Belief in God will always require ‘some’ faith

The Hammer said:

That isn't evidence. The only evidence is truly found within.

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I believe we are all different in what we consider to be evidence of God.
For me, the evidence is external and Messengers are the evidence.
Not all people find God within or even have a relationship with God.
We humans are all very different.

firedragon said:

How do messengers of God be evidence for God? I mean what is your criteria to establish that they are messengers of God prior to establishing God exists? What are the criteria?

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I believe the Messengers of God are the evidence that God provides for humanity.
There are criteria that can be used to determine who is a Messenger. I have my own set of criteria but other people can use differnt criteria. Do you want to see my list of criteria?

Ella S. said:

With good enough evidence, you should be able to prove it to others

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You are doing the following assumption. That all evidence is objective in effect. That is not the case, when you look closer. Rather if you accept that there in some cases, but not all are subjective evidence, you can explain how the following works:

Someone: I have evidence that the world is material.
Someone else: I have evidence that the world is from God.
Me: I don't have any such positive evidence, yet we are all here.

The problem arrives when you don't account for the following observation of cognitive, moral and cultural relativism.
"Man is the measure of all things: of the things that are, that they are, of the things that are not, that they are not."
Not that everything is subjective, but neither that everything is objective.
Rather that everything is a self-referring concept of elements of objective, inter-subjective and subjective cases.

Trailblazer said:

I believe the Messengers of God are the evidence that God provides for humanity.
There are criteria that can be used to determine who is a Messenger. I have my own set of criteria but other people can use differnt criteria. Do you want to see my list of criteria?

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Yes. I would like to see your criteria. If you wish I will not respond to it. I'll just read it for myself.

Thanks in advance.

firedragon said:

How do messengers of God be evidence for God? I mean what is your criteria to establish that they are messengers of God prior to establishing God exists? What are the criteria?

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The Word of God is the mother of all words.

6:19 Say (O Muhammad): What thing is of most weight in testimony? Say: Allah is Witness between me and you. And this Qur´an hath been inspired in me, that I may warn therewith you and whomsoever it may reach. Do ye in sooth bear witness that there are gods beside Allah? Say: I bear no such witness. Say: He is only One Allah. Lo! I am innocent of that which ye associate (with Him).

Regards Tony

TransmutingSoul said:

The Word of God is the mother of all words.

6:19 Say (O Muhammad): What thing is of most weight in testimony? Say: Allah is Witness between me and you. And this Qur´an hath been inspired in me, that I may warn therewith you and whomsoever it may reach. Do ye in sooth bear witness that there are gods beside Allah? Say: I bear no such witness. Say: He is only One Allah. Lo! I am innocent of that which ye associate (with Him).

Regards Tony

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Irrelevant Tony. And your methodology quoting the Qur'an is not the Islamic methodology. Never have been. Study what you are quoting Tony I beg you.

firedragon said:

Yes. I would like to see your criteria. If you wish I will not respond to it. I'll just read it for myself.

Thanks in advance.

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Please bear in mind that the following criteria are my criteria which is based upon who I believe were Messengers of God, who met all these criteria. My criteria narrow the playing field and it will eliminate most claimants, since they will fail to meet all the criteria.

The minimum criteria would be:

1. He had good character as exemplified by his qualities such as love, mercy, kindness, truth, justice, benevolence, gracious, merciful, righteous, forgiving, patient.

2. He believed he had been given a mission by God and did everything he could to see that it was carried out. He was completely successful before his death, and he accomplished everything that he set out to do.

3. He wrote much about God and God's purpose for humans both individually and collectively, or scriptures were written by others who spoke for him. He firmly believed that the work he was doing was for the Cause of God.

4. He had many followers while he was alive, and there are still millions who follow his teachings and gather in groups based on the religion he founded.

5. His followers have grown more numerous in recent times.

Another criterion I believe he would have to meet is that his religion could not contradict or be in opposition to any of the world religions that are already established and he could not talk down any of those religions and say his religion is the only true religion from God.

This is a starting point but there are other questions we would want to ask ourselves before we would be able to believe that a man was a true Messenger of God because that is a bold claim so there should be a lot of evidence to support such a claim.

Trailblazer said:

Please bear in mind that the following criteria are my criteria which is based upon who I believe were Messengers of God, who met all these criteria. My criteria narrow the playing field and it will eliminate most claimants, since they will fail to meet all the criteria.

The minimum criteria would be:

1. He had good character as exemplified by his qualities such as love, mercy, kindness, truth, justice, benevolence, gracious, merciful, righteous, forgiving, patient.

2. He believed he had been given a mission by God and did everything he could to see that it was carried out. He was completely successful before his death, and he accomplished everything that he set out to do.

3. He wrote much about God and God's purpose for humans both individually and collectively, or scriptures were written by others who spoke for him. He firmly believed that the work he was doing was for the Cause of God.

4. He had many followers while he was alive, and there are still millions who follow his teachings and gather in groups based on the religion he founded.

5. His followers have grown more numerous in recent times.

Another criterion I believe he would have to meet is that his religion could not contradict or be in opposition to any of the world religions that are already established and he could not talk down any of those religions and say his religion is the only true religion from God.

This is a starting point but there are other questions we would want to ask ourselves before we would be able to believe that a man was a true Messenger of God because that is a bold claim so there should be a lot of evidence to support such a claim.

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Thank you so much for sharing your personal views. I cherish it more than you know.

Cheers.

Nakosis said:

So, if in my perception, there is no God, is that equally valid?

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If it works for you, of course it's valid. Your perceptions are validated - or invalidated - by your experience.

Twilight Hue said:

May the God in your mind serve you well.

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And may the absence in yours serve you likewise.

Trailblazer said:

Belief in God will always require ‘some’ faith because we can never see God or hear God speak to us directly.

However, it is my contention that the better the evidence we have of God’s existence the less faith we will require in order to believe in God. In other words, there is an inverse correlation between good evidence and faith required to believe in God.

I will even contend that with good enough evidence we can know in our own minds that God exists even though we can never prove it to anyone else.

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Agree. And that's why I believed in God. For me, there is more than enough evidence and even though I've never seen God, that evidence validates my faith.

RestlessSoul said:

And may the absence in yours serve you likewise.

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It does. Very well too.

Vee said:

Agree. And that's why I believed in God. For me, there is more than enough evidence and even though I've never seen God, that evidence validates my faith.

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But who God is to Baha'is is different than who God is to the JW's. So, faith in what? One of you is wrong. Then add in Islam, Christianity, and all the other religions and sects of those religions and you have people putting their faith into what their particular religion and sect says is true. That's why I appreciate the Atheists that call all religious believers out and ask, "What objective proof and evidence do you offer?" Because the Bible says so?

And how many different versions of "The Bible says so" are there? Then add in the Baha'is. They say their prophet is the return of Christ and everybody else that was ever promised in all the other religions. They believe all the founders of each major religion were true "manifestations" from the one true God. Baha'is put their faith in that belief, but do JW's? And if not, why not? You probably want some proof. And you probably reject that "proof".

CG Didymus said:

But who God is to Baha'is is different than who God is to the JW's. So, faith in what? One of you is wrong.

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I now like to see life as chosen Frames of Reference CG, right and wrong are the extremities. Life is enabling one's own self to expand on our fames of reference.

No one is wrong, in their chosen frame of reference and no one has the ultimate truth, as truth is relative to our frames of reference.

In science, a fact once taught in schools can become a thing of the past, we transition to the new frame of reference.

Regards Tony

CG Didymus said:

Because the Bible says so?

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My "proof" that God - as in a superior being, creator of all things - exists, is that after studding science for many years, I came to the conclusion that the universe is too complex to have happened by chance. The Bible didn't make me believe in God. Science did.
I believe in God because when I see how everything works, there is no doubt in my mind that someone imagined, projected and made it happen. The myriads of lucky chances that would have to happen for all life forms to exist and function the way they do is simply mind boggling. I've had moments of doubt here and there, but all it takes if for me to check the process of developing a human being from conception to birth, or see how the eye works, or how the immune system operates, etc, and my doubts are gone immediately. Any of those things, among millions of others, is just too complex to have happened randomly.

7-

TransmutingSoul said:

I now like to see life as chosen Frames of Reference CG, right and wrong are the extremities. Life is enabling one's own self to expand on our fames of reference.

No one is wrong, in their chosen frame of reference and no one has the ultimate truth, as truth is relative to our frames of reference.

In science, a fact once taught in schools can become a thing of the past, we transition to the new frame of reference.

Regards Tony

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If there is one God, and he sends messengers/manifestations to teach us the truth, I would think that would be The Truth and not some relative truth, or a Truth that gets misinterpreted and changed over time. But that is what the Baha'i Faith teaches. But it's even more complicated than that. Scriptures of many religions were written by others and not the prophet. So, how dependable are they as being The Truth? And then the religious leaders add their interpretations to them. How true are those interpretations? I don't think Baha'is trust them as being The Truth.

So, what do we have? I agree with Baha'is. All the Scriptures and interpretations of those Scriptures by people in those other religions aren't The Truth. So, what are they? Half truths? Man-made interpretations of The Truth? Yet, all religions expect their teachings to be accepted and believed as being The Truth. All on faith, because they can't be proven to have come from a God.

Vee said:

My "proof" that God - as in a superior being, creator of all things - exists, is that after studding science for many years, I came to the conclusion that the universe is too complex to have happened by chance. The Bible didn't make me believe in God. Science did.
I believe in God because when I see how everything works, there is no doubt in my mind that someone imagined, projected and made it happen. The myriads of lucky chances that would have to happen for all life forms to exist and function the way they do is simply mind boggling. I've had moments of doubt here and there, but all it takes if for me to check the process of developing a human being from conception to birth, or see how the eye works, or how the immune system operates, etc, and my doubts are gone immediately. Any of those things, among millions of others, is just too complex to have happened randomly.

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Okay, but why believe the Bible's version of God? Why not the Baha'is version? Or the version of some other religion? Oh, but if the Bible God did all those things that the Bible says he did, I would say there is proof. He parted the seas. Jesus walked on water. Elijah had God send fire from heaven. That God shows himself to alive and well and very active in the happenings of the world. Some Baha'is seem to think God doesn't get involved all the much in the world and that those Bible stories were fictional. And unless God is still active today, maybe those stories were just fiction.

But I know lots of Christians that believe God still heals and sends his angels and gives people prophecies and fills them with the Holy Spirit, and to prove it, he has them speak in tongues. But how many of us trust those Christians? Unfortunately, those Christians are too often found out to be frauds. So, what about the God they say they believe in? It sure makes me mistrust anybody that claims they "know" God.

Faith is the degree we stop rebelling irrationally by what has been proven by evidence, signs, and proofs for God. God can become more manifest, but he not completely hidden either. It's to cage the rebellious spirit and slit the dark passion to rebel against God's signs, light, and proofs.

If he forced his signs and Mohammad (s) and his family (a) forced with signs to degree of something like day of judgment, yes, everyone would be forced to believe, but the trial is over in this case.

But Mohammad (s) and his family (a) did perform miracles. And right now, God is more hidden, due to Imam Mahdi (a) not being in public and so miracles are not in public display right now.

This is a huge trial. And it's because we failed the warning of God's Name AlifLamMeem (Hassan Al-Askari (a)- the 11th Imam).

We are in abnormal period with no miracles in the open. This is the dark night that is bound to disappear but the darkness of the night is something we take refuge in Surah Falaq. The dark night has become so long, and we await the morning and day.

CG Didymus said:

So, what do we have? I agree with Baha'is. All the Scriptures and interpretations of those Scriptures by people in those other religions aren't The Truth. So, what are they? Half truths? Man-made interpretations of The Truth? Yet, all religions expect their teachings to be accepted and believed as being The Truth. All on faith, because they can't be proven to have come from a God.

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I see we have choice CG. To me it is explained most logically in the teaching of progressive revelation.

Baha'i do not know all truth CG, that is the domain of the Messenger, and Baha'u'llah is clear that God only gives us in each age what we can handle. This age is no different, as the Bible has offered, it is an age that Christ was to guide us unto all truth, not to hand it out on a plate. A guide is not the entire Book CG

There is over one hundred volumns of writings remaining in this age to guide us towards the peace and security of the entire human race, to enable us to create and ever advancing civilisation. Baha'u'llah had more disposed of, thrown into the tigress river, saying humanity was not ready for what was revealed by the 'Pen of the Most High'. I see this was a direct result of the Babi and Baha'i themselves. Imagine even the believers were not capable of grasping the full intent of the Message of Baha’u’llah and their actions saw much of the Revealed Word destroyed for this age.

Thus we still have the guide CG, not the full Truth.

Now all faiths have writings that are included in that guide. As the guide to all truth is now written, we can use it to see what was of God in the past and what is of men chasing worldly powers and desires.

How could we see where we went wrong without that new disclosure? It would be business as usual, as it still is, when we do not embrace the new guide. It is faiths killing faiths, people destroying people, anarchy and dishonesty dominating, godless actions and mindsets seeming to be appropriate choices.

It appears injustice really has to afflict every Nation before we will learn a lesson. I guess the world will let thrants keep murdering Ukrainian Citizens and it will take the actions of another tyrant based Nations to show the world what dominating National mindsets do to a decent peaceloving humanity.

Baha'u'llah has offered the path to peace CG, it is your choice as to what you do with that Revelation. I can only keep offering it, obligation free, to all I meet, in one way or another, that is my goal in life, as long as I remain here.

Regards Tony

Link said:

Faith is the degree we stop rebelling irrationally by what has been proven by evidence, signs, and proofs for God. God can become more manifest, but he not completely hidden either. It's to cage the rebellious spirit and slit the dark passion to rebel against God's signs, light, and proofs.

If he forced his signs and Mohammad (s) and his family (a) forced with signs to degree of something like day of judgment, yes, everyone would be forced to believe, but the trial is over in this case.

But Mohammad (s) and his family (a) did perform miracles. And right now, God is more hidden, due to Imam Mahdi (a) not being in public and so miracles are not in public display right now.

This is a huge trial. And it's because we failed the warning of God's Name AlifLamMeem (Hassan Al-Askari (a)- the 11th Imam).

We are in abnormal period with no miracles in the open. This is the dark night that is bound to disappear but the darkness of the night is something we take refuge in Surah Falaq. The dark night has become so long, and we await the morning and day.

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I see that the greatest miracle is a change of heart. It is an amazing shift in our chosen frame of reference. It is when we swing wide open the Gate on the narrow path and are exposed to the full radiance of the Glory of God, dumbstruck at our nothingness.

Regards Tony