How about Evidentiary Faith? You begin with an intriguing oxymoron, since for many people, as soon as you have evidence for your belief, it becomes justified belief and is no longer believed by faith (unjustified belief). The title becomes Justified Unjustified Belief.
That doesn't sound like advice for a child? Who talks to adults like that? People are much more complex than that.
Furthermore, the child already knows to be attracted to good fruit, but might not know how to apply that to life. Which is the good fruit when it's not a literal piece of fruit?
I'm reminded of the comment from gun people who want everybody armed, that the best defense against a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. Why not just put black and white hats on them to be certain to be able to tell which is which, since they don't produce literal fruit. It's equally simplistic thinking. I'm reminded of these lyrics from Pink Floyd: "So, so you think you can tell heaven from hell, blue skies from pain?"
You see the writings of the messengers as good fruit. Excellent fruit, in fact, so excellent, you recognize a God in it. I see it as tasteless. Does that count as evil? Should I take the advice of Jesus and hew down that tree, since it didn't "bringeth forth good fruit" for me?
You're making a distinction that doesn't exist. You're saying that something is not a claim if you add "I believe" to it. What else can it mean to say "I believe it but I don't claim it"? Yet what you're not seeing is that "I believe" is implied when you assert that something is correct. You believe it is correct. By your reckoning, nothing is ever claimed, because everything stated as fact is only believed whether the would-be claimant uses those words or not.
Then there is nothing to know unless you already believe in a God. When you say that the proof of God for you is in the writings of Baha'u'llah, I assumed that you meant that the words convinced you that these were not the just thoughts of a human being, but one channeling God. I look at the same words and see yet another person who claims he experiences a God, and assume as I do with all such people who tell me that they experience God directly that they are experiencing their own mind and misinterpreting it as experiencing something out there, classic projection, as when a liar sees others as liars and thinks he is sensing something real out there in those people, but it actually only projecting himself onto them, that is, misinterpreting his own mind.
Isn't that what we see when somebody is experiencing imperatives from his animal brain (limbic) and his higher self (reasoning and moral faculties in the cortex), and sees it as an angel on one shoulder doing battle with a demon on the other and arguing through the ear holes? That's not your mind, you're told. It's Satan fighting to steal your soul.
Today, this is considered metaphor by many, but it is taught as literally true in some churches including several that I went to. It's the Devil sowing seeds of doubt. They mean it literally, because that's how they understand this internal dialog and the cognitive dissonance it generates for them.
Regarding messengers and prophets, I've never seen anything from any of them that seemed like they had special knowledge. They don't write anything that isn't human appearing, which is why I say that scripture is not a reliable source of divine instruction.
And if you are correct that there is no other way to know about anything about God or spirits, and I think you are, then if scripture doesn't serve as evidence of the existence of the divine, nothing does, and thus nothing can be known about whether gods exist or what they're like if they do.
Therefore, search for gods over. Conclusion: agnosticism. Worldview: godless. Lifestyle: irreligious, atheist.
Whether taken literally or metaphorically, again, I see childlike advice: If you believe hard enough, it will come true. Of course, we see this advice fail routinely. And when it does, we hear, "God answers prayer, but sometimes the answer is no." Nothing is impossible with faith? Well, whatever one is praying for that got the no answer is impossible if the supplicant can't make it happen himself.
So then everybody gets to decide what is meant literally and what isn't? That's kind of the problem with writing in vague, poetic language, and why important documents are written in unambiguous language. A will is a message from the grave from somebody no longer able to clarify what he wants. Shouldn't a God have that standard as well, since as you say, there is nothing else to judge that God and it's will by.
Well, I've taken them up on that, and decided it's all metaphor. When Jesus or Baha'u'llah speak of God, that stands for the better part of themselves, the part of them that they consider good and noble (Freud's superego). They just don't know it.
In Christian theology, the crucifixion represents the death of Middle Age and The Age of Reason, and the resurrection is represents the rebirth of reason (look at the etymology of renaissance) and the advent of Enlightenment values. And the apocalypse represents human self-destruction, as man eventually removes himself from the Drake equation, disappointing alien civilizations everywhere just reaching the technological state of 20th century man, and who wonder where we and one another are (Fermi paradox).
The book of Job represents the absurdity of life, where bad things happen to good people. The Exodus represents our journey in life when lost, and the promised land is finding the answers (that's me before and after leaving religion and faith). Moses is reason, guiding us to that promised land. The tablets on Sinai represent the moral compass (conscience).
As long as I can make these all into parables and metaphors, none can be wrong. And who can say I'm wrong, that this scripture or that one needs to be taken literally? If anybody objects, I'll just say what you did - anybody can see not to take (any of) that literally.
Really? I do. Bible literalists (fundamentalists), like the people who take the part about handling snakes literally. How many people in history do you think have cut off a hand or plucked out an eye based on other words of Jesus?
I took the part about moving mountains literally when I was early in my Christian walk. Nobody ever said, "Not really." You just discover that it doesn't work, and then either leave the religion for its failure to keep its promises, or just say what you're saying - "I guess that they didn't mean it literally." I'm sure that there are people who still do, somehow reconciling the lack of moving mountains in the world with some apologetics slight of hand such as, "They are moving as the earth turns, or they're moving by plate tectonics. Or by erosion - the Appalachians and Ozarks used to be much bigger. Or seafloor uplifting - "Everest and the Himalayas are still rising." Or my fave - "Your faith just wasn't good enough."
