April 7. On this date in 1947, Shoghi Effendi wrote a Canadian Bahá'í "But he assures you this is due to a misapprehension caused by a very bad translation of the Aqdas...the laws of the Aqdas, as they will be applied in future, are really the protective framework of the New World Order..."
To an individual believer
Dear Bahá'í Sister:
Your letter dated March 10th has been received, and our beloved Guardian has instructed me to answer it on his behalf.
He quite understands how you feel, and you must have been shocked to find something in the teachings you love so dearly which savoured of church fines ! But he assures you this is due to a misapprehension caused by a very bad translation of the Aqdas.
The fines specified by Bahá'u'lláh are very much the same in principle as those applied by common law as a punishment for breaking the law. No one can possibly associate these necessary checks on law-breaking with a church fine of any sort.
If you study the Bahá'í teachings deeply you will see that the laws of the Aqdas, as they will be applied in future, are really the protective framework of the New World Order, and have nothing to do with the ecclesiastical practices of the past.
He will pray that you may become an able and gifted teacher and promoter of our beloved Faith.
With warm greetings,
R. Rabbani
Assuring you of my loving prayers for your spiritual advancement, and the success of every effort you exert for the promotion and consolidation of our beloved Faith,
Your true brother,
Shoghi
On March 5, 1935, Shoghi Effendi wrote "... concerning the "Kitáb-i-Aqdas", he does not think that it would be advisable to circulate at present, whether among the friends or in the outside public, any of the existing translations of this book...When completed, this translation should not, the Guardian feels, be printed entirely and circulated among the believers. But only extracts of it should, with the approval of your N.S.A., be brought to the attention of the friends until such time as the publication of the whole book would be deemed advisable."
On December 27, 1941, Shoghi Effendi wrote the NSA of India giving reasons as to why the Kitáb-i-Aqdas is not circulated amongst all the Bahá'ís or translated into their native languages.
William McElwee Miller and Earl E. Elder's translation of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas was published by the Royal Asiatic Society in 1961 as Al-kitab al-aqdas or The most holy book, some thirty years before the Bahá'í Administrative Order's authorized translation in 1992.
What I particularly like about the Elder & Miller translation is that it uses contemporary English. The 1992 translation commissioned by Universal House of Justice unnecessarily uses words like "hath," "heareth," "thy," and "ye" in an attempt to mimic the tone of the King James Version of the Bible.
In 1973 a "Synopsis and Codification" of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas was published in English by the Universal House of Justice, with 21 passages of the Aqdas that had already been translated into English by Shoghi Effendi with additional terse lists of laws and ordinances contained in the book outside of any contextual prose.
The Aqdas was only officially translated into English in 1992, by which time other translations were becoming increasingly available through dissemination via the internet.
On March 5, 1993, the Universal House of Justice wroteregarding the publication of an English translation of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas.
My personal opinion is that the material in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas is so objectionable that the Bahá'í authoritieswished to shield Western believers from its contents, as they do from Bahá'u'lláh's other works by not providing translations.
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