If we ask God for Proof we must be content with one proof.

[Audie]

pretty hard to determine a “prophet’s” character as we are not witnesses or contemporaries to them.

How do you suggest we accurately judge their character? And even if we judge them to be alright, how does that make them qualified on the topic of God?

Easy to judge the clarity of prose,
which generally reflects clarity of
thought and understnding.

 

[an anarchist]

The Bible tells us that God does not respond ro such shallow unhindered requests.

Shallow is the request, huh?

Shallow is your claim that a request for proof is shallow!

 

[an anarchist]

Easy to judge the clarity of prose,
which generally reflects clarity of
thought and understnding.

So if they speak a bunch of gobbly gook…

 

[TransmutingSoul]

Doubtful given the Bahai theology makes its way into many threads…

Much like the Athiest on a religious forum. That has no interest of actually contributing to the thread in any meaningful way.

An oxymoron indeed.

Regards Tony

 

[an anarchist]

Or you did not listen to the answers given.

Or maybe you are just hearing what you want to hear

 

[TransmutingSoul]

If any god were smart enough to be a real
god he'd know
1. How to convince anyone if he wanted to.
2. That ever since before he started, that
what he was going to do would not work.

Yes God does know who will accept the gift, but that does not mean those that do not, were not given ample opportunity.

The Message becomes a sword, it cuts the old from the new. The Message becomes the required standard that humanity must find and many will embrace its concepts, without recognition of the source.

Regards Tony

 

[Audie]

So if they speak a bunch of gobbly gook…

To paraphrase a bit, trying to read that is
like trying to push a barge through a cornfield.

 

[TransmutingSoul]

Or maybe you are just hearing what you want to hear

It was the opossite for me, when I eventually asked, I heard what I did not want to hear, that I actually had to drastically change the direction of life I had chosen.

That is what is hard to get beyond, asking God for answers, a lot of the time we do not want the answer given, it's easier to remain worldly.

Regards Tony

 

[Audie]

Yes God does know who will accept the gift, but that does not mean those that do not, were not given ample opportunity.

The Message becomes a sword, it cuts the old from the new. The Message becomes the required standard that humanity must find and many will embrace its concepts, without recognition of the source.

Regards Tony

You do understand that you are just
saying things?

 

[TransmutingSoul]

pretty hard to determine a “prophet’s” character as we are not witnesses or contemporaries to them.

How do you suggest we accurately judge their character? And even if we judge them to be alright, how does that make them qualified on the topic of God?

Yes this can be a challenge. After the Messengers pass on we have usually two sources. We have the source of opinions of those that apposed the Messengers and we have the Source of those that embraced the Messengers, rarely do we get opinions for a neutral source.

This history is available for those that do not.live in the age the Messengers walked the earth. The test then becomes how willing are we to pursue the given evidence?

Regards Tony

 

[TransmutingSoul]

I wonder if atheists sounds as arrogant to theists as statements such as the quoted above come across as arrogant.

Most likely.

Regards Tony

 

[TransmutingSoul]

Giving visible proof wouldn’t negate free will.

That is why God gives the Messengers. What better proof than a man who shows by his person, his life and the Message, that he has a knowledge beyond learning.

Regards Tony

 

[TransmutingSoul]

Shallow is the request, huh?

Shallow is your claim that a request for proof is shallow!

Typo, Insincere Requests is what I see that Bible verse warns us of.

Regards Tony

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

I guess you are in the "This would not prove anything" opinion space!

Any reasonable body of evidence for God would convince me.

This is why I remain an atheist.

I see they can prove God, but the only one they will prove God to, is those that ask from the heart, in true sincerity.

This isn't how facts work.

I don't need to "ask from my heart, in true sincerity" to find the temperature of an object or the distance from the Earth to the Sun.

When you say that I need to have a particular mindset about your God before I can see that your God is real, this is a big red flag that you aren't talking about an honest investigation.

It would.be up to you as what you would want God to do to Prove God exists. Can you do that in all sincerity? I do not think you currently could, from the way you reply to this OP.

I'd need to know more about your God to figure out what testable predictions would be implied by the existence of your God.

Talking to other Baha'i members, it seems like the Baha'i God has been designed to be pretty unfalsifiable. I don't want to assume that they speak for you, but I'm not holding out a lot of hope.

If you are not interested, they do not ask you to listen, nor ask you to respond to their given Message, they will not proselytize, they will send you on your way.

My experience here is that a fair number of Baha'i are very into proselytizing. They also get very offended if you point this out, which makes talking about it difficult.

That's no challenge, that would be a path of choosing ignorance over knowledge. Choosing a worldview over the Divine knowledge, is of absolutely no interest to a great majority of people.

Regards Tony

There's that question-begging again.

The claim that your position is informed by any knowledge, let alone "Divine knowledge" with a capital D, assumes facts not in evidence.

What's your goal here? Is it to actually convince people or is it to feel better about the fact that you can't convince people?

 

[TransmutingSoul]

You do understand that you are just
saying things?

I am offering what I see God has offered to us about the path to finding Faith.

The conversation could be more productive if that topic of conversation was pursued.

Regards Tony

 

[TransmutingSoul]

What's your goal here? Is it to actually convince people or is it to feel better about the fact that you can't convince people?

I have no goal but to share conversations with those that want to find God.

Having a religious debate is in its nature could be seen as proselytizing, but I do not see it is, if one is not forcing or compelling anyone to enter the debate and discuss the topic on hand.

You are responding this OP of your own free will, is it not to proselytize your opinion, in the light to advocate or promote your beleif, or lack of belief, or your chosen course of action in life?

Regards Tony

 

[Twilight Hue]

Do you think you could be content with one proof?

This extract from the Kitab-i-iqan by Baha'u'llah first addresses why we reject a Messenger

"...It is evident that the changes brought about in every Dispensation constitute the dark clouds that intervene between the eye of man’s understanding and the divine Luminary which shineth forth from the dayspring of the divine Essence. Consider how men for generations have been blindly imitating their fathers, and have been trained according to such ways and manners as have been laid down by the dictates of their Faith. Were these men, therefore, to discover suddenly that a Man, Who hath been living in their midst, Who, with respect to every human limitation, hath been their equal, had risen to abolish every established principle imposed by their Faith—principles by which for centuries they have been disciplined, and every opposer and denier of which they have come to regard as infidel, profligate and wicked—they would of a certainty be veiled and hindered from acknowledging His truth.…"

Then He adds that the darkest veils become the teachings and traditions

"....It behooveth us, therefore, to make the utmost endeavor, that, by God’s invisible assistance, these dark veils, these clouds of Heaven-sent trials, may not hinder us from beholding the beauty of His shining Countenance, and that we may recognize Him only by His own Self..."

It is the Self of the Messengers that become the greatest way we can recognise God.

".....And should we ask for a testimony of His truth, we should content ourselves with one, and only one, that thereby we may attain unto Him Who is the Fountainhead of infinite grace, and in Whose presence all the world’s abundance fadeth into nothingness, that we may cease to cavil at Him every day and to cleave unto our own idle fancy...." — The Kitáb-i-Íqán

That is the OP, it appears if we want proof, then we should ask of only One and be content with it.

Would One proof be sufficient for you?

Bonus question if you want to share, "What proof could we possibly ask"?

I am aware of stories of what some people have asked and that some also were not content with just one.

Many had private thoughts and challenges that they expected to be answered without asking the question.

Thus another question, if you want to share is, "if someone could always do this, is it proof of Divinity, would it convince you"?

Regards Tony

As long as there is doubt, it will require just as many proofs.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

That is why God gives the Messengers. What better proof than a man who shows by his person, his life and the Message, that he has a knowledge beyond learning.

Regards Tony

"Messengers" can't be proof of God.

To establish that someone is a Messenger of God, you would need to establish that they were sent by God. But you can't do this without first establishing that God exists to send the Messenger.

 

[TransmutingSoul]

As long as there is doubt, it will require just as many proofs.

I see that is a wise response.

Off to bed now, goodnight all.

Regards Tony

 

[TransmutingSoul]

"Messengers" can't be proof of God.

To establish that someone is a Messenger of God, you would need to establish that they were sent by God. But you can't do this without first establishing that God exists to send the Messenger.

It can be proof, if the Messengers are all we can and will ever know of God.

Regards Tony