How are these Great Beings explained?

oldbadger said:

Thanks for that......
The value for me in being able to debate about Great Beings is that I don't feel so much anger as before. So there has been therapeutic benefit.......
I wandered the extreme Christian websites for several months (punishment?) and the result was a much better grasp of Mosiac and Christian guides and laws, because the only way to survive on such websites is to only quote the bible, thus requiring, and leading to better education.

It's not for me to propose values for you, to you, but I'm prepared to bet (Oops!) that the next time you stand on any platform at any public meeting, that you'll be much more prepared, practiced, sharp, refined and fast at offering answers to questions, attitudes and heckles.

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You're making us all better human beings.

oldbadger said:

Sadly Christians were told that they could keep slaves...... this a typical example of how badness can creep into any religion:-

Colossians 4:1 "You masters, treat your slaves in a righteous and fair way, knowing that you also have a Master in heaven."
Slaves, submit yourselves to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good and considerate, but also to those who are harsh. (1 Peter 2:18)

Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear (Ephesians 6:5)

Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything (Colossians 3:22)

Teach slaves to be subject to their masters in everything, to try to please them, not to talk back to them (Titus 2:9)

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Yes. God must be tired if sending Messengers we just always ignore. But human rights has advanced a hell of a lot in the last 60 years and that's a very good sign we are leaving our past behind.

oldbadger said:

Hi....
Where do you get these ideas from?
The Israelites were commanded to make war, kill and execute.

Jesus was an insurrectionist whose mission was to enforce the laws of Moses, especially the poor laws (imo) and he could not succeed with peace, harmony. Yes, he wanted his own supporters to bond, but..... peace?

Here's a short selection of quotes:-
A selection of the Laws of Moses.
Witches must die (Ex. 22:17) Canaanites musd all die (Deut. 20:16) A Court may sentence of death by decapitation (Ex. 21:20; Lev. 26:25, strangulation (Lev. 20:10), burning with fire (Lev. 20:14), stoning (Deut.22:24)
A selection of Christian prophecies:
Matthew {10:34} Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.

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Clearly laws were harsher in times where there wasn't proper civilization like in a desert where there were no courts, police, jails, detention centers or correction facilities to re educate criminals. To protect the innocent from serial offenders harsh methods had to be adopted to put fear into people to obey the law.

In today's world those laws are no longer necessary or appropriate as we are able to deal with these situations more humanely because we are not in a desert and are more civilized. So laws of thousands of years ago were needed to be what they were and now they are being adapted for this age.

Yes the Israelites were ordered to kill but whom? The Amalekites attacked Israel as they came out of Egypt. They were constantly attacking Israel. Are Israel not permitted to defend themselves?

Amalekites

Nomadic tribe of formidable people that first attacked the Israelites after the exodus at Rephidim. Descendants of Amalek, the grandson of Esau (Gen. 36:12), they inhabited the desolate wasteland of the northeast Sinai Peninsula and the Negev. They were the first to attack Israel after the exodus (Num. 24:20). Israel won the initial battle (Exod. 17:8-16), but later was driven back into the Sinai wilderness by a coalition of Amalekites and Canaanites (Num. 14:39-45). Thereafter the Amalekites waged a barbaric guerrilla war against Israel (Deut. 25:17-19). Fighting continued after Israel settled in Canaan. Because of their atrocities, God commanded Saul to exterminate the Amalekites (1 Sam. 15:2-3). Saul disobeyed and the Amalekites were not defeated completely until late in the eighth century B.C. (1 Chron. 4:43). No archaeological data concerning the Amalekites has been discovered to date. See Exodus; Negev.

CG Didymus said:

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Here's a link to 1Corinthians 15. It's a Christian explanation and has the verses they use to come up with the "Glorified" body.

"We die a natural human body, but we are raised with an incorruptible body" This he gets from verse 42.

"The resurrected, glorified body receives incorruption, glory, power, making it a spiritual body (42-44). One must have a glorified body to enter the kingdom (I Corinthians 15:35-55). Because our mortal flesh cannot inherit the kingdom of God, our bodies must be changed (51-54)."
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This answer is good and bad for Baha'is. Here Christians are saying that it is not a normal material flesh but a new spiritual flesh. You guys say we move on to a different spiritual world. It kind of coincides. But, still, if that is true, and Jesus was raised in a spiritual flesh that could be felt and had flesh and bone and could eat, yet was not a ghost, then why didn't Abdu'l Baha say so?

But he didn't. Instead he comes up with some way to make all the verses about the resurrected Jesus totally symbolic. For that to be true then no body saw Jesus. Nobody touched Jesus, and he ate with no one. His body was lying dead in a grave. And his followers, know spreading his word and bringing life to his teaching... They are his come back to life body.

That is absolutely false to what the NT says and what is believed by Christians.

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There is no such a thing in Bible called 'Spiritual Flesh'. Adding things to Bible are forbidden in Bible.
And do you know why they have to add things to Bible? It is to make Bible say what they want it to say. Because 'as is' does not confirm their interpretations.
If you really think about 1Corinthians 15, you would see it rejects the idea that Jesus resurrected with Flesh and Bone literally.

Either way, that even does not address the point I made: where in Bible says, a glorified body, can enter a room which is locked. Address this! Why loosing focus. Remember, you need to solve the puzzle, how Jesus came to locked room. You said, because He had a glorified body. Does a glorified body give the ability to enter a locked room?! How do we know?

Also, they seem to be confusing the idea of glorified body, with Resurrection of Christ.
The glorified body, as described in Bible, is related to the Day of Resurrection, which is not the same Day as Resurrection of Jesus after crucifixion. Why do they mixed them up? Where in Scripture says, these are the same type of Resurrection? I see too many speculations.
The Glorified body is about getting enlightened in different levels; some are enlightened like the Sun, some like the moon, and some like the stars! This is an analogy, that the Spiritual body of all people will reflect the Light of God in different levels, thus glorified, and becomes uncorrupted in a spiritual sense, not literally. 'Corruption', as in 'sinfulness', not, as in 'meat or flesh getting rotten'. It is corruption of the Spiritual body, which is to be defeated on the Day of resurrection, not the natural body.

CG Didymus said:

We've been through this before. Have you read the Book of Joshua? God tells Joshua to kill every man, woman and child in Jericho.

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in Deuteronomy ch 20 we see that God says to preserve the generations but in other cities mentioned below He wanted no traces to remain and gave the reason as being that He didn't want Israel to inherit their corruption.

13 And when the Lord thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword: 14 But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the Lord thy God hath given thee. 15 Thus shalt thou do unto all the cities which are very far off from thee, which are not of the cities of these nations.

16 But of the cities of these people, which the Lord thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth: 17 But thou shalt utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee: 18 That they teach you not to do after all their abominations, which they have done unto their gods; so should ye sin against the Lord your God.

God apparently judged some cities as He did Sodom and wanted them completely destroyed.

InvestigateTruth said:

I don't think you really believe in what you say here. How can you drive such a quick conclusion?!
Don't you think you actually need more evidence to make a conclusion like this?
The burden of proof is on the one who makes the accusation.

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I don't need any more information to know it is wrong to marry off little girls.

I consider it pedophilia.

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loverofhumanity said:

in Deuteronomy ch 20 we see that God says to preserve the generations but in other cities mentioned below He wanted no traces to remain and gave the reason as being that He didn't want Israel to inherit their corruption.

13 And when the Lord thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword: 14 But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the Lord thy God hath given thee. 15 Thus shalt thou do unto all the cities which are very far off from thee, which are not of the cities of these nations.

16 But of the cities of these people, which the Lord thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth: 17 But thou shalt utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee: 18 That they teach you not to do after all their abominations, which they have done unto their gods; so should ye sin against the Lord your God.

God apparently judged some cities as He did Sodom and wanted them completely destroyed.

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There is no excuse for murdering non-combatants, - women children, old folks, etc.

No excuse what so ever.

Verses like these are the ones that tell me the Bible is not from any God.

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loverofhumanity said:

Then we agree to disagree because to me the context in Sodom is abundantly clear to me.

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No. YHVH uses YADA in the text. It does not say homosexuality. We are told the people of Jerusalem were twice as bad as Sodom.

So it is pure baloney. There would be no reason what so ever for the citizens of Sodom to want to have homosexual gang-bang sex with unwilling strangers.

It is ludicrous!

You folks still haven't answered the question!

How can it be homosexual sex when YHVH says he is going down to Sodom to do it?

Answer the question.

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loverofhumanity said:

in Deuteronomy ch 20 we see that God says to preserve the generations but in other cities mentioned below He wanted no traces to remain and gave the reason as being that He didn't want Israel to inherit their corruption.

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Yes! Answering only the above para, the immense risk of bringing outsiders within was that their sicknesses and deseases could spread into and destroy the whole people. Once sickness was amongst the peiople the security, strength of the whole nation was lost.

Mostly, only the very young were spared because if they were virginal then they carried no deseases.

The shellfish law was AS IMPORTANT as the sexual laws. Look up 'shellfish poison paralysis' and you can see why this sickness can wipe out a whole group in an afternoon.

It amazes me how these laws were so perfect for the Israelites back in those days.

loverofhumanity said:

Absolutely. I was thinking about people like the Jews who were slaves before Moses intervened. That was a very significant moment in human history where oppressed slaves were taught to stand up for their rights which we have seen repeated numerous times with things like rejection of apartheid in South Africa and the black movement in the USA.

Moses set an example that is still being followed today by mostly non Jews demanding their rights.

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There is absolutely no evidence for the Exodus, or of this huge amount of Hebrew slavery in Egypt.

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loverofhumanity said:

Not completely innocent people He didn't.

Besides their horrific religious practices including ritual prostitution and child-sacrifice, these people were involved in wickedness in their day-to-day lives. If Lv 18 reflects Canaanites practices, they were regularly involved in incest, adultery, child-sacrifice, sodomy, and bestiality (Lv 18:6-23). God calls these practices the most heinous sin. It cannot be demonstrated that these practices contribute anything positive to society. Israel was not to do any of these practices (Lv 18:24-30). They were to kill or to drive the Canaanites into exile (Dt 20:16-18).(Moody's Bible Commentary)

God seems to allow us to go so far and then intervenes. There is just so much time allotted to us to change our ways. I believe we are given a certain amount of time to become acceptable but if we persist being corrupt God will not turn a blind eye forever.

We have the story Sodom which God destroyed because of its wickedness & who knows but that our Sodom moment is fast approaching when God will purge this earth of its corruption? Could it be another war? Or a geological event? Who knows? But if the Holy Roman Empire could fall then so can our current materialistic society collapse in a heap just like Sodom.

The likeness between Sodom and current day society is strikingly similar.

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The HEBREW had ritual prostitution in the Temples.

The Hebrew had child sacrifice.

The Hebrew were wicked in their "day-to-day lives."

The Hebrew were involved in incest, adultery, child-sacrifice, sodomy, and bestiality.

"God calls these practices the most heinous sin.?" God said the people of Jerusalem had twice the abomination!

How do we know the Hebrew did this? The Bible tells us they did.

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Ingledsva said:

The HEBREW had ritual prostitution in the Temples.

The Hebrew had child sacrifice.

The Hebrew were wicked in their "day-to-day lives."

The Hebrew were involved in incest, adultery, child-sacrifice, sodomy, and bestiality.

"God calls these practices the most heinous sin.?" God said the people of Jerusalem had twice the abomination!

How do we know the Hebrew did this? The Bible tells us they did.

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Hi.......
Do you believe what the bible tells about all the above?

oldbadger said:

Hi.......
Do you believe what the bible tells about all the above?

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Not sure what you mean?

The Bible definitely states such.

They are verses where they are telling on themselves, usually including angry statements from YHVH concerning such.

Do I think they actually did these things? Most likely, as the surrounding tribes did them, and they were most likely originally Canaanite themselves.

Do I think YHVH was talking to them? NO.

The Bible says they kept turning back - over-and-over.

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Ingledsva said:

Not sure what you mean?

The Bible definitely states such.

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Fair enough....

I just asked 'do you believe what the bible tells about what the Hebrew were doing as described?

You mentioned that you did believe.......... thus....

Do I think they actually did these things? Most likely, as the surrounding tribes did them, and they were most likely originally Canaanite themselves.

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My angle?
Well, I think that although evidence to prove is absent, I do believe, on the balance of possibilities, that the Exodus did happen, and I take interest in what other folks accept and reject about the OT accounts. Obviously that's it's own thread

Tony Bristow-Stagg said:

It was not from God.

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How do you know that? All the people involved claimed they were doing God's work.

CG Didymus said:

I have a question for you. One of the Baha'i said that no where in their writings does it say Krishna founded Hinduism. But isn't that part of the problem you had with them? I thought one of them said something like that? Don't sweat it too much. I don't want or expect to go back through 500 pages of posts or anything. But, do you remember anything like that?

Regardless, if they didn't say Krishna started Hinduism, then they're still messed up.. because then they don't have any known manifestation that started it.

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In my experience, they've more often said that Hinduism has no known individual founder, but if I remember right, they often just toss Krishna's name into the list along with Christ, Moses, etc, and by definition, He's different than that list because He's God (to Vaishnavites). As you know, they're inconsistent. The four Baha'i's contributing here will often contradict each other, and the stuff from the Baha'i' literature also contradicts each other. For example, some lists have Confucius, while others don't.

loverofhumanity said:

Nothing to do with God at all. God only teaches things like compassion and non violence, peace, love and harmony.

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And the desire to convert everyone?

Carlita said:

@adrian009 This is probably something you'd be kinda interested in.

History Timeline Homosexuality (defined as actions) oh, here's where the excerpts come from. Courage FAQs This is one huge reason I left the Church. Not just for myself but for the people there. I'd be horrified if I was alive years ago in WW1 and WW2 seeing this full blown as if it were all adnormal.

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Thank you. Its a lot of history that I have never considered in any real depth before.

Carlita said:

"I am glad that we are talking about 'homosexual people' because before all else comes the individual person, in his wholeness and dignity. And people should not be defined only by their sexual tendencies: let us not forget that God loves all his creatures and we are destined to receive his infinite love." - Pope Francis, The Name of God is Mercy
I like this quote. Though he doesn't refer to wholeness as identities, many LGBT doesn't define themselves by sexual attraction. Can you imagine if someone asked a straight person what their values are, they'd say "well, I'm attracted to men" (as a woman) "I have a tendency to look at men when they are hot." He stops. "Oooh! You're asking about my values.... equality, love, and god."

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Pope Francis's words resonate with me. I'm getting my head around this whole LBGT attraction/identity and the subtleties. You have clearly thought about is a great deal over the years and especially in regards to the Catholic church.

Carlita said:

On the same website the Francis quote is on, is a website of an organization called Courage. This is what it says (Excerpts):

Courage answering FAQ questions

Why are same-sex attractions considered “objectively disordered (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2358)? Isn’t that a harsh term?

Courage: "The attraction of a man for a woman, or a woman for a man, is objectively ordered toward this marital union, although in particular cases it may be disordered by lustful, promiscuous or adulterous desires. Homosexual attractions, however, are never directed toward the sexual union of spouses who are complementary in nature and whose union can lead to the procreation of new human beings. In all cases they go against the proper order of willing and acting that is inherent in our human nature, created and redeemed by God."

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Its very interesting to view the catechisms of the Catholic Church. There are many similarities between the Baha'i and Faith. Some of the wording is somewhat harsh though.

Carlita said:

This doesn't take into factor that many LGBTQ Catholics have lead "heterosexual" marriages and dismissed their identity and normal attractions for their communion with christ in a sacramental ordained marriage.

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I think that its incredibly important to acknowledge those who have made this sacrifice and to have hope. We all have our struggles in life. It is hard for me to imagine the struggles for many in the LGBT community. Thanks for taking the time to explain some of your thoughts about it.

adrian009 said:

Pope Francis's words resonate with me. I'm getting my head around this whole LBGT attraction/identity and the subtleties. You have clearly thought about is a great deal over the years and especially in regards to the Catholic church.

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Yep. I have. I went to Mass one day and had a huge smile on my face thereafter. The Catholic Church does not agree with the overarching definition of marriage for all people just the definition through their tradition. So, I am listening to the what the priest says and instead of, like the protestant churches, condemning gay people within their sermon, he just talks about the value of marriage. He wasn't bias and took no sides. (He probably assumed everyone in the Church was straight) He just talked about marriage. I left with a difference of opinion rather than being upset.

The Catechism was written way back when homosexuality (orientation) was against the law. A lot of religious say they have improved in their definitions; and, honestly, not many cultural and liturgical religions have.

adrian009 said:

Its very interesting to view the catechisms of the Catholic Church. There are many similarities between the Baha'i and Faith. Some of the wording is somewhat harsh though.

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Yeah, there are harsh words. I had a dream last night I was a victim of the holocaust. I escaped trying to find a place to hide and didn't know if Americans were exempt from the roundup. Someone turned me in, I got away in an open area and woke up. I would have like to see the end in part but when it gets intense, my heart jumps and wakes me up.

Homosexuals were in the holocaust as well. Their presumed actions just because of the name they were killed. How do you refer to someone who is homosexual without reference to whether he had and/or who he had sex with?

adrian009 said:

I think that its incredibly important to acknowledge those who have made this sacrifice and to have hope. We all have our struggles in life. It is hard for me to imagine the struggles for many in the LGBT community. Thanks for taking the time to explain some of your thoughts about it.

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It's a huge one, I tell you that. After all the thinking about it, it made sense that one would give themselves to christ before anything sinful or not. That's why priests go into vocation, not to run away from sin but to serve god.

But, yeah, when you have a chance, let me know what your answer is to the last question on my post.

Vinayaka said:

And the desire to convert everyone?

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If the character of man be not changed, the futility of God's Messengers would be realized (Baha'u'llah)

Getting more members is not what the Manifestations came for and agreed to suffer all kinds of cruelty instead of living comfortably. They came to call us to our higher spiritual nature and to develop spiritual civilization on earth.