Iceland

Iceland
Iceland Bahá’í Summer School, 2004.
Location of Iceland
National Assembly		Iceland
Statistics:
Total Population
-	UN 2021	370,335
Bahá'í pop.
-	Bahá'í source
-	Non-Bahá'í source	638
History: Firsts
-	Bahá'í to visit	1924, Amelia Collins
-	Local Bahá'í	1924, Hólmfrídur Arnadóttir
-	Local Assembly	1965, Reykjavík
-	National Assembly	1972
Official Website		http://www.bahai.is/
Related media
Categories: Iceland • People

Iceland is an island country located between North America and Europe. Icelandic is the official language and Christianity is the predominant religion.

In the Middle Ages Iceland was part of the Kalmar Union and was ruled by Denmark after the Union dissolved. It became independent, with the King of Denmark remaining Head of State, in 1918 then became a Republic in 1944.

The Bahá’í Faith was first present in Iceland in the 1920s with a community being firmly established in the 1960s. The Bahá’í community of Iceland remains active to the present day.

History

The Bahá’í Faith was brought to Iceland in 1924 when Amelia Collins spent two days in the country with her husband while on a cruise. She befriended Hólmfrídur Arnadóttir who became a Bahá’í. In 1935 Martha Root visited Iceland for one month during which she met with public figures and proclaimed the Faith through lectures, talks broadcast on radio, and interviews with the local media. Arnadóttir assisted Root during her visit and she translated Bahá’u’lláh and the New Era into Icelandic in 1937.

As of 1949 two Danish Bahá’ís had settled in Reykjavík and that year Mason Remey visited the country, however at the time of Hólmfrídur Arnadóttir's passing in 1955 she was the only Bahá’í in Iceland. The country was re-opened to the Faith in 1956 when Canadian Bahá’í Marguerite Allman pioneered, and in 1957 the first Icelandic Bahá’í since Arnadóttir declared through her.

Teaching work slowly progressed in Iceland in the late 1950's and early 1960's and in 1965 the Local Spiritual Assembly of Reykjavík was established. In 1966 an article providing a positive overview of the Faith was published in Vikan, the most circulated weekly magazine in Iceland, and in September that year the government of Iceland officially recognized the Bahá’í Faith empowering the communities administration to oversee Bahá’í marriages and granting it tax exempt status. In June 1969 Hand of the Cause Adelbert Mühlschlegel visited Iceland to assist with teaching efforts for the entire month.

In January 1971 the Icelandic community doubled in size, and the Universal House of Justice announced that a National Spiritual Assembly was to be established in Iceland the following year. In September 1971 a major international Bahá’í conference titled the North Atlantic Oceanic Conference was held in Reykjavík to allow for consultation on teaching efforts in the region which was attended by John Robarts and Paul Haney. In 1972 the National Spiritual Assembly of Iceland was established with Enoch Olinga attending the countries first National Convention, and a National Youth Committee was formed shortly afterwards.

Between 1973 and 1976 Iceland was visited by Hands of the Cause Raḥmatu’lláh Muhájir and William Sears and Auxiliary Board member Hadi Afsahi with Afsahi proclaiming the Faith to religious and political leaders. An International Youth Conference was also held in Njardvik and the Bahá’í Information Service was established as an agency of the National Assembly which began producing Icelandic Bahá’í teaching materials in the mid 1970's. In 1977 the National Spiritual Assembly of Iceland was officially registered as a religious society with the government, and in the late 1970's weekend Bahá’í teacher training programmes were established. In the early 1980's Eavaro T. Jonsson wrote a biography of Bahá’u’lláh which was the first Bahá’í book to be composed in Icelandic, and in 1982 Rúḥíyyih Khánum visited Reykjavík.

In the 1980's Bahá’í youth camps began to be held in Iceland, the publication of translations of Bahá’í literature into Icelandic was expanded, and the community secured ownership of three properties across the country. In the latter part of the decade the Bahá’ís of Iceland became more active in teaching the religion on an individual basis, and the Bahá’í community was gifted three thousand saplings of trees by the Iceland Ministry for Forestry to be planted on endowment land owned by the community. Throughout the late 1980's the National Spiritual Assembly organized weekend institutes aiming to develop a sense of Bahá’í family life in the community and local communities held several deepenings.

A teaching campaign was launched in Iceland in October, 1995, as well as an official website with information on the Faith in Icelandic and Faroese. In 1997 an Icelandic Bahá’í pharmacist organized a first-aid course for fishermen in his local area in order to train them in how to use first-aid supplies while at sea. In November, 1998, a special two day devotional meeting was held in Reykjavík at which the recently completed Icelandic translation of Gleanings was presented to the community.

In 2000 a Bahá’í from Isafjordhur initiated a fair to celebrate the United Nations International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination which was attended by over one thousand people which contributed to the Icelandic Parliament establishing a Regional Information and Social Center for Newcomers, and the same year the President of Iceland visited the Bahá’í House of Worship in New Delhi, India, where he met with a Bahá’í delegation. In 2006 the Bahá’í community of Iceland assisted in the foundation of an Interfaith Forum for Iceland alongside twelve other faith groups.

In 2021 the Kitáb-i-Aqdas was published in Icelandic for the first time, and in 2022 grassroots local conferences were held across Iceland as part of the Global Conferences initiative of the international Bahá’í community.