The Báb signalized the importance of the dispensation which He came to herald, by inaugurating a new calendar. In this, as in the Gregorian Calendar, the lunar month is abandoned and the solar year is adopted.

The Bahá’í year consists of 19 months of 19 days each (i.e. 361 days), with the addition of certain “Intercalary Days” (four in ordinary and five in leap years) between the eighteenth and nineteenth months in order to adjust the calendar to the solar year. The Báb named the months after the attributes of God. The Bahá’í New Year, like the ancient Persian New Year, is astronomically fixed, commencing at the March equinox (usually March 21), and the Bahá’í era commences with the year of the Báb’s declaration (i.e. 1844 A.D., 1260 A.H.).

In the not far distant future it will be necessary that all peoples in the world agree on a common calendar.

It seems, therefore, fitting that the new age of unity should have a new calendar free from the objections and associations which make each of the older calendar unacceptable to large sections of the world’s population, and it is difficult to see how any other arrangement could exceed in simplicity and convenience that proposed by the Báb.

The months in the Bahá’í Calendar are as follows:

Arabic NameTranslationFirst Days
1stBaháSplendorMarch 21
2ndJalálGloryApril 9
3rdJamálBeautyApril 28
4th‘AẓamatGrandeurMay 17
5thNúrLightJune 5
6thRahmatMercyJune 24
7thKalímátWordsJuly 31
8thKamálPerfectionAug. 1
9thAsmá’NamesAug. 20
10th‘IzzatMightSept. 8
11thMashíyyatWillSept. 27
12th‘IlmKnowledgeOct.16
13thQudratPowerNov. 4
14thQawlSpeechNov. 23
15thMasa’ilQuestionsDec. 12
16thSharafHonorDec. 31
17thSulṭánSovereigntyJan. 19
18thMulkDominionFeb. 7
Intercalary DaysFeb. 26 to March 1, inclusive.
19th‘AláLoftinessMarch 2

Spiritual Assemblies

Before ‘Abdu’l-Bahá completed His earthly mission, He had laid a basis for the development of the administrative order established in Bahá’u’lláh’s Writings. To show the high importance to be attributed to the institution of the Spiritual Assembly, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in a tablet declared that a certain translation must be approved by the Spiritual Assembly of Cairo before publication, even though He Himself had reviewed and corrected the text.