Questions for Atheists and Agnostics

[Shad]

The context of that quote was the reason we get a divine revelation, why we need Messengers of God. Here is the full quote:

Those quotes were vague and didn't address my point. More so you missed the point that results shift opinion. Results Baha'i are lacking in comparison to other religions.

 

[Trailblazer]

Those quotes were vague and didn't address my point. More so you missed the point that results shift opinion. Results Baha'i are lacking in comparison to other religions.

I guess I did not understand what your point was.
I do not know what you mean by "results are lacking." What results?

But generally speaking, you cannot expect to see the same results from the Baha'i Faith that is comprised of only 0.1% of the world population as you would see from older and more established religions such as Christianity and Islam, that comprise 33% and 22% of the world population, respectively. That is unrealistic and thus it is an unfair comparison.

 

[Shad]

I guess I did not understand what your point was.
I do not know what you mean by "results are lacking." What results?

I am talking about perception of your religion. It is making grand claims about how it can establish world peace and government. Yet when one were to look at the accomplishments of your group and religion those are few in comparison to other groups.

But generally speaking, you cannot expect to see the same results from the Baha'i Faith that is comprised of only 0.1% of the world population as you would see from older and more established religions such as Christianity and Islam, that comprise 33% and 22% of the world population, respectively.

I can hold this expectation based on the grand promises your religion has made about itself and goals. Jews are barely double your group yet look at the Nobel prize list.

That is unrealistic and thus it is an unfair comparison.

Not when your religion claims to be from God.... God... Your group claims to be the latest version of God's religion yet accomplished what? The ultimate being has your back yet nothing of consequence is produced. This shows a problem with your supposed methods used by your religion.

Talk about unfair when you do not claim such a being is behind your group.

 

[Trailblazer]

I am talking about perception of your religion. It is making grand claims about how it can establish world peace and government. Yet when one were to look at the accomplishments of your group and religion those are few in comparison to other groups.

My religion makes no claims when any of this will happen. It took humanity 6000 years (since the beginning of the Adamic Cycle of religion) to make the mess it has made in the kitchen. It is not going to clean up that mess in 155 years. Get real. This new religious cycle, the Cycle of Fulfillment (Bahai Cycle) will last no less than 500,000 years. Time is not an issue.

I can hold this expectation based on the grand promises your religion has made about itself and goals. Jews are barely double your group yet look at the Nobel prize list.

The Baha’i Faith goals are different from what other religions have. The Baha’i Faith has met or exceeded all their goals to date.

The goal of the Baha’i Faith administration was to expand to as many locations as possible around the world. These goals have been met. The Baha’i Faith has spread to over 250 countries and territories and is almost as widespread as Christianity. Most of this happened during the “formative age” of the Baha’i Faith (1921-1944) FOURTH PERIOD: THE INCEPTION OF THE FORMATIVE AGE OF THE BAHÁ’Í FAITH 1921–1944

Another goal of the Baha’i Faith was to establish the administrative order, including the Universal House of Justice (UHJ), and National Spiritual Assemblies (NSAs) and Local Spiritual Assemblies (LSAs) around the world. All these goals have been met.

Another goal was to build Baha’i temples around the world. That goal has been met.

Not when your religion claims to be from God.... God...

It does not matter if the religion is from God... God is not going to do jack squat. God gave man free will to do the work of building the Kingdom of God on earth and Baha’u’llah revealed what is needed to build it... It will take as long as it takes and it will depend upon humans how long that is.

 

[Trailblazer]

I now understand that you are not being honest and sincere. I was just a pawn being used to editorialize your cultist and nonsense belief. And, used as an excuse to fill the post with your unfalsifiable scriptural dribble. You had no intentions of proving anything from the outset. We were never really engaged in a sincere argument in search of even the relative truth. You already knew the truth, and only needed a means to express YOUR TRUTH, and YOUR LOGIC, for YOUR FAITH. I think that it is best to agree that we both have a very clear difference of opinion, relating to reality. I certainly don't want to insult both our intelligence anymore.

I have been honest and sincere from the very beginning. Apparently you had some misconceptions about what this dialogue was about, but that did not come from anything I said. Apparently you had an agenda I never had. I told you all along that I just answer what is written to me in posts.

I never told you I had any intentions of proving anything to you. I told you that I cannot prove anything anyone else and that everyone has to prove religious beliefs to themselves by doing an independent investigation.

I never told you I was searching for truth. I told you I already knew the truth, so I was never dishonest. I told you I would be willing to look at objective sources about the Baha’i Faith and if they could refute what I believe I would consider them.

 

[Truly Enlightened]

I have been honest and sincere from the very beginning. Apparently you had some misconceptions about what this dialogue was about, but that did not come from anything I said. Apparently you had an agenda I never had. I told you all along that I just answer what is written to me in posts.

I never told you I had any intentions of proving anything to you. I told you that I cannot prove anything anyone else and that everyone has to prove religious beliefs to themselves by doing an independent investigation.

I never told you I was searching for truth. I told you I already knew the truth, so I was never dishonest. I told you I would be willing to look at objective sources about the Baha’i Faith and if they could refute what I believe I would consider them.

The action of answering my questions is not the issue, and you know it. It is HOW you answer that is the issue. The answers can be non-responsive, irrelevant, inaccurate, biased, misleading, ambiguous, etc. So it is simply a given to expect the answers to be germane, direct, concise, and objectively relevant to the question. If you simply answer my questions with irrelevant religious dialogue, inferences and insinuations, designed to put YOUR beliefs in a more positive light, then you are not being intellectually honest in your answers. Especially, when you simply ignore WHY I felt that your answers all seem to be avoiding the questions.

I am a searcher of the truth(not just imply that I am).Therefore, I must weigh the positives with the negatives, before I make any life-changing decision. Especially, if it has the potential to change my world-view of reality. When I state that you should not look only at one point of view of a subject(KKK), from their perspective, but should look at it from many perspectives(positives and negatives). No rational person would offer any argument against this. I even used product surveys for determining the best restaurants as verifiable examples. Your response was to answer a question with a question(avoidance), blame it on the motives of enemies of the faith, and is now claiming that you only meant what their beliefs are, not what their true practices are. That is deceptive. If you are NOT an independent searcher of the truth(not as scripturally defined in the Baha'i text), then you are just gullible, or need some emptiness filled. If something sounds too good to be true, the rule of thumb, is that it usually ain't.

I asked you to point to anything that was a lie, being used by your critics to discredit your belief, and why? I gave specific questions such as the poisoning of Baha'u'llah, the involvement of the Baha'i's in the Iranian Revolution, the relationship of the Baha'i's with the British and Russian Governments, the succession wars and self-proclamation of being the prophet foretold, and the laws, rules, and practices within the Baha'i faith? Are these claims by the naysayers true or false? Not ONE direct answer to ONE direct question. All you gave me was what the Baha'u'llah tells you to parrot as your obviously scripted response. You were just using my questions as a platform to promote your biased scriptural editorializing. Most people would simply expect objective falsifiable answers, to at least non-religious and non-supernatural claims.

My agenda is irrelevant, since I am not making any extraordinary claims. I am not here to disprove your claims. I am here to understand the rationale behind your claims. There is no objective rationale for your claims. There is only unjustified parroted repetition, based on in-house closed religious idealism and the adherence to inhouse laws and practices. To claim that one must prove a religious belief to oneself is silly, since proof is not subjective. Otherwise, delusions can also be classified as proof. I don't expect you in the future to take responsibility for anything you say, imply, or insinuate. I expect you to use every opportunity to parrot your belief, no matter how it is questioned.

Now that I truly understand that your intention was never about supporting your claims with any objective evidence, or was never interested in any search for the truth, your claims are all belief claims. Since you are not a searcher for the truth(the truth you already know), or will never change your mind, why would you need to compare any other claims? Fortunately, the truth does not need your consideration. There will always be people with a certain mind-set, that makes them more susceptible to superstitions nonsense, especially if it is packaged nicely. Since your conversation is essentially one-way, I'll leave you to it.

 

[Shad]

My religion makes no claims when any of this will happen. It took humanity 6000 years (since the beginning of the Adamic Cycle of religion) to make the mess it has made in the kitchen. It is not going to clean up that mess in 155 years. Get real. This new religious cycle, the Cycle of Fulfillment (Bahai Cycle) will last no less than 500,000 years. Time is not an issue.

A lot of issues of the past have been solved in the last century or two without God backing anything. Having no time frame is useful to hide behind when the lack of progress is brought up.

The Baha’i Faith goals are different from what other religions have. The Baha’i Faith has met or exceeded all their goals to date.

Your stated goals are small and unimportant to anyone outside your faith. None of your goals are unusual for a religion.

It does not matter if the religion is from God...

Yes it does.

God is not going to do jack squat. God gave man free will to do the work of building the Kingdom of God on earth and Baha’u’llah revealed what is needed to build it... It will take as long as it takes and it will depend upon humans how long that is.

This is a typical dodge of many religions by placing focus on people instead of the religion and it's methods. "My plans are perfect, it is everyone else that is the problem"

 

[Trailblazer]

A lot of issues of the past have been solved in the last century or two without God backing anything. Having no time frame is useful to hide behind when the lack of progress is brought up.

It is a Baha’i belief that a lot of issues have been solved by humans during the last century because of the coming of Baha’u’llah and the Holy Spirit that was released into the world.

I do not need to hide behind anything or excuse anything because there is nothing to excuse. Progress will happen in due time. It is all dependent upon what humans do or don’t do.

Your stated goals are small and unimportant to anyone outside your faith. None of your goals are unusual for a religion.

So what? The goals are what have been set forth by God through the administrative order of the Baha’i Faith. It does not matter if anyone else thinks they are important. It only matters what God thinks.

Yes it does.

Yes it matters if the religion is from God but that does not mean God is going to do what He has enjoined humans to do through Baha’u’llah.

This is a typical dodge of many religions by placing focus on people instead of the religion and it's methods. "My plans are perfect, it is everyone else that is the problem"

The focus is on the people in the religion because they are the ones doing the work that has been set forth by the religion through the administrative order set up by Baha’u’llah. There is nothing wrong with the methods. They work when people follow them.

 

[Trailblazer]

The action of answering my questions is not the issue, and you know it. It is HOW you answer that is the issue. The answers can be non-responsive, irrelevant, inaccurate, biased, misleading, ambiguous, etc. So it is simply a given to expect the answers to be germane, direct, concise, and objectively relevant to the question.

My answers are not non-responsive, irrelevant, inaccurate, biased, misleading, ambiguous, etc. They are just honest direct answers to questions.

If you simply answer my questions with irrelevant religious dialogue, inferences and insinuations, designed to put YOUR beliefs in a more positive light, then you are not being intellectually honest in your answers. Especially, when you simply ignore WHY I felt that your answers all seem to be avoiding the questions.

You cannot read my mind. You do not know why I say what I say, my motives. My answers are not designed for anything. I just answer what I am asked. I just answer with the truth about my beliefs. I am not trying to make them look like anything they are not. I just tell the truth as I know it.

I am not responsible for your feelings. I just answer questions with what I know. I am not avoiding questions. Just because you FEEL like I am ignoring questions does not mean I am ignoring questions.

I am a searcher of the truth (not just imply that I am). Therefore, I must weigh the positives with the negatives, before I make any life-changing decision. Especially, if it has the potential to change my world-view of reality. When I state that you should not look only at one point of view of a subject (KKK), from their perspective, but should look at it from many perspectives (positives and negatives). No rational person would offer any argument against this.

That is a straw man. I never said that anyone should only look at one point of view on any subject, including the KKK. All I ever said is that if you want to know what the KKK believes you ask the members of the KKK because they know what they believe in. On TV, they interview members or ex-members of the KKK because that is where they get the accurate information about the KKK. If you want to evaluate the KKK and decide if you were going to join then you would look at it from many perspectives (positives and negatives). The same applies to any religion.

If you are evaluating a religion such as the Baha’i Faith you should look at all sides, positive and negative. I never said you shouldn’t. But you cannot expect me to present the negative and say that is accurate because I do not believe it is accurate, so that would be dishonest of me to say that. I have been a Baha’i for 48 years so I have had time to evaluate it and I made my decision. I am not looking to find out if it is true or not. I already determined that.

I even used product surveys for determining the best restaurants as verifiable examples. Your response was to answer a question with a question(avoidance), blame it on the motives of enemies of the faith, and is now claiming that you only meant what their beliefs are, not what their true practices are. That is deceptive. If you are NOT an independent searcher of the truth (not as scripturally defined in the Baha'i text), then you are just gullible, or need some emptiness filled. If something sounds too good to be true, the rule of thumb, is that it usually ain't.

I am not a searcher of truth because I already found the truth. That is now I know how to identify a lie about my religion. Why would I still be questioning my religion after 48 years? I would have a very weak faith or be pretty slow not to know what my religion teaches after 48 years.

I asked you to point to anything that was a lie, being used by your critics to discredit your belief, and why? I gave specific questions such as the poisoning of Baha'u'llah, the involvement of the Baha'i's in the Iranian Revolution, the relationship of the Baha'i's with the British and Russian Governments, the succession wars and self-proclamation of being the prophet foretold, and the laws, rules, and practices within the Baha'i faith? Are these claims by the naysayers true or false? Not ONE direct answer to ONE direct question.

I answered your question about the poisoning of Baha’u’llah directly and I posted a website you can read for more detailed information. I told you I do not know if the claims by the naysayers regarding the involvement of the Baha'i's in the Iranian Revolution, the relationship of the Baha'i's with the British and Russian Governments, and the succession wars are true or false. I am not an expert in Baha’i history so I suggested you ask another Baha’i. I am not going to answer something I do not know the answer to. It is my obligation to do research for you. If you want to know you can find out, or you can ask a Baha’i who knows. There are plenty of Baha’is on this forum.

All you gave me was what the Baha'u'llah tells you to parrot as your obviously scripted response. You were just using my questions as a platform to promote your biased scriptural editorializing. Most people would simply expect objective falsifiable answers, to at least non-religious and non-supernatural claims.

Baha’u’llah does not tell me to do anything at all. I have no scripted responses. I just answer honestly with what I know. I am not trying to promote anything. I just answer honestly. You want to control how I answer questions. You expect certain answers and when you don’t get them you get angry.

My agenda is irrelevant, since I am not making any extraordinary claims. I am not here to disprove your claims. I am here to understand the rationale behind your claims. There is no objective rationale for your claims. There is only unjustified parroted repetition, based on in-house closed religious idealism and the adherence to inhouse laws and practices. To claim that one must prove a religious belief to oneself is silly, since proof is not subjective. Otherwise, delusions can also be classified as proof. I don't expect you in the future to take responsibility for anything you say, imply, or insinuate. I expect you to use every opportunity to parrot your belief, no matter how it is questioned.

If that is what you believe then go join the naysayers and stop asking questions. You do not WANT answers with the truth about the Baha’i Faith. You just want to confirm what you already suspect, but you are not going to get that from me, because I am not a naysayer.

To claim that one must prove a religious belief to oneself is the absolute truth because the only other way would be someone proving it to you. Nobody can prove it to you, because you have to decide for yourself. There is objective evidence but it must be evaluated by each individual and the way they interpret the evidence is subjective, since no two people have the same background or way of thinking. What seems rational to one person seems irrational to another person because all people take in and process the same information differently.

Now that I truly understand that your intention was never about supporting your claims with any objective evidence, or was never interested in any search for the truth, your claims are all belief claims. Since you are not a searcher for the truth (the truth you already know), or will never change your mind, why would you need to compare any other claims? Fortunately, the truth does not need your consideration. There will always be people with a certain mind-set, that makes them more susceptible to superstitions nonsense, especially if it is packaged nicely. Since your conversation is essentially one-way, I'll leave you to it.

I t was never my intention to support my claims. That was your idea. I told you want the evidence was long ago. I cannot provide evidence that does not exist.

I never said I was searching for truth or that I wanted to compare other claims. That was your idea. All I ever said is that I will look at any unbiased evidence that comes from outside the Baha’i Faith, not that I am going to change my mind. I would change my mind only if I was able to uncover something about the Baha’i Faith that I did not know that would prove it is not the Truth from God. So far no such evidence has been forthcoming.

 

[Truly Enlightened]

My answers are not non-responsive, irrelevant, inaccurate, biased, misleading, ambiguous, etc. They are just honest direct answers to questions.

You cannot read my mind. You do not know why I say what I say, my motives. My answers are not designed for anything. I just answer what I am asked. I just answer with the truth about my beliefs. I am not trying to make them look like anything they are not. I just tell the truth as I know it.

I am not responsible for your feelings. I just answer questions with what I know. I am not avoiding questions. Just because you FEEL like I am ignoring questions does not mean I am ignoring questions.

That is a straw man. I never said that anyone should only look at one point of view on any subject, including the KKK. All I ever said is that if you want to know what the KKK believes you ask the members of the KKK because they know what they believe in. On TV, they interview members or ex-members of the KKK because that is where they get the accurate information about the KKK. If you want to evaluate the KKK and decide if you were going to join then you would look at it from many perspectives (positives and negatives). The same applies to any religion.

If you are evaluating a religion such as the Baha’i Faith you should look at all sides, positive and negative. I never said you shouldn’t. But you cannot expect me to present the negative and say that is accurate because I do not believe it is accurate, so that would be dishonest of me to say that. I have been a Baha’i for 48 years so I have had time to evaluate it and I made my decision. I am not looking to find out if it is true or not. I already determined that.

I am not a searcher of truth because I already found the truth. That is now I know how to identify a lie about my religion. Why would I still be questioning my religion after 48 years? I would have a very weak faith or be pretty slow not to know what my religion teaches after 48 years.

I answered your question about the poisoning of Baha’u’llah directly and I posted a website you can read for more detailed information. I told you I do not know if the claims by the naysayers regarding the involvement of the Baha'i's in the Iranian Revolution, the relationship of the Baha'i's with the British and Russian Governments, and the succession wars are true or false. I am not an expert in Baha’i history so I suggested you ask another Baha’i. I am not going to answer something I do not know the answer to. It is my obligation to do research for you. If you want to know you can find out, or you can ask a Baha’i who knows. There are plenty of Baha’is on this forum.

Baha’u’llah does not tell me to do anything at all. I have no scripted responses. I just answer honestly with what I know. I am not trying to promote anything. I just answer honestly. You want to control how I answer questions. You expect certain answers and when you don’t get them you get angry.

If that is what you believe then go join the naysayers and stop asking questions. You do not WANT answers with the truth about the Baha’i Faith. You just want to confirm what you already suspect, but you are not going to get that from me, because I am not a naysayer.

To claim that one must prove a religious belief to oneself is the absolute truth because the only other way would be someone proving it to you. Nobody can prove it to you, because you have to decide for yourself. There is objective evidence but it must be evaluated by each individual and the way they interpret the evidence is subjective, since no two people have the same background or way of thinking. What seems rational to one person seems irrational to another person because all people take in and process the same information differently.

I t was never my intention to support my claims. That was your idea. I told you want the evidence was long ago. I cannot provide evidence that does not exist.

I never said I was searching for truth or that I wanted to compare other claims. That was your idea. All I ever said is that I will look at any unbiased evidence that comes from outside the Baha’i Faith, not that I am going to change my mind. I would change my mind only if I was able to uncover something about the Baha’i Faith that I did not know that would prove it is not the Truth from God. So far no such evidence has been forthcoming.

You should have been a politician. You have truly taught me a lot about my fellow humans.