Words with meaning

A few hours later I was watching an older episode of the Daily Show with Jon Stewart, in which his guests, Kambiz Hosseini and Saman Arbabi, explained how they try not to use hyperboles when identifying people. Labels such as socialist, fascist, or Nazi are thrown around to represent unpleasant things people have done or said. The original dictionary definitions of these words are no longer used outside of a political science course. Now, they merely mean “someone I don’t like.” For example, Democrats in the United States call Republicans “Nazis”, Republicans call President Obama a socialist, and anyone who puts any sort of restrictions or limitations is called a fascist.

Jon Stewart’s interview with Kambiz Hosseini and Saman Arbabi was so entertaining that I wanted to share it with my brother. Composing an email with the link, I wrote in the subject line “amazing interview,” and then I stopped. “Amazing?” I was also guilty of extending the meaning of a word.

Amazing has been tagged onto everything, so that nothing really is that amazing anymore. Even in the Baha’i writings, I can become overly familiar with certain words, merely reading them over and not grasping their deep implication. Some words, such as “worthy” and “mercy,” explode with profound meaning. Yet, those words can lose their intense significance if they are not reflected upon properly.

I understand that words can change their meanings over the years, sometimes deliberately and sometimes accidentally. One common example of this change is the word “gay”, which at one time meant “happy” and now is used to describe someone’s sexual orientation. However, even as words lose their meaning, and gay is not happy but sick is definitely cool, it is important for us to remember what a great bounty we have in being able to express ourselves with a wide range of words. In composing that email to my brother, I could have not only used “amazing”, but “remarkable”, “engaging”, “amusing”, “witty”, or even “interesting”.

The Bab, Baha‘u’llah [the Founders of the Baha’i Faith], ‘Abdu’l-Baha, Shoghi Effendi and the Universal House of Justice [The governing body] also have a multitude of various words that they have been able to choose from in  composing anything from revelation to legislation and guidance. The words that they have selected have been perfectly placed in order to allow us to understand, to interpret, and to be inspired. Since there is no clergy in the Baha’i Faith, the text and literature is relied upon so that each individual may read the passages for themselves and acquire knowledge by independently studying.

Words are too important to lose their shine or prominence. I know that sometimes I need to take a pause and ponder my choice of words before I spew them out, and more importantly, understand why certain words have been selected in the Baha’i writings. As Baha‘u’llah has revealed in The Kitab-i-Iqan, “…those words that have streamed forth from the source of power and descended from the heaven of glory are innumerable and beyond the ordinary comprehension of man… Ponder a while those holy words in your heart, and, with utter detachment, strive to grasp their meaning… With fixed and steady gaze, born of the unerring eye of God, scan for a while the horizon of divine knowledge, and contemplate those words of perfection which the Eternal hath revealed, that haply the mysteries of divine wisdom, hidden ere now beneath the veil of glory and treasured within the tabernacle of His grace, may be made manifest unto you.”