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Do you really think that is what I'm trying to tell Tony? Here's the sequence of replies.Welcome to the nobody club Tony. You’re not alone!
I see it over and over again that most Baha'is push their dogmatic view of "their" truth. How's is that bringing people together? How many people have been turned off by Baha'is not listening to them, but instead telling them how to interpret their own Scriptures? Tony, it's not working.
CG, I am a black and white guy, I give black an white answers, that's me, always has been. That is how I see the world and to me why waste time and beat around the bush? I see an urgency, I pass on the urgency. I do not desire to be popular or liked in that process. I leave that up to others.
Baha'is haven't earned the respect to blurt out their message like that. Even in those "mass teaching" projects, the Baha'is tried to break the news that they believed "Christ" has returned gently.
All I'm saying is "Black and White" attitudes aren't working here. That's something a Fundamentalist Christian would do. They would say, "Jesus is the only way. You are going to hell unless to turn to Jesus." Why don't you listen to them? Because you don't believe that is really true. Your religion teaches something different.
Well, that is how you sound to the Hindus, Jews, the Sikhs, and all the others.
I am in no need of respect from any person CG, this is not about me, it is about us. Who is drawing the lines? I am a world citizen, every person is my brother or sister, I treat them as I treaty own self, all are welcome, all are loved. Just as a family is made up of individuals, so is this world.
If you treat everybody as your brother and sister, and treat as you treat yourself, and if all are welcome, and all are loved, then whether you need it or want it, you would be respected by others as being a great Baha'i.
I am happy to leave the world as a nobody CG, I do not need others to identify with my journey in life and what I have chosen to do to make a better world as a Baha'i CG. Those that choose to Love me, know me for what I am, as I also know them in return.
Could you go over again what Baha'is believe a "soul" is versus the "spirit" in a person? Mainly, is the soul a spiritual part of a person and is eternal. If so, then what is their spirit?It would be a completely unjust God who would reward evil souls the same as good ones.
Abdu'l-Baha did a good job of explaining that. The human soul is the same as the human spirit, so the words soul and spirit mean the same thing.Could you go over again what Baha'is believe a "soul" is versus the "spirit" in a person? Mainly, is the soul a spiritual part of a person and is eternal. If so, then what is their spirit?
And you could do an experiment. Be a black and white guy with the next stranger you meet. Walk up to them and tell them, "Hi, I'm Tony and I'm a Baha'i. Baha'is believe that Baha'u'llah is the return of Christ and taught that all people and religions are one." And what if they say, "But we are Catholic." Or, "We are Buddhist." Or, "We are Atheist." What would you say, "I don't care what you were. I'm a black and white kind of guy. You need to read the Baha'i Writings and see for yourself. It is THE truth."
God does not send the Messengers for Himself. God sends the Messengers for human benefit. Humans are not whole, complete, and perfect without any needs or desires. Humans have needs and that is why God sends Messengers.Trailblazer said: There is no reason to believe that God could not send a Messenger to speak for Him on earth and the preponderance of evidence shows that God did just that.
I gave you a very good reason but you choose to ignored it. The reason is God is whole, complete, and perfect without any needs or desires.
But Messengers of God are not ordinary people, as I already explained. I rest my case.You seem like an ordinary person to me. I rest my case.
I believe Buddha was a Messenger of God, but not all great men were Messengers of God.History is full of great men who were selfless in the service of others. Take the Buddha for example.
God forbid—all men, be they good or evil, pious or infidel, are equal in the sight of God.We are all equal in the eyes of the one true God regardless of our imperfections or behavior.
There is no reason to think that God could not send Messengers or that He hasn’t done so. No one knows anything God does but I believe that God speaks to Messengers through the Holy Spirit.There is no doubt we need help. I can't argue with this premise. But the idea that you know God did something on purpose is delusional. No one speaks for God. No one knows the mind of God. No one knows anything God does. People attribute meaning to their experiences. This is why we have faith because we have no evidence.
No, it isn’t an objective truth everyone will agree on.Your "Messengers" are sacred and holy. This is your choice. But this is not an objective truth we can all agree on.
It means that God is merciful and He gives us gifts. When God sends Messengers, they reveal what will be of benefit to humans, but God does not have to do anything to assist humans and in fact God could wipe us all out since God has no need for humans. All that we get from God is because of God’s Love for us. God created us out of His Love for us, not out of His need for us.I have no idea what this scripture means. Please explain it.
Sorry, I should not assume that would be understandable. If one does not understand the basic teachings of Baha’u’llah, one cannot understand the Writings of Baha’u’llah. I will explain that piece by piece:Trailblazer said: “The one true God, exalted be His glory, hath wished nothing for Himself. The allegiance of mankind profiteth Him not, neither doth its perversity harm Him. The Bird of the Realm of Utterance voiceth continually this call: “All things have I willed for thee, and thee, too, for thine own sake.” Gleanings, p. 260
Again, I'm not impressed. I have no idea what "birds of the realm of Utterance" means. Why is the "U" capitalized. My God! Why is scripture always crazy gibberish. What does "neither doth" mean. Jesus Christ!
You are correct in saying that other people's opinions should not be the basis or the foundation of your spirituality. We are solely responsible for your own salvation. The caveat is that Messengers of God are not ordinary people, and it is by their Guidance, which is God’s Guidance, that we can attain our own spirituality, since they know the Will of God and we cannot possibly know the Will of God without Them. In short, we can become spiritual when we follow the Will of God, not our own will, since humans are fallible and prone to make mistakes.Trailblazer said: That makes absolutely no sense. If God is the absolute authority, absolute authority cannot come from within a human.
Well thank you for agreeing with me. Obviously, you have sense of knowing what makes sense. This knowing is the only authority worth trusting. Other people's opinions should not be the basis or the foundation of your spirituality. You are solely responsible for your own salvation. Stop looking for it from other people's opinions.
I agree with everything you said above, except when you said “But I'm pretty sure justice is NOT going to come from God.” Why wouldn’t God be just? Why wouldn’t justice come from God? I do not think we will see God’s justice until we die, and I have no idea how justice will be doled out by God in the afterlife, but I have no doubt that it will be doled out because a God that is not just is not loving; those two go hand in hand. I mean we cannot have thoroughly evil people who committed heinous murders not being held accountable for their actions and going to heaven with people who lived a selfless noble life – that is unjust and it is not loving towards the people who lost loved ones to those murderers and may have suffered their entire life because of their loss.Obviously no one knows what really happens after we die until we die. But I'm pretty sure justice is NOT going to come from God. If you want justice it's going to come from secular law enforcement. Evil only exists in the realm of men. Men are responsible for cleaning it up. God has nothing to do with it. God has no need or desire to get involved. Clearly this is true based on human experiments. There seems to be no amount of evil God will not tolerate in order to preserve our free-will. Again, if you want justice, I would not put God to the test. I would take responsibility for achieving justice here and now.
All of those are straw men. I am simply a rational person who believes in justice for all. It is not justice for heinous murderers to gate the exact same treatment from God as noble selfless people who sacrificed their lives in service to God… Get real.This may sound unjust if your heart is immature and you take pleasure in the thought of sinners suffering. Or maybe your heart is full of hate and you are seeking revenge against
people who have sinned against you. Or maybe you are jealous and envious of someone else having more power than you do.
This is not about me, it is about justice. What you propose is irrational and unjust, everyone going to heaven regardless of faith and deeds. It is egregious.But from our omnipotent all-loving God's perspective, that is, our God of unconditional love, there is no condition on which love is judged. But what difference does it make to you, or to God, if Hitler walks through the gates of Heaven and experience eternal Heavenly bliss? It's not like Hitler is going to stop you from doing the same thing!
Murder is not subjective, it is evil. There might be mitigating circumstances but that is up to the courts to decide.The problem with evil is it is very subjective. A behavior for one person may be perfectly okay and absolute evil to another.
And what if you don’t get forgiveness from them? Usually you don’t.Therefore, in my World, you cannot achieve salvation from saying magic words or following what the "Messengers" are telling you to think or do. The only way to achieve salvation is to get forgiveness from the person or people you have sinned against.
Why wouldn’t the law of karma also apply to the afterlife? I think it does because we reap what we sow. The following passage does not imply that God will punish us but rather we will realize what we did and that will be the punishment for our misdeeds.We all know the golden rule. But there is also the golden rule of karma. If you cause suffering in others you will experience suffering in your own life here and now in equal proportion. The problem of evil affects our life in the present.
If we do not get justice in this life through the court system why shouldn’t we get justice from God in the afterlife, however that is doled out?Expecting justice from God is wishful thinking.
Where do you get these ideas? This sure sounds like wishful thinking to me. I do not believe we will ever see God, not even after we die.Yikes. I think when we die we are too busy looking into the face of God experiencing God's infinite beauty to have time left over for any phone calls with the under-World.
So you believe in reincarnation?I believe in a cyclical Universe where everything repeats over and over again until every possible choice we can make get experienced by God as He realizes His omnipotence. God's experience of time is completely different than our own.
Yet you seem to think you know the Will of God, isn’t that interesting. If you did not think you knew it you would not be saying what is going to happen to everyone in the afterlife, that they will all experience God’s Love. How can you know that unless you know the Will of God?Trailblazer said: I do not have any Messenger telling me how to think. All the Messenger does is reveal the will of God.
The will of God. I am speechless. The only way to know the will of God is to BE God. I simply cannot accept this level of hubris.
Why would you believe in a God you have no evidence for? Your faith is in yourself, not in God. My faith is in God as revealed by Messengers who established religions, not a God I made up in my own head. You want God to be an omnipotent God of unconditional love, so you created that in your mind. You are taking a pretty big chance because there is no reason to believe that you are right. Religious believers are not taking a chance because they have the scriptures to go by, so even if they did not get it completely right they will be in the ball park.Your argument is circular. As I said, my faith is a choice. I have no evidence at all my God is as I have described. I may be completely wrong and I will suffer after I die. But this is the difference between you and me. My faith is stronger than yours because I am willing to risk it all by putting ALL of my faith in an omnipotent God of unconditional love. I feel very confident God will not let me down and I am going to do very well after I die. But thank you very much for your advice.
According to my beliefs, the purpose for which we were created is to know and love God.You do not understand the purpose of life and why we are here. We exist so our omnipotent God can experience the thrill of having limitations by sharing in our experiences of joys and frustrations. When we experience greatness in nature, in ourselves, and in great human performance it brings us closer to the unity of the perfection that is God. We are all drawn to God throughout our lives until we die and rejoin God in everlasting eternal bliss.
All of that in the paragraph above is congruent with Baha’i beliefs. God is immanent, God is also transcendent. At the same time as God is knowable, God is also unknowable. Great quote.I found this thought extremely profound and I am still trying to wrap my head around it!
"Dionysius describes the kataphatic or affirmative way to the divine as the "way of speech": that we can come to some understanding of the Transcendent by attributing all the perfections of the created order to God as its source. In this sense, we can say "God is Love", "God is Beauty", "God is Good". The apophatic or negative way stresses God's absolute transcendence and unknowability in such a way that we cannot say anything about the divine essence because God is so totally beyond being. The dual concept of the immanence and transcendence of God can help us to understand the simultaneous truth of both "ways" to God: at the same time as God is immanent, God is also transcendent. At the same time as God is knowable, God is also unknowable. God cannot be thought of as one or the other only"
God does not send the Messengers for Himself. God sends the Messengers for human benefit. Humans are not whole, complete, and perfect without any needs or desires. Humans have needs and that is why God sends Messengers.
But Messengers of God are not ordinary people, as I already explained.
There is no reason to think that God could not send Messengers or that He hasn’t done so. No one knows anything God does but I believe that God speaks to Messengers through the Holy Spirit.
As I said before, no one knows the mind of God, but that does not mean that no one speaks for God. Messengers of God who speak for God ONLY reveal the Will of God, not the mind of God. The Will of God is what God wants for humanity.
3: O SON OF MAN! Veiled in My immemorial being and in the ancient eternity of My essence, I knew My love for thee; therefore I created thee, have engraved on thee Mine image and revealed to thee My beauty.
The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 4
- ·God does not want anything for Himself.
- The loyalty or commitment of humans to God, or conversely, the perversity of mankind is of no profit to God.
- The Bird of the Realm of Utterance refers to the Messengers of God who speak for God. The “U” is capitalized out of reverence because the Utterance of the Messengers is equivalent to the Utterance of God.
- As the Voice of God, the Messengers say that everything they reveal to humans comes from God and it is for the sake (benefit) of humans.
The caveat is that Messengers of God are not ordinary people, and it is by their Guidance, which is God’s Guidance, that we can attain our own spirituality, since they know the Will of God and we cannot possibly know the Will of God without Them. In short, we can become spiritual when we follow the Will of God, not our own will, since humans are fallible and prone to make mistakes.
“From the foregoing passages and allusions it hath been made indubitably clear that in the kingdoms of earth and heaven there must needs be manifested a Being, an Essence Who shall act as a Manifestation and Vehicle for the transmission of the grace of the Divinity Itself, the Sovereign Lord of all. Through the Teachings of this Day Star of Truth every man will advance and develop until he attaineth the station at which he can manifest all the potential forces with which his inmost true self hath been endowed. It is for this very purpose that in every age and dispensation the Prophets of God and His chosen Ones have appeared amongst men, and have evinced such power as is born of God and such might as only the Eternal can reveal.”
Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 67-68
“The Prophets and Messengers of God have been sent down for the sole purpose of guiding mankind to the straight Path of Truth. The purpose underlying Their revelation hath been to educate all men, that they may, at the hour of death, ascend, in the utmost purity and sanctity and with absolute detachment, to the throne of the Most High.”
Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 156-157
Why wouldn’t justice come from God?
I mean we cannot have thoroughly evil people who committed heinous murders not being held accountable for their actions and going to heaven with people who lived a selfless noble life – that is unjust and it is not loving towards the people who lost loved ones to those murderers and may have suffered their entire life because of their loss.
All of those are straw men. I am simply a rational person who believes in justice for all. It is not justice for heinous murderers to gate the exact same treatment from God as noble selfless people who sacrificed their lives in service to God… Get real.
Again, you gave created a God made in your own image, a make believe God, maybe because you don’t like the Bible God.
This is not about me, it is about justice. What you propose is irrational and unjust, everyone going to heaven regardless of faith and deeds. It is egregious.
But more importantly, it is a fantasy. Everything in this world is based upon rewards and punishments and it will be no different in the afterlife. We will reap what we sowed. There are no free rides to heaven.
Murder is not subjective, it is evil. There might be mitigating circumstances but that is up to the courts to decide.
And what if you don’t get forgiveness from them? Usually you don’t.
I think maybe you should be a Christian because they only have to ask forgiveness and they are saved. They do not have to do anything else because they believe God will not punish anyone as long as they repent and ask for forgiveness, and believe Jesus died for their sins.
Why wouldn’t the law of karma also apply to the afterlife? I think it does because we reap what we sow. The following passage does not imply that God will punish us but rather we will realize what we did and that will be the punishment for our misdeeds.
“It is clear and evident that all men shall, after their physical death, estimate the worth of their deeds, and realize all that their hands have wrought. I swear by the Day Star that shineth above the horizon of Divine power! ...
If we do not get justice in this life through the court system why shouldn’t we get justice from God in the afterlife, however that is doled out?
Where do you get these ideas? This sure sounds like wishful thinking to me. I do not believe we will ever see God, not even after we die.
So you believe in reincarnation?
here do you get these ideas? God does not rely upon humans to “realize” His omnipotence; God knows He is omnipotent because God knows everything. God does not rely upon humans for anything.
Yet you seem to think you know the Will of God, isn’t that interesting. If you did not think you knew it you would not be saying what is going to happen to everyone in the afterlife, that they will all experience God’s Love. How can you know that unless you know the Will of God?
Why would you believe in a God you have no evidence for? Your faith is in yourself, not in God.
My faith is in God as revealed by Messengers who established religions, not a God I made up in my own head. You want God to be an omnipotent God of unconditional love, so you created that in your mind. You are taking a pretty big chance because there is no reason to believe that you are right. Religious believers are not taking a chance because they have the scriptures to go by, so even if they did not get it completely right they will be in the ball park.
“The purpose of God in creating man hath been, and will ever be, to enable him to know his Creator and to attain His Presence. To this most excellent aim, this supreme objective, all the heavenly Books and the divinely-revealed and weighty Scriptures unequivocally bear witness.” Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 70
God does not need us for anything at all, but we need God for our very existence, since only by the power of God can we exist.
God has no limitations and thus cannot experience any limitations. God is completely independent of his creatures so God does not experience what we experience. You are anthropomorphizing God, bringing God down to a human level.
Do you really think that is what I'm trying to tell Tony? Here's the sequence of replies.
Do you really think that is what I'm trying to tell Tony? Here's the sequence of replies.
But, do you know or care what the beliefs of some to the other people posting on these threads that are started by Baha'is? They came to you. Many of them with an opposing view. Why challenge their view in a way that makes them oppose the Baha'i Faith even more?
Why challenge their view in a way that makes them oppose the Baha'i Faith even more?
Yes, it's a complicated thing. I can see how a person that becomes truly humble and is as nothing, then they can reflect God's love more. But then there are those that are trying to force it. They aren't truly humble but know that they should be humble. They know they should tell others about spiritual truths, but they aren't truly living them yet. But who among us is so spiritual, that we don't have to tell others about how spiritual we are? Which then defeats the purpose. And everyone can see through us and see we how un-spiritual we are.I was just thinking along the lines of being humble and being as nothing.
But, do you know or care what the beliefs of some to the other people posting on these threads that are started by Baha'is? They came to you. Many of them with an opposing view. Why challenge their view in a way that makes them oppose the Baha'i Faith even more?
If Baha'u'llah is as He claims, then how do you reconcile your response to that Message since you first heard of it?
How will you come to terms with the years that you have not joined in and tried to change the world in the way that Baha'u'llah said it must change, to find our unity?
Explain to me how the Message of Baha'u'llah is not the challenge?
In the end, no one that does not see it is a challenge, will take it on, be it given with milk or honey or by the sword of the tongue. Which brings me back to the fact that one can not control what the response will be, but one can choose to not put fuel on a fire.
Yes, it's a complicated thing. I can see how a person that becomes truly humble and is as nothing, then they can reflect God's love more. But then there are those that are trying to force it. They aren't truly humble but know that they should be humble. They know they should tell others about spiritual truths, but they aren't truly living them yet. But who among us is so spiritual, that we don't have to tell others about how spiritual we are? Which then defeats the purpose. And everyone can see through us and see we how un-spiritual we are.
That is what I'm talking about. Some Baha'is can't truly humble themselves and be one with other people in other religions or with atheists. They still have to tell them how much better the Baha'is Faith is. But, I really do think we're all getting better. Which is nice.
Okay, most of the people from other religions that respond to Baha'is on these threads are disagreeing with something about the Baha'i Faith or about what a Baha'i has said. So quoting you, "one can choose to not put fuel on a fire." That is the challenge for Baha'is. Is that really putting "honey" on it? A person might think they are speaking with the "sword" of truth, but they aren't. They are talking about the sword of the truth of their religion, and it's smashing into a brick wall.
But most of us don't have walls all the way around us. There is a door. Knock and ask nicely most people will let you in. Come to the door with your sword drawn... no ones going to open the door.
The Baha'is message has many good points, but some bad ones too. To a Hindu you say that Krishna is not an incarnation and there is no reincarnation. To Jews you tell them that they have missed their Messiah Jesus... and Muhammad, and The Bab and Baha'u'llah. To the Christian you tell them that Jesus is not God. He's didn't rise from the dead, but, in fact, he is dead. If the door was ever open, it just got slammed in your face. They're not going to listen to you. They are going to oppose you and find everything they can that shows how wrong your religion is.
For me, the Baha'i message has some problem areas. I'm not going to sign a declaration card that says that I believe the Baha'i leaders were sent by God. I'm not going to sign a card saying I'm going to obey the things he taught. The Baha'i Faith falls into that negative thing called "organized" religion. You have your teachings and rules and leaders that are there to make sure people follow most of those rules. Will there be a day when more and more rules get enforced? I think so. And like all religions with a lot of rules, nobody is able to obey and follow all of them. Not one Baha'i is perfect. So way give the power to rule over others to imperfect people? There is going to be problems. The ones passing judgement over others are going to have vices too... but probably hidden from view. Which then makes those people lead double lives... the Holy outward life and the not so holy secret life.
Are you going to rid the world of alcohol? If not, there will be Baha'is that drink. How about pot and other "recreational" drugs? If Baha'is aren't going to rid them forever, then some Baha'is will find them and use them. And then there's the sexual preference issue. There will always be gays, lesbians, transsexuals and people having sex without being married. Sex with others while being married. And so on. Baha'i rules aren't going to change any of those things. And it will be worse if Baha'is ever get the power to try and enforce their rules. Other than that... I really like the Baha'i Faith.
Yes, it's a complicated thing. I can see how a person that becomes truly humble and is as nothing, then they can reflect God's love more. But then there are those that are trying to force it. They aren't truly humble but know that they should be humble. They know they should tell others about spiritual truths, but they aren't truly living them yet. But who among us is so spiritual, that we don't have to tell others about how spiritual we are? Which then defeats the purpose. And everyone can see through us and see we how un-spiritual we are.
That is what I'm talking about. Some Baha'is can't truly humble themselves and be one with other people in other religions or with atheists. They still have to tell them how much better the Baha'is Faith is. But, I really do think we're all getting better. Which is nice.