Yes, beautiful poetic Baha'i speak... we are the leaves of one tree. The flowers of one garden. But... we were all taught to believe different things. Many of us questioned those things and went out and searched for better or greater truths. Some found truth in the religious teachings from India or China or from Persia. Or, some rediscovered Jesus and swear he is the only truth.
Now we have the Baha'i Faith. How does it square with those other beliefs that we have studied and learned and, sometimes, believed was the absolute truth. Baha'is are asking as to believe them as having the absolute truth. That is what Baha'is are doing and saying. It might very well be the truth. But, if the Baha'i Faith is the truth, then all our old beliefs are wrong and not the absolute truth. There are some things or many things wrong with them... according to the Baha'i Faith.
Hi CG.
I think what we are appealing for people to do in order to reconcile their differences and live in harmony and peace is to accept our past, each other’s history and culture. If we can accept or appreciate that there is truth in all religions not just our own then it will go a long way to peace. There is truth in every religion, in every human being. Different religions express truth different ways and place emphasis.on different qualities.
For example Jesus focused on love and forgiveness while Buddha mindfulness and meditation, Krishna that we are spirit not our bodies and detachment, Baha’u’llah on unity. So if we made one Bible in our hearts and in it love, detachment, unity, mindfulness and so on then we stand to benefit.
Baha’is need to learn the Christian concept of love and the Buddhist concept of mindfulness and meditation and they can learn unity from us, None of us has all or exclusive absolute knowledge.
By asking me these good questions you are teaching me and helping me to become a better person. We cannot lose sight of what all the religions teach. To do so would be spiritual suicide. But we do need to build on our past knowledge and add to it the concept of the oneness of mankind so as to end discrimination and prejuduces and establish peace.
None of us have absolute truth not the Baha’is or anyone only God. All we have is the collective knowledge and wisdom of our past and some new concepts Baha’u’llah has brought specifically for this age to add to our accumulated knowledge not replace it and in the future as we develop and advance we will attain greater heights spiritually but we need each other. We are all parts of one great whole.
We can only achieve peace and happiness if we work together in harmony. If we cut up the human body it ceases to function so we need the disjointed body of humanity to become whole and healthy and begin to function as it was meant to.
Only ego prevents us from all dropping our prejudices towards one another’s faith and accept all truth no matter where it comes from.