Is it a waste of my time to try having honest, logical debates with theists?

[JustWondering]

We are not reinterpreting other people’s religions; we are just explaining what some of the scriptures of those religions mean. Are you assuming that the followers of the older religions interpreted all of their scriptures correctly and now we are interpreting them differently in order to make them fit into the Baha’i schema?

Yes, why would I think otherwise?

That is one way to view it, but that does not make any sense, unless the Baha’i Faith is a false religion and Baha’u’llah was not a Messenger of God.

It makes perfect sense if you haven't bought into the religion. I am an atheist, remember?

If the Baha’i Faith is a true religion then Baha’u’llah was a Messenger of God. He claimed that God taught Him the knowledge of all that hath been so that means He knew what was meant by what was revealed in the older scriptures better than any of the followers of those religions can possibly know. I do not consider that disrespectful if Baha’u’llah was a Messenger of God because God entrusted Him with that responsibility as part of His mission, but if He wasn’t a Messenger of God, He was a liar. It is a or b.

It could be C, he is not a messenger of god but thought he was, there's been plenty of people like that, one is on the forums. If I don't believe the previous messengers and messages were legit why would I think the new "messenger" is legit?

I do not know that much about what Muslims believe the Qur’an means but it is possible they misconstrued some of its meaning. As for the Bible, it was never intended to be fully understood until the time of the end. Baha’is believe that Baha’u’llah unsealed the Book so it can now be understood; not all of the Bible, but what is important to understand has now been explained by Baha’u’llah and Abdu’l-Baha, His eldest son and the centre of His Covenant:

Daniel Chapter 12: 4 But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased. 8 And I heard, but I understood not: then said I, O my Lord, what shall be the end of these things? 9 And he said, Go thy way, Daniel: for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end. 12Blessed is he that waiteth, and cometh to the thousand three hundred and five and thirty days.

Like I have previously said, it's easy to come around later and make whatever interpretations you want. There are literally hundreds if not thousands of different Christian sects with different beliefs because they all interpret the bible differently. Which is why it is an inefficient means of communication to rely on men to rely your messages. If having men paraphrase your messages was an efficient means of communication there wouldn't be any confusion would there? In reality however, we have scores of different religions saying they're the ones who have it right. The only reason that can't be obvious to you is because you refuse to acknowledge it. Your religions built in defense is "people are attached to their past religions", but this in itself doesn't make sense. If god meant to pass further messages on, he'd surely have made that clear, yes?

The early Church fathers interpreted the Bible the way they did because they could not fully understand it. The "Book" was intended to be sealed up until the time of the end, the thousand three hundred and five and thirty days. The 2,300 years was up in 1844 and the book was unsealed.

The bible isn't a book that was written by one author. It is a collection of books/messages from multiple, mostly unknown authors. When Christianity was made the official religion of the Roman empire a council decided which stories/writings would be official and put in the bible and which wouldn't. Secondly, what sense does it make to give people writings that are nonsensical for 2000+ years? Your explanation doesn't sound reasonable or legit to me.

There is a starting point from which the waiting in Dan 12:12 began, so if one knows how to do the math, the thousand three hundred and five and thirty days comes out to the exact year the Bab came to announce the coming of Baha’u’llah. This and the math is explained by Abdu’l-Baha in Some Answered Questions, 10: TRADITIONAL PROOFS EXEMPLIFIED FROM THE BOOK OF DANIEL.

So if you do some math the way the Bab tells you to do it, you get the result the Bab wants you to get? How is that supposed to be convincing?

Yes, I believe that the Angel Gabriel communicated to Him through the Holy Spirit.

So how does it make sense to send an angel to one man instead of, say, a whole city to pass on gods will? Why is it that supposed prophets get visited by celestial beings or god himself when no one else is around? You don't find that suspicious at all? Not even a little bit?

I just got finished discussing this with an atheist on my forum. He said exactly the same things you just did and I asked him why the use of Messengers is suspect and why is it inefficient? Why is the method that you propose better than Messengers?

Because I know, for a fact, from personal experience, that men can lie. I know, for a fact, that men can be delusional and insane. I know for a fact, that men screw things up. It's that simple. If your god is capable of creating universes and life, surely it can use a better means of communication than playing a game of telephone with us. At the very least, your god could leave concrete verifiable evidence that supports his prophets claims. Yet, all we have to go on for what to believe about the divine, is the unverifiable claims of men.

In your answer please explain how your proposed method of communication could convey all of the information that Baha’u’llah wrote in over 15,000 Tablets such that everyone in the world could access and understand this information.

You don't believe that god himself couldn't effectively convey his will in less then 100 tablets, if he wrote it himself? An entity that can create universes and life from nothing likely has an intellect beyond anything we could comprehend, and you think this massive intellect decided to give mankind important messages by playing a game of telephone using ancient ignorant men to instruct other ancient ignorant men? That doesn't add up? He could have etched his will into the sides of mountains that are impervious to wear and damage. in a language we all magically understand perfectly without having to be taught. I could go on. If given enough time I could come up with hundreds of ways that would be more effective for god to impart messages to us with. Yet, the way things stand, all we have are the unverifiable claims of various men down through the ages.

 

[JustWondering]

Most laypeople in general either don't know how to debate or they only know a tiny bit and then get flustered when things don't go as they expected. It's the same for both theists and atheists. They both tend to provide basic shallow outlines of popular arguments for their beliefs but they have no idea how to defend them.

If you really want to judge the merits of a belief system, you ought to look at actual scholars working in the relevant fields who argue for said beliefs, not Joe from accounting who hasn't a clue about what establishes the rationality of a belief but happens to go to Church every sunday.

There's nothing keeping scholars and well informed people from the debate forums here.

 

[JustWondering]

Neither, because I imply space is God the creator and a natural act of God is to create. But I also know , the word God has ambiguity and can be applied differently .

At this point it sounds like you have your own religion and need to describe in detail the attributes of your god. If we are to have any meaningful discussion anyway.

I do not see how you have answered the question , so I will ask again. If God was the first descriptive word used to describe a natural process or action that created things of the Universe, would you believe in God?

What is this natural process? Can it be observed, verified in some way? I need more information.

 

[shmogie]

But the bible itself doesn't support that your god is omnipotent, so where are you getting this from?

All you have to do is prove your statement.

 

[Apologes]

There's nothing keeping scholars and well informed people from the debate forums here.

My point was that you ought to take into consideration who the person you've been talking to is behind the ideological label.

I didn't say there is something or that there are no such people here (although they are a minority from what I can tell).

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

If you really want to judge the merits of a belief system, you ought to look at actual scholars working in the relevant fields who argue for said beliefs, not Joe from accounting who hasn't a clue about what establishes the rationality of a belief but happens to go to Church every sunday.

A belief system is defined by the beliefs of its adherents. “Joe from accounting” and his ilk are a much bigger part of the belief system than some scholar.

And if the two of them have such different beliefs, then the scholar’s arguments will have nothing to do with whether Joe’s faith is reasonable.

 

[Apologes]

A belief system is defined by the beliefs of its adherents.

I wasn't talking about what defines a belief system, but what merits it has (how good of an argument you can offer in its favor). Either way, this is logic turned on it's head. In order to be an adherent of a belief system, that system has to be already defined so that one could follow it (be an adherent). There may be exceptions when it comes to personal noetic structures or more relaxed spiritual views which are free of dogma, but this is particularly true if we're talking about organized religons such as Christianity or Islam which have a standard set of dogma constructed by the religious authorities. If one doesn't believe the dogma than clearly they aren't adhering to the belief system. Hence why an atheist cannot be a Roman Catholic no matter how much they insist they are.

“Joe from accounting” and his ilk are a much bigger part of the belief system than some scholar.

No, Joe and his ilk are a much bigger part of the believer base of a belief system than some scholar. (There are always more laypeople than scholars.) They in no way, however, influence the belief system. They can either adhere to it or not, but people like Joe from accounting do not have it in their power to alter and define what a belief system (in the sense that we're talking here) would be.

And if the two of them have such different beliefs, then the scholar’s arguments will have nothing to do with whether Joe’s faith is reasonable.

Obviously, if a scholar is arguing for a belief that Joe doesn't hold, said arguments would be irrelevant to Joe's beliefs.

Your entire post misses the point of what I was talking about, though. I was pointing out that, when evaluating the merits of a position, one ought to look at the best people defending said position which would be scholars (for religion it could be either theologians or philosophers) instead of looking at laymen who haven't thought much about their beliefs and are ignorant of the discussion that is being had on an issue.

This is a clear example of evaluating the sources of your information so what in the world are you objecting to here?

 

[1robin]

Why is it so hard for many theists to provide/follow logical arguments? You would think, that given the amount of time their religions have been around they would have some well reasoned arguments ready to go. Yet when I try to have an honest and rational debate/discussion with a theist about religion it usually ends with them name calling, constantly ignoring/trying to change the subject, or walking away from the debate/discussion. So is it a waste of my time trying to debate theists?

It is not hard at all to provide you with logical arguments for the majority of biblical claims and / or doctrines. What is it specifically you would like an argument to demonstrate?

Would you like sound arguments for........?
1. The biblical God's existence?
2. His attributes?
3. The textual integrity of the bible's literary pedigree?
4. The explanatory scope of substitutional atonement?
5. The historical evidence for Christ's existence?
6. The nature of morality?
etc.........

Pick one of the above or suggest another relevant topic and I will attempt to provide a rational argument concerning it.

 

[tayla]

is it a waste of my time trying to debate theists?

Yes, it is a complete waste of time. They assume there is something other than the physical universe. Sadly for them, this simply cannot be proven using the scientific method. So why debate it unless y'all are open to the possibility about this something else? The only tools available are intuition and philosophy.

 

[JustWondering]

All you have to do is prove your statement.

God was sorry for causing the great flood and said he would never do such a thing again. However, if he is omnipotent he could just undo what he did and deal with matters another way. Yet he didn't do that.

 

[JustWondering]

It is not hard at all to provide you with logical arguments for the majority of biblical claims and / or doctrines. What is it specifically you would like an argument to demonstrate?

Would you like sound arguments for........?
1. The biblical God's existence?
2. His attributes?
3. The textual integrity of the bible's literary pedigree?
4. The explanatory scope of substitutional atonement?
5. The historical evidence for Christ's existence?
6. The nature of morality?
etc.........

Pick one of the above or suggest another relevant topic and I will attempt to provide a rational argument concerning it.

I think it would be best for you to create a thread or two for topics on the list you are confident about and provide a link so this thread isn't derailed.

 

[Trailblazer]

Yes, why would I think otherwise?

You would only think otherwise if you understood what Baha’u’llah wrote. As it is you have no reason to think otherwise but that is because you are lacking information.

It could be C, he is not a messenger of god but thought he was, there's been plenty of people like that, one is on the forums. If I don't believe the previous messengers and messages were legit why would I think the new "messenger" is legit?

C is essentially the same as B because it amounts to the same thing, so I should have just said A =true Messenger; B = false Messenger.

The only reason you should believe that Baha’u’llah was a true Messenger of God is because of the evidence that indicates that. It is irrelevant how many false messengers there have been.

There have been many false messengers, (a) ones who thought they got a message from God (psychotics) or (b) ones who were lying (con-men), but logically speaking that does not mean that there was no true Messenger of God because it is the Fallacy of Hasty Generalization to assume that just because many or most were false messengers all were false messengers.

I can guarantee that none of those false messengers did what Baha’u’llah did, wrote what He wrote, or fulfilled all the prophecies that He fulfilled, or established a thriving world religion.

Like I have previously said, it's easy to come around later and make whatever interpretations you want. There are literally hundreds if not thousands of different Christian sects with different beliefs because they all interpret the bible differently. Which is why it is an inefficient means of communication to rely on men to rely your messages. If having men paraphrase your messages was an efficient means of communication there wouldn't be any confusion would there? In reality however, we have scores of different religions saying they're the ones who have it right. The only reason that can't be obvious to you is because you refuse to acknowledge it.

Why do you blame the “Messenger method of communication” for what the followers of the religions such as Christianity DID with the messages? It is obvious to me that we have scores of religions saying they are the ones that are right, but so what? I believe that all the religions that had legitimate Messengers were right for the “times” in which they were revealed. The original scriptures were right but then the followers mistranslated and/or misinterpreted them and they all did it differently, so that is what we have a one to many for religions such as Christianity when they should have never been more than one religion. The reason Christianity split up into hundreds of sects is because there was no written Covenant passing down the succession of authority after Jesus died. It is similar for all world religions, including Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, etc.

So all the major religions were “right” for the dispensations for which they were revealed but after they fulfilled their purpose a new religion was revealed by God through a Messenger, and then that was the right religion for that dispensation. So when Jesus said He was the Only Way, He was indeed the Only Way for his dispensation, until Muhammad appeared; then Muhammad was the Way. Then Baha’u’llah came so He is the Way for this dispensation. Baha’u’llah is the Way God wants us to use in order to know God’s Will for this age in history, but the other religions won’t step out of the way... They will have to eventually because it will become obvious to everyone this time that Bahaullah was the Promised One of All Ages, the Messiah the Jews await, the return of Christ. There will always be some stragglers but eventually there will be only one religion in the world, the religion of God. It might not even be called the Baha’i Faith by that time, because by then another Messenger might have appeared, but all religions that are established for the next 500,000 years will be under the shadow of Baha’u’llah.

Your religions built in defense is "people are attached to their past religions", but this in itself doesn't make sense. If god meant to pass further messages on, he'd surely have made that clear, yes?

It is as clear as the noonday sun in Arizona, in Baha’u’llah’s Writings. This was not something God wanted anyone to know until Baha’u’llah came, which is why it was not revealed in the previous religions. The reason it was not revealed is because the world was not ready to unify under one banner since there was not even the means of communication that would have been necessary for that to take place. Jesus said He had many things to say but you cannot bear them now. Baha’u’llah was the Comforter/Spirit of truth who came to reveal the many things because mankind is now ready to hear them. Mankind was not sufficiently evolved spiritually to hear the many things back in Jesus’ day but by virtue of Christianity and Islam mankind evolved to where it was ready by the year 1844. Mankind badly needs the teachings of Baha’u’llah if humanity is to survive and move forward to the next stage of its evolution, just as Jesus was badly needed when he appeared.

The bible isn't a book that was written by one author. It is a collection of books/messages from multiple, mostly unknown authors. When Christianity was made the official religion of the Roman empire a council decided which stories/writings would be official and put in the bible and which wouldn't. Secondly, what sense does it make to give people writings that are nonsensical for 2000+ years? Your explanation doesn't sound reasonable or legit to me.

You will have to ask God if you want to know exactly why He allowed a book(s) such as the Bible to lead people astray for over 2000 years. However, it was not the Bible per se that led them astray, it was the false doctrines of Christianity. In spite of the fact that the Bible was written by many men who were mostly unknown, it conveyed the spiritual teachings of Jesus which were necessary to move humanity along to the next stage of its evolution. There was a lot of collateral damage along the way, but the All-Knowing God knew that Baha’u’llah would be coming along to clean up the mess in the kitchen. It’s going to take a long time though, because humanity has been making a mess in the name of religion for many thousands of years, at least as far back as the beginning of the Prophetic Cycle of religion, which began with Adam about 6000 years ago and ended with Muhammad.

So if you do some math the way the Bab tells you to do it, you get the result the Bab wants you to get? How is that supposed to be convincing?

No, the Bab did not say how to do the math. The Bab just appeared in the exact year the math points to. Abdu’l-Baha explained the math in Some Answered Questions.10: TRADITIONAL PROOFS EXEMPLIFIED FROM THE BOOK OF DANIEL.
(Continued on next post)

 

[Trailblazer]

So how does it make sense to send an angel to one man instead of, say, a whole city to pass on gods will? Why is it that supposed prophets get visited by celestial beings or god himself when no one else is around? You don't find that suspicious at all? Not even a little bit?

No, I do not find it suspicious because it makes perfect sense to me. Then again, I have no confirmation bias because I was not raised Christian; both my parents dropped out of Christianity long before the children were born. I was closest to my dad who was an atheist. I never thought about God or religion until I was in my first year of college and stumbled upon Baha’i.

The Holy Spirit comes to Prophets/Messengers because God chose them to receive His message. It makes more sense if you understand that they are another order of creation, above any ordinary man. They are not just men. A Messenger of God is a subtle, mysterious and ethereal Being that has been assigned a twofold nature; the physical, pertaining to the world of matter, and the spiritual, which is born of the substance of God Himself. His body is human but His Soul was not conceived at conception like ours, but was rather preexistent. In that preexistence His Soul was given the capacity to receive direct revelations from God. Although the Messenger had to translate that Revelation into a form we could understand, His Words are endowed with an invisible spiritual force. In short, no ordinary man could do the job that they do. They are uniquely qualified to receive and disperse messages from God.

Because I know, for a fact, from personal experience, that men can lie. I know, for a fact, that men can be delusional and insane. I know for a fact, that men screw things up. It's that simple. If your god is capable of creating universes and life, surely it can use a better means of communication than playing a game of telephone with us. At the very least, your god could leave concrete verifiable evidence that supports his prophets claims. Yet, all we have to go on for what to believe about the divine, is the unverifiable claims of men.

You are correct about men, but as I just noted above, Messengersof God are not ordinary men. Of course before you should be willing to believe such a claim you would have to do a lot of homework. The first principle of the Baha’i Faith is individual investigation of truth:
Independent Investigation of Truth
Proofs of Prophethood, Bahá’u’lláh and the New Era, pp. 8-9

You don't believe that god himself couldn't effectively convey his will in less then 100 tablets, if he wrote it himself? An entity that can create universes and life from nothing likely has an intellect beyond anything we could comprehend, and you think this massive intellect decided to give mankind important messages by playing a game of telephone using ancient ignorant men to instruct other ancient ignorant men? That doesn't add up? He could have etched his will into the sides of mountains that are impervious to wear and damage. in a language we all magically understand perfectly without having to be taught. I could go on. If given enough time I could come up with hundreds of ways that would be more effective for god to impart messages to us with. Yet, the way things stand, all we have are the unverifiable claims of various men down through the ages.

What does not make logical sense is that any human knows more than an All-Knowing and All-Wise God about how best to convey His message to mankind. So it is not about what God could do, it is about what God actually does and why God does it that way, instead of some other way.

The method you proposed is not realistic. We are not living in the days of Moses where God writes messages on stone. We have moved way past that age in history. We now need more than 10 commandments, we got 15,000 Tablets and that is only part of the Revelation of Baha’u’llah because we also have what His appointed interpreters wrote, which is more than twice that. The Revelation of Baha’u’llah is so massive it has been likened to an ocean. The only realistic way to convey that is in writing and there is no reason God cannot appoint a Messenger to do His writing for Him.

It is strange that you say that the claims of the Messengers are unverifiable. How do you think any of these other methods you propose could be verified to have come from God? How would you know? The Messengers are far easier to verify; well let me correct that, Bahaullah is because we have so much written about Him that is verifiable. We did not have that for any previous Messengers such as Moses and Jesus. We cannot even verify that they existed. This is a new day and this time God wanted to make sure everyone got the message because it is a much more important message than ever before since mankind’s survival depends upon it. Do you watch any TV news?

 

[Jedster]

God was sorry for causing the great flood and said he would never do such a thing again. However, if he is omnipotent he could just undo what he did and deal with matters another way. Yet he didn't do that.

Well obviously God didn't watch the film Timecop

 

[1robin]

I think it would be best for you to create a thread or two for topics on the list you are confident about and provide a link so this thread isn't derailed.

I do not see how my response was inconsistent with your OP. You suggested Christians do not have rational arguments to back up their faith claims. I offered to supply a rational argument in any relevant subject of your choice. I only have limited time to post so I rarely bother creating new threads.

 

[JustWondering]

I do not see how my response was inconsistent with your OP. You suggested Christians do not have rational arguments to back up their faith claims. I offered to supply a rational argument in any relevant subject of your choice. I only have limited time to post so I rarely bother creating new threads.

I leave it up to you. Discussing what constitutes a logical argument is more what this thread is more about and we would likely lose sight of that if we started discussing one of your topics. A logical argument/claim to me is something that makes reasonable sense without support from pre-established beliefs. Keep in mind that I am an atheist. Why do you expect me to give more credence to claims that are unsupported by credible evidence by your religion than others? If I'm being honest and unbiased I can't give your religion more leeway than other religions like Hinduism and Scientology for instance. As an atheist I think its logical that a man named Jesus taught what the biblical Jesus taught (for the most part), it had to start with someone right? He was however, a very human man who didn't have magical powers. If the mythological parts of the bible are left out I don't have much dispute with the new testament. If you start claiming the more fantastical parts of the bible were real events, then you need to give an atheist a good reason to consider that those events were not purely mythological in nature. You don't think that's an unreasonable position do you?

 

[JustWondering]

You would only think otherwise if you understood what Baha’u’llah wrote. As it is you have no reason to think otherwise but that is because you are lacking information.

I think I have the gist of it, just don't find it compelling. I am an atheist mainly because mystical thinking doesn't come naturally to me or is even appealing to me.

C is essentially the same as B because it amounts to the same thing, so I should have just said A =true Messenger; B = false Messenger.

The only reason you should believe that Baha’u’llah was a true Messenger of God is because of the evidence that indicates that. It is irrelevant how many false messengers there have been.

By false messengers I was referring to Moses, Jesus, and Muhammed. If I don't think they're legit why would I believe someone who's building a religion off of them is legit?

There have been many false messengers, (a) ones who thought they got a message from God (psychotics) or (b) ones who were lying (con-men), but logically speaking that does not mean that there was no true Messenger of God because it is the Fallacy of Hasty Generalization to assume that just because many or most were false messengers all were false messengers.

I can guarantee that none of those false messengers did what Baha’u’llah did, wrote what He wrote, or fulfilled all the prophecies that He fulfilled, or established a thriving world religion.

What could he have possibly written that any other man couldn't have written? If he was compelled by god and had special knowledge surely he had some amazing revelations that no one else could have possibly produced.

Why do you blame the “Messenger method of communication” for what the followers of the religions such as Christianity DID with the messages? It is obvious to me that we have scores of religions saying they are the ones that are right, but so what? I believe that all the religions that had legitimate Messengers were right for the “times” in which they were revealed. The original scriptures were right but then the followers mistranslated and/or misinterpreted them and they all did it differently, so that is what we have a one to many for religions such as Christianity when they should have never been more than one religion. The reason Christianity split up into hundreds of sects is because there was no written Covenant passing down the succession of authority after Jesus died. It is similar for all world religions, including Judaism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, etc.

There would be no mistranslations if god wrote it himself in immutable stone on each continent. Which would in itself be proof positive of his existence and will. We wouldn't have hundreds of religions fumbling around and at odds with each other. You honestly think that god whispering stuff into the ear of one guy is a better way of conveying his will and knowledge?

So all the major religions were “right” for the dispensations for which they were revealed but after they fulfilled their purpose a new religion was revealed by God through a Messenger, and then that was the right religion for that dispensation. So when Jesus said He was the Only Way, He was indeed the Only Way for his dispensation, until Muhammad appeared; then Muhammad was the Way. Then Baha’u’llah came so He is the Way for this dispensation. Baha’u’llah is the Way God wants us to use in order to know God’s Will for this age in history, but the other religions won’t step out of the way... They will have to eventually because it will become obvious to everyone this time that Bahaullah was the Promised One of All Ages, the Messiah the Jews await, the return of Christ. There will always be some stragglers but eventually there will be only one religion in the world, the religion of God. It might not even be called the Baha’i Faith by that time, because by then another Messenger might have appeared, but all religions that are established for the next 500,000 years will be under the shadow of Baha’u’llah.

What do you think of Mormonism? It was established 40 years before Baha'i and clearly claims it is the true religion and others (Abrahamic) are corrupted forms of the truth?

It is as clear as the noonday sun in Arizona, in Baha’u’llah’s Writings. This was not something God wanted anyone to know until Baha’u’llah came, which is why it was not revealed in the previous religions. The reason it was not revealed is because the world was not ready to unify under one banner since there was not even the means of communication that would have been necessary for that to take place. Jesus said He had many things to say but you cannot bear them now. Baha’u’llah was the Comforter/Spirit of truth who came to reveal the many things because mankind is now ready to hear them. Mankind was not sufficiently evolved spiritually to hear the many things back in Jesus’ day but by virtue of Christianity and Islam mankind evolved to where it was ready by the year 1844. Mankind badly needs the teachings of Baha’u’llah if humanity is to survive and move forward to the next stage of its evolution, just as Jesus was badly needed when he appeared.

Again, I am an atheist. I do not recognize your Baha'u'llah as having any special knowledge or authority. I live my life as a lawful, productive member of society. I help others out when I can. I have empathy for others and animals. Religion has no bearing on how I live my life. Why should I care about what your Baha'u'llah had to say?

You will have to ask God if you want to know exactly why He allowed a book(s) such as the Bible to lead people astray for over 2000 years. However, it was not the Bible per se that led them astray, it was the false doctrines of Christianity. In spite of the fact that the Bible was written by many men who were mostly unknown, it conveyed the spiritual teachings of Jesus which were necessary to move humanity along to the next stage of its evolution. There was a lot of collateral damage along the way, but the All-Knowing God knew that Baha’u’llah would be coming along to clean up the mess in the kitchen. It’s going to take a long time though, because humanity has been making a mess in the name of religion for many thousands of years, at least as far back as the beginning of the Prophetic Cycle of religion, which began with Adam about 6000 years ago and ended with Muhammad.

So you admit yourself that god's message was screwed up for 2000 years (with god using human messengers) and then in the next breath say that using messengers is the best way to do things. Your position doesn't make sense.

No, the Bab did not say how to do the math. The Bab just appeared in the exact year the math points to. Abdu’l-Baha explained the math in Some Answered Questions.10: TRADITIONAL PROOFS EXEMPLIFIED FROM THE BOOK OF DANIEL.
(Continued on next post)

So your Bab decided to show up when this math formula said he should? Why would I be impressed with a convoluted self fulfilled prophecy? That's simply not compelling, it's not convincing to me.

Secondly, none of the promises where kept, taken from your linked page:

"...in the time of these two Manifestations the earth will be transformed, the world of existence will be renewed, and beings will be clothed in new garments. Justice and truth will encompass the world; enmity and hatred will disappear; all causes of division among peoples, races and nations will vanish; and the cause of union, harmony and concord will appear. The negligent will awake, the blind will see, the deaf will hear, the dumb will speak, the sick will be cured, the dead will arise. War will give place to peace, enmity will be conquered by love, the causes of dispute and wrangling will be entirely removed, and true felicity will be attained. The world will become the mirror of the Heavenly Kingdom; humanity will be the Throne of Divinity. All nations will become one; all religions will be unified; all individual men will become of one family and of one kindred. All the regions of the earth will become one; the superstitions caused by races, countries, individuals, languages and politics will disappear; and all men will attain to life eternal, under the shadow of the Lord of Hosts."

 

[JustWondering]

No, I do not find it suspicious because it makes perfect sense to me. Then again, I have no confirmation bias because I was not raised Christian; both my parents dropped out of Christianity long before the children were born. I was closest to my dad who was an atheist. I never thought about God or religion until I was in my first year of college and stumbled upon Baha’i.

Really? You're an adherent to this religion and you don't have any confirmation bias?

The Holy Spirit comes to Prophets/Messengers because God chose them to receive His message. It makes more sense if you understand that they are another order of creation, above any ordinary man. They are not just men. A Messenger of God is a subtle, mysterious and ethereal Being that has been assigned a twofold nature; the physical, pertaining to the world of matter, and the spiritual, which is born of the substance of God Himself. His body is human but His Soul was not conceived at conception like ours, but was rather preexistent. In that preexistence His Soul was given the capacity to receive direct revelations from God. Although the Messenger had to translate that Revelation into a form we could understand, His Words are endowed with an invisible spiritual force. In short, no ordinary man could do the job that they do. They are uniquely qualified to receive and disperse messages from God.

I don't believe this. Again, I am an atheist. It is not reasonable to support unverified claims with more unverified claims. Start with verifiable claims and work from there. Otherwise, if you're talking to an atheist like me, you're gonna lose us right away.

You are correct about men, but as I just noted above, Messengersof God are not ordinary men. Of course before you should be willing to believe such a claim you would have to do a lot of homework. The first principle of the Baha’i Faith is individual investigation of truth:
Independent Investigation of Truth
Proofs of Prophethood, Bahá’u’lláh and the New Era, pp. 8-9

Even if you prove this is true, which I very much doubt you can do, the people this prophet leaves the teachings with, run off with it and lose sight of what the original teacher meant to teach them. This is more likely to happen with the teachings come from a fallible human. If god conveyed it himself in a way that could not be misinterpreted while at the same time (with my etched mountain example) leaving undeniable evidence of the divine origin of the teachings.

Also, what keeps anyone from just claiming to be the chosen prophet of god? Answer: nothing. So again, how is that a reliable means of spreading information?

What does not make logical sense is that any human knows more than an All-Knowing and All-Wise God about how best to convey His message to mankind. So it is not about what God could do, it is about what God actually does and why God does it that way, instead of some other way.

I CAN question anything I want. I am not beholden to your theology. I am not limited by your flawed reasoning. If a god exists, it gave me the mind I'm using right now to question your claims/position.

The method you proposed is not realistic. We are not living in the days of Moses where God writes messages on stone. We have moved way past that age in history. We now need more than 10 commandments, we got 15,000 Tablets and that is only part of the Revelation of Baha’u’llah because we also have what His appointed interpreters wrote, which is more than twice that. The Revelation of Baha’u’llah is so massive it has been likened to an ocean. The only realistic way to convey that is in writing and there is no reason God cannot appoint a Messenger to do His writing for Him.

You are getting all of this from humans. Fallible, unreliable humans. It doesn't cost god anything to perform miracles, he's god! We're being asked by MEN to believe in fantastical beings/events that we have never seen. Just have to take theses MEN's word for it. That's not good enough, especially when god is portrayed as having no problem performing miracles in the past for people.

It is strange that you say that the claims of the Messengers are unverifiable. How do you think any of these other methods you propose could be verified to have come from God? How would you know? The Messengers are far easier to verify; well let me correct that, Bahaullah is because we have so much written about Him that is verifiable. We did not have that for any previous Messengers such as Moses and Jesus. We cannot even verify that they existed. This is a new day and this time God wanted to make sure everyone got the message because it is a much more important message than ever before since mankind’s survival depends upon it. Do you watch any TV news?

Yes, it's easy to verify men exist and make claims. Verifying their fantastical claims is the tricky part, well for you anyway.

 

[Trailblazer]

I think I have the gist of it, just don't find it compelling. I am an atheist mainly because mystical thinking doesn't come naturally to me or is even appealing to me.

Mystical thinking does not come naturally to me either. I was attracted to Baha’i because of the practical teachings, not the mystical ones. I do not even meditate. I am kind of a recalcitrant Baha’i. That said, I do believe in a soul and an afterlife, because that makes sense to me. All of what I believe I believe because it makes sense to me. I am not much of an emotional person when it comes to beliefs because I know emotions can lead one astray. But I can be emotional about people because I think it is good to have feelings for others. I have a passion for the Baha’i Faith only because I believe it is for the good of humanity, not because I am attached to Baha’u’llah, as Christians are attached to Jesus.

By false messengers I was referring to Moses, Jesus, and Muhammed. If I don't think they're legit why would I believe someone who's building a religion off of them is legit?

You have a good point. Part of being a Baha’i is that we accept all the past Messengers as legit, but if I was not a Baha’i I probably would not believe in any of them, because they are not verifiable. I only believe in them because I believe in Baha’u’llah and He verified them. If I was not a Baha’i I would be a deist or an agnostic because only looking through Baha’i glasses can I understand any of the past religions, why we had them and what their purposes were, how they fit into God’s plan. One cannot discern that by looking at their man-made doctrines and dogmas.

What could he have possibly written that any other man couldn't have written? If he was compelled by god and had special knowledge surely he had some amazing revelations that no one else could have possibly produced.

You’d have to read what Baha’u’llah wrote in order to determine for yourself whether it was amazing revelations that no one else could have possibly produced. I believe that it was, but not everyone will because what people understand varies according to a combination of factors such as childhood upbringing, heredity, education, adult experiences, and present life circumstances.

There would be no mistranslations if god wrote it himself in immutable stone on each continent. Which would in itself be proof positive of his existence and will. We wouldn't have hundreds of religions fumbling around and at odds with each other. You honestly think that god whispering stuff into the ear of one guy is a better way of conveying his will and knowledge?

I think that God revealing His will for every age through the Holy Spirit to one man who can carry that message to all of humanity is the only realistic way for everyone to get the message. It is the same as if God wrote it Himself because the Messengers are God in the sense that they carry perfect knowledge of God. If something was written by God on stone, how would that be any different than God using a Messenger to write it for Him? The big difference is that if a Messenger writes it then it can be distributed to every human being on earth via books and the internet. What people do with that information is entirely their own choice. God gave man free will so he could choose to believe or not believe. God does not want to give proof positive because then people would not have to use their own innate abilities coupled with their own efforts to come to belief on their own.

The fact that we have the Original Writings of Baha’u’llah penned in His own hand is no small thing, because we have never had that with any of the older religions. Instead we had writings of men. Baha’u’llah was not just a man; He was a Messenger of God so He was a protected Source of information, protected because He was “chosen” by God to receive the message.

What do you think of Mormonism? It was established 40 years before Baha'i and clearly claims it is the true religion and others (Abrahamic) are corrupted forms of the truth?

I did not know that is what Mormonism teaches. In a sense they are right, because all the older religions did corrupt the truth that came through their Messengers. However, I do not believe that Joseph Smith was a Prophet or got any communication from God, so he was not the one who could straighten out what the other religions got wrong. That was what was entrusted to Baha’u’llah. Moreover, Mormons believe that Jesus Christ was the Only Way so I see them as another sect of Christianity. As such, they reject all the other religions, so according to Baha’i beliefs they have to be wrong, since we do not reject the other religions.

Again, I am an atheist. I do not recognize your Baha'u'llah as having any special knowledge or authority. I live my life as a lawful, productive member of society. I help others out when I can. I have empathy for others and animals. Religion has no bearing on how I live my life. Why should I care about what your Baha'u'llah had to say?

I guess the only reason why you would care is if you believed that there is a God and that Baha’u’llah spoke for God. But you might also care if you cared about the future of humanity. Years ago, I had an atheist on my forum who loved the Baha’i Faith for all that it represented and did to promote unity of the human race and world peace. He even put a write-up about Baha’u’llah on his website.

Were you always an atheist or were you raised in a religious family?

So you admit yourself that god's message was screwed up for 2000 years (with god using human messengers) and then in the next breath say that using messengers is the best way to do things. Your position doesn't make sense.

It does make sense if you realize that it was not God or the Messengers who were to blame for messing up the messages. It was humans who screwed up the messages, and given humans have free will, what happened was unavoidable. Moreover, this was all part of God’s plan and it does not matter anymore since we now have a clear message from God. However, free will is the fly in the ointment, because adherents to those older religions are still clinging to them thus holding back the progress of humanity by keeping it divided. But God knew that would happen and He also knows that eventually they will relinquish those religions and there will be only one religion. It will just take time.

So your Bab decided to show up when this math formula said he should? Why would I be impressed with a convoluted self fulfilled prophecy? That's simply not compelling, it's not convincing to me.

How is that a self fulfilled prophecy? The Bab got the message from God in the year 1844 when God revealed it to Him. That was not something He controlled. The year 1844 just happens to be the year that the Bible predicts as the year of the second coming of Christ.

Secondly, none of the promises where kept, taken from your linked page:

"...in the time of these two Manifestations the earth will be transformed, the world of existence will be renewed, and beings will be clothed in new garments. Justice and truth will encompass the world; enmity and hatred will disappear; all causes of division among peoples, races and nations will vanish; and the cause of union, harmony and concord will appear. The negligent will awake, the blind will see, the deaf will hear, the dumb will speak, the sick will be cured, the dead will arise. War will give place to peace, enmity will be conquered by love, the causes of dispute and wrangling will be entirely removed, and true felicity will be attained. The world will become the mirror of the Heavenly Kingdom; humanity will be the Throne of Divinity. All nations will become one; all religions will be unified; all individual men will become of one family and of one kindred. All the regions of the earth will become one; the superstitions caused by races, countries, individuals, languages and politics will disappear; and all men will attain to life eternal, under the shadow of the Lord of Hosts."

“in the time” does not mean during the lifetimes of these two Manifestations. It means that these events will take place during the Messianic Age, which began in 1844 and will last no less than 500,000 years. Thus the word Time refers to an Age in history.

“God’s purpose is none other than to usher in, in ways He alone can bring about, and the full significance of which He alone can fathom, the Great, the Golden Age of a long-divided, a long-afflicted humanity. Its present state, indeed even its immediate future, is dark, distressingly dark. Its distant future, however, is radiant, gloriously radiant—so radiant that no eye can visualize it......

What we witness at the present time, during “this gravest crisis in the history of civilization,” recalling such times in which “religions have perished and are born,” is the adolescent stage in the slow and painful evolution of humanity, preparatory to the attainment of the stage of manhood, the stage of maturity, the promise of which is embedded in the teachings, and enshrined in the prophecies, of Bahá’u’lláh. The tumult of this age of transition is characteristic of the impetuosity and irrational instincts of youth, its follies, its prodigality, its pride, its self-assurance, its rebelliousness, and contempt of discipline.”
The Promised Day is Come, pp. 116-117

 

[Trailblazer]

Really? You're an adherent to this religion and you don't have any confirmation bias?

I meant to say I had no confirmation bias before I became a Baha’i because I had no religion before I became a Baha’i. One can only be biased if they had preexisting beliefs.

Confirmation bias, also called confirmatory bias or myside bias,[Note 1] is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms one's preexisting beliefs or hypotheses, while giving disproportionately less consideration to alternative possibilities.[1]
Confirmation bias - Wikipedia

Would I have confirmation bias now, if I went searching for another religion? Sure I would, I would be biased by having been a Baha’i for so long.

I don't believe this. Again, I am an atheist. It is not reasonable to support unverified claims with more unverified claims. Start with verifiable claims and work from there. Otherwise, if you're talking to an atheist like me, you're gonna lose us right away.

I understand that because I have been posting to atheists day and night for about four years now. Most atheists say the same things about evidence and I say the same things back. How do you think that God-related beliefs can be verified in any objective way? All we can verify are facts about the Messenger and if we end up believing He got a message from God then we can deduce that everything He wrote was the truth from God. As I think I told you before, it all hinges on that; A = true Messenger; B = false Messenger. However, since most atheists will not even consider the possibility that a Messenger could speak for God, they have chosen Option C.

Even if you prove this is true, which I very much doubt you can do, the people this prophet leaves the teachings with, run off with it and lose sight of what the original teacher meant to teach them.

That won’t happen this time around because Baha’u’llah’s Writings are safeguarded from human interference. By virtue of the Covenant of Baha’u’llah it was ensured that the Universal House of Justice would allow nobody to ever tamper with the Original Writings of Baha’u’llah. We are free to interpret those Writings ourselves, but we also have appointed interpreters, Abdu’l-Baha and Shoghi Effendi. Official translations have to be authorized by the UHJ so there cannot be many different translations as we see with the Bible.

This is more likely to happen with the teachings come from a fallible human. If god conveyed it himself in a way that could not be misinterpreted while at the same time (with my etched mountain example) leaving undeniable evidence of the divine origin of the teachings.

A Messenger of God (who Baha’is normally refer to as a Manifestation of God) is not a fallible human, He is infallible. The reasons things got changed and misinterpreted in the past religions was because there was never a written Covenant that assured the continuity of guidance for the followers as we have now:

“The Bahá’í Faith began with the mission entrusted by God to two Divine Messengers—the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh. Today, the distinctive unity of the Faith They founded stems from explicit instructions given by Bahá’u’lláh that have assured the continuity of guidance following His passing. This line of succession, referred to as the Covenant, went from Bahá’u’lláh to His Son ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, and then from ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to His grandson, Shoghi Effendi, and the Universal House of Justice, ordained by Bahá’u’lláh. A Bahá’í accepts the divine authority of the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh and of these appointed successors.”
From: Bahá’u’lláh and His Covenant

How could God convey it in a way that could not be misinterpreted by humans, since humans are the ones misinterpreting it, even if it was etched on a mountain? God would have to override the human free will to interpret it differently than He intended.

As I said before, God does not want to provide undeniable evidence of the divine origin of the teachings, because that would constitute proof. I could explain that but that would be another conversation. That would be a good topic for a new thread but I do not have the time to answer all the posts that would engender, but I will explain it to you if you want, since I already have it written up in a Word document, given how many times I explained it to others on another forum. Baha’u’llah explained why God does not provide proof of His existence to everyone in one beautiful paragraph. I have interpreted what that means so everyone could understand it. I understand why nonbelievers do not like not having proof, but there is a good reason that makes perfect sense.

Also, what keeps anyone from just claiming to be the chosen prophet of god? Answer: nothing. So again, how is that a reliable means of spreading information?

It does not matter what people claim; it only matters who is the chosen Prophet of God. God has given us a logical mind and entrusted us with the responsibility to distinguish between a true Prophet and a false prophet and there is a clear procedure for doing so: Proofs of Prophethood, Bahá’u’lláh and the New Era, pp. 8-9

It is reliable if the Prophet is reliable, a true Prophet of God.

I CAN question anything I want. I am not beholden to your theology. I am not limited by your flawed reasoning. If a god exists, it gave me the mind I'm using right now to question your claims/position.

You are DOING exactly what God wants you to do, using your reasoning. You should question my reasoning if it does not seem right, but I would not discount it out of hand because there might be something you do not understand. It took me years to really grasp Baha’i theology; I did not happen in a few days. But once I understood it, it all fits together hand in glove.

You are getting all of this from humans. Fallible, unreliable humans. It doesn't cost god anything to perform miracles, he's god!

Of course you’d be right if a Manifestation of God was not more than a human... in that case, there would be no reason to believe a word he wrote. So again, it all goes back to understanding the nature of a Manifestation of God, one of the major underpinnings of Baha’i theology.

Spoken like a true Christian, God can do anything. The part you are omitting is that if God is omnipotent, God only does what God wants to do, and since we are not omnipotent, we have nothing to say about it.

We're being asked by MEN to believe in fantastical beings/events that we have never seen. Just have to take theses MEN's word for it. That's not good enough, especially when god is portrayed as having no problem performing miracles in the past for people.

There are two issues here: (1) Manifestations of God are not just men, and (2) God does not want to prove He exists by doing miracles. That is not to say God could not do so, but as I said above, there is a good reason He doesn’t do so. Moreover, what God did in the past He did in the past, but those miracles were only good for those who witnessed them. Baha’u’llah did perform miracles, He had a book of miracles, but He did not want anyone to see those because He did not want people to believe in Him because of those miracles. Do Baha’is Believe in Miracles?

Yes, it's easy to verify men exist and make claims. Verifying their fantastical claims is the tricky part, well for you anyway.

I have already verified the claims for myself. I cannot verify them for anyone else. Everyone has to verify them for themselves in order for them to be their beliefs and not mine. I hope you understand what I mean. It is related to the independent investigation of truth that I mentioned before.