Photographs between p. viii and p.i:
NATIONAL SPIRITUAL ASSEMBLY OF THE BAHÁ'ÍS OF AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND
For Bahá'í Year 91-1934 to 1935
Back Row: (left to right)Mr. P. M. Almond (Treasurer), Miss E. Blundell, Mr. O. A. Whittaker (Vice-Chairman), Mr. R. S. Brown (Chairman)
Front Row: (left to right)Mrs. S. M. Jackman, Mrs. C. Moffitt, Mr. H. Hyde-Dunn, Miss M. B. Stevenson, Miss H. M. Brooks (Secretary)
HANDS OF THE CAUSE OF GOD
Mr. John Henry Hyde-Dunn, Mrs. Clara Hyde-Dunn
Hazíratu'l-Quds, 2 Lang Road, Centennial Park, Sydney
MASHRIQU'L-ADHKÁR, SYDNEY
Letters from the Guardian
FOREWORD
Fifty years ago‹on April 18th 1920‹John Henry and Clara
Hyde-Dunn arrived in Sydney, N.S.W., from the United States
of America. Impelled by the spirit of the Tablets of 'Abdu'l-Bahá's
Divine Plan, they had come to bring to Australia the
Message of Bahá'u'lláh.
The following half-century has witnessed a remarkable
growth and expansion of the Bahá'í Faith and the Bahá'í community
throughout Australasia.
In 1923 the first Bahá'í local spiritual assembly in Australia
was formed in Melbourne, Victoria. Now there are 208 Bahá'í
centres throughout the Commonwealth of Australia. The
National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá'ís of Australia and
New Zealand was formed in 1934. This was followed in 1938
by the first Australian Bahá'í Summer School at Yerrinbool,
N.S.W. In 1944 the National Bahá'í Headquarters was established
in Sydney and in 1956 New Zealand, formerly administered
jointly with Australia, established its own National Spiritual
Assembly.
This marked the beginning of similar development in the
Australasian area. In 1958 the National Spiritual Assembly of
the Bahá'ís of the South Pacific was formed. Two years later the
National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá'ís of the South-West
Pacific came into being, and in 1969 the National Spiritual
Assembly of the Bahá'ís of New Guinea was formed. Currently,
this Ridván, two new national spiritual assemblies‹Tonga and
the Cook Islands, and Samoa‹are being formed.
In 1958 the foundation ceremony took place on the site of
the Bahá'í House of Worship at Ingleside, near Sydney, overlooking
the Pacific Ocean across which the Dunns travelled to
bring the Bahá'í Faith to Australia.
Three years later, in 1961, this Mashriqu'l-Adhkár‹designated
the Mother Temple of the Antipodes‹was dedicated by
Hand of the Cause of God, Amatu'l-Bahá Rúhíyyih Khánum.
A unique feature of this remarkable expansion of the Faith
of Bahá'u'lláh in Australasia has been the guidance, encouragement
and counselling of the Bahá'í community by the Guardian
of the Bahá'í Faith, the late Shoghi Effendi.
From 1921, when he was appointed Guardian by the Will
and Testament of 'Abdu'l-Bahá, to his passing in 1957, a tremendous
expansion of the Faith and its institutions, both in the
Holy Land, the World Centre of the Faith, and throughout the
entire world, of which the growth and expansion in Australasia
is only a part, took place.
It is not our purpose to comment even briefly on the many
significant Bahá'í events which took place during this period
of Guardianship on the world scene. Suffice it to say however,
that the development by the Guardian, Shoghi Effendi, of the
institution of the Hands of the Cause of God and the appointment
in Australasia, firstly of Clara Dunn and later of Collis
Featherstone as Hands of the Cause‹John Hyde-Dunn had post-humously
been elevated to this distinguished rank‹has contributed
much to the spread and development of the Faith in
the Australasian area.
To mark the occasion of the Fiftieth Anniversary of the
arrival of the Bahá'í Faith in Australia, the National Spiritual
Assembly is publishing in one volume hitherto unpublished
letters of the Guardian, Shoghi Effendi, to the National Spiritual
Assembly of Australia and New Zealand.
It is the Assembly's hope that these letters, covering as they
do almost the entire first fifty years of the Faith in Australia,
will bring to a new generation of believers the encouragement,
warmth, love and understanding of the Guardian, Shoghi Effendi,
which they brought in those first fifty years and from which
have sprung deeds of heroism, self-sacrifice and devotion to the
Faith of Bahá'u'lláh throughout Australasia.
National Spiritual Assembly
of the Bahá'ís of Australia.
Hazíratu'l-Quds,
Sydney.
Ridvan 1970.