In Memoriam 1992-1997/Isidro Jachakollo

In Memoriam 1992-1997 Isidro Jachakollo

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ISIDRO JACHAKOLLO CA.1922-1993 ANDRÉS JACHAKOLLO 1921-1994

Tsidro Jachakollo Condori was born in the village of Kollana-Wilakollo, Pantaleón Dalence province, in the department of Oruro, Bolivia. He was a sensitive seeker at an early age, having been prepared by his grandmother Manuela Choquecallata de Jachakollo. Isidro remembers:

She knew what was going to happen during our grandchildren's time. When I was fifteen years old I started to understand what my grandmother had been talking about. She said that since olden times until now, we have been suffering because we had no one to teach us truth, justice, or education. She said that we, the indigenous peoples, were living like animals in our own land, like the fox and the vicuna of the field, because the Spaniards and the white people had taken our belongings, our gold, our land, etc., leaving us with customs, prejudices, and diseases. All the indigenous people depend on only one God, the Almighty Creator. We must never forget our Creator and must continue to seek freedom, education and justice, and the true unity of humanity. My grandmother was seventy-five years old, and I have never forgotten her words.

As a young man Isidro traveled to Cala-Cala Bustillos to trade in wool, potatoes, and other crops, during which time his search intensified, and he was influenced by Hilarión Cuellar and Toribio Miranda.

It was impossible to have peace, elther in one's material or spiritual life, [Page 188]because the landowner masters caused the indigenous people to suffer, taking their livestock, capriciously taking their sheep from the pens, beating and mistreating the owners, killing them for no other reason other than that they sought education, respect, and justice.

How many times did we remember our great-great-grandparents, the Incas, saying that these people from the city would finish us, the Kollasuyo Indians, just as they did the Incas. Only God, our Creator, could save us... all the indigenous people must worship one God.

I continued to meditate on the words of my grandmother and of Hilarión Cuellar and continued to humbly investigate in my heart what, and where, was true justice for the indigenous people.

It was my custom in the mountains, the deserts, and the highlands to recite the prayers of Moses in Aymará at daybreak, removing my sandals and kneeling, getting my trousers muddy right on the pathways. Meditating, I thought, "Why were the children of God divided and deceiving each other on this one earth instead of humanity living as one family, reconciled, with universal education, bringing peace and justice to the entire world?"

In 1956 his brother Andrés took him to the home of a Bahá’í in La Paz. From the pioneer Angel Garcia, Isidro learned of the Faith. Angel and another pioneer, Elton Smith,¹²¹ were invited to Wilakollo, where the community gathered to hear the Teachings of Bahá’u’lláh. The next day, Isidro had his first village teaching experience in Bomba. Andrés continued to teach Isidro, and in 1957 Isidro enrolled as a Bahá’í. "I didn't know enough, but I taught," Isidro said. After attending a month-long course with Estanislao Alvarez in La Paz, Isidro, Andrés, and Carmelo Jachakollo began to teach more seriously, enrolling new believers and opening up new communities in Sak'ani and Jankuyo, for which they received a congratulatory letter from the National Assembly of South America.¹²²

With the help of visitors, Estanislao, Athos Costas, and Massoud Khamsi, the first Local Assembly was formed, and Isidro served from time to time as its chairman or secretary.

Isidro never rested. He was soon asked by the National Assembly to make more extensive teaching trips to four departments in the north of Potosi province. His efforts resulted in entry by troops, and some seventy Local Assemblies were established.

And so the new Bahá’ís began to come once again to my house in Wilakollo to learn more and more about the Bahá’í Faith and... my wife, Justina Mamani de Jachakollo, sacrificed so many years, day and night, to attend to the visitors... five to ten Bahá’ís at a time; and giving or loaning bedsheets, ponchos, until everything was worn out; consuming potatoes, potato starch, flour, corn—so many loads of food were eaten... While I taught in the countryside, my wife attended to both jobs... She labored with all her faith, taking care of her livestock. When I didn't have fare money, she would sell lambs, potato starch,

Notes

¹²¹ See "In Memoriam," The Bahá’í World, vol. XV, pp. 504-5.

¹²² The National Assembly of South America comprised the communities of Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, and Bolivia from 1957 until 1961 when the National Assemblies of each of those countries was established. [Page 189]

Isidro Jachakollo

potatoes, etc., for my fare. She took care of the house, and worked on the farm. My two children, Valeria and Daniel, helped their mother. Being poor, we made sacrifices.

Isidro wanted to leave behind the old customs and spoke to the authorities. He wanted to see the emergence of a Bahá’í-inspired campesino civilization.

And so I wrote an explanatory document and delivered it to the magistrate and right in the middle of the plaza during festival he read it. That letter was for the well-being of the community. When the people heard it, they beat me and kicked me, in public, until I was bloody. One of them persecuted me, wanting to kill me with a revolver ... When he came to know of this, the Sub-Prefect congratulated me saying. "Isidro, with all the activities you are doing which are for the future, you should guide your community for their own good. One day they themselves will remember you. It is true that unity is strength."

Isidro continued to travel teach, sleeping at times in caves by the rivers. He remembers a time when the miners were on strike and the government declared a state of emergency; the National Assembly encouraged them to continue holding classes and conferences. "We had to go through the bullets, guns firing like popcorn." His teaching work took him into Chile.

In the 1960s the National Assembly appointed him as native pioneer for Challapata Huari responsible for the teaching work in many provinces. For twenty years he traveled throughout the departments by bicycle, avoiding transportation expenses. In 1970 he and his family moved to Huari.

Singing was essential to the teaching work.

I would make up Bahá’í songs in Aymará and Quechua and Spanish. With these songs more and more Bahá’ís were raised up... [In order to promote] the teachings, LSA functioning, the Covenant, and about the Nineteen Day Feasts, native song has always been the model. The recorded songs were sent all over. These songs were sung with flute, moceñadas, penkilladas, even with a band. They achieved much success. When I attended the national, regional, and local conventions, I would bring musical groups... because [they] were so important for attraction... It really was a conquest throughout our country, so important were the traveling teachers, Bahá’í musical groups, and the songs.

Isidro had another son, Mehdi, who was four years old when Justina died in 1973. At times the children helped in the [Page 190]teaching work. Isidro served on the national and regional teaching committees and continued to travel teach.

Isidro was hospitalized for a few months, during which time he was elected to the National Assembly, and about 1981 he was asked to serve as the coordinator of the Obbadi Oruro Institute. He continued to teach although his health had not recovered. "When I could no longer talk, the tape player taught from my bed... And soon, as sick as I was, I went out to teach in the countryside... where there were roads I traveled by bus and minibus. I almost died several times on that teaching trip."

He attended international conferences in Cuzco, Peru; Otovalo, Ecuador; and Bahia-Salvador, Brazil, and made a two-month teaching trip to Ecuador. In Oruro he was instrumental in establishing several local Bahá’í centers.

At the Obbadi Oruro Institute he oversaw the training classes and the "mother’s center’s classes." "There are always Bahá’í women in these courses," he noted, "and a few have enrolled. . . We noticed that the women had more faith—they always seek unity." Some years there were more than two hundred enrollments at the Institute.

Isidro’s soul ascended to the Abhá realm on June 29, 1993. He was proud that his children grew up to be teachers of the Cause. On July 2 the Universal House of Justice cabled:

DEEPLY SADDENED TO LEARN OF PASSING MR. ISIDRO JACHAKOLLO, INDEFATIGABLE TEACHER CAUSE. HIS OUTSTANDING RECORD DEVOTED SERVICES OVER SEVERAL DECADES, INCLUDING HIS MANY YEARS AS MEMBER NATIONAL SPIRITUAL ASSEMBLY BOLIVIA, LOVINGLY REMEMBERED. KINDLY CONVEY OUR SYMPATHY HIS DEAR FAMILY AND ASSURE THEM OF OUR PRAYERS HOLY SHRINES FOR PROGRESS HIS RADIANT SOUL THROUGHOUT DIVINE WORLDS. ADVISE HOLD MEMORIAL GATHERINGS HIS HONOR.

Adapted, in part, from a translation from the Spanish of a transcription of a narration given by Isidro Jachakello in February 1988

Andrés Jachakollo Ticona

Andrés Jachakollo Ticona was born on November 10, 1921, in Villakolo, Oruro, Bolivia. Oruro is also known as the Altiplano (high plains) of the Andes, populated by the Aymara people. In 1956 Andrés was involved in an indigenous spiritual movement promoting freedom and the investigation of truth. One day he was visiting the city of La Paz when he saw a poster advertising the Bahá’í World Faith. Inquisitive, Andrés rang the bell of the rooming house of Yvonne de Cuellar that was used as the Bahá’í Center. Two indigenous friends were with him, and they were invited to learn about the Faith. For three days pioneers Elton Smith and Angel Garcia explained the teachings. When Andrés understood the Bahá’í Faith taught that the religion of the ancestors was good, he accepted it, becoming the first indigenous Bahá’í. Andrés invited Elton and Angel to Villakolo, where most of the community accepted the Faith including his brother Isidro and cousin Carmelo. Andrés, Isidro, and Carmelo Jachakollo became well-known traveling teachers, and they opened many indigenous communities, both in Oruro as well as in the north of Potosí.

123 See, "In Memoriam," The Bahá’í World, vol. XIX, pp. 619-22. [Page 191]

Andrés Jachakollo

During Ridván of 1957 Andrés attended, as an observer, the first National Convention for the region of South America, held in Buenos Aires, Argentina. He must have been inspired by it because a few months later he sent a list of forty new declarations. Encouraged by what was happening pioneers moved from Argentina to Bolivia, and in 1960 Andrés began to travel with them to visit indigenous communities; most of the time they went on foot. The Hands of the Cause in the Holy Land noted in the Ridván message that year:

The rapid spread of the Faith among the Indians of South America in recent months has rivaled the extraordinary progress made in the heart of the African continent and the islands of the Pacific, and may well foreshadow a parallel process of mass conversion in the New World. In Bolivia, a seven-fold increase in the number of Indian believers has occurred since last Ridván bringing the total to over the one thousand mark, drawn from almost a hundred different localities. As many as twenty-five new all-Indian Local Spiritual Assemblies may be formed in this country alone during the current Ridván period.¹²⁴

In 1961 the National Spiritual Assembly of Bolivia was established, and Andrés was elected to it. Two years later, as a member of that institution, he was a delegate to the International Convention electing, for the first time, the Universal House of Justice. As did so many other delegates, he went on to the World Congress in London. Many Bahá’ís remember when Andrés, dressed in indigenous clothing, rose at the World Congress and with a powerful voice said, "Why have we come? We have come to remember the centenary of the declaration of Bahá’u’lláh calling for the unity of all nations and all races." Andrés stentorian voice echoed through the Albert Hall, and his words were received with great applause.

In 1972 Andrés was appointed to the Auxiliary Board, a service he performed to an advanced age. In 1983 he was a member of a "Trail of Light" team, a group of South American natives that visited and taught in indigenous communities throughout North America.

On November 18, 1994, two days after Andrés’ death, the Universal House of Justice cabled the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Bolivia:

DEEPLY SADDENED LOSS OUTSTANDING PROMOTER FAITH ANDRES JACHAKOLLO FIRST BOLIVIAN INDIGENOUS BELIEVER AND FIRST CHAMPION CAUSE GOD AMONGST HIS COUNTRYMEN. HIS UNIQUE RECORD HISTORIC CONTRIBUTIONS TO GROWTH

¹²⁴ The Ministry of the Custodians: 1957-1963 (Haifa: Bahá’í World Centre, 1997), p. 189. [Page 192]AND SPREAD BAHÁ’U’LLÁH’S TEACHINGS IN BOLIVIA AS WELL AS MEMORY HIS PARTICIPATION FIRST WORLD CONGRESS LONDON ARE IMPERISHABLE. MAY PRESENT GENERATION BELIEVERS INSPIRED BY EXAMPLE HIS LONG YEARS OF SACRIFICE ARISE ACHIEVE FRESH TRIUMPHS FOR FAITH. ASSURE FERVENT PRAYERS HOLY SHRINES FOR PROGRESS HIS SOUL KINGDOM ON HIGH. URGE HOLDING MEMORIAL GATHERINGS IN HIS HONOR VARIOUS DEPARTMENTS. KINDLY CONVEY OUR LOVING CONDOLENCES HIS FAMILY AND BEREAVED FRIENDS.

Adapted from an article written in Spanish by Athos Costas