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Religious Faith and life beyond this mortal realm

TransmutingSoul

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Let's add a few more variables to your equation. Your Biblical interpretation process is filtered through the writings of Bahais.

Thus is it your will, or is it God's will or is it Ballulah's will you choose to follow?

God's Will is that we embrace the 'Glory of God' via our own free will.

It is a process the Bible calls being born again.

It is gaining admittance into the Spiritual Worlds, to which you have your choices. I can not change anybody else's choices and it is not for me to do.

Regards Tony
 

TransmutingSoul

Veteran Member
Premium Member
They have to sell their religion, Christians, Muslims, Bahais and many others.

It is never for sale, it has and will always be entirely every person's free will choice.

Change cannot happen unless we make the change first in our own selves and by that example reflect that change to others.

Every person is different, some will never accept change, some take time, some it happens quickly and some are already part of it.

Thus it is our choice as to what we see the world needs and what change we need to make within our own selves, to bring about that change.

Regards Tony
 
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Trailblazer

Veteran Member
You are not being the servant of any God, you are a servant of Bahaullah, and that is what he wanted. That is 'ego'.
I never heard anything so ridiculous. Baha'u'llah did not want to be worshiped. He repeatedly told us to worship only God.

“O kings of the earth! He Who is the sovereign Lord of all is come. The Kingdom is God’s, the omnipotent Protector, the Self-Subsisting. Worship none but God, and, with radiant hearts, lift up your faces unto your Lord, the Lord of all names. This is a Revelation to which whatever ye possess can never be compared, could ye but know it.”
Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 210

“By My Beauty! Nothing whatsoever shall, in this Day, be accepted from you, though ye continue to worship and prostrate yourselves before God throughout the eternity of His dominion. For all things are dependent upon His Will, and the worth of all acts is conditioned upon His acceptance and pleasure. The whole universe is but a handful of clay in His grasp. Unless one recognize God and love Him, his cry shall not be heard by God in this Day. This is of the essence of His Faith, did ye but know it.”
Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 293
 
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TransmutingSoul

Veteran Member
Premium Member
In this 21st Century, you want us to believe that?

We can consider that a closed mind to other possibilities is a blindness in itself.

Last week I went to a conference in a mining town called Mount Isa. Very remote town. The Workplace Health and safety Officer lives in a Council House that the people of the town knows is lived in by another presence.

The Officer has named the presence Jason :) There are many people that will not live in that house now, but the Officer has come to accept Jason and they get along fine.

The stories of what happens are amazing and witnessed by many people. There is more to this world than what we see.

Regards Tony
 

osgart

Nothing my eye, Something for sure
May I ask what you mean by no food dependence? I think about things like that sometimes. Our bodies were created to depend on food in order to live. The Bible says that food will be in abundance in the future.

We depend on food to survive; I like food once in awhile but mandatory eating to survive is something that I could do without.

I was letting my imagination wander and thinking of what it would take to desire to live forever. Dependency vs. total self sufficiency. Right now the whole human race is dependent. Biological bodies are not suitable for eternity. A glorious body would have no survival necessities, it would be perpetual.

Also you wouldn't want to lose the people you love. There is a lot that goes into desiring to live forever.
 

TransmutingSoul

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Also you wouldn't want to lose the people you love. There is a lot that goes into desiring to live forever

The example may very well be of the path that Jesus and the Bab showed us. (To name a couple)

To live, to be Love, may exist when we die to self.

Regards Tony
 

osgart

Nothing my eye, Something for sure
The example may very well be of the path that Jesus and the Bab showed us. (To name a couple)

To live, to be Love, may exist when we die to self.

Regards Tony

I find I have a self and a selfless side. It balances out quite nicely. From my experience I can be a self without ego. My selfless side only wants others to be at peace, with the joy of life. My self side is that I have desires and necessities for my own being. Desires to be valued by those I love, to be apart of life.

I can't imagine total selflessness without any self.
 

TransmutingSoul

Veteran Member
Premium Member
I find I have a self and a selfless side. It balances out quite nicely. From my experience I can be a self without ego. My selfless side only wants others to be at peace, with the joy of life. My self side is that I have desires and necessities for my own being. Desires to be valued by those I love, to be apart of life.

I can't imagine total selflessness without any self.

Yes I would see that is the case. In this life we must live to do our best, that takes a level of self to survive and a chosen level of selflessness to serve all humanity.

Those that gave and give their life for a higher truth in Faith that it has purpose, have chosen a path of less self for the path of the higher self, the part I see the Bible says is made in God's Image.

Regards Tony
 

Trailblazer

Veteran Member
Who knows God Will?
Who Understands God?
Who sees through God's eyes?
According to Baha'u'llah, the Manifestations of God do. :D

“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
 

Trailblazer

Veteran Member
How many times can you climb Mt Everest before it becomes as boring as walking from the bedroom to the toilet?
How many times can you swim to the bottom of the ocean before it becomes as boring as dipping your toe in a tub?
How many times can you greet your great-grandma before it becomes as boring as looking in a mirror?
True.
Forever, eternity, is a verrrry verrrry long time.
Your logic is valid. It would be a very long time if we had to live it in THIS world. :rolleyes:
 

Aupmanyav

Be your own guru
I never heard anything so ridiculous. Baha'u'llah did not want to be worshiped. He repeatedly told us to worship only God.
Dictionary.com:
the state of being manifested
outward or perceptible indication; materialization
Spiritualism. a materialization

And, he was the materialization of Allah.
 

Aupmanyav

Be your own guru
We can consider that a closed mind to other possibilities is a blindness in itself.
Last week I went to a conference in a mining town called Mount Isa. Very remote town. The Workplace Health and safety Officer lives in a Council House that the people of the town knows is lived in by another presence. The Officer has named the presence Jason :) There are many people that will not live in that house now, but the Officer has come to accept Jason and they get along fine.
Another funny superstitious story. Allah and Manifestation and 'Maid of Heaven' and now, Jinnat. You people are real funny and ante-deluvian, like the stone-age aboriginals surviving in Andaman islands. Can I repeat your first sentence:
"We can consider that a closed mind to other possibilities is a blindness in itself."
 
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TransmutingSoul

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Dictionary.com:
the state of being manifested
outward or perceptible indication; materialization
Spiritualism. a materialization

And, he was the materialization of Allah.

This is how it is seen in the Baha'i Writings;

"..... The reality of the Divinity is sanctified above singleness, then how much more above plurality. For that divine reality to descend into stations and degrees would be tantamount to deficiency, contrary to perfection, and utterly impossible. It has ever been, and will ever remain, in the loftiest heights of sanctity and purity. All that is mentioned regarding the manifestation and revelation of God pertains to the effulgence of His light and not to a descent into the degrees of existence.

God is pure perfection and the creation is absolute imperfection. For God to descend into the degrees of existence would be the greatest of imperfections; rather, His manifestation, dawning, and effulgence are even as the appearance of the sun in a clear, bright, and polished mirror.... "

Thus for us it is like seeing the sun reflected in a mirror, the sun is not manifest in the mirror and it is not manifest on the earth.

Regards Tony
 

Trailblazer

Veteran Member
Dictionary.com:
the state of being manifested
outward or perceptible indication; materialization
Spiritualism. a materialization

And, he was the materialization of Allah.
To materialize would mean that Baha'u'llah became God in the flesh.
A Manifestation of God is not God in the flesh.

“The Christian equivalent to the Bahá'í concept of Manifestation is the concept of incarnation. The word to incarnate means 'to embody in flesh or 'to assume, or exist in, a bodily (esp. a human) form (Oxford English Dictionary). From a Bahá'í point of view, the important question regarding the subject of incarnation is, what does Jesus incarnate? Bahá'ís can certainly say that Jesus incarnated Gods attributes, in the sense that in Jesus, Gods attributes were perfectly reflected and expressed.[4] The Bahá'í scriptures, however, reject the belief that the ineffable essence of the Divinity was ever perfectly and completely contained in a single human body, because the Bahá'í scriptures emphasize the omnipresence and transcendence of the essence of God…..

One can argue that Bahá'u'lláh is asserting that epistemologically the Manifestations are God, for they are the perfect embodiment of all we can know about God; but ontologically they are not God, for they are not identical with God's essence. Perhaps this is the meaning of the words attributed to Jesus in the gospel of John: 'If you had known me, you would have known my Father also' (John 14:7) and 'he who has seen me has seen the Father (John 14:9)…..

The New Testament, similarly, contains statements where Jesus describes Himself as God, and others where He makes a distinction between Himself and God. For example, 'I and the Father are One (John 10:30); and 'the Father is in me, and I am in the Father (John 1038); but on the other hand, 'the Father is greater than I (John 14:28); and 'Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone (Mark 10:18; Luke 18:19). These statements do not contradict, but are complementary if one assumes they assert an epistemological oneness with God, but an ontological separateness from the Unknowable Essence.
Jesus Christ in the Bahá'í Writings
 

Aupmanyav

Be your own guru
I understand. Had he said he was an human incarnation of Allah, the Iranians would have immediately killed him. So, he said he was THE reflection of God. Smart use of words. But the purpose still was the same, to put himself above the other people. He also said that he was the sender of prophets (mursil-al-rasul), Lord of Lords (Rabbi-ul-Ala) equating himself with Allah. That is 'ego'. That is hunger for importance. All of the monotheistic religion leaders are no different, whether Zoroaster, Moses, Jesus or Mohammad; and among the later ones Joseph Smith, Mirza Ghulam Ahmad apart from Bahaullah.
https://www.quora.com/Where-in-the-writings-of-Bahaullah-does-he-claim-to-be-a-prophet
 

TransmutingSoul

Veteran Member
Premium Member
I understand. Had he said he was an human incarnation of Allah, the Iranians would have immediately killed him. So, he said he was THE reflection of God. Smart use of words. But the purpose still was the same, to put himself above the other people. He also said that he was the sender of prophets (mursil-al-rasul), Lord of Lords (Rabbi-ul-Ala) equating himself with Allah. That is 'ego'. That is hunger for importance. All of the monotheistic religion leaders are no different, whether Zoroaster, Moses, Jesus or Mohammad; and among the later ones Joseph Smith, Mirza Ghulam Ahmad apart from Bahaullah.
https://www.quora.com/Where-in-the-writings-of-Bahaullah-does-he-claim-to-be-a-prophet

You quote from sources that are not portraying what Baha'u'llah has revealed.

This makes it clear and is authorised Baha'i Writings;

Shoghi Effendi in "The Dispensation of Bahá'u'lláh":

"That Bahá'u'lláh should, notwithstanding the overwhelming intensity of His Revelation, be regarded as essentially one of these Manifestations of God, never to be identified with that invisible Reality, the Essence of Divinity itself, is one of the major beliefs of our Faith — a belief which should never be obscured and the integrity of which no one of its followers should allow to be compromised."

Regards Tony
 

Aupmanyav

Be your own guru
That is not surprising. Shoghi Effendi was the great grandson of Bahaullah. All his importance and wealth was due to being related to Bahaullah. Why would not he say that?
The link gives reference from Kitáb-i-Aqdas.

"At the time of Shoghi Effendi's death, all living male descendants of Bahá'u'lláh had been declared Covenant-breakers by either `Abdu'l-Bahá or Shoghi Effendi, leaving no suitable living candidates."
Shoghi Effendi - Wikipedia
 
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TransmutingSoul

Veteran Member
Premium Member
That is not surprising. Shoghi Effendi was the great grandson of Bahaullah. All his importance and wealth was due to being related to Bahaullah. Why would not he say that?
The link gives reference from Kitáb-i-Aqdas.

"At the time of Shoghi Effendi's death, all living male descendants of Bahá'u'lláh had been declared Covenant-breakers by either `Abdu'l-Bahá or Shoghi Effendi, leaving no suitable living candidates."
Shoghi Effendi - Wikipedia

Most men could not take the responsibility that came with that 'importance'. Shoghi Effendi did not want to be the Guardian, never even contemplated that He would be appointed to such a role. It took a great toll on his health and mind. He said he knew his life had ended and went in solitude to the mountains for quite some time to find peace with what was in front of him. He had to return during his ministry to find health of mind in those mountains.

"... During all this time the Guardian lived simply in an apartment built above `Abdu'l-Bahá's house, RuhiyyihKhanum joining him as his wife on 24 March 1937. He always lived with his work, his bed and his desk being in the same room. When he travelled, he almost always went third class. All of his time was given to his ever-growing work for the Cause of Bahá'u'lláh. Those who saw the amount of work he did each day realized that it was only through the power of God that a man could accomplish so much day after day, year after year....."

Do you know that Shoghi Effendi passed away without a Will? One reason this has been thought to be so, is firstly he could not appoint a Successor for the reason you posted, they has all succumbed to self pursuits and broken the Covenant. Secondly he had no earthly possessions to give and no wealth to distribute. I guess he was hoping that before he left, up to his last breath, that it may be possible for Him to appoint a Successor, but God doeth as God so Willeth.

It is a life worthy of study and admiration, it does not deserve to be condemned in any way.

It was a life that shines a light from the immortal realm upon us all.

Regards Tony
 

Aupmanyav

Be your own guru
Nice write-up. I do not know about Shoghi Affendi's wealth. He had no successor, probably it went to his wife, Rúhíyyih Rabbání (Mary Sutherland Maxwell). Or perhaps she was paid by the Bahai controller group. There are many ways money could be passed on.
 
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