Quran and Bible in the Bahai Faith

[Rainbow Mage]

I had a few questions about how Bahais approach the Bible and the Quran. My first question is if you hold the Quran as perfectly preserved as Muslims do? How do you view the Bible? Do you view the Bible and the Quran as binding in any way upon Bahais?

Okay second question. Do you believe that the .Bahai administration holds authority to make rulings about their contents?

Thank you

 

[BruceDLimber]

Greetings!

I had a few questions about how Bahais approach the Bible and the Quran. My first question is if you hold the Quran as perfectly preserved as Muslims do? How do you view the Bible? Do you view the Bible and the Quran as binding in any way upon Bahais?

We view them both as legitimate, God-sent scripture.

That said, the Qur'an is indeed perfectly preserved, whereas the Bible does contain a few errors and alterations.

A good example is the ending of Mark, which is now so widely regarded as a spurious later addition that most Christian denominations now either relegate it to a footnote or omit it entirely!

Neither one is currently directly binding on Baha'is because we have approximately 200 volumes of our own, Baha'i scripture that provides our teachings and laws.

Okay second question. Do you believe that the Bahai administration holds authority to make rulings about their contents?

(For the record, the correct spelling is "Baha'i": the apostrophe denotes the transliteration of a <silent> letter that alters the pronunciation of the word. If it'll help, "baha" means "glory," and the suffix forms the adjective, so that Baha'i literally means "of Glory.")

If you mean interpretations, the Baha'i administration does not have the prerogative to make rulings about our scriptures, no.

That right ended with the death of Shoghi Effendi in 1957; he and his predecessor, 'Abdu'l-Baha, had both been given the authority to issue interpretations of our scriptures.

The House of Justice does have the authority to make new laws on any subjects not already stated in our scriptures (and later on to revise or revoke these if needed), but our scriptures and the already-existing official interpretations stand as written and aren't subject to change any time in the Baha'i Era (which will last at least another eight and a half centuries).

Peace,

Bruce

 

[Rainbow Mage]

Thank you Bruce