Baháʼí calendar

The Badíʻ calendar used in the Baháʼí Faith is a solar calendar consisting of nineteen months and four or five intercalary days, with new year at the moment of Northern spring equinox. Each month is named after a virtue(e.g. Perfection, Mercy), as are the days of the week. The first year is dated from 1844 CE, the year in which the Báb began teaching.

Years on the calendar are annotated with the date notation of BE (Baháʼí Era). The Baháʼí year  BE on March .

History

The Baháʼí calendar started from the original Badíʿ calendar, created by the Báb in the '' Kitabu'l-Asmáʼ''Lambden, Stephen (2018).
Kitab al-asma' – The Book of Names
'. Lambden states that the "source did not, however, give precise details about where the calendral materials were located in the Kitab al-asma'." and the '' Persian Bayán'' (5:3) in the 1840s. An early version of the calendar began to be implemented during his time. It used a scheme of nineteen months of nineteen days, with the product of 361 days, plus intercalary days to make the calendar a solar calendar. The first day of the early implementation of the calendar year was Nowruz, while the intercalary days were assigned differently than the later Baháʼí implementation. The calendar contains many symbolic meanings and allusions including connections to prophecies of the Báb about the next Manifestation of God termed He whom God shall make manifest.

Baháʼu'lláh, the founder of the Baháʼí Faith, who claimed to be the one prophesied by the Báb, confirmed and adopted this calendar. Around 1870, he instructed Nabíl-i-Aʻzam, the author of '' The Dawn-Breakers'', to write an overview of the Badíʿ calendar.Momen, Moojan (2014)
The Badíʻ (Baháʼí) Calendar: An Introduction
In the ''Kitáb-i-Aqdas'' (1873) Baháʼu'lláh made Naw-Rúz the first day of the year, and also clarified the position of the Intercalary days to immediately precede the last month.. Baháʼu'lláh set Naw-Rúz to the day on which the sun passes into the constellation Aries. Baháʼís interpret this formula as a specification of the vernal equinox, though where that should be determined was not defined.

The calendar was first implemented in the West in 1907.

The Baháʼí scriptures left some issues regarding the implementation of the Badíʿ calendar to be resolved by the Universal House of Justice before the calendar can be observed uniformly worldwide.

On 10 July 2014 the Universal House of Justice announced provisions that will enable the common implementation of the Badíʿ calendar worldwide, beginning at sunset 20 March 2015, coinciding with the completion of the ninth cycle of the calendar (see below). Before that time, the Baháʼí calendar was synchronized to the Gregorian calendar by starting the year at sunset on March 20, regardless of when the vernal equinox technically occurs, meaning that the extra day of a leap year occurred simultaneously in both calendars. The intercalary days always stretched from 26 February to 1 March, automatically including the Gregorian leap day so that there were four intercalary days in a regular year, and five in a Gregorian leap year. The Universal House of Justice selected Tehran, the birthplace of Baháʼu'lláh, as the location at which the time and date of the vernal equinox is to be determined according to astronomical tables from reliable sources. These changes, which "unlocked" the Badíʿ calendar from the Gregorian calendar, came into effect at the start of year 172 BE.

Significance

As the name Badíʿ (''wondrous'' or ''unique'') suggests, the Baháʼí calendar is indeed a unique institution in the history of human culture. Sociologist Eviatar Zerubavel notes that the nineteen-day cycle creates a distinctive rhythm which enhances group solidarity. (Zerubavel argues that the nineteen-day cycle is more properly defined as a week, rather than a month, because it bears "no connection whatsoever" to the lunar cycle.) Furthermore, by finding the closest approximation of the square root of the annual cycle, Baháʼís "have managed to establish the most symmetrical relationship possible between the week and the year, which no one else throughout history has ever managed to accomplish."

Years

Years in the Baháʼí calendar are counted from Thursday 21 March 1844, the beginning of the Baháʼí Era or Badíʿ Era (abbreviated ''BE'' or ''B.E.''). Year 1 BE thus began at sundown 20 March 1844.

The length of each year is strictly defined as the number of days between the opening and closing days of the year, with the number of intercalary days adjusted as needed. The year ends on the day before the following vernal equinox.

Vernal Equinox

The first day of each year (Naw-Rúz) is the day (from sunset to sunset) in Tehran containing the moment of the vernal equinox. This is determined in advance by astronomical computations from reliable sources.

Since the Gregorian calendar is not tied to the equinox, the Gregorian calendar shifts around by a day or two each year, as shown in the following table.Baháʼí Dates 172 to 221 B.E. (2015 – 2065; prepared by the Baha'i World Centre)
(pdf)

Months

The Baháʼí calendar is composed of nineteen months, each with nineteen days. The intercalary days, known as Ayyám-i-Há, occur between the eighteenth and nineteenth months.

The names of the months were adopted by the Báb from the Du'ay-i-Sahar, a Ramadan dawn prayer by