Is it possible to investigate Bahaullah's claim?

[TransmutingSoul]

What is it you actually wish to debate? You've already made up your mind. Do you want other opinions, or do you want confirmation of your opinion? If it's the first, then it could be a debate. If it's the second, then it's not a debate, but a search for approval of an opinion, and a fake debate just to keep the Baha'i faith alive and discussed on these forums.

I see what was asked is if there is proof of a higher education in religious study.

Regards Tony

 

[Left Coast]

That would divert the OP.

Those stories are available and all I will offer in this OP is that in the end, they did not meet Baha'u'llah challenges, as they knew they could not match the wisdom.

Who didn't meet his challenges? And did they say that, or did Bahaullah and his followers say that? What did Bahaullah actually say that demonstrated his knowledge? It seems to me this is quite relevant to the OP.

 

[oldbadger]

Ok, but probably yes or probably no, is not really the answer to OP. The question is, can we know with evidence and certainty the answer. Maybe Bahaullah is innocent in His claim, and maybe we are too quick to judge. Why not investigate scientifically?

I have a fairly large file of info on Bahauallah.
I was a fairly good investigator.

I'll look through the evidence and come back on this. It will take some time.
Bahauallah was a very well educated person, which throws this claim of his in to extreme doubt and mistrust, I'm afraid.

And 'Yes', it is possible to investigate his claim.

 

[TransmutingSoul]

Who didn't meet his challenges? And did they say that, or did Bahaullah and his followers say that? What did Bahaullah actually say that demonstrated his knowledge? It seems to me this is quite relevant to the OP.

That is all in the faiths recorded history, easily found.

I am interested to know if there is new information on the topic of Baha'u'llah's education.

Regards Tony

 

[Left Coast]

That is all in the faiths recorded history, easily found.

Evidently not, since you have not produced it.

I am interested to know if there is new information on the topic of Baha'u'llah's education.

Regards Tony

His education is irrelevant if his knowledge wasn't extraordinary.

 

[YoursTrue]

One of the major claims Bahaullah made, was that, He did not have education in religion, however, when we read His Writings which are just many, we see He had detail knowledge of Religions.
Well, then He claims, He did not acquire His knowledge through human learning, but rather He was given all knowledge to Him by God.


Let's set aside whether or not He received any knowledge from God for the purpose of this discussion.

OK, let's set it aside. But, on the other hand, not that it was "knowledge from God," Satan the devil in the guise of a serpent to Eve, told her that God didn't really mean what He said. So these external sources of so-called knowledge need to not only be questioned, but examined in the light of possibilities.

 

[YoursTrue]

Did Bahaullah's knowledge of religion exceed that of people with PhDs in those fields?

I like your self imposed description of "Buddhish..." Cute. kind of. maybe. cute anyway.

 

[YoursTrue]

This is completely false. Almost no-one knows when Michaelmas is anymore, but ask anyone prior to the 20th century and they'd likely know. Ask them what it's all about and they'd likely know. Most people prior to the 19th c. were not formally trained beyond extreme basics in religion, as we'd consider it, but just by living it day to day they'd know more than most people do now.


People can and do make self-study in these areas and some can go above and beyond. David Bowie was self-taught in music.

List of autodidacts - Wikipedia


Bahaullah never said he didn't read any books, though.

I imagine he must have spoken to people. Be that as it may, however, I repeat what I said to another poster, the serpent aka the devil, spoke to Eve with so-called knowledge of the unseeable. OK and ok. In other words, if someone wants to believe otherwise, ok and ok. But I believe that messages from beyond are certainly not always true.

 

[Left Coast]

I like your self imposed description of "Buddhish..." Cute. kind of. maybe. cute anyway.

Well thanks.

 

[DagonVarunaMitraApolloZan]

I made a thread asking questions of Bahai people as well, as I was requested to:
Questions for knowledgeable Bahai / followers of Baha'u'llah I thought this might interest some of you, and anyone at all is invited, even non-Bahai people, to answer or discuss whatever.

I genuinely want to understand more about the thinking involved and mostly what makes one go for it and what makes one doubt it or feel inhibited from accepting Bahai religion or the claims of the Bahai or Baha'u'llah.

 

[InvestigateTruth]

What is it you actually wish to debate? You've already made up your mind. Do you want other opinions, or do you want confirmation of your opinion? If it's the first, then it could be a debate. If it's the second, then it's not a debate, but a search for approval of an opinion, and a fake debate just to keep the Baha'i faith alive and discussed on these forums.

Most replies in this thread tell me OP, was not very clear to everyone here.

The question is: is it possible to determine fairly accurate, how much Bahaullah had education, and self learning? Meaning, are there historical evidence that Bahaullah went to school to learn religion, or, possessed religious Book for self study? If so, how much "based on factual history", did He have human learning?

How Much is important here.

Suppose, you studied first grade math. Is it the same as, if you study at university PhD in math?

I am not looking here for, imagination to answer these questions, but actually history and evidences to determine this fairly accurate.
I hope OP is more clear now.

 

[InvestigateTruth]

I have a fairly large file of info on Bahauallah.
I was a fairly good investigator.

I'll look through the evidence and come back on this. It will take some time.
Bahauallah was a very well educated person, which throws this claim of his in to extreme doubt and mistrust, I'm afraid.

And 'Yes', it is possible to investigate his claim.

Great. Now we're talking.

 

[Vinayaka]

Most replies in this thread tell me OP, was not very clear to everyone here.

The question is: is it possible to determine fairly accurate, how much Bahaullah had education, and self learning? Meaning, are there historical evidence that Bahaullah went to school to learn religion, or, possessed religious Book for self study? If so, how much "based on factual history", did He have human learning?

How Much is important here.

Suppose, you studied first grade math. Is it the same as, if you study at university PhD in math?

I am not looking here for, imagination to answer these questions, but actually history and evidences to determine this fairly accurate.
I hope OP is more clear now.

I've seen this before, and the same stuff will result. It will be inconclusive. Baha'is will claim he had no formal education, and non-Baha'i will claim he did. It's been done ... many times. There is no conclusive evidence either way.

 

[oldbadger]

Great. Now we're talking.

OK........... Ready?
Question:- Was Bahauallah a Hafiz?
In his youth had he studied and learned the Quran by heart?

 

[Kelly of the Phoenix]

Ok, did they also claim, they had not studied religions?

I think Paul tries to claim he doesn't get anything from anyone, just God. I could be wrong.

Maybe Bahaullah learned by speaking to people of different religions.
Is it possible to know if indeed this was the case, or this was not the case?

It's also possible Jesus and his followers (and Paul) did as well. Jerusalem was a major stop for Eurasian road trips.

Normally no people know details knowledge of religions, unless he has a formal education.

Lots of people don't even know the details of their own religion.

But, if a person is not trained in math, and has not studied the subjects much by himself, he would not know more than those who have PhD in math.

You haven't seen Good Will Hunting, have you?

Those stories are available and all I will offer in this OP is that in the end, they did not meet Baha'u'llah challenges, as they knew they could not match the wisdom.

I've read Bahai posts for awhile now. There's nothing I see truly mind-blowing. It's just as derivative as all the others.

Not saying that's bad. It's just not original.

OK, let's set it aside. But, on the other hand, not that it was "knowledge from God," Satan the devil in the guise of a serpent to Eve, told her that God didn't really mean what He said. So these external sources of so-called knowledge need to not only be questioned, but examined in the light of possibilities.

And in the interest of knowledge, Satan isn't in that story at all.

 

[oldbadger]

I do not know if there has been enough history released from Iran to determine this.

What we can say though is that statement was made by Baha'u'llah as proof of His message in Persia. If it was false, what I think we would find is those that tried to discredit Baha'u'llah would have used the statement to show Baha'u'llah a Liar.

As no material exists to discredit the statement, it appears it is based in truth.

Regards Tony

Hello Tony.
You know Bahauallah grew up in a very rich and influential family environs.
Probably received a 100% private education.

In any case, do you think that he studied the Koran?
Do you think he achieved the station of Hafiz?

 

[oldbadger]

I think Paul tries to claim he doesn't get anything from anyone, just God. I could be wrong.

Hello Kelly.....
The above looks about right.
Paul didn't have a clue about Jesus or anything that he did or said, outside of the last meal and last day.

Never once did Paul describe an anecdote, incident, situation or action that Jesus was involved in. Nothing.

So I totally believe that his knowledge of Jesus came from thin air.

 

[firedragon]

Is it possible that Bahaullah studied extensively? Yes. Is it possible that someone secretly taught him these things? Yes. Is it possible that Bahaullah never wrote anything but got someone else to write because he rich enough to do that? Yes. Is it possible that Bahaullah used magic like harry potters journalist to write everything with a magical pen? Yes. Is it possible there was a cat in Persia who could fly? Yes.

The whole thread is full of answers to the OP about "it is possible he was this and it is possible that it was that". People can come up with a 1000 possibilities. Anything is a possibility. If you like to pose possibilities as answers, then it should a possibility that he was God incarnate himself. After all, every answer in this thread is a "possibility". So why not take that possibility, that he was God?

 

[firedragon]

One of the major claims Bahaullah made, was that, He did not have education in religion, however, when we read His Writings which are just many, we see He had detail knowledge of Religions.
Well, then He claims, He did not acquire His knowledge through human learning, but rather He was given all knowledge to Him by God.


Let's set aside whether or not He received any knowledge from God for the purpose of this discussion.

The Question is: Is it possible to investigate this subject through available historical sources, and any other methods to come to a concrete conclusion if Bahaullah did not have any human learning in the subject of religions in particular? If possibly He had any education, how much was it, and what subject and at what level exactly?

Are there enough historical resources or anything else available to us to know if, indeed Bahaullah had not studied subjects of religions?




In His letter to the King of the Time, the ruler of Persia, Bahaullah wrote the following letter:

"I was but a man like others, asleep upon My couch, when lo, the breezes of the All-Glorious were wafted over Me, and taught Me the knowledge of all that hath been. This thing is not from Me, but from One Who is Almighty and All-Knowing. And He bade Me lift up My voice between earth and heaven, and for this there befell Me what hath caused the tears of every man of understanding to flow. The learning current amongst men I studied not; their schools I entered not. Ask of the city wherein I dwelt, that thou mayest be well assured that I am not of them who speak falsely."

Baha'u'llah

I cannot make any comments of where he got his knowledge from or if he had any formal education etc because I have not come across solid documentation on that subject. But what I can and do say is that there are discrepancies in what he says or at least what I feel are discrepancies.

For example, Bahaullah speaks of "corruption of the text" which apparently Muhammed was told by Gabriel about the Jews and their scripture. He says that this was about the Jews who lived at his time who were misinterpreting their Pentateuch, not that the text itself is perverted.

The problem I have is that it was myth, and its still a myth that the Quran mentions anything about Jews perverting their text. What it says is that people wrote books by their own hands and claimed it was from God. Perverting a text is where you intentionally edit, cut and paste, infer and interpolate to change the story. Well, that has indeed happened in text. But what the Quran says is the foundational claim by people that what they wrote by hand was Gods work itself.

So this is a contradiction.

In my opinion this is a problem of lack of scholarship. Though Bahaullah had knowledge, his knowledge is not deep. It lacked scholarship. So he wrote down the myth that was circulating around at that time with apologists and non-muslim critics that Muhammed thought Jews and Christians perverted the texts, but scholarship has shown that its not the case. The Quran did not say anywhere they perverted the text which is a very much existing myth even today. It says people wrote them. Not God. People just claimed they were from God.

Thats not to offend anyone.

 

[InvestigateTruth]

OK........... Ready?
Question:- Was Bahauallah a Hafiz?
In his youth had he studied and learned the Quran by heart?

We are told, that in Persia, 19th century, the education for children of noble families, did not include a detail learning of the Quran or any other religion.
To master religion, there were special schools for religious learning. Bahaullah did not go to this school, and also, as youth there is no evidence He studied religion. As a child, and early youth, Bahaullah received some basic reading writing, poetry, basic Quran reading, or basic Arabic reading of some chapters of the Quran.