Earlier Postings Under 'Apologetics' Should Be Here

[RonPrice]

I’ll just test the waters to see if this posting is accepted here under “Non-Catholic Religions” before adding any more. I should have posted this item here rather than under the sub-section/title ‘Apologetics.’

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Apologetics is a branch of systematic theology, although some experience it’s thrust in religious studies or philosophy of religion courses. Some encounter it on the internet for the first time in a more populist and usually much less academic form. As I see it, apologetics is primarily concerned with the protection of a religious position, the refutation of that position’s assailants and, in the larger sense, the exploration of that position in the context of prevailing philosophies and standards in a secular society. Apologetics, to put it slightly differently, is concerned with answering critical inquiries, criticism of a position, in a rational manner. Apologetics is not possible, it seems to me anyway, without a commitment to and a desire to defend a position. For me, the core of my postion I could express in one word: Revelation. With that said, though, the activity I engage in, namely, apologetics, is a never ending exercise.

The apologetics that concerns me is not so much Christian apologetics but Baha’i apologetics. There are many points of comparison and contrast, though, which I won’t go into here. Christians have the opportunity…to defend Christianity by the use of apologetics. And so it is that I give Christians here an opportunity to defend their position. In the process we will all, hopefully, learn something about our respective Faiths, our religions, which we hold to our hearts dearly.

At the outset, then, in this my first posting, my intention is simply make this start. To state what you might call “my apologetics position.” This brief statement indicates, in broad outline, where I am coming from in the weeks, months and, perhaps, years ahead. -Ron Price with thanks to Udo Schaefer, “Baha’i Apologetics?” Baha’i Studies Review, Vol. 10, 2001/2002.

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A Brief Signature:

I am a Canadian who has been living in Australia for 33 years. I am married to a Tasmanian and have been for 30 years after 8 years in a first marriage. We have three children aged 38, 33 and 26. I am retired and at 60 spend most of my time writing, reading and engaging in apologetics and in teaching the Baha’i Faith in various ways and in varying degrees using various genres of writing. That is why, among other reasons, I was attracted to this site.

 

[flameburns623]

Umm:

So you’re saying you’re going to abscound with the Catholic Answers forum to proclaim the Baha’i Faith? It’ll be interesting to see if they’ll allow it. By the way: I’m not Roman Catholic and have no dog in this fight. I also frequent the Baha’i Forum over at Delphi. I’m just kind of skeptical that the moderators will simply give you a soapbox here to expound the Baha’i Faith at liberty. To compare/contrast the teachngs of Baha’u’llah with those of Catholicism, mebbe. And for what it’s worth: proponents of the Baha’i Faith (don’t call it ‘Baha’ism’ please–it’s rude) tend to be very civil, low-key, and reasonable to cnverse with. I don’ think it would be the Baha’i who would be disruptive, if this thread is allowed to stand. But this is the moderators call, not mine: I’m just visiting myself.

 

[elgom]

So, okay, what is the Bahai Faith all about? I am studying Catholic Apologetics, yet in doing so it is necessary to be able to understand the differences among us.

Perhaps while you are here you will be given a greater understanding on the Catholic Church as well.

God bless you on your journey.

 

[RonPrice]

I want to conclude my initial posting, as best I can, outlining a basic orientation to Baha’i apologetics, especially since one of the two replies I had to the first part of my initial posting expressed an interest in Baha’i apologetics. Indeed, it seems to me that one could not engage in any serious apologetics unless one had a pretty good picture of the position of one’s interlocutor.

Critical scholarly contributions or criticism raised in public or private discussions, an obvious part of apologetics, should not necessarily be equated with hostility. Often questions are perfectly legitimate aspects of a person’s search for an answer to an intellectual conundrum. Paul Tillich, renouned Protestant theologian, once expressed the view that apologetics was an “answering theology.”(Systematic Theology, U. of Chicago, 1967, Vol.1, p6.)

I have always been attracted to the founder of the Baha’i Faith’s exhortations in discussion to “speak with words as mild as milk,” with “the utmost lenience and forebearance.” I am also aware that, in cases of rude or hostile attack, rebuttal with a harsher tone may well be justified. It does not help an apologist to belong to those “watchmen” the prophet Isaiah calls “dumb dogs that cannot bark.”(Isaiah, 56:10)

In its essence apologetics is a kind of confrontation, an act of revealing one’s true colours, of hoisting the flag, of demonstrating essential characteristics of faith. Dialogue, as one of Catholicism’s greatest apologists from my point of view anyway, Hans Kung puts it, “does not mean self-denial.”(quoted by Udo Schaefer, “Baha’i Apologetics,” Baha’i Studies Review, Vol.10, 2001/2) Schaefer goes on: “A faith that is opportunistically streamlined, adapting to current trends, thus concealing its real features, features that could provoke rejection in order to be acceptable for dialogue is in danger of losing its identity.”

It is almost impossible to carry the torch of truth through a crowd without getting someone’s beard singed. In the weeks that follow, my postings will probably wind up singing the beards of some readers and, perhaps, my own in the process. Such are the perils of dialogue, of apologetics. Much of Baha’i apologetics derives from the experience Baha’is have of a fundamental discrepancy between secular thought and the Baha’i revelation on the other. In some ways, the gulf is unbridegeable but, so too, is this the case between the secular and much thought in the Christian revelation. That is why, or at least one of the reasons, I have chosen to make postings at this apologetics site.

Anyway, that’s all for now. It’s back to the winter winds of Tasmania, about 3 kms from the Bass Straight on the Tamar River. The geography of place is so much simpler than that of the spiritual geography readers at this site are concerned with, although I am aware that whom the gods would destroy they first make simple and simpler and simpler. I look forward to a dialogue with someone. Here in far-off Tasmania–the last stop before Antarctica, if one wants to get there through some other route than off the end of South America–your email will be gratefully received, I trust with greater speed than my last response. -Ron Price, Tasmania.

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