Religion 101

Today (Friday, May 24) marks one of the most important Buddhist holidays. Vesak, otherwise known as “Buddha Day” (or sometimes “Buddha’s Birthday”) commemorates the birth, enlightenment, and death of Siddhartha Gautama, the historical Buddha.

Although observed by Buddhists in many lands, Vesak is a holiday of particular significance among Theravada Buddhists, adherents of the branch of the religion most common throughout Sri Lanka, Myanmar (Burma), Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand.

The name of the holiday is derived from Vesakha, the name of the current month in the Pali language of the traditional Theravada Buddhist calendar (Pali being related to Sanskrit and the language of the Pali Canon, the scriptures of Theravada Buddhism). Vesak is celebrated upon the first full moon of that month.

Because this calendar is a lunar calendar, there is a certain amount of built-in “drift” with regard to corresponding dates on the Western (Gregorian) calendar, which means that Vesak does not always fall on the same Western calendar date. Last year, for instance, Vesak was celebrated on May 5, 2012 in most countries (there is some regional variation); next year, by contrast, it is anticipated to fall upon May 13, 2014.

Vesak is traditionally observed with special temple ceremonies, hymns, offerings, sermons, giving to charity, vows and rededication, and of course vegetarian feasts. One popular practice associated with the holiday is the ceremonial washing or bathing of small figures of the baby Buddha, a rite of symbolic cleansing.

Tomorrow (May 23), members of the Baha’i Faith will celebrate “the Declaration of the Bab,” one of eleven holy days on the Baha’i religious calendar. Of those eleven Baha’i holy days, work is suspended on nine of them; this is one of those nine.

Baha’is, like Jews and Muslims, reckon “days” as beginning and ending not at midnight or at dawn but at sunset. Accordingly, the holiday known as the Declaration of the Bab technically begins at sunset tonight, and will run through sunset tomorrow.

The Baha’i Faith is one of the youngest and smallest of the world’s religions. Founded in Persia (now Iran) in the 19th century, Baha’i has grown into a relatively small but rapidly growing and already widespread global religion, with a worldwide population currently estimated at somewhere between five and seven million members.

Baha’i was founded by a Tehran-born monotheistic prophet known as Baha’u'llah (1817-1892), whose adoptive title is Persian for “Glory of God.” Claiming to be the latest in a series of messengers from God (a line which Baha’i regards as including not only Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad, but also Krishna and Buddha), Baha’u'llah preached both the unity of all religions as well as the unity of all humanity, and called for global peace and justice.

Baha’is believe that prior to the advent of Baha’u'llah, his coming was foretold by a previous religious leader known as the Bab (“the Gate”), who anticipated — almost John the Baptist-like — the arrival of another messianic-like figure, whom Bahai’s subsequently identified as Baha’u'llah.

The Baha’i holy day known as “the Declaration of the Bab” commemorates the May 23, 1844 proclamation by the Bab himself that he was, in fact, the herald or forerunner of an imminent and subsequent new divine messenger — e.g., of Baha’u'llah, the founder of the Baha’i Faith.

In a previous blog entry, I commented upon a recent news story involving the cancellation of an Arkansas school district’s elementary school graduation ceremonies in the wake of a local controversy over prayer, which the district had intended to incorporate as part of the official proceedings.

Rather than simply nix the planned prayers, the district instead cancelled the ceremonies altogether. Subsequently, many parents and other local citizens (most of whom were Christian) complained that one person’s objection to the inclusion of a Christian prayer in a public school graduation ceremony had somehow violated their rights en masse.

However, this was not a matter of a minority unfairly overruling a majority (much less of “political correctness” gone overboard), but a simple and straightforward matter of constitutional legality.

Even if an overwhelming majority of the community was in favor of the school district conducting prayers as part of its graduation ceremonies, the wishes of the majority were not even a factor in this case. Public schools are part of the state, and as such must remain religiously neutral themselves. The principle of “separation of church and state” means that state-run public schools may not conduct prayers, or otherwise favor, support, endorse, or advocate for religion.

This sort of squabble is by no means an isolated instance. Unfortunately, public schools — which, by their very nature, must be secular rather than religious institutions — are all too often the locus of similar violations of church/state separation.

Next case in point: just a few days ago, an Oklahoma high school removed from its classroom walls approximately 100 plaques bearing the Ten Commandments. Those plaques had long adorned the walls of most of the classrooms within the state-run public school, in effect expressing a clearly unconstitutional endorsement or advancement of religion (insofar as the Ten Commandments are clearly religious in nature), until a student at this high school recently objected to their presence.

Rather than risk a lawsuit, the school administration removed the plaques. Of course, while this may have avoided costly legal proceedings, it could not avoid raising the ire of many in the community, who took this entire episode as just another outrageous anti-Christian swipe, rather than what it was: an upholding of constitutional law, and the preservation of the secular nature of state-run public schools.

The fact that two high-profile news stories revolving around such violations of church/state separation in our public schools recently appeared within days of each other merely serves to underscore the fact that these sorts of misunderstandings and skirmishes are still anything but rare.