Who Was Baha’u’llah, and How Can We Evaluate His Claims?

[KWED]

Yet in 170 years we do already have a global consciousness permeating humanity.

Do we?
Please elaborate.

 

[KWED]

Baha'u'llah offered this for us to consider.
"There can be no doubt whatever that the peoples of the world, of whatever race or religion, derive their inspiration from one heavenly Source, and are the subjects of one God."

Well, that is obvious nonsense because there are many millions who completely reject the concept of the supernatural.
Moreover, the billions who do believe in gods have widely varying ideas about it and their inspiration is completely different.
Bahaullah was wong.

 

[KWED]

The verse does not say I will gather all of you from all the nations and places to which I have banished you, declares the LORD.

There are 15.2 million Jews in the world and 6.8 million Jews live in Israel. Israel is already one of the most densely populated countries in developed world, so what would happen if all the Jews in the world returned to Israel? That is not to mention that the Jews living in other countries who were born and raised there and have family there might not want to move to Israel.

Israel Area and Population Density

Israel is one of the most densely populated countries in developed world and has an estimated population of 8.7 in 2017, which ranks 101st in the world population.

Israel Population 2022 (Demographics, Maps, Graphs)

Bangladesh has nearly 3 times the population density of Israel, yet Israel has far better infrastructure, so it would not be a problem if all the Jews returned to Israel.

 

[KWED]

This is why it would be a miracle and good evidence that the anointed king is the messiah. It's not something anyone can just claim for themselves.

You think that a country having a high population density is a miracle and a sign of divine intervention?

 

[KWED]

I am not that good with history so I will have to defer to @Truthseeker and @TransmutingSoul to answer that question.

I'm pretty confidence that the answer is "none".

 

[KWED]

You look at the "fruits". Did the person as far as you can tell live in such a way that it is likely he came to promote himself? Did the words he say inspire people to better behavior?

1. Many people have done that.
2. Bahaullah didn't inspire many people.

Did He raise the people around him to better behavior?

1. Many people have done that.
2. Bahaullah didn't raise many people.

Did he sacrifice himself in some way to deliver the message?

Many people have sacrificed themselves for a cause they believe in.

Or as a result of his message did he come into material riches or benefit himself in some way?

Yes.

When you look at the scriptures he supposedly revealed do they strike a chord inside you?

No.

[/quote]Did he help create a better civilization?[/QUOTE]No.

So we can see that your list of "fruits" show he was not really different from many other people. He may have genuinely believed that he was a messenger of god (people often suffer from convincing delusions), but that doesn't mean he actually was one. And his claims certainly can't be used as evidence for the existence of a god.

 

[KWED]

There is really a truckload to explore. Mostly I see no point of posting any more. People are not willing to see it as a truckload, they want to refute it one by one.

I will offer there are some unexplainable incidents, that are even recorded by people that did not become Baha'i, about when they had a meeting with Abdul'baha.

There are people that have conversed with Abdul'baha and recording what he said in reply to them. The thing here was, they were English speakers and Abdul'baha was speaking Persian or Arabic.

It is not until a translator came in that they realised they no longer understood what was being said.

That would be mind blowing, and yet it still was not enough of a sign that there was a power far beyond our understanding involved in that exchange.

Regards Tony

You think that someone who doesn't speak Persian not understanding someone speaking Persian is "evidence"of magic?

 

[KWED]

The only good evidence that one could provide that he was actually a prophet of God is demonstrating that he had knowledge only the creator of the universe would know.

Until a prophet of God gives us a working Theory of Everything that's at least several centuries ahead of our current scientific models, then there's no good evidence that they are a prophet of God.

In fact, that is the minimum criteria for merely suspecting that they are a prophet of God, by my mileage, because there could be a number of other ways they obtained such a ToE without recourse to God. So it's only a starting place.

Since Baha'u'llah can't even do that, then he clearly wasn't a prophet of God.

Ah, but vague platitudes are far more important than repeatable, testable evidence.

 

[CG Didymus]

Rather disingenuous of you. @loverofhumanity and @Trailblazer have different opinions as Trailblazer just said. There is no uniformity of opinion in the Baha'i Faith. Perhaps there uniformity in your own piece of Christianity, and so you don't understand this.

Why isn't there a set standard of belief that all Baha'is should have about the Bible? Just with the Baha'is that have been posting on this thread we have an extreme difference of opinion and belief. Is the Bible "The Word of God"? Were the writers inspired by the Holy Spirit? Are the accounts written about historically accurate? Which means if the writer says that the seas parted or the Sun stopped in the sky, that is what actually happened. Or, if it says that God spoke or a serpent spoke or a donkey spoke, that is what really happened? Or, my usual one, if the NT says that Jesus showed himself to be alive with many proofs, that he actually, somehow, did come back to life... and then floated off into the sky, then that's what really happened?

I don't expect any Baha'i to even consider those kinds of events really happened. So, is it plainly stated in the Baha'i writings that those things aren't real but were symbolic? Then, my complaint with the Baha'i interpretation is that, because of the way it is written, it is written as if those things actually happened. With some of them they claim to have witnesses these things really happening. To me, that doesn't sound like they are writing some symbolic parable. Which means, if those things didn't really happen, they were made up and passed off as being true, but were not meant to be taken symbolically.

 

[CG Didymus]

We are allowed to believe what we want to, as you said. If it comes to the point where there are too many problems with the Baha'i understanding of the Bible, we can quit being Baha'is. The thing is, there are many evidences that point to Baha'i being true, and we need to decide if there are too many evidences pointing away from that. There are things we may not understand and accept for the time being, but on the strength of other things we accept as true, we can set them aside until we understand them. But as I said, the contradictions for any person can be too much according to our own understanding. For you it seems there are too many contradictions according to your own understanding, and it is your right to have your own understanding.

All I'm saying is that what most Baha'is "wholeheartedly" believe about the Bible is probably going to be the Baha'i interpretation of the Bible... which makes lots of things symbolic. Are there Baha'is that believe in the 6 day creation story, that the world was completely flooded about 4-5000 years ago, that people are born with some kind of inherited sin because of Adam, and that Jesus is the only way to have your sins forgiven, then why would that person be a Baha'i?

It's probably because the Baha'i offers a symbolic interpretation of those things that explains them away that attracts some people to the Baha'i Faith. So, for the Baha'i Faith to clearly layout there what they really believe about the Bible is probably a good thing. Too loose and allowing too wide of an interpretation of the Bible is probably a bad thing, that I think could lead to Baha'i on Baha'i arguments.

 

[CG Didymus]

And I must repeat that it is my informed opinion that it is extremely unlikely that MrB Is a messenger of God.

It is my informed opinion that it is extremely likely Baha'u'llah is a Messenger of God.

And what are those things? What are a few of the things that convinced you?

 

[CG Didymus]

Baha’u’llah explains these things in a Tablet.


We testify that when He came into the world, He shed the splendor of His glory upon all created things. Through Him the leper recovered from the leprosy of perversity and ignorance. Through Him, the unchaste and wayward were healed. Through His power, born of Almighty God, the eyes of the blind were opened, and the soul of the sinner sanctified.

Leprosy may be interpreted as any veil that interveneth between man and the recognition of the Lord, his God. Whoso alloweth himself to be shut out from Him is indeed a leper, who shall not be remembered in the Kingdom of God, the Mighty, the All-Praised. We bear witness that through the power of the Word of God every leper was cleansed, every sickness was healed, every human infirmity was banished. He it is Who purified the world. Blessed is the man who, with a face beaming with light, hath turned towards Him.

Yeah, yeah, so you make it symbolic. That's the problem... the writers said that Jesus healed some lepers, some blind people, and cast out demons out of some people. "Every" leper, every sick person was not healed. And then what was that spiritual healing that Jesus brought? The disease was sin. Sin that had enter the world because one man, Adam, disobeyed and ate a piece of a forbidden fruit. The Law, for Christians, cannot save a person. They could never be good enough to pay the price. A perfect sacrifice was needed. God's only Son, Jesus, was that sacrifice. Jesus was killed to atone for the sins of the world, but God didn't leave him in the grave to rot away but raised him up on the third day. And the story goes that Jesus let himself be touched to prove he was real and not a ghost.

So, myth and legend? Pure BS? Or, like the Baha'is do explain it all away by making it symbolic? And lots of us do explain it away, because it is so very hard to think that in anyway all of that is true. But lots of people use the "BS" explanation. So, why do Baha'is say their symbolic explanation is correct?

 

[CG Didymus]

I am still wondering about all this early 17th Century English. Surely the latest messenger for today would speak as we speak today. If not, why not?

I was told that Shoghi Effendi was sent to Oxford just so he could learn to translate the writings into that kind of old English. But it's the on and on of the "Oh thou most effulgent... Oh thou most Magnificent One and Oh thou most this or that... I keep thinking, Yeah, get to the point of what you are trying to say. Way to wordy and flowery. But some people love it.

 

[CG Didymus]

He was the son of a nobleman and government official. He would have had private tuition and been exposed to books and learning from an early age. The claim that he had no education and was only able to read and write by magic is baseless and nonsensical.

Supposedly he could just tune into that higher power and see everything he needed to know. But then, some of the people here on the forum have said that his science isn't accurate... And that it matches the scientific thinking of the time. So, what's the problem with this higher power? It gave him misinformation?

 

[CG Didymus]

But if there is no god, there are no messengers of god, so all those who claim to be one are delusional or dishonest.

Before you can claim that anyone is a messenger of god you need to demonstrate that there is a god in the first place. That is basic logic and rational thinking.

Then every "messenger" of God had a contradictory message. Baha'i, naturally, explain it away by saying that "originally" the messengers all taught the truth about God, but those darn followers wrote things wrong, then the people interpreted those writings wrong, then later, some other followers added things in. So, that non-existent "original", "true", message was lost. And if that is the case whose fault is that? I say it is God's fault. He didn't have the messenger write it down but let oral traditions go on for years before things got written. Then in some religions, God let corrupt people take leadership of the religion.

So, like what do we know about God if we were members of a Christian Church? God is a three-in-one being. God created a beautiful archangel named Lucifer, but then he fell and turned into Satan. All sinners, that aren't washed in the sanctifying blood of Jesus, will be sent to hell.

Or, what if we follow one of the Hindu religious groups that follow Krishna? There are three main Gods. Krishna was the incarnation of one of those Gods. We reincarnate over and over again until we get pure enough to break the cycle of needing to be reborn into this world.

The Baha'i offer a "truth" that explains all those others away. But part of what it explains away is the "truth" about God that we learned from the other religions. So, we are worse off if we believed in any of those other religions, because we'd have to unlearn that "truth" and learn the real "truth" that the Baha'i Faith teaches. My conclusion... People make up their Gods and religious beliefs.

 

[CG Didymus]

Well, that is obvious nonsense because there are many millions who completely reject the concept of the supernatural.
Moreover, the billions who do believe in gods have widely varying ideas about it and their inspiration is completely different.
Bahaullah was wong.

Exactly, I always bring up the Aztecs as an example to the Baha'is. How many centuries did they believe that their God needed a blood sacrifice to make sure they had good crops, had lots of babies and beat their enemies in war? But that God wasn't real.

 

[TransmutingSoul]

He was the son of a nobleman and government official. He would have had private tuition and been exposed to books and learning from an early age. The claim that he had no education and was only able to read and write by magic is baseless and nonsensical.

That is not what Baha'u'llah has claimed, as it is known that Baha'u'llah had the education a young noble man would have received.

There is a lot one can find out about this, I will not repeat here.

What Baha'u'llah was referring to was the schools of religious institution and knowledge to which all Muslim Mullah attend and to which he was addressing. Baha'u'llah was confirming with them, that he had not attended the schools of learning that they had attended.

This was known in Persia, it was never negated by any of the Mullah, it was never used against Baha'u'llah.

Yet here we are with such silly refutations by uninformed individuals.

Regards Tony

 

[Trailblazer]

I am still wondering about all this early 17th Century English. Surely the latest messenger for today would speak as we speak today. If not, why not?

Baha'u'llah did not speak in early 17th Century English, He spoke in Persian and Arabic.
His Writings were translated in that way.

Some time ago, @TransmutingSoul explained why the Writings were translated into King James English.

Tony said: The reason is that Shoghi Effendi went to England to study English so He could better translate the Writings of Baha'u'llah from Persian and Arabic into English.

From his studies he determined that King James English was the best form to portray Persian and Arabic to English speakers.

Apparently Persian and Arabic have a form of poetic prose that is hard to portray to English speakers. King James English must in a small way convey some of that poetic prose experienced by Persian and Arabic speakers.

Shoghi Effendi offered that the future may see different translations.

 

[Trailblazer]

He was the son of a nobleman and government official. He would have had private tuition and been exposed to books and learning from an early age. The claim that he had no education and was only able to read and write by magic is baseless and nonsensical.

That was not Baha'u'llah's claim. His claim is that He had no 'formal' education.

“O KING! 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. This is but a leaf which the winds of the will of thy Lord, the Almighty, the All-Praised, have stirred.”” Proclamation of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 57

 

[KWED]

That is not what Baha'u'llah has claimed, as it is known that Baha'u'llah had the education a young noble man would have received.

But that is what @Trailblazer and others here claim.
So you accept that his ability to write and his knowledge of the world came from traditional rather than supernatural means.

Yet here we are with such silly refutations by uninformed individuals.

Indeed. It seems some people will believe any old nonsense if it confirms their magical beliefs.