Leaving a New Religious Movement
December 27th, 2007Buying the halal lamb and chickens was a really good idea because it meant I felt really comfortable eating at mum’s house on Christmas day. Not a haram piece of meat in sight 
But the presents. Oh goodness Abu Yasmin and I are nearly in despair at the amount of presents my mum bought Yasmin. I think she is compensating for us not giving Yasmin Christmas presents, so with Yasmin’s birthday annual aqiqah celebration, Eid and now Christmas all in the same month, Yasmin just thinks every other week she gets a whole bunch of presents. We’ve decided we’re going to have a clear-out of the older presents and give them to charity as there is just way too much, and we can use it as a teaching opportunity for Yasmin.
Had a chat with Dad about religion, which was a bit surreal. I rarely talk about religious topics in-depth with my parents. They don’t really like me being Muslim, but have come to accept it. Abu Yasmin being the stirrer that he is, mentioned to my dad that I was listed as a Baha’i apostate in Moojan’s article. I think both my parents hope that one day I will come to my senses and re-join the Baha’is, so this was a bit of a jolt for dad.
He’s an old-timer. Living in Indonesia for the past thirteen or so years he has been totally disconnected from the goings-on in the Baha’i community, so he thinks of the Baha’i religion as the peace-love-and-mungbeans faith it was, when he joined in the sixties. When I told him of my less than salubrious experiences with Baha’i administration he dismissed them as evidence of the fallibility of Baha’is. Which is true, but the lynch-pin claim of Baha’is is that their administration is supposed to be divinely ordained and guided. My experience is that the Baha’i administration is just as messy and ordinary as other human-developed religious institutions, just like the Vatican hierarchy, the administration of the Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Mormons. Dad told me “I’m a Baha’i because I haven’t found anything better.”
Abu Yasmin and I caught a doco on the cable the other day, “Children of God”, about a millennial cult based around the teachings of a paedophile. Here in Australia, they are known as The Family and have been the subject of many government raids and accusations of child abuse over the years. Now, the Baha’is are nothing like the Children of God on that score, but what did strike me was the similarity of ‘effect’ of being raised in a new religious movement, on those who leave.
My parents individually joined the Baha’is in the hippy era when there was a lot of apocalyptic thinking about nuclear war and idealistic promises of a Utopian future based on peace, love and world unity. As a child, I was raised to believe that I was part of a small group of people doing the real work to establish world unity. I used to tell myself I had won the ‘divine lottery’ being born into the Baha’i religion, as most of humanity was sleeping in darkness, not knowing that God’s new age had dawned. All the wars and rumours of war were simply portents of the old world order being rolled up.
When the scales fell from my eyes and I left, I developed a cynicism about world politics. I didn’t believe there was inevitably a beautiful future ahead, no matter the current darkness. Instead, humans really could stuff up the world and blow it to smithereens if they were stupid enough. I miss the naivety of my former beliefs, but like al-Ghazzali says–once the mirror of taqlid (blind faith) is smashed, it can never return to that original pristine state, Instead, a new faith must be created by slowly melting and combining all the shards of the mirror together over a lifetime of experiences and jihad an-nafs (war against sinning inclinations).
The ex-Children of God members were too mourning their naivety in a way. They expressed feelings that they were unprepared for the world outside and that they had failed, God was punishing them and so on. I still carry a part of that with me too astaghfrullah. Being told over and over that you’re part of God’s special plan for humanity, if you leave that hive of worker-bees then you have failed, God has rejected you, you are not fit for the special work of God’s plan. Moojan’s article is a perfect example of this thinking that is indoctrinated into Baha’is.
Actually, it’s not you that has failed, but the broken promises of the cult or the new religious movement. Nevertheless, a child’s psychological indoctrination is hard to break. I think for me, part of my spiritual searching for a Sufi shaykh or a guide, is to find a man or woman of God who can assure me that I am not rejected of God.
A Melburnian Muslim convert blogs religion, academia and life in general.
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Although I was not raised within a NRM, I had joined the Baha’is two years after becoming a Muslim (which felt like a ‘new’ faith to me) and subsequently resigned from the Baha’i Faith a few months ago after thinking and praying about it for a long time. I, too, still have a lingering wonderment if God has “rejected” me for “abandoning The Plan”, etc. Finding a saint or a guide to assure you that you are not rejected by God would be a wonderful thing, but even more wonderful is assuring one’s own self that it is not rejected by God.
As for as indoctrination goes, I feel that it is a universal thing within all faiths and religions, and not just new religious movements. If your parents were Muslims, and you became a Baha’i as a young adult, I bet they would also be upset. That’s all for me.
Peace,
If I could dispel any misgivings you may have about leaving the Baha’is, I would do so at a trace, whatever the cost!
Baha’u'llah has stated time and again about the personal investigation of truth, and yours has been a most thorough investigation; if the search should lead to anywhere else but the Baha’is, then why hesitate? We are all swimming in the same ocean, though we live on different beaches. Mine is no better than yours, save for those who live in Brighton; it’s full of rocks!
Hmmm…maybe the Baha’is DO live in Brighton?
Having said that, if you could see my beach, you would weep at the sheer beauty of it…as I would should I visit yours.
Hi Matt and Toby,
I was talking with Abu Yasmin today and I think the issue is that none of the great religions or the new religious movements have ‘exit strategies’ for those who wish to leave, apart from labeling the leaver an apostate, a heretic, an unbeliever etc.
I think for those of us who have left any religion or new religious movement, there is no real closure to be had really. No “we understand that you can no longer fellowship with us, we want to hear your reflections and learn why you want to leave, we wish for you all the best on your future journey wherever it takes you.”
Invariably, when I give talks on Islam I am asked why I became a Muslim followed on by why did I leave the Baha’i faith. My usual answer is polite and fluffy “well you know, we all follow different paths, and I just found my home in Islam more than I did in the Baha’i faith.” I never go into perhaps some of the deeper and more real issues. Because they’re not really asking me. They want a five-second answer that will demonstrate I am a ‘moderate’ Muslim and not a Qur’an-thumping zealot who will try and convert everyone with whom I come into contact.
Ultimately I do believe that God guides people along different paths, and for me my path is that of Islam. To everything else I answer “God knows best”.
“I was talking with Abu Yasmin today and I think the issue is that none of the great religions or the new religious movements have ‘exit strategies’ for those who wish to leave, apart from labeling the leaver an apostate, a heretic, an unbeliever etc.”
That’s a really good point, as I’ve read and heard many stories that would make the hardest of hearts weep. But for some reason, my experiences of leaving two faiths was not so much hostility from outside sources, but more of dealing with my own feelings of guilt and shame for not sticking to it. I have had some folks (both Muslim and Baha’i) who would try to break me by saying very hurtful things to me, but there will always be people like that. When I think of people like the Prophet Muhammad
, and ‘Abdu’l-Baha (peace be upon them), I am consoled because they were two people who truly loved and were thoughtful to humanity as a whole.
My way out of the Baha’i Faith was actually quite simple. All I did was write a very vague letter to the National Spiritual Assembly of my country, stating that I did not want to be a member of the Baha’i Faith any longer (I did not explain any of my reasons), and they complied within a matter of a few days…
I was always told that a person had to say the words “I don’t believe Baha’u'llah is who he says he is” in a meeting with one of the institutions. Perhaps that is just hearsay, or worse, maybe I was on the “dissident radar”
(shutters to even entertain that notion)
“I think for those of us who have left any religion or new religious movement, there is no real closure to be had really. No “we understand that you can no longer fellowship with us, we want to hear your reflections and learn why you want to leave, we wish for you all the best on your future journey wherever it takes you.””
It’s an interesting dynamic, isn’t it? With many people whom I have conversed with, there seems to be predictable “phases” as to how a community behaves towards a new seeker, new believer, veteran believer, and senior believer. When a new seeker comes into a community, it is as if sometimes the community will stretch itself to the point of breaking to be as open minded and “tolerant” as possible to accommodate the seeker’s interest. And sometimes the seeker is a bit close minded themselves, and the community helps to broaden the scope of that individual. Sometimes the seeker accepts these changes in his/her new understandings, and becomes a believer.
But over time as the new believer is manifesting the open minded nature that the community itself has nourished, it’s as if the community goes back to its own comfort zone that it existed in before the seeker came in, and the new believer is left wondering “what the heck just happened?” Those same open minded attitudes that were instilled into the new believer in the first place while he/she was a seeker now become the source of criticism and rebuke.
That is the problem with living up to everyone else’s standards. You never know if yours and others ideas will become reversed, and you’ll still be contending against each other while holding the other’s previous beliefs as your own.
Yes of course - and when you get Baha’is like Toby who are kind-hearted and accepting (no matter your leaving) it shows that one cannot generalise, and perhaps it is more reflective of the individual psychology than any official reaction on the part of the Baha’is (or organisation of whichever religion or NRM).
The first time I left, I wrote a vague letter like yours as well. I did have a visit with two LSA members, but as they were personal friends it was more of a “what’s going on?” I didn’t know it at the time but I was suffering clinical depression and I am sure that had to have played a part in my leaving.
The second time (I rejoined the Baha’i organisation after a short ‘dabble’ with Islam) I stuck it out for a year but by the end of the year I just realised I didn’t belong. This time I didn’t write an official letter, I just stopped going to stuff, and began practicing Islam. So technically I am probably on the books somewhere (although I imagine by now they know I am Muslim).
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Hi Maryam, I learnt a lot about Bahaism from you. So it’s organization is fallible, we know that about any religion. Yeah it claims divinity or whatever, however the Islam’s “house” is not remotely in perfect order either. The way I see it, and no offense to your lovely self, you leave behind one set of dogmas (no charity to non-bahai organizations) to accept another set of dogmas (no adoption, no pork, etc). Both for no particularly good reasons, esp. not from the POV of the modern western world we live in. To me it’s not progress.
This is a response to just one small portion of your comment. You implied that adoption is forbidden in Islamic Law, and that is not true as far as I know.
Hi Rory,
It’s a fair enough criticism - if the Baha’i organisations are so crappy, why join a religion that has a worse track record when it comes to institutional religion??
The big difference between the Baha’i religion and Islam, is that the former claims that its formal organisational structures are divinely mandated, guided and protected.
However, for Muslims the institutional structures do not play such a role. It is understood and expected that human beings, being fallible, will fail to live up to the ideal expectation of Islam. But that each one of us has the right and ability to question injustices where they occur - even at the hands of fellow Muslims.
So, when Baha’i organisations fail, it is the promise of God that has failed. When Muslim organisations fail, they demonstrate the inherent fallibility in the human nature. The latter I can accept, the former I cannot.
P.S. Matt is correct. Adoption isn’t forbidden - hiding the lineage of adopted children is.
Fine, adoption is not forbidden, only adopted kids are not supposed to be treated as blood kids (in inheritance matter, for instance). To us in the West the true test of our humanity is when we can just love those who are not of our blood equally as those who are. That’s why, I believe, among other reasons, the west is far more advanced in social justice than others/esp. the Muslim world.
My question to you is what is the hierarchy of authority in Islam? Quran, Hadith and then consensus of scholars, right? So scholars/Muslim clerics in practice decide what proper, binding interpretation of islam, right? And in Islamic countries, their rules are absolute, more or less. How is it any difference to the above claim of divinity by the Bahai organization? In theory Muslims can question widely held belief/practice/interpretation. In reality, we know it’s not so. Not without these critics being persecuted/assasinated/prosecuted. The situation is not pretty, and it’s in fact getting worse by the day (remember the british teacher’s scandal in sudan and the recent assasination of Benazir Bhutto). If you were born in Arab countries or strictly Islamic countries like Pakistan, you would grow up being fed with the version of Islam that makes you cringe (and surely offends our western/secular/humanistic sensibility), not the version that is preached in the west to convert westerners. Read Nonie Darwish’s account how growing up a Muslim in Egypt she never knew any other meaning of jihad other than holy war. Certainly not inner struggle the way it was defined in the west, esp. after 9/11 and hating Jews and Christians were openly and loudly broadcast from the mosques’ loudspeakers. She never heard any peace song, All they heard were songs glorifying jihad, martyrdom and winning wars. All of these were never questioned, and the fruit of which we see daily in the abysmal state of the Muslim world. She’s of course but one former Muslim who will testify the same grave situations, the validity of which we rarely hear moderate Muslims recognize, as if none of what these people say was true, that they all made these things up. So unless you question the hierarchy in Islam that allows this kind of backwardness to go unchecked, I don’t think you are giving a balanced view on how corrupt and fallible the Bahai organisation is, when they are but mostly harmless small group of people practicing quietly what they believe (well their number is too immaterial to make such a roar even when they are zealously evangelical as you say they are. And I don’t necessarily support their belief either).
Having said this, of course, I don’t mean offense to your lovely self.
And while we are at it, I’d like to remind all of you guys to lend a support to this Bangladeshi editor (Salah Veldin Shoabib Choudhury) who’s facing trial and potential death just for expressing the opinion of toleration and allowing existence of Israel. Please go to http://www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/signed.cgi?IFLAC102 and show real action in fighting against any religious institution that claims infallibility. This is the real urgent issue facing the Muslim world that needs more acknowledgement among moderate Muslims that there is indeed a serious issue related to how Islam is interpreted/practiced/understood around the globe that threatens humanity and our civilization in such magnitude. Dwelling on charges of “Islamophobia” won’t help the Muslim world gain the respect back because the media is merely reporting what’s happening and what’s being done by Muslims in the name of Islam. They are not making up the stories. The focus shouldn’t be on the media but the Muslim world itself.
(I appologize for the previous two messages, please ignore them)
Rory, you asked:
My question to you is what is the hierarchy of authority in Islam? Quran, Hadith and then consensus of scholars, right?
And I reply:
The hierarchy of authority in Islam is Quran, and reason. Quran continuously asks us to ponder and to think. It never asks us to look at any Hadith. Of course, if the legislative power of the Reason suggests that a Hadith is consistent with the Quranic teachings then it would have corroborative value. As`well, the legislative discretion of the Reason may recommend that a consensus of scholars (which it judges to be consistent with Quran) may be of statistical validity for disentangling of inference. Of course, it is the reason that judges characteristics of that consensus (is it distributed normally? is it skewed towards fanaticism, or skewed in the other direction? Is it dispersed around a well defined mean or is it bi-or-multimodal and so on).
You write:
So scholars/Muslim clerics in practice decide what proper, binding interpretation of Islam, right?
I reply, of course not. Quran says that each individual is responsible for every miniscule measure of his/her right or wrong actions. Quran says human is nothing but its deeds. There is no organizational authority in Islam, period. Nobody can substitute the legislative power of the individual’s reason. Of course, the Reason may suggests that it would be more efficient if I trust may various affairs such as my health care to physician, my flight to a jet pilot, and my religious laws to a religious expert. As it would be silly to fly with a pilot who is mentally incapable it would also be unwise to adhere to the advice of a religious guide who is imbalanced (simply because, Islam means peace, and balance).
You Write: And in Islamic countries, their rules are absolute, more or less. How is it any difference to the above claim of divinity by the Bahai organization?
I reply by asking: is there any Islamic country in the world? Countries may claim they are Islamic(as virtually every country likes to claim that it is democratic). But are they? Islam is concerned with individual and as such the concept of Islamic country is an oxymoron. Quran says God is inside every individual ( literally closer than his heart arteries to his head), indicating that each individual is potentially divine. Nowhere in Quran have we seen a reference to divinity of mosque or any other religious organization.
You write: In theory Muslims can question widely held belief/practice/interpretation. In reality, we know it’s not so.
I say; the Islamic history is replete with the name of people of conscience who questioned the authority (from Hallaj to Sadra to Hafiz, to Araghi , to Naser Khosrow and the list goes on and on)…and yes they have been persecuted, mistreated, and assassinated, because they believed in the Quranic teaching that “Laisa alensan ella maa sa’a,” i.e. man is defined by his deeds ( literally man nothing but his deeds).
Of course, the current situation is not pretty, and it’s in fact getting worse by the day. But this is the fault of the educational system, poverty, geopolitical meddling for natural resources and so on . The same factors have created the Latin American terrorism (remember Chiapas conflict in Mexico and the Zapatistas, Senderistas, MRTA in Peru, and so on). Nobody blames these on Catholicism and yet alone on Christianity. It is easy to note the symptoms enumerated by Nonie Darwish and totally discount the causes analyzed by people like Fanon, Chomsky and others.
May you prosper in seeking peace and balance.