• Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Access to private conversations with other members.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

How are these Great Beings explained?

Vinayaka

devotee
Premium Member
The problem we have here is that all that witnesed this with a pure heart, became Baha'is even when they may have been originally hostile. They in turn have left honest accounts of these meetings. There are a few that did not accept and left records.
Indeed that is a huge problem, isn't it? Were you able to access the records of those who did not accept? Or are you even allowed to?

One of the other huge problems, as I see it., is taking the testimony of Baha'u'llah himself about himself as proof of his greatness, unparalleled in human history.

It's about as legitimate as taking the word of a criminal when he says, 'But your honour, I didn't do it."

In short, none of this is evidence of much at all. Personal testimony isn't evidence.
 

TransmutingSoul

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Indeed that is a huge problem, isn't it? Were you able to access the records of those who did not accept? Or are you even allowed to?

One of the other huge problems, as I see it., is taking the testimony of Baha'u'llah himself about himself as proof of his greatness, unparalleled in human history.

It's about as legitimate as taking the word of a criminal when he says, 'But your honour, I didn't do it."

In short, none of this is evidence of much at all. Personal testimony isn't evidence.

As you are free to choose.

To me it is the Greatest Evidence and I thank Baha'u'llah for the veils He has given us so we can make that choice.

Regards Tony
 

Vinayaka

devotee
Premium Member
I find it strange too. I think that is a question for them. They should reply why.
They already have, many times, and many times over. Over 2 billion of them see no evidence. They think it's all hokum. But of course, you;re right, and they are all wrong.

But what I really wonder is what you're actually afraid of. Is belonging to this faith so much of your identity that to take one open look outside that box shake your entire world that much?
 

Vinayaka

devotee
Premium Member
As you are free to choose.

To me it is the Greatest Evidence and I thank Baha'u'llah for the veils He has given us so we can make that choice.

Veils? What veils did he give you? What do you even mean by veil? Is this more Baha'ispeak?

Remember, he didn't give me anything. You can't speak for me. Us? Really?
 

Dawnofhope

Non-Proselytizing Baha'i
Staff member
Premium Member
Action and experience are education too. Which is preferable, reading about something, or doing it? Go read a manual about motorcycle riding, and then go buy a bike and ride it. Then tell me which event lead to more education about it.

The Hindu environment is 'all in' so learning is happening all the time, just not the type that gets you stuck in intellectual gridwork/dogma, which is a barrier to spiritual progress. Going around in circles on the same topics ad infinitum. But it also is magnetic, human to get stuck there.

Your guru was wise to emphasise practice/doing/action IMHO rather than too much study. We all need to find a way to live successfully or at least do the best we can. The sooner we focus on doing just that, the better. We can definitely give too much emphasis to the intellectual side and achieve much less.
 
Last edited:

TransmutingSoul

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Veils? What veils did he give you? What do you even mean by veil? Is this more Baha'ispeak?

Remember, he didn't give me anything. You can't speak for me. Us? Really?

So when you ask a question, would you like a reply?

We see your answer in the purpose of a veil, it hides that what is behind it, the more veils we place the more we do not see. We place the veils by our own selves.

Only a quote can give the answer, as Baha'u'llah has given that answer, that we have many veils, yes we, as it is in all the Holy Books and passed on and down in all Faiths, written in one way or another.

"...Tear asunder, in My Name, the veils that have grievously blinded your vision, and, through the power born of your belief in the unity of God, scatter the idols of vain imitation. Enter, then, the holy paradise of the good-pleasure of the All-Merciful. Sanctify your souls from whatsoever is not of God, and taste ye the sweetness of rest within the pale of His vast and mighty Revelation, and beneath the shadow of His supreme and infallible authority. Suffer not yourselves to be wrapt in the dense veils of your selfish desires, inasmuch as I have perfected in every one of you My creation, so that the excellence of My handiwork may be fully revealed unto men. It follows, therefore, that every man hath been, and will continue to be, able of himself to appreciate the Beauty of God, the Glorified. Had he not been endowed with such a capacity, how could he be called to account for his failure?......This is one of the verities that lie enshrined in My Revelation—a verity which I have revealed in all the heavenly Books, which I have caused the Tongue of Grandeur to utter, and the Pen of Power to inscribe."

Bahá'í Reference Library - Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, Pages 143-144

Regards Tony
 

siti

Well-Known Member
I thank Baha'u'llah for the veils He has given us
You guys wear veils? How...er...interesting. I'd heard (a while back) that some Iranian men had taken to wearing the hijab to poke fun at the women who want the freedom to discard the traditional female garb. I don't suppose there's any connection?
 

Dawnofhope

Non-Proselytizing Baha'i
Staff member
Premium Member
Yes, you do. Far less than Islam, in my view, but some. Ahimsa for sure, and some shared virtues.

Its so important to remember what we have in common. The world is a small place these days and peoples from seemingly disparate backgrounds often find themselves having to work together in the interests of the greater good. I'm sure that is an unavoidable reality especially if we are working in health, education, or the justice system.
 

Vinayaka

devotee
Premium Member
Your guru was wise io emphasise practice/doing/action IMHO rather than too much study. We all need to find a way to live successfully or at least the best way we can. The sooner we focus on doing just that, the better. We can definitely become give too much emphasis to the intellectual side and achieve much less.

Thank you. He was pragmatic, as is his successor.

My Mother taught me how to garden ... how deep the seeds go, when to plant, what will winter over, hardiness. Her focus was on 'good dirt' as she put it. 'If you have good dirt, the garden will grow.' The engineers and doctors at the temple come by, and watch me planting a rosebush, and look puzzled at the deep hole, enriched soil, and the rough way I treat the plant's roots. I harvested about 100 pounds of apples this fall from friend's trees, who were letting them fall and rot. I air dry them in the veranda, and neighbours wonder what the heck I'm doing. Nobody knows the old tricks and techniques any more.

My engineer friends are fools about this stuff, yet I couldn't do what they do, or what you do.

As a teacher, I learned more being in the classroom for 3 weeks that 4 years of education taught me.

Of what value is it to think you know the nature of God, the right interpretation, or all that jazz, if you can't even smile at your neighbour?
 

Vinayaka

devotee
Premium Member
So what's your take on Krishna, or do you not think too much about this central character for the Vaishnavas?

Personally, same as Christ. Seriously doubt either existed, but don't care much. Irrelevant to my belief system, so no real opinion that matters. Still, just because I have so much in common with Vaishnavites and Buddhists, it's easier to get along.
 

Vinayaka

devotee
Premium Member
We see your answer in the purpose of a veil, it hides that what is behind it, the more veils we place the more we do not see. We place the veils by our own selves.

We? Tony, I've told you I don't read the quotes. They're too preachy and egotistical for me. So in discussions with me, you're wasting your time. But go ahead. Maybe the other Baha'is read them.
 

InvestigateTruth

Well-Known Member
See what Thomas Paine wrote a hundred years before Abdu'l Baha:

“We have it in our power to begin the world over again…The birthday of a new world is at hand.” (Common Sense, 1797)
There was nothing new about declaring a new world at hand at the beginning of the 20th century, it happened at the beginning of the 19th (as Paine's remark indicates), the 18th - Newton's Principia (1687) bringing Nature's secrets into the

The coming of a new world was also prophesied to happen by Return of Christ:
I quote Revelation 21:

1Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,”a for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 2I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’b or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

5He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”



In Baha'i View this Prophecy was fulfilled by God through Manifesting Bahaullah:

"Soon will the present-day order be rolled up, and a newone spread out in its stead. Verily, thy Lord speaketh the truth, and is the Knower of things unseen."

"Erelong shall We bring into being through thee exponents of new and wondrous sciences, of potent and effective crafts, and shall make manifest through them that which the heart of none of Our servants hath yet conceived. Thus do We bestow upon whom We will whatsoever We desire, and thus do We withdraw from whom We will what We had once bestowed. Even so do We ordain whatsoever We please through Our behest."


"THE world’s equilibrium hath been upset through the vibrating influence of this most great, this new World Order. Mankind’s ordered life hath been revolutionized through the agency of this unique, this wondrous System—the like of which mortal eyes have never witnessed."
 

Vinayaka

devotee
Premium Member
Its so important to remember what we have in common. The world is a small place these days and peoples from seemingly disparate backgrounds often find themselves having to work together in the interests of the greater good. I'm sure that is an unavoidable reality especially if we are working in health, education, or the justice system.

It's also important to me to just say that we have it in common and leave it at that, and not to say that your prophet caused it all to happen. That gets annoying.
 

Vinayaka

devotee
Premium Member
You guys wear veils? How...er...interesting. I'd heard (a while back) that some Iranian men had taken to wearing the hijab to poke fun at the women who want the freedom to discard the traditional female garb. I don't suppose there's any connection?

It's an analogy. The veil is the hiding of the truth, the covering of the box, the illusion of Baha'u'llah, the dam on the river of life, the words of the Covenant Breakers, the ashes after fire ... the smell of a jak.

Do you understand Baha'ispeak?
 

Vinayaka

devotee
Premium Member
"THE world’s equilibrium hath been upset through the vibrating influence of this most great, this new World Order. Mankind’s ordered life hath been revolutionized through the agency of this unique, this wondrous System—the like of which mortal eyes have never witnessed."

Do you know why these guys had to brag so much? Was that the nature of the society they lived in at that time? Was Islamic discussion just one big bragfest to see who could outdo each other? Did they brag about cattle, land, wives, and mundane things too, or was it just about their spirituality?

In Hinduism we're taught that the spiritual ego is the greatest barrier to real progress.
 

Dawnofhope

Non-Proselytizing Baha'i
Staff member
Premium Member
Prayer is speaking directly to your God, I assume?
What spirit is required to carry such messages? It's direct, isn't it?

Baha'is often pray to God or the Manifestation of God. Our human spirit communes with the Spirit of God.

Do you need spirits to help you to peruse and consider all?

Meditation | What Bahá’ís Believe

Fasting is a physical action.
The fact that you can think motre quickly/clearly is a scientific fact rather than anything spiritual

Fasting is about much more than that. Its a time of greater reflection on God's purpose in our lifes as well as restraint from that which would come between ourselves and God.

Fasting | What Bahá’ís Believe

From paper to eye, translated in brain.
No spirits required.

I cannot see anything at all which is spiritual about Bahai.

Baha'is are asked to recite the words of God morning and evening. Reciting or even chanting sacred scriptures is an important aspect of many religions.

What religious education?
I cannot see anything spiritual about Bahai at all. Mark described spirits as tangible beings that dived down, drove out, forced a person, and also bad spirits that were unclean.
And so spiritual is all about good and bad spirits, tangible , and you discount this.

I'm trying to explain to you what your first wife's faith was about. You seem to have a low opinion of the Baha'is and so all I can do is explain what it is, and what it isn't.

Baha'is do not believe in either Satan or evil spirits. However depending on how we live our lives we can be influenced by the positive and negative spiritual forces of other people, and reflect them in our lives and therefore be an agent for good or evil in the world. Part of the journey to becoming better people is overcomng negative forces in ourselves such as ego, hate, and resentment.

Oh dear! Progression of soul by good deeds. Just how far away from most Christianity do you really want to travel?
That must be contrary to Bahauallah wrote about then, because he claimed that our destinies were predestined.

This becomes more like religious two-minds by the 1000 posts.

The progress of the soul for Baha'is depends on both faith and deeds. This is entirely consistent with Christian belief.

I don't where you are coming from with the destiny/predestination talk?

Bahais used to say that the parents of Bahais would be 'looked after'........ this smacks of that.
Bahai is about predestiny.......... or not. Which?

It is true that if we become a force for good in the world then we can have a greater influence on our relatives including children and parents.
 
Top