No room for questions in heaven. How will you ask ?
The above is a link to where this questioning started, but in order to prevent de-railing the thread, this thread has been created for anyone at all, especially Bahai people or anyone who deems themselves informed about Bahai or even just logical people, to contribute and think about and answer some of these questions.
The questions are as follows (but more may be brought up throughout the thread, and anyone else can also ask questions here about Bahai things or to me or whatever).
I currently do not consider myself a Bahai or follower of the Bab or Baha'u'llah, and will add that I may be somewhat prejudiced or suspicious of practically anything at all coming out of Persia and in relation to the Persian culture, all the way back through the Zoroastrian times even. The thing I dislike Persians for most, is their part in the creation and proliferation of the Hadiths. I don't like Persian people too much, even though some of the women can be good looking to me, but basically don't like anything about them at all overall usually (and also find that a lot of them might be crazy too), so that is to say I'm clearly prejudiced. At the time of the Zoroastrian things, they called the things from India demonic supposedly (naming as Daevas words like Sarva and Indra), and even said odd things about God in various ways like how they attributed to Ahriman the movement of things or change basically, which I attribute to God. Then they went on to make a big fuss about "the family of the Prophet" and mystical qualities and caste systems and blah blah blah, and they were killing lizards like crazy too, just not a fan of these people or their culture or their land or their ideas, even though they get lots of praise. Their influence on the religions, including Judaism, also seems to have been a potentially bad one as well. So, being quite hostile from the get go to this group of people, the idea of a charismatic leader coming along and making any claim, I'm already extremely skeptical, because I don't respect them at all, and already consider them liars from long ago, from the Zoroastrian times, into their Shia split times, finding their Shia traditions to be vile and obnoxious and even blasphemous, and then not being fond also of the Bahai movement either, as a kind of Westernizing suck up type movement, that is supported and funded by groups I don't like (like Zionists) to try to create some kind of trouble for Muslims (who I'm not particularly fond of either).
So, getting that out of the way, this is a great opportunity for people who are knowledgeable of the Bahai religion and history and apologetics to teach everyone who visits this thread all about the religion and put at ease their questions. It is unlikely to move me, except that the patience and courtesy and gentleness that people treat me with here in patiently answering my questions will likely leave me with the opinion that the Bahai are nice people (in fact, I already have this opinion of them, as they are decent and simple folks as far as I've seen and my family has been friends with Bahai people as well).
So to start off:
1. Why should Bab and Baha'u'llah be believed? While we're at it, why should any of these people be believed? Jesus, Muhammed, Moses, Abraham, Paul, all the rest, whoever you can think of, why?
2. What significant update to Islam was required when the Muslims seem to still be functioning as Muslims along with the Qur'an.
3. Is the Qur'an to be believed, or is it a lie?
4. What are the changes to the Qur'anic laws by the Bab and to the Bab's laws by Baha'u'llah, and why was such an update necessary between these two in such an extremely small amount of time?
5. How are Bahai not just some type of Muslims?
6. Who are all the Prophets, and what is the point of calling them anything or giving them any significance if they are to be disregarded and are outdated anyway? Like, who cares about them if all that matters really is the Baha'u'llah and what Baha'u'llah says?
7. How do we know these people aren't just like any "Charismatic Cult Leader"?
8. The Mormons or the LDS Church (Church of Jesus Christ and the Latter Day Saints or whatever) call their organizations leaders Prophets and have a chain of new ones leading back to Joseph Smith, then Brigham Young, and they keep updating and saying that this is the old stuff and here is the new stuff, is there any similarity to that and the Bahai thinking, and why should the Mormons not be believed and followed? They too are a wealthy organized religion with fancy looking buildings and other things.
9. What does it take to be a Bahai, and 9.2. how can one be a Bahai, and 9.3. why should one be a Bahai? 9.4. What is the expected fate of non-Bahai? 9.5. What is expected to happen to the devout Muslims? 9.6. So what then makes this addition necessary or worth the risk?
10. What is the population of the Bahai, their true number, in your estimates (taking out the nominal and not serious Bahai, but actual practitioners).
11. Please give the daily life and routine and rituals and activities of the best and most ideal Bahai person, 11.2. and if you do this, and 11.3. if not, why not? 11.4. Are you failing? 11.5. You aren't afraid or don't care much or what?
12. What is your personal story with Bahai, or if you are a Bahai, how did you come to Bahai or come to believe in it, and 12.2. what do you think of the Qur'an and 12.3. Why aren't you just a follower of the Qur'an?
13. What factor makes one or leads one to be a true Bahai and what is believed to be the factor that makes people deny it or defy it or reject it or be skeptical of it in the genuine views of the Bahai?
14. I view Bahai religion as a degradation or inferior version of Qur'anic Islam, can you clarify or correct this view and show how it might actually be an improvement on the Qur'anic religion or differs from it in such a way in its teachings and practices? I currently find the Muslims to be more devout, more physically clean, more disciplined, etc, so superior in every way to the Bahai which seems like its just a deflated and luke-warm Western pandering version of Islam.
15. What are the Bahai views on the actual detailed description of God (what is God, in detail, down to every detail you can muster up), angels, demons, jinn, whatever, the whole cosmology, the whole belief system in detail, magic, mysticism, symbols, all that you can discuss which give a clear picture of the Bahai worldview and cosmology and locations and history and bestiary and all that.
16. How can one come to respect, admire, or follow Baha'u'llah if one doesn't have much respect for any human beings, or for Baha'u'llah's supposed predecessors, or Muhammed, or Jesus, or Moses, or even God? 16.2. How much belief or practice is required to be a true Bahai or attain God's reward, and what is that Reward anyway and in return for what exactly and why?
17. What is the opposite of a Bahai (sometimes this helps clarify what a Bahai is through the example of what is not a Bahai or what the diametric opposite might be). 17.2. Who, if anyone, are the bad guys or groups, or list all the major bad guys or groups, like even Satan if Satan plays a role at all in the teachings of Baha'u'llah.
18. The statistical numbers of other groups are higher, what does this mean? Has the mission failed, or is it only getting started? It seems doubtful at this rate or with these numbers that Bahai religion will be a major force in 1000 years. 18.2. What accounts for the slaying of Bab and Baha'u'llah if these were slain (as compared to Muhammed, who was not slain, or Moses, who was not slain), and the comparatively small following of the Bahai faith as compared to variations of Islam and Christianity?
19. What are the strongest appeals and apologetics for Bahai religion and why one should follow it and perform each of the required or recommended rituals or tasks?
20. How was your mood and thought process before and after Bahai religion was taken on as your personal religion, and what aspects of it do you personally perceive as those which make the most beneficial difference in your thinking or practices?
21. What are some resources or all the best resources to read all the important or just all of the available and translated Bahai literature online, and what is the value if any of doing so, and what are the bare minimum requirements or recommendations for reading (how much does one need to know, and also if there is any stuff people should avoid reading or which when they read they become really difficult or skeptical).
22. Where is God right now, as I'm writing this, in your beliefs or understandings, and what would God think if I thought poorly of Baha'u'llah or Muhammed or something? Or even God? 22.2.What would thinking poorly of God be exactly in your opinion?
Lots of questions!
23. What is the Bahai organization hierarchy and system and who are the leaders and bosses and why?
24. Have you heard of the Ismaeli leadership structure? Can you compare it to them or the Mormons or Jehovah Witnesses?
25. What aspects of your personal history and background do you think really might be responsible for your accepting Bahai religion as your religion (or rejecting it, if a non-Bahai answers).
Do you know how much I spend on dog food to feed all of them? Luckily we have the money. I told them last night that they were not getting any more food because they kept looking at me with those puppy dog eyes and we had already fed them several times... I should eat so well!
