Tuesday, September 30, 2008

I should preface this by telling you that I majored in English Literature at University... and that the single hardest class I ever took was English grammar. I should tell you also that the best students in our class were those who had English as a second (or third, etc.) language.
Flash minorly forward in the background of the heart of today's post: my favorite mistake that native Persian speakers make when speaking English is that are often wont to confuse their he/she pronouns - in Persian there is no distinction of gender in the second person pronoun....
This is why, when I read prayers in the Bahá’í Faith specifically dedicated to women, prayers that have often been translated from the original Persian, I realize the profound importance given to the station of women by Bahá'u'lláh. The soul is genderless - gender is merely a phenomenon of physical existence - but this does not mean that men and women do not contribute uniquely, yet equally, to the beauty, wonder, betterment and advancement of humanity.
The following prayer, penned by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá (the eldest son of Bahá'u'lláh), touched - nay, rather sang to - my heart last night. Whether you are a man or a woman, I hope you feel equally inspired:

"O Thou kind Lord! Bestow heavenly confirmation upon this daughter of the kingdom, and graciously aid her that she may remain firm and steadfast in Thy Cause and that she may, even as a nightingale of the rose garden of mysteries, warble melodies in the Abhá Kingdom in the most wondrous tones, thereby bringing happiness to everyone. Make her exalted among the daughters of the kingdom and enable her to attain life eternal.
Thou art the Bestower, the All-Loving."

2 comments:

Unknown said...

I was listening to NPR the other day and the guest who was Iranian had written a book about Iranian history. In discussing his book he was talking about the conjugations of Farsi and how people have this problem s you describe...it was so interesting.

My parents have English as a second language and their grammar is far better than most people I know...

j'taimee said...

OH! I would totally love to hear that article - I'll have to track it down.

I totally believe it - I didn't really begin to learn the fundamentals of English grammar until I started to study other languages.... Go figure.

 
/* Use this with templates/template-twocol.html */