Can we change our mind about what we believe?

[Trailblazer]

None of that happened.

Not all of that literally happened since the language is figurative, but some of it has happened and the rest will happen during this age.

Revelation 21:1 Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,”[a] for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 2 I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.

I believe that the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, refers to the new Law of God that came by way of Revelation of Baha'u'llah. That there was no longer any sea is figurative. Seas are what divide the peoples of the earth, so it means that what divides people will be no more since the peoples of the world will be united.

“The time foreordained unto the peoples and kindreds of the earth is now come. The promises of God, as recorded in the holy Scriptures, have all been fulfilled. Out of Zion hath gone forth the Law of God, and Jerusalem, and the hills and land thereof, are filled with the glory of His Revelation. Happy is the man that pondereth in his heart that which hath been revealed in the Books of God, the Help in Peril, the Self-Subsisting. Meditate upon this, O ye beloved of God, and let your ears be attentive unto His Word, so that ye may, by His grace and mercy, drink your fill from the crystal waters of constancy, and become as steadfast and immovable as the mountain in His Cause.

In the Book of Isaiah it is written: “Enter into the rock, and hide thee in the dust, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of His majesty.” No man that meditateth upon this verse can fail to recognize the greatness of this Cause, or doubt the exalted character of this Day—the Day of God Himself. ”

Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 12-13

Then you have the other problem, you claimed the Bible is corrupted. How do you demonstrate which is corrupted and which is not? Anything you quote may be corrupted. You haven't demonstrated anything was corrupted so there is that as well.

No, I did not say the Bible is corrupted, I said the religious traditions of the past were corrupted.

“This is the Day when the loved ones of God should keep their eyes directed towards His Manifestation, and fasten them upon whatsoever that Manifestation may be pleased to reveal. Certain traditions of bygone ages rest on no foundations whatever, while the notions entertained by past generations, and which they have recorded in their books, have, for the most part, been influenced by the desires of a corrupt inclination.”

Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 171

 

[Trailblazer]

Interesting, now it is YOU who is claiming what a God would or would not do. This entire time when I mention what a God would or should do you come back with "you cannot speak for a God", and now, here you are speaking for what a God should or would do>

No, I am not speaking for what a God should or would do.
I said: "A God who is supposedly infinite and creates universes and "talks" sounds ridiculous and made up."

And nobody can prove a person is a messenger of any God.

That doesn't mean there are no Messengers of God.
Proof is not what makes a Messenger a Messenger, God makes Him a Messenger.
If you had any logical abilities you would know that.

You cannot demonstrate his claims are true even to yourself. You can use confirmation bias on his words and find a way to think you are seeing they are true.

I know what I have demonstrated to myself, you do not know. I have demonstrated it to myself.
I had no confirmation bias when I became a Baha'i because I had no preexisting beliefs to confirm.

Confirmation bias, also called confirmatory bias or myside bias,[Note 1] is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms one's preexisting beliefs or hypotheses, while giving disproportionately less consideration to alternative possibilities.[1] Confirmation bias - Wikipedia

I don't believe them, and there is no reason to believe them that I have seen.

Then don't believe them. You should not believe them with no reason.

Exactly my point. His words are not progressive. He doesn't speak to the times. It was the industrial revolution. It was the scientific revolution right around the corner. He spoke to that ZERO. Philosophy has become big, he spoke to that ZERO.
HE spoke no science we were about to discover, or math, or medical knowledge.

He did speak to the times but progressive revelation has nothing to do with whether His words were progressive.

According to Baha'i beliefs, progressive revelation means that religious truth is revealed by God progressively and cyclically over time through a series of divine Messengers,

Progressive revelation is a core teaching in the Bahá'í Faith that suggests that religious truth is revealed by God progressively and cyclically over time through a series of divine Messengers, and that the teachings are tailored to suit the needs of the time and place of their appearance.[1][2] Thus, the Bahá'í teachings recognize the divine origin of several world religions as different stages in the history of one religion, while believing that the revelation of Bahá'u'lláh is the most recent (though not the last—that there will never be a last), and therefore the most relevant to modern society.[1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_revelation_Baha'i

Every time you make a point that you read in Bahai scripture, and then post the scripture, you are claiming it's true because it says so.

All of the evidence you produced was "because he said so".

None of the evidence I posted is "because he said so".

 

[Trailblazer]

"It's true because the book says it's true".

No, that is not why it is true, if it is true. That is what you totally miss.
I believe it is true because I believe that Baha'u'llah was a Messenger of God who brought the truth, not because the book says it's true.

Of course He made a claim and the claim is in the book. How else could we know who He was?

Not everyone has to care about what is really true.

But I do.

 

[ppp]

No, that is not why it is true. That is what you totally miss.
It is true because that Baha'u'llah was a Messenger do God who brought the truth, not because the book says it's true.

Of course He made a claim and the claim is in the book. How else could we know who He was?

@joelr is talking about the reason you say it is true. That is the context of your discussion. Why don't you get that?

 

[crossfire]

Of course we can change our minds. At the very least we can suspend disbelief to open our minds up enough to at least consider other perspectives.

There is a rather common term that gets thrown around for those with fragile, inflexible minds. I'll hide it behind spoiler tags for the fragile-minded.

Spoiler

snowflake

 

[Trailblazer]

@joelr is talking about the reason you say it is true. That is the context of your discussion. Why don't you get that?

But that is not what he said.

He said:
All of the evidence you produced was "because he said so".
"It's true because the book says it's true".

Both of those statements are false representations of my position, so they are straw men.

You said: "the reason you say it is true"

I do not say it is true, I say I believe it is true. I cannot prove it is true so I don't say it is true.

I do not believe it is true "because he said so".
I do not believe it is true "because the book says it's true".

I believe it is true because I did an independent investigation of the Baha'i Faith in order to determine if it is true.

 

[ppp]

But that is not what he said.

He said:
All of the evidence you produced was "because he said so".
"It's true because the book says it's true".

Both of those statements are false representations of my position, so they are straw men.

So you say.

I do not say it is true, I say I believe it is true.

There is no functional difference between the two.

And your next move will be to quote mine some random internet dictionaries on the definitions of say and believe and pretend that the definitions make some point that you will never define or discuss or defend from your own mental faculties. Your modus operandi is avoidance and obfuscation. You hide in the vagueness of other people's poor definitions, avoiding any positive specific declarations of your own. No direct commitments, personal accountability, or candid vulnerability. In other words, the Trump model of hollow assertions and hollow denials. The old spit and get.

There is no persistence justification for authoritative structures. They lose their value and their warrant with every action. The right of any structure to exist must be justified now, and in ten minutes, and in ten minutes from that. Their previous warrant is not such a justification. And you have not a damned idea what I am talking about.

 

[Jacob Samuelson]

Can we change our mind about what we believe?

@PureX said that one CAN change their mind, but they won't because they don't want to deny their current understanding of 'what is'. #523

I disagree. One CAN change their mind, and they sometimes do, if they get new information that causes them to change their mind. However, if they don't change their mind, it is because they truly believe that what they believe is true according to their current understanding. It is not that they won’t change their mind, as if they are stubbornly refusing to change their mind, it is that they have no reason to change their mind.

Why should anyone deny that what they believe is true?

Conversely, why should anyone accept any belief as true if they don’t believe it is true?

Why should atheists accept that God exists when they see no evidence for God’s existence?

I do not think that atheists are stubbornly refusing to believe in God. I take them at their word when they say that they see no evidence for God. It is not that they won’t believe in God, it is that they can’t believe in God because they see no evidence for God. The same holds true for me. It is not that I won’t disbelieve in God, it is that I can’t disbelieve in God because I see evidence for God.

One can't see when their eyes are closed. One may still be able to open their eyes and adjust their vision to the newfound light.

 

[joelr]

..because not every concept is a physical one .. we all know what is meant by the "mind"..
You insisting that you know everything about it, and that it is merely a product of the physical,
is irrelevant.

Where did I insist I know everything about the mind? It is a product of the physical, that isn't in question. They are related, when the physical brain changes so does the mind.
You are speculating there is more to the brain, some sort of life force/vitalism along with the brain. So I ask, how do you know such a thing might exist? You said it's not physical and cannot be shown by physical means. Then how did you come to believe it and how do you demonstrate it's true?w

"the" future universe? Do you refer to this present one?
..that's not what I refer to.

I don't know what you are talking about.

 

[joelr]

The Bible was originally written on papyrus and parchment, not books as we know it. Also, those writing were not recording or investigating scientific endeavors, but rather their experiences with their God and people.

They did write exact dimensions for the ark. They did use a crude form of pi for building instructions. They also gave medical tips, examples of biblical medical application are the use of 'balm' to treat sores (Jeremiah), Fig as a cure for a boil (Isaiah), and Mandrake as a fertility remedy enabling Jacob and Leah to have a fifth son (Genesis).

There are over 100 verses related to real estate. There is a section on rules of war, divorce, how to burn incense, the cosmology of the entire known universe. Clearly there was space and motivation to tell some unknown facts about reality. That never happened because there was no God involved, it was written by people. The knowledge contained within reflects that perfectly.

 

[joelr]

Not all of that literally happened since the language is figurative, but some of it has happened and the rest will happen during this age.

Revelation 21:1 Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,”[a] for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 2 I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.

I believe that the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, refers to the new Law of God that came by way of Revelation of Baha'u'llah. That there was no longer any sea is figurative. Seas are what divide the peoples of the earth, so it means that what divides people will be no more since the peoples of the world will be united.

More cognitive bias. Things that don't happen you can then say they were figurative. People are not uniting but rather becoming more divided in politics and religion.

And again:

Apocalypses and Apocalypticism

Apocalyptic authors suffered from lack of perspective, falsely believing themselves to have been living at the end times.


Their readers share the same lack of perspective, falsely imagining that the text refer to the readers time (when they actually referred to the authors time)

For centuries people have been reading Revelation as future history. Often convinced the signs point to their own time. This is called temporal narcissism.
1:03:19


Revelation is misread as future history. War, famine, pestilence and death are already loosed on Earth. Revelation envisions a world where they will be eliminated.

In the Book of Isaiah it is written: “Enter into the rock, and hide thee in the dust, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of His majesty.” No man that meditateth upon this verse can fail to recognize the greatness of this Cause, or doubt the exalted character of this Day—the Day of God Himself. ”

Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 12-13

Then he is wrong because I recognize no great cause, it's a fictive mythology.
You haven't demonstrated that he is having revelations so I don't care what he says, why do you continue to post his meaningless ramblings?




http://reference.bahai.org/en/t/b/GWB/gwb-10.html.utf8?query=jerusalem&action=highlight#pg13

No, I did not say the Bible is corrupted, I said the religious traditions of the past were corrupted.

“This is the Day when the loved ones of God should keep their eyes directed towards His Manifestation, and fasten them upon whatsoever that Manifestation may be pleased to reveal. Certain traditions of bygone ages rest on no foundations whatever, while the notions entertained by past generations, and which they have recorded in their books, have, for the most part, been influenced by the desires of a corrupt inclination.”

Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 171

That equates to exactly the same thing. Why would you quibble over such a pointless detail? And if the traditions have been influenced and written down wrong then that also means the Bible is corrupted?
However this is just a claim from a man who provides no evidence of this nor does he provide evidence of revelations.
I am certain he is a con artist and attempted to form a cult. He used every possible trick to not have to do supernatural or magic acts. Including claiming some parts of the Bible are "corrupted".

He clearly doesn't know anything about Biblical historicity. He knows nothing about the religious syncretism or that Islam is also a man made religion.

 

[joelr]

No, I am not speaking for what a God should or would do.
I said: "A God who is supposedly infinite and creates universes and "talks" sounds ridiculous and made up."

Again, that is exactly the same thing. These semantic quibbles you are doing are pointless and time wasting.
I literally did the exact same thing by saying a God should explain some science, medical advice and so on.
You said a God does not have to operate by my expectations.

Then you go and say a God cannot talk because that sounds "made up". You are doing the exact same thing you spoke against. Once again, using confirmation bias to not allow others to say what a God should do but then of course you get to decide what a God can and cannot do.

The irony of you saying a talking God sounds "made up" is hilarious. Meanwhile a man claims to hear God messages, yet can offer no proof, God doesn't tell him a single thing humans don't already know and somehow that doesn't sound made up also?

That is because you read his works and decided to believe him and now, using confirmation bias anything that doesn't support your beliefs is "ridiculous" and anything that does is fine.

That doesn't mean there are no Messengers of God.

It also doesn't mean Zeus isn't real, or Bigfoot, or Inanna,

Proof is not what makes a Messenger a Messenger, God makes Him a Messenger.
If you had any logical abilities you would know that.

If you had any logical abilities you would know this statement is 100% illogical and basically nonsense.
I cannot believe I even have to explain this?
You are conflating two separate categories.
God is the subject who would send messages.
Evidence and proof is how we would know it's true, they are not the same.

This is MORE semantic nonsense.


You haven't demonstrated any God exists.
You haven't demonstrated any person has messages from God.
No one has. There are only claims with unsufficient evidence.


The evidence sucks. How can I demonstrate this. All religions have the same evidence, claims, stories, vague prophecies. None are compelling to you except the one you happened to buy into. You did not buy into it because of the evidence, not in Bahai or any other religion.

You became convinced and then looked at evidence with a bias and seem to be able to overlook bad evidence. Which also seems to happen in all other religions as well.

I know what I have demonstrated to myself, you do not know. I have demonstrated it to myself.
I had no confirmation bias when I became a Baha'i because I had no preexisting beliefs to confirm.

Like I said, I suspect you read his work and decided to believe and were not applying a rational, skeptical , empirical methodology to the facts.
I suspect it was an emotional choice.

Now you use confirmation bias.

Confirmation bias, also called confirmatory bias or myside bias,[Note 1] is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms one's preexisting beliefs or hypotheses, while giving disproportionately less consideration to alternative possibilities.[1] Confirmation bias - Wikipedia

Exactly what you are doing.


Confirmation bias - Wikipedia

Then don't believe them. You should not believe them with no reason.

He did speak to the times but progressive revelation has nothing to do with whether His words were progressive.

According to Baha'i beliefs, progressive revelation means that religious truth is revealed by God progressively and cyclically over time through a series of divine Messengers,

Progressive revelation is a core teaching in the Bahá'í Faith that suggests that religious truth is revealed by God progressively and cyclically over time through a series of divine Messengers, and that the teachings are tailored to suit the needs of the time and place of their appearance.[1][2] Thus, the Bahá'í teachings recognize the divine origin of several world religions as different stages in the history of one religion, while believing that the revelation of Bahá'u'lláh is the most recent (though not the last—that there will never be a last), and therefore the most relevant to modern society.[1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_revelation_Baha'i

Yeah you posted this. What's up with repeated postings of material I am certain is from an ordinary man?

Even here he fails. These words in his work DO NOT fit the time and place at all. First, this was the industrial revolution. Including medical revolution. It was time (if a God existed) to tell us medical information about things like Penicillin and many others, even things we don't know today. To take the stress off survival so we can focus on theology and growing as a species.
It was a scientific revolution. Time to tell us about the universe and what is beyond, the origin, origin stories are in all religions. We are due a scientific version.
We also needed philosophy. This was the time. But he gave nothing. In fact the Gospels are MORE PROGRESSIVE than his long, drawn out Dark Ages like praise of God where he gives no real theology whatsoever.
Aquinus, Origen, Turtullien, and several others built upon Graeco-Roman philosophy and tried to add it to Yahweh theology. It would have been time to correct or expand upon this.
Nothing.
Not progressive.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_revelation_(Bahá'í)

None of the evidence I posted is "because he said so".

Unless you speak directly to him, every single aspect of your beliefs are directly related to what he wrote. It is 100% true that your claim is "its true because it says so in the book". In every post you continue to provide evidence of this fact. In this post you quoted scripture to demonstrate your beliefs.
Your position is, I believe what the book says, or it's true because it says so in the book.

 

[joelr]

No, that is not why it is true, if it is true. That is what you totally miss.
I believe it is true because I believe that Baha'u'llah was a Messenger of God who brought the truth, not because the book says it's true.

Of course He made a claim and the claim is in the book. How else could we know who He was?

More useless semantics. Desperately trying to talk your way around the FACT that your logic is "it's true because the book says so".

Once again, I never thought I would have to actually explain this to someone because it's so obvious.............

I don't know how to even simplify this down any further?


When Christians say "the only way to heaven is through Jesus", they are saying it's true because the book says so.

They don't say "no that isn't true, it's true because Jesus is the son of God and he said the only way to heaven is through him...."

They accept that the book with words from Jesus is the same thing.

You just did a tautology, you said the same thing in different words. Do you speak to Baha u llah? No. You read his words in a book.

So your defense is "it's true because the book says so"


It does not matter if I change it to "it's true because some guy said so"


It is still equally as illogical and RIDICULOUS. Same bad logic.

But I do.

If you actually care about what is really true then you have never learned a proper rational, skeptical, empirical methodology to put beliefs through before believing them.

Something has to have evidence proportional to the claim. Prolific writing is not evidence of revelations. Nothing in Bahai can demonstrate the claim. Many things can show he is just a man.
Yes many others have tried to do apologetics and fell extremely short. They had to resort to "proofs" like "his life", "his work", nothing that could not be done by any other person.
They bought a hill and built a garden and called it Mt Carmel and claimed the Mt Carmel prophecy was fulfilled. People bought it.

The Mt Carmel prophecy isn't that a garden will be built on a hill. It's the entire world, including animals will be like eve. All at peace, like the post revelation world. That is a scam.

If you cared about what was true you would have recognized there is no evidence for these claims. I believe you care more that you find ways to make your current beliefs true in your mind.

 

[joelr]

For any "true believer" in any religion, that "sunk" a lot of time and effort into a religion makes it difficult for the believer to have an open mind and consider that maybe their beliefs are wrong. This is true of Baha'is too. They see "evidence" for believing, but they don't seem to consider the evidence against their beliefs... at least outwardly.

So, Christians, Baha'is and some people in some of the other religions do get to be like "brick walls". They have invested too much into believing that they can't or don't want to take a serious look at the evidence against believing in the religion and prophet. And, naturally, they accuse others of being like a brick wall and blind to the truth.

I'd imagine that everybody that looks into a new religion like the Baha'i Faith has some degree of skepticism. And maybe some that have so little that almost immediately they fall in love with the teachings and the religion.

Things like love for all people... And a plan from God that will unite and bring peace to the world... sure sound good. Maybe so good that the new believer ignores all the contradictory things in the details. Details like the very real differences held by the different religions.

But the simplistic explanation that is given in the Baha'i Faith is enough to get the new believer to move on and not worry about those differences. They are told that some things were symbolic and not literal... like hell, Satan, the resurrection in Christianity and reincarnation and incarnations of God of Hinduism.

Then the other thing new Baha'is are told is that the followers also added things into the religion based on misconceptions and misinterpretation... Like making Jesus God and part of a trinity.

I just remembered another problem I have with the Baha'i "progressive revelation" thing... Each manifestation supposedly brought a new set of social laws with them. I've asked what were the new laws that Jesus brought? Again, to me, it's just a simplistic way of getting rid of the teachings of the older religions and saying that their new religion has come to update and replace the old laws given in the religions of the past.

For me, it seems much more likely that each culture made laws that fit their society. That it wasn't their God giving the laws. It was just their religious leaders. Or, if Baha'is want to believe that God wanted people that did any type of work on the Sabbath should be stoned, then fine. But did that law really replace the laws of the other religions in the world? I doubt it. Each religion had its own dumb and horrible laws that they claim came from their God.... Like sacrificing people to their God. But, of course, Baha'is don't talk about those religions much, unless they had a prophecy they can use.

I agree with what you are saying. I read the Bahai scripture sometimes and it reminds me a lot of some of the new age channelers. Lot of words but he never really says anything new. But those channelers sold millions of books, Seth, Abraham-Hicks, Bashar. So that is enough sometimes, sound confident and make claims.
The defenders of Bahai talk a lot around the lack of evidence, no one has been able to explain how exactly one knows revelations are real.

 

[muhammad_isa]

I don't know what you are talking about..

You said: "..yes, we can make predictions about the future universe based on current conditions."

What future universe? If all you know is this present universe, what can you know
about any other?

You merely assume .. it has nothing to do with science, which deals with the material.
If people understand non-material concept, it means it is "a thing"..
..of course, there are many unknowns .. that is reality!

 

[YoursTrue]

They did write exact dimensions for the ark. They did use a crude form of pi for building instructions. They also gave medical tips, examples of biblical medical application are the use of 'balm' to treat sores (Jeremiah), Fig as a cure for a boil (Isaiah), and Mandrake as a fertility remedy enabling Jacob and Leah to have a fifth son (Genesis).

There are over 100 verses related to real estate. There is a section on rules of war, divorce, how to burn incense, the cosmology of the entire known universe. Clearly there was space and motivation to tell some unknown facts about reality. That never happened because there was no God involved, it was written by people. The knowledge contained within reflects that perfectly.Pe

People, including scientists, write what they know or realize. Many changes and presumptions have been changed in science. It doesn't mean, however, they are correct in their assessments. And memory can be erroneous. Nevertheless, differences occur in copying and/or transmission, and I believe in the God that enabled life. I hope you have a good day.

 

[CG Didymus]

The defenders of Bahai talk a lot around the lack of evidence, no one has been able to explain how exactly one knows revelations are real.

When I was first told about the Baha'i Faith in the 70's, it was presented as everything was factual. I was terribly religiously gullible. I believed and trusted that people were telling me the truth. It didn't take long to find out that everybody had a different "truth".

The Baha'is did use Bible prophecy as an important part of "proving" that Baha'u'llah was the return of Christ. They used "when he the spirit of truth comes". They used William Miller to show how some Christians were sure that Jesus would return in 1844. I had never read the Bible, so I assumed everything they were saying was true. But then I did read the Bible.

The questions I ask, that you and others ask, can't be answered by Baha'is with anything substantial. A person needs to believe that the Baha'i Faith is true in order for the Baha'i answers to work. Much the same as a born-again Christian has to believe the Bible and NT in a certain way to make their beliefs make any sense.

So, can a Baha'i or Christian or anyone else change their beliefs? Yes... but not as long as they keep believing their old beliefs are the ultimate and absolute truth. For me, one thing took down both Christianity and the Baha'i Faith, was the virgin birth story. Once I read Isaiah for myself, it was obviously plucked out of context. One verse and the gospel writer used it as a prophecy to create a whole birth story. And, since the Baha'i support the virgin birth, they too are just as guilty. But they do plenty of their own cherry-picking that, for me, takes away any credibility.

 

[Trailblazer]

Then he is wrong because I recognize no great cause, it's a fictive mythology.

If He is wrong He is wrong, if He is right He is right.

He is not wrong because YOU do not recognize His Cause.
That is patently illogical because people's opinions and beliefs don't make anything true or false.
What is true is true, what is false is false. That is independent of anyone's personal opinions or beliefs.

 

[Trailblazer]

Again, that is exactly the same thing.

Only in YOUR mind, according to how you think, and that is what you do not understand. Everyone does not think like YOU.
The reason you keep arguing with me is because you can only see your own point of view. It's your way or the highway.

Then you go and say a God cannot talk because that sounds "made up".

I did not say that God cannot talk because it sounds made up. I only said a God that talks sounds made up.

Trailblazer said: A God who is supposedly infinite and creates universes and "talks" sounds ridiculous and made up. #247

Those two statements mean different things yet you conflate them to mean the same thing.

I don't know what God can do, only God knows that, but a God that talks makes no logical sense to me since talking is a human thing and God is not a human. Without a mouth, how could God talk? It makes more sense to me that the Old Testament is anthropomorphic.

That is because you read his works and decided to believe him

I did not read the Writings of Baha'u'llah before I decided to believe Him. I read what other people wrote about the Baha'i Faith and I read some Writings of Abdu'l-Baha. Only much later did I read the Writings of Baha'u'llah.

The evidence sucks.

Only in your opinion. In my opinion the evidence is excellent.

How can I demonstrate this.

You can't, since it is ONLY a personal opinion you hold.

You became convinced and then looked at evidence with a bias and seem to be able to overlook bad evidence.

No, I became convinced because of the evidence. I looked at the evidence FIRST, and that is why I was convinced.
What is bad evidence to YOU is good evidence to me. What can't you just accept that everyone does not think like you?

Like I said, I suspect you read his work and decided to believe and were not applying a rational, skeptical , empirical methodology to the facts.
I suspect it was an emotional choice.

Your suspicions are wrong. I did not read the Writings of Baha'u'llah before I decided to believe Him. I read what other people wrote about the Baha'i Faith and I read some Writings of Abdu'l-Baha. Only much later did I read the Writings of Baha'u'llah.

Not progressive.

Only in your personal opinion.

 

[Trailblazer]

More useless semantics. Desperately trying to talk your way around the FACT that your logic is "it's true because the book says so".

How arrogant it is for you to speak for me. I can speak for myself.

My logic is not "it's true because the book says so".
My logic is not "it's true because of the evidence."

I believe it is true because of the evidence, not because the book says so, but the evidence is not what makes it true.
If it was true it would be true even if there was no evidence at all. This is what you totally miss.

When Christians say "the only way to heaven is through Jesus", they are saying it's true because the book says so.

You are correct. Christians believe what they believe because the Bible says so, but I do not believe what I believe is true because the Baha'i Writings say so. I believe because of the evidence.

You just did a tautology, you said the same thing in different words. Do you speak to Baha u llah? No. You read his words in a book.

So your defense is "it's true because the book says so"

Nope. And I am not going to bother explaining that again.

Something has to have evidence proportional to the claim. Prolific writing is not evidence of revelations.

I never said that prolific writing is evidence of revelations.

Nothing in Bahai can demonstrate the claim. Many things can show he is just a man.

I believe that many things demonstrate that He was more than just a man. Same for Jesus and the other Messengers of God.
The fact that you do not believe that doesn't mean it is not true. The fact that I believe it doesn't make it true. It is either true or false.

If you cared about what was true you would have recognized there is no evidence for these claims. I believe you care more that you find ways to make your current beliefs true in your mind.

If you cared about what was true you would have recognized there is evidence for these claims. I believe you care more that you find ways to make your current beliefs true in your mind.

Do you see how arrogant that sounds, speaking for another person and what they care about?
It is just two people with different viewpoints of the evidence. I see it as evidence, you don't it as evidence. It's that simple.

In your mind if there is no evidence and you are not going to admit you could be wrong, so you will keep saying there is no evidence.