s dramatic process of growth than did Baha'i youth. In
their exploits during these crucial decades--as, indeed, throughout the
entire history of the past one hundred and fifty years--one is reminded
again and again that the great majority of the band of heroes who launched
the Cause on its course in the middle years of the nineteenth century were
all of them young people. The Bab Himself declared His mission when He was
twenty-five years old, and Anis, who attained the imperishable glory of
dying with his Lord, was only a youth. Quddus responded to the Revelation
at the age of twenty-two. Zaynab, whose age was never recorded, was a very
young woman. _Sh_ay_kh_ 'Ali, so greatly cherished by both Quddus and
Mulla Husayn, was martyred at the age of twenty, while
Muhammad-i-Baqir-Naq_sh_ laid down his life when he was only fourteen.
Tahirih was in her twenties when she embraced the Bab's Cause.

Following in the path that these extraordinary figures had opened,
thousands of young Baha'is arose in subsequent years to proclaim the
message of the Faith throughout all five continents and the scattered
islands of the globe. As an international youth culture began to emerge in
society during the late nineteen sixties and seventies, believers with
talent in music, drama and the arts demonstrated something of what Shoghi
Effendi had meant when he pointed out: "That day will the Cause spread
like wildfire when its spirit and teachings are presented on the stage or
in art and literature...."(122) The spirit of zeal and enthusiasm
characteristic of youth has also provided an ongoing challenge to the
general body of the community to explore ever more audaciously the
revolutionary social implications of Baha'u'llah's teachings.

The burst of enrolments brought with it, however, equally great problems.
At the immediate level, the resources of Baha'i communities engaged in the
work were soon overwhelmed by the task of providing the sustained
deepening the masses of new believers needed and the consolidation of the
resulting communities and Spiritual Assemblies. Beyond that, cultural
challenges like those encountered by the early Persian believers who had
first sought to introduce the Faith in Western lands now replicated
themselves throughout the world. Theological and administrative principles
that might be of consuming interest to pioneers and teachers were seldom
those that were central to the concern of new declarants from very
differ