False Prophets the most used comeback!

[Servant19]

Sorry bruv but you’ve got it completely topsy-turvy at this point.

What you have stated above is the heresy of Nestorianism from our perspective (not saying you are a heretic mind because you are not Catholic so you cannot be ):

vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p122a3p1.htm#470

The Hypostatic Union was not a union of two separate “entities”, a Divine Person and a Human One.

It was rather the Divine Person of the Pre-Existent Word of God *assuming *an additional human nature and soul.

Jesus is the Divine Person of the Word of God. He pre-existed from all eternity and through the Incarnation assumed a human nature and soul.

Dear Vouthon,

Is it not possible that this Divine Nature, the Eternal Logos, or the “First Mind” (from the Baha’i Writings) might not be eternally in union with the human souls of ALL the Messengers of God?

The Bab and Baha’u’llah both expressed explicitly their pre-existence.

The Bab reveals that “Before I chose the womb of my mother, I discoursed with Muhammad about the future of Islam”

Does this say that the Bab was lying to you, or that “other” souls may also have a union with the Eternal Logos?

I hope that after having read the section of Julio Savi’s book i linked, especially the section titled “World of the Kingdom”, the following may be of some interest:

What is this power that enables them to bestow upon mankind such teachings and spiritual forces? The Bahá’í texts maintain that they convey to mankind `the revelation of the Soul of God’, in other words they are the visible expression of the spiritual reality of the world of the Kingdom.

This spiritual reality, the First Emanation of the Divine Reality, is reflected in the human reality of these personages, like the sun is reflected in a perfect mirror. They are therefore characterized by a threefold reality:

Material: that is, their bodies, which – like all human bodies – are bound to be born, to grow up, to develop and to die.

Human: that is, their souls, their individualities. In this regard Bahá’u’lláh writes: Everyone of them is a mirror of God... All else besides them are to be regarded as mirrors capable of reflecting the glory of these Manifestations Who are themselves the Primary Mirrors of the Divine Being...'. He writes moreover that the soul of the Manifestation of God is a pure and stainless Soul’ and Abdu'l-Bahá explains that it is a perfect soul’, `like a mirror wherein the Sun of Reality is reflected… a perfect expression of the Sun’.

When the soul of the Manifestation is compared to God, it is like a perfect mirror reflecting the divine rays; when it is compared to mankind, that soul occupies a quite different position. Abdu'l-Bahá says: … the individual reality of the Manifestation of God is a holy reality, and for that reason it is sanctified and, in that which concerns its nature and quality, is distinguished from all other things…’.

In this context, He likens this perfect Soul to the sun, which is the direct source of its shining rays, and human souls to the moon, which merely reflects those rays.

These souls are different from human souls also in another respect: `The Prophets are pre-existent. The soul or spirit of the individual comes into being with the conception of the physical body. 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…’.

Also the Manifestations of God have a rational soul, which is the human reality', or human spirit’, says Abdu'l-Bahá, and they … share it with all mankind’. However, He explains that the degree of perception typical of the Manifestations of God is not the same rational perception which is typical of human souls, but a universal divine mind' transcending human knowledge, in that it is a conscious power, not a power of investigation and of research’. Such power `is the special attribute of the Holy Manifestations and of the Dawning-Places of Prophethood; a ray of this light falls upon the mirrors of the hearts of the righteous’.

Therefore human knowledge is but the reflection of a ray, when compared to such a sun as is the knowledge of the Manifestation of God.

Moreover, in the station of their individualities the Divine Manifestations are so many different mirrors, because they have a special individuality... It is clear that the reality of Christ is different from that of Moses.' Nevertheless that which is reflected in the mirrors is the one sun’, therefore it is easy to understand how, though the Manifestations of God differ from each other in many respects, yet they are essentially one and the same.

Divine: that is the Word of God, the Logos. This reality has neither a beginning nor an end; it is eternal, yet it is inferior to God, because it was created by Him. ... this third state is alone partaken of by the divine messengers, although great saints have attained extraordinary pre-eminence and reflect the splendour of the sun,' says Abdu’l-Bahá.

These three aspects of the reality of the Manifestation of God are described by `Abdu’l-Bahá through the following metaphor: their material nature is as a niche, their human nature is as the lamp within the niche, their divine nature as the light which emanates from the lamp.

cont. below

.

 

[Servant19]

cont…

, since the Manifestations of God are endowed with a divine universal mind', they know the essence of things, and not just their attributes. Their knowledge of the essence of things is likened by Abdu’l-Bahá to the self-consciousness of human beings: it is a conscious power, not a power of investigation and of research', He says. As they are endowed with such perfect knowledge-consciousness of the world, they know also the essential connection which proceeds from the realities of things’, which Abdu'l-Bahá defines as nature’ in its meaning of will of God. Therefore they can convey to mankind as much of their knowledge as mankind can profit from in its specific time and circumstances, a knowledge which may well be defined as `science of reality’.

As to their spiritual power, it is an emanation of the world of the Kingdom whose Manifestation they are. In fact, Bahá’u’lláh writes that they are the vehicle for the transmission of the Grace of the Divinity itself'; and Abdu’l-Bahá explains: `The greatest power of the Holy Spirit exists in the Divine Manifestations of the Truth. Through the power of the Spirit the Heavenly Teaching has been brought into the world of humanity… everlasting life has come to the children of men… the Divine Glory has shone from East to West and… will the divine virtues of humanity become manifest.’

Very interested to hear what your thoughts are on this brother

Thanks for your time and consideration.

.

 

[Vouthon]

Thankyou brother. Gee the differences are so so subtle, its so very difficult to put a finger on it, and I am beginning to think that the only difference is that you believe the Eternal Logos to be God, but Baha’is know this as not to be the case.

.

Dear Servant

Thank you for the link! Most interesting.

I do believe that you have hit upon an important, even if subtle, metaphysical difference. In Catholic theology nothing can be considered “eternal” that is not God. Yet it is only the first; the second difference I have outlined above if you consider the two diagrams. The “divine nature” that Baha’u’llah claimed the Manifestations possess is not the same as the Hypostatic Union. It is more in line with the Nestorian digram. As you said the divine nature is a “distinct” entity that from the person of the Manifestation, even though it is intimately one with him. God and the Manifestation are different in essence. Jesus, by contrast, in His Divine Nature possesses the fullness of the divine essence joined to His glorious humanity in His single Person.

The link that you gave me notes:

Explaining the station of the world of the Kingdom, Abdu'l-Bahá says: This emanation, in that which concerns its action in the world of God, is not limited by time or place; it is without beginning or end – beginning and end in relation to God are one.’ Then He adds: `Though the “First Mind” is without beginning, it does not become a sharer in the preexistence of God, for the preexistence of the universal reality in relation to the existence of God is nothing-ness, and it has not the power to become an associate of God and like unto Him in preexistence… '…[36]

He describes the world of the Kingdom as an intermediate spiritual reality, which, on the one hand, cannot be identified with God, Who is unfathomable in His Essence, and, on the other, is eternal and infinite, because it emanates directly from Him. This reality is not essential preexistence, because it is preceded by a Cause that is God Himself; but it is temporal preexistence, because it has no beginning. For even as the essential attributes of God are coexistent, coeternal' with God, so also **the world of the Kingdom -- which is the expression of these essential attributes as active attributes -- is coeternal with God**. In fact the divine attributes are actually and forever existent and not potential’,[37] or else God would be imperfect.

The Word of God would appear to be an eternal emanation from God. In other words it is dependant on Him for its existence and is thus in a sense “created” even if not in time. It is not therefore correct to approximate it as being identical with God.

In Catholic theology, God the Son (the Eternal Word) is “begotten not made, of one Being with the Father (consubstantial), light from light, true God from true God”. In a sense this is similar to what the above says about the world of the Kingdom being “co-eternal with God”, without beginning or end as far as time is concerned. However the difference protrudes when we come to the fact that the Word of God “cannot be identified with God Who is unfathomable in His Essence”.

Compare:

St. Gregory of Nazianz

“…He is called Son because he is identical to the Father in essence; and not only this, but also because he is of him. He is called only-begotten not because he is a unique Son . . . but because he is Son in a unique fashion and not in a corporeal way. He is called Word because he is to the Father what a word is to the mind…” (Orations 30:20 [A.D. 380]).

To Catholic ears you must understand that for something to be “eternal, without beginning or end” yet not be identical with God is alien. This I think is the cardinal difference, along with our different understandings of the incarnation.

Read:

catholictheology.info/summa-theologica/summa-part1.php?q=28

10. The Eternity of God

1. Eternity is the complete possession of boundless perfection, all at once, without beginning, succession, or end, and therefore without any before and after.

2. Since God is immutable, he is not subject to time which consists of continuous change. And since God is infinite, he is not limited by the terminations called beginning and ending.

3. Only God is eternal, for only God is immutable and infinite. Some creatures are called eternal in the meaning that they will never end; such are spiritual beings. And even bodily things are called eternal in the sense that they are not quickly or visibly affected by time; thus we speak of “the eternal hills.” But strictly speaking, eternity belongs to God alone, and is identified with the essence of God.

1. Eternity, as duration, differs essentially from time. Time is a matter of before and after, of past and future, but eternity is an all-perfect changeless present. Eternity is an immutable, everlasting now. Thus eternity involves infinity, and so is identified with the pure actuality of God. We can know what eternity means, but we cannot picture it in imagination. Every attempt to envision eternity in imagination results merely in a lengthened view of imaginary time. And time, as we have just noticed, is essentially different from eternity, and even opposite to it.

1. Time is a continuous succession of events or movements (therefore, of changes) which can be numbered, and considered with reference to before and after. But eternity is without succession or movement, and involves no aspects of before and after. Besides time and eternity there is a duration called eviternity that we ascribe to spiritual creatures (souls, angels) which have had a beginning but which have no substantial change and no ending.

 

[Servant19]

Thanks brother

Two thoughts come to mind:

1. I think the definitions of the word “essence” is different in the two theologies under review and,
2. Did you get to read this part?

"The attributes we ascribe to God fall in the Bahá’í texts (as well as in the Islamic tradition) into two categories: essential and active attributes.[11] But, whereas in the Islamic tradition, the two categories of attributes are clearly distinguished from each other, i.e. a Divine attribute is either essential or active, in the Bahá’í texts the same attribute can be viewed as essential (i.e. in its own reality) or as active (i.e. as ex-pressed in action), depending on the plane in which it is seen.[12]

The Bahá’í texts state moreover that we understand but a faint reflection of God’s active attributes in the world, and that we cannot understand anything at all of His essential at-tributes. In fact, Abdu'l-Bahá says that the essential names and attributes of God are identical with His Essence…’ and sets forth a concise, rational explanation of His statement:

God is absolutely preexistent, i.e. He is not preceded by a Cause', and therefore His is essential pre-existence’; moreover He is without beginning', and therefore He has also preexistence of time’…13

`If the attributes are not identical with the Essence, there must also be a multiplicity of preexistences’;[13]

`…as Preexistence is necessary (essential), therefore the sequence of preexistence would become infinite. This is an evident error.’

Inasmuch as Divine Essence and divine essential names and attributes are one and the same thing, it follows that:

God’s essential names and attributes are incomprehensible as well as His Essence.[14]

As the divine entity is eternal, the divine attributes are coexistent, coeternal'[15] and co-equal’[16] with and to Him.

`…His attributes are infinite.’

`…the names of God are actually and forever existent and not potential’,[17] otherwise God would be imperfect.

It is therefore possible to conceive a station where only God, Who is essentially preexistent and preexistent of time, exists, with His incomprehensible, coexistent, coeternal', co-equal’, infinite', actually… existing’ essential Names and Attributes.

Bahá’u’lláh alludes thus to such station: `He was a hidden treasure… This is a station that can never be described, not even alluded to’.[18]"

It’s very late here now, I’m off to sleep (or not lol) with all this on my mind!!!

Pray for me!!!

Lol

.

 

[Vouthon]

Is it not possible that this Divine Nature, the Eternal Logos, or the “First Mind” (from the Baha’i Writings) might not be eternally in union with the human souls of ALL the Messengers of God?

Dear brother Servant

Ah, so we hit another difference! This is an important one. The answer to your question is “no” from a Catholic perspective, because the soul of Jesus did not pre-exist the incarnation when he was conceived in Mary’s womb. His soul is and was a perfectly normal human soul that came into being when he was conceived of his mother, just as ours did. It was not the “soul” of Christ that pre-existed his birth but the Divine Person of the Eternal Son who “assumed” that human soul and nature in the incarnation.

You are making a mistake from our perspective in assuming that “Jesus”, as a person, is equivalent to his “soul” when Jesus is the Person of the Eternal Divine Son who assumed a created human soul in the incarnation.

Does this say that the Bab was lying to you, or that “other” souls may also have a union with the Eternal Logos?

No, I do not think that the Bab was lying, nor do I think Baha’u’llah was. I hope it reassures you to know this. While others may think so, my understanding of the divine plan leads me to see the work of the Holy Spirit in the Baha’i Faith. In the context in which they spoke and under the influence of the theology which they genuinely believed in and imbibed from Islam, I believe that they were sincere.

Yet the reason I do not consider the Bab to be a liar is that I do not think he is claiming what Jesus claimed. I think that both he and Baha’u’llah were wrong in considering Jesus to be of the same nature as themselves, however I think that this was a sincere error stemming from their Islamic upbringing for which they are in no way culpable.

Jesus, I believe, claimed nothing else but to be in His Divine Person the very Essence of God. Neither the Bab, nor Baha’u’llah claimed this. In fact Baha’u’llah explicitly dissociated himself from the Essence which is unfathomable.

When they claim to pre-exist their creation in time, neither is this in conflict with Catholic theology. It is a characteristic signifying mark of the highest mystical state of union with God.

Consider one of our holy mystics, Blessed Henry Suso:

“…Eternity is life that is beyond time but includes within itself all time but without a before or after.** And whoever is taken into the Eternal Nothing possesses all in all and has no ‘before or after’**. Indeed a person taken within today would not have been there for a shorter period from the point of view of eternity than someone who had been taken within a thousand years ago…Now these people who are taken within, because of their boundless immanent oneness with God, see themselves as always and eternally existing…”

- Blessed Henry Suso (c. 1296-1366), German Catholic mystic & Dominican priest (The Little Book of Truth). p320

Those blessed souls who partake in this life of the divine nature through grace, whom God elevates to Himself, “see themselves as always and eternally existing”, “without before or after”, even though they are creatures created in time. Why?

Because God knows us in Himself before creating us in time. According to the Catholic doctrine of exemplarism, God foresees from all eternity everything that he creates in time. He has an eternal idea of every human person according to which he creates them in time.

Frank Tobin gave a good description of this highly mystical doctrine in his introduction to his translation of Blessed Henry Suso’s “Exemplar”:

“…What then are creatures? In chapter 3 Suso replies by describing their twofold existence. In a sense they have existed eternally in God who is their Exemplar. They existed as ideas in the Divine Mind. Truth then states the startling but inevitable conclusion that follows from the eternal existence of creatures, “All creatures in God are God”…One is to become free of oneself as one was before one “flowed out” from God. In other words, the mystical goal to be striven for is described in terms of a return to the way of existing one enjoyed when one was nothing else but an idea in the Mind of God. This return to God, or breakthrough, is viewed as superior to one’s flowing out into independent creaturely existence…”

James A Wisemann, a scholar of Blessed Ruysbroeck’s writings, notes:

“…As regards Ruusbroec’s expressions about a mystic’s felt oneness with God, this background of exemplarism means that it is not really a matter of attaining such union for the first time, but returning to a oneness that was ours primordially…”

The Rhineland school of Catholic mysticism, to which Ruysbroeck belonged, taught that human beings pre-exist in God’s mind in the form of ideas and believed that the goal of life was the return of the created spirit into God; the re-union of our creaturely being in time with our uncreated ‘idea’ as known within the mind of the Godhead from all eternity.

I believe that the Bab and Baha’u’llah, when they claimed to pre-exist and be “God” yet not in essence, were saying much the same thing as Blessed Henry who had experienced the same.

Consider: Is there anything different between St. Catherine of Genoa’s “My me is God” and the Bab’s statement? Yet neither of these persons claimed identity with the Divine Essence. It is this that Catholics believe Jesus did.

What I present here, brother Servant, is my honest and heartfelt understanding from a Catholic perspective. I hope that you read it in the good faith in which it is intended to be put forward, even where you may consider me to be in error.

 

[Vouthon]

Thanks brother

It’s very late here now, I’m off to sleep (or not lol) with all this on my mind!!!

Pray for me!!!

Lol

.

Wow! I forget you live in Australia I certainly don’t want your sleep disturbed by deep, complex theological debates that go back centuries. We can continue discussing this tomorrow if you would like? I will read the section above.

 

[Vouthon]

Thanks brother

Two thoughts come to mind:

1. I think the definitions of the word “essence” is different in the two theologies under review and
   .

Could you perhaps, when time allows, provide us with a definition of the “essence” according to the Baha’i Faith? That would be very helpful.

Here are some definitions from Catholic sources:

St. Gregory Nazianzus, Doctor of the Church, (c. 380 A.D.)

“…What God is in nature and essence no man has ever yet discovered nor can discover. He has neither beginning nor will He have an end. He is like some great sea of Being, limitless and unbounded, transcending every conception of time and nature. Only His shadow falls across the mind, and even that but dimly and obscurely, as shadow produced not by what He truly is, but only by the things around Him, partial images gathered from here and there and assembled into one, some sort of presentation of the truth, but which flees before it is grasped and escapes before it is conceived…”

Arnobius of Sicca, Early Church Father, (d. c. 327)

Whatever you would say of God, whatever thought you might conceive about Him in the silence of your mind, it misses the mark and is corrupted in expression; nor can it have the note of proper signification, since it is expressed in our terms, which are adapted to human transactions. There is only one thing about the nature of God which man can most certainly understand: you must know and realize that nothing about Him can be brought out with mortal speech

St. John Chrysostom, Early Church Father, (c. 345 - 407)

Why does John say, “No one has ever seen God?” So that you might learn that He is speaking about the perfect comprehension of God and about the precise knowledge of Him. **For that all those incidents were condescensions and that none of those persons saw the pure essence of God is clear enough from the differences of what each did see . . . they all saw different shapes . . . no one can know God in an utterly perfect manner, as to His essence **. . . they were not able to have a clear knowledge and an accurate comprehension of Him, nor did they dare to gaze intently upon His pure and perfect essence, nor even upon this condescension. For to gaze intently is to know.

Dionysius, ecclesiastical writer & mystical theologian, (sixth century AD)

“…Deity above all essence, knowledge and goodness; Guide of Christians to Divine Wisdom; direct our path to the ultimate summit of your mystical knowledge, most incomprehensible, most luminous and most exalted, where the pure, absolute and immutable mysteries of theology are veiled in the dazzling obscurity of the secret Silence, outshining all brilliance with the intensity of their Darkness, and surcharging our blinded intellects with the utterly impalpable and invisible fairness of glories surpassing all beauty…”

(The Mystical Theology: Dionysius the Areopagite: Mystical Theology)

catholicculture.org/culture/library/dictionary/index.cfm?id=33757

God

The one absolutely and infinitely perfect spirit who is the Creator of all. In the definition of the First Vatican Council, fifteen internal attributes of God are affirmed, besides his role as Creator of the universe: “The holy, Catholic, apostolic Roman Church believes and professes that there is one true, living God, the Creator and Lord of heaven and earth. He is almighty, eternal, beyond measure, incomprehensible, and infinite in intellect, will and in every perfection. Since He is one unique spiritual substance, entirely simple and unchangeable, He must be declared really and essentially distinct from the world, perfectly happy in Himself and by his very nature, and inexpressibly exalted over all things that exist or can be conceived other than Himself” (Denzinger 3001).

Reflecting on the nature of God, theology has variously identified what may be called his metaphysical essence, i.e., what is God. It is commonly said to be his self-subsistence. God is Being Itself. In God essence and existence coincide. He is the Being who cannot not exist. God alone must be. All other beings exist only because of the will of God.

newadvent.org/cathen/05543b.htm

The Supreme Being has — or rather is — a unique and utterly simple essence, free from all composition, whether physical or metaphysical. Moreover, in God — otherwise, as we shall see, than in creatures — there is no distinction of any kind between His essence and His existence. Spiritual created beings, however, as free from the composition of matter and form, have physically simple essences; yet they are composite in that their essences are the result of a union of genus and differentia, and are not identical with their existence.

 

[Vouthon]

Here are a list of some of our key “de fide” (infallible) doctrines that you may also find interesting in this respect (also some non-de fide ones):

catholictreasury.info/trinity.php

The Nature of God

Our natural knowledge of God in this world is not an immediate, intuitive cognition, but a mediate, abstractive knowledge, because it is attained through the knowledge of creatures. (Sent. certa.)
Our knowledge of God here below is not proper (cognition propria) but analogical (cognition analoga or analogica). (Sent. certa.
The Blessed in Heaven possess an immediate intuitive knowledge of the Divine Essence. (De Fide)
The Immediate Vision of God transcends the natural power of cognition of the human soul, and is therefore supernatural. (De Fide)
The soul, for the Immediate Vision of God, requires the Light of Glory. (De Fide D 475.)
God’s Essence is also incomprehensible to the blessed in Heaven. (De Fide)

The Attributes or Qualities of God

The Divine Attributes are really identical among themselves and with the Divine Essence. (De Fide)
God is absolutely perfect. (De Fide)
God is actually infinite in every perfection. (De Fide)
God is absolutely simple. (De Fide)
There is only One God. (De Fide)
The One God is, in the ontological sense, The True God. (De Fide)
God is absolute Veracity. (De Fide)
God is absolutely faithful. (De Fide)
God is absolute ontological Goodness in Himself and in relation to others. (De Fide)
God is absolute Benignity. (De Fide) D 1782.
God is absolutely immutable. (De Fide)
God is eternal. (De Fide)
God is immense or absolutely immeasurable. (De Fide)
God is everywhere present in created space. (De Fide)
God’s Knowledge is Infinite. (De Fide)
God knows all that is merely possible by the knowledge of simple intelligence (scientia simplicis intelligentiae). (De Fide)
God knows all real things in the past, the present and the future. (scientia visionis). (De Fide)
By the knowledge of vision (scientia visionis) God also foresees the future free acts of the rational creatures with infallible certainty. (De Fide)
God also knows the conditioned future free actions with infallible certainty (scientia futuribilium). (Sent. communis)
God’s Divine Will is Infinite. (De Fide)
God loves Himself of necessity, but loves and wills the creation of extra-Divine things, on the other hand, with freedom. (De Fide)
God is almighty. (De Fide)
God is the Lord of the heavens and of the earth. (De Fide)
God is infinitely just. (De Fide)
God is infinitely merciful. (De Fide)

 

[daler]

Hello Daler

Thank you for your post.

Here is how the Catechism of the Catholic Church explains the “forty days” significance in the lives of Moses and Jesus:

We therefore see the Old Testament narrative of the wandering of the Jews for 40 years as a corporeal foreshadowing of a spiritual truth later unveiled in Christ’s life, through his 40 days and nights in the desert.

I understand that you are relating this to Baha’u’llah in a similar respect?

Vouthon,
Thank you so very much for this helpful insight. You see, I have a certain fascination with the symbolism inherent in the various Scriptures, seeking the hidden meaning as though peering into a rosebud which has yet to blossom, wondering what color will the petals be, what fragrance, etc.
Then, when the bud blooms, we can examine the pattern which has emerged, study it in comparison with its history, and draw from it certain conclusions. Call it the Fibonacci Code… the patterns of which are present in all things.
So from the Baha’i perspective, we view this present Rose as being the One alluded to in the various past prophetic utterances and events which hold promise and foretell things to come (from their specific time period). Hence, such things as these numerical parallels hold significance.
Another one for me is the significance of the 7 days in the week, the 7 times prophecy of Moses to the children of Israel, and the 7 “half-times” given to us by Daniel (time, times, and a half). It is as though God has instilled these numbers into our conscious minds and our cultural cadences to so familiarize us with a certain tempo that we might recognize when these events unfold, yet they remain hidden (in plain sight) before the eyes of men who do not perceive their significance.
This divine countdown, 7 times, 7 half-times, 0 … resets a new clock, folding up that which was a prelude, and establishing a new order, complete with a new calendar enumerating it. The basis of the 7 times of 360 years, that being 2520 years, is interpreted as having begun at the low watermark of Jewish events under Manasseh when he was carried away to Babylon in 677 BC. 2520 - 677 being 1843 (plus 1 accounting for no “year zero”) equalling 1844 AD, the year of the Bab’s declaration.
As the Baha’is independently concur with the conclusion of the Adventists concerning the 2300 days (years) of Daniel initiating in 457 BC, the result is again 1844, as 2300 minus 457 (plus 1 accounting for no “year zero”) is concurrent, and confirmed by Christ’s crucifixion after 70 weeks (of years), or 490 years after 457 BC. The clincher then for me (or one of them) is that 1260 AH coincides with 1844 AD, which number is mentioned in various forms throughout both Daniel and Revelation, as 1260 specifically, 42 months (42 X 30 = 1260, 3 1/2 times, and 3 1/2 days (3.5 X 360 = 1260).
So you see my fascination with numbers, eh? Then combined with Elam as the place of Daniel’s vision and Jeremiah’s prophecy of “The Lord shall set His throne in Elam”, it just keeps getting better and better…

I hope I am not imposing upon you in my sharing, as I do respect your learning and perspective, and your willingness to contribute to these dialogues in such a spirit of courtesy and good-will.

God bless,
Dale
.

 

[Techno2000]

Dear brother Servant

Ah, so we hit another difference! This is an important one. The answer to your question is “no” from a Catholic perspective, because the soul of Jesus did not pre-exist the incarnation when he was conceived in Mary’s womb. His soul is and was a perfectly normal human soul that came into being when he was conceived of his mother, just as ours did. It was not the “soul” of Christ that pre-existed his birth but the Divine Person of the Eternal Son who “assumed” that human soul and nature in the incarnation.

You are making a mistake from our perspective in assuming that “Jesus”, as a person, is equivalent to his “soul” when Jesus is the Person of the Eternal Divine Son who assumed a created human soul in the incarnation.

No, I do not think that the Bab was lying, nor do I think Baha’u’llah was. I hope it reassures you to know this. While others may think so, my understanding of the divine plan leads me to see the work of the Holy Spirit in the Baha’i Faith. In the context in which they spoke and under the influence of the theology which they genuinely believed in and imbibed from Islam, I believe that they were sincere.

Yet the reason I do not consider the Bab to be a liar is that I do not think he is claiming what Jesus claimed. I think that both he and Baha’u’llah were wrong in considering Jesus to be of the same nature as themselves, however I think that this was a sincere error stemming from their Islamic upbringing for which they are in no way culpable.

Jesus, I believe, claimed nothing else but to be in His Divine Person the very Essence of God. Neither the Bab, nor Baha’u’llah claimed this. In fact Baha’u’llah explicitly dissociated himself from the Essence which is unfathomable.

When they claim to pre-exist their creation in time, neither is this in conflict with Catholic theology. It is a characteristic signifying mark of the highest mystical state of union with God.

Consider one of our holy mystics, Blessed Henry Suso:

Those blessed souls who partake in this life of the divine nature through grace, whom God elevates to Himself, “see themselves as always and eternally existing”, “without before or after”, even though they are creatures created in time. Why?

Because God knows us in Himself before creating us in time. According to the Catholic doctrine of exemplarism, God foresees from all eternity everything that he creates in time. He has an eternal idea of every human person according to which he creates them in time.

Frank Tobin gave a good description of this highly mystical doctrine in his introduction to his translation of Blessed Henry Suso’s “Exemplar”:

James A Wisemann, a scholar of Blessed Ruysbroeck’s writings, notes:

The Rhineland school of Catholic mysticism, to which Ruysbroeck belonged, taught that human beings pre-exist in God’s mind in the form of ideas and believed that the goal of life was the return of the created spirit into God; the re-union of our creaturely being in time with our uncreated ‘idea’ as known within the mind of the Godhead from all eternity.

I believe that the Bab and Baha’u’llah, when they claimed to pre-exist and be “God” yet not in essence, were saying much the same thing as Blessed Henry who had experienced the same.

Consider: Is there anything different between St. Catherine of Genoa’s “My me is God” and the Bab’s statement? Yet neither of these persons claimed identity with the Divine Essence. It is this that Catholics believe Jesus did.

What I present here, brother Servant, is my honest and heartfelt understanding from a Catholic perspective. I hope that you read it in the good faith in which it is intended to be put forward, even where you may consider me to be in error.

Hi Vouthon thank you for this (Consider one of our holy mystics, Blessed Henry Suso) I never heard of him before you got any more. catholictreasury.info/books/eternal_wisdom/ew3.php

 

[Servant19]

Could you perhaps, when time allows, provide us with a definition of the “essence” according to the Baha’i Faith? That would be very helpful.

Here are some definitions from Catholic sources:

catholicculture.org/culture/library/dictionary/index.cfm?id=33757

newadvent.org/cathen/05543b.htm

Thank you for all these Catholic sources brother

On what authority do these individuals speak, and by what determinants are you putting forward to ascertain that they speak the truth?

Thank you again dear friend

.

 

[Vouthon]

Thank you for all these Catholic sources brother

On what authority do these individuals speak, and by what determinants are you putting forward to ascertain that they speak the truth?

Thank you again dear friend

.

That God is incomprehensible in His essence is a de fide (infallible) doctrine of the Catholic Faith. See:

jloughnan.tripod.com/dogma.htm

God’s Nature is incomprehensible to men. (De fide.)

God’s Essence is also incomprehensible to the blessed in Heaven. (De fide.)

In God there are Three Persons, the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. Each of the Three Persons possesses the one (numerical) Divine Essence. (De fide.)

The ECFs (Early Church Fathers) are an important reference point. Particularly where they agree on matters pertaining to doctrine, they are witnesses to Sacred Tradition which for us is not tradition of men (ie customs, rituals) but rather the living word of God acting through the Church. I believe that they speak the truth because, firstly, most of them were bishops and therefore in our understanding the successors of the apostles, protected by the charism of truth. Secondly, they were among the greatest theologians of their period, most of them canonized (save Pseudo-Dionysius because he wrote anonymously) and many were later recognised as Doctors of the Church. The Mystical Theology by Dionysius the Areopagite is considered the foundational text of Catholic apophatic mysticism and was used as a significant source of almost quasi-apostolic authority by the medieval Church, for example the scholastics.

I will add here for you another source, the confession of faith from the Fourth Lateran Council 1215:

We firmly believe and simply confess that there is only one true God, eternal and immeasurable, almighty, unchangeable, incomprehensible and ineffable, Father, Son and holy Spirit, three persons but one absolutely simple essence, substance or nature {1} . The Father is from none, the Son from the Father alone, and the holy Spirit from both equally, eternally without beginning or end; the Father generating, the Son being born, and the holy Spirit proceeding; consubstantial and coequal, co-omnipotent and coeternal; one principle of all things, creator of all things invisible and visible, spiritual and corporeal; who by his almighty power at the beginning of time created from nothing both spiritual and corporeal creatures

Ludwig Ott’s compilation of church doctrine is a generally valid and useful source for understanding what are the dogmas of the Catholic Faith. I thought it might be a useful source for you in your discussion with Catholics, since we are have a great deal of extra-biblical sources for our beliefs that can be quite vast and confusing to some.

Unlike with a Protestant Christian, my reference point is not a single book (the Bible) but a vast corpus of literature written by magisterium approved doctrinal theologians spanning 2,000 years and who represent a living, breathing tradition guided by the Holy Spirit. That gives me a lot of information to potencially pool from

On the matter of God being in essence beyond human conception, all the Fathers of my faith were agreed. As were the later scholastics such as St. Thomas Aquinas, another Doctor of the Church and its greatest philosopher:

“…The ultimate reach of our knowledge of God consists in realizing that we do not know him. For then we grasp that what God is surpasses all we understand of Him…God eludes every conception of our intelligence, so that it cannot grasp him…We cannot give God a name that defines or includes or equals his essence since we do not know to that extent what God is…God eludes the conception of our intellect because he transcends all that our mind conceives of him….It is because human intelligence is not equal to the divine essence that this same divine essence surpasses our intelligence and is unknown to us: wherefore man reaches the highest point of his knowledge about God when he knows that he knows him not, inasmuch as he knows that that which is God transcends whatsoever he conceives of him…”

- Saint Thomas Aquinas (De Potentia VII, 5, ad 14), The Angelic Doctor

 

[tonyfish58]

What do you think about this:therealpresence.org/eucharst/mir/lanciano.html

Techno2000 - Sorry, I am not big on this type of event, I did not look at Miracles re proof of Faith

If one excepts these as proof of Faith then you would except all Prophets as they have all done and are the cause of miracles events!

The true Miracle is being Born Again

Gos bless your Faith in Christ - Regards Tony

 

[IgnatianPhilo]

Techno2000 - Sorry, I am not big on this type of event, I did not look at Miracles re proof of Faith

If one excepts these as proof of Faith then you would except all Prophets as they have all done and are the cause of miracles events!

The true Miracle is being Born Again

Gos bless your Faith in Christ - Regards Tony

Not really. What miracle did the Bab or Ali commit exactly that forces us to believe them?

 

[arthra]

Not really. What miracle did the Bab or Ali commit exactly that forces us to believe them?

Miracles are no longer used as “proofs” and no one “forces” you to accept the Bab or Baha’u’llah as acceptance is based on your own independent investigation of the truth…

 

[Techno2000]

Miracles are no longer used as “proofs” and no one “forces” you to accept the Bab or Baha’u’llah as acceptance is based on your own independent investigation of the truth…

So what tonyfish58 said isn’t true.

 

[tonyfish58]

So what tonyfish58 said isn’t true.

That is not correct. I said just because we do not use them as proof, does not mean they did not perform them.

Arthra has told you the Baha’i view of Miracles as a proof of Faith as I did in my post.

It is also Biblical as Christ also did no want this aspect of Faith to overtake His True Mission. When Christ performed a Miracle this is what He said;
**
“Jesus ordered the people not to tell anyone, but the more he kept ordering them, the more they kept spreading the news”.** Mark 7:36 International Standard Version

"Then Jesus said to him, “See that you don’t tell anyone. But go, show yourself to the priest and offer the gift Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.” Matthew 8:4 NIV

That is self explanatory is it not?

God Bless and Regards Tony

 

[Techno2000]

That is not correct. I said just because we do not use them as proof, does not mean they did not perform them.

Arthra has told you the Baha’i view of Miracles as a proof of Faith as I did in my post.

It is also Biblical as Christ also did no want this aspect of Faith to overtake His True Mission. When Christ performed a Miracle this is what He said;
**
“Jesus ordered the people not to tell anyone, but the more he kept ordering them, the more they kept spreading the news”.** Mark 7:36 International Standard Version

"Then Jesus said to him, “See that you don’t tell anyone. But go, show yourself to the priest and offer the gift Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.” Matthew 8:4 NIV

That is self explanatory is it not?

God Bless and Regards Tony

So you are saying Bab and Baha’u’llah did Miracles but kept them hidden from the people ?

 

[daler]

So you are saying Bab and Baha’u’llah did Miracles but kept them hidden from the people ?

. There have been miracles recorded, but even as Jesus said not to talk about them, so also did the Bab and Baha’u’llah say the same.

. The point which seems to be missed is this. That miracles are not to be regarded as proofs, for they are only proof to those to who were witness to them. After that, they become a kind of hearsay, a rumor reported amongst men, subject to alteration and magnification.

. The other aspect of this which seems to be lost is that of the true proofs, which are even as the fruits of a tree, which prove what kind of tree it is. The greatest proof of the Manifestations of God are not tricks and miracles, but Their verses which, when implanted in the hearts of men, suffer them to be changed into new creatures.

. By the power of the Words of God, as uttered by His Prophets and Messengers, humanity is set upon its true course, bares its potential fruit, and achieves spiritual victory.

. Even as Jesus said: “Ye must be born again”, so too did Baha’u’llah utter these words:

. “Whoso hath been reborn in this Day, shall never die; whoso remaineth dead, shall never live.” .

reference.bahai.org/en/t/b/TU/tu-3.html

.

 

[tonyfish58]

So you are saying Bab and Baha’u’llah did Miracles but kept them hidden from the people ?

Dale has supplied the answer to that question above

May I suggest you read about the life of Baha’u’llah - This link is to a story as written by Abdul’Baha.

bahaistories.blogspot.com.au/2010/07/story-of-bahaullah-told-by-abdul-baha.html

Regards Tony