Baháʼí World Centre buildings

Listen for a moment. Beneath the traffic of Haifa there is a quieter sound here: water running in narrow stone channels and the soft crunch of gravel under shoes. The air smells of cut grass and warm cypress. Above you, a golden dome catches the light. Below you, terraces of clipped lawn and flowerbeds fall toward the sea. This is the Baháʼí World Centre, the spiritual and administrative heart of a faith with followers in almost every country on earth.

Let us start with who these buildings are for. The Baháʼí Faith began in Iran in the mid-nineteenth century. Its followers believe in the unity of God, the unity of religion, and the unity of humanity. The faith traces its origins to two figures. The first was a young merchant known as the Báb, a title that means the Gate. The second was Baháʼuʼlláh, whom Baháʼís regard as the founder of their religion.

The story that brings them to Haifa is a story of exile. The Báb was executed by the Persian authorities in 1850, in the city of Tabriz. His followers hid his remains for decades, moving them in secret from place to place. Baháʼuʼlláh, meanwhile, was banished from Iran and sent from city to city across the Ottoman Empire. In 1868 he arrived as a prisoner in Acre, the walled port you can see across the bay on a clear day.

So this place exists because of a prison. Baháʼuʼlláh spent his final years in and around Acre, and he is buried near that city, at Bahjí. For Baháʼís, his shrine there is the holiest place on earth. But during visits to Mount Carmel, he chose a spot on this slope for the Báb's remains. His son, ʻAbduʼl-Bahá, carried out that wish. The remains were laid to rest here in 1909, in a simple stone building.

Now look up at the shrine itself. The stone structure that ʻAbduʼl-Bahá built is still there, inside. What you see today is an outer shell, completed in 1953. It was designed by William Sutherland Maxwell, a Canadian architect. He wrapped the older building in a colonnade of pale stone, then lifted a drum and a gilded dome above it. The design mixes European classical columns with arches and ornament drawn from the Islamic world.

Here is a detail most visitors miss. The dome is not covered in solid gold. It is clad in thousands of curved tiles, glazed and gilded, laid in overlapping rows like the scales of a fish. Walk a little to the side and watch how the light moves across them. At midday the dome looks almost white. In the late afternoon it turns deep amber, and from the city below it glows like a lamp.

The terraces around you are much newer. There are nineteen of them, stepping down the mountain in a long straight line, with the shrine near the middle. They were designed by the architect Fariborz Sahba and opened to the public in 2001. Notice the strict symmetry. Paths, stairs, fountains and flowerbeds mirror each other left and right. The gardeners keep the hedges so sharp that they look drawn with a ruler.

Now turn and look downhill, past the lowest terrace. The line of the gardens continues straight down into the city, along Ben Gurion Avenue. That street runs through the old German Colony, a neighbourhood founded in the nineteenth century by German Christian settlers known as Templers. Their stone houses, with red tile roofs, still line the avenue. The axis from sea to shrine is no accident. It ties the gardens to the street plan below.

The shrine is only one part of the World Centre. A short distance away, higher on the slope, a group of buildings stands along a curving path known as the Arc. These hold the administrative life of the faith. The most prominent is the Seat of the Universal House of Justice, the elected body that leads the worldwide Baháʼí community. Its white marble columns and green roof can be seen from parts of the city below.

Along the same Arc stands the International Archives Building, completed in the 1950s. Its shape follows the model of a Greek temple, with columns on every side, and it may remind you of the Parthenon in Athens. Inside, it keeps relics and writings connected to the founders of the faith. Nearby, more buildings house study and teaching work. Unlike the shrine and terraces, these are generally not open to casual visitors.

In 2008, the Baháʼí holy places in Haifa and Western Galilee were added to the UNESCO World Heritage List. UNESCO is the United Nations agency that protects sites of cultural value to all humanity. The listing covers both this site and the shrine near Acre. It is one of very few World Heritage listings tied to a modern religion. That fact surprises many people. Most sites on the list are ancient.

Another surprise: much of the work you see here is done by volunteers. Baháʼís from many countries come to serve at the World Centre for months or years. They guide visitors, tend the gardens and maintain the buildings. Baháʼís do not have clergy, and the community does not accept donations from people outside the faith. So the care shown in these gardens comes from the believers themselves. Look at the gardeners as you walk.

Before you leave, stand still for a minute. Notice the sound of the water again, and the wind moving off the bay. Ships wait offshore. Acre sits on the far curve of the coast, where this story began in a prison cell. Above you, the dome shines in the sun. As you walk back down toward the city, look back once or twice. The view of the shrine changes with every step.