"The Baha'i Faith"

[DavidMark]

If the culmination is in Jesus, what would be the need of another culmination after that? If there would be, the first one would not be a culmination at all/

Dear Lapell: Have you ever heard of this other Mark:
Mark 8:38 **Whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation; of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed, when he cometh in the **Glory of his Father with the holy angels.

**In My Name, which standeth supreme above all names!
Praise and glory beseem the Lord of Names and the Creator of the heavens,
He, the waves of Whose ocean of Revelation surge
before the eyes of the peoples of the world.
The Day-Star of His Cause shineth through every veil
and His Word of affirmation standeth beyond the reach of negation.
**
(Tarazat (Ornaments) Tablets of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 29)

We believe in Jesus, and the prophecies of Jesus. We believe Christ has returned in this Day in the same Spirit, but with th “new name” promised in Rev. 3:12. That Name is the Glory of God, (in Arabic) This is the Everlasting Father, promised a long time ago.

Please look at this website bahaullah.org/

 

[DavidMark]

My friend planten wrote:
David, this is an important post.
Please tell me in what year (exactly) Bahaullah died??
You can also tell me how he died and where he died?
Is there any shrine (tomb) of Bahaullah?

Sorry everything i say is bad to you.
I had thought you might want to see a picture
of the Shrine and get information on everything…

 

[DavidMark]

Bahá’u’lláh said the promises Christ made are fulfilled,
and that He was the return of the same Spirit;
and that all religions are being judged in this Day.
I read His Books and believed Him. Just like that!
Now, either He is a liar, a lunatic, or the LORD.
…so why equivocate?
If I accepted a liar, I’m pretty stupid, right?
But I investigated. Did you investigate,
or did you stick with what you were born into?
Would you respect a liar or worship a lunatic?
We know Christ wasn’t a lunatic by His life.
We know Bahá wasn’t a lunatic by His life.
I have found no lies in the Christ’s Gospel
or Bahá’u’lláh’s Book of Certitude etc.
Many places show the Christians worshipped Christ;
therefore I will worship with my whole heart
in this, the Day of His great Advent.

 

[Wahid_Azal]

My friend planten wrote:
David, this is an important post.
Please tell me in what year (exactly) Bahaullah died??
You can also tell me how he died and where he died?
Is there any shrine (tomb) of Bahaullah?

Sorry everything i say is bad to you.
I had thought you might want to see a picture
of the Shrine and get information on everything…

So are you running away now from the challenge you made to me to come here on the comments section of Mr Emtesali’s blog, trying to change the subject now? But since Sen McGlinn is here, a dubious individual directly on the payroll of the Baha’i Internet Agency, perhaps he would wish to debate me about your “profit” instead since obviously he cannot stifle or censor any discussion here as he has attempted to do elsewhere.

How about it, Sen. You finally ready to meet Lady destiny at my hands? What better place than a Catholic forum do it, eh?

Wahid

p.s. for DavidMark: dead people cannot be libeled. Only the living can. FYI

 

[NoWings]

So are you running away now from the challenge you made to me to come here on the comments section of Mr Emtesali’s blog, trying to change the subject now? But since Sen McGlinn is here, a dubious individual directly on the payroll of the Baha’i Internet Agency, perhaps he would wish to debate me about your “profit” instead since obviously he cannot stifle or censor any discussion here as he has attempted to do elsewhere.

How about it, Sen. You finally ready to meet Lady destiny at my hands? What better place than a Catholic forum do it, eh?

Wahid

p.s. for DavidMark: dead people cannot be libeled. Only the living can. FYI

Where is this mysterious blog that the challenge was issued?

EDIT Never mind. I found it.

 

[NoWings]

I have a question for Baha’is.

Why is it that Shoghi Effendi specifically called for twin pillars in the Baha’i system, namely the Guardianship and the House, yet the House continues on consuming both functions when it specifically states that BOTH pillars must be present?

I’ve asked this question before on other forums and was never given an adequate answer.

 

[Sen_McGlinn]

Why is it that Shoghi Effendi specifically called for twin pillars in the Baha’i system, namely the Guardianship and the House, yet the House continues on consuming both functions when it specifically states that BOTH pillars must be present?

First, I don’t think the House of Justice has stepped into the Guardian’s shoes. What happens rather is that new generations of Bahais who have never known the Guardianship are not aware of the difference between the two institutions, and they read the letters of the UHJ as if it was the voice of the Pope speaking ex cathedra on doctrine & morals. It’s reverential and usually well-meant, but fundamentally mistaken, and not what the Universal House of Justice intends.

In Shoghi Effendi’s vision the two institutions are distinct and complementary, and it is not possible for either to step into the shoes of the other. So when there was no House of Justice, the Guardian simply proceeded without legislating, and now we have to continue without the possibility of new authoritative interpretations of Bahai scripture.

There a section in Shoghi Effendi’s theological Summa, “The Dispensation of Baha’u’llah” where he says that the two institutions are complementary, not alternatives or substitutes:

“Each exercises, within the limitations imposed upon it, its powers, its authority, its rights and prerogatives. These are neither contradictory, nor detract in the slightest degree from the position which each of these institutions occupies. Far from being incompatible or mutually destructive, they supplement each other’s authority and functions, and are permanently and fundamentally united in their aims.”

Then the core sentence:

“Divorced from the institution of the Guardianship the World Order of Baha’u'llah would be mutilated and permanently deprived of that hereditary principle which, as ‘Abdu’l-Baha has written, has been invariably upheld by the Law of God….”

By “divorced” I think he is thinking of a forceable and artificial
separation, that is, if a version of the Bahai Faith were to be
constructed (eg by Mirza Ahmad Sohrab, in Shoghi Effendi’s day) without this institution, it would lack the hereditary principle. In that event, there would still be a theoretical hereditary element, since Abdu’l-Baha was the son of Baha’u’llah; but he says, without the Guardianship the Faith would be deprived of the hereditary principle, so he must mean, a *living exemplar *of the hereditary principle. This is just the hand that history has dealt us, and the deprivation is permanent. No way to fix it. But we – especially Americans with their anti-monarchial tradition – probably do not mourn the loss of the hereditrary element too much.

What follows is more serious :

“… Without such an institution the integrity of the Faith would be imperiled, and the stability of the entire fabric would be gravely endangered. Its prestige would suffer, the means required to enable it to take a long, an uninterrupted view over a series of generations would be completely lacking, and the necessary guidance to define the sphere of the legislative action of its elected representatives would be totally withdrawn.”

Integrity, stability, prestige and a long view are definite plusses that we do miss. But these ones are not entirely “lost” – because this sentence can be read to a certain extent as “If there had not been such an institution the integrity f the Faith would have been imperiled…” etc. If Abdu’l-Baha had died without the House of Justice elected and had not appointed the Guardian, it’s not hard to see that things would have gone very badly. However the Faith has suffered some of these negative effects through having one and one only Guardian: some prestige (no equivalent to the Aga Khan or Pope as a public figure), we’ve lost that element of the oral transmission of wisdom within the family. The Guardian has given us a lot of guidance about the sphere of legislative action that was not clear from the writings of Baha’u’llah and Abdu’l-Baha: his specifying that we must not “allow the machinery of
their administration to supersede the government of their respective
countries.” is priceless, to give one example.

So there we are: the Guardianship is no longer functioning. We have a great deal from the one Guardian we did have, and we can neither minimise the value of the Guardianship by saying nothing is lost, nor go to the other extreme and say that God’s plan has been completely frustrated by the end of the line after a single generation.

God’s will is not exhuasted by the “governor” model of providence (in theology-speak, gubernatorial providence). God is also described in the New Testament as one who reaps where he did not sow, which is to say, there is also redemptive providence, which opens every situation to a divine possibility. If gubernatorial providence was 100%, there would be no *** to redeem

Sen

 

[DavidMark]

It is Baha’u’llah Himself Who created the institution of the House of Justice, and provided for a Guardianship. Had He not done so, 'Abdu’l-Baha could not have designated a specific person to occupy that post. And as Sen has said, Shoghi Effendi had to proceed, setting up local and national assemblies, who would eventually elect the Universal House of Justice. When the Guardian died, there was no qualified person to succeed him.
A prophecy from the end of the book of Daniel, concerning the “1335 days” relates to the world-wide establishment of the Baha’i Faith, and culminates with the Guardian’s 10 year teaching crusade, which took news of the Faith to many countries, and concluded in 1963 with the first election of the Universal House of Justice.

YA BAHA 'UL ABHA!

 

[NoWings]

First, I don’t think the House of Justice has stepped into the Guardian’s shoes. What happens rather is that new generations of Bahais who have never known the Guardianship are not aware of the difference between the two institutions, and they read the letters of the UHJ as if it was the voice of the Pope speaking ex cathedra on doctrine & morals. It’s reverential and usually well-meant, but fundamentally mistaken, and not what the Universal House of Justice intends.

Isn’t that the whole point of having the UHJ? So there can be infallible rulings and whatnot? I thought that was the point of the organization in the first place.

 

[Sen_McGlinn]

Isn’t that the whole point of having the UHJ? So there can be infallible rulings and whatnot? I thought that was the point of the organization in the first place.

That’s the point (or part of it), of both the UHJ and the Guardianship, but they each have their own sphere. The UHJ can make and change Bahai canon law, the religious law that governs the Bahai community, and it can also take the laws in scriputre and cast them into a codified form that is practical to administer (a Qanun). The Guardian - not the UHJ - rules on questions of faith and doctrine, on the interpretation of scripture. This separation of the two spheres is comparable to the separation of the judiciary, legislative and executive in Montesquieu’s theory of government. It is so far as I know unique in religious history: usually the head of a religious community determines its doctrine, but not in the Bahai case. The Head of the Bahai Community is the Universal House of Justice, but doctrine is what is stated in the Bahai scriptures and the interpretations given to us by Abdu’l-Baha and Shoghi Effendi. Liturgy is a third sphere that I won’t go into, suffice to say that the UHJ also does not determine how we say our prayers or run our devotional meetings, although it can call attention to things that should not occur in any Bahai meeting.

Because this model is so new, Bahais tend to import models of religious leadership from other religions, where the leaders do have an absolute mandate. Give us time, we are trying something new here.

The Bahai ecclessiology is to Catholic church (for example) what constitutional government is to absolute monarchy. It formalises in separate institutions, 3 functions that a wise leader recognises are separate.

~~Sen McGlinn

 

[arthra]

A helpful statement can be found in the Preamble of the Constitution of the Universal House of Justice itself I believe:

*To enact laws and ordinances not expressly recorded in the Sacred Texts; *

*to abrogate, according to the changes and requirements of the time, its own enactments; *

*to deliberate and decide upon all problems which have caused difference; *

*to elucidate questions that are obscure; *

*to safeguard the personal rights, freedom and initiative of individuals; *

*and to give attention to the preservation of human honour, to the development of countries and the stability of states:
*
Source:

*bahai-library.com/?file=uhj_constitution.html
*

 

[NoWings]

That’s the point (or part of it), of both the UHJ and the Guardianship, but they each have their own sphere. The UHJ can make and change Bahai canon law, the religious law that governs the Bahai community, and it can also take the laws in scriputre and cast them into a codified form that is practical to administer (a Qanun). The Guardian - not the UHJ - rules on questions of faith and doctrine, on the interpretation of scripture. This separation of the two spheres is comparable to the separation of the judiciary, legislative and executive in Montesquieu’s theory of government. It is so far as I know unique in religious history: usually the head of a religious community determines its doctrine, but not in the Bahai case. The Head of the Bahai Community is the Universal House of Justice, but doctrine is what is stated in the Bahai scriptures and the interpretations given to us by Abdu’l-Baha and Shoghi Effendi. Liturgy is a third sphere that I won’t go into, suffice to say that the UHJ also does not determine how we say our prayers or run our devotional meetings, although it can call attention to things that should not occur in any Bahai meeting.

Because this model is so new, Bahais tend to import models of religious leadership from other religions, where the leaders do have an absolute mandate. Give us time, we are trying something new here.

The Bahai ecclessiology is to Catholic church (for example) what constitutional government is to absolute monarchy. It formalises in separate institutions, 3 functions that a wise leader recognises are separate.

~~Sen McGlinn

Well, that sounds good on paper, but in practice the entire concept is flawed and imbalanced with the absence of Guardianship.

If Congress or the Judicial branch were to just up and disappear, I don’t think the model as a whole would work.

This model, intended on two twin offices, is now flawed with the absence of one.

I have a separate question. Can the UHJ elect a new Guardian?

 

[DavidMark]

NoWings, the way the lovers of Baha’u’llah (and the Bab, and Abdu’l-Baha the Center of the Covenant, and the Guardian and the House of Justice), perceive this is something blossoming exactly the way God wants it to, not the critics. The same tremendous forces which were the genesis of other faiths, will carry this one on to its destined crescendo.

God is the only Absolute. This System is mighty enough to sustain mankind into the future, far better than anything else. Baha’u’llah provided for exigencies, contingenices and extenuating circumstances. The Hands of the Cause is another critical Institution that facilitated the birth of the House of Justice.
The House will continue to refer to everything the Guardian did or said; and before long we will see the Cause come out of obscurity and attract greater numbers, as well as the hostility of the unbelieving world, which has, until now been pretty much indifferent.

Nothing has stopped it yet, and nothing will, because it is a combination of metaphysical and physical forces. It is not a man-made system, but the promised Theophany stirring in the world. To me, this is intimately interwoven with the very life of humanity, spiritual and terrestrial. Were it not for this Cause, our chances are bleak; as if a great meteor was aimed right at us; as it is, we have a Defender, the Lord of Hosts, the Holy One of Israel, which is why Moses took his shoes off on the way in!
If I seem zealous, it is because luke-warm will not do.

 

[Wahid_Azal]

Well, that sounds good on paper, but in practice the entire concept is flawed and imbalanced with the absence of Guardianship.

If Congress or the Judicial branch were to just up and disappear, I don’t think the model as a whole would work.

This model, intended on two twin offices, is now flawed with the absence of one.

I have a separate question. Can the UHJ elect a new Guardian?

Sen McGlinn is a typical liberal Bahai obscurantist pseudo-intellectual and apologist, so you aren’t going to get any straight answers from him. The theoretical answer is, no, the uhj has no power to elect another (Haifan) Baha’i guardian since the position is supposed to be hereditary. However there are other Bahai schismatic groups who recognize guardians of their own, one of whom appears to be on the verge of electing its own uhj: i.e. the Baha’is Under the Provisions of the Covenant which is currently under the disputed leadership of one Neal Chase. They are a bit weird this BUPC, and there are rumors that David Koresh (of the Branch Davidians, i.e. the Waco cult) was very briefly connected with their former leader Leland Jensen, but here is one of their websites:
http://www.bupc.org/

Here’s a website dealing with the various Bahai sects (all of whom are antagonistic towards each other):
sectsofbahais.com/

There’s one serious error with its classifications, however; and that is, it identifies the Bayanis as a Baha’i sect. The Bayanis have nothing to do with Baha’ism whatsoever and do not even recognize the legitimacy of Bahaism or its claims. Likewise to place the Shaykhi school as the parent creed of the greater Babi movement is also misleading since the Shakhis are technically orthodox Twelver Shi’ite Muslims.

Wahid

 

[Wahid_Azal]

Nothing has stopped it yet,.

Nothing has proven any of its claims or prophecies true yet either, like the nonsense about the Lessor Peace by the year 2000 which none of you seem to be wanting to talk about anymore. The fact is that the Haifan Bahai organization serves a useful tool to certain Western neo-colonialist/globalist agendas in the Middle East, South America and South-Asia. So long as this agenda serves a purpose, the Haifan Bahai organization will exist. On the day when it ceases to serve that purpose, or when the existence of the state of Israel no longer remains viable (which is a virtual inevitability), the fortunes of the Haifan Bahai organization will completely evaporate as well. Other Baha’i organizations will certainly continue to exist, like the various Orthodox Bahai groups, but the power and influence of the dominant Haifan clique will cease.

Furthemore, once the Islamist/Khomeinst regime in Iran finally ceases to be as well the fortunes of Baha’ism will also decline there. The reason for this is that Khomeini and the so-called Islamic Revolution and its Islamic Republic have done an invaluable service for the global agenda of the Haifan Bahai organization, especially in North America and Western Europe. When that excuse no longer exists, and Iran is hopefully secularized at such point (with the clerics sent packing back to the seminaries and the mosques where they belong), the vast majority of Iranians will turn to either agnosticism, Zoroastrianism or the various long-established forms of alternative spirituality, such as Sufism. Even various forms of Christianity have a future in a post-Islamic Republic Iran. Bahaism does not because its form of religious Stalinism does not appeal to the sensibilities of contemporary Iranians over-sensitized over the past 30 years by despotic religious absolutism in any shape or form.

Wahid

 

[arthra]

“no wings”… Thanks for your questions!

NoWings wrote:

Well, that sounds good on paper, but in practice the entire concept is flawed and imbalanced with the absence of Guardianship.

My reply:

*Actually “no wings”… You may not know this but the Guardianship as an Institution of our Faith continues… Yes the last living Guardian was Shoghi Effendi… but his interpretations and perspectives on the Faith are still respected and abided by even though there is no “living” Guardian. Before the House of Justice makes a decision the research on the subject as to the Guardian’s position is studied, this is then a factor in any decision made by the House… *
**
*Where the Guardian or Abdul-Baha has not made any decision or pronouncement the House is free to make a decision or judgement on it’s own for the Baha’is… that’s how it works as I see it… *

If Congress or the Judicial branch were to just up and disappear, I don’t think the model as a whole would work.

My reply:

*The Baha’is Administration though is not based on the model of the United States government. It is rather based on the Kitab-i-Aqdas and the Will and Testament of Abdul-Baha as well as the interpretations of Abdul-Baha and the Guardian… *

This model, intended on two twin offices, is now flawed with the absence of one.

See above…

I have a separate question. Can the UHJ elect a new Guardian?

My response:

This question interestingly has of course been explored soon after the passing of the Guardian and the answer is “no”… The House cannot elect a Guardian. Only the Guardian can designate a successor and Shoghi Effendi left no Will.

*- Art *

 

[NoWings]

There is no harm in any affliction which befalleth thee in the love of El-Baha, for this affliction is a gem which glistens and shines on the crown of guidance which adorns thy head among the maid-servants. Remember the hardships of the disciples, and what Mary, the Virgin; Mary, the Magdalene; and Mary, the mother of Jesus, bore in the path of God; especially Barbara, until she was martyred in the love of Christ; and she being attracted unto the Kingdom of God, her spirit soared unto the summits of holiness in the paradise of eternal life, in the place of Meeting.

(Abdu’l-Baha, Tablets of Abdu’l-Baha v2, p. 261)

Was re-reading the thread and the bolded parts caught my attention.

Is this to mean that Mary the Virgin and Mary the Mother of Jesus are two different people, or that Abdul Baha believed that the Magdalen was Jesus’ mother?

Or did he, for some reason, decide to stick the Magdalen between two descriptors for the same person?

 

[NoWings]

Baha’is Under the Provisions of the Covenant

Wow. Those are the Remey guys. Their website is filled with doomsday predictions and quirky stuff.

What is the Baha’i response to Remey’s claims of Guardianship through adoption by Abdul-Baha? The logic they use is fairly sound.

 

[Wahid_Azal]

Wow. Those are the Remey guys.

One of them. There are presently several Remey sects. There’s the predominant Marangellist Remeyite sect whose guardian is Joel Maragella. Then you have the Soghomonian sect, the Tarbiyyat Baha’is, and the BUPC, etc.

Their website is filled with doomsday predictions and quirky stuff.

Indeed. Don’t say I didn’t warn you

What is the Baha’i response to Remey’s claims of Guardianship through adoption by Abdul-Baha? The logic they use is fairly sound.

Actually it isn’t because the implied language of primogeniture in the will and testament of Abbas Effendi Abdul-Baha is pretty straightforward indicating a successor who must hail from amongst a direct hereditary member of the family.

Wahid

 

[NoWings]

Actually it isn’t because the implied language of primogeniture in the will and testament of Abbas Effendi Abdul-Baha is pretty straightforward indicating a successor who must hail from amongst a direct hereditary member of the family.

Wahid

Fair enough, but if it’s that simple to refute, then why is there a 30-mile long post with that as its foundation? Are they just… quirky?