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Ruhi Institute

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The Ruhi Institute is a Bahá'í educational institution which operates under the guidance of the National Spiritual Assembly of Colombia. It is based in Puerto Tejada, Colombia.[1]

The Institute has developed a series of educational programs focused on spiritual development and the practical application of Bahá’í principles which have been adopted as the standard curriculum for all Bahá’í Training Institutes worldwide at the direction of the Universal House of Justice.

History[edit]

Origins[edit]

The origins of the Ruhi Institute were consultations held by the Bahá’í community of Colombia hosted by the National Spiritual Assembly in the early 1970's which were focused on consolidation of newly declared Bahá’ís introduced to the religion through mass teaching. The consultations were held as many newly established communities in the country were collapsing after a short time.[2]

The consultations resulted in the development of a short introductory booklet about the Bahá’í Faith designed for a Catholic audience which explained the concept of a Manifestation of God, provided a brief overview of the lives of the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh, and an explanation of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá's role as the Center of the Covenant. The booklet included several quotes which were to be memorized and the booklet was designed to be facilitated by Bahá’í travel teachers.[3] The booklet successfully improved the quality of the teaching work with ten thousand declarations occurring in the first two years the book was used, however the number of Bahá’ís serving as active teachers remained small and the teaching work soon stagnated.[4]

Further consultation resulted in the Colombian Bahá’í community deciding to focus on deepening local Bahá’ís in order to reduce the reliance of communities on visiting travel teachers and the National Teaching Committee developed a series of deepening booklets on various topics.[5] It was eventually decided that a more systematic and practical program would be required in order to encourage new Bahá’ís to begin actively serving the Faith.[6]

Initial Establishment[edit]

The Ruhi Institute came into being in 1976.[7] It was named after Ruhi Arbab who had passed away in 1975.[8] The Institute was originally focused on establishing a building in Puerto Tejada where human resources could be developed and Hand of the Cause Raḥmatu’lláh Muhájir laid the cornerstone of the building during a visit to Colombia shortly before his passing in December 1979.[9]

As of 1980 the Institute consisted of a month long program held at the Puerto Tejada center on Sundays during which participants studied tutorial courses held for the purposes of training human resources to serve the Faith in rural settlements in the Norte del Cauca region outside the city of Cali.[10] After a short time the Institute became decentralized from the building itself with the courses being facilitated in rural villages and towns across the country.[11]

The National Spiritual Assembly of Colombia quickly developed the Ruhi Institute appointing an administrative structure modeled on the institution of the National Teaching Committee, with Laurie Arbab serving as its inaugural director,[12] and granting 30% of its national budget to the Institute.[11] The Institute decided to begin developing its study courses according to "paths of service" with the first path it focused on being basic deepening. The focus of the initial courses were the Bahá’í writings, prayer, and life and death.[13]

In the early 1980's a Colombian Auxiliary Board member noted that most Bahá’í communities in the country wanted to establish community kindergartens,[14] and in 1983 the Ruhi Institute established a pilot program dedicated to establishing kindergartens focusing on delivering secular education according to Bahá’í principles.[15]

Other developments in the early 1980's were the Institutes conclusion that the establishment of a functioning Local Spiritual Assembly should not be considered a prerequisite for community activities being organized and a series of courses focused on the "path" of community development were prepared, and the identification of another potential path of service focused on assisting in the establishment of youth groups. Youth groups were identified as a priority by an Auxiliary Board member who was working with youth groups and a series of courses titled "Animators of Youth Groups" were developed.[16]

The effectiveness of the Ruhi Institutes methodology quickly attracted the attention of the international Bahá’í community beyond Colombia with its materials being utilized across the world. In October 1982 a deepening program based on the Ruhi Institutes system was held in Trinidad & Tobago,[17] and in February 1983 the Ruhi materials themselves were used at Bahá’í tutorial schools held in Panama.[18] At the 1982/83 Puerto Rico Winter School Counselors Athos Costas and Donald Witzel gave a presentation on the work of the Ruhi Institute.[19] In April 1984 booklets based on the Ruhi Institutes booklets were used to facilitate deepenings in villages across the Central African Republic,[20] and the Ruhi materials themselves were presented and used at an Auxiliary Board member conference in St. Lucia in August.[21]

As of 1985 the Ruhi Institute had published its materials in the format of nine study courses in Spanish, English, and French, which were being used across Central America and the Caribbean and it had begun preparing nine more courses.[22] At the conclusion of the Seven Year Plan of the Universal House of Justice in 1986 the Ruhi Institute method and materials were identified as a major factor in the consolidation of the Bahá’í communities of Central America during the Plan.[23]

In 1987 the Ruhi Institute decided to formally establish a second specialized path of service in its curricula focused on the education of children based on its experience with the kindergarten pilot program and its children's education courses were based in the Puerto Tejada centre.[15]

Formal Development[edit]

In 1988 the National Spiritual Assembly of Colombia decided to develop the official status of the Ruhi Institute by pursuing legal recognition of the body as a non-profit organization with a Board of Directors appointed by the Assembly.[24]

The Institute initially had a seven member Board of Directors and it began to formalize its decentralized mode of delivering courses paying travel expenses for tutors to visit youth groups and centers across the country to facilitate courses.[25] In the late 1980's the Institute also began offering one to two month long intensive programs designed to train volunteers who were offering to complete a year of service with participants visiting from other countries across Central America.[26]

In June 1991 the influence of the Ruhi Institute expanded beyond the Americas when the National Spiritual Assembly of India had one of the Ruhi material manuals translated into Hindi and used it to train forty children's class teachers.[27] In 1994 the Ruhi Institute made its materials more widely available when it compiled three of its courses and had them published by Palabra, a US Bahá’í publisher based in Florida, as Reflections on the Life of the Spirit,[28] and in 1995 it published three of its courses focused on children's classes as Teaching Children's Classes: Grade 1 also through Palabra.[29]

The Universal House of Justice's Five Year Plan beginning in 2001 introduced the concept of study circles as a means of stimulating and monitoring the growth of Bahá’í communities which are small study sessions in local communities focused on studying materials prepared by a Training Institute. Initially the Universal House of Justice encouraged National Spiritual Assemblies to develop their own training materials however in 2004 it noted that most National Assemblies had adopted the Ruhi Institutes materials,[30] and in 2005 it announced that it had decided that the Ruhi materials would be the curriculum used by all training institutes worldwide.[31]

In a January 1, 2022, message the Universal House of Justice announced that the Ruhi Institute aimed to complete the development of its materials by 2031 and that it did not plan to develop more materials after doing so.[32]

Publications[edit]

The Ruhi Institute began publishing its courses in the format of books which compiled the individual courses. The courses are sequential and each Ruhi book is numbered and intended to be completed in order although some books also have branch courses dedicated to specific acts of service which are not part of the main sequence.[33]

The materials are periodically revised and some are distributed as pre-publication materials. The first four books have been made widely available through being published on the Ruhi Institute's website. The Institute also publishes materials to be used for Junior Youth groups separate to the main sequence of books.

Main sequence[edit]

  • 1994 - Book 1: Reflections on the Life of the Spirit (internet edition published 2020)[34]
  • 1995 - Book 2: Arising to Serve (internet edition published 2020)[35]
  • 1995 - Book 3: Teaching Children's Classes: Grade 1 (internet edition published 2020)[36]
  • 1996 - Book 4: The Twin Manifestations (internet edition published 2021)[37]
  • 2006 - Book 5: Releasing the Powers of Junior Youth (internet edition published 2022)[38]
  • 2000 - Book 6: Teaching the Cause (internet edition published 2023)[39][40][41]
  • 2001 - Book 7: Walking Together on a Path of Service (internet edition published 2024)[42]
  • Pre-publication - Book 8: The Covenant of Bahá’u’lláh
  • Pre-publication - Book 9: Gaining an Historical Perspective
  • Pre-publication - Book 10: Building Vibrant Communities
  • In development - Book 11: Material Means
  • In development - Book 12: Family and the Community
  • In development - Book 13: Engaging in Social Action
  • In development - Book 14: Engaging in Public Discourse

Other[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ↑ https://ruhi.org/institute/index.php
  2. ↑ Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, p 8
  3. ↑ Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, pp 21-22
  4. ↑ Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, pp 23
  5. ↑ Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, p 29
  6. ↑ Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, p 30
  7. ↑ The Bahá’í World, An International Record. (1993). Bahá’í World Centre. Haifa. Volume 21 (1992-1993), Pg(s) 237. View as PDF.
  8. ↑ https://sucursalpostblog.wordpress.com/2016/05/23/tributo-a-una-vida-de-servicio/
  9. ↑ Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, p 63
  10. ↑ Baha'i News (1980). National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States. No 594, Pg(s) 9. View as PDF.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, p 33
  12. ↑ https://bahai.works/MUHJ86-01/322/Passing_of_Laurie_Arbab,_Former_Member_of_National_Spiritual_Assembly_of_Colombia_and_Director_of_Ruhi_Institute
  13. ↑ Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, p 28-34
  14. ↑ Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, p 46
  15. ↑ 15.0 15.1 Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, p 47
  16. ↑ Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, p 49
  17. ↑ Baha'i News (1983). National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States. No 625, Pg(s) 16. View as PDF.
  18. ↑ Baha'i News (1984). National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States. No 640, Pg(s) 8. View as PDF.
  19. ↑ Baha'i News (1983). National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States. No 629, Pg(s) 16. View as PDF.
  20. ↑ Baha'i News (1984). National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States. No 641, Pg(s) 6. View as PDF.
  21. ↑ Baha'i News (1984). National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States. No 644, Pg(s) 13. View as PDF.
  22. ↑ The Bahá’í World, An International Record. (1994). Bahá’í World Centre. Haifa. Volume 19 (1983-1986), Pg(s) 157. View as PDF.
  23. ↑ The Bahá’í World, An International Record. (1994). Bahá’í World Centre. Haifa. Volume 19 (1983-1986), Pg(s) 106. View as PDF.
  24. ↑ Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, p 55
  25. ↑ Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, pp 60-61
  26. ↑ Ruhi Institute, Learning About Growth, Ruhi Institute: Cali, 1991, p 61
  27. ↑ The Bahá’í World, An International Record. (1998). Bahá’í World Centre. Haifa. Volume 20 (1986-1992), Pg(s) 175. View as PDF.
  28. ↑ The Bahá’í World, An International Record. (1996). Bahá’í World Centre. Haifa. Volume 23 (1994-1995), Pg(s) 330. View as PDF.
  29. ↑ The Bahá’í World, An International Record. (1996). Bahá’í World Centre. Haifa. Volume 23 (1994-1995), Pg(s) 331. View as PDF.
  30. ↑ https://www.bahai.org/library/authoritative-texts/the-universal-house-of-justice/messages/20040421_001/1#267978006
  31. ↑ https://www.bahai.org/library/authoritative-texts/the-universal-house-of-justice/messages/20051228_001/1#069472713
  32. ↑ https://www.bahai.org/library/authoritative-texts/the-universal-house-of-justice/messages/20220101_001/1#451741684
  33. ↑ https://ruhi.org/materials/list.php#15andolder
  34. ↑ https://ruhi.org/institute/path.php?link_id=1#1
  35. ↑ https://ruhi.org/materials/pdfs/RUHI0060_AS_BK2_EN_2.1.1.PE_FullText_20200930.pdf
  36. ↑ https://ruhi.org/materials/pdfs/RUHI0110_CC1_BK3_EN_2.2.1.PE_FullText_20210930.pdf
  37. ↑ https://ruhi.org/institute/path.php?link_id=4#4
  38. ↑ file:///C:/Users/Cash%20Mall/Downloads/RUHI0260_JY1_BK5_EN_2.1.1.PE_FullText_20220712%20(1).pdf
  39. ↑ https://www.ruhi.org/en/walking-a-path-of-service/#TCH
  40. ↑ https://ruhi.org/institute/path.php?link_id=6#6
  41. ↑ http://bahaistudies.net/ruhi/ruhi6.pdf
  42. ↑ http://bahaistudies.net/ruhi/ruhi7.pdf

External links[edit]

For relevant quotes see the Bahai9 compendium entry:
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