Calendars & New Years

Human measurement of time has been dependent on earth’s rotation on its axis that gives us our day and night, and the earth’s revolving around the sun that gives our year 365 days and a quarter. Today, the Gregorian Calendar is the most widely used worldwide, along with many other calendars. The teachings of the Bahá’í Faith, which gave to the world a new Calendar, starting in 1844 CE, state that the phenomenon of time here in this world, defined as it is by our planet’s days, lunar months and solar years, changes upon death, when the rotating earth, the sun, moon and stars are purely human construct governing our existence on the planet. In the afterlife, there is no such conception of time. For, it is a plane of existence freed from the limitations of material world. Therefore, through daily reflection upon the influence of the Divine on this earthly plane, one realises that laws, both spiritual and mundane, govern humankind’s perception of time. With the globe as our homeland, it is high time humanity adopts a new calendar that is truly universal as an expression of the power of unity in diversity. Through this new calendar, sacred moments globally acknowledged and commemorated would further strengthen humanity’s understanding of its common destiny in the context of time and space, and, thereby, recast the rhythm of life ushering in the promised era of peace and prosperity, the Aquarian Age, described in the Sacred Scriptures as the Ram Rajya, or Kingdom of God, on earth.

Source: Economic Times, 20/03/2020