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Will Mankind Survive?

Trailblazer

Veteran Member
So the only reason atheists don't go on killing sprees are because of religions?

No, I never said or meant that. I was thinking that being educated and civilized would preclude killing sprees.
Also do you truly believe that savages around the world have no morals?

Its obviously sad to see a person getting killed, because he believes its so important to spread the word of Jesus. But how do you think that these people have survived on that Island for 30000 years, if they have no morals? That they stick together and attack any outside threats shows that they have morals and unity within the tribe.
It is debatable whether a tribe that kills a man just for encroaching on their territory is moral. They might have unity within the tribe but does that make them moral? I did not follow that story very well but as I recall they did warn him what would happen and he persisted so maybe what happened is understandable. He took a risk so he should not have been surprised at the outcome.
Because assuming that a person is capable of choosing between good and evil purely based on free will is wrong. This is just one of many stories.
That is not what I am claiming. I am not claiming that all people can choose between good and evil simply because they have free will, this was just a very simple explanation not intended to cover all scenarios. He just meant that generally speaking, people can choose between good and evil if they are a relatively normal person without a mental illness or a brain disorder. I mean most people can choose not to rape and murder other people and most people can choose to be relatively kind to other people.
The Brain on Trial

This is just a story about how tumors can affect our behavior and therefore its difficult to assume that Whitman was in fact deciding through free will to do evil. Also you do not choose which flavor of ice cream you like. Also people do not wake up one day and decide that they want to be a pedophile etc. So saying that we have free will to choose between good and evil is not as simple as just deciding one over the other, as it makes it sound in the writing that you quoted and why I say that they are on the brink of being wrong, but that they seem to be based on what most of us think, when we talk free will, that we are in complete control, but we ain't.
Obviously Whitman was not “free” to decide because the tumor was interfering with his thinking processes and making him compulsive, not free to choose. But if people wake up one day and decide that they want to be a pedophile that could be a choice or it could be because of a mental illness or brain dysfunction. Just because they might have had a bad childhood that does not mean they are unable to choose between right and wrong behavior. I am not letting them off the hook that easily.

I am also not saying that anyone is free to choose anything they want to do. Free will is constrained by many factors such as childhood upbringing, heredity, education, adult experiences, and present life circumstances. How free we are varies with every given situation we find ourselves in. However, because we have two natures we are free to make moral choices according to one or the other nature. Otherwise, we would just be at the mercy of our past and present experiences and our heredity. If humans did not have free will how could we be responsible for our actions and held accountable in a court of law?
But if we can't trust the bible as you have said several times, which is the foundation for God that you seem to believe in. Then how does Baha'u'llah know that its that God we are talking about and not some other God?
First off, we have to realize that Bahaullah was raised as a Muslim, so He grew up believing in the God of Islam, which is the same conception of God that Baha’is have, the One True God of monotheism, the same God Jews believe in but the one Christians kind of mucked up with their believe in the Trinity. So, when Baha’u’llah got His Revelation, we can assume that he already knew who God was.
I can understand that me referring to the bible constantly, can seem annoying. But Im trying to figure out where the basis of God, that you believe in even comes from, as I really don't think its obvious based on your explanations. It seems to be, like you are solely basing everything on Baha'u'llah telling the truth and that it is not up for questioning, is that correct?
The basis of the God that I believe in comes from what Baha’u’llah wrote, since I was never the adherent to any other religion before I became a Baha’i. You are right that I believe that everything Baha’u’llah wrote is the truth about God not up for questioning because that is a core Baha’i belief.

Divine unity means that we believe that the Will of Baha’u’llah was identical to the Will of Baha’u’llah. That means that everything He wrote is the same as if God had written it Himself. The following passage is a very important passage to understand and hopefully you will understand why everything Baha’u’llah wrote carries so much weight for me.

“The essence of belief in Divine unity consisteth in regarding Him Who is the Manifestation of God and Him Who is the invisible, the inaccessible, the unknowable Essence as one and the same. By this is meant that whatever pertaineth to the former, all His acts and doings, whatever He ordaineth or forbiddeth, should be considered, in all their aspects, and under all circumstances, and without any reservation, as identical with the Will of God Himself. This is the loftiest station to which a true believer in the unity of God can ever hope to attain. Blessed is the man that reacheth this station, and is of them that are steadfast in their belief.” Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 167

It is notable that no other religion has this belief about Manifestations of God being identical to God. Christians believe that Jesus was an incarnation but a Manifestation of God is not an incarnation because He is not God in the flesh, although in every other way He is God. Jews do not believe that about Moses and Muslims do not believe that about Muhammad, they believe they were fallible human Prophets who revealed a message from God.
 

Nimos

Well-Known Member
It doesn’t but we do not know that God did not have a reason for doing all of this, that it was not part of God’s Plan. I think it was God’s Plan to allow the Bible to be written that way and allow people to try to sort it out for themselves, and since God is All-Knowing, God knew that in the future Baha’u’llah would come and straighten it out. This is the way of God, to test His servants.
Think about how many people have been killed due to this? Not only those arguing over the bible but also the Quran. And still people all around the world is being mistreated based on how they interpret these scriptures. What would be the purpose of allowing so much suffering, because God want to test us? Furthermore we still have no clue who is right or wrong, if any, so its not because we are getting any closer to solving the mystery. Wouldn't you agree that it all seems slightly like God is having a laugh at the expense of human well being?

What Baha’u’llah wrote serves an important purpose. It is a protection for people so they will not believe in any false prophets who might make claims during the next 1000 years. Had Jesus written something like that then no Christians would have been looking for the return of Christ until after a specified date, as Baha’is now have.
But both God, Jesus, Paul and Peter warned against false prophets.

Ezekiel 13 (God)
1 The word of the LORD came to me:
2 “Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel who are now prophesying. Say to those who prophesy out of their own imagination: ‘Hear the word of the LORD!

3 This is what the Sovereign LORD says: Woe to the foolish prophets who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing!
4 Your prophets, Israel, are like jackals among ruins.
5 You have not gone up to the breaches in the wall to repair it for the people of Israel so that it will stand firm in the battle on the day of the LORD.

6 Their visions are false and their divinations a lie. Even though the LORD has not sent them, they say, “The LORD declares,” and expect him to fulfill their words.
7 Have you not seen false visions and uttered lying divinations when you say, “The LORD declares,” though I have not spoken?

8 “ ‘Therefore this is what the Sovereign LORD says: Because of your false words and lying visions, I am against you, declares the Sovereign LORD.
9 My hand will be against the prophets who see false visions and utter lying divinations. They will not belong to the council of my people or be listed in the records of Israel, nor will they enter the land of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Sovereign LORD.
10 “ ‘Because they lead my people astray, saying, “Peace,” when there is no peace, and because, when a flimsy wall is built, they cover it with whitewash,
11 therefore tell those who cover it with whitewash that it is going to fall. Rain will come in torrents, and I will send hailstones hurtling down, and violent winds will burst forth.


Jeremiah 23 (God)
16 This is what the LORD Almighty says: “Do not listen to what the prophets are prophesying to you; they fill you with false hopes. They speak visions from their own minds, not from the mouth of the LORD.

Matthew 7 (Jesus)

15 “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves.

Matthew 24 (Jesus)

21 For then there will be great distress, unequaled from the beginning of the world until now—and never to be equaled again.
22 “If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive, but for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened.
23 At that time if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Messiah!’ or, ‘There he is!’ do not believe it.

24 For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.
25 See, I have told you ahead of time.

26 “So if anyone tells you, ‘There he is, out in the wilderness,’ do not go out; or, ‘Here he is, in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it.

Acts 20 (Paul)
28 Keep watch over yourselves and all the flock of which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers. Be shepherds of the church of God, which he bought with his own blood.
29 I know that after I leave, savage wolves will come in among you and will not spare the flock.
30 Even from your own number men will arise and distort the truth in order to draw away disciples after them.


2 Peter (Peter)

1 But there were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who bought them—bringing swift destruction on themselves.
2 Many will follow their depraved conduct and will bring the way of truth into disrepute.

3 In their greed these teachers will exploit you with fabricated stories. Their condemnation has long been hanging over them, and their destruction has not been sleeping.

So why would all of them warn against this and yet you have Islam popping up and then Bahai, how do you know that this is not what they warned against? Since the bible is older than both these religions, wouldn't it be reasonable to assume that them warning about this, is as valid if not even more valid that the words of Baha'u'llah, when God and Jesus themselves warned against it?

One atheist poster I am posting to said: “And there is no legitimate reason why an omnipotent and omniscient god couldn't eliminate evil in a single second.” This poster bases everything he believes about what a hypothetical god could do upon the fact that god is omnipotent, so god can do anything; so when God does not do what he thinks God should do (eliminate all suffering), he says god must be evil. How rational is this?
It is a rational explanation of Gods actions if he have those attributes as there is no reason to assume that weren't able to remove suffering if he wanted to. If he can't then he can not be said to have those attributes, so its one of the two have to be the case from a rational point of view. However the conclusion that it makes God evil is just one explanation, but one would at least have to accept that as a minimum God does allow suffering to happen for whatever reason, and therefore one could argue that if someone doesn't stop suffering, if they with a blink of an eye could do so at no cost to them or others, would be considered evil.

Continue...
 
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Nimos

Well-Known Member
No, I never said or meant that. I was thinking that being educated and civilized would preclude killing sprees.
Ok, so religions play no role in whether we are moral or not, but rather that it is through our culture and society that we develop these?

It is debatable whether a tribe that kills a man just for encroaching on their territory is moral. They might have unity within the tribe but does that make them moral?
I think this is because you believe in objective morality, but looking at history at varies cultures it becomes fairly obvious I think that morality is subjective. For instance I strongly disagree with a lot of the stuff that certain Islamic cultures do, when they marry and treat women almost as properties. I even strongly disagree with your rule that women is not allowed to be in the House of Justice and that this will be explained later, that is utter none sense, and just and excuse as I see it to not having to explain why for the next 1000+ years. That to me is discriminating and highly immoral, but that does not mean that I don't think you or people from those Islamic countries have any morals, they simply differ from mine.

But lets take a trip down memory lane of early human societies.

China sacrifice
Human sacrifice was practiced in China for thousands of years. At a 4,000-year-old cemetery near modern-day Mogou village in northwestern China, archaeologists found hundreds of tombs, some of which held human sacrifices. One sacrificed victim was around 13 years old. Archaeologists have also found thousands of human sacrifices at Shang Dynasty (1600 – 1040 B.C.) sites in the modern-day city of Anyang.

Mound 72
A 10-foot (3 meters) mound called Mound 72 by modern-day archaeologists holds the remains of 272 people, many of them sacrificed. It is located at Cahokia, a city located near modern-day St. Louis that flourished from A.D. 1050 to 1200.

Inca child mummies
The Inca flourished during the 15th ccentury A.D., conquering large swaths of territory in the Andes and connecting it with a vast system of roads. The Inca also practiced child sacrifice; their mummies have been found by archaeologists, often near the summit of mountains or volcanoes.

Maya sacrifice
The ancient Maya practiced human sacrifice on special occasions. These sacrifices were sometimes conducted in their temples, and many of the victims may have been prisoners of war. At the ancient city of Chichen Itza, victims were painted blue, in honor of the rain god Chaak, before being sacrificed and thrown into a well.

Some archaeologists believe that Maya ball games would, on rare occasions, end with members of the losing or winning team being sacrificed. Evidence for these sacrifices is mainly found in depictions of Maya art, and not all archaeologists interpret the images as representing the sacrifice of a ball team.

Greeks sacrificed to Zeus
Textual references and archaeological remains indicate that the ancient Greeks, at times, practiced human sacrifice. In 2016, a 3,000-year-old skeleton of a male teenager was found at an altar dedicated to Zeus at Mount Lykaion in Greece. Archaeologists believe that the teen may have been sacrificed to Zeus, an idea supported by ancient texts that tell of child sacrifices that were made on the mountain.

The Nazca
The Nazca culture flourished in Peru between roughly 100 B.C. and A.D. 800. They are famous for constructing the Nazca Lines, thousands of geoglyphs scratched on the desert floor that show geometric designs as well as images from the natural world and human imagination. While most famous for their geoglyphs, the Nazca also practiced human sacrifice; Archaeologists have found the remains of trophy heads, as they call them, at several Nazca sites. Archaeologists believe that many of these trophy heads come from prisoners, who were executed and then had their heads chopped off.

There are lots of examples of this going on all over the world. But today this is considered immoral, but for these people probably not that much as they were doing it for their Gods or whatever reason they might have had. So when these people on the island attack foreigners, its probably because they feel threaten and simply tries to protect their territory and society. It doesn't make them immoral, simply that they have different ones than we do.

That is not what I am claiming. I am not claiming that all people can choose between good and evil simply because they have free will, this was just a very simple explanation not intended to cover all scenarios. He just meant that generally speaking, people can choose between good and evil if they are a relatively normal person without a mental illness or a brain disorder. I mean most people can choose not to rape and murder other people and most people can choose to be relatively kind to other people.
Yes but that is what is at the heart of the free will debate are we in complete control of this or not? And whether we actual have any free will or if its just an illusion.

And not saying that you are wrong in what you are saying, as I do not think people shouldn't be punished for their actions either. As in most cases as you say people can choose to act on it or not.
 
Global communication is advancing in leaps and bounds. Through the internet and phone systems interaction between countries and cultures is at an all time high. Diversity and Understanding will bring a Greater force than all the armies of the world and we are walking toward that.
Politically what I see going on in the US is systems failure to bring the nation closer together, despite sincere efforts on the part of different groups and individuals to make things better. I would also say a lot of people get duped with what later turns out to be empty promises from politicians, or promises unfulfilled.

What do you see going on as a result of “interaction between countries and cultures” as reported in mainstream media? Without even considering what is going on globally the US is not only divided politically but among its citizenry as well, and the political process has not changed any of that for the better.

I watched “AM Joy” today and as usual as reported elsewhere what is exposed is competition among Republicans and Democrats for votes and each have a different conclusion of not only what is going on in the country but what to do about such things as the humanitarian crisis on the southern border of the US.

I could go on and on but what’s the point? What’s your point? Despite whatever good ideas or intentions you or I may have how does that impact people in power, whether it is in the realm of government or business? What is questioned strongly now is that officials in the US Government, for whatever reason, are either not upholding the law or they are blatantly breaking it!

It’s not that I don’t see anything going on in the world that is potentially promising and good but the current system of government in the US alone is not equipped to constructively deal with overwhelming problems much less a divided world community!

Do you ever watch mainstream media on TV, and I don’t mean Fox News! I suspect you cherry pick by only looking at positive developments, what little there is of it, and ignore glaring problems going from barely tolerable to worse. Of course I don’t even know if you are a US citizen.

Insofar as unity versus disunity is concerned what I see overwhelmingly, in the US and around the world, is disunity so what that adds up to at the very least is a systems failure.

As I recall it is recorded in the New Testament of the Bible Jesus said “A house divided cannot stand” and I think that principle basically holds true today.
 
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Trailblazer

Veteran Member
Think about how many people have been killed due to this? Not only those arguing over the bible but also the Quran. And still people all around the world is being mistreated based on how they interpret these scriptures. What would be the purpose of allowing so much suffering, because God want to test us? Furthermore we still have no clue who is right or wrong, if any, so its not because we are getting any closer to solving the mystery. Wouldn't you agree that it all seems slightly like God is having a laugh at the expense of human well being?
All we really do know is that God allowed the Bible to be written this way, because hypothetically, since God is omnipotent, God could have prevented it. I cannot say I know what God’s intentions or motives were, if there were any. It is a complete mystery. I know that God tests His servants but that does not mean the Bible was a test, that was just me surmising.

I do not think that God is laughing at anyone; if anything God is sad that we cannot get it together after all these years. If people had recognized Baha’u’llah, or if they would do so now, then they would understand a lot of what the Bible means and they could put the Bible in a proper perspective. Baha’u’llah unsealed the Book, as Daniel said.

Daniel 12:4 But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.

Daniel 12:9 And he said, Go thy way, Daniel: for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end.

Daniel 12:12 Blessed is he that waiteth, and cometh to the thousand three hundred and five and thirty days.

The words in the "book" (Bible) were intended to be sealed up until the time of the end, until the thousand three hundred and five and thirty days came. The 2,300 years came in 1844. That math is explained in Some Answered Questions, 10: TRADITIONAL PROOFS EXEMPLIFIED FROM THE BOOK OF DANIEL.

1844 was the date of the proclamation of the Bab, which signalized the beginning of the Baha’i Era, the beginning of the Messianic Age. We are now living in the Time of the End, which refers to the time when Christ would return. Before that we were living in the prophetic age which started with Adam and ended with Muhammad.

The book (Bible) was unsealed by the coming of the Bab and Baha’u’llah because Baha’u’llah and His appointed interpreter Abdu’l-Baha explained what the Bible means.
But both God, Jesus, Paul and Peter warned against false prophets.

So why would all of them warn against this and yet you have Islam popping up and then Bahai, how do you know that this is not what they warned against? Since the bible is older than both these religions, wouldn't it be reasonable to assume that them warning about this, is as valid if not even more valid that the words of Baha'u'llah, when God and Jesus themselves warned against it?
There have been many false prophets and that is why the Bible warned to watch out for them. However, the fact that there have been many false prophets does not preclude there being a true prophet. After all, Jesus also said we shall know them by their fruits, so that means that there must also be true prophets.

Matthew 7:16-20 Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.

Fruits: the pleasant or successful result of work or actions: FRUIT | meaning in the Cambridge English Dictionary

The New Testament also warns to be looking for the return of Christ so we will not miss Him. If Jesus was going to come barreling down from the clouds for all to see, as Christians believe, why would we have to be so careful to be watching?

Revelation 3:2-3 Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to die: for I have not found thy works perfect before God. Remember therefore how thou hast received and heard, and hold fast, and repent. If therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come on thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee.

Revelation 16:15 Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.

Luke 12:39-40 And this know, that if the goodman of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched, and not have suffered his house to be broken through. Be ye therefore ready also: for the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not.

Matthew 24:29-30 Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken: And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.

Matthew 24:42-44 Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come. But know this, that if the goodman of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken up. Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh.

2 Peter 3:10-13 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up. Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness, Looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat? Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.

Mark 13:32-37 But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father. Take ye heed, watch and pray: for ye know not when the time is. For the Son of Man is as a man taking a far journey, who left his house, and gave authority to his servants, and to every man his work, and commanded the porter to watch. Watch ye therefore: for ye know not when the master of the house cometh, at even, or at midnight, or at the cockcrowing, or in the morning: Lest coming suddenly he find you sleeping. And what I say unto you I say unto all, Watch.
It is a rational explanation of Gods actions if he have those attributes as there is no reason to assume that weren't able to remove suffering if he wanted to. If he can't then he can not be said to have those attributes, so its one of the two have to be the case from a rational point of view. However the conclusion that it makes God evil is just one explanation, but one would at least have to accept that as a minimum God does allow suffering to happen for whatever reason, and therefore one could argue that if someone doesn't stop suffering, if they with a blink of an eye could do so at no cost to them or others, would be considered evil.
The flip side of that is that just because God has these attributes that does not mean God is obligated to remove all suffering. Do you understand that this is just what humans want, and if God is omnipotent, God does not kowtow to human desires? The key phrase is “if he wanted to.” But if God does not want to, who are we to question an omniscient God? Also, maybe there is a reason for suffering, a good reason. I consider it really childish and short-sighted for this atheist to assume there is no reason for suffering so nobody should ever suffer.

But he used to be a Christian, so maybe this is a throwback from his Christian days, and maybe he believes that everything should have remained idyllic like the Garden of Eden forever, and he also thinks that God should eliminate death since it cause suffering, at least to those who are left behind. But how could physical death be eliminated, I asked him? If nobody ever died, nobody could be born because there would be overpopulation. His answer was that there could just be certain people who lived forever. Now, so you understand why I say he should have remained a Christian?

God allows suffering but God does not cause suffering, so why should God put a stop to what He has not caused? If humans have the ability to end their own suffering, why should God do it for them? Also, we cannot assume that God could, with the blink of an eye, end all suffering just because God is omnipotent. How would that play out? God would have to take over the lives of people and change them all around. This is unrealistic because it would make this world into an ant farm.

Of course there are many things that cause suffering in this world; accidents, injuries, diseases, hunger, struggling to survive. So suffering is unavoidable in life in this material world. Evil is one cause of suffering, and this atheist poster thinks that God should eliminate all evil.

Since humans are the cause of evil, there are only three ways I can see that God could put a stop to all the evil in the world: (1) annihilate humans, or (2) override human free will choice to do evil, or (3) help humans learn to be good so they will not be evil.

Which one do you consider the most realistic and rational? Why?
 

Trailblazer

Veteran Member
Ok, so religions play no role in whether we are moral or not, but rather that it is through our culture and society that we develop these?
Religions do play a role, but that does not mean that religion is necessary for people to be moral. After all, people get religion by osmosis if they live in society. All the atheists I know are very moral, but most of them were raised as Christians, so they would have learned morality growing up, if they learned the actual teachings of Jesus rather than just the Bible stories and the Christian doctrines.
I think this is because you believe in objective morality, but looking at history at varies cultures it becomes fairly obvious I think that morality is subjective. For instance I strongly disagree with a lot of the stuff that certain Islamic cultures do, when they marry and treat women almost as properties.
That was in accordance with Islamic Laws, but those laws are no longer in place in the Baha’i Faith.
I even strongly disagree with your rule that women is not allowed to be in the House of Justice and that this will be explained later, that is utter none sense, and just an excuse as I see it to not having to explain why for the next 1000+ years. That to me is discriminating and highly immoral, but that does not mean that I don't think you or people from those Islamic countries have any morals, they simply differ from mine.
So hypothetically speaking, you would discount an entire religion just because women cannot serve on the UHJ? How is that immoral? Baha’i women are not bothered by it and they do not feel oppressed. I think you are projecting your values onto others. It is not as if women are not considered completely equal in the Baha’i Faith and they serve on every other Baha’i Institution at the highest level. It is only the UHJ they cannot serve on and that will be explained later, before 1000 years have transpired. A person could surmise that the reason for this is because women can get pregnant in which case their first duty would be towards their child, so it would be difficult to serve on the UHJ, which is a huge responsibility.

Universal education is an important principle of the Baha’i Faith, but did you know that if the family cannot afford to educate all their children, the girls are given priority, since they are the first educators of the children?
But lets take a trip down memory lane of early human societies.

There are lots of examples of this going on all over the world. But today this is considered immoral, but for these people probably not that much as they were doing it for their Gods or whatever reason they might have had. So when these people on the island attack foreigners, its probably because they feel threaten and simply tries to protect their territory and society. It doesn't make them immoral, simply that they have different ones than we do.
What do you think about human sacrifices or even animal sacrifices as condoned and practiced to in the Old Testament? Do you think these were acceptable in those days simply because those cultures accepted them? Do you think they would be acceptable now if they were being practiced by certain cultures?

No, I do not think morality should be subjective, because in that case, anything goes. I think God should set the standards for morality and they should be changed whenever God decides they need to change. Moreover, when the Laws have been changed that means the old Laws no longer apply. But that is not what has happened because the older religions have hung onto their old laws and customs, and it will remain that way until all the religions are eventually unified under one banner. This will happen in the future, because it has been ordained by God.

“That which the Lord hath ordained as the sovereign remedy and mightiest instrument for the healing of all the world is the union of all its peoples in one universal Cause, one common Faith. This can in no wise be achieved except through the power of a skilled, an all-powerful and inspired Physician. This, verily, is the truth, and all else naught but error. Each time that Most Mighty Instrument hath come, and that Light shone forth from the Ancient Dayspring, He was withheld by ignorant physicians who, even as clouds, interposed themselves between Him and the world. It failed, therefore, to recover, and its sickness hath persisted until this day. They indeed were powerless to protect it, or to effect a cure, whilst He Who hath been the Manifestation of Power amongst men was withheld from achieving His purpose, by reason of what the hands of the ignorant physicians have wrought.” The Summons of the Lord of Hosts, pp. 91-92

The ignorant physicians are the religious leaders of the past.
Yes but that is what is at the heart of the free will debate are we in complete control of this or not? And whether we actual have any free will or if its just an illusion.
I never claimed that we are in complete control of what we choose to do, only that we can make choices from what is available to us. We cannot even control all our moral choices, but ideally if we could, the world could become a sublime paradise.
And not saying that you are wrong in what you are saying, as I do not think people shouldn't be punished for their actions either. As in most cases as you say people can choose to act on it or not.
I am glad to hear you say that. I think it is a given that we have free will to choose because we know that we make choices all the time and we are held accountable by law for our moral choices, if we commit crimes. People who argue that we have no free will at all are just being irrational because we could not DO anything if we had no free will. You can call it “will” if you want to and say we are not free to choose anything we want to do, we still have the freedom to choose unless we are incarcerated, and even then we have limited choices.

The atheist poster I was telling you about insists we do not have any free will and he calls it the “free will excuse” and says it is an excuse because it gets God off the hook for the evil in the world. In other words, if we have free will that means we are responsible for the evil in the world, but he thinks that God should be responsible since God is omnipotent so God could eliminate it. I hope you can understand how this is irrational, because it takes away all human responsibility for actions.

He says: “If a god were all knowing, it automatically follows that he would know how to prevent or eliminate evil. If a god were all-good and loving, it automatically follows that the god would want evil prevented or eliminated”

So to him, the presence of evil in the world means God cannot be good, thus if God exists, God is evil. That is ludicrous to think that God would be evil, because if God was evil, God would not send Messengers to assist humanity, moreover God could wipe us out in an instant. This idea that God is “up there” looking down and enjoying watching humans suffer is too ludicrous to even address. It is delusional.

Why does it follow that just because he does not like evil in the world God should eliminate all evil? This is highly subjective. Not only that, he expects God to eliminate it so we won’t have to, since he does not think we have any free will.

I will leave you with what Baha’u’llah said about evil. Notice that He says “Unto each one hath been prescribed a pre-ordained measure, as decreed in God’s mighty and guarded Tablets” which means that we each have a different capacity, so it follows that the same behavior is not expected from everyone. Then He says “All that which ye potentially possess can, however, be manifested only as a result of your own volition” which indicates that we have a will of our own which needs to be exercised in order to live up to our capacity, to fulfill our God-given potential. That does not mean that we are completely free to choose our moral behaviors, but it is a cop-out to say that because we are not completely free to choose we have no freedom to choose at all.

“And now, concerning thy question regarding the creation of man. Know thou that all men have been created in the nature made by God, the Guardian, the Self-Subsisting. Unto each one hath been prescribed a pre-ordained measure, as decreed in God’s mighty and guarded Tablets. All that which ye potentially possess can, however, be manifested only as a result of your own volition. Your own acts testify to this truth. Consider, for instance, that which hath been forbidden, in the Bayán, unto men. God hath in that Book, and by His behest, decreed as lawful whatsoever He hath pleased to decree, and hath, through the power of His sovereign might, forbidden whatsoever He elected to forbid. To this testifieth the text of that Book. Will ye not bear witness? Men, however, have wittingly broken His law. Is such a behavior to be attributed to God, or to their proper selves? Be fair in your judgment. Every good thing is of God, and every evil thing is from yourselves. Will ye not comprehend? This same truth hath been revealed in all the Scriptures, if ye be of them that understand. Every act ye meditate is as clear to Him as is that act when already accomplished. There is none other God besides Him. His is all creation and its empire. All stands revealed before Him; all is recorded in His holy and hidden Tablets. This fore-knowledge of God, however, should not be regarded as having caused the actions of men, just as your own previous knowledge that a certain event is to occur, or your desire that it should happen, is not and can never be the reason for its occurrence.”
Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 149-150
 
I get what you are saying, but I don't think its correct to compare God with such analogy. Because the reason a child and parent have to go through those stages have to do with growing up as a biological being, which is something we share with a huge amount of other animals here on the planet, and is not really a lot different than the lions teaching their cubs to hunt etc. So we are talking about an individuals ability to survive during its life time. But God, according to you have done this over a period of approximately 300000 years, well he ignored the first 294000 years, So what was the purpose of those?

Therefore the analogy makes little sense, I think. Also it makes you wonder how many millions of years God need to reveal everything to us, if he is going at that speed. :)
Admittedly, a parental analogy of God to man is lacking since God is ultimately indefinable. Obviously if God does have a relationship with man it is not biological in nature anymore than with any other life form but rather the Creator with the created. When it comes to man I think life is more involved than with cubs being taught to hunt for physical survival. Mere survival has never appeased man’s inquiry as to the why of things despite man sharing with cubs a biological nature. :)

So if God is involved with teaching man through Prophets it would have essential qualities that go beyond mere biology or physicality. It would have qualities commensurate with what makes man’s capacity so much greater than other species or life forms than basically going by instinct, which religion has termed “rational soul.”

What parenting cubs get with being taught hunting skills is basically driven by readymade instinctual drives from its biological parent which has nothing to do with rational reasoning outside of a material context, such as philosophy or wondering is there a purpose for human life beyond physical survival. No other species to my knowledge is prepared to die for an idea or ideal. Ideas or ideals have no physical properties. Thus we differ from other species not in degree but in kind. :)

No other species other than man has harnessed its knowledge of nature for its own specific purposes such as lighting cities with electricity, and so forth etc. etc. etc. On the other hand, man has the capacity with such knowledge to destroy itself and much of the planet so it is a double edged sword! So God help us if there is no God through Prophets to teach us how our capacities must only be used constructively in a moral sense rather than destructively in a narcissistic sense of selfishness. Going by memory, as Baha’u’llah put it “Self is the greatest prison.”

It is a Baha’i principal that the closer we are to God the closer we are to our proper selves. Only Prophets are commissioned by God to show how that can be accomplished since they serve as conduits or mediators between the unknowable God and finite man.

In one of the Baha’i Obligatory Prayers it is said that God is above all attributes and qualities so if that is true it is obvious that any kind of knowledge about God must, by necessity, come to man through a pure channel such as a Prophet appointed by God.
 
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Trailblazer

Veteran Member
But God, according to you have done this over a period of approximately 300000 years, well he ignored the first 294000 years, So what was the purpose of those?
Religion existed before the Bible was revealed, it has existed from the dawn of mankind.

There have been various Universal Cycles of religion since mankind was created. Within each Cycle there were many different Prophets and religions. The Cycle of religion that began with Adam and culminated with Muhammad is called the Adamic Cycle, or the Prophetic Cycle, named as such because it was the Age of Prophecy. There were many Universal Cycles that preceded Adam but they are too remote in history to know anything about.

“And now regarding thy question, “How is it that no records are to be found concerning the Prophets that have preceded Adam, the Father of Mankind, or of the kings that lived in the days of those Prophets?” Know thou that the absence of any reference to them is no proof that they did not actually exist. That no records concerning them are now available, should be attributed to their extreme remoteness, as well as to the vast changes which the earth hath undergone since their time.

Moreover such forms and modes of writing as are now current amongst men were unknown to the generations that were before Adam. There was even a time when men were wholly ignorant of the art of writing, and had adopted a system entirely different from the one which they now use. For a proper exposition of this an elaborate explanation would be required.” Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 172-173

The previous Cycle was the Adamic Cycle (Prophetic Cycle) and it was leading up to the Baha’i Cycle, laying the foundation, preparing the way. That was its purpose, as the purpose of every religious Cycle is to prepare the way for the Cycle that will follow.

Muhammad was called the Seal of the Prophets because He was the last prophet in the Adamic Cycle and thus He sealed off the Adamic Cycle. The Bab ushered in a new Cycle of religion called the Age of Fulfillment. All the “new age” movements and all the scientific discoveries we have seen since the last century are the result of the inception of this new Cycle. We are living in a new age of mankind.

Within the Adamic Cycle humanity went through all kinds of ups and downs, but from here on in humanity will only move forward, never again back. Right now we are at the very beginning of the new Cycle so it has the appearances of ups and downs, as people work through all the problems that carried over from the Adamic Cycle.

The present Universal Cycle of religion includes the Adamic Cycle (Prophetic Cycle) and the Baha’i Cycle (Cycle of Fulfillment). The Baha’i Cycle will last no less than 500,000 years.

TABLE: BAHA'I SACRED HISTORY

I. PREVIOUS UNIVERSAL CYCLES - of which no trace remains

II. PRESENT UNIVERSAL CYCLE

· A. ADAMIC CYCLE, CYCLE OF PROPHECY - lasted approximately 6,000 years

1. Adam 1. Indian religious figures
2. Noah - Krishna
3. Abraham
4. Moses 2. Zoroaster
5. Jesus 3. Buddha
6. Muhammad
+ Other unknown or unspecified prophets

· B. BAHA'I CYCLE, CYCLE OF FULFILLMENT - to last 500,000 years

1. The Bab
2. Bahá'u'lláh - Universal Manifestation for this Universal Cycle

a. Heroic, Primitive, or Apostolic Age - 1844-1921 (or 1932 - the death of Bahiyyih Khanum)

i. Ministry of the Bab (1844-53)
ii. Ministry of Bahá'u'lláh (1853-92)
iii. Ministry of `Abdu'l-Bahá (1892-1921)

b. Formative, Transitional, or Iron Age - 1921 -

i. First Epoch (1921-44/46) - Erection of the Administrative Order
ii. Second Epoch (1946-63) - spread of the Faith beyond the confines of the Western Hemisphere
iii. Third Epoch (1963-86) - emergence of the Faith from obscurity and initiation of social and economic development plans
iv. Fourth Epoch (1986- ) - national communities taking on the responsibility for their own development
v. Successive further Epochs

c. Golden Age
Successive Epochs leading to the Most Great Peace

3. Further Manifestations - under the shadow of Bahá'u'lláh

· END OF PRESENT UNIVERSAL CYCLE

III. FURTHER UNIVERSAL CYCLES

Ages and Cycles
 

Bird123

Well-Known Member
Politically what I see going on in the US is systems failure to bring the nation closer together, despite sincere efforts on the part of different groups and individuals to make things better. I would also say a lot of people get duped with what later turns out to be empty promises from politicians, or promises unfulfilled.

What do you see going on as a result of “interaction between countries and cultures” as reported in mainstream media? Without even considering what is going on globally the US is not only divided politically but among its citizenry as well, and the political process has not changed any of that for the better.

I watched “AM Joy” today and as usual as reported elsewhere what is exposed is competition among Republicans and Democrats for votes and each have a different conclusion of not only what is going on in the country but what to do about such things as the humanitarian crisis on the southern border of the US.

I could go on and on but what’s the point? What’s your point? Despite whatever good ideas or intentions you or I may have how does that impact people in power, whether it is in the realm of government or business? What is questioned strongly now is that officials in the US Government, for whatever reason, are either not upholding the law or they are blatantly breaking it!

It’s not that I don’t see anything going on in the world that is potentially promising and good but the current system of government in the US alone is not equipped to constructively deal with overwhelming problems much less a divided world community!

Do you ever watch mainstream media on TV, and I don’t mean Fox News! I suspect you cherry pick by only looking at positive developments, what little there is of it, and ignore glaring problems going from barely tolerable to worse. Of course I don’t even know if you are a US citizen.

Insofar as unity versus disunity is concerned what I see overwhelmingly, in the US and around the world, is disunity so what that adds up to at the very least is a systems failure.

As I recall it is recorded in the New Testament of the Bible Jesus said “A house divided cannot stand” and I think that principle basically holds true today.



There seems to always be a power struggle for control in politics. It's like small children fighting over a toy. It's sad to watch grown adults act this way. You are right that more gets done when people work together. On the other hand, in the USA, leaders change in just a few years. It wasn't long ago the Democrats had power and the Republicans were crying.

If you depend only on the news broadcasts for news, the view is always going to be bad. Let me give you an example of something happening very few know about. There is an Arab country that will change and no one sees. The internet is influencing the young people in this country. One day, these young people will grow up and they will be running that country. The knowledge and understanding these young people are getting through the internet will not only make their country better, it will make the world better.

I am not saying the world is without problems, however adversity breeds invention. Everyone wants a world with no problems, but very little is learned having it made. On the other hand, wanting to have it made is the driving force that leads people toward resolution. The struggle continues.

Yes, there is a lot going on in this world. The dynamics are amazing. One thing I do know. We are not supposed to Control others. People must learn their lessons and when they do, intelligence will make the best choices.

I do think interaction is a must. The least one can do is point them in the right direction. You can never know when that light bulb will go off over their heads and they will understand. When they do, their choices will be much better.
 
There seems to always be a power struggle for control in politics. It's like small children fighting over a toy. It's sad to watch grown adults act this way. You are right that more gets done when people work together. On the other hand, in the USA, leaders change in just a few years. It wasn't long ago the Democrats had power and the Republicans were crying.
So what’s your point? That you accept as perfectly normal for power struggles to go back and forth wherein one side or the other will be crying?

If you depend only on the news broadcasts for news, the view is always going to be bad.
It’s not true the view of all news broadcasts is bad. Not all of it is bad and, no, I don’t only depend on news broadcasts for being in touch with what is going on. I also participate on Forums such as this one to get other opinions such as yours!

Also, I respect professional journalism as expressed in the free press in the US despite it not always getting everything right. How could they if so many people don’t tell the truth? At least they are sometimes able to expose the lies of the powerbrokers in both government and business!

Let me give you an example of something happening very few know about. There is an Arab country that will change and no one sees. The internet is influencing the young people in this country. One day, these young people will grow up and they will be running that country. The knowledge and understanding these young people are getting through the internet will not only make their country better, it will make the world better.
How do you know one day “these young people will grow up and they will be running that country”? Their country could be attacked by an unbalanced Trump Administration since Trump, who may be an unbalanced narcissist, is Commander and Chief of US Armed Services! Since it’s an Arab country the Oligarchy Regime in Russia could also get involved before these young people you are referring to even get a chance to run their own country. Your touching story of young people learning on the internet in an Arab country is a fragile situation which could end at anytime!

You don’t appear to appreciate the fact that there is no system in any country globally that has a future if it has to depend on the vacuum of a world system of nations that is in good working order. All we have presently is the UN but that body is too plagued with divisive politics also as is the case in individual countries such as the US, the UK and elsewhere. As a result, all the marvelous technology you boast about could end, or, at the very least, be disrupted for a considerable length of time.

In short, I think you are living in a fool’s paradise that is based on very precarious circumstances.
 
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Nimos

Well-Known Member
Baha’u’llah unsealed the Book, as Daniel said.
If you read the Book of Daniel, I think its rather obvious that this is meant to be understood as a story and not historical facts. Based on how it is written, its sound more like how you would write a fairy tale.

There have been many false prophets and that is why the Bible warned to watch out for them. However, the fact that there have been many false prophets does not preclude there being a true prophet. After all, Jesus also said we shall know them by their fruits, so that means that there must also be true prophets.
So at least according to the bible Baha'u'llah could be a false prophet, how exactly would you be able to tell? As you have said countless of times, we can't trust the bible, wouldn't that be what someone following a false prophet would say? So I hope you can see how easy it would be for me to make such claim in relation to the bible. And a person that do believe in Jesus and Christianity would probably be even more on guard towards what Baha'u'llah is saying. Especially claiming that so many things in the bible is wrong and then saying that Islam is partly more correct, to finally conclude that whatever Baha'u'llah said is absolutely true. Do you see why people that do not share your beliefs would be rather skeptic about what you say?

The flip side of that is that just because God has these attributes that does not mean God is obligated to remove all suffering.
God might not have to do it, but when he chooses not to and remember this doesn't cost him anything. I think people are in their full right to question God and his motive and whether he is in fact all good. Remember God could explain himself at any point, and again at no cost to him as we wouldn't be able to do anything about it anyway, but he chooses not to.

The key phrase is “if he wanted to.” But if God does not want to, who are we to question an omniscient God?
We can question and should question him for not doing so, regardless of him being omniscient or not. Moses questioned God and he explained himself to him, so see no reason why we shouldn't be allow to either.

Exodus 5:22-23
22 Moses returned to the Lord and said, “Why, Lord, why have you brought trouble on this people? Is this why you sent me?
23 Ever since I went to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has brought trouble on this people, and you have not rescued your people at all.”


Exodus 6
1 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Now you will see what I will do to Pharaoh: Because of my mighty hand he will let them go; because of my mighty hand he will drive them out of his country.”
2 God also said to Moses, “I am the Lord.
3 I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob as God Almighty, but by my name the Lord I did not make myself fully known to them.
4 I also established my covenant with them to give them the land of Canaan, where they resided as foreigners.
5 Moreover, I have heard the groaning of the Israelites, whom the Egyptians are enslaving, and I have remembered my covenant.
6 “Therefore, say to the Israelites: ‘I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment.
7 I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. 8 And I will bring you to the land I swore with uplifted hand to give to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob. I will give it to you as a possession. I am the Lord.’”


God is rather chatty and seem to have no problem answering the question also remember that God in the OT is really talking a lot and probably the most use phrase, which he seems very keen on is "I am the Lord." or variations of it. He seem quite concerned that the Jews should forget it and therefore constantly reminds them. So whether he is omniscient or not, have nothing to do with whether or not he ought to explain himself. He had no problems doing it before, so why not now? There is no logical reason for that as I see it.

Also, maybe there is a reason for suffering, a good reason. I consider it really childish and short-sighted for this atheist to assume there is no reason for suffering so nobody should ever suffer.
And what good reason is that? The promise is that people end up in heaven or paradise or whatever one believe and that there will be no suffering there and no death etc. So if its silly or childish to think God ought to remove it on Earth, its just as childish to believe in heaven and paradise.

But he used to be a Christian, so maybe this is a throwback from his Christian days, and maybe he believes that everything should have remained idyllic like the Garden of Eden forever, and he also thinks that God should eliminate death since it cause suffering, at least to those who are left behind.
But according to the bible that is what is promised once you go to heaven, so he is not wrong about that. And besides all that, it still doesn't explain the purpose of Earth in the first place, if one can't remember anything in heaven of what they did on Earth. Then Earth doesn't matter anyway. And if people just can't remember all the bad things, what type of individuals are going to live in heaven, people with screwed up memories running around in a state of eternal happiness. It doesn't make sense, regardless of God removing death on Earth or if he does it in Heaven.

If nobody ever died, nobody could be born because there would be overpopulation. His answer was that there could just be certain people who lived forever. Now, so you understand why I say he should have remained a Christian?
I think its good he realized that what he was believing in made no sense. And it seems the moment he started to be critical and skeptic of what he was taught that none of it made sense.

God allows suffering but God does not cause suffering, so why should God put a stop to what He has not caused?
When God orders the killing of people he doesn't like, he does cause suffering. When God having the ability or have created the Earth so natural dieasters occur that is outside our control, kills and causes suffering for lots of people or when malaria caused by mosquitoes kills like crazy:

The majority of these deaths are due to malaria. The World Health Organization estimates that between 300 and 500 million cases of malaria occur each year -- and a child dies from malaria every 30 seconds.

Then God could remove malaria if he wanted to and that would save a child every 30 second. Now a child have 2 parents which have to suffer the consequences of loosing a child as well. So its rather obvious that God at least doesn't give a rats *** about suffering. And that makes him a quite unpleasant God in my eyes at least. And God being omnipotent and omniscient would know that mosquitoes would kill as many people as they do and yet he have had billions of years to fix it, before we humans would even know that malaria existed. But yet he chose not to. So why is the suffering caused simply due to malaria needed and not ultimately God's fault?

Also, we cannot assume that God could, with the blink of an eye, end all suffering just because God is omnipotent. How would that play out? God would have to take over the lives of people and change them all around. This is unrealistic because it would make this world into an ant farm.
If God exists we are already his ant farm, whether he changes us or not doesn't matter. If God exists and we die, he will pass judgement on us and decide our fate anyway. Besides that we are talking about God, so nothing is unrealistic otherwise he simply can't be all powerful.

Since humans are the cause of evil, there are only three ways I can see that God could put a stop to all the evil in the world: (1) annihilate humans, or (2) override human free will choice to do evil, or (3) help humans learn to be good so they will not be evil.
He created humans in his image, he created the whole universe, so he could probably solve the issue in a million different ways. I don't get why you can accept God being able to do miracles, create universes, create humans, animals etc. But the moment he is suppose to do something that you don't think he should be able to, its unrealistic or he is simply not able to do it. Its very strange, how God seem to change how powerful he is according to what is expected of him. I don't get why I as an atheist have to defend God, it makes little sense :D

but most of them were raised as Christians, so they would have learned morality growing up
Can only speak for my self and I was raised in a Christian country, but religion played no role, never talk about and no one in my family knows anything about it, Im the only one that have any interest in it.

So hypothetically speaking, you would discount an entire religion just because women cannot serve on the UHJ? How is that immoral? Baha’i women are not bothered by it and they do not feel oppressed. I think you are projecting your values onto others. It is not as if women are not considered completely equal in the Baha’i Faith and they serve on every other Baha’i Institution at the highest level.
I think women ought to have equal rights, because they are humans, gender doesn't matter. Maybe the women in Bahai faith think its fine and I can't do anything about that. But to me it is wrong and find it immoral, because it does prevent them from obtaining equal rights, with no logic reason for it, besides that is what Baha'u'llah think is right, to me that is passive suppression of women for no good reason.

Continue...
 
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Nimos

Well-Known Member
A person could surmise that the reason for this is because women can get pregnant in which case their first duty would be towards their child, so it would be difficult to serve on the UHJ, which is a huge responsibility.
Sorry but I don't buy that explanation. This is how it works in Denmark and it doesn't matter what job you have. I even had a job once, where my boss were promoted to head of marketing while on leave.

Length of parental leave in Denmark
In total, parents in Denmark get 52 weeks of paid parental leave. The general rule is that the mother has the right to four weeks of leave directly before the planned birth and then to a further 14 weeks of leave after birth.

The father is entitled to take two weeks of leave during the first fourteen weeks after the birth of the child. Then 32 weeks follow where the mother and father can freely share leave between them. They can choose to be on parental leave at the same time or in periods one after the other.

If one parent works in Sweden, they are able to be on parental leave at the same time for 30 days, in addition to the 2 weeks that the father can take after the birth of the child.


Extended parental leave
The right to paid parental leave applies for a total of 52 weeks. As a parent, you are entitled to extend the 32 joint weeks by either 8 or 14 weeks, by receiving a smaller amount of parental allowance each month. The pay for the 32-week period is then spread out over either 40 or 46 weeks. You do not need your employer's approval for this.

If it can work for a whole country it can work for the UHJ.

Universal education is an important principle of the Baha’i Faith, but did you know that if the family cannot afford to educate all their children, the girls are given priority, since they are the first educators of the children?
Again this is terrible, its not up to the UHJ or shouldn't be to educate people but to the country they live in.

Education in Denmark is compulsory for children below the age of 15 or 16, even though it is not compulsory to attend Folkeskole ("public school"). The school years up to the age of fifteen/sixteen are known as Folkeskole, since any education has to match the level offered there. About 82% of young people take further education in addition to this. Government-funded education is usually free of charge and open to all. Denmark has a tradition of private schools and about 15.6% of all children at basic school level attend private schools, which are supported by a voucher system.

The Education Index, published with the UN's Human Development Index in 2008, based on data from 2013, lists Denmark as 0.873, among the highest in the world, beneath Australia, Finland and New Zealand.

The chief national officer of the education system is Minister of Education (Denmark) Merete Riisager (Liberal Alliance). Minister for the Ministry of Higher Education and Science (Denmark) since 28 November 2016 is Søren Pind.

Literacy in Denmark is approximately 99% for both men and women.

The Danish students' Grants and Loans Scheme
Danish students are entitled to public support for their further education - regardless of social standing. Tuition at Danish public and most private educational institutions is free for Danish students and for EU/EEA students as well as for students participating in an exhange programme. All other students have to pay a tuition fee. Society lends students a helping hand in covering living costs for a great variety of courses and studies. Support for students' living costs is awarded by the State Educational Grant and Loan Scheme (Danish acronym: "SU" and "SU-lån"), a system managed by the Danish Agency for Institutions and Educational Grants (Styrelsen for Institutioner og Uddannelsesstøtte) in collaboration with the educational institutions and under the auspices of the Ministry of Higher Education and Science.

Over 493.000 (2016) Students benefit from these two types of educational support every year. The annual budget amounts to 24,4 billion Danish Kroner, around 1 per cent of Gross National Product.

What this means is that almost all education is Denmark is free and students are paid money each month to study, on top of that they can lend money from the State at very low interests rate, that they don't have to start paying back before 2 years after they have finished their education.

So to give you an idea of how much money a student can get:

If you are 20 or above and doesn't live at home:

Each month (Free of charge): 925,84 Dollars
Loan up to (Very low interest rate): 473,73 Dollars
If you have a child(Free of charge): 236,94 Dollars

Besides that you also get for each child (Free of charge):
0-2 year 684,25 dollars. pr. quarter
3-6 year 541,90 dollars. pr. quarter
7-14 year 426,13 dollars. pr. quarter
15-17 year 142,04 dollars. pr. month

So lets say that you are 25 years old and study and have a 5 year old child and a student loan, then you could get 1772 dollars each month.

If things are done correctly, there is no need to prioritize one gender over the other. It all depends on how people think society should take care of their citizens.

What do you think about human sacrifices or even animal sacrifices as condoned and practiced to in the Old Testament? Do you think these were acceptable in those days simply because those cultures accepted them?
I don't know how many human sacrifices were done, but sacrificing animals I think were fairly common. I think there is a reason why the bible tells you how to do it.

The atheist poster I was telling you about insists we do not have any free will
This is most likely because he is a determinist, I do not share that view.

He says: “If a god were all knowing, it automatically follows that he would know how to prevent or eliminate evil. If a god were all-good and loving, it automatically follows that the god would want evil prevented or eliminated”

So to him, the presence of evil in the world means God cannot be good, thus if God exists, God is evil. That is ludicrous to think that God would be evil, because if God was evil, God would not send Messengers to assist humanity, moreover God could wipe us out in an instant. This idea that God is “up there” looking down and enjoying watching humans suffer is too ludicrous to even address. It is delusional.
I think he is partly correct. I agree with the statement: “If a god were all knowing, it automatically follows that he would know how to prevent or eliminate evil. If a god were all-good and loving, it automatically follows that the god would want evil prevented or eliminated” But I don't agree that God is necessarily evil, but it has to either be as he say or as we have already talked about, that God decide what is good and evil and we basically have no free will deciding this, which makes our free will unnecessary, because that is basically the only important thing as I see it about having free will in the first place. So either way, none of it really turns out great for God or us for that matter, I think. :)


(I have skipped some of the topics, as these posts are getting longer and longer. So its not because I don't want to answer you. But simply to try to reduce the length slightly, so we don't end up with 3 posts each time :D)
 
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Nimos

Well-Known Member
So if God is involved with teaching man through Prophets it would have essential qualities that go beyond mere biology or physicality. It would have qualities commensurate with what makes man’s capacity so much greater than other species or life forms than basically going by instinct, which religion has termed “rational soul.”
Im not sure I understand what you mean with biological nature? God speaks and interact with Moses and a lot of the other people in bible on a regular basis. So not really sure what you mean beyond biology or physical?

No other species to my knowledge is prepared to die for an idea or ideal. Ideas or ideals have no physical properties. Thus we differ from other species not in degree but in kind. :)
I think you will find it hard to find any animals with the capacity to come up with ideals are complex ideas in general.

But animals do rather strange things:

You can find lots of these videos.

It does make one wonder why these animals would do this, there seem to be little gained. And you could argue that it shows some signs of knowing the difference between right and wrong.
 

Bird123

Well-Known Member
So what’s your point? That you accept as perfectly normal for power struggles to go back and forth wherein one side or the other will be crying?

It’s not true the view of all news broadcasts is bad. Not all of it is bad and, no, I don’t only depend on news broadcasts for being in touch with what is going on. I also participate on Forums such as this one to get other opinions such as yours!

Also, I respect professional journalism as expressed in the free press in the US despite it not always getting everything right. How could they if so many people don’t tell the truth? At least they are sometimes able to expose the lies of the powerbrokers in both government and business!

How do you know one day “these young people will grow up and they will be running that country”? Their country could be attacked by an unbalanced Trump Administration since Trump, who may be an unbalanced narcissist, is Commander and Chief of US Armed Services! Since it’s an Arab country the Oligarchy Regime in Russia could also get involved before these young people you are referring to even get a chance to run their own country. Your touching story of young people learning on the internet in an Arab country is a fragile situation which could end at anytime!

You don’t appear to appreciate the fact that there is no system in any country globally that has a future if it has to depend on the vacuum of a world system of nations that is in good working order. All we have presently is the UN but that body is too plagued with divisive politics also as is the case in individual countries such as the US, the UK and elsewhere. As a result, all the marvelous technology you boast about could end, or, at the very least, be disrupted for a considerable length of time.

In short, I think you are living in a fool’s paradise that is based on very precarious circumstances.


Are you having a bit of trouble trying to control the world? Because of this do you see nothing but doom and gloom?

I do not believe Trump will ever go to war other than a trade war? Why? War costs lots of money. Trump knows this. Trump won't spend the money for it. On the other hand, Trump might take out a nuclear site if he thought it posed high risk.

Children do grow up. They do end up leading countries. Change is the nature of this world. Look in the past. Even the USA is changing.

You speak of systems and countries that do not work. Systems, countries and people change. Who would ever have thought Russia would be anything but communism? Even China has incorporated capitalism with it's monetary system. Stock market in China, who would have ever thought that was possible a few short years ago?

My point about power struggles is that people choose to do anything for power or control of others. Lessons are being learned. Aren't you as well learning lessons about control?? Does it hurt you that you can't control all those politicians and countries?

People who have power always think they have more power than they actually do. They can choose to use their power for Good or they can choose to hurt people. Look at the past. Goodness goes to the top. Hurtful people might have a run, however what happens when people get enough?

I think you need a break to focus on goodness. Take a month off or at least a couple of weeks. Get into nature away from news, tv, phones and the rat race. Look around you and unwind. All the action will still be waiting for you when you return. It doesn't matter what everyone else does. It's what you choose to do that counts!

This is a multilevel classroom. You are going to see people learning lessons you have already learned. In learning lessons, people will make bad choices. This is part of learning. Like I said. Do not control! Point them in the right direction. It really is the only way. Why? If not careful, you will choose some hard lessons for yourself and not realize this until it's at your door. On the other hand, the lessons we choose will lead to Understanding. Your journey has always been up to you.
 

Trailblazer

Veteran Member
So at least according to the bible Baha'u'llah could be a false prophet, how exactly would you be able to tell?
Even if I did not have what Jesus said about good fruits and bad fruits in Matthew 7:16-20, it is just logical that a true prophet would have good fruits and a false prophet would have bad fruits. But the fruits are just part of what we look at. We also look at the Person of Baha'u'llah, everything that surrounds His Revelation, and His Writings.
And a person that do believe in Jesus and Christianity would probably be even more on guard towards what Baha'u'llah is saying.
Of course I know how skeptical most people are about my Baha’i beliefs and I also understand why. It is especially Christians who are taken aback by the claims of Baha’u’llah because most of them believe that the same Jesus is going to return.
God might not have to do it, but when he chooses not to and remember this doesn't cost him anything. I think people are in their full right to question God and his motive and whether he is in fact all good.
Since God is omnipotent and omniscient so has all the power and knowledge to remove all suffering, we can logically conclude that there must be a reason God chooses not to remove all our suffering.
Remember God could explain himself at any point, and again at no cost to him as we wouldn't be able to do anything about it anyway, but he chooses not to.
God did explain Himself through Baha’u’llah, and after that Abdu’l-Baha, Shoghi Effendi explained more, and now if we have questions understanding any of this we have the UHJ to turn to for answers.
We can question and should question him for not doing so, regardless of him being omniscient or not. Moses questioned God and he explained himself to him, so see no reason why we shouldn't be allow to either.
I did not mean we cannot question (wonder why) the reasons for suffering; I mean we cannot question the fact that suffering exists because after all there is nothing we can really do about suffering except cope with it or try to overcome it. So what I meant is that we cannot really question the way the world is (full of suffering) because God created it that way and it is a done deal. Moreover, we cannot question God directly like Moses did so the best way to know why suffering exists is to read the answers in scriptures.
God is rather chatty and seem to have no problem answering the question also remember that God in the OT is really talking a lot and probably the most use phrase, which he seems very keen on is "I am the Lord." or variations of it. He seem quite concerned that the Jews should forget it and therefore constantly reminds them. So whether he is omniscient or not, have nothing to do with whether or not he ought to explain himself. He had no problems doing it before, so why not now? There is no logical reason for that as I see it.
God has done a lot more explaining through the Revelation of Baha’u’llah, so all the answers that we can have are there. If some things remain unexplained that is because there is no answer we can understand at this time.

Why do you think God kept saying "I am the Lord?" I think I know why. God was reminding the Jews He was in charge, and that they were not in charge. We see similar things in the Writings of Baha’u’llah although not in the first person but rather in the third person.
And what good reason is that? The promise is that people end up in heaven or paradise or whatever one believe and that there will be no suffering there and no death etc. So if its silly or childish to think God ought to remove it on Earth, its just as childish to believe in heaven and paradise.
The reason for suffering is so we can learn lessons and grow spiritually and we will improve our character so we will be prepared to enter the afterlife, since our character is all that we take with us to the afterlife. There will be no suffering in heaven if we get what we need here but there will be if we don't.
But according to the bible that is what is promised once you go to heaven, so he is not wrong about that.
What is promised in the Bible is eternal life in heaven, which is a quality of life, of nearness to God. It is not promised that our physical body will live forever.
And besides all that, it still doesn't explain the purpose of Earth in the first place, if one can't remember anything in heaven of what they did on Earth. Then Earth doesn't matter anyway.
The purpose of living on Earth is to prepare our souls for the afterlife. I never said we won’t remember what we did on Earth, but I don’t think we will dwell upon it, because in heaven we will continue on our spiritual journey acquiring more perfections, so it would not behoove us to dwell on the past.
When God orders the killing of people he doesn't like, he does cause suffering. When God having the ability or have created the Earth so natural dieasters occur that is outside our control, kills and causes suffering for lots of people or when malaria caused by mosquitoes kills like crazy:
So, you believe that God ordered killings? Yes, God created the Earth where natural disasters and diseases would occur, and I have no answer as to why. Perhaps avoiding suffering was not a goal God considered important.
Then God could remove malaria if he wanted to and that would save a child every 30 second. Now a child have 2 parents which have to suffer the consequences of loosing a child as well. So its rather obvious that God at least doesn't give a rats *** about suffering. And that makes him a quite unpleasant God in my eyes at least.
Humans can also remove malaria by making new discoveries in medicine. Maybe that is what God expects us to do.

If you had any idea how much I have suffered in my life you would wonder why I still believe in God. I tear up just thinking about it so I try not to think about it and just live in the present. And it is not as if my present life is devoid of suffering either, even though it is better than the past. Nobody except my husband and God knows how much I have suffered. One reason I am on these forums so much is because I want to help people understand about God because at the end of the day it was God who came to my rescue, when I finally stopped hating Him. All the psychiatrists, psychologists, counselors and drugs were not helping me. I was in a downward spiral. I cannot tell you how many times I have been suicidal. Let me just say that losing a child is difficult but it is not the worst thing that can happen. I never had any children to lose.

The only reason I was able to maintain a belief in God through all that suffering is because of Baha’u’llah. But even so, I went through a period of almost 10 years where I hated God and wanted nothing to do with Him or the Baha’i Faith. Only thanks to some Baha’is on the Planet Baha’i forums was I able to finally start digging my way out of the hole I was in. No, given all I have struggled, nobody is going to succeed in making me believe God is bad, not again. I would not be alive today were it not for God.
And God being omnipotent and omniscient would know that mosquitoes would kill as many people as they do and yet he have had billions of years to fix it, before we humans would even know that malaria existed. But yet he chose not to. So why is the suffering caused simply due to malaria needed and not ultimately God's fault?
Why is it God’s fault, because these diseases evolved? It sure is easy to blame the absentee God for everything that is wrong in the world. If you think these physical diseases are so horrible you do not know anything about mental-emotional diseases. Once people die they are no longer is mental anguish.
If God exists we are already his ant farm, whether he changes us or not doesn't matter. If God exists and we die, he will pass judgement on us and decide our fate anyway. Besides that we are talking about God, so nothing is unrealistic otherwise he simply can't be all powerful.
God did save me and he has saved a lot of people, but they have to turn to God and ask if they want to be saved. I do not mean saved from original sin the way Christians understand it. I mean saved from our self and our suffering. I do not think God is going to pass judgement on us or decide our fate. We decide our own fate by what we believe, how we live, and who we become as a result.
He created humans in his image, he created the whole universe, so he could probably solve the issue in a million different ways. I don't get why you can accept God being able to do miracles, create universes, create humans, animals etc. But the moment he is suppose to do something that you don't think he should be able to, its unrealistic or he is simply not able to do it. Its very strange, how God seem to change how powerful he is according to what is expected of him. I don't get why I as an atheist have to defend God, it makes little sense.
God is not going to do it FOR US because God gave us an intelligent brain and free will so we would do it ourselves. What some atheists do not understand is that just because God is All-Powerful does not mean God is obligated to do everything atheists think God should do. Omnipotent means that God only does what God chooses to do.

What is expected of God? You have that backwards. It is God who has expectations of humans. Humans have no right to expect God to do anything. But God does do something very important, He sends Messengers with the remedies that are needed in every age. Then people reject them and complain that God did not do anything.
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Can only speak for my self and I was raised in a Christian country, but religion played no role, never talk about and no one in my family knows anything about it, Im the only one that have any interest in it.
Well, it was the same for me growing up in a Christian country. My parents never talked about religion or God and my father was an atheist. I was not interested in religion but my older brother was so that is how I discovered the Baha’i Faith. But for 42 years after I became a Baha’i I had little interest in it. Only during the last six years have I become interested.
I think women ought to have equal rights, because they are humans, gender doesn't matter. Maybe the women in Bahai faith think its fine and I can't do anything about that. But to me it is wrong and find it immoral, because it does prevent them from obtaining equal rights, with no logic reason for it, besides that is what Baha'u'llah think is right, to me that is passive suppression of women for no good reason.
I have to say that it is illogical to say women do not have equal rights just because they cannot serve on the UHJ. I had more faith in your logical abilities but obviously your bias is stronger than your logic. There is no suppression of women in the Baha’i Faith. It is also wrong to say it is immoral when you do not even know the reason.

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Trailblazer

Veteran Member
Sorry but I don't buy that explanation. This is how it works in Denmark and it doesn't matter what job you have. I even had a job once, where my boss were promoted to head of marketing while on leave.

I never said that was the reason, I said I could surmise. We do not know the reason but we are told we will know later.
Length of parental leave in Denmark
In total, parents in Denmark get 52 weeks of paid parental leave. The general rule is that the mother has the right to four weeks of leave directly before the planned birth and then to a further 14 weeks of leave after birth.

If it can work for a whole country it can work for the UHJ.
I never should have said what I did because I do not know that this is the reason women cannot serve on the UHJ. The reason is a complete mystery to me and quite frankly I do not really care nor do any other Baha’i women I know. So the question is why it matters so much to people that are not even Baha’is? Logically speaking, this one rule does not mean that women are not treated equally. There are other Baha’i Laws that favor women so men could complain about those.

But you just made a case for my surmising by pointing out how Denmark allows for that much parental leave for the mother. “The general rule is that the mother has the right to four weeks of leave directly before the planned birth and then to a further 14 weeks of leave after birth.”

That indicates that they consider it vitally important for the mother to prepare for the birth and to be with the child after he/she is born. This demonstrates how little you know about the functions of the UHJ. There can be no parental leave for those who serve on the UHJ because of their vitally important function for the Baha’is of the world. :eek:
Again this is terrible, its not up to the UHJ or shouldn't be to educate people but to the country they live in.
Well, I do not know where you got the idea that the UHJ has any role in educating people. That is not their function. Universal education simply means that education should be universal, that everyone should have an education. The secular governments or private schools or universities will educate the people.

The responsibilities of the UHJ are explained here: Universal House of Justice - Wikipedia
What this means is that almost all education is Denmark is free and students are paid money each month to study, on top of that they can lend money from the State at very low interests rate, that they don't have to start paying back before 2 years after they have finished their education.
That sounds like a great educational system. I think it is a travesty that many young people in the United States want to attend college but either have to take out student loan or forfeit their education. Many years ago there were some states that had free tuition for two-year colleges but I think they have since done away with that program. I was very fortunate to have my tuition paid for because I had an aunt who left me and my sister what was a lot of money back in those days, with the stipulation that we had to use it for college or wait to get it until we were 25 years old. Both my sister and I went to college and both of us went on further to get a Master’s degree. We ran out of money after our Bachelors degrees so had to pay my own way by working. I later went back to college again and got another Master’s degree but I had to work full time during those years. After that I attended a homeopathy school and got a degree in homeopathic medicine.

My aunt had three PhDs in science subjects so she highly valued education and my father (her brother) had a PhD as well. My mother also went to college but had to drop out when my brother was born during WWII.
If things are done correctly, there is no need to prioritize one gender over the other. It all depends on how people think society should take care of their citizens.
You do have to understand the culture and the century in which the Baha’i Revelation occurred. Back then, women could not even vote in many countries and certainly they were not highly educated as they are now. The stipulations are a ‘worst case scenario’ in case a family was too poor to send both their boys and girls to school. A future Baha’i society would look more like your country, and clearly the United States is quite backward by comparison. I do not follow politics a lot like Unity of Mankind does, so I do not know much of what transpires, but I know enough to know that the government in the United States is corrupt and it has only become worse since President Trump was elected. God willing we will have a much better President elected in 2020.
I don't know how many human sacrifices were done, but sacrificing animals I think were fairly common. I think there is a reason why the bible tells you how to do it.
Do you think it is acceptable for civilized people to sacrifice (kill) animals? I think it is a travesty.
This is most likely because he is a determinist, I do not share that view.
I do not know if this is determinism but his position is that there is no reason to think that anyone can make a different choice under the same conditions. He says that only if conditions change can different outcomes result. My position is that nobody can ever prove that a person could not made a different choice under the same conditions, so for example nobody can prove that a murderer did not have any other choice but to murder. The entire criminal justice system is predicated upon the fact that the criminals could have made another choice.

This atheist’s position is that criminals are accountable because society has to be protected but they are not responsible for their choices because they had no choice. So he thinks no murderer or rapist is responsible for his actions. He will not allow for the possibility of free will because he knows that means that humans are responsible for evil, not God. He thinks humans are not responsible but rather God is responsible because God is omnipotent.

If you are not a determinist, do you believe we have free will?
I think he is partly correct. I agree with the statement: “If a god were all knowing, it automatically follows that he would know how to prevent or eliminate evil. If a god were all-good and loving, it automatically follows that the god would want evil prevented or eliminated.”
God wants to prevent or eliminate evil because God id good and loving. God does know the best way to prevent or eliminate evil because God is all-knowing The best way is to educate humans on morality so they become moral and do not commit evil acts. The way God does this is to send Messengers who bring teachings and laws to humanity.

I do not want to make this post too long, but I wrote up a response to my atheist friend and I want to pass it along to you. You do not have to respond to it unless you have definite opinions you want to share.

Free will is the reason for evil. It is not an excuse. Humans alone are responsible for all the evil in the world because they commit all the evil in the world. There is no way God is responsible to stop people from committing evil even though hypothetically He could.

I was thinking about this on my way to work this morning and it suddenly came to me why God does not stop evil people from committing evil acts [aside from the fact that it would override free will]. Sorry this is going to be long but I guess it can be called a Hail Mary since it is important that I try to get my point across to you even if you CHOOSE to reject it.

The reason God does not stop evil people from committing evil acts is because if God stopped an evil person from committing an evil act, the intent to do that evil act would still exist. Even more importantly, the evil person would not learn the lesson he needs to learn by doing the evil act and suffering the consequences. He would still be the same evil person with no chance for rehabilitation. So God would not be doing that person any favors by preventing his evil act. The victim of his evil act will also learn something because she can overcome and become a stronger person for having suffered. These are all learning opportunities we only have in this material world. The victim will also be plunged into the ocean of God’s mercy, if she reaches out for it.

I am not making all this up. This is what happens in real life and there are many testimonials so there is evidence. Everyone knows that we learn through experience and suffering makes us stronger, unless we blame God or other people and act like a victim.

The structure of world stability and order has been reared upon, and will continue to be sustained by, the twin pillars of reward and punishment.There are rewards and punishments in both this world and in the afterlife. If we do good deeds in this world we are rewarded and if we do bad deeds we are punished. Likewise, in the afterlife we will be rewarded for good deeds and punished for bad deeds. It is not God who will be handing out the rewards and punishments, they will simply accrue to us as the result of our actions in this life, because in the afterlife we will be whoever we have become in this life. Moreover, after we die and the brain and mind die and we are left only with our soul, we will be stripped of our defenses, so there will be no unconscious mind by which we can trick ourselves into thinking bad behavior is acceptable. If someone was evil in this world, he will have to face it and suffer the consequences.

We all have free will in this world in order to shape our destiny and prepare our souls for the afterlife, but we will not have free will in the afterlife. Where we wind up will be according to who we were in this world, what we did with our lives. That is why it is so important to learn what we need to learn in this life. It is not really beliefs that are important, it is actions and consequences that teach us. The importance of beliefs is that help us to know what good actions are, according to God, who sets those standards. We can prevent a lot of suffering by following the teachings and laws of God. If everyone followed them there would be no evil in the world. That will happen eventually but it is way down the road.
But I don't agree that God is necessarily evil, but it has to either be as he say or as we have already talked about, that God decide what is good and evil and we basically have no free will deciding this, which makes our free will unnecessary, because that is basically the only important thing as I see it about having free will in the first place. So either way, none of it really turns out great for God or us for that matter, I think.
I probably already explained this to you but it bears repeating since apparently you did not understand. Yes, God decides what is good and evil and reveals that through the Messengers who reveal scriptures. No, we have no free will in deciding what God’s laws will be but we definitely have free will in deciding whether to follow God’s laws or not. So that means that free will is absolutely necessary. It turns out great for us if we use our free will to choose to follow God’s laws because in that case we are morally good rather than evil.
 

Trailblazer

Veteran Member
Im not sure I understand what you mean with biological nature? God speaks and interact with Moses and a lot of the other people in bible on a regular basis. So not really sure what you mean beyond biology or physical?


I think you will find it hard to find any animals with the capacity to come up with ideals are complex ideas in general.

But animals do rather strange things:

You can find lots of these videos.

It does make one wonder why these animals would do this, there seem to be little gained. And you could argue that it shows some signs of knowing the difference between right and wrong.
God's Creation is amazing, isn't it? :D
 

Nimos

Well-Known Member
God did explain Himself through Baha’u’llah, and after that Abdu’l-Baha, Shoghi Effendi explained more, and now if we have questions understanding any of this we have the UHJ to turn to for answers.
Im talking about God explaining himself to all humans, not through messengers. The use of these, causes nothing but confusing and if he is not able to, or interested in interfering with our lives and remove suffering, as that is the only thing that matters to us humans as I see it. Then at least he could stop trying to communicate in these extremely ineffective ways. Im sorry, but God's intention with these messages are not helping us in any way and they are not working. So if God exists either he should change how he does things or he ought to stay away completely, I think. If God exists he is the only solution, not UHJ or any religion.

God has done a lot more explaining through the Revelation of Baha’u’llah, so all the answers that we can have are there. If some things remain unexplained that is because there is no answer we can understand at this time.
To me as an atheist, that is simply not a good enough answer. As I mentioned to you earlier about this statement being a mind trap, as one can constantly fall back on it. Whenever there is something we don't understand or can explain, its because it haven't been revealed yet. But the fact is that almost everything in the world today have been "revealed" and explained by science. Most of which in modern day are atheists, do you think its part of Gods plan to reveal the truth through non believers? that sounds rather illogical to me. That is why I don't like this progressive revelation you talk about, its a way to keep people ignorant and not wanting to ask and seek answers. What is the point of science? if we approach something we don't understand, then the religious answer is that this haven't been revealed yet, so lets sit and wait for God. But the strange thing is that he never reveals anything, should we use progressive revelation as our means for progress, we would still be living in the stone age. :)

Why do you think God kept saying "I am the Lord?" I think I know why. God was reminding the Jews He was in charge, and that they were not in charge. We see similar things in the Writings of Baha’u’llah although not in the first person but rather in the third person.
Im pretty sure that you are correct :) But its like a human standing next to an ant hill and constantly yelling at them that they are the big human and that they can destroy them whenever they want to. To me its extremely childish behavior of a God. Why does God have to remind them all the time? Im pretty sure they got it after the first 50 times. :)
So, you believe that God ordered killings? Yes, God created the Earth where natural disasters and diseases would occur, and I have no answer as to why. Perhaps avoiding suffering was not a goal God considered important.
Yes according to the bible he ordered the killing and killed lots of people. Here is a death count comparison between Satan and God.

godvsatan.jpg


And this is even a low estimate, some put it at around 2.8 million.

Humans can also remove malaria by making new discoveries in medicine. Maybe that is what God expects us to do.
Well think about all the people that were killed before, again scientists decided that enough is enough, as it didn't seem like the solution were going to be handed to us. Suggesting that maybe this is what God intended, I personally think is slightly disrespectful towards those people that spend time and energy to do something good for the world. Its sort of like people that are getting cured of some terrible disease or whatever and then claim that if it weren't for God they would never have made it. People ought to thank the doctors and those that made the medicin and knowledge available instead. Its the same with people claiming that evolution is wrong and just made up, but have no issue when it comes to vaccines. And again God is apparently not interested enough in curing malaria that he bothers to do anything about it. Its fair enough that people want to believe in God and have faith in him, but keep him out of science and don't give him credit for anything related to that, give it to those people that actually work to make these things possible.

One reason I am on these forums so much is because I want to help people understand about God because at the end of the day it was God who came to my rescue, when I finally stopped hating Him. All the psychiatrists, psychologists, counselors and drugs were not helping me. I was in a downward spiral. I cannot tell you how many times I have been suicidal. Let me just say that losing a child is difficult but it is not the worst thing that can happen. I never had any children to lose.
I have obviously no clue about what is going on in your life that causes you to have it like this. And its fine that you find comfort with God and your religion.

What some atheists do not understand is that just because God is All-Powerful does not mean God is obligated to do everything atheists think God should do. Omnipotent means that God only does what God chooses to do.
And that probably explain why so many people are atheists, because what is the point or proof of God if he doesn't do anything. There is nothing valid to go by, nothing to test and therefore the most rational position is to be an atheist. We don't stand in Gods way to convince us, but as you say, he does nothing that could make us change our minds.

I have to say that it is illogical to say women do not have equal rights just because they cannot serve on the UHJ. I had more faith in your logical abilities but obviously your bias is stronger than your logic. There is no suppression of women in the Baha’i Faith. It is also wrong to say it is immoral when you do not even know the reason.
Regardless of how you see it, that is suppression of women right, you might not care and other Bahai women might not either. But there is no difference between that and for instance someone saying that "Women shouldn't be allowed to vote" or that "Black people shouldn't be allowed to ride in the front of a bus". What does it matter if you are in the front of the bus anyway, you still get from A to B, right? These are way to suppress certain type of people either by gender, skin color etc. And im against that regardless of what it is, because it makes no sense.

Continue...
 
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Nimos

Well-Known Member
Do you think it is acceptable for civilized people to sacrifice (kill) animals? I think it is a travesty.
I think its pointless to sacrifice animals, because its superstition, but in biblical times they did, that is what im talking about, that they had rules for how to do this in the bible.

If you are not a determinist, do you believe we have free will?
This is what I wrote to another about free will, so that is how I see it:
We have free will with limitations based on passed experiences. How you choose to understand your limitations decide the amount of free will you think you have.

To quickly explain that non sense :D I think we have free will when we have no previous experiences to guide us, which is not the full explanation but will get back to that.

True free will
In the other post I used the example:

You have to choose between (A), (A) or none of them?

Not knowing what any of them means or what the consequences are by choosing one over the other, leaves you with having to make a choice based on nothing to guide you (no experiences).

As you get experience with the example above:

(Get 10 dollars), (Get 100 dollars) or (Get Nothing)

You would choose the second (A) every time, in this example I simply used dollars as a clear example of value to demonstrate your "wants" which you have no control over.

How to understand limitations:
Me wanting chocolate ice cream is not an expression of free will or me wanting chocolate ice cream over vanilla ice cream is not an expression of free will. Passed experience of having tasted these decide which one I will choose, since I had no free will in choosing that I like the taste of chocolate more than vanilla, I have no choice in this matter.

This as I see it comes down to how one perceive ones senses. Are these considered part of you as neutral agents, which only purpose is to guide you and help you make sense in the world in which you live, and therefore part of the complete system? If that is the case, you would have what I described above. Free will with limitations based on passed experiences.


If you feel this lack of control over your senses is interfering with free will. You only have free will as described in the "True free will" above, and therefore your senses controls your free will. Leaving you with very little. :)

So eventually we get to this as I see it:
We have free will with limitations based on passed experiences. How you choose to understand your limitations decide the amount of free will you think you have.

Whether that is true or not, I have no clue. But to me that seems most likely to be true.

I do not want to make this post too long, but I wrote up a response to my atheist friend and I want to pass it along to you. You do not have to respond to it unless you have definite opinions you want to share.
Im not sure, my responds is all that helpful as I might not share your other atheists view on this, but ill try :)

Free will is the reason for evil. It is not an excuse. Humans alone are responsible for all the evil in the world because they commit all the evil in the world. There is no way God is responsible to stop people from committing evil even though hypothetically He could.
I will make my answer based on my own world view this time, which means that I will work with the assumption that I see no evidence for God, otherwise I think you might find my answer slightly weird. :)

But first of all, I don't believe good and evil exists and besides when im writing here on the forum, I very rarely use the words to describe anything. To me "Good" and "Evil" are simply describing words for whenever something in considered beneficial or none beneficial. So for instance, I wouldn't refer to Hitler as being evil, but rather I would call him sick and I think there is a natural explanation for why he ended up doing what he did.

Furthermore, if religious evil existed, it would also mean that there are no logical reason for why a baby could not be born evil, which I do not believe is possible, but rather that a persons behavior is formed through out their lives. Obviously a baby might be born with psychological issues, which would make them sick rather than evil.

With that in mind and to adresse your post.

I don't think free will is purely the reason for evil, but that passed experiences and biological issues might cause certain people to behave in ways that we would refer to as being evil. And in some cases these people are simply incapable of controlling themselves, despite knowing that they might be doing something wrong. So when you say that humans are responsible for all evil in the world. I would agree, but also acknowledge that this is far more complicated than people tend to make it. If a person is not born evil, it means that they are shaped into behaving like that during their life. This means that its not easy to figure out why or how someone turns out the way they are or what exactly led them to do, whatever action they ended up doing.

The reason God does not stop evil people from committing evil acts is because if God stopped an evil person from committing an evil act, the intent to do that evil act would still exist. Even more importantly, the evil person would not learn the lesson he needs to learn by doing the evil act and suffering the consequences. He would still be the same evil person with no chance for rehabilitation. So God would not be doing that person any favors by preventing his evil act. The victim of his evil act will also learn something because she can overcome and become a stronger person for having suffered. These are all learning opportunities we only have in this material world. The victim will also be plunged into the ocean of God’s mercy, if she reaches out for it.
I really couldn't agree less with what you are saying here :)

Its sound like you imagine that there are like X amount of evil intents and to get rid of them God have to allow them, is that what you mean?

Also if these evil intents and suffering is suppose to teach people lessons, you are going to run into issues. First of all it doesn't explain why they have to exist in the first place, I know your answer will be, due to free will. But you can have free will without evil, I don't see any reason why that shouldn't be possible. But also there is no reason a persons evil acts have to hurt someone else in order to teach that person a lesson. God could punish the evil person and leave the good person unharmed. Secondly I would imagine you having some problems explaining, how a murder victim is learning anything? But also why their death is needed to teach their love ones a lesson. Third you would run into issues with children/babies that die at birth or at a very young age and what exactly they learned from that?

Furthermore, which is in relation to what I wrote above about me not believing in good and evil. You would run into issues with natural evil as suffering due to these could not be explained by human acts. But suffering caused because God wanted Earth to work like that.

So I agree that these experiences might help a person become stronger, but its not necessarily a positive experience or something that people should prefer and it is not even certain that it will be beneficial for the person in the end either.

I probably wouldn't write what you did to the other atheist as I think he would most likely reach the same conclusion or something very similar as mine.
 
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Trailblazer

Veteran Member
Im talking about God explaining himself to all humans, not through messengers. The use of these, causes nothing but confusing and if he is not able to, or interested in interfering with our lives and remove suffering, as that is the only thing that matters to us humans as I see it. Then at least he could stop trying to communicate in these extremely ineffective ways.
God does not speak directly to humans because humans could never understand God. Only the Messengers can understand God because they have a divine mind.

Speak for yourself. Removing suffering is NOT all that matters to most people, it only matters to atheists and maybe to some believers. However, most people simply endure their suffering and don’t complain about it.

The communication has not been confusing or ineffective for everyone, only for a few atheists. Jews understood Moses quite well, Christians understood Jesus, Muslims understood Muhammad, and Baha’is understand Baha’u’llah; so what’s the problem with Messengers?
Im sorry, but God's intention with these messages are not helping us in any way and they are not working.
How do you know that they are not helping in any way? What would you expect to see if they were working? Of course, it would help if people actually read them and believed them.
So if God exists either he should change how he does things or he ought to stay away completely, I think. If God exists he is the only solution, not UHJ or any religion.
To me as an atheist, that is simply not a good enough answer.

You and all the other atheists... :rolleyes: What God does is never good enough. However, it is good enough for 93% of people in the world who are believers, why is that?
As I mentioned to you earlier about this statement being a mind trap, as one can constantly fall back on it. Whenever there is something we don't understand or can explain, its because it haven't been revealed yet. But the fact is that almost everything in the world today have been "revealed" and explained by science. Most of which in modern day are atheists, do you think its part of Gods plan to reveal the truth through non believers? that sounds rather illogical to me.
Give me a break, spiritual truth has not been revealed by science, and it is spiritual truth that is so vitally necessary to change people in the world, science only changes the world we live in.

Do you really think it is necessary to understand EVERYTHING? Only God understands everything. If you cannot accept that there will always be mysteries in life then religion is not for you. Even science has not figured out everything, science is constantly evolving.
That is why I don't like this progressive revelation you talk about, its a way to keep people ignorant and not wanting to ask and seek answers. What is the point of science? if we approach something we don't understand, then the religious answer is that this haven't been revealed yet, so lets sit and wait for God. But the strange thing is that he never reveals anything, should we use progressive revelation as our means for progress, we would still be living in the stone age.
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The intention of progressive revelation is not to keep people ignorant but rather to reveal what people need and what we can understand and utilize.

Progressive revelation is not designed for scientific progress, it is for spiritual progress. Baha’u’llah revealed more than we can even handle during this age, so much that He actually ended up having to ask His companions to thrown hundreds of thousands of verses into the Tigris River. :eek:

“As to those verses which He either dictated or wrote Himself, their number was no less remarkable than either the wealth of material they contained, or the diversity of subjects to which they referred. A vast, and indeed the greater, proportion of these writings were, alas, lost irretrievably to posterity. No less an authority than MírzáÁqáJán, Bahá’u’lláh’s amanuensis, affirms, as reported by Nabíl, that by the express order of Bahá’u’lláh, hundreds of thousands of verses, mostly written by His own hand, were obliterated and cast into the river. “Finding me reluctant to execute His orders,” MírzáÁqáJán has related to Nabíl, “Bahá’u’lláh would reassure me saying: ‘None is to be found at this time worthy to hear these melodies.’ …Not once, or twice, but innumerable times, was I commanded to repeat this act.” God Passes By, p. 138
Im pretty sure that you are correct
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But its like a human standing next to an ant hill and constantly yelling at them that they are the big human and that they can destroy them whenever they want to. To me its extremely childish behavior of a God. Why does God have to remind them all the time? Im pretty sure they got it after the first 50 times.
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Simply put, God keeps having to remind people because they behave like children, kind of like mom having to keep telling Johnny to stop playing in the street. If humans had gotten the message God would not have to keep reminding them. Look around and you will realize that humans STILL have not gotten the message of who God actually IS and what He can do to them.
Yes according to the bible he ordered the killing and killed lots of people. Here is a death count comparison between Satan and God.

And this is even a low estimate, some put it at around 2.8 million.
That’s a cute diagram, but do you really believe it? I do not believe Satan even exists so I already don’t believe that he killed anyone; so why would the stories about what God did be true? I guess you are not including the people who were purportedly wiped out in the flood of Noah?
Well think about all the people that were killed before, again scientists decided that enough is enough, as it didn't seem like the solution were going to be handed to us. Suggesting that maybe this is what God intended, I personally think is slightly disrespectful towards those people that spend time and energy to do something good for the world. Its sort of like people that are getting cured of some terrible disease or whatever and then claim that if it weren't for God they would never have made it. People ought to thank the doctors and those that made the medicin and knowledge available instead. Its the same with people claiming that evolution is wrong and just made up, but have no issue when it comes to vaccines. And again God is apparently not interested enough in curing malaria that he bothers to do anything about it. Its fair enough that people want to believe in God and have faith in him, but keep him out of science and don't give him credit for anything related to that, give it to those people that actually work to make these things possible.
Why is it disrespectful towards those people that spend time and energy to do something good for the world? You really like to twist things in order to make God into the fall guy, don’t you? Isn’t it good enough a cure was found? How the hell do you think God could cure malaria? Do you think God is a big man up in the sky who can just wave a magic wand? ... Because God is omnipotent, I am so sick of hearing atheists say that.

I never suggesting giving God the credit for science. The scientists deserve all the credit. God sure does not want any credit for anything.
I have obviously no clue about what is going on in your life that causes you to have it like this. And its fine that you find comfort with God and your religion.
No, you don’t have a clue what was and is going on, and neither does anyone else, except my husband and God. I do not find comfort in God or my religion as they only contribute to the problems I have now. I would not have half of these problems I have if it was not for God and my religion, but that’s a long story. However, it is too late to turn back the clock and disbelieve in God.
And that probably explain why so many people are atheists, because what is the point or proof of God if he doesn't do anything. There is nothing valid to go by, nothing to test and therefore the most rational position is to be an atheist. We don't stand in Gods way to convince us, but as you say, he does nothing that could make us change our minds.
God has done what God does, He has sent Messengers throughout the ages. That is not good enough for atheists so they will just have to remain atheists because God us not going to change His time-honored method of revealing Himself just to please a few atheists who reject His Messengers for no good reason.

God does not want to convince you, He wants you to convince yourselves by looking at the evidence He provides... I must have typed this 100 times by now, and counting since most of my posts have been to atheists for the last five years.

No, there is nothing you can test for to prove God exists, as religion is not the same as science.
Regardless of how you see it, that is suppression of women right, you might not care and other Bahai women might not either. But there is no difference between that and for instance someone saying that "Women shouldn't be allowed to vote" or that "Black people shouldn't be allowed to ride in the front of a bus". What does it matter if you are in the front of the bus anyway, you still get from A to B, right? These are way to suppress certain type of people either by gender, skin color etc. And im against that regardless of what it is, because it makes no sense.
Oh yes, there is a huge difference. There is no reason why women should not be allowed to vote or that black people shouldn’t be allowed to ride in front of the bus, but there is a reason why women cannot serve on the UHJ and we will know the reason eventually. Meanwhile, just like all atheists who need to know everything, you assume there cannot be a valid reason just because you do not know what it is. Your analogies don’t work... There is no suppression going on just because Baha’i women cannot serve on one of the institutions.
 
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