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5.2.) Significantly, the calendar does not contain any provision for representing dates prior to the epoch of 21 March 1844 A.D. The Baha'i calendar does not, for example, contain any means of representing the dates of birth of the two principal figures, the Bab and Baha'Ullah. |
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5.3.) There is no accepted format for producing a monthly calendar by relating the structure of the week to the structure of the month. A Baha'i calendar in the West is, in fact, a Gregorian calendar, with Baha'i days of observance indicated for the corresponding Baha'i dates. |
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Such a structure is simple to produce, since it is logically constrained. The worst case is the occurrence of the first of the month on a Friday, implying the need for four rows and seven columns, as shown: |
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5.4.) The date of Naw Ruz is celebrated by different rules in different countries, although this date marks the beginning of the year in a solar calendar. Most Baha'i days of observance are dated in terms of their position with regard to the vernal equinox. Given the importance of this date in the Baha'i calendar, the use of the N-days-after rule for defining days of observance would serve as a consistent single rule for all dates, if all dates were observed in a solar calendar. |
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5.5.) The placement of the intercalary period between the penultimate and last months makes the calendar unnecessarily difficult, from a computational stand-point. |
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5.6.) Although the Baha'i calendar is an explicitly solar calendar in the Persian tradition, it remains tangled with the lunar Islamic calendar by religious injunction. It is the intention, for example, of Baha'i authorities that the birth dates of the Bab and Baha'Ullah (20 October and 12 November) should be celebrated eventually on consecutive days. This can only happen, however, if the rules of the Islamic calendar are followed for these dates, and hence for the calendar as a whole. But the solar Baha'i calendar and the lunar Islamic calendar are structurally incompatible, as you have seen. It is clear that religious intention and the logical implications of structural calendrics have not been resolved in this case. |
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For some of these (and other) reasons, the issue of calendar reform has been under consideration for several decades by Baha'i authorities. The direction to be taken by any reform remains unclear. |
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