Would/Should God communicate directly to everyone in the world?

[CG Didymus]

...The Bible is not wholly authentic, and in this respect is not to be compared with the Qur'an

...we cannot be sure how much or how little of the four Gospels are accurate and include the words of Christ

Except for what has been explained by Bahá'u'lláh and 'Abdu'l-Bahá

...The Bahá'ís believe that God's Revelation is under His care and protection and that the essence, or essential elements, of what His Manifestations intended to convey has been recorded and preserved in Their Holy Books.

So here we have a guy who claimed to be the Son of God and he couldn't jot down a few things we should do to keep God happy and not provoking him to anger? This guy had a direct line to God and couldn't make it clear what God wanted us to do? Instead, this guy let others write down the things he said and did, so essentially, we don't know a dang thing he said and did. Except for what Baha'u'llah and Abdul Baha' say he said? Cool.

That makes things so easy. Christianity as believed and practiced by Christians, starting with his early followers, got it wrong. Therefore, except for a few good things, the rest is BS. I'm beginning to see the light. And what exactly did God protect of the revelation of Jesus? Whatever it was, nobody knew until nearly 2000 years after Jesus when the Baha'is told us what that protected essence was. Wow... God certainly works in mysterious ways... as in very, very strange.

 

[CG Didymus]

(96) PRE-EXISTENCE - of Prophets
The Prophets, unlike us, are pre-existent. The soul of Christ existed in the spiritual world before His birth in this world. We cannot imagine what that world is like, so words are inadequate to picture His state of being.
(Shoghi Effendi: High Endeavors, Page: 71)

Prophets like Isaiah? Or prophets as in manifestations? Either way there must have been a bunch of them. So in the beginning was God... and Baha'u'llah, and Zoroaster, and Jesus, and Moses and so on?

But we normal humans didn't have a soul until an egg got fertilized in our mothers? And then that soul exists forever and ever? Now who has this freewill? The idiot physical body that knows nothing at birth and has to go through life to learn things? Or, the soul? Or, is it a little of both? Or, does the soul know what is right and tries to tell the body, but God in his infinite wisdom gave that body freewill and let that stupid body choose either right or wrong?

And then, after the body dies, the poor soul has to answer to God? No, that wouldn't be fair, and God is so just and fair. So that must mean the body and the soul are equally given the choice of doing right and wrong? Oh, and then God makes so many things in life so fun and pleasurable to test the body and soul to see if it will screw up?

 

[CG Didymus]

So true ... I see God as much like a transmitter of radio waves. He sends out the message, the ether is the medium, and the receivers are those who are able to tune in. The psychology of communication has 3 components: sender, medium, and receiver. The entire purpose of the Agamic mystical Hindu temple is communication between the 3 worlds. One definition of a bhaktar is 'a person who can communicate with God'. At the average Hindu temple, we see a range of folks, some who are really good at it, some who have no clue, and some who get it some of the time, but not always. But the point is that it is there. It's for everyone, yet not everyone can hear. I've also seen Abrahamics run from the temple as the idea of it, or the vibration of it is very scary to them, so unfamiliar they are with feeling it. Most Abrahamics are too wise to even enter the place as they 'know' it's of the devil.

For me, this 'messenger' idea is just someone who wants to control the radio station so only a certain message can get through.

But, as we all know, I believe it's very different paradigms, and like you, I have an anti-Baha'i agenda.

This will add to the Hindu perspective ... Puja | What is puja?

You did hear? An normal individual can't communicate with God. So whomever people think they are communicating with... it ain't God. God wants you to listen to the manifestation and do as he says... except all the past messages are wrong. So don't listen or read those things. Now I think you're okay with the Quran, but, to be sure, you should only read official Baha'i books. That way you can't go wrong.

Like you said Abrahamic religions and Dharmic religions... different paradigms.

 

[Trailblazer]

I'm beginning to see the light. And what exactly did God protect of the revelation of Jesus? Whatever it was, nobody knew until nearly 2000 years after Jesus when the Baha'is told us what that protected essence was. Wow... God certainly works in mysterious ways... as in very, very strange.

I am glad you are beginning to see the light.

 

[Trailblazer]

Prophets like Isaiah? Or prophets as in manifestations? Either way there must have been a bunch of them. So in the beginning was God... and Baha'u'llah, and Zoroaster, and Jesus, and Moses and so on?

I think it is only the Universal Manifestations of God, not the prophets of the OT.

And then, after the body dies, the poor soul has to answer to God? No, that wouldn't be fair, and God is so just and fair. So that must mean the body and the soul are equally given the choice of doing right and wrong? Oh, and then God makes so many things in life so fun and pleasurable to test the body and soul to see if it will screw up?

The soul works through the body while we are alive in earth, so they work together as a unit. Yes, we have free will so we can choose between right and wrong. Yes, God tests us by making things pleasurable so we have to choose between them and God. So here is what happens to the soul when we die. In a nutshell, it goes north or south depending upon the choices we make in this world.

“Thou hast asked Me concerning the nature of the soul. Know, verily, that the soul is a sign of God, a heavenly gem whose reality the most learned of men hath failed to grasp, and whose mystery no mind, however acute, can ever hope to unravel. It is the first among all created things to declare the excellence of its Creator, the first to recognize His glory, to cleave to His truth, and to bow down in adoration before Him. If it be faithful to God, it will reflect His light, and will, eventually, return unto Him. If it fail, however, in its allegiance to its Creator, it will become a victim to self and passion, and will, in the end, sink in their depths.” Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 158-159

.

 

[Shad]

as belief is defined as an unsupported …..truth

No it is accepted truth which is different from truth itself. Eg Someone can believe a lie as a truth but that does not make the lie the truth.

your denial is noted

Rejection of a claim. Try again

and dismissed

Babble

 

[Shad]

God is not a person, so God cannot deliver the message in person.

Babble. God is all-powerful yet can not delivery a message? Ergo you just made your God not God.

That is one reason God used a Messenger,

Assertion to explain what is babble.

but the other reason is that nobody could ever understand direct communication from God unless they had a dual nature, divine and human.

Assertion. More so an all powerful God can by definition create a message Humans can understand or it is not God.

Messengers have both natures so they can bridge the gap in understanding between God and man.

Babble.

It is the humans who make the errors, not God. Humans will always make errors because humans are fallible. There is no reason to think that they would not misinterpret what God said to them, if it was even possible for them to understand God.

Except you and your religion right?

Dogma masquerading as a rational set of answers is hilarious

 

[Thief]

Babble. God is all-powerful yet can not delivery a message? Ergo you just made your God not God.

babble...on

the body is formed to form a unique spirit

speaking to you in Voice would interfere with your unique development

you're on your own

until you die.....and then you might need Someone to help you out of that carcass

you did not put 'you' into that parcel of flesh
you can't get out

and you know where it ends up

going to follow it?

 

[Trailblazer]

I don't mean that God make excuses, but that people make up excuses on behalf of God in order to explain why he doesn't do certain things.

Don’t you see, God would also need excuses if we had to MAKE excuses for God?
Again, how could an Omnipotent/Omniscient/Infallible God need any excuses for what He does or does not do?

Like when someone raises the question why an all loving God allows a new born baby to be born with a deadly condition, what exactly have the child done? The amount of harm it causes to its parents and family etc.?
Unable to answer why an all loving God would do this, while still maintaining that he is all loving, one need to come up with an excuse of how something like this can happen. Which could be explanations like "God work in mysteries ways" or "We simply can't understand God".
But none of these explain anything but are merely excuses. That is what I mean.

I can answer why God allows this, it is because that is the way God crested the material world, it is a storehouse of suffering and that suffering is not doled out equally. I can understand why it is difficult to believe that an All-Loving God would create a world like this, so there must be something we cannot understand, or something we do not YET understand. Either that, or God is not All-Loving. Those are the two logical possibilities... Oops I forgot, the third logical possibility is that God does not exist and all the suffering is just random and there is no afterlife where the suffering that is not our doing will be recompensed.

I think, I tried to explain it to you as well in the other post. Evidence need to be consistent or it will be a mess. Imagine that the two of us were trying to solve a crime, but had completely different understandings of what evidence are. It would be impossible to solve the case. So for anything to be considered evidence, we need to follow the same rules, which need to meet some sort of standard.

That can never happen because humans are all different so they will always view the SAME evidence from their particular perspectives. So in effect we all have to solve our own cases by looking at the evidence that is there. We might come to the conclusion that the evidence is good enough, or we might conclude that the evidence is insufficient.

There is a huge difference here, there is no logical reason to assume that people would have to work hard to know the truth from God.

Explain why people should not have to do anything to know the truth from God.

Looking at the bible the Jewish people do not work hard for this, it is handed to them on a silver plate through Moses or directly from God, for which they are all aware is present with them, as he speaks and perform miracles in front of them constantly.

Please to not go back and review history. Even if God spoke directly to the Israelites on Mt. Sinai, that was only proof of God to those people standing there. After that, all the future generations had were the scriptures, which are what everyone of every religion has as evidence of God.

So the Jewish people have nothing more than the Christians or the Muslims or the Baha’is. They have scriptures saying that certain things happened and this is proof of God.

Therefore college degrees are not handed out to everyone, but requires people to work for them. But again this process is well understood, but this is not the case with obtaining the truth from God, as there is no established process of what this requires. So claiming that people do not deserve this and that they need to work for it, is simply making up excuses for God, as also mentioned above.

But there is a well-established process delineating what is required to believe God exists.... For starters:

Hebrews 11:6 And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who approaches Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him.

Then in the Baha’i Faith we have a long explanation of what is required of a true seeker: Tablet of the True Seeker

Those are pretty steep requirements so people do not have to meet all of those in order to find God; that is simply the ideal.

Exactly and that is where most atheists or skeptics would say "Hold your horses and ask why should we believe such person?" I can't verify that these messengers got anything from God and neither can they. Which from a logical point of view, give me no reason to believe such claim.

I certainly do understand that. Just because I happen to believe in Baha'u'llah and all the other Messengers that preceded Him that does not mean I think that everyone can *just believe* because I do. But if one is not even open-minded enough to look at what is there that is a guarantee they will never believe, just as if one does not apply to get into college that is a guarantee they will never get into any college. They still might not pass all their courses and get a college degree, but at least they will have the opportunity. My point is that we all have to start somewhere.

As I mentioned to you in the other post as well. The way I would do it, if I were God, would be in a way that no one would be in doubt. Angels coming down from heaven, Jesus, Moses and the whole gang. As God in all my glory I would inform all humans of the truth, I would perform miracles which would defy natural laws.[/quote]

If God did not want anyone to have doubts, God would have been more obvious, by one of the methods that you delineated or something similar. So, because God did not do that we can logically conclude that God wants us to have doubts, at least while we are searching; but that does not mean we will continue to have doubts, because once we find God ( I mean realize that God exists) then we will no longer have any doubts, if we have faith. That might sound like a contradiction but it isn’t because strong faith is the same as knowing, without actual proof.

So going into our search we will have doubts, just like we would probably have some doubts before we start college for the first time, but after we have been in college and had some success, then we have more confidence that we can succeed. So just as with college we need to have some faith, and then we will reap the rewards from our hard work, but just as with college there is no guarantee we will succeed, so we have to take a chance.

For example, I have two Masters degrees and I got the second one against all the odds; I mean it nearly killed me because I had to work full time and go to school full time, working over 60 hours a week. I made it through with close to a 4.0 but then I later had to go back to college again to get a GIS certificate, a completely different field,because I lost my job and I could not compete for jobs without the certificate. I was probably the oldest person in the class. It was highly technical and I never thought I would pass, let alone get a good grade, but I got a 4.0. All during that time I worked 40 hours a week and went to classes and studied another 40 hours every week. I was able to do it only because I was so motivated. Now I am at the end of my career so my focus has shifted and I am motivated to become a better Baha’i and get right with God.

This to me is merely pushing the questions to other religions, which is not able to answer any of these questions either or provide any better evidence than you are. And that is the whole issue, that it is completely based on faith. So them claiming that stuff have been revealed to them, is no difference than if some random person claimed the same tomorrow and started to write down stuff. Because based on your own logic, God could have chosen to come to this person, at that time.

Yes, it is based upon faith, since nobody can prove God exists or that God sent Messengers; but it can still be the truth, that’s the thing that atheists do not seem to understand. What we have faith in can either be true or false, logically speaking. I see no reason to discount any possibilities until we have really given it a fair chance; but of course that is only the case if we are highly motivated to believe in God. If not, we will probably not want to put forth that much effort.

To me this is encouraging people to seek blind faith and im not really keen on that.

I hope I explained what I think that verse means above. In short, I think it means that we have to have faith that we will find the object of our quest in order to go on the quest and we have to seek God in order to find Him.

If it were preordained by God, then there is no free will. Because using your free will, there is nothing you can do to prevent it. And you have no clue what could affect a prophecy, it might be you simply being a certain place at a given point in time, that could interfere with the prophecy, you have no way of knowing that and therefore it would make little sense to talk about free will.

That is true. I think that the fulfillment of prophecies was preordained so it would happen regardless and nobody’s free will decisions could prevent it from happening.

So if you don't know what a divine mind is either or if it even exists, then why jump to the conclusion that it is true, rather than demanding those claiming so, to provide you with evidence for it first? And then you can draw your conclusions based on that.

I did not jump to any conclusions, I studied the Baha’i Faith diligently for years before I even began to understand these concepts. However there are certain things that we were not intended to fully understand because they are beyond human understanding. I think that the pinnacle of wisdom is to accept that there are certain things that we will never understand. I leave you with one of my favorite passages.In short what it means is that we will never understand the mystery of God so it is futile to try.

“Wert thou to ponder in thine heart, from now until the end that hath no end, and with all the concentrated intelligence and understanding which the greatest minds have attained in the past or will attain in the future, this divinely ordained and subtle Reality, this sign of the revelation of the All-Abiding, All-Glorious God, thou wilt fail to comprehend its mystery or to appraise its virtue. Having recognized thy powerlessness to attain to an adequate understanding of that Reality which abideth within thee, thou wilt readily admit the futility of such efforts as may be attempted by thee, or by any of the created things, to fathom the mystery of the Living God, the Day Star of unfading glory, the Ancient of everlasting days. This confession of helplessness which mature contemplation must eventually impel every mind to make is in itself the acme of human understanding, and marketh the culmination of man’s development.” Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 165-166

 

[Shad]

babble...on

the body is formed to form a unique spirit

speaking to you in Voice would interfere with your unique development

you're on your own

until you die.....and then you might need Someone to help you out of that carcass

you did not put 'you' into that parcel of flesh
you can't get out

and you know where it ends up

going to follow it?

This is just more babble.

 

[Nimos]

Don’t you see, God would also need excuses if we had to MAKE excuses for God?
Again, how could an Omnipotent/Omniscient/Infallible God need any excuses for what He does or does not do?

God would only need excuses if he exist. So we can go with the idea that God does exists and then try to find explanations for these excuses that he would have to have. I agree with you on that.

Yes, it is based upon faith, since nobody can prove God exists or that God sent Messengers; but it can still be the truth, that’s the thing that atheists do not seem to understand.

I think most atheists can understand it, so I don't see that as an issue. Where the majority of us differs from believers is in the regards of evidence and faith that we are willing to accept, but will rather go with what seems to be the most rational explanation.

So if we continue from above.

1. What excuses would God have? What could be the explanation? And why haven't he given them to us?

We don't know and the most logical explanation is that God does not exists. Which explain why there are no answers to any of these questions.

2. I can answer why God allows this, it is because that is the way God crested the material world, it is a storehouse of suffering and that suffering is not doled out equally. I can understand why it is difficult to believe that an All-Loving God would create a world like this, so there must be something we cannot understand, or something we do not YET understand. Either that, or God is not All-Loving.

There doesn't seem to be any good explanation for why God is said to be all loving, while there are evil in the world either that which hit children and babies or natural evil. So again, the answer to this is, we don't know, and we can try to come up with explanation for it. Or we can take the most logical stand point which seems to explain it, which as above, is that God doesn't exists.

So as more and more of these questions are raised and the answer given by believers, is constantly falling into the categories of "Guesses" and "We don't know", but which in contrast seems to be perfectly explainable, if the answer to these questions is, that there is no God, why would one not go with that explanation?

You have to remember that atheists (at least not most) are not just denying God just for doing it. But because there are no answers to the questions asked. And those where answers are given is done in a way that they can not be verified, which doesn't really have anything to do with atheism, as that is purely being skeptic towards unverified information.

So going through all these claims that are made by religions and not being able to get answers and the most rational answer constantly seems to point in the direction that God does not exists, doesn't mean that atheists doesn't understand what it means to have faith. But merely that we don't see any reason to go there, when there seem to be a much better and more rational explanation.

Assume for one second that God does not exists. Wouldn't you agree that it would explain why there are suffering in the world? Why God does not explain himself? and whatever other question that you might come up with, which have been raised over years?

None of these questions are particular difficult to explain, if God does not exist.

But yes, in the end, none of this proof that God doesn't exist, it is purely based on what is most rational and logic, given what we know.

That can never happen because humans are all different so they will always view the SAME evidence from their particular perspectives.

I don't think, I completely agree with you here. It is possible to agree on what evidence are. For instance, we could probably agree, that Muhammad flying to heaven on a winged creature as it is claimed, is not evidence for such creature existing, and that we would need more than a story to jump to such conclusion.

Where there is going to be a conflict is when people are already convinced that Muhammad flew there, because the Quran is 100% accurate and therefore it is absolutely true, so for them that would be evidence for such creature existing. So its not that we as such can not agree on what is evidence and what is not, because of the evidence themselves, but because people approach things with a confirmation bias towards what they believe ought to be true, rather than approaching a topic from a neutral stand point and let the evidence speak for themselves and based on that draw whatever conclusion seem most rational. And in the case that there is not enough evidence, one should go with the conclusion that we don't know. Meaning stay skeptical, towards people jumping to conclusions.

Explain why people should not have to do anything to know the truth from God.

Because there are countless of examples of people claiming that God spoke to them for no particular reason, both in the scriptures and outside. Besides that nothing prevent God from revealing the truth.

Even if God spoke directly to the Israelites on Mt. Sinai, that was only proof of God to those people standing there.

God spoke to them throughout the whole bible, even the Egyptians, Babylonians etc. according to the bible at least, experiences God.

But if one is not even open-minded enough to look at what is there that is a guarantee they will never believe, just as if one does not apply to get into college that is a guarantee they will never get into any college.

I don't think you are making correct comparisons here, one of them is a known fact. We know that colleges exists and that if you go there and complete an education there, you get a degree. So if you do not apply to one obviously you won't get one.

The other one, requires you to be open minded about something for which there are no evidence even existing, and even if you truly believe, and think you have experienced God, one would ultimately not be able to deny that maybe its merely their mind playing them tricks. And still of all the people that claim to have been in "contact" or "felt" God, none of them seems better at explaining any of the questions that is asked.

However there are certain things that we were not intended to fully understand because they are beyond human understanding. I think that the pinnacle of wisdom is to accept that there are certain things that we will never understand.

I would completely disagree with that, if answers were given that were consistence, none of it would be difficult to understand. The reason we don't understand something is because of the lack of answers and evidence. Once we have enough of them, things seems fairly easy to understand. If you look at the history of science, things that we know today and consider common knowledge, would have been considered a mystery earlier, something that was beyond human understanding. Why would the ancient Norse explain lightning coming from Thor? If they have had the information about it as we do. The reason they did it, is most likely because they had no explanations and its such a powerful burst of energy and sound, that obviously some greater being would have to be behind it.

To me we as humans have to be careful not to fall into the same trap, as we, with the knowledge we have, know that time after time things, that seems beyond our understanding is being explained in ways that are both logical and rational, and we are constantly pushing the boundaries. Religion is holding on, because it works in the supernatural, which we can not test, observe or even conclude is real, so everything is possible. And no explanations have been given by religion the last 2-4000 years to anything. That in it self, seems to suggest that maybe something is not true here.

 

[Thief]

This is just more babble.

Babylon would be proud of you

 

[Trailblazer]

God would only need excuses if he exist. So we can go with the idea that God does exists and then try to find explanations for these excuses that he would have to have. I agree with you on that.

That is irrational. If God exists and God is All-Knowing, All-Wise and Infallible, how could He need any excuses for what He does or does not do? Humans need excuses because they are imperfect and they make mistakes. A perfect God cannot ever need excuses.

What we are looking for are explanations as to why God does what God does, and there are some explanations.

1. What excuses would God have? What could be the explanation? And why haven't he given them to us?

We don't know and the most logical explanation is that God does not exists. Which explain why there are no answers to any of these questions.

What questions? Why would we have the answers to everything just because God exists? Maybe there are reasons God does not give us all the answers.

2. I can answer why God allows this, it is because that is the way God created the material world, it is a storehouse of suffering and that suffering is not doled out equally. I can understand why it is difficult to believe that an All-Loving God would create a world like this, so there must be something we cannot understand, or something we do not YET understand. Either that, or God is not All-Loving.

There doesn't seem to be any good explanation for why God is said to be all loving, while there are evil in the world either that which hit children and babies or natural evil. So again, the answer to this is, we don't know, and we can try to come up with explanation for it. Or we can take the most logical stand point which seems to explain it, which as above, is that God doesn't exists.

The explanation as to why there is evil in the world is that humans have free will and some humans choose to do evil deeds. As for natural evil, it is not really evil. It causes suffering for some people but it all depends upon how people cope with it. I think it exists because God wants to test us and make us into better people, stronger people, people who will work together to help each other and thereby improve their character. This is what I see every time a natural disaster occurs, people helping other people. If there was no suffering in the world there would be no development of character.

I think that saying God does not exist because we see evil and suffering is a cop-out. It makes more sense to me to try to figure out the why these exist.

So as more and more of these questions are raised and the answer given by believers, is constantly falling into the categories of "Guesses" and "We don't know", but which in contrast seems to be perfectly explainable, if the answer to these questions is, that there is no God, why would one not go with that explanation?

One would not go with that explanation unless all they wanted was an easy answer just so they can be done with it and live their lives not caring about the truth... If they dismiss God, the reality could be that God exists and there are some answers although not every question can be answered.

You have to remember that atheists (at least not most) are not just denying God just for doing it. But because there are no answers to the questions asked.

So going through all these claims that are made by religions and not being able to get answers and the most rational answer constantly seems to point in the direction that God does not exists, doesn't mean that atheists doesn't understand what it means to have faith. But merely that we don't see any reason to go there, when there seem to be a much better and more rational explanation.

How does no god existing give you an answer to your questions, a rational explanation? If you did not have unrealistic expectations of what God would/should do if God existed then the answer would be we are humans and subject to suffering because of the way the world is, and God does not intervene except when He sends a Messenger to help us. There are so many reasons why there is suffering but saying that there is no god is not a solution. Also, for most people who are believers, knowing there is a God and an afterlife is a great solace when they do suffer.

Assume for one second that God does not exists. Wouldn't you agree that it would explain why there are suffering in the world? Why God does not explain himself? and whatever other question that you might come up with, which have been raised over years?

None of these questions are particular difficult to explain, if God does not exist.

I understand what you are implying, that if God existed there would/should not be suffering in the world, but this is because you have expectations that God would/should eliminate of suffering just because God is omnipotent. A more rational way to approach this would be to try to understand why there is suffering in spite of a God existing and to try to ameliorate as much suffering as possible. If people were less selfish a lot could be done to ameliorate suffering, so I think a lot of suffering is a spiritual problem.

People who are happy and not suffering do not generally go out of their way to help others but sometimes they do when it is an emergency such as a natural disaster like the fires raging in California right now. One reason why these disasters might happen is to get people to be more caring, working together. It seems rather brutal but maybe it is the only way because otherwise most people just care about themselves and their immediate family and friends, and they will be on the sofa watching TV and eating chips. So maybe God is giving them an opportunity to change and grow spiritually.

People who have suffered a lot have more compassion for others whereas people who have not suffered much do not have a clue. Also, people who suffer more grow more spiritually and they are less attached to this material world. Lastly, if there was no afterlife, suffering in this world would make no sense at all, so suffering cannot be understood without realizing that this life is only a very small part of our total existence. Of course, for atheists who do not believe there is an afterlife, suffering is not going to serve any purpose.

For instance, we could probably agree, that Muhammad flying to heaven on a winged creature as it is claimed, is not evidence for such creature existing, and that we would need more than a story to jump to such conclusion. And in the case that there is not enough evidence, one should go with the conclusion that we don't know. Meaning stay skeptical, towards people jumping to conclusions.

What I would say is that such details do not really matter because that is not the essence of the Islamic faith, but if some people believe that I do not see any harm in it. Some beliefs do cause harm but that is not one of them. The religious belief that causes most harm is Christians who are waiting for Jesus to return and FIX things in the world that humans are responsible to fix.

I agree that in the case that there is not enough evidence, one should go with the conclusion that we don't know, meaning stay skeptical, rather than jumping to conclusions.

Because there are countless of examples of people claiming that God spoke to them for no particular reason, both in the scriptures and outside. Besides that nothing prevent God from revealing the truth.

That is not a sufficient answer to say that just because God can reveal the truth God should do reveal the truth. I believe that God wants us to all look at the truth that has already been revealed in scriptures. I think God will guide people to see that but not just because they want Him to, but rather because they made a sincere effort. IF God spoke to certain people there had to be a reason even if we do not know the reason. God wanted them to know something or God wanted them to do something.

God spoke to them throughout the whole bible, even the Egyptians, Babylonians etc. according to the bible at least, experiences God.

Well maybe, but not necessarily... Remember, we need to be skeptical if we do not know, rather than jumping to conclusions. God might have revealed something to those people because they would be part of the Bible stories that people would later read and get their faith from. That is one possible explanation. But that does not mean God is going to reveal something to everyone just because they want Him to.

I don't think you are making correct comparisons here, one of them is a known fact. We know that colleges exists and that if you go there and complete an education there, you get a degree. So if you do not apply to one obviously you won't get one.

The other one, requires you to be open minded about something for which there are no evidence even existing.

I understand the difference, college is more of a known than God existing can be known; but do you understand the similarity? You cannot get the college degree unless you apply and go to college and even then you cannot be sure you will get the degree, as there is as certain risk involved. Also, there is evidence for God existing but maybe you have to look at it differently to see what is there.

I would completely disagree with that, if answers were given that were consistence, none of it would be difficult to understand. The reason we don't understand something is because of the lack of answers and evidence. Once we have enough of them, things seems fairly easy to understand. If you look at the history of science, things that we know today and consider common knowledge, would have been considered a mystery earlier, something that was beyond human understanding.

Granted, anything in the material world can be understood if we study it long enough, but God is not in the material world and the afterlife is a spiritual world we cannot understand because we can only study the material world. The soul is immaterial so it cannot be understood by science, it is a mystery. Scientists have not even been able to explain how the mind works and I think that is because the mind works through the soul and the soul is a mystery no human mind can unravel.

To me we as humans have to be careful not to fall into the same trap, as we, with the knowledge we have, know that time after time things, that seems beyond our understanding is being explained in ways that are both logical and rational, and we are constantly pushing the boundaries. Religion is holding on, because it works in the supernatural, which we can not test, observe or even conclude is real, so everything is possible. And no explanations have been given by religion the last 2-4000 years to anything. That in it self, seems to suggest that maybe something is not true here.

We should always accept the logical and rational explanation for things if we have those explanations, but the supernatural cannot be explained that way. I believe that there have been many new explanations since 1844 when the Bab and later Baha’u’llah showed up and wrote on a myriad of subjects.Most of the tablets of Baha’u’llah have not even been translated into English yet and sadly, very little of the Bab’s extensive Writings have been translated into English.

 

[Nimos]

What questions? Why would we have the answers to everything just because God exists? Maybe there are reasons God does not give us all the answers.

I can see how one would look at this and be able to accept it. But to me this is sort of like complicating things unnecessarily and starting to base logic on unverifiable things.

Sort of like saying. We don't know what created the Big bang, But if aliens exists outside our Universe there is a good chance that they did it and therefore we have to figure out, how they did it. So we could jump on that train trying to speculate how these aliens did it or we could maybe take a more rational approach, which doesn't require aliens and simply say that with our current knowledge, we just don't know and since we have no evidence of these aliens, it would be irrational to start working from such standpoint. So its like adding stuff to problems that is not necessary to come up with more logic explanations or conclusions, based on what we actually know.

The explanation as to why there is evil in the world is that humans have free will and some humans choose to do evil deeds.

Can you explain to me how free will and prophecies are going to work together hand in hand? What is your understanding or definition of free will, does it mean that we can do whatever we feel like or are we working within the restrictions of what God allow?

As for natural evil, it is not really evil. It causes suffering for some people but it all depends upon how people cope with it. I think it exists because God wants to test us and make us into better people, stronger people, people who will work together to help each other and thereby improve their character. This is what I see every time a natural disaster occurs, people helping other people. If there was no suffering in the world there would be no development of character.

But I think one will have issues explaining what exact lesson is learned or how we as humans becomes stronger when a tsunami kills a small baby, how exactly is that helping anything.

This is from Unicef:

NEW YORK/ GENEVA/ WASHINGTON D.C., 18 September 2018 – An estimated 6.3 million children under 15 years of age died in 2017, or 1 every 5 seconds, mostly of preventable causes, according to new mortality estimates released by UNICEF, the World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations Population Division and the World Bank Group.

The vast majority of these deaths – 5.4 million – occur in the first five years of life, with newborns accounting for around half of the deaths.

“Without urgent action, 56 million children under five will die from now until 2030 – half of them newborns,” said Laurence Chandy, UNICEF Director of Data, Research and Policy. “We have made remarkable progress to save children since 1990, but millions are still dying because of who they are and where they are born. With simple solutions like medicines, clean water, electricity and vaccines, we can change that reality for every child.”

So your point is that these 6.3 million children that dies, is to test us... and again this is only from 2017, so could probably expect the number to be roughly around that from the former year and years to come... Now my question is, how exactly is this making us stronger, especially those that are among the 6.3 million which dies. Are their lives sole purpose to make this point, so the rest of us, I assume "chosen" ones, can become stronger? I really hope you can see that this make absolutely no sense.

But none the less, based on what you wrote, what exactly is the purpose of these peoples life? And if the estimation is correct, that until 2030 we can expect 56 million children to die, half which is newborns, is that just God that keeps testing "US", again not "THEM" because they will die.

When you write what you do, do you ask yourself these questions? Because for me personally and one of the reasons, I enjoy religion is because of these things. So a question is made like "Why is there evil in the world?", My first thought would be "What exactly does people mean by evil?" and then you go through all these claims and explanations people come up with and try to find examples where it doesn't fit. And to me, as I think I have already mentioned to you, is that the conclusion to this question is that there is no such thing as evil. Because it simply doesn't fit with what we know, as I see it. But that this is merely a religious expression with no real meaning to it. And probably also why it lend it self to so many explanatory issues for religious people.

One would not go with that explanation unless all they wanted was an easy answer just so they can be done with it and live their lives not caring about the truth... If they dismiss God, the reality could be that God exists and there are some answers although not every question can be answered.

But this is the issue, which believers seem to not want to acknowledge and what none believers are asking for, evidence for the claims put forward. It have nothing to do with an easy answer or not wanting to know the truth about a potential God. Until some sort of evidence is provided, there simply can't be any talk about what is the truth and what is an easy answer. Because there is nothing to go on, the easiest answer to me, is to just blindly accept a God without evidence, because if there is none, we have to find the answers to these things else where. Where do we come from? How did life began? These are all but easy answers. Saying that some God did it and not providing any evidence for it, that is the easy answer and also why religion have such a hard time expanding on these questions, because they can't find any evidence and explanations, so its just a cascade of guessing left right and center, mixed with faith in what they think ought to be true.

I would love to know where we come from, how life was created and all the other mysteries of the Universe, but not to the extend that im willing to accept whatever people throw at me, because that is what they believe is true. As I mentioned to you a long time ago, people believe the most weird things and if you are to stay rational one have to go with the evidence and be willing to change ones views if needed, and accept whatever that might be and adjust ones world view to that. You might consider that the easy way out, but trust me, being able to just throw it all on God, is much easier.

Well maybe, but not necessarily... Remember, we need to be skeptical if we do not know, rather than jumping to conclusions. God might have revealed something to those people because they would be part of the Bible stories that people would later read and get their faith from. That is one possible explanation. But that does not mean God is going to reveal something to everyone just because they want Him to.

Yes, that is an explanation and why we test these claims that we find in the bible, and most of them simply does not fit with logic. For instance saying that God is all good and then reading how he does some of the most horrible things ever written, is not logic. Therefore believers make up excuses and explanations for which there is not rationality behind, trying to fit this together.

And when you have looked at enough of this, what you are saying seems less and less likely to be the explanation, but instead wishful thinking. Which is why, and I know you have mentioned it sometimes, why I keep referring to the bible. Is because some people constantly, when talking about what God and Jesus is, clearly make up things, without any reference to what is actually written in the bible or where they got it from. And to me, that just doesn't fly, its fine that people want to believe things is a certain way, but then don't refer to the bible as if it came from there, when it clearly didn't.

I understand the difference, college is more of a known than God existing can be known; but do you understand the similarity? You cannot get the college degree unless you apply and go to college and even then you cannot be sure you will get the degree, as there is as certain risk involved. Also, there is evidence for God existing but maybe you have to look at it differently to see what is there.

Don't get me wrong, I understand where you are going with the example. But there have been people claiming that they became religions without actually working for it. For instance and most famously, I guess, Francis Collins of the Genome project. "He eventually came to a conclusion and became a Christian after a "leap of faith" when he saw a frozen waterfall during a hike on a fall afternoon. He has described himself as a "serious Christian".So following your example he is not really telling the truth, not a true believer or how should I understand your view on this, as I think we can agree that it would be to stretch it, to say that he really worked for it, right?

Scientists have not even been able to explain how the mind works and I think that is because the mind works through the soul and the soul is a mystery no human mind can unravel.

I doubt you will find any none religious and even hard finding a religious scientist that would support the conclusion that the mind works through the "soul", as that would be an extremely unscientific statement to make. The reason being that we haven't observed or even have a clear definition of what a soul is suppose to be, and let alone that one even exist.

We should always accept the logical and rational explanation for things if we have those explanations, but the supernatural cannot be explained that way.

Agree and that is why one ought to be skeptical of any claim that rely on the supernatural to provide the explanation.

 

[Trailblazer]

Can you explain to me how free will and prophecies are going to work together hand in hand? What is your understanding or definition of free will, does it mean that we can do whatever we feel like or are we working within the restrictions of what God allow?

Prophecies are certain events that were preordained by God so they are set in stone. They are not subject to change according to free will.

Here is one definition of free will I have written up and posted in previous discussions:

The will is the faculty by which a person decides on and initiates action. Clearly we have a will because if we had no will we would not be able to do anything at all. To will something is to intend, desire, or wish (something) to happen. How “free” we are to use that will to believe or act is another matter. I do not think that we can believe or do “anything” we want to do. The choices we make are constrained by many factors such as childhood upbringing, heredity, education, adult experiences, and present life circumstances. These all affect how we think and how we think affects how we act.

But I think one will have issues explaining what exact lesson is learned or how we as humans becomes stronger when a tsunami kills a small baby, how exactly is that helping anything.

I was not saying that this applies to a small baby or children who die before they have a chance to live their lives. That is not helping them, it is just a tragedy, at least from our limited perspective, what we can see. The only way we can accommodate a just and loving God belief is if we realize there is a recompense for those who die before they come of age as well as adults who suffer or die through no fault of their own. But regarding children, the following is what I believe:

THE IMMORTALITY OF CHILDREN

So your point is that these 6.3 million children that dies, is to test us... and again this is only from 2017, so could probably expect the number to be roughly around that from the former year and years to come... Now my question is, how exactly is this making us stronger, especially those that are among the 6.3 million which dies. Are their lives solely the purpose to make this point, so the rest of us, I assume chosen ones, can become stronger? I really hope you can see that this make absolutely no sense.

No, I was not referring to children, only to adults, and I was only saying that there is “potential” for people to develop character through suffering, not that everyone will develop it. Nor was I saying that I think suffering is just great because it can help people develop their character. I have great difficulty accommodating a God who created a world in which people will suffer, some people so much more than other people. The only way that could be counterbalanced is if there is an afterlife where we are rewarded and where there is no more suffering, which I believe there is. That does not help us in this life though, not unless we have a lot of faith.

But none the less, based on what you wrote, what exactly is the purpose of these peoples life? And if the estimation is correct, that until 2030 we can expect 56 million children to die, half which is newborns, is that just God that keeps testing "US", again not "THEM" because they will die.

I am not saying there is a purpose to ALL suffering, you ran with what I said and made more out of it than was there. Some suffering simply exists because we live in a material world and there will always be suffering in the material world because of its very nature.

“O thou seeker of the Kingdom! Thy letter was received. Thou hast written of the severe calamity that hath befallen thee—the death of thy respected husband. That honourable man hath been so subjected to the stress and strain of this world that his greatest wish was for deliverance from it. Such is this mortal abode: a storehouse of afflictions and suffering. It is ignorance that binds man to it, for no comfort can be secured by any soul in this world, from monarch down to the most humble commoner. If once this life should offer a man a sweet cup, a hundred bitter ones will follow; such is the condition of this world. The wise man, therefore, doth not attach himself to this mortal life and doth not depend upon it; at some moments, even, he eagerly wisheth for death that he may thereby be freed from these sorrows and afflictions. Thus it is seen that some, under extreme pressure of anguish, have committed suicide.” Selections From the Writings of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, p. 200

When you write what you do, do you ask yourself these questions? Because for me personally and one of the reasons, I enjoy religion is because of these things. So a question is made like "Why is there evil in the world?", My first thought would be "What exactly does people mean by evil?"

Why do you think there is no such thing as evil, or are you saying that evil is not as religious people describe it? Actually, Abdu’l-Baha said that evil is nonexistent, because it is simply the absence of good just as dark is the absence of light.

74: THE NONEXISTENCE OF EVIL

But this is the issue, which believers seem to not want to acknowledge and what none believers are asking for, evidence for the claims put forward. It have nothing to do with an easy answer or not wanting to know the truth about a potential God. Until some sort of evidence is provided,there simply can't be any talk about what is the truth and what is an easy answer. Because there is nothing to go on, the easiest answer to me, is to just blindly accept a God without evidence, because if there is none, we have to find the answers to these things else where.

I guess you mean evidence that God exists. You already know my position on that, Messengers of God and the scriptures they reveal and the religions that are established as the result of their coming are the evidence. Obviously, atheists do not accept this as evidence as they are looking for some other kind of evidence that does not exist, since it is God who is responsible for providing the evidence and Messengers are the only evidence God has ever provided. You might say that Creation is the evidence but since it could be explained in some other way, it is not really very good evidence, except to people who already believe in God.

Where do we come from? How did life began? These are all but easy answers. Saying that some God did it and not providing any evidence for it, that is the easy answer and also why religion have such a hard time expanding on these questions, because they can't find any evidence and explanations.I would love to know where we come from, how life was created and all the other mysteries of the Universe, but not the the extend that im willing to accept whatever people throw at me, because that is what they believe is true.

We cannot have the answers to these questions unless they were revealed by God. All religion says is that God is the Creator of the heavens and the earth but how did that happen? We really cannot know how God does stuff and I do not know why it is so important to people. I mean what would our knowing that change about the world? Don’t we have enough problems in the world that need to be solved?I am not suggesting you should accept explanations that do not make rational sense to you.

Yes, that is an explanation and why we test these claims that we find in the bible, and most of them simply does not fit with logic. For instance saying that God is all good and then reading how he does some of the most horrible things ever written is not logic. Therefore believers make of excuses and explanations for which there is not rationality behind trying to fit this together.

OI am out of that game because I do not try to justify what is in the Bible that god purportedly did; I just say I do not know how or why it was written that way. I believe what Baha’u’llah revealed abut God so I do not need to refer to the Bible for information about God.

And when you have look at enough of this, what you are saying seems less and less likely to be the explanation, but instead wishful thinking. Which is why, and I know you have mentioned it sometimes, why I keep referring to the bible. Is because some people constantly, when talking about what God and Jesus is, clearly make up things, without any reference to what is actually written in it or where they got it from.

I fully agree that people have misinterpreted the Bible to make Jesus and God in their own image, to their liking, what they want. People all interpret the Bible differently, so how could anyone know which interpretation is correct? It is all about what people want to justify, such as a certain idea about the afterlife that is appealing to them. Bible verses can be used to believe whatever people want to believe.

Don't get me wrong, I understand where you are going with the example. But there have been people claiming that they became religions without actually working for it.

I do not think everyone has to work as hard as everyone else to be a believer, just as in college some people have to work harder than other people to get the same degree. There are many factors to consider. Not everyone has to search as hard as everyone else depending upon their starting point. Also, I think that God guides whoever He chooses to so sometimes God might guide someone who did not search that hard.

I hardly searched at all and I just knew the Baha’i Faith was the truth but I had nothing preventing me from seeing that since I was not raised in any religion, so I had no confirmation bias to overcome. I probably was told there was a God by my mother although I had no religious training and never went to Church, but I do not remember much of childhood, just saying the Lord’s Prayer at bedtime is all I can remember but I do not remember what I thought about it, why I was saying it. Joining the Baha’i Faith I do not remember thinking much about God either, I joined because of the teachings. Only mush later did I even have a God concept, although I halfheartedly believed God existed when I joined.

I doubt you will find any none religious and even hard finding a religious scientist that would support the conclusion that the mind works through the "soul", as that would be an extremely unscientific statement to make.

Of course you would not find a scientist saying the mind works through the soul, but you won’t find one who knows how the mind works either.

Agree and that is why one ought to be skeptical of any claim that rely on the supernatural to provide the explanation.

Do you mean an explanation of how the supernatural works? There are explanations how the soul works but of course they can never be proven since the soul is a mystery, a sign of God.

 

[Nimos]

How “free” we are to use that will to believe or act is another matter. I do not think that we can believe or do “anything” we want to do.

So if I understand you correctly, your idea of free will is kind of like, how we as humans can not really choose to eat stones for instance, because that is not part of what we as biological beings were "designed" to eat? And the same goes with free will, some decisions or actions, we are simply not able to take because they would interfere with God's plan of how things have to turn out. Is that how you see it?

I was not saying that this applies to a small baby or children who die before they have a chance to live their lives.

This is where things go wrong as I see it. Because now you are introducing imaginary boundaries to this issue. At which age are we not talking about children anymore? Is there are "magical" switch the moment a person reaches 17 or 18 years old, where suddenly all this starts to apply to them?

Labeling humans of different ages with more specific names, like a baby might refer to a human around the age of 3 and below, child in another range, a teenager etc. have no meaning in regards to what we are talking about. Its purely names we have invented to make it easier to talk precisely with each other when referring to different age groups.

So when you write: "No, I was not referring to children, only to adults" it have no meaning at all, as there is no fixed universal rules, for when one is one or the other. Its purely a label, they are all humans. Its basically to say, that it only apply to electricians, but not carpenters. Which again is just what we call people working in these fields, so we know who we are talking about.

Honestly I think a lot of religious people make the same mistakes when they try to apply explanations to why things are as they are. The moment you bring in babies and children, it somehow never apply to them.

Remember, I told you about the issue of evil and how religious people will say that this is or that person is evil. Yet the moment I ask them, that if what they are claiming is true, then there is no logical reason to think that a person can not be born evil?
Also if evil is some sort of supernatural force, then one should be able to identify, at which point a human "turns" evil. And also explain why a baby can't be born evil or not be corrupted by Satan the moment they are born. And im yet to hear any good explanation for that. To me the reason is much as yours, because we have all had experience with babies or small children, and to point our finger at them, and argue that they are evil or that God would allow anything to happen to them, is not easily explained, because we all know how innocent they are. So "this" imaginary logic that somehow, there is a different between a child and an adult need to be there, which again makes absolutely no sense.
Because you would have to argue why there is a sudden change at a given point of time, when a person reaches a certain age.

The only way that could be counterbalanced is if there is an afterlife where we are rewarded and where there is no more suffering, which I believe there is. That does not help us in this life though, not unless we have a lot of faith.

And faith certainly doesn't help the new born baby, which had no time to even understand what faith is. To me, this need an explanation from the religious communities, because a child dying during child birth, is for most people a horrible thing and causes huge amount of pain to them. So even the idea of an afterlife is not helping here, because it sort of make the child's early death seem more like a punishment for the parents rather than something good, and the child never got to experience life anyway. So if it was a caring and loving God, why would babies even die during child birth, if the purpose is to instantly take them to the afterlife? I honestly think that seems a bit cruel, both to the child and its parents.

I am not saying there is a purpose to ALL suffering, you ran with what I said and made more out of it than was there. Some suffering simply exists because we live in a material world and there will always be suffering in the material world because of its very nature.

I ran with it, because I think it needs or deserve an explanation by those claiming that an all good God, is watching over us and keep telling people this is the truth and how wonderful he is. I don't think its unfair at all. If God created everything and set everything in motion the way he wanted it to be, he also created natural evil. Even the bible, confirm that God is the creator of all bad things, so why keep claiming that God is all good? And if so, then they should explain the problem with natural evil. So whether we are talking about the material or natural world, should make little difference, when God is involved.

Why do you think there is no such thing as evil, or are you saying that evil is not as religious people describe it? Actually, Abdu’l-Baha said that evil is nonexistent, because it is simply the absence of good just as dark is the absence of light.

Evil is just as with the age above, its labels we attach to things that we find undesirable, none beneficial or harmful. Its simply makes it possible to quickly explain our view on a given incident. But what we consider evil varies between human cultures and over time. For instance looking at slavery, this is considered an evil doing today, but if you go back just a few hundred years, this were considered perfectly fine. Sacrificing humans were also considered a good thing, you had to do, to please the Gods. Remember Abraham is about to sacrifice his child as well, because God commanded it. But is stopped in the end by an angel that intervene, all in the name of faith.

Genesis 22:2
2 God said, "Please take your son, your only unique son whom you love—Isaac—and go to the land of Moriah. Offer him as a burnt offering there on one of the mountains that I will point out to you."

Genesis 22:9-12
9 and came to the place about which God had spoken. Abraham built an altar there, arranged the wood, tied up his son Isaac, and placed him on the altar on top of the wood.
10 Then he stretched out his hand and grabbed the knife to slaughter his son.
11 Just then, an angel of the LORD called out to him from heaven and said, "Abraham! Abraham!" "Here I am," he answered.
12 "Don't lay your hand on the youth!" he said. "Don't do anything to him, because I've just demonstrated that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only unique one, from me."

So to me, evil does not exists, no force driving it. Just as there are no good in the sense of which it is granted to God. Good is merely what we think og things that are beneficial to us, either as a group or individually. People that die due to natural "evil", whether they are young or old, do so because they were at the wrong place, at the wrong time. Children that die during child birth, does so because that is how the natural world works. Some are born to early, some with dieases or biological errors, which can be caused by how their parents lived, maybe they got exposed to something, our food which is filled with all sorts of chemicals, the possibilities of why this occur is numerous. But with increased knowledge and better healthcare, we can reduce the amount that dies and get a better understanding of what could help prevent some of these things in the future. This we can thank humans for, there is no need to explain "good" and "evil", if God does not exists, because they don't exists either, they are merely human constructs.
Only when you introduce God, these problems are introduced as well and become impossible to explain, as I see it.

We really cannot know how God does stuff and I do not know why it is so important to people. I mean what would our knowing that change about the world?

If we knew how life began, how the Universe were created, it would skyrocket human knowledge. Think about it like this, what on Earth does it matter if we know about quantum physics or not? I can't see it anyway?

But think about what it have done for the world, computers, cell phones just to mention two and what impact these have had in people lives, both in regards to connecting you with friends and within pretty much all industries in the world.

If we knew how life were created, we could potentially grow new limbs for people, new eyes, new medicin, we might even discover how to live forever, making traveling around the Universe a real possibility. We could "grow" good and healthy food, recreate extinct animals. These are just guesses, that I think we eventually could do from having a full knowledge of how to create life from nothing. Humans would be Gods

I fully agree that people have misinterpreted the Bible to make Jesus and God in their own image, to their liking, what they want. People all interpret the Bible differently, so how could anyone know which interpretation is correct?

Yes, the interpretations can be quite different. But the actual bibles that have been found are not. There are many minor differences in them, like copy mistakes etc. But the content it self, is pretty consistence as far as I know. So its not like you have 5000 different versions of the bible, where in one of them Jesus is satan and in the next one he is an angel etc. Which is also why, I refer to the bible, rather than what some random person believe it means. Because that is what they think it ought to be or it might just be what they were told etc. It doesn't have to be due to some hidden agenda, people make mistakes and so do I, I probably get a lot of what the bible say wrong as well. But ill rather discuss that with references to the bible, than having to discuss someones personal view of what they believe Jesus or God is, based on absolutely nothing.

Do you mean an explanation of how the supernatural works? There are explanations how the soul works but of course they can never be proven since the soul is a mystery, a sign of God.

Yes, but I would refer to such as guesses, rather than explanations. Because first of all one would have to demonstrate that a soul even exist. If we don't know that, then there is not really any need for one. Its like me, giving you an explanation of aliens and what they are capable of, which you would hopefully agree with, would make little sense, unless you had actually seen them.

 

[Trailblazer]

So if I understand you correctly, your idea of free will is kind of like, how we as humans can not really choose to eat stones for instance, because that is not part of what we as biological beings were "designed" to eat? And the same goes with free will, some decisions or actions, we are simply not able to take because they would interfere with God's plan of how things have to turn out. Is that how you see it?

No, not necessarily because they would interfere with God’s plan, because not everything is preordained. Rather, what happens to us is caused by the decisions we make; God simply knows what those decisions will be because God is omniscient. What we would choose to do or not do would depend upon our own desires and preferences which are determined by a combination of factors such as childhood upbringing, heredity, education, adult experiences, and present life circumstances. How free we are to act varies with any given situation and we all have certain limitations; time restrictions, financial considerations, and emotional issues that might prevent us from doing something we might otherwise do. In short, free will is a complicated subject.

This is where things go wrong as I see it. Because now you are introducing imaginary boundaries to this issue. At which age are we not talking about children anymore? Is there are "magical" switch the moment a person reaches 17 or 18 years old, where suddenly all this starts to apply to them?

Labeling humans of different ages with more specific names, like a baby might refer to a human around the age of 3 and below, child in another range, a teenager etc. have no meaning in regards to what we are talking about. Its purely names we have invented to make it easier to talk precisely with each other when referring to different age groups.

So when you write: "No, I was not referring to children, only to adults" it have no meaning at all, as there is no fixed universal rules, for when one is one or the other. Its purely a label, they are all humans. Its basically to say, that it only apply to electricians, but not carpenters. Which again is just what we call people working in these fields, so we know who we are talking about.

Honestly I think a lot of religious people make the same mistakes when they try to apply explanations to why things are as they are. The moment you bring in babies and children, it somehow never apply to them.

What I said about recompense in an afterlife would be for anyone who God determined did not have time to fulfill their purpose in life, because through no fault of their own they were taken out before they had time, so it could also apply to an adult and there is no set age. My point was that children are in a special category because they are too young to have fulfilled their life purpose, so in that case God gives them a great recompense; as Abdu’l-Baha said regarding God, “they are the centers of the manifestation of bounty, and the Eye of Compassion will be turned upon them.”

Remember, I told you about the issue of evil and how religious people will say that this is or that person is evil. Yet the moment I ask them, that if what they are claiming is true, then there is no logical reason to think that a person can not be born evil?

Why would there need to be a logical reason? Why would anyone be born evil? How could they be born that way if people’s action are what make them evil, or do you buy Adam and Eve and original sin?

Also if evil is some sort of supernatural force, then one should be able to identify, at which point a human "turns" evil. And also explain why a baby can't be born evil or not be corrupted by Satan the moment they are born.

It sounds like you have bought the farm; if you know that expression it mean that you believe what it says in the Bible. This is so odd coming from an atheist.

The Baha’i Faith teaches that all humans are born good. Although we have an animal/physical nature so we have the “propensity” to sin, nobody has sinned before they were born. Baha’is do not believe there is a “being” called Satan, but rather Satan represents the lower material nature of man, his selfish nature, as contrasted with his higher noble nature.

And faith certainly doesn't help the new born baby, which had no time to even understand what faith is.

But that is not necessary that they know because if they die they simply go to the spiritual world which is merely an extension of this world, the difference being it is not physical, but rather spiritual.

So if it was a caring and loving God, why would babies even die during child birth, if the purpose is to instantly take them to the afterlife? I honestly think that seems a bit cruel, both to the child and its parents.

Admittedly, it can be difficult to believe in a caring and loving God when we see so much suffering in the world. Yet that is what the scriptures say about God so if we believe in these religions that teach that we believe that, and we also believe that there are mysteries in life we cannot understand and that many of them will be understood after we die and go to the spiritual world.

I ran with it, because I think it needs or deserve an explanation by those claiming that an all good God, is watching over us and keep telling people this is the truth and how wonderful he is. I don't think its unfair at all. If God created everything and set everything in motion the way he wanted it to be, he also created natural evil. Even the bible, confirm that God is the creator of all bad things, so why keep claiming that God is all good? And if so, then they should explain the problem with natural evil. So whether we are talking about the material or natural world, should make little difference, when God is involved.

There is no explanation for suffering in the world that is not caused by human free will choices. It is just part of life in the material world. Here we go, back to the Bible again. No, God did not create evil or bad things although God allows them to exist. I wish someone would take all the Bibles and burn them, for all the heartache they have caused people. I do not think that natural disasters are evil, as evil is related to humans. A hurricane can cause suffering but it is not inherently evil.

Evil is just as with the age above, its labels we attach to things that we find undesirable, none beneficial or harmful. Its simply makes it possible to quickly explain our view on a given incident. But what we consider evil varies between human cultures and over time.

So to me, evil does not exists, no force driving it. Just as there are no good in the sense of which it is granted to God. Good is merely what we think of things that are beneficial to us, either as a group or individually. People that die due to natural "evil", whether they are young or old, do so because they were at the wrong place, at the wrong time. Children that die during child birth, does so because that is how the natural world works. Some are born to early, some with diseases or biological errors, which can be caused by how their parents lived, maybe they got exposed to something, our food which is filled with all sorts of chemicals, the possibilities of why this occur is numerous. But with increased knowledge and better healthcare, we can reduce the amount that dies and get a better understanding of what could help prevent some of these things in the future. This we can thank humans for, there is no need to explain "good" and "evil", if God does not exists, because they don't exists either, they are merely human constructs.

I pretty much agree with you that good is what we consider beneficial and much of what we consider evil is just random occurrences in the material world. However, I believe that God is good by His nature and humans can be either good or evil according to their two natures and the choices they make determine where they end up. I consider a selfish person who chooses to murder someone for sex or money to be evil. By contrast, someone who is selfless and makes personal sacrifices for other people is good.

If we knew how life began, how the Universe were created, it would skyrocket human knowledge.

But I do not see how that would benefit anyone to have that knowledge. How would it make the world a better place? How would it end war and disunity and prejudice? How would it improve human character?

Think about it like this, what on Earth does it matter if we know about quantum physics or not? I can't see it anyway?

That is a little different because it could have an effect on how we perceive reality.

But think about what it have done for the world, computers, cell phones just to mention two and what impact these have had in people lives, both in regards to connecting you with friends and within pretty much all industries in the world.

I am not so sure that this has been a positive impact overall. it has made life easier but it has also made life more complicated and people more materialistic. So far, while riding my bike to work I have been hit by two different drivers who were talking on their cell phones. I could have been hurt much more badly or I could have been killed, all because some man had to talk on his stupid phone. I think this has spiraled out of control. Computers are another matter. They make life a lot easier and make work easier to do. I cannot even imagine doing the cartographer job I do now without a computer, but I did it back in the 70s and 80s.

If we knew how life were created, we could potentially grow new limbs for people, new eyes, new medicin, we might even discover how to live forever, making traveling around the Universe a real possibility. We could "grow" good and healthy food, recreate extinct animals. These are just guesses, that I think we eventually could do from having a full knowledge of how to create life from nothing. Humans would be Gods

I do not see the positive aspect knowing how life was created so humans could become like God but I do see it as beneficial if it could lead to advances in medicine.

Yes, but I would refer to such as guesses, rather than explanations. Because first of all one would have to demonstrate that a soul even exist. If we don't know that, then there is not really any need for one. Its like me, giving you an explanation of aliens and what they are capable of, which you would hopefully agree with, would make little sense, unless you had actually seen them.

It makes no sense to me to say that just because we cannot demonstrate (prove) that the soul exists we have no need for a soul. Rather, if the soul has a vial function we have the need for a soul. Some atheists say the same thing about God and that does not make sense to me either. Rather, if the soul or God exist, it matters, even if we cannot prove they exist or fully understand what they are or how they function. It is not like aliens because aliens do not impact have any bearing on our lives.

 

[Nimos]

What we would choose to do or not do would depend upon our own desires and preferences which are determined by a combination of factors such as childhood upbringing, heredity, education, adult experiences, and present life circumstances. How free we are to act varies with any given situation and we all have certain limitations; time restrictions, financial considerations, and emotional issues that might prevent us from doing something we might otherwise do. In short, free will is a complicated subject.

I think one have to make a distinction when talking about free will where a God is involved and where he is not. Because if God exists and he have created us, then he have giving us free will. Which in it self is fine.

However the issue still occurs when you add prophecies. Because if you do not know what actions or life choices are prevented due to these predictions then you can't really argue for free will.

Lets go with the killing of Baha'u'llah, before he gets to the role he have in the Bahai faith. So lets use some examples. Lets imagine that a person is chopping down a tree and it falls on the road just as Baha'u'llah is driving by in his car. At this moment the prophecy have not yet been furfilled so the person that chop down the tree will suddenly decide to fell it in some other direction than they original intended, so it doesn't hit his car. So God or whoever interfere with his free will?

Lets take it even further and imagine that 2 km from the road a ganglord is shooting after a person, which jumps in a car and drive down the road at very high speed and eventually hit Baha'u'llah car, which would kill him. Now at which point does God interfere with the actions that people make. Does he prevent whatever happened that eventually led to the ganglord shooting after this guy or make it so the bullets actually hit the person trying to escape so he can't get in his car? At what point does God interfere with free will.

That is why even talking about free will and prophecies makes no sense. Because there is no way to decide when God interfere with our free will, to make sure that the prophecies happens as he intended. So to me it makes childhood upbringing, heredity and what else you mentioned irrelevant in regards to free will, when we have prophecies involved.

Why would there need to be a logical reason? Why would anyone be born evil? How could they be born that way if people’s action are what make them evil, or do you buy Adam and Eve and original sin?

Because evil as a religious term have little meaning, if one do not believe that it comes from original sin or satan or whatever. That is why I told you that I do not think evil exists, but is merely a term we use. And my argument would be that those people that we might refer to as being evil are merely doing what they do, due to natural causes which can be explained, maybe not now but in the future once we know more about the human mind.

Once this is understood and we know how or what might make a person do certain things we consider an evil act, then evil as we know it will go away and so will original sin and satan.

Another issue is that throwing the term evil around about people have little meaning. Even if one believe that it is a person's action that make them evil.

This is from another post about morality:

This is a passage from the book Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari (Can highly recommend it). I have to translate it from Danish, so will probably contain a few errors:

The Aché people, that were hunter and gatherers and lived in the jungle of Paraguay until 1960, give a more sinister view of these types of societies. When a highly esteemed member of the tribe died, the Aché would kill a little girl and bury them together.... When an old aché-women became a burden for the rest of the tribe, one of the younger men would sneak up behind her and kill her with a blow to the head with an axe. One of the aché-men told the anthropologists about his life in the jungle. >>I often killed old women, I killed my aunts... the women were afraid of me... Now, when the white have come, I have become weak.<< Infants born without hair were considered underdeveloped and killed on the spot. A women explained that her first girl were killed, because the men in the tribe didn't want any more girls. At another occasion a man killed a little boy, because he were in a bad mood and the boy was crying. Another child was buried alive because it looked funny while the other kids laughed at it.

One have to be careful judging the aché to fast. The anthropologists that lived with them for years, tells that violence between adults were very rare. Both male and female could freely change their partner. They always smiled and laughed and didn't have any hierarchy with leaders and dominating figures. They were extremely generous with the few items they owned and the thought of riches and succes of no importance. What they valued most of all, were good social relationships and close friendships. Their view on killing children, old people and the sick were a lot like we view abortion and euthanasia today. Besides that, the aché were hunted and killed by relentless farmers from Paraguay. The need to flee from their enemies have most likely caused them to develop a very uncommon view on anyone that could be considered a burden for the tribe...

After reading this, would you consider the Aché evil and if not, why?

And in what way does it make sense to use the word evil then?

It sounds like you have bought the farm; if you know that expression it mean that you believe what it says in the Bible. This is so odd coming from an atheist.

I think you misunderstand what I mean, because you answer it out of context. As im still referring to people using the word evil as if it is some sort of force or interfering with humans that make them so. Again, as I think, I mentioned to you in the last post, I don't believe good and evil exists at all, in the way religious people use them. Like saying that God is all good etc. And therefore I obviously do not believe in original sin either.

There is no explanation for suffering in the world that is not caused by human free will choices. It is just part of life in the material world. Here we go, back to the Bible again. No, God did not create evil or bad things although God allows them to exist. I wish someone would take all the Bibles and burn them, for all the heartache they have caused people. I do not think that natural disasters are evil, as evil is related to humans. A hurricane can cause suffering but it is not inherently evil.

I think you are wrong, clearly you disagree with the Bible, because it doesn't fit with your world view and therefore you seem so convinced that it is so corrupt that whenever it say or tells about God doing something that you find wrong, then that is the explanation. As I mentioned to you in the last post, the actual content of the bibles that have been found is very consistent in what they are saying. So stating that they ought to be burned because they are corrupted seems very wrong. Have you considered that, it might actually be you having a wrong impression of God, and simply not agreeing with him, as he is described in the Bible?

Because wouldn't the most fair thing be, to accept that the content of the bible is written the way it is, because that is actually what the ancient Jews believed, and if you want to claim that it is corrupted, that you present physical evidence of it being so?
Like bibles actually telling completely different stories, that would support what you are saying. Because I would have no issue agreeing with you, if we had lots of bibles telling such stories, but the fact is, that we don't.

I consider a selfish person who chooses to murder someone for sex or money to be evil. By contrast, someone who is selfless and makes personal sacrifices for other people is good.

But what if a person does both, its not always black and white, as the story of the Aché above also shows. That is why the meaning of good and evil in a religious sense have little meaning.

Lets use and example:

A person decides to murder someone for whatever reason. Which would make them evil..
Now the same person later in life, decide to risk his life going on some fragile ice to save a child that have falling through it, while everyone else is just standing there yelling for someone to do something. Now does that make the person good again? Ór how much "Good" must a person do to make up for evil?

There is no logical answer to this, except to say that God will decide that in the end. Which to me is basically like saying, "I have no clue". Because the answer is not obviously explainable. And we all know that, what a human does throughout their life, is not black and white. And just because a person might do some wicked things, doesn't mean that this is solely what they are capable of.

But I do not see how that would benefit anyone to have that knowledge. How would it make the world a better place? How would it end war and disunity and prejudice? How would it improve human character?

Knowing the process which created the Universe would first of all explain how we are even here in the first place. It could explain our position in the Cosmos, which might make us change our view on what it means to be a human and what we ought to do, rather than blowing each other up.

It makes no sense to me to say that just because we cannot demonstrate (prove) that the soul exists we have no need for a soul.

I never said that there is no need for a soul, just that spending a lot of time explaining how and what a soul is, makes little sense if we don't even know if it exists. As I said, its like spending a lot of time explaining what the Byr-force is, which is some energy that I just made up. But basically it is the life force of all living things, without it there would be no life. But where did it come from? And what is it capable of, that is some very interesting questions, that we should answer.....
Obviously this make absolutely no sense, since we don't know if Byr-force exists in the first place. And its exactly the same with a soul, just because you have heard people use the word before and more seem inclined to believe in it, doesn't make it true.

It is not like aliens because aliens do not impact have any bearing on our lives.

How do you know that aliens didn't create us? Maybe they planted the seeds of life on the early Earth, and eventually that started the process of life. To me this is what is wrong with religious assumptions, there is no limit to blindly accept, Gods, souls, afterlife, miracles, prophecies etc. But everything else, not so much. Because Im certain that you would never consider my example above with the Byr-force as seriously as that of a soul, despite there being just as much evidence for mine as there is for a soul.

 

[Trailblazer]

I think one have to make a distinction when talking about free will where a God is involved and where he is not. Because if God exists and he have created us, then he have giving us free will. Which in it self is fine.

When we USE our free will, God is not involved, and that is why it is FREE. Everything that happens happens by God’s Will or Free Will.

However the issue still occurs when you add prophecies. Because if you do not know what actions or life choices are prevented due to these predictions then you can't really argue for free will.

Lets go with the killing of Baha'u'llah, before he gets to the role he have in the Bahai faith. So lets use some examples. Lets imagine that a person is chopping down a tree and it falls on the road just as Baha'u'llah is driving by in his car. At this moment the prophecy have not yet been fulfilled so the person that chop down the tree will suddenly decide to fell it in some other direction than they original intended, so it doesn't hit his car. So God or whoever interfere with his free will?

If it was God’s will that the prophecy be fulfilled by Baha’u’llah then nobody can come along and thwart God’s will because God’s will overrides human free will. Do you understand?

God interferes with human free will whenever He chooses to because God is All-Powerful. There is no way we can know if/when that happens. We are told in scriptures that God does not interfere when it comes to our beliefs because God wants us to make our own choices.

That is why even talking about free will and prophecies makes no sense. Because there is no way to decide when God interfere with our free will, to make sure that the prophecies happens as he intended. So to me it makes childhood upbringing, heredity and what else you mentioned irrelevant in regards to free will, when we have prophecies involved.

If prophecies are involved God made sure they were fulfilled by the free will of Baha’u’llah and if anyone tried to stop them from being fulfilled then God interfered.

Because evil as a religious term have little meaning, if one do not believe that it comes from original sin or satan or whatever. That is why I told you that I do not think evil exists, but is merely a term we use. And my argument would be that those people that we might refer to as being evil are merely doing what they do, due to natural causes which can be explained, maybe not now but in the future once we know more about the human mind.

Once this is understood and we know how or what might make a person do certain things we consider an evil act, then evil as we know it will go away and so will original sin and satan.

So you think that people do evil just because they do, and there is no reason except something amiss in their brains? That is proven false by the fact that there are motives for these evil acts such as murder, as people murder for money or sex or even just enjoyment of killing. These are selfish acts so they point to someone who is spiritually and morally depraved and we all have free will so they are responsible for their depravity.

Here is what Baha’u’llah wrote about evil. It has nothing to do with original sin or satan. It is because people do not follow God’s laws:

“And now, concerning thy question regarding the creation of man. Know thou that all men have been created in the nature made by God, the Guardian, the Self-Subsisting. Unto each one hath been prescribed a pre-ordained measure, as decreed in God’s mighty and guarded Tablets. All that which ye potentially possess can, however, be manifested only as a result of your own volition. Your own acts testify to this truth. Consider, for instance, that which hath been forbidden, in the Bayán, unto men. God hath in that Book, and by His behest, decreed as lawful whatsoever He hath pleased to decree, and hath, through the power of His sovereign might, forbidden whatsoever He elected to forbid. To this testifieth the text of that Book. Will ye not bear witness? Men, however, have wittingly broken His law. Is such a behavior to be attributed to God, or to their proper selves? Be fair in your judgment. Every good thing is of God, and every evil thing is from yourselves. Will ye not comprehend? This same truth hath been revealed in all the Scriptures, if ye be of them that understand. Every act ye meditate is as clear to Him as is that act when already accomplished. There is none other God besides Him. His is all creation and its empire. All stands revealed before Him; all is recorded in His holy and hidden Tablets. This fore-knowledge of God, however, should not be regarded as having caused the actions of men, just as your own previous knowledge that a certain event is to occur, or your desire that it should happen, is not and can never be the reason for its occurrence.” Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 149-150

This is a passage from the book Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari (Can highly recommend it). I have to translate it from Danish, so will probably contain a few errors:

After reading this, would you consider the Aché evil and if not, why?

I would consider their acts evil and probably born of ignorance, and this is why God sends Messengers to instruct us in how to behave.

I think you misunderstand what I mean, because you answer it out of context. As im still referring to people using the word evil as if it is some sort of force or interfering with humans that make them so. Again, as I think, I mentioned to you in the last post, I don't believe good and evil exists at all, in the way religious people use them.

Okay, I agree evil is not an outside force (satan) or something we are born with (original sin). If people do evil it is a free will choice they make because they follow their lower nature rather than their higher nature:

“In man there are two natures; his spiritual or higher nature and his material or lower nature. In one he approaches God, in the other he lives for the world alone. Signs of both these natures are to be found in men. In his material aspect he expresses untruth, cruelty and injustice; all these are the outcome of his lower nature. The attributes of his Divine nature are shown forth in love, mercy, kindness, truth and justice, one and all being expressions of his higher nature. Every good habit, every noble quality belongs to man’s spiritual nature, whereas all his imperfections and sinful actions are born of his material nature. If a man’s Divine nature dominates his human nature, we have a saint.” Paris Talks, p. 60

I think you are wrong, clearly you disagree with the Bible, because it doesn't fit with your world view and therefore you seem so convinced that it is so corrupt that whenever it say or tells about God doing something that you find wrong, then that is the explanation.

No, whatever men wrote about God is not necessarily about God. I want to share something with you regarding the Bible that I just posted to someone else. This is about the New Testament but it can also apply to the Old Testament.

There is a near consensus among liberal, and some mainline theologians, that:

• The Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were not written by Jesus' disciples but by person or persons whose names are unknown.
• Neither Paul nor any of the Gospel writers had been an eyewitness to Jesus' ministry, execution, or after-death appearances.
• The Gospels record the beliefs and memories of various Christian groups as they had evolved at the time they were written.
• God did not directly inspire the authors of the Bible. Instead, the writers composed text in support of their personal beliefs and those of their faith group. In particular, the Gospels contain various passages of religious myths which describe Christian traditions which were invented after Jesus' death.
• The Bible is not inerrant. Many passages in the Gospels and Epistles of the Christian Scriptures (New Testament) contain religious propaganda, beliefs unique to the author and his/her faith group, words created by the authors and attributed to Jesus, stories of events that never happened, material picked up from surrounding Pagan cultures, etc.

Liberals compare Bible passages in the light of contemporary Jewish, Pagan and non-canonical Christian writings. They also study the culture of the time and the beliefs of surrounding Pagan societies. Of particular interest are the evolving beliefs of the followers of Christ during the approximately seven decades between the crucifixion and the completion of the last Gospel, John. They have come to very different conclusions about the resurrection.
http://www.religioustolerance.org/resur_lt.htm

Have you considered that, it might actually be you having a wrong impression of God, and simply not agreeing with him, as he is described in the Bible?

No, I do not believe everything that men wrote about God. I do not care what the ancient Jews believed. That does not make it accurate. It is not authentic scripture.

Or how much "Good" must a person do to make up for evil?

There is no logical answer to this, except to say that God will decide that in the end. Which to me is basically like saying, "I have no clue". Because the answer is not obviously explainable. And we all know that, what a human does throughout their life, is not black and white.

I agree with that. Nothing is black and white. People can change and redeem themselves but whether God forgives them is another matter.

I never said that there is no need for a soul, just that spending a lot of time explaining how and what a soul is, makes little sense if we don't even know if it exists.

I agree, I think we need to know that it exists, and something about its function and eternal destination, but we do not need to spend a lot of time talking about it.

How do you know that aliens didn't create us? Maybe they planted the seeds of life on the early Earth, and eventually that started the process of life. To me this is what is wrong with religious assumptions, there is no limit to blindly accept, Gods, souls, afterlife, miracles, prophecies etc. But everything else, not so much.

I understand your point. I can understand why religious beliefs sound strange to atheists. I cannot speak for other religious people, only for myself. I accept them because I accepted the Baha’i Faith, and I read about them and they made sense to me. My belief was not so much about Baha’u’llah or even God in the beginning; that came later. These beliefs all fit together because there has to be a God for us to have a soul for an afterlife and there has to be an afterlife given all the suffering in the world. There have to be prophecies to predict the next prophet. Miracles are not necessary but The Messengers of God can do miracles because they are God-men.

 

[Nimos]

If prophecies are involved God made sure they were fulfilled by the free will of Baha’u’llah and if anyone tried to stop them from being fulfilled then God interfered.

I get what you are saying, but again from a logical point of view, based on what you are saying, there isn't anything such as free will. I know that you will disagree with me saying this. But it simply follows natural from what you are saying. The moment God can intervene in our free will as he pleases and we do not know what actions could interfere with a prophecy then there can't be free will in any meaningful way.

So you think that people do evil just because they do, and there is no reason except something amiss in their brains? That is proven false by the fact that there are motives for these evil acts such as murder, as people murder for money or sex or even just enjoyment of killing. These are selfish acts so they point to someone who is spiritually and morally depraved and we all have free will so they are responsible for their depravity.

No, i think you approach this backwards in regards to what I mean. So let me try to explain it.

Humans are driven by desires, so for instance a person might starve and in order to get food, they end up killing someone to fulfill this desire. A person might have very strong sexual desires towards children and at some point, no longer be able to suppress them and therefore chooses to act on them, well knowing that the consequence of doing so will lead to the child getting hurt and them being punished if caught. In some cases this will trigger a remorse with the person that did it, which lead to them turning them themselves in, or they might not and continue to do it until caught. And in some case they will feel nothing wrong in what they have done, which are the ones we commonly refer to as psychopaths.

We might refer to what these people chose to do as evil, simply as a way to express our view on what they did in a fast and easy understandable way when communicating with each other. So rather than starting to use in depth and precise words to describe their complete set of actions and what mentally conditions they are in and so forth, we just use a single word.

So hope that make its clear what I mean, so to say that a person do evil really have no meaning, besides it being a quick way to express how we feel. So first you have all the actions that a person does, the you have the person's mental conditions and these combined might result in us labeling the complete set of event leading to something bad as being that of evil.

That is why, I wrote that with time and knowledge about the human brain and what might cause some people to behave or have these desires while others don't While some choose to act on them and others don't, will eventually get rid of the idea of evil, because it will be replaced by a better understanding of why humans do these things.

I would consider their acts evil and probably born of ignorance, and this is why God sends Messengers to instruct us in how to behave.

Well God didn't send anyone to instruct them to do otherwise. Also as the text said, these people were in fact happy and valued social relationships and strong friendship above anything else. If they believed they were doing something evil, you would expect them to not really be happy or value such thing, but probably spend all their time running away from each other.

My point being, that we judge these people based on what we think is morally right. Which have little to nothing to do with what these people think. It doesn't make them evil, it simply illustrate that morally does not come from God, but is developed independently from humans to humans, based on what condition one is living under and what society one live in.

Clearly these people had gotten something wrong, but to me this is no different from when people sacrificed children or humans to the Gods, or when the bible say that homosexuality is wrong or that people ought to be stoned to death for varies things. Morality or lack there of is developed based on what belief is in a given society at a given point, it would be irrational to think that morals would develop if people in that society did not agree or see the meaning in why something is morally wrong and ought to be changed.

Okay, I agree evil is not an outside force (satan) or something we are born with (original sin). If people do evil it is a free will choice they make because they follow their lower nature rather than their higher nature

I think I understand what you mean, but to me, I would explain it like this. All humans have desires, and most have a mixture of both none harmful ones and harmful ones. Its no secret that a lot of women and children are abused throughout the world everyday, and that we as humans are very good at causing varies harm to each other. So if these harmful desires were not common then it would be strange. Where the difference is between humans is how dominating these are and how well suited one is to suppress them and for some this seems to be more easily done than by others.

So the way I see it, its a struggle between desires and the ability to suppress them.

No, whatever men wrote about God is not necessarily about God. I want to share something with you regarding the Bible that I just posted to someone else. This is about the New Testament but it can also apply to the Old Testament.

I agree with what you wrote about the bible.

But I don't think that it changes the fact, that if one were to remove the bible as a whole and claim that it was no the least truth, then one ought to be an atheist. Because rejecting it, pretty much ruins the foundation for all the major religions, as there is nothing to go on. And would make it possible for anyone to just make up stuff about God as they please. Also it would be pointless even using the bible and its verses to try to explain anything. And this is where faith enters the picture, because obviously one have to decide whether to believe that the bible tells the story of God the creator and Jesus and so forth or if it nothing, but made up stuff.

No, I do not believe everything that men wrote about God. I do not care what the ancient Jews believed. That does not make it accurate. It is not authentic scripture.

I know you do not care about it. But I think that would leave your beliefs somewhat amputated in regards to content and structure. Because what is the creation story according to Bahai faith?.. There is no reason to assume that any of the prophets in the bible ever existed and therefore no basis to assume that the messengers that you believe in is true either are there?

I know you disagree with this, but you picking out things from the bible which you agree is definitely true, while at the same time, "wishing" for all the bibles to be burned, is a type of rational thinking, I have ever heard from you I know people of other religious pick and choose as well, but at least they can admit that there are certain passages in the bible that are confusing and complicated, but yet it doesn't mean that they should just be disregarded to the extend, that you seem willing to do.

Might be because you have so many different religions to choose from and you go with the ladder approach, so the bible is least trustworthy, then the Quran which is slightly more accurate and then finally Baha'u'llah writings, that are spot on true, I don't know.

I understand your point. I can understand why religious beliefs sound strange to atheists. I cannot speak for other religious people, only for myself.

I think for most atheists, it doesn't really matter much that it is religious beliefs, but rather beliefs in general, which are unsupported, but claimed as being true, that is the issue.

For me its no different than if I watch someone arguing for the Earth being flat, despite having absolutely no evidence, yet they maintain that it is. To me its about being skeptic and critical towards beliefs unless there are evidence to support them. What makes religious beliefs different, is the impact it can have on other peoples life, how it can convince people to behave in certain ways, which is sometimes harmful. That to me, requires justifications from those claiming these truth. And if they can't, Ill fight them, not because of their beliefs, but because of the harm they cause to others.

These beliefs all fit together because there has to be a God for us to have a soul for an afterlife and there has to be an afterlife given all the suffering in the world.

It probably fits well with a God and him being there ...IF there is a soul and afterlife, but if there isn't and since we have no evidence for them to exists, then to me at least, God is not needed and the explanations can be found else where. Throwing in God, because one need there to be a soul and afterlife to explain suffering is wrong as I see it. Because suffering is perfectly explainable through human behavior and natural causes without the need of a God. But the different is, that if we can acknowledge that, we also know that we can fix it or reduce it, if we put effort into it. Its not a mystery that needs to be solved, but rather changes to how we do things. Expand our knowledge in areas for which we still do not have a complete understanding. God have very little to nothing to offer in this regard.