohibition instead of including it in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas. But is this questioning of the wisdom of divine Legislation not a sign of human hubris? Is it not written in the Tablet Tajallíyát,

"Say, none can ever fathom the manifold exigencies of God's consummate wisdom"^[156],

and in the Tablet Ishráqát,

"Know thou for a certainty that the Will of God is not limited by the standards of the people, and God doth not tread in their ways."^[157]

Certainly, the divine Will manifest in the divine Law is beyond human comprehension. It is unrestrained, unfathomable by reason, and applies simply because it exists, not because of its inherent persuasive power. It is a'aBábud^[158]; it must be accepted as it is. These words stand boldly above every rational reflection:

"He doeth whatsoever He willeth and ordaineth whatsoever He pleaseth^[159] ... He shall not be asked of His doings"^[160].

However, the fact that the Word of God is unfathomable^[161] does not mean it is blocked from rational reasoning. For some of His laws, for example the parental consent for marriage^[162], or the intestate share of the children^[163], Bahá'u'lláh Himself has given an explanation. That most laws are apodictic in nature does not mean that asking for their purpose is inadmissible. We need only remember that beyond any purpose which we may find and understand, stands the wisdom of God that remains impenetrable^[164], and that "the primary purpose" of the divine Law, as already stated in the Torah^[165], is "human happiness"^[166], "abiding joy"^[167]:

"Whoso keepeth the commandments of God shall attain everlasting felicity^[168] ... O My servants! Sorrow not if, in these days and on this earthly plane, things contrary to your wishes have been ordained and manifested by God, for days of blissful joy, of heavenly delight, are assuredly in store of you."^[169]

I think that the reason for the different treatments of various addictive behaviours is found in the fact that there is a wide spectrum of addictions. One addiction is not the same as another. There is a big difference whether someone is gluttonous, addicted to nicotine, to medication, to alcohol, or even to heroin or cocaine. Gluttons, aside from aesthetical problems, have social consequences only insofar that the individual suffers from excess weight and thus has health risks. The consumption of tobacco leads to permanent damage, loss of control, and ultimately to addiction only after persistent use. The consumption of alcohol may lead to addiction only after a lengthy period of abuse, but quite rapidly to an intoxication that diminishes or suspends sound judgement and free will. The addictive potential of heroin and other drugs is such that even a single attempt can cause physical dependence. The decisive factor seems to be that as smokers may harm themselves and others and gradually lose control over their habit, they do not lose control over their behaviour altogether. They never lose the ability of insight into social norms or their ability to act according to norms. Their discernment and control, i.e. in legal terms their capacity for criminal responsibility, remains intact. This is rapidly diminished with addictive substances such as alcohol, heroin, or cocaine where it is often completely suspended. Thus, the consumption of alcohol and drugs often leads to criminal acts and being addicted to these substances leads to delinquency. The same holds true for gambling which often leads to obsession and which is mentioned in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas together with opium and other intoxicating drugs.^[170] Smokers are not subject to this danger, as addicted as they may be.

Thus, it is quite sensible that smoking, in spite of all its health risks, has not been prohibited in the divine Law. If we look at the wording of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, we can see that these differences may even be found in the diction: the consumption of alcoholic beverages, gambling^[171], and the consumption of opium are explicitly prohibited. However, the prohibition of alcohol is relatively moderate in diction:

"It is inadmissible that man, who hath been endowed with reason, should consume that which stealeth it away."^[172]

From Tablets of Bahá'u'lláh^[173] and from the interpretations of 'Abdu'l-Bahá and Shoghi Effendi it becomes clear that this is a strict prohibition and not just advice. By contrast, the prohibition of gambling and opium is worded much more directly:

"Gambling and the use of opium have been forbidden unto you. Eschew them both, o people, and be not of those who transgress. Beware of using any substance that induceth sluggishness and torpor in the human temple and inflicteth harm upon the body."^[174]

Towards the end of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, opium is inexorably condemned once again:

"It hath been forbidden you to smoke opium. We, truly, have prohibited its practice through a most binding interdiction in the Book. Should anyone partake thereof, assuredly he is not of Me. Fear God, O ye endued with understanding."^[175]

All addictive, hallucinogenic or habit-forming drugs, including (in addition to opium and alcohol) hashish, marijuana, and LSD, are categorically forbidden for the believer (except under qualified medical prescription) because they lead to indolence and apathy and inflict "harm upon the body"^[176]. The goal is a drug-free society, a society from which addiction is gradually banned. From this perspective the increasingly voiced demands for the acceptance of the addiction to and the legalisation of "soft" drugs or even all drugs^[177], for the introduction of a "drug class for primary school students" in which they are supposed to learn the "responsible use of hashish"^[178], and for the downplaying and glorification of drugs^[179] to the extent of declaration of a "right to intoxication" appear irresponsible and the expression of a hedonistic society.

5. Regarding addiction as a severe form of attachment to the world and thus an offence against the commandment to be detached, still does not deal with the problems of smokers' continuous abuse of the body and the resultant permanent damage inflicted to their health. What is the value attributed to the body and to physical health in the Bahá'í Revelation?

The Scriptures of the Báb, Bahá'u'lláh, and 'Abdu'l-Bahá offer much more on the relation of body and soul than all other Holy Writings.^[180] According to Bahá'u'lláh, the body is a divine bounty. In it the immortal soul manifests itself during its life on earth. The body is the bearer of the highest gift God has given humanity: reason. Through it humanity has been given the capability "to know and recognize the one true God"^[181]. The body, a creation of divine omnipotence and love, is the instrument of the soul^[182], the indispensable bearer of the human spirit for the duration of earthly existence:

"By the appearance of the spirit in the physical form, this world is enlightened."^[183]

Therefore, the body has its own dignity which is immediately apparent to the uncorrupted human being who has a natural aversion to its debasement.^[184] In the mystical Writings of Bahá'u'lláh, the physical human being appears as a "temple"^[185] of the Divine, a metaphor used earlier by St. Paul^[186]. Therefore, it is a grave sin in every religion for persons to harm themselves and destroy this temple.^[187] Furthermore, individuals carry a moral responsibility towards their body which require them to care for and attend to it and, above all, not to harm it. The ill-disposed tendencies towards the body that kept recurring in Christianity^[188] are clearly rejected.

In the Persian Bayán^[189] the Báb revealed the following regarding the relationship between the body and the soul,

"Since the physical body is the throne whereon the inner temple is established, God hath ordained that the body be preserved to the extent possible."

For this reason, the "utmost respect deference"^[190] should be shown, even to a dead body.

Physical health, therefore, is a high asset. It directly serves to achieve the goals that have been set for man by the Creator: to worship God on earth and to serve Him. Shoghi Effendi writes, "You should always bear in mind Bahá'u'lláh's counsel that we should take the utmost care of our health, surely not because it is an end in itself, but as a necessary means of serving His Cause."^[191] The words of the pagan Juvenal^[192] scorned by Martin Luther, "a sound mind in a sound body"^[193] are repeatedly confirmed by 'Abdu'l-Bahá:

"The more healthful his body the greater will be the power of the spirit of man; the power of the intellect, the power of the memory, the power of reflection will then be greater."^[194]

He also emphasised the interaction between the mind and physical health:

"Spiritual health is conducive to physical health."^[195]

This view of human corporeality corresponds to the high station Bahá'u'lláh has ascribed to the art of medicine. In the Law-i-iBáb He revealed:

"Say: The science of healing is the most noble of all sciences, verily, it is the greatest instrument given by God, the Quickener of moldering bones, for preserving the bodies of people. God hath given it precedence over all sciences and branches of wisdom."^[196]

A fundamental prerequisite of any medical art is prophylaxis, to refrain from anything that harms the body. In the same Tablet we read therefore to "eschew harmful habits, for they truly, are a calamity for created beings"^[197]. If the consumption of tobacco is, as already shown,^[198] the "main preventable cause for illness and death in the industrial societies", there is no need for further elucidation that smoking is indeed a "harmful habit", a "calamity for created beings" and that the smoker acts persistently contrary to the divine exhortations to care for and to preserve the body, the instrument of the soul.

6. Let us now summarize the preceding discussion, before we finally turn to the aspect of purity, under which Bahá'ís generally view smoking:

Smoking is not explicitly prohibited in the Book of God. However, it is sinful because it contradicts a whole range of ethical norms and goals which may be identified as the commandments of

1. courtesy
2. charity and mercy
3. justice and fairness ('adl wa insáf), and respect for the common good
4. renunciation of one's self
5. detachment from the fetters of the material world
6. not becoming a slave to one's lusts and passions and renouncing all corrupt inclinations
7. preserving and caring for the body, the "instrument of the immortal soul", the "temple of God".

Chapter 7

A Digression:
On Purity and Cleanliness in Religious History

Now let us turn to the aspect of purity, an aspect which no European would normally consider when assessing the ethics of smoking (which, as we have already seen^[199], hardly anyone would think of doing anyway). We are in the fortunate position to have an authoritative interpretation of this term by 'Abdu'l-Bahá; it is generally known as the Tablet of Purity^[200]. This text also contains a highly negative judgement of smoking.

Before turning to this text which is of such central relevance to this issue, it seems sensible to examine the virtue of "purity" more closely in the context of religious history. With a deeper and keener understanding of this text, it becomes clear that purity is not a peripheral virtue in our set of values, but rather one of primary importance.^[201]

1. "Pure" in its true sense is to be free from mixture with any contaminants. Thus, one speaks of pure water, pure air, pure marble, and so on. Purification in its true sense is the removal of dirt. Purity in its true sense to be free from dirt, stains, and other foreign contaminants. The figurative meaning of these conceptions has been known since the earliest time: the purity of colour, of sounds, of language, of judgement, of motives and the like.^[202] In a discussion of morals, purity means moral perfection, the integrity of an individual's inner being from the worldly influences that are seen as "defiling". Moral purity is closely related to innocence.^[203] In the context of sexuality, purity is identical to chastity.

Today most will find it hard to understand that external purity, i.e. cleanliness, should have anything to do with religion. Cleanliness is thought of as an achievement and a prerequisite for life in a modern society, such as the special measures taken in operating rooms or in computer chip factories. Certainly, compared to the conditions prior to the first industrial revolution, cleanliness is a modern achievement. However, we should be careful not to make judgements only on the basis of our Western conditions, because in large parts of the world cleanliness and hygiene are not taken very seriously. But even the situation in Europe can be quite surprising. A survey in Germany revealed that an alarmingly high number of people do not own a toothbrush and never use one. Moreover, since the seventies, cleanliness has been defamed as a supposedly "bourgeois virtue". A counter-culture has established itself in which dirt, torn clothing, physical neglect, and bizarre hair and beard styles have become the hallmark of a progressive attitude. Thus the virtue of purity has disintegrated together with our value system. In any case, in our society cleanliness is not perceived as a moral obligation. At best, it is seen as a necessity imposed by science and reason.

And yet purity, including its outward manifestation cleanliness, is a subject for norms, taboos, and commentary in most religions, even primitive religions. Outward purity has been a prerequisite for establishing contact with the Divine. Cultic or ritual purity was required for entry into the sanctuary or for the validity of religious acts.

2. Cultic purity, the concepts of pure and impure, played an important role in the Old Testament. In chapters eleven to fifteen of Leviticus we find so-called purity laws which show how ritual purity is lost, through every ejaculation, through every act of sexual intercourse, through menstruation, through many illnesses, especially leprosy, and through every touch of a corpse. Not only was a woman impure during her menstruation but so was everything and every person she touched.^[204] The man with whom she had intercourse was impure for eight days. After giving birth to a son, a woman was impure for seven days, after a daughter for fourteen days and she was forbidden to enter the sanctuary for thirty-three days, or sixty-six days, respectively. Ritual purity after slight impurifications could be restored through ablutions with water. Severe impurification could only be restored through complicated priestly purification rites.

The purity laws include the prohibitions of certain dishes along with the distinction between pure and impure animals.^[205] For the most part the laws of purity seem to have served the purpose of hygiene. Little by little, the multitude and rigour of cultic purity laws led to a formalism and ritualism while the essential inner moral purity was neglected, as shown by the protests of the prophets.^[206]

Beyond thoroughly regulated ritual purity, physical cleanliness is rarely identified as a moral obligation in the Old Testament.^[207] However, inner moral purity is mentioned: "Create in me a clean heart, o God, and renew a right spirit within me"^[208], "Truly God is good to Israel, even to such as are of a clean heart"^[209]. And when Isaiah says: "Wash you, make you clean" it becomes clear from the context that moral purity is meant, because He continues, "put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil."^[210] The commandment to be pure is particularly valid with respect to idol worship: "And from all your idols, will I cleanse you."^[211]

3. In Christianity, cultic purity is overcome through Paul's doctrine of the end of the law in Christ.^[212] Purity is henceforth the purity of the heart: "Blessed are the pure in heart."^[213] Jesus polemicized against the over-emphasis of ritual purity and the neglect of the purity of heart: "Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man."^[214] "But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart ... and they defile the man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies. These are things which defile a man: but to eat with unwashed hands defileth not a man."^[215] Physical cleanliness was never a special subject in Christianity. Bathing has always been suspicious to the Church. As late as 1914 a standard text for German Catholics^[216] was published containing a warning against taking baths because of the accompanying moral hazard, especially for young people.

4. It is altogether different in Islam. Here, purity plays an important role. Purity and cleanliness are not only necessary prerequisites for prayer but also the independent subject of numerous admonitions in the Qur'án and in oral traditions. According to a hadíth^[217] passed on by Muslim^[218], the Messenger of God said, "Purification is called half of the faith". A hadíth handed down by Jábir reads: "The key to paradise is prayer and the key to prayer is purification."^[219] Even in one of the first revelations the Prophet exclaims, "Thy Lord, magnify Him! Thy raiment, purify it! The abomination, flee it! "^[220] In two passages in the Qur'án we find: "Verily God loveth those ... who seek to be clean."^[221] This not only refers to outward cleanliness but also to an inner cleanliness, the purity of the soul. Generally, in the Islamic conception there is an interaction between physical and spiritual purity. The author of the collection of hadíth mentioned previously remarks in a footnote, "Purity of the body is a prelude to the purity of the soul"^[222] ... "A pure mind in a pure body" is the watchword of Islam. Here cleanliness is not next to godliness but is half of godliness or faith."^[223] This, too, reminds us of the verse by Juvenal "Orandum est, ut sit mens sana in corpore", against which Luther polemicized.

The basic instructions for ritual purity^[224] can be found in súra 5, verse 8-9:

"O Believers! when ye address yourselves to prayer, wash your faces, and your hands up to the elbow, and wipe your heads, and your feet to the ankles. And if ye have become unclean, then purify yourselves. But if ye are sick, or on a journey, or if one of you come from the place of retirement, or if ye have touched women, and if ye find no water, then take clean sand and rub your faces and your hands with it. God desireth not to lay a burden upon you, but He desireth to purify you, and He would fill up the measure of His favour upon you, that ye may be grateful."

Since a Muslim says the alt, the obligatory prayer, five times a day, thereby performing the ablutions necessary for the prayers to be valid five times a day, he has ample opportunity to be clean.

In the hadíth collections, the Prophet's words on physical purity assume an even greater importance. There are, for example, precise recommendations for the believer to cleanse himself with water or pebbles after bowel movements or after urinating. The small can of water used in Persia for this purpose can obviously be traced back to the Prophet.^[225] The left hand and not the right is always to be used for cleaning oneself after defecating.^[226] A hadíth reads: "Abstain from three objects of curse, easing near springs of water and on roads and under shade."^[227]

There are two things which we are convinced were the achievements of western civilisation, but which were actually introduced by the Prophet Muhammad: the handkerchief and the toothbrush. He forbade the believers to spit on the ground in public places and He Himself used a piece of cloth for this purpose.^[228] He had a toothbrush that He used regularly and He repeatedly admonished His people to do the same: "The tooth-brush purifies the mouth and is a means of seeking the pleasure of the Lord."^[229] According to a hadíth passed on by al-Bukhr^[230] the Prophet said, "Were it not that I would place too heavy a burden on my community, I would have commanded them to use the tooth-brush at every ablution."^[231] The Prophet used it before every ablution.^[232]

From the hadíths, we also learn that, after reaching of the age of maturity, the believer must take a weekly bath during which head and body are to be washed.^[233] One hadíth reads: "Taking a bath on Friday is incumbent upon every one who has attained puberty and he should use the tooth-brush and use scent if he can find it."^[234] The weekly bath was seen as the hygienic minimum. The commandment of purity included cleaning all clothes as well as the home.

It is interesting in this context that a woman's menstruation did not lead to her being avoided because of impurity. Pointing out to the Prophet that the Jews did not sit at the table with such a woman and would not even share the same room, the Prophet responded: "Do everything except sexual intercourse."^[235]

The Prophet Himself, immaculate in His person, loved fragrances, used musk, ambergris, and camphor and used to burn aromatic woods. At one point, after not having received any revelation for some time, He said to a companion: "How can revelations not be interrupted when you do not trim your nails, nor clip your moustache, nor cleanse your finger-joints."^[236]

Beyond ritual purity, during all His prophetic service Muhammad educated His people to a state of cleanliness which was always seen as a symbol for the purity of the soul and of the heart. The actual object of religion is to purge heart and soul from the shackles of selfish desires and evil thoughts. Thus, life itself is seen as a continuous act of purification, the spiritual component of which is equivalent to sanctification.

The extent to which purity and the process of purification are seen as being identical with religion can be seen from this verse from the Qur'án: "And whoever shall keep himself pure, he purifieth himself to his own behoof."^[237] Of those who have fulfilled good deeds and reach the "Gardens of Eden, beneath whose trees the rivers flow" it is said: "This, the reward of him who hath been pure."^[238] And again: "Happy he who is purified by Islam."^[239] And finally there is the task given to Moses by God. He should bring Pharaoh the message from God with the words: "Hast thou the will to purify thyself, and that I should guide thee to thy Lord, then thou shalt fear? "^[240]

5. It is in this tradition that we see the verses revealed by the Báb in the Persian Bayán:

"God loveth those who are pure. Naught in the Bayán and in the sight of God is more loved than purity and immaculate cleanliness ... He indeed desireth that under all conditions, all may be adorned with such purity, both inwardly and outwardly, that no repugnance may be caused even to themselves, how much less unto others."^[241]

Another verse is completely dedicated to the moral purification of those who want to reach the presence of Bahá'u'lláh:

"Know thou that in the Bayán, purification is regarded as the most acceptable means for attaining nearness unto God and as the most meritorious of all deeds."^[242]

6. In the Kitáb-i-Aqdas we find the verse:

"This is the changeless Faith of God, eternal in the past, eternal in the future."^[243]

This means that the Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh is in continuity with the revelations of the Adamic cycle, especially with the two previous dispensations, the Qur'án and the Bayán. It is not surprising then that purity in its three forms, ritual purity, cleanliness, and moral purity, is a cornerstone of its moral value system. Bahá'u'lláh has partly confirmed, partly abrogated, and partly replaced existing concepts and laws with new ones and thus has adjusted the Religion of God to fit present circumstances.

In the Kitáb-i-Aqdas, Bahá'u'lláh has abolished the Shí'ite concept of ritual "impurity"^[244], according to which not only particular things^[245] but all non-Islamic peoples were regarded as "impure"^[246]. He has announced that through His revelation,

"all created things were immersed in the sea of purification. When, on that first day of Ridván, We shed upon the whole of creation the splendours of Our most excellent Names and Our most exalted Attributes ... Consort ye then with the followers of all religions, and proclaim ye the Cause of your Lord."^[247]

This verse testifies to the process of spiritual purification which this event initiated. However, one should not assume, as the Universal House of Justice emphasises^[248], that if everything has been immersed in the sea of purification, purity has been solemnised once and for all. Bahá'u'lláh has elaborated on every aspect of this virtue. Inner moral purity is a recurring issue in all his works, especially in the mystical writings, while cleanliness and ritual purity are treated in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas.

We should actually note that there are such things as cultic provisions or rituals, i.e. prescribed forms of worship. We should forget the biased view held in the past that the Bah' Faith is a religion without dogma^[249], without theology^[250], without ritual, and without clergy. Only the latter is correct. The first three points are untenable. It is true, however, that the ritual provisions from the pen of Bahá'u'lláh may not be augmented. This is a numerus clausus. Among the ritual prayers the obligatory prayers^[251] hold a special position, for which Bahá'u'lláh has prescribed ablutions^[252]. Before prayer the hands and face are to be washed. If there is no water, it is sufficient to speak the verse: "Bismi'lláh al-athar al-athar" ("In the Name of God, the Most Pure, the Most Pure").^[253] These ablutions are necessary constituents of the obligatory prayers. Without them, the prayer is not valid. However, these ablutions are not yet mandatory for Western Bahá'ís. [This is changed by the letter of 28th December 1999 from the Universal House of Justice to the Bahá'ís of the World – CM.]

Ritual purity includes the cleanliness of dress:

"Fear Him and be of those who are pure. Should the garb of anyone be visibly sullied, his prayers shall not ascend to God, and the celestial Concourse will turn away from him."^[254]

A number of former ritual purity commandments have been abrogated. For example, in contrast to the Jewish and Islamic laws of purity, semen is explicitly pronounced as being pure.^[255] Also, certain things that render prayer ritually impure according to shar'ía^[256], such as hair, sable-skin, and bones, are henceforth pure.^[257] Most importantly Bahá'u'lláh has also abolished the impurity of peoples belonging to a different religion^[258] and commanded His people to "consort with all religions with amity and concord, that they may inhale from you the sweet fragrance of God."^[259] In this regard one should keep in mind that even members of the "peoples of the Book", Jews and Christians, are impure according to Shí'ite law.

Bahá'u'lláh admonishes His people to cleanliness:

"Hold ye fast unto refinement (lafah) under all conditions, that your eyes may be preserved from beholding what is repugnant both to your own selves and to the dwellers of Paradise. Should anyone depart therefrom, his deed shall at that moment be rendered in vain; yet should he have good reason, God will excuse him. He, in truth, is the Gracious, the Most Bountiful^[260] ... Cleave ye unto the cord of refinement with such tenacity as to allow no trace of dirt to be seen upon your garments^[261] ... Be ye the very essence of cleanliness amongst mankind^[262] ... It has been enjoined upon you to pare your nails, to bathe yourselves each week in water that covereth your body^[263] ... It is not permissible to bathe yourselves in water that hath already been used ..."^[264]

In this context, Bahá'u'lláh warns the believers against Persian public bath houses:

"Whoso maketh his way toward such baths will smell their fetid odour ere he entereth therein."^[265]

Bahá'ís are instructed to wash their feet, every day in summer, every third day during winter time.^[266] Washing the body under running water is preferable to immersing the body.^[267] In this vein the prohibition against plunging one's hands into food while eating^[268] as well as the commandment to renew one's household effects every nineteen years^[269] should be seen in the light of outward purity. Bahá'u'lláh assures:

"Truly, We desire to behold you as manifestations of paradise on earth, that there may be diffused from you such fragrance as shall rejoice the hearts of the favoured of God."^[270]

An especially philanthropic admonition in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas is to

"Make use of rose-water, and of pure perfume; this, indeed, is that which God hath loved from the beginning that hath no beginning."^[271]

Bahá'u'lláh's commandment of "moderation in all things"^[272] also applies to the virtue of cleanliness. Cleanliness is not an end in itself. If it degenerates into a neurotic cleansing obsession, the right sense of proportion is abandoned and a virtue turns into a plague.

Ritual purity and cleanliness, however, are only prerequisites and complementary components of this inner purity, this purity of the heart and of the soul that, as a leitmotif recurring throughout the Writings of Bahá'u'lláh, is the goal of our earthly life. The recognition of truth itself, the recognition of the Manifestation, requires this purity of heart: "Blessed are the pure in heart; for they shall see God", says the Sermon of the Mount^[273], and in the Kitáb-i-Íqán we read:

"They that tread the path of faith, they that thirst for the wine of certitude, must cleanse themselves of all that is earthly -- their ears from idle talk, their minds from vain imaginings, their hearts from worldly affections, their eyes from that which perisheth^[274] ... When a true seeker determines to take the step of search in the path leading to the knowledge of the Ancient of Days, he must, before all else, cleanse and purify his heart, which is the seat of the revelation of the inner mysteries of God, from the obscuring dust of all acquired knowledge, and the allusions of the embodiments of satanic fancy. He must purge his breast, which is the sanctuary of the abiding love of the Beloved, of every defilement, and sanctify his soul from all that pertaineth to water and clay, from all shadowy and ephemeral attachments. He must so cleanse his heart that no remnant of either love or hate may linger therein, lest that love blindly incline him to error, or that hate repel him away from the truth."^[275]

Moral purity is sincerity and noble-mindedness, the freedom of motive from selfish interests, the freedom of thought from base and corrupt inclinations, from insidious intentions, from malice, craftiness^[276], and intrigues. It is the innocence of heart of which Christ spoke.^[277] Purity pervades all virtues. It surpasses them when it is turned into holiness. This is why, as Bahá'u'lláh revealed, everything that "hath been set forth in the Book by the Pen of Glory is an effective means for the purging, the purification and sanctification of the souls of men"^[278].

Although "the essence of faith is fewness of words and abundance of deeds"^[279], inner motivation is required before action can have the desired effect:

"We verily behold your actions. If We perceive from them the sweet smelling savour of purity and holiness, We will most certainly bless you."^[280]

This is especially true for service to the Cause of God.^[281] "To be pure and to fear God", Bahá'u'lláh has instructed His believers:

"We enjoin the servants of God and His handmaidens to be pure and to fear God, that they may shake off the slumber of their corrupt desires^[282] ... He is not to be numbered with the people of Bahá who followeth his mundane desires, or fixeth his heart on things of the earth."^[283]

The human heart is the temple that is God's abode, but God wants to reside only in a pure heart:

"O Son of Being! Thy heart is My home; sanctify it for My descent. Thy spirit is My place of revelation; cleanse it for My manifestation^[284] ... O Son of Man! The temple of being is My throne; cleanse it of all things, that there I may be established and there I may abide."^[285]

Chapter 8

'Abdu'l-Bahá's Judgement

In the Tablet known as the Tablet of Purity^[286] 'Abdu'l-Bahá has summarised these thoughts and, employing the standards of this "purity", clearly identified and condemned two widely spread vices: the use of opium^[287] and the smoking of tobacco. This takes us back to the starting point of our ethical examination. 'Abdu'l-Bahá begins by speaking of the spiritual purity which we were just discussing:

"O Friends of the Pure and Omnipotent God! To be pure and holy in all things is an attribute of the consecrated soul and a necessary characteristic of the unenslaved mind. The best of perfections is immaculacy and the freeing of oneself from every defect. Once the individual is, in every respect, cleansed and purified, then will he become a focal centre reflecting the Manifest Light. First in a human being's way of life, must be purity, then freshness, cleanliness, and independence of spirit. First must the stream be cleansed, then may the sweet river waters be led into it ... A burnished heart will mirror forth the comely face of truth."^[288]

'Abdu'l-Bahá then responds to the interaction between inner and outer purity, between purity and cleanliness:

"My meaning is this, that in every aspect of life, purity and holiness, cleanliness and refinement, exalt the human condition and further the development of man's inner reality. Even in the physical realm, cleanliness will conduce to spirituality, as the Holy Writings clearly state. And although bodily cleanliness is a physical thing, it hath, nevertheless, a powerful influence on the life of the spirit. It is even as a voice wondrously sweet, or a melody played: although sounds are but vibrations in the air which affect the ear's auditory nerve, and these vibrations are but chance phenomena carried along through the air, even so, see how they move the heart. A wondrous melody is wings for the spirit, and maketh the soul to tremble for joy. The purport is that physical cleanliness doth also exert its effect upon the human soul. Observe how pleasing is cleanliness in the sight of God, and how specifically it is emphasised in the Holy Books of the Prophets; for the Scriptures forbid the eating or the use of any unclean thing. Some of these prohibitions were absolute, and binding upon all, and whoso transgressed the given law was abhorred by God and anathematised by the believers. Such, for example, were things categorically forbidden, the perpetration of which was accounted a most grievous sin, among them actions so loathsome that it is shameful even to speak their name."^[289]

As has been shown, not everything that God abhors is explicitly prohibited in the Holy Writings. In this context, 'Abdu'l-Bahá identifies those actions "which do not cause immediate harm". But these actions, too, are an abomination to the Lord and are reprehensible and repulsive in His sight:

"Their avoidance is necessary for purity, cleanliness, the preservation of health, and freedom from addiction^[290] ... Among these latter is the smoking of tobacco, which is dirty, smelly, offensive, an evil habit, and one the harmfulness of which gradually becometh apparent to all. Every qualified physician hath ruled, and this hath also been proven by tests, that one of the components of tobacco is a deadly poison, and that the smoker is vulnerable to many and various diseases. This is why smoking hath been plainly set forth as repugnant from the stand-point of hygiene^[291] ... My meaning is that in the sight of God, smoking tobacco is deprecated, abhorrent, filthy in the extreme; and, albeit by degree, highly injurious to health. It is also a waste of money and time, and maketh the user a prey to a noxious addiction. To those who stand firm in the Covenant, this habit is therefore censured both by reason and experience, and renouncing it will bring relief and peace of mind to all men. Furthermore, this will make it possible to have a fresh mouth and unstained fingers, and hair that is free of a foul and repellent smell."^[292]

In another statement 'Abdu'l-Bahá harshly criticises smoking:

"In truth the loss and waste of this profitless smoke are evident. It impaireth the body, weakeneth the nerves, and preventeth the brain from entertaining exalted thoughts. One's time runneth to waste and one's substance is squandered. It neither quencheth one's thirst nor satisfieth one's hunger. A person endowed with intelligence will surely abandon this ruinous habit, and will pursue that which promoteth his health and well-being."^[293]

It is noteworthy that 'Abdu'l-Bahá, usually impressive through his mildness of language, unleashes quite an arsenal of harsh expressions when condemning the consumption of tobacco. This is an indication of how repugnant smoking is to Him. This becomes even clearer when He compares the tobacco plant to the "Cursed Tree" in the Qur'án:

"One of the meanings of the 'Cursed Tree'^[294] is tobacco. It is unsavoury, disgusting, harmful and poisonous. It wasteth one's substance and attracteth illness and weariness."^[295]

From all these testimonies it becomes evident that the Teachings strongly condemn the smoking of tobacco, although they do not actually forbid it. Shoghi Effendi and the Universal House of Justice have made it clear that in the Bahá'í Faith the decision to smoke or not to smoke is a personal matter and cannot be enforced by law.^[296] 'Abdu'l-Bahá's statements on smoking "are merely an exhortation and not a command"^[297]. Thus, nobody has the right "to prevent anyone from smoking"^[298]. The Universal House of Justice has expressed its hope "that the wide-spread publicity being given to the evil effects of smoking, both to smokers and on those who have to breathe smoke-laden air, will help to convince everyone of the wisdom of 'Abdu'l-Bahá in strongly discouraging Bahá'í's from smoking"^[299]. Shoghi Effendi stated that smoking "should not be made an issue"^[300]. However, as the tremendous health-risks of smoking (for smokers and non-smokers alike) and the waste which results from the financial burden on society become more obvious every day, smoking itself has turned into a passionately discussed issue in society. Treading lightly serves no purpose. Bahá'í's cannot remain aloof from this discussion. They ought to make a stand and refer to the fact that 'Abdu'l-Bahá, even at a time when smoking was accepted as natural in society, passed a devastating verdict on it.

'Abdu'l-Bahá's fondest wish was that Bahá'ís would give up this vice:

"Make ye then a mighty effort, that the purity and sanctity which, above all else, are cherished by 'Abdu'l-Bahá, shall distinguish the people of Bahá; that in every kind of excellence the people of God shall surpass all other human beings; that both outwardly and inwardly they shall prove superior to the rest; that for purity, immaculacy, refinement, and the preservation of health, they shall be the leaders in the vanguard of those who know. And that by their freedom from enslavement, their knowledge, their self-control, they shall be the first among the pure, the free and the wise."^[301]

This is an instruction and a goal. To emulate Him is imperative for Bahá'ís, if only for reasons of credibility. When Bahá'ís smoke, are they not people about whom Bahá'u'lláh says that they "walk in the ways of those whose words differ from their deeds"^[302] and whose conduct contradicts their creed^[303]? The physician who, raising his yellow nicotine finger, swears by the beard of Hippocrates that the patient must quit smoking if he wants to prevent another heart attack, does not really appear convincing. Bahá'u'lláh's admonition is unambiguous:

"O Son of Spirit! Know thou of a truth: He that biddeth men be just and himself committeth iniquity is not of Me, even though he bear My name."^[304]

An expressive example of how steadfast faith can motivate a person and confer the power to quit a vice spontaneously is Mírzá Abu'l-Fadl, the greatest Bahá'í scholar to date, who, before converting to the Faith of Bahá'u'lláh, was the rector of a theological university in Tehran. One day in Cairo, where he publicly taught the Faith, he was brought a copy of the Law-i-Dukhn. The report by the bearer, Husayn-i-Rúhí Effendi, is given in Taherzadeh's The Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh:

"I had not yet finished the reading of the Tablet for him when he took his cigar case, threw it out in the street and said that this was the end of smoking for him although he was chain-smoker. He used to roll his own cigarettes by hand, light a new one with the old, and smoke non-stop from morning till evening. He said to me: O R Effendi, I have been smoking for fifty-five years and I am addicted to it. And, soon you will see that because of the effect of nicotine a member of my body will be paralysed. It did not take very long until one of his arms was paralysed and he could not move it. This lasted for two years. The doctors strongly urged him to resume smoking but he refused, saying, "I prefer to die than to disobey 'Abdu'l-Bahá."^[305]

In a prayer, 'Abdu'l-Bahá begs the divine Providence to "bestow upon the People of Bahá purity and immaculacy in all things":

"Grant that they be freed from all defilement, and released from all addictions. Save them from committing any repugnant act, unbind them from the chains of every evil habit, that they may live pure and free, wholesome and cleanly, worthy to serve at Thy Sacred Threshold and fit to be related to their Lord. Deliver them from intoxicating drinks and tobacco, save them, rescue them, from this opium that bringeth on madness, suffer them to enjoy the sweet savours of holiness, that they may drink deep of the mystic cup of heavenly love and know the rapture of being drawn ever closer unto the Realm of the All-Glorious."^[306]

Bibliography

'Abdu'l-Bahá, Paris Talks. Addresses given by 'Abdu'l-Bahá in Paris in 1911-12. London: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 12th edn, 1971

___ The Promulgation of Universal Peace. Talks Delivered by 'Abdu'l-Bahá during His Visit to the United States and Canada in 1912. Compiled by Howard MacNutt. Wilmette/Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 2nd edn 1982

___ The Secret of Divine Civilisation. Translated by Marzieh Gail in consultation with Ali-Kuli Khan. Wilmette/Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 2nd edn 1970

___ Selections from the Writings of 'Abdu'l-Bahá. Compiled by the Research Department of the Universal House of Justice; translated by a Committee at the Bahá'í World Centre and by Marzieh Gail. Haifa: Bahá'í World Centre, 1978

___ Some Answered Questions. Collected and translated from the Persian by Laura Clifford Barney, with a new introduction, Wilmette, Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 4th rev. edn 1981

Aristotle, The Nicomachean Ethics. Translated with Commentaries and Glossary by Hippocrates G. Apostle, Dordrecht, Netherlands/Boston, Mass.: D. Reidel Publishing Company, 1975

Auer, Alfons, Autonome Moral und christlicher Glaube, Tübingen 21977

Báb, Selections from the Writings of the Báb. Compiled by the Research Department of the Universal House of Justice and translated by Habib Taherzadeh with the assistance of a Committee at the Bahá'í World Centre. Haifa: Bahá'í World Centre 1976

Bahá'í Prayers. A Selection of prayers revealed by Bahá'u'lláh, the Báb, and 'Abdu'l-Bahá. Wilmette/Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust 1982

Bahá'í Prayers. A Selection. London/UK: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, rev. edn 1951

Bahá'u'lláh, Epistle to the Son of the Wolf. Translated by Shoghi Effendi. Wilmette/Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, rev. edn 1976

___ Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá'u'lláh. Translated by Shoghi Effendi. Wilmette/Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, rev. edn 1978

___ The Hidden Words. Translated by Shoghi Effendi. London: Bahá'í Publishing Trust 1949. Wilmette/Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, rev. edn 1954

___ The Kitáb-i-Aqdas. The Most Holy Book. Haifa: Bahá'í World Centre, 1992

___ The Kitáb-i-Íqán. The Book of Certitude. Translated by Shoghi Effendi. Wilmette/Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 6th edn 1974

___ Prayers and Meditations. Compiled and translated by Shoghi Effendi. London: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, rev. edn 1978

___ The Seven Valleys and The Four Valleys. Translated by Al-Kuli Khán (Nablu'd-Dawlih), assisted by Marzieh Gail. Wilmette/Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 5th edn 1978

___ Synopsis and Codification of the Laws and Ordinances of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas the Most Holy Book of Bahá'u'lláh. Haifa, Bahá'í World Centre, 1st edn 1973

___ Tablets of Bahá'u'lláh revealed after the Kitáb-i-Aqdas. Compiled by the Research Department of the Universal House of Justice and translated by Habib Taherzadeh with the assistance of a Committee at the Bahá'í World Centre. Haifa: Bahá'í World Centre 1978

Böckle, Franz (ed.), Christlicher Glaube in moderner Gesellschaft. Vol. 12, Freiburg 1981

Bollnow, O. T., Wesen und Wandel der Tugenden. Frankfurt 1981

Bramly, Serge, Terre Wakan. Univers sacré des Indiens d'Amérique du Nord. Paris: Éditions Robert Laffont 1974

Confucius, The Analects of Confucius. Translated and annotated by Arthur Waley. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd 61971

Corti, Egon C., Geschichte des Rauchens. Die trockene Trunkenheit. Frankfurt 1986

Eisenburg, Josef, "Süchtiges Verhalten als Krankheitsursache", in: Josef Eisenburg (ed.), Sucht. Ein Massenphänomen als Alarmsignal. Schriften der Katholischen Akademie in Bayern, Bd. 126. Düsseldorf: Patmos-Verlag 1988

Engisch, Karl, Einführung in das juristische Denken. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer 1956

Fádl-i-Mázinderání, Amr wa Khalq, Vol. 3. Teheran 1971

Fananapazir, Khazeh and Stephen Lambden, "The Tablet of Medicine (Law-i-iBáb ) of Bahá'u'lláh. Introduction, translation and notes", in: Stephen Lambden (ed.), Bahá'í Studies Bulletin, Vol. 6:4-7:2. Newcastle-upon-Thyne, October 1992

Faruki, Kemal, "Legal Implications for Today of al-Akhám al-Khamsa", in: Hovannisian, Richard G. (ed.), Ethics in Islam. Ninth Giorgio Levi Della Vida Biennial Conference. Malibu/Cal.: Undens Publications 1983

Faust, V. and H. Mensen, "On the Epidemiology and Psychology of Smoking", in: V. Faust (ed.) Suchtgefahren in unserer Zeit. Stuttgart 1983

Fazel, Seena and Khazeh Fananapazir, "Some Interpretative Principles in the Bahá'í Writings", in: The Bahá'í Studies Review. A Publication of the Association for Bahá'í Studies, English Speaking Europe, Vol. 2 No. 1. 1992

Friedlaender, Michael, The Jewish Religion, 2nd edn rev. and enl. London: Shapiro, Vallentine and Co 1922

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang v., Faust. Part One. New York: Philosophical Library 1958

___ Gedenkausgabe der Werke. Briefe und Gespräche, Vol. 22 Gespräche, ed. by Ernst Beutler. Zürich 1949

Goldziher, Introduction to Islamic Theology and Law. Translated by Andras and Ruth Hamori, with an introduction and additional notes by Bernard Lewis. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press 1981

Grimm, Jacob und Wilhelm, Deutsches Wörterbuch, Vol. 20. Leipzig 1920

Höffe, Otfried, "Personale Bedingungen für ein sinnerfülltes Leben", in: Eisenburg, Josef, Sucht. Ein Massenphänomen als Alarmsignal. Schriften der Katholischen Akademie in Bayern, Bd. 126. Düsseldorf: Patmos-Verlag 1988

Horace, Satires, Epistles, and ars poetica. With an English translation by H. Rushton Fairclough. London, Cambridge/Mass.: Harvard University Press 1966

Hovannisian, Richard G. (ed.), Ethics in Islam. Ninth Giorgio Levi Della Vida Biennial Conference. Malibu/Cal.: Undens Publications 1983

Konträr. Das Meinungsmagazin, September 1988

Luther, Martin, D. Martin Luther's Werke. Kritische Gesammtausgabe. Unveränderter Abdruck 1967 der bei Hermann Böhlaus Nachfolger, Weimar, erschienenen Ausgabe, Vol. 1, 1883

Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, begründet von Dr. Michael Buchberger, Vol. 3, Freiburg, zweite, völlig neu bearbeitete Auflage 1957, Sonderausgabe 1986

Maulana Muhammad 'Al, A Manual of Hadíth, Lahore, n. d.

Mawdudi, Abul A'lá, Towards Understanding Islam, published by The Islamic Foundation. Leicester/UK 1980

McLean, Jack, "Prolegomena to a Bahá'í Theology", in: The Journal of Bahá'í Studies, Vol. 5, no. 1. Ottawa 1992

Nabl-i-Zarand, The Dawn-Breakers. Nabíl's Narrative of the Early Days of the Bahá'í Revelation. Translated from the original Persian text and edited by Shoghi Effendi. Wilmette/Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 1932

Nietzsche, Friedrich, The Will to Power. London: Widenfeld and Nicolson 1968

Nöcker, Guido, Von der Drogen- und Suchtprävention. Herford 1990 (thesis)

Pieper, Josef, Das Viergespann. Klugheit, Gerechtigkeit, Tapferkeit, Maß. München: Kösel-Verlag 1964

Pollak, J. E., Persien. Das Land und seine Bewohner. Leipzig 1865

Pope John Paul II, Veritatis Splendor. Glanz der Wahrheit, mit einem Vorwort von Leo Scheffczyk. Stein am Rhein: Christiana Verlag 1993

Schaefer, Udo, Die Freiheit und ihre Schranken. Zum Begriff der Freiheit in Bahá'u'lláh's Kitáb-i-Aqdas. Hofheim: Bahá'í-Verlag 1994

___ Die Grundlagen der Verwaltungsordnung der Bahá'í. Heidelberg 1957 (thesis)

___ The Imperishable Dominion. The Bahá'í Faith and the Future of Mankind. Oxford: George Ronald 1983

___ "The New Morality: an outline", in: The Bahá'í Studies Review, Vol. 5, No. 1, 1995

Schaefer, Udo/Nicola Towfigh/Ulrich Gollmer, Desinformation als Methode. Die Bahá'ísmus-Monographie des F. Ficicchia. Hildesheim: Olms-Verlag 1995

Schiller, Friedrich, William Tell; an historical play from the German of Schiller. With notes and illustrations, by William Peter. Heidelberg: Verlag Winter 1839

Schmidt, Ferdinand, "Folgekosten des Rauchens", in: Deutsche Hauptstelle gegen Suchtgefahren (ed.), Jahrbuch zur Frage der Suchtgefahren 1983. Hamburg 1983

Shoghi Effendi, The Advent of Divine Justice. Wilmette/Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 1971

___ Bahá'í Administration, Wilmette/Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 6 edn 1953

___ God passes by. Wilmette, Illinois: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 7th reprint 1974

___ Principles of Bahá'í Administration. A Compilation. London: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 3rd edn 1973

___ The World Order of Bahá'u'lláh. Wilmette/Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust, 2nd rev. edn 1974

Shorter Encyclopaedia of Islam, ed. on behalf of the Royal Netherlands Academy by H. A. R. GiBáb and J. H. Kramers. Leiden, photomechanic reprint 1961

Sours, Michael W., "Seeing with the Eye of God: Relationships between Theology and Interpretation", in: The Bahá'í Studies Review, Vol. 1 no. 1, pp. 31 ff.

Stumpfe, K. D., "Wie groß ist die Zahl der abhängigen Raucher?", in: Suchtgefahren: Beiträge aus Fürsorge und Forschung. Fachorgan der deutschen Gesellschaft für Suchtforschung und Suchttherapie, October 1987, Heft 5. Hamburg: Neuland Verlag

Tabari, 'Ali Ibn Sahl Rabban Tabari, The Book of Religion and Empire. A Semi-Official Defence and Exposition of Islam, written by order at the court and with the assistance of the Caliph Mutawakkil by Ali Tabari, translated with a critical apparatus from an apparently unique Ms. in the John Rylands Library by A. Mingana, D. D. Lahore: Law Publishing Co (n. d.)

Tacitus, The Histories. The Annals in four volumes, Vol. IV. London: Heinemann 1962

Taherzadeh, Adib, The Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh. 'Akká. The Early Years 1868-77, Vol. 3, Oxford: George Ronald, 1983;
The Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh. Mazra'ih and Bahjí: 1877-92, Vol. 4. Oxford: George Ronald 1987

Udáná. Das Buch der feierlichen Worte des Erhabenen. Eine kanonische Schrift des Pl-Buddhismus, in erstmaliger deutscher Übersetzung aus dem Urtext von Dr. Karl Seidensticker. Augsburg 1920

Zoohori, Elias, The Throne of the Inner Temple. A Compilation. Selections from Bahá'í Writings on the Human Body, its Health and Nutrition, Purity and Holiness, Science of Medicine, Illnesses, and physical and spiritual Healing. Kingston/Jamaica: University of the West Indies 1985

Compilations

Huqúqu'lláh. The Right of God. Compiled by the Research Department of the Universal House of Justice, Bahá'í World Centre, published by the Bahá'í Publishing Trust. Oakham/England 1986

The Divine Art of Living. Selections from Writings of Bahá'u'lláh and 'Abdu'l-Bahá, compiled by Mabel Hade Pain. Wilmette/Ill.,: Bahá'í Publishing Trust 1974

The Universal House of Justice, Prohibition of Intoxicating Drinks. A compilation published by the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá'ís of New Zealand, Auckland 1986

Journals

Bahá'í Studies Bulletin, Stephen Lambden (ed.), Newcastle upon Tyne

Bahá'í Studies Review. A Publication of the Association for Bahá'í Studies, English Speaking Europe. London

Cancer Epidemiology. Biomakers & Prevention: A Publication of the American Association for Cancer Research. Baltimore/Md.

Journal of Bahá'í Studies, The. A Publication of the Association for Bahá'í Studies. Ottawa/Canada

Medical Tribune. Internationale Wochenzeitschrift. Frankfurt-Wiesbaden

Neue Juristische Wochenschrift, in Verbindung mit dem dt. Anwaltsverein und der Bundesrechtsanwaltskammer hrsg. NJW-Fundhefte: systematischer Nachweis der deutschen Rechtsprechung, Zeitschriftenaufsätze und selbständigen Schriften. München-Frankfurt: Beck Verlag 1992

Star of the West. A Bahá'í Magazine. Oxford: George Ronald, reprint 1978

Chapter 9

End Notes

1. Verband der Cigarettenindustrie
2. quoted from Konträr. Das Meinungsmagazin, September 1988.
3. "L'usage du tabac était avant tout d'ordre religieux. Les shamans s'en servaient pour établir des rapports avec leurs Esprits tutélaires pour 'écarter la maladie' d'un patient... Le tabac jouait un rôle important dans presque toutes les cérémonies, que ce soit un rite de puberté, des funérailles, des préparatifs pour une expédition guerrière, ou une fête célébrant la nouvelle année... Sur les Plaines et dans l'Est, le tabac était un élément culturel essentiel. Les 'ballots sacrés' contenaient presque toujours une pipe et du tabac. Chaque fois que le ballot était ouvert, la pipe était fumée" (Serge Bramly, Terre Wakan, p. 85).
4. In Arabic the word shariba is used for drinking as well as for smoking.
5. A cultural history of smoking is offered by Egon C. Corti, Geschichte des Rauchens. Die trockene Trunkenheit [A History of Smoking, the Dry Intoxicant], Frankfurt 1986 (Insel-Taschenbuch Nr. 904).
6. Misocapnus sive de abusu Tobacci lusus regius, Londini 1603 [The Smoking Opponent or A Royal Treasure Piece on the Misuse of Tobacco].
7. quoted from Corti, op. cit., p. 139.
8. Johann Wolfgang v. Goethe, Briefe und Gespräche, Vol. 22 (Gespräche), p. 518-519.
9. Institut für Präventive Pneumologie.
10. Süddeutsche Zeitung, 3 March 1992.
11. Prof. Dr. Ferdinand Schmidt, Weltgesundheitsbroschüre [World Health Brochure], 1988.
12. The medical aspects of smoking are not presented here as the health hazards of smoking may be assumed to be common knowledge today. The relevant literature is vast and can only be briefly referred to here. Some sources for further information include: Preston, Samuel H., Older Male Mortality and Cigarette Smoking, Westport, Connecticut, Greenwood Publication Group Inc., 1976 (Repr. of 1970 ed.); Ward, Brian, Smoking and Health, Chicago: Watts, Franklin, Inc., 1986; World Health Organisation Staff (ed.), Legislative Responses to Tobacco Use, Hingham, Massachusetts: Kluwer Academic Books, 1991.
13. On the resulting costs see Ferdinand Schmidt, "Folgekosten des Rauchens" [The Costs Resulting from Smoking], in: Deutsche Hauptstelle gegen Suchtgefahren (ed.), Jahrbuch zur Frage der Suchtgefahren 1983, Hamburg 1983.
14. "Die Nichtraucher machen mobil" [The Non-smokers are Mobilising], "Den Rauchern bläst der Rauch ins Gesicht" [Smoke is Blowing in the Smokers' Face] were the titles of two German television programmes documenting the situation "on the smoking front".
15. Press release of the German Federal Ministry for Youth, Family, Women, and Health of November 6, 1988.
16. Medical Tribune, 25 September 1987.
17. according to Süddeutsche Zeitung, 11 November 1994.
18. Die Zeit, 19 September 1986.
19. Konträr. Das Meinungsmagazin, September 1988.
20. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Selections from the Writings or 'Abdu'l-Bahá 129:9.
21. The medical and ethical aspects of smoking were the topic of a German Bahá'í Summer School in 1989. The present manuscript was the author's lecture.
22. cf. U. Schaefer, The Imperishable Dominion, pp. 1-24; 222-224; U. Schaefer, Beyond the Clash of Religions, pp. 27ff.
23. The Will to Power, No. 320.
24. cf. The Imperishable Dominion, pp. 37-42; 47-49.
25. Josef Pieper, Das Viergespann, p. 11.
26. The Analects XVII, 13.
27. "Breathe not the sins of others so long as thou art thyself a sinner. Shouldst thou transgress this command, accursed wouldst thou be" (The Hidden Words, Arabic 27). "How couldst thou forget thine own faults and busy thyself with the faults of others? Whoso doeth this is accursed of Me" (The Hidden Words, Arabic 26). "The tongue I have designed for the mention of Me, defile it not with detraction. If the fire of self overcome you, remember your own faults and not the faults of My creatures, inasmuch as every one of you knoweth his own self better than he knoweth others" (The Hidden Words, Persian 66).
28. Gleanings 145.
29. Kitáb-i-Aqdas, 99, 148, 183.
30. Lawh-i-Ahmad, Bahá'í Prayers, p. 210.
31. Bahá'u'lláh, Tablets 9:3.
32. Bahá'í Prayers, p. 174.
33. "sine ira et studio", Tacitus, Annals I, 1.
34. "He calls it reason, but he suits it to his ways, more brutish than the brutes" (Goethe, Faust I, Prologue in Heaven, Mephistopheles).
35. Bundesministerium für Jugend, Familie und Gesundheit.
36. Hauptstelle gegen Suchtgefahren.
37. Evangelische Zentralstelle für Weltanschauungsfragen.
38. Katholische Akademie in Bayern.
39. Evangelische Akademie Baden.
40. This reminds one of Deng Xiaoping's pragmatic motto: "Look for truth in the facts!"
41. cf. Alfons Auer, Autonome Moral und christlicher Glaube [Autonomous Morals and Christian Faith], Tübingen 1977, pp. 12, 21, 28-30, 46-47; also Franz Böckle, Fundamentalmoral [Fundamental Morals], München 1977; idem, "Werte und Normbegründung" [Values and the Foundation of Norms], in: Franz Böckle (ed.), Christlicher Glaube in moderner Gesellschaft [Christian Faith in Modern Society], Vol. 12, Freiburg 1981, p. 37. According to Josef Pieper, systematic moral theology today largely corresponds to the "general moral conscience"; in both he sees expression of "a deeply rooted spiritual transition process" (Das Viergespann, p. 18). Cf. also: Udo Schaefer, The Imperishable Dominion, pp. 222-224; idem, Die Freiheit und ihre Schranken, p. 48. U. Schaefer/N. Towfigh/U. Gollmer, Desinformation als Methode, p. 311. This process has been the subject of harsh criticism by Pope John Paul II in his encyclical "Veritatis Splendor" in 1993 (cf. No. 13, 15, 84ff., 102 ff, 114ff.).
42. "The episode of Sinai has been re-enacted in this Revelation... He hath admonished all men to observe that which is conducive to the exaltation of the Cause of God and will guide mankind unto His straight Path" (Tablets 17:60 [p. 248]).
43. "When it is uncertain whether a thing should be declared as forbidden or as permitted, permission prevails for it is the root" (I. Goldziher, Introduction to Islamic Theology and Law, p. 56); cf. also Kemal Faruki, "Legal Implications for Today of al-Akhám al-Khamsa", in: Hovannisian, Ethics in Islam, p. 66.
44. Persian Bayán IX, 7; Khasá'il-i-Sa'bih (cf. The Dawnbreakers, pp. 143-144).
45. Namely until the coming of "Him whom God shall make manifest" which is Bahá'u'lláh and His Revelation of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas.
46. The logical legal principle lex posterior derogat legi priori (Dig. 1,4,4 Modestin [the latter law abrogates the former]) is also reflected in divine Law: the prophet Muhammad abrogated the law of the Torah with the Qur'ánic law, the Báb the sharí'a with the Bayán. However, the relationship between the Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh to that of the Báb was a special one. The shortness of the mission of the Báb is one of the mysteries of the Bahá'í Faith: "That so brief a span should have separated this most mighty and wondrous Revelation from Mine own previous Manifestation, is a secret that no man can unravel and a mystery such as no mind can fathom." (Bahá'u'lláh, quoted in The World Order of Bahá'u'lláh, p.124).
47. In the Tablet Ishráqát we read: "Our exalted Herald ... hath revealed certain laws. However, in the realm of His revelation these laws were made subject to Our sanction, hence this Wronged One hath put some of them into effect by embodying them in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas in different words. Others We set aside. He holdeth in His hand the authority. He doeth what He willeth and He ordaineth whatsoever He pleaseth. He is the Almighty, the All-Praised. There are also ordinances newly revealed" (Tablets (8:71 [= p. 132]).
48. cf. Adib Taherzadeh, The Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh, Vol. 3, p. 231 with reference to 'Abdu'l-Bahá, quoted by Fádl-i-Mázinderání (Amr va Khalq, Vol. I, 8).
49. Haifa, Bahá'í World Centre 1978.
50. see the note on p. 159 of Tablets of Bahá'u'lláh.
51. from Arabic huqqa, an oriental pipe for smoking, here a metaphor for smoking.
52. This is a reference to the injunction of the Báb prohibiting smoking (see footnote 44). As the early Bábs refused to smoke, they were readily recognised and persecuted.
53. translated from the Persian, quoted from an unpublished compilation on smoking prepared by the Research Department of the Bahá'í World Centre.
54. Taqíya: the disavowal of one's faith in case of danger (Qur'án 16:106) became of particular significance among the Sh'í'a (cf. Shorter Encyclopaedia of Islam, headword "Taqíya"). While the taqíya was permitted in the Báb Religion, and also during the ministry of Bahá'u'lláh, it is not a recognised principle in the Bahá'í Faith. For more details see U. Schaefer/ N. Towfigh/ U. Gollmer, Desinformation als Methode, pp. 265-273.
55. Selections from the Writings of 'Abdu'l-Bahá 129:8.
56. 'Abdu'l-Bahá has explained that smoking is a form of drinking (in Arabic, the verb shariba is used for "drinking" as well as for "smoking" [cf. Kitáb-i-Aqdas, Synopsis, p. 59, No. 16]).
57. Ex. 20:13-16; Deut. 5:17-20.
58. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Selections 129:5-6.
59. p. 47.
60. Kitáb-i-Aqdas, Note 130.
61. verse 121.
62. cf. Tablets 15.
63. cf. A. Taherzadeh, The Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh, Vol. 4, p. 191ff.
64. verses 37, 105.
65. cf. Karl Engisch, Einführung in das juristische Denken, pp. 85ff.
66. cf. "Exegese", Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, Vol. 3, pp. 1273.
67. Shoghi Effendi explains that "at the very root of the Cause lies the principle of the undoubted right of the individual to self-expression", his freedom "to declare his conscience and set forth his views" (Bahá'í Administration, p. 63): "God has given man a rational power to be used and not killed" (Principles of Bahá'í Administration, p. 25). On the interpretation principles in Scripture cf. Seena Fazel and Khazeh Fananapazir, "Some Interpretative Principles in the Bahá'í Writings", in: The Bahá'í Studies Review. A Publication of the Association for Bahá'í Studies, English Speaking Europe, Vol. 2 No. 1, further Michael W. Sours, "Seeing with the Eye of God: Relationships between Theology and Interpretation". in: The Bahá'í Studies Review, Vol. 1 No. 1, pp. 31; Moojan Momen, "Relativism: A Basis for Bahá'í Metaphysics", in: Studies in Báb and Bahá'í Religions, Vol. 5, ed. Momen, Los Angeles: Kalimat Press 1988. On the whole subject see also U. Schaefer/ N. Towfigh/ U. Gollmer, Desinformation als Methode, pp. 144-154.
68. For further elucidation I refer to my article "The New Morality: an outline", in: The Bahá'í Studies Review, Vol. 5, No. 1, 1995.
69. for example, the twin duties of the Covenant. Cf. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 1.
70. This classification of duties into those towards God, towards humanity, and towards ourselves corresponds to the systematics of duties in Jewish law (cf. M. Friedländer, The Jewish Religion, pp. 273, 292, 319) and in the Islamic sharí'a (cf. A. Mawdudi, Towards Understanding Islam, ch. VII, 1, The Rights to God), although there are noticeable differences in the respective contents.
71. Tablets 7:15; cf. also Gleanings 139:8; Epistle to the Son of the Wolf, paragraph 50.
72. insáf; cf. The Hidden Words, Arabic 2; Tablets 10:3; Gleanings 100:6.
73. Tablets 6:20; 7:36; 10:12; Gleanings 146.
74. Tablets 6:20; 6:38; 8:55; Gleanings 14:15.
75. Tablets 6:20.
76. According to a report in the Süddeutsche Zeitung (11 November 1994), half of all young children in Germany are exposed to tobacco smoke when at home with their parents.
77. Medical Tribune No. 40, October 2, 1987.
78. Bundesgesundheitsblatt [Federal Health Paper] 30 (1987) Nr. 9, pp. 307-318.
79. According to a report by Prof. Dr. Schmidt of Mannheim, Germany, a member of the expert commission "Smoking and Health" at the WHO, in: Zentralmarkt [Central Market], Würzburg, No. 39, September 25, 1986. On the latest research findings on passive smoking see reports in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 8 January 1992 and 22 January 1993 as well as the periodical Cancer Epidemiology, Biomakers and Prevention, Vol. 1, pp. 35.
80. Medical Tribune, 42/78, 1988.
81. Deutsches Ärzteblatt of 25 October 1988.
82. Süddeutsche Zeitung, 21 February 1994.
83. "Der brave Mann denkt an sich selbst [bis] zuletzt" (William Tell I,1).
84. cf. Tablets 4:3,34; The Hidden Words, Arabic 8, Persian 43, 69.
85. The Hidden Words, Persian 38.
86. Gleanings, 5:6.
87. Gleanings 147:1; cf. also Gleanings 35:5; 82:1; 136:1; 43:3; The Hidden Words, Persian 32.
88. Gleanings 43:3; cf. also 35:5; 82:1; 136:1; The Hidden Words, Persian 32.
89. The main illnesses for habitual smokers are smoker's leg, cerebral apoplexy, heart attack, and most of all, numerous forms of cancer. Approximately 30% of deaths from cancer in the Federal Republic of Germany are caused by smoking (press release by the Federal Health Ministry, 29 April 1987).
90. Tablets 11:13; Gleanings 117.
91. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, The Secret of Divine Civilisation, p. 96.
92. op. cit., p. 103.
93. Tablets 7:11; 9:4.
94. Tablets 10:23.
95. The Hidden Words, Arabic 2.
96. Gleanings 100:6.
97. Kitáb-i-Íqán 110 [= p. 102/103].
98. The Hidden Words, Arabic 11, 13.
99. Gleanings 27:2.
100. Arabic 3.
101. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Selections 118:1.
102. Kitáb-i-Íqán 108, 110 (pp. 100, 102); Some Answered Questions 55:5.
103. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Paris Talks 3:7.
104. Mat. 5:48.
105. The Hidden Words, Persian 14.
106. The Hidden Words, Persian 19.
107. The Hidden Words, Persian 39.
108. The Hidden Words, Persian 40.
109. The Hidden Words, Persian 41.
110. The Seven Valleys, p. 11.
111. The Seven Valleys, p. 34.
112. The Seven Valleys, p. 35.
113. Gleanings 128:2,3.
114. Gleanings 128:4; cf. Qur'án 5:89; 2:163;168.
115. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 54, 83, 178; Tablets 6:2,4; 8:33; 10:6,9; 12:4; The Hidden Words, Arabic 68; Persian 45; Gleanings 14:18; 29:2; 46:4; 60:3; 100:1; 149.
116. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 64.
117. Gleanings 137:3; Tablets 9:4.
118. The Hidden Words, Persian 32, 34, 45, 65, 68; Tablets 4:25; 6:36; 7:59; 11:23.
119. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 2.
120. Gleanings 81.
121. Persian, envoy.
122. Gleanings 136:6.
123. from Greek hedoné = lust, pleasure, the philosophical doctrine founded by Aristippos and Epicur that pleasure is the principle good and should be the aim of action. Hedonism denotes a pleasure-seeking life-style as well.
124. Les Fleurs du Mal, XLIX, L'invitation au voyage.
125. The Hidden Words, Persian 45.
126. 45:22.
127. Kitáb-Íqán, paragraph 251.
128. Gleanings 153:1.
129. Gleanings 153:4.
130. Gleanings 136:6.
131. Gleanings 135:6.
132. The Hidden Words, Persian 45.
133. Russel, M., "Cigarette smoking: Natural history of a dependence disorder", in: Br. J. Med. Psychol. 44 (1971), 1-16; Krasnogor, N. (ed.), "Cigarette smoking as a dependence process", in: NIDA Research Monograph, No. 23, Rockville, 1979; Opitz, K. and M. Horstmann, "Nicotin, Pharmakologie eines abhängig machenden Stoffes" [Nicotine, pharmacology of an dependence creating substance], in: Deutsches Ärzteblatt, 78 (1982), 1869-1873; Stumpfe, K. D., "Die Nikotinsucht" in: Suchtgefahren 30 (1984) pp. 76-81.
134. Eisenburg, Josef, Süchtiges Verhalten als Krankheitsursache [Addictive Behaviour as a Cause of Illnesses], p. 47.
135. Faust, V. and H. Mensen, "On the Epidemiology and Psychology of Smoking", in: V. Faust (ed.) Suchtgefahren in unserer Zeit [Addictive Dangers in our Time], Stuttgart 1983, pp. 33ff.
136. Stumpfe, K. D., "Wie groß ist die Zahl der abhängigen Raucher?" [How great is the number of addicted smokers?], in: Suchtgefahren [Addictive Dangers]. Fachorgan der deutschen Gesellschaft für Suchtforschung und Suchttherapie, October 1987, Heft 5, pp. 230ff.
137. The deprivation syndrome is indicated by subjective signs such as restlessness, numbness, headache, voracious appetite, sleeping disorders, shakiness, concentration debility, anxiety, sickness, and nausea. Objective conditions are alterations of electrophysiological conditions of the brain, a decreased heart rate, reduced blood pressure, and an almost obligatory increase in weight after interrupting the supply of nicotine (Eisenburg, op. cit., p. 52) An estimated 59% of smokers are addicted to nicotine (Stumpfe, op. cit., pp. 330, 335).
138. According to the findings of Russian psychologists at the Bashkirian University, the consumption of loud rock music over a long period of time has a strong narcotic effect on listeners. It stimulates the production of morphine-like substances in the body. When rock fans are deprived of their regular dose of music for a number of days, they show the same deprivation symptoms as drug addicts; their irritability increases, their hands shake, and their pulse is irregular (Süddeutsche Zeitung, 9 June 1987).
139. Höffe, Otfried, "Personale Bedingungen für ein sinnerfülltes Leben" [Personal Requirements for a Meaningful Life], in: Eisenburg, Josef, Sucht, p. 144.
140. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Book III (1119b).
141. cf. Gleanings 163:2,3; Tablets 6:31; 11:19; Kitáb-i-Aqdas 43.
142. exemplified by the common California farewell: "Have fun!"
143. As did the State Court of Lübeck, Germany in 1992 with its sensational judgement of 19 December 1991 (2 Ns/KI 167/90) to the German Federal Constitutional Court. With respect to the liability to punishment of the consumption and the sale of hashish, the criminal court saw an offence against article 2 of the German Constitution guaranteeing the basic right to individual liberty and self-determination and demanded legalisation of the consumption sale of hashish. It said, "Intoxication, just as eating, drinking, and sex, belongs to the fundamental needs of man. The more technical, fast, and functional a society is, the greater is the need to escape this embrace." The "right to intoxication" would be protected by the Constitution in the framework of the basic rights of a citizen (Neue Juristische Wochenschrift 1992, 1571-1577).
144. Höffe, op. cit., in: Eisenburg, Josef, Sucht, p.153.
145. I, 3, 1095 b.
146. Mat. 5:48.
147. The Hidden Words, Persian 40.
148. Gleanings 153:6.
149. cf. Gen. 25:34.
150. The Hidden Words, Persian 14.
151. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, in: Bahá'í Prayers, p. 57.
152. Prayers and Meditations 137:2.
153. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Bahá'í Prayers (English edition) 46:2.
154. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Selections 146:8.
155. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Promulgation of Universal Peace, p. 458.
156. Tablets 5:14.
157. Tablets 8:19.
158. Islamic theological expression for man's relationship to God, the adoration of God (cf. Shorter Encyclopaedia of Islam, p. 525).
159. Tablets 8:19; cf. Qur'án 2:254.
160. Qur'án 21:23.
161. "We speak one word, and by it we intend one and seventy meanings" (Kitáb-i-Íqán 284 [= p. 255]).
162. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 65.
163. cf. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 20: "When We heard the clamour of the children as yet unborn, We doubled their share."
164. This concept of law largely corresponds to Islamic doctrine, cf. Shorter Encyclopaedia of Islam, keyword: "Sharí'a" (Number 2, p. 525). Also, the Jewish philosopher Moses Maimonides (1135-1204), who tried to find reasonable explanations for every law in the Torah, emphasises that, with few exceptions, the Torah withholds the purpose and objective of the precepts and that it is by no means always possible to expound the purpose of a commandment or prohibition (cf. M. Friedländer, The Jewish Religion, p. 243).
165. Deut. 4:40; cf. M. Friedländer, The Jewish Religion, p. 242.
166. The Secret of Divine Civilisation, p. 60; Gleanings 133:2.
167. Gleanings 45.
168. Gleanings 133:1.
169. Gleanings 153:9.
170. 155; cf. also "Notes" 169 to the Kitáb-i-Aqdas.
171. According to the Qur'án 5:92 as prohibited as wine ("an abomination of Satan's work"), gambling possesses a high addictive potential even though it is not an actual substance. Obsessive gambling can diminish or utterly suspend legal responsibility and lead to the moral destruction of the personality. Therefore, gambling is also prohibited in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas (155).
172. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 119.
173. As in the Qur'án (ar-Rahiq al-makhtúm: "choice sealed wine, the seal of musk" [83:25-26]) and as in Islamic mysticism, wine is a metaphor frequently used in the Writings of Bahá'u'lláh for the intoxicating effect of the revealed Word ("the wine of Mine utterance" (Tablets 4:7; 7:9); "My sealed Wine" (Tablets 14:4); "the choice, sealed wine" (17:129); "the wine of immortal life" (The Hidden Words, Persian 55); cf. also Kitáb-i-Aqdas 4, 5 and Note No. 2). Bahá'u'lláh revealed: "Drink ye, O handmaidens of God, the Mystic Wine from the cup of My words. Cast away, then, from you that which your minds abhor, for it hath been forbidden unto you in His Tablets and His Scriptures. Beware lest ye barter away the River that is life indeed for that which the souls of the pure-hearted detest. Become ye intoxicated with the wine of the love of God, and not with that which deadeneth your minds, O ye that adore Him! Verily, it hath been forbidden unto every believer, whether man or woman. Thus hath the sun of My commandment shone forth above the horizon of My utterance" (quoted from Prohibition of Intoxicating Drinks, No. 5). In another Tablet Bahá'u'lláh states, "Beware lest ye exchange the Wine of God for your own wine, for it will stupefy your minds, and turn your face away from the Countenance of God, the All-Glorious, the Peerless, the Inaccessible. Approach it not, for it hath been forbidden unto you by the behest of God, the Exalted, the Almighty" (Kitáb-i-Aqdas, Notes No. 144). 'Abdu'l-Bahá explains this prohibition as follows: "The drinking of wine is, according to the text of the Most Holy Book, forbidden; for it is the cause of chronic diseases, weakeneth the nerves, and consumeth the mind" (quoted from Prohibition of Intoxicating Drinks, No. 6).
174. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 155.
175. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 190.
176. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 119. On "the wicked hashish" 'Abdu'l-Bahá says that it "extinguishes the mind, freezeth the spirit, petrifieth the soul, wasteth the body and leaveth man frustrated and lost" (quoted from Prohibition of Intoxicating Drinks, No. 40).
177. cf. the report in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 5 June 1992 on a convention of public prosecutors and social workers in Hamburg.
178. cf. reports in Süddeutsche Zeitung, 8 April, 2 and 5 June 1992.
179. As for example Guido Nöcker, who ascribes a positive effect to drugs, recommending the "states of mind connected to intoxication and ecstasy as a means of gaining knowledge as well as a form of affective discharge" of that knowledge and seeing the "risks in the consumption of alcohol, tobacco, and other illegal drugs" as "acceptable" because they "offer a way to act out and compensate for conflicts and stress which have no other solutions available or known, at least in our current conceptualisation of life" (Von der Drogen- und Suchtprävention, pp. 211, 150).
180. cf. Gleanings 81; 82; 83; 86.
181. Gleanings 95:1; 83:1.
182. Gleanings 80:1.
183. Some Answered Questions 52:3.
184. "There existeth in man a faculty which deterreth him from, and guardeth him against, whatever is unworthy and unseemly, and which is known as his sense of shame. This, however, is confined to but a few." (Tablets 6:18).
185. cf. The Hidden Words, Arabic 58.
186. "What? Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's" (I Cor. 6:19-20; cf. also I Cor. 6:15).
187. According to Jewish and Christian tradition, the biblical prohibition against killing (Ex. 20:13) also applies to suicide (cf. also Rom. 14:7). The Qur'án contains an explicit prohibition of suicide (4:29). Also in the Bahá'í teachings, God is the sole Lord over life and death. Therefore individuals may not arbitrarily shorten the time given for their perfection. Individuals should "gratefully and patiently" accept "all difficulties and afflictions" that may be a means of self perfection ('Abdu'l-Bahá, quoted from Fádl-i-Mázinderání, Amr wa Khalq, Vol. 3, p. 14). The suicide of Haidar Alá who took his life out of his ardent desire to become a martyr during the time of Bahá'u'lláh was accepted "as a sign of Our mercy" by Bahá'u'lláh, but He prohibited such acts for all times: "However, this station has ended with him. Who, after him, commits such an act will not be mentioned before God. Such deeds never were and never will be our desire for you" (unauthorised translation, quoted from Amr wa Khalq, Vol. 3, p. 12/13).
188. Martin Luther thought that an early death was best, "the sooner the better. For, as St. Cyprian says, nothing is more advantageous to a Christian than to die early. But we prefer to listen to the words of the pagan Juvenal when he says: 'Orandum est, ut sit mens sana in corpore sano'" (Luther, Werke [WA] I, 418, 3).
189. V:12.
190. Báb, Selections 3:23:1 (p. 95).
191. From a letter written on behalf of Shoghi Effendi to an individual believer, 17 July 1937, quoted from E. Zoohori, The Throne of the Inner Temple 54.
192. 60–140 AD.
193. Satirae X ("Orandum est, ut sit mens sana in corpore sano".
194. Star of the West, Vol. VIII No. 18, p. 229/230.
195. quoted from The Divine Art of Living, p. 58.
196. The Arabic text is published in Majmu 'a-yi alwáh-i mubáraka (Cairo 1920), Reprint Wilmette/Ill.: Bahá'í Publishing Trust 1981, pp. 222-226. The English text quoted above is taken from the provisional translation of Khazeh Fananapazir & Stephen Lambden, in: "The Tablet of Medicine (Lawh-i-Tibb) of Bahá'u'lláh. Introduction, translation and notes", in: Stephen Lambden (ed.), Bahá'í Studies Bulletin, Vol. 6:4-7:2, October 1992, pp. 18ff. The original text is on pp. 25ff. According to this provisional translation the versification of the verse quoted above is VII:5. This Tablet has been translated into Western languages only in extracts. A. Taherzadeh, The Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh, Vol. 3, pp. 358-360 gives a summary of key-points of this Tablet and of its recipient, Aqá Mírzá Muhammad-Ridá.
197. op. cit. III:5. In an annotation (p. 39) the authors point out that "by 'harmful habits' (al-i 'áda al-mudirra) which should be avoided, the partaking... of addictive substances is probably intended; such 'substances' as can, from the Bahá'í and ethico-religious perspective, be viewed as calamitous for human beings".
198. cf. pp. 16ff., 34ff.
199. cf. pp. 19ff.
200. published in Selections 129.
201. The duties that are to be derived from the virtue of purity are also of the kind that we have towards ourselves.
202. cf. Grimm, Deutsches Wörterbuch, key-word "Reinheit [purity]", Vol. 14, pp. 680-699.
203. cf. Bollnow, O. T., Wesen und Wandel der Tugenden, p. 49.
204. Lev. 15:19-23.
205. Gen. 7:2; 8:20 and following. Impure animals were mostly beasts of prey, carrion-eating animals, animals living in the earth or in hostile environments, such as deserts or ruins. The consumption of these animals was dangerous.
206. Jes. 1:10-17; Jer. 7:21 and following.
207. "Wash you, make you clean" (Is. 1:16). Likewise Friedländer's The Jewish Religion (Part II "Our Duties", p. 237), also provides a detailed account only of ritual purity.
208. Ps. 51:10; cf. Prayers and Meditations 155.
209. Ps. 73:1.
210. 1:16.
211. Ez. 36:25.
212. Rom. 3:23-24, 28; 10:4; Gal. 3:24-25; Acts 10:9-16.
213. Mat. 5:8.
214. Mat. 15:11.
215. Mat. 15:18-20. A very similar statement is to be found in the Pálí Canon: "Not through water does man attain purity, how often he may bathe; he who lives a life of truth and virtue is pure" (Udáná I, 9).
216. F. X. Wetzel, Das Goldene Katholikenbuch [The Golden Book of Catholics] ed. A. Fäh 1914.
217. quoted from Maulana Muhammad 'Alí, A Manual of Hadíth IV:1.
218. Muslim b. Al-Hajáj (817-875), the author of one of the six recognised collections of traditions (hadíth), the Sahih (cf. Shorter Encyclopaedia of Islam, p. 417; Goldziher, Introduction to Islamic Theology and Law, p. 39).
219. quoted from Maulana Muhammad Alí, A Manual of Hadíth IV:2
220. Qur'án 74:3-5.
221. 2:222; 9:109.
222. Maulana Muhammad 'Alí, op. cit., Introduction to ch. IV, p. 41.
223. Maulana Muhammad 'Alí, op. cit., p. 41.
224. Tahára, cf. also Shorter Encyclopaedia of Islam, p. 559. The state of ritual impurity (hadath) can, in the case of the so-called "Great" Impurity (janába) only be removed by the "Great Purification" (ghusl), i.e. the cleansing of the whole body, while "lesser" impurity requires only "lesser" purification (wudú'), which mainly consists cleansing the face, the hands, and the lower arms. In the state of hadath a Muslim must neither say the ritual prayers (salát), nor circumambulate the Ka'ba, nor touch a Qur'án (cf. also Shorter Encyclopaedia of Islam, pp. 87, 114, 115, 559, 635). Sexual intercourse, menstruation, and childbirth cause ritual impurity.
225. A Manual of Hadíth IV:13 (p. 46).
226. op. cit., IV:10 (p. 45).
227. op. cit., IV:11 (p. 45).
228. op. cit., IV:16 (p. 47).
229. op. cit., IV:18 (p. 48).
230. al-Bukhárí, Muhammad b. Isma'il (810-870), the author of one of the six recognised collections of traditions (hadíth), the al-Jám'i al-Sahih (cf. Shorter Encyclopaedia of Islam, p. 65; Goldziher, Introduction to Islamic Theology and Law, p. 39)
231. A Manual of Hadíth IV:19 (p. 48).
232. op. cit., IV:22 (p. 49).
233. op. cit., IV:45 (p. 59).
234. op. cit., IV:44 (p. 58).
235. op. cit., IV:51, cf. also Qur'án 2:222.
236. quoted from Ali Tabari, The Book of Religion and Empire, p. 27.
237. 35:19.
238. 20:78.
239. 87:14.
240. 79:18.
241. Báb, Selections 3:5:1-2.
242. op. cit. 3:27:1. Concerning personal cleanliness see also Persian Bayán 8:6 (cf. E. G. Browne, "A Summary of the Persian Bayan", in: M. Momen (ed.), Selections from the Writings of E. G. Browne, p. 397.
243. cf. 182.
244. najása.
245. cf. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 9; Note 12.
246. najis (see Shorter Encyclopaedia of Islam, pp. 431ff.). Whereas according to the Qur'án only the idolaters (mushrikún) are declared unclean ("only they who join Gods are unclean" [9:28]), Shí'ite law includes all non-Muslims, even the ahl al-Kitáb (cf. Qur'án 3:70; 3:71; 3:99), the "People of the Book", Jews and Christians: "It declares the bodily substance of an unbeliever to be ritually unclean, and lists the touching of an unbeliever among the ten things that produce najásá, ritual impurity" (I. Goldziher, Introduction to Islamic Theology and Law, p. 213). The personal physician of Násiri'd-Dín Sháh, Dr. J. E. Pollak, who lived many years in Persia wrote: "Should a European arrive at the beginning of a meal, a Persian is thrown into embarrassment. Good manners forbid sending the European away, but to invite him in is fraught with difficulty because food touched by an unbeliever is considered unclean" (Persien. Das Land und seine Bewohner, Vol. 1, p. 128). "Remnants of food from the table of Europeans are scorned by the servants and left to the dogs"... "A European must not fail to carry with him a drinking vessel. Nowhere will he be offered one, because according to Persian belief every vessel becomes unclean immediately an unbeliever has used it" (ibid., Vol. II, p. 55; cf. p. 356). "Shí'ite law regards food prepared by Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians, Bahá'ís as forbidden foods, and the meat slaughtered by them as forbidden meat" (I. Goldziher, ibid., p. 216. For more details on the Shí'ite legal positions towards other faiths see Goldziher, ibid., pp. 211-217).
247. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 75; cf. "Notes" 106 and 107.
248. Sundry excerpts concerning the Kitáb-i-Aqdas and its Laws, p. 14 (unpublished).
249. As to the term "dogma": This view obviously goes back to the eminent Swiss psychiatrist, professor Auguste Forel, who in his will professed himself to be a Bahá'í and pronounced: "This is the real religion of 'Social Welfare' without dogmas or priests" (quoted from Shoghi Effendi, God passes by, p. 375). Also Jack McLean writes in his excellent contribution "Prolegomena to a Bahá'í Theology" (The Journal of Bahá'í Studies, Vol. 5, No. 1, pp. 25 ff.): "The Bahá'í Faith eschews dogma" (p. 34), however, he made clear that he used the notion "dogma" in its narrower sense of "a final and dully perceived infallible doctrine imposed upon the believers by the institution of a religion" (op. cit.). In this sense, the Bahá'í Faith has no "dogmas", no body of doctrines formerly and authoritatively defined and affirmed, as the Church has. However, the Bahá'í Faith has revealed teachings, as do all religions, which are authoritative and binding for all believers. The teachings of the Báb, Bahá'u'lláh and 'Abdu'l-Bahá are, as McLean aptly points out, "perceived objectively by the community of believers as being statements of truth and as such carry binding authority, harking back to one of the original meanings of "dogma", that is, a revealed doctrine" (op. cit., p. 34). In this broader sense the Bahá'í Faith has "dogmas". It is worth stressing that if it were true that the Bahá'í Faith was a faith without dogma, it would not be a religion at all. Shoghi Effendi spoke of the "tenets and purposes" of the faith (The Advent of Divine Justice, p. 41). For more details on this subject see my doctoral thesis Die Grundlagen der Bahá'í-Verwaltungsordnung, pp. 133ff.).
250. On this subject I refer to Jack McLean's article quoted in the preceding footnote.
251. salát.
252. cf. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 18.
253. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 10. This represents a change from the Qur'ánic ordinance of tayammum (cf. Shorter Encyclopaedia of Islam, p. 588), using sand for the ablution instead of water.
254. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 76.
255. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 74.
256. These concepts were, as Bahá'u'lláh explicitly notes, not ordained by God but rather made up by the 'ulamá' (Kitáb-i-Aqdas 9).
257. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 9.
258. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 75.
259. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 144.
260. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 46.
261. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 74.
262. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 74.
263. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 106.
264. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 106.
265. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 106.
266. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 152.
267. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 106.
268. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 46.
269. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 151.
270. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 106.
271. Kitáb-i-Aqdas 76. This advice "that everyone who has attained to puberty should use ... scent if he can find it" had already been given by the prophet Muhammad (cf. Maulana Muhammad 'Alí, A Manual of Hadíth IV:44).
272. All things "are subject to this same principle of moderation" (Gleanings 163:3), comparable to the ancient motto:
     "Est modus in rebus, sunt certi denique fines
     quos ultra citraque nequit consistere rectum"
     (Horace, Satires I,1,106). ("There is a measure in all things. There are fixed bounds, beyond and short of which right can find no place").
273. Mat. 5:8.
274. para 3.
275. para 214 (= p. 192).
276. "When will this world-afflicting craftiness be transformed into sincerity?" (Tablets 17:104).
277. "Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven" (Mat. 18:3).
278. quoted from Huqúqu'lláh No. 40.
279. Tablets 10:13.
280. Gleanings 141:4.
281. cf. Gleanings 5:3; 128:7.
282. Epistle to the Son of the Wolf, para 40.
283. Gleanings 60:3.
284. The Hidden Words, Arabic 59.
285. The Hidden Words, Arabic 58.
286. Lawh-i-Dukhán.
287. Which not only includes all its derivatives, such as heroin in particular, but also all addictive drugs (cf. Prohibition of Intoxicating Drinks, pp. 39-40).
288. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Selections 129:1-2.
289. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Selections 129:4-5.
290. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Selections 129:6.
291. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Selections 129:7.
292. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Selections 129:9.
293. From a Tablet to an individual believer, translated from the Persian, taken from an unpublished compilation on smoking. These reasons which 'Abdu'l-Bahá cites against smoking coincide for the most part with those given by Goethe pp. 13ff.
294. az-Zaqqúm: "A tree growing in the midst of hell" (Qur'án 37:62,64; 17:60; 44:43; 56:52). In the Persian Bayán (9:7) the Báb refers to tobacco as a leaf of this infernal tree (cf. M. Momen, Selections from the Writings of E G. Browne, p. 405).
295. From a Tablet translated from the Persian, taken from an unpublished compilation on smoking.
296. To use Immanuel Kant's terminology, a matter of "morality" not of "legality".
297. Shoghi Effendi, 14 March 1939.
298. Shoghi Effendi, 26 February 1947; 22 July 1951.
299. Letter of 28 March 1973.
300. Letter of 7 August 1950.
301. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Selections 129:14.
302. Gleanings 139:8.
303. cf. Gleanings 128:3.
304. The Hidden Words, Arabic 28.
305. Vol. 3, pp. 437/438. As the source, Taherzadeh gives: Mehrábkhání, Sharhi-Ahvái-Mírzá 'Abu'l-Fadl-i-Gulpáygáni, pp. 16-17.
306. 'Abdu'l-Bahá, Selections 129:12.

start page