Baha’i Rants

The following is my commentary on a recently published paper titled: “Marginality and Apostasy in the Baha’i Community” - by the Baha’i theologian, Dr. Moojan Momen.

Let me make a crystal clear distinction here: I do not agree with Momen, his assertions nor his conclusions. In fact I strongly disagree with pretty much everything he says in this paper. However, I have nothing personal against him, and unlike him, I do not cast aspersions on his faith in Baha’u'llah nor his sincerity as a Baha’i.

I was going to leave this paper in the hands of others and have them take it away in due time (much like garbage at the curb). But I came to the realization that merely ignoring it won’t do anyone any good. If Momen is sincere in his attempts to be a Baha’i theologian, then he would welcome feedback. Even if it is negative.

“Research”
Momen did his “research” (to find out why it is in quotes keep reading) in the summer of 2006. Which means that he potentially could have run into Baha’i Rants. I don’t know if this blog never made it into his paper because he didn’t find it or because he found it and chose not to categorize me as an “apostate”. It doesn’t really matter because thanks to Momen, now other Baha’is are using his lexicon to sling mud at me and categorize me on Momen’s behalf.

Perhaps Momen is ignorant of the consequence of introducing such a lexicon. He has in effect handed every pretentious and self-righteous Baha’i, carte-blanche to engage in calumny and backbiting against a fellow Baha’i, by providing them with the thin camouflage of academic legitimacy.

As I mentioned in Reflections on 3 years of blogging, this is already in full swing.

Apparently someone (or two someones) out there pointed out to the fellow Baha’i blogger (George Dannells) that I was an enrolled Baha’i in good standing, which would mean that I can’t be an “apostate” - at least according to the definition that Momen uses. George loves to censor any and all comments that don’t agree with him so he promptly erased the two comments regarding my blog’s categorization.

But that wasn’t enough for George, to prove that he is right, he wrote:

This post may seem totally arcane and unnecessary to most Baha’i Views readers, to whom I apologize. The following excerpts are intended as a response to Anonymous 1 and Anonymous 2, whose comments I have deleted on the previous “Google 100″ post. They questioned my conclusion that the blog bahairants could be identified as an apostate site. It is my impression that apostate narratives, mythology, and issues constitute the vast majority of its content, so the label seems appropriate. The fact that the blogger claims to be a Baha’i in good standing is irrelevant.

I’m not mentioning this to highlight a minor Baha’i blogger in a huff but rather to point out the real and immediate consequences of Momen’s abominable paper.

George Dannells doesn’t really care that I haven’t left the Faith nor that I do not intend to. He doesn’t want to wait or think it is necessary. As George says, it is “irrelevant”. Which is strange since he jumps at the chance to call me an “apostate” but doesn’t mind that I do not fulfill the requirements. Since George is an intelligent fellow, the only obvious conclusion is that he is doing so out of spite and malice.

My personal choice is to do my utmost to see such attacks, insults and perversions as a Baha’i should. Which means that I welcome them with open arms and only retaliate with love and compassion. This isn’t easy because I’m no saint. But it is my duty since my Beloved instructs me to do this.

But questions nag at me: do we really want to go down this path of name calling and “categorization”? does such behavior, even couched in academic jargon, help or hinder the Faith?

I’ll leave you to ponder that.

The danger of such wrong ideas is that (as George has demonstrated) people within the Faith are all too ready to accept them as truth. Just as the Republican strategist Karl Rove has demonstrated, if you repeat a lie a few times, soon enough, there are ample fools to believe it as truth. And all it takes is for no one to stand up to set things right.

Read For Yourself
Since I’ll be referring to Momen’s paper, here it is. You know, for your own individual investigation of truth purposes.

Although Momen provides some real full names of people, he also uses letters (AA, BB, CC, etc.) to name those he labels as “apostates”. However, since he provides background information on these unnamed “apostates”, it is very easy to identify them.

This paper is so riddled with factual errors that it is not sporting to write a full critique. That, and the fact that such an exercise would be a monumentally boring undertaking, stops me from doing so. What you will find here is more of a rant or a meandering stroll inside Momen’s paper.

The most devastating and fundamental error that Momen makes is to insist on lumping 12 people with absolutely nothing in common with each other. Unfortunately Momen didn’t bother to do one iota of real research or he would have tossed out the idea of categorizing someone like say, Alison Marshall - who is, in her own words “in love with Baha’u'llah”, and who was booted out unceremoniously by the UHJ - with someone like, say, Eric Stetson who has left the Baha’i Faith of his own accord, holds it in low regard and is now a devout Christian.

Momen writes:

The apostates described here, whatever their differences, share an obsessive hatred of their former religious community.

Obsessive hatred? This is so out of left field that I am speechless (almost).

Does Juan Cole have an “obsessive hatred” of the Baha’i Faith? To anyone who has followed his activities since his resignation it is clear that Juan is doing just fine and has not done or said anything remotely related to the topics that were discussed on Talisman. If he even refers to the Baha’i Faith nowadays it is in passing within his writings about the Middle East, current events and other work he is engaged in.

What about Denis MacEoin? Does he harbor “obsessive hatred” towards the Baha’i Faith? Again, not even close. He has left behind all work and scholarship related to the Faith to become a quite successful fiction writer under the pen name, Daniel Easterman. As far as I know he has not said a peep about the Faith nor done anything related to it since his resignation.

I’ll let K. Paul Johnson, another “apostate”, clarify in his own words in this letter to the editors of Religion (where Momen’s screed was published):

Dear Editors:

In “Marginality and Apostasy in the Baha’i Community,” Moojan Momen names me first among a list of alleged Baha’i apostates. In three sentences he misrepresents me on four crucial points:

“Johnson, a librarian, had been a Baha’i for five years (1969-1974) and could be called a serial apostate (1) since he then became a theosophist and subsequently wrote a book ‘debunking’ Blavatsky. (2) He has now moved on to Edgar Cayce’s Association for Research and Enlightenment. (3) He was active on the Talisman list as an ex-Baha’i, attacking core Baha’i beliefs (4) and publishing an article about the Talisman episode in Gnosis magazine.”

1. I was never a Baha’i apostate by Momen’s definition, resigning as a member at the age of 20 but remaining in friendly relations with Baha’is for many years thereafter. My Talisman membership in the mid-1990s was motivated primarily by the fact that I was writing a book at the time that addressed Baha’i history, and the discussion list provided access to the leading scholars in the field. Several Baha’i members of the list read relevant sections of my manuscript and made helpful suggestions; these included Robert Stockman of the National Baha’i Center and Christopher Buck, both now cited as sources by Momen, as well as Juan Cole, now named as an apostate. Since the book, Initiates of Theosophical Masters, was published in 1995 no Baha’i has ever to my knowledge suggested in any way that it was unfriendly to the Baha’i community. Far from angrily rejecting my Baha’i “spiritual past,” I embraced it in that book and in my dealings with Baha’is at the time.

2. The statement that I became a theosophist and subsequently wrote a book debunking Blavatsky is misleading in three ways. I wrote three books about Blavatsky, all while an active theosophist with substantial support from fellow theosophists. The research on which they were based was shared in a collegial atmosphere over a ten year period, in Theosophical conferences and lectures across the country and abroad. Although my books aroused some controversy, most Theosophical reviews were favorable. I have never repudiated or attacked Blavatsky and my books have generally, and accurately, been regarded as friendly to her.

3. It is untrue that I have now “moved on” to the Association for Research and Enlightenment after apostasizing from Theosophy. In 1995 I moved on from Theosophy as a literary subject and began research for a book about Edgar Cayce that appeared three years later. But I first joined the ARE thirty years ago, a few months before first joining the Theosophical Society, and have been involved intermittently with both movements ever since. The two have always been intertwined interests for me, but except for the period when I was writing about Cayce in the late 1990s, Blavatsky has been the greater influence and remains so now.

4. The claim that I participated in Talisman “as an ex-Baha’i” who attacked “core beliefs” is another misrepresentation. It is more accurate to say that I was there as a Theosophical historian, whose ex-Baha’i status inspired him to write a book that was friendly to the Baha’is. The majority of listmembers were welcoming and did not perceive me as attacking their religion. But in 1996 some of the Baha’i scholars on Talisman were targeted by the administration as dissidents which resulted in the closing of the list. My brief Gnosis article about the experience is the only thing I have ever published that was critical of the Baha’is, so I find it surprising ten years later to see myself at the head of Momen’s list. It is disheartening to see a sectarian enemies list filled with personal attacks on individuals in a scholarly journal, and I hope this will be the last instance of such an article in Religion.

Sincerely yours,

K. Paul Johnson

Martin Luther, Constructive?
Although a minor point, it is bizarre that Momen categorizes Martin Luther as an example of “constructive anger” (towards the Catholic Church). To any serious student of history, Luther was an acid tongued, indefatigable critic whose bitterness towards the Pope, papacy and the Catholic Church was frightening. He likened the pope to the genitalia of Satan and rhetorically asked his fellow Christians why they didn’t bathe their hands in the blood of cardinals and bishops. None of the so-called “apostates” on Momen’s list come close to reach the zeal and single-mindedness of Luther’s “obsessive hatred”.

Momen’s paper continuously disagrees with itself. For example, he writes:

Although these apostate groups and the very similar ‘covenant-breaker’ groups, as they are known by core Baha’is, are often referred to as sects or splinter groups of the Baha’i Faith, this characterisation is in a sense incorrect. These groups are not developing their own distinctive beliefs and practices. They exist only to attack the main Baha’i community.

Here Momen gives a clue as to his true intentions: to expand the classification enough to just touch the terminology used within the Baha’i Faith for the “untouchables”; covenant-breakers. The title of “covenant-breaker” is such a loaded and powerful label within the Baha’i Faith that even implying that one is “similar” is the ultimate insult and enough to be ostracized.

The fact is that these “apostate groups” are not at all a cohesive group, nor do they have anything common with each other. They all arrived at a different crossroad and took different paths from there.

But then he goes on to attempt to prove that there is cohesion and identity within the “apostate” group through their activity of creating an “apostate mythology”. It is obvious by now that Momen has taken the leap into full fantasy mode.

Momen continues:

Since conflict is viewed negatively by Baha’is the pathway of contention chosen by apostates is unlikely to be effective.

I’m not sure which Baha’i Faith Momen is writing about since one of Abdu’l-Baha’s (the Perfect Examplar for Baha’is) most famous quotes is this:

The shining spark of truth cometh forth only after the clash of differing opinions.

It is true that Baha’is are bidden to not engage in “dissention and strife”. The only problem is that any disagreement, however minor, or well based, is seen as “dissention” by the institutions. This has created a stifling atmosphere and choked creativity and individual initiative within the Baha’i community.

To imply that the Baha’i Faith negatively views conflict is categorically false. It is one of the inherent ingredient for successful consultation and as the Master eloquently puts it, required for the discovery of truth.

Intellectual Twilight Zone
Then Momen continues to step directly into the intellectual Twilight Zone by suggesting, just before his conclusions, that the recent movement towards “core activities” - including Ruhi - are in fact a movement towards the ideals of “apostates”.

Yet the changes that have been occurring in the Baha’i world can be seen to be in the direction suggested by some apostates.

So proving himself a formidable opponent to coherence, Momen first asserts that “apostates” are hate-filled little demons running around spewing vitriol at the Baha’i Faith and then right after, that they have the same ideals as the Universal House of Justice.

Still with me? Good. ‘Cause I’m not sure if I am. Hold me close now. We’re almost done.

The truth is that most “apostates” truly dislike Ruhi and its “monkey see, monkey do” courses. Rather than expand the mind of Baha’is and plunge them into the ocean of the Writings, it is rigid, biased and fundamentally flawed because it is based on the anachronistic Shiite tradition of taqlid - abolished by Baha’u'llah long ago.

Far from empowering Baha’is to become independent learners and thinkers, Ruhi inculcates a dogmatic and cult-like “programming”.

So first he suggest that these changes align with the thinking of “apostates” and then the best that Momen can do in refuting that these changes were caused by them is to say:

Still, these changes have probably not arisen in reaction to the apostates.

Which is as water tight an argument as you’ll get inside this paper! Wow. How can I ever punch a hole in that statement: “probably not”. Wow. Just… wow.

Momen fails to prove anything nor provide any satisfying argument that is tenable. Unable to answer the calls of Baha’is and former Baha’is for improvements within the Faith, Momen falls back into the position of name calling. But since this is academia, instead of “Your Mama!” or “Nya, Nya na nya!” we have a paper which is a thinly veiled insult full of ad hominem arguments based on nothing more than empty assertions and academic jargon.

Here are Momen’s conclusions. First:

The majority of the apostates have tried to turn the status of the Baha’i Faith from that of an ‘allegiant organisation’ to that of a ‘subversive’ one, or a ‘cult’.

Not only does Momen provide no proof of this… by using the social science model and vocabulary he has chosen, it is Momen who is implying that the Baha’i Faith is a cult!

Let me explain.

The implications of the model he is using are not very flattering to the Faith. Momen uses the framework of Bromley and it is upon Bromley’s definition of “apostasy” Momen build his tottering arguments.

I wonder if Momen actually read Bromley? If he did, then he must know that Bromley uses “apostasy” to means specifically “contested exits” from “subversive organizations”.

In other words, cults.

So implicit in Momen’s adoption and usage of Bromely’s framework is his assertion that the Baha’i Faith is a cult.

Also, several of the “exits” Moojan describes were not “contested”, i.e. cases where either the person didn’t want to leave and was forced to, or wanted to leave when the organization didn’t want them to. For Bromley it is precisely the low status of the religion in the wider society that makes “apostasy” possible. His typical apostate is an ex-member of a group that is widely considered a “cult”, that goes through “deprogamming”, and then turns around and makes a career of warning others of the horrors of the group.

This can be quite literal, as in becoming a professional counsellor or speaker. In other words, Moojan is using a model that implies that the Baha’i Faith is pretty much on the level of Hare Krishna or Scientology in the eyes of the wider society.

Second conclusion:

The experience of persons moving from the centre to marginality and on to apostasy can be the opposite of that of those who remain within the core of the movement. It is thus important to recognise that when Baha’i apostates give descriptions of tyranny and authoritarianism, they are referring to exactly the same institutions and individuals that core members experience as providing encouragement and guidance.

Momen here describes the experience of a lot of Baha’is - that of being treated by the institutions with arbitrary authority; of severe retribution; of closed and non-transparent decision making which refuses due process. Momen does not and can not refute that Baha’is have been thus treated by the institutions. And that they continue to be (sadly). All he says here is that yes, well, sometimes the institutions behave badly and sometimes well. This is like the physically abusive husband who, in his defense, points out that on occasion he takes out the garbage.

Third conclusion:

The use of the Internet by these apostates has been both extensive and crucial.

What a shocking revelation! The intertubes are being used! Wow! What’s next? Momen telling us that kids are using these “tubes” to download music? pirate movies? chat with each other? Somebody call the Nobel Institute. We have a genius on our hands.

Fourth:

By drawing on figures from Baha’i history, some factual and some considerably reworked, the apostates have created an apostate mythology, with its own heroes and anti-heroes.

Momen gives examples of this “mythology”: the LA Class in the 70’s, Dialogue magazine and others. The only problem is that all of the examples he provides are factual, provable and documented.

For example, Momen disputes (implicitly) that the LA Class was “suppressed” but we have the very letter of the NSA of the United States in which they write to the class members and tell them to stop. Similarly with Dialogue and the other situations, the “mythology” fantasy that Momen repeats is no mere narrative. It is historically documented fact.

Fifth:

“…apostates have been very successful in their use of the academic media to present their views.”

Again, this isn’t a conclusion but like the usage of the internet (above) a mere statement of the obvious. However, this mundane fact made to masquerade by Momen as a “conclusion”, holds within it the very reason why Momen embarked on this ridiculous exercise in the first place.

Momen (and his close minded peers) can not stand the fact that not only are the topics put forward by “apostates” lingering, waiting for any reasonable response from Baha’i theologians. But that these ideas are being exposed to the whole world (via the internet) and via academic channels to a discerning audience. So rather than respond to the legitimate concerns and criticisms, Momen has lashed out with personal insults veiled loosely in academic jargon.

Finally, Momen’s sixth conclusion:

Frustration leads to marginality and in turn to rejection of the religion.

Again, this conclusion is tacked on without any attempt to prove it. It dangles as an embarrassingly naked assertion. Truth is that frustration does not necessarily lead to marginality. Nor to rejection of religion. There are many Baha’is who are happy to be Baha’is and yet hold the views of those Momen so pointlessly shoehorns into “apostates”. You are reading the words of one such person. Alison Marshall is another example. There are many more but why continue? Momen’s flimsy argument is already in taters.

I know that Momen believes that he is doing good. He probably thinks that his is an attempt to discredit “apostates” and defend the Baha’i Faith against those who attack it.

Only problem is that, unbeknownst to him, he is actually doing much more damage than any of the 12 “apostates” he cites.

As Baha’u'llah said:

My imprisonment doeth Me no harm, nor do the things that have befallen Me at the hands of My enemies. That which harmeth Me is the conduct of my loved ones who, though they bear My name, yet commit that which maketh My heart and My pen to lament.

My final response is inspired by Abdu’l-Baha and a certain English professor of German descent (who’s thick accent made learning Shakespeare, Coleridge and Wordsworth somehow ironic).

First, here is Abdu’l-Baha explaining what a Baha’i is (taken directly from the official website of the Baha’is of the United States):

To be a Baha’i simply means to love all the world; to love humanity and try to serve it; to work for universal peace and universal brotherhood.

And thanks to my old teacher, I now have the perfect poem for this occasion:

He drew a circle that shut me out.
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout
But love and I had the wit to win;
We drew a circle that took him in.
- Edwin Markham

Related Links:

Karen Bacquet (a named “apostate”) responds on her blog
Alison Marshall’s (another “apostate”) reaction on her blog
From Tarikh (Baha’i Discussion List): Ahead of the Curve & Unenrolling (thanks to BahaisOnline)
A more serious commentary on Momen’s paper

Tongue in cheek response from Brendan Cook
A useful categorization chart
A humorous summary of Momen’s paper

Here’s a very interesting article from the 1995 Baha’i Studies Review. This means that it actually passed Baha’i pre-publication review - so if you’re concerned, rest assured that the institutions ok’ed this. As far as I know, the author isn’t a naughty Baha’i “dissident”.

If it was up to me, this sort of material would be in Ruhi, rather than the mind-numbing regurgitation of platitudes we currently have. It may be a bit long but I think when you finish the first paragraph you’ll be hooked (bold is my own emphasis):

My aim here is to deal with one faulty way of justifying a normative Bahá’í position, not because it carries any serious philosophical weight, but because of its apparent popularity amongst those who wish to eliminate, right at the outset, any need for further moral reflection and consultation. This is the “because Bahá’u'lláh said so” school of thought. Such-and-such is wrong, it is asserted tout court, because Bahá’u'lláh said it is wrong, and no other reason need be provided. This “answer”, though philosophically bankrupt, is rhetorically powerful, because its proponents can immediately end any dissent by making agreement with them seem like a matter of faithfulness to the Covenant. (1) Because the rhetorical power of pulling the “Covenant card” here heralds an end to the independent investigation of truth and consultation, it is a particularly insidious non-answer that we would do well to consider carefully.

Let us first distinguish two senses of saying that x is wrong because Bahá’u'lláh says it is wrong (where x is some activity, action, state of affairs, etc). First, one might simply be asserting that Bahá’u'lláh’s saying that x is wrong gives us a (peremptory) reason for believing that it is so. Much of the rhetorical power of the because-Bahá’u'lláh-said-so school rests on this intuition. But this is besides the point when one is engaged in moral justification. When we demand the basis of the Bahá’í normative position on x, we are asking for (a) the philosophical justification of the position that x is wrong, and not for (b) the reason for the belief that it is so, or for the moral agent’s reason for action according to that position.(2)

One may, for example, have very good reasons for believing that something is true, but without knowing the reasons why it is that it is true.

Second, one might be asserting that Bahá’u'lláh (or God) saying that morality is such and such makes it so. That is, one might adopt the position of divine voluntarism, which holds that the moral good is the moral good simply because it is willed as the moral good by the divine Will. Here then, one could reject the “because Bahá’u'lláh said so” school by rejecting voluntarism. One would accuse the school of getting it backwards: x is not wrong because Bahá’u'lláh said it is wrong, rather, Bahá’u'lláh said it is wrong because it is wrong.(3) But I wish to remain agnostic on this issue, and leave open the possibility, without committing myself to it, that Bahá’í ethics presupposes divine voluntarism. For example, one might cite, in favour of a voluntarist position, the passage in The Kitáb-i-Aqdas in which Bahá’u'lláh urges religious leaders not to judge the word of God by their own prevalent standards since God’s word itself is the standard of right and wrong, truth and error: “the Book itself is the unerring Balance established amongst men” (¶99). This passage need not at all be taken to be one in support of the voluntarist position, but my argument here does not depend on settling that issue one way or the other.

If this passage is interpreted as supporting voluntarism, it could also be cited in favour of the because-Bahá’u'lláh-said-so school, but only if one interprets its application in the first of two ways. The first way is the doctrine of immediate application, the second a doctrine of mediate application. On the first doctrine, one would apply voluntarist justification immediately at the level of each and every particular injunction, ordinance, exhortation, law, and claim of Bahá’í ethics. So the moral reason that, say, taking mind-altering substances is wrong, would be that Bahá’u'lláh has forbidden it, period. We would need no further reflection on the matter, and the reasons given in the Bahá’í writings for the law, such as its effect on the soul and human moral agency, would be superfluous. Much of the rhetorical force of the doctrine of immediate application rests on the ambiguity, identified earlier, between two very different propositions. One was (a) the proposition that the divine say-so provides the justificatory basis for a given moral claim or principle; another was (b) the proposition that the divine say-so provides a (peremptory) reason for belief in, or a (peremptory) reason for action according to, that principle. The because-Bahá’u'lláh-said-so school, and its doctrine of immediate application, would have us believe that the second proposition (b) justifies the first (a), but the move from (b) to (a) is clearly logically fallacious.

In the case of the doctrine of mediate application, the (fiat of the) divine Will serves as a voluntarist justification for the totality of the ethical theory as a whole, but not as a justification for a particular moral or ethical claim. Instead, the justification for a particular moral claim is made in terms of the other moral principles and concepts which form a part of the total theoretical framework. On this doctrine, for example, Bahá’í ethical theory’s justification for the particular moral claim that some action (e.g., taking mind-altering substances) is wrong, must be given in terms of the other moral principles and concepts which form the totality of Bahá’í ethics (e.g., it retards the progress of the soul, or it forfeits “moral responsibility”), even if the ultimate basis for that totality be the divine say-so. In other words, the divine say-so plays a role in meta-ethical, but not ethical, justification. The mediate doctrine presupposes, of course, that Bahá’í ethics forms a rationally coherent theoretical framework.

The point here is not that divine voluntarism is correct; rather that even if we were to concede it, we would still need to reject the immediate application doctrine, and with it the because-Bahá’u'lláh-said-so school, because a Bahá’í voluntarist account must adopt a mediate application doctrine. That this is so can be readily seen by the fact that both Bahá’u'lláh and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá write as if their teachings form part of a coherent whole, and hence both freely justify a given principle (e.g. the forbidding of alcohol) in terms of other Bahá’í ethical principles and concepts (e.g. moral responsibility, or the progress of the soul). This also appears to be part of the reason why so many Bahá’ís have difficulty coming to terms with the fact of male-exclusivity in the membership of the Universal House of Justice: because it appears not to be justifiable in terms of, indeed it appears to contradict, other moral principles which form a part of the totality of Bahá’í moral and political philosophy. Notice again that citing Bahá’u'lláh’s say-so regarding male-exclusivity only provides Bahá’ís with (b) a (peremptory) reason for believing that it is a proper moral principle(4) (presumably fitting coherently into the whole theoretical framework), and a (peremptory) reason for action according to that principle, without illuminating (a) the justificatory basis for that principle–after all, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had said that that justificatory reason would become apparent in the future, even though Bahá’ís already had Bahá’u'lláh’s say-so when ‘Abdu’l-Bahá was writing. The latter does not provide the former.

So to determine the basis for the Bahá’í position on some question in ethics, one must consider Bahá’í ethical theory as a whole, and justify the position in those terms, and not in terms of the divine say-so. What is more, given the Bahá’í principle of the harmony of science and religion, and that religion must be scientific in its method, the Bahá’í position must be interpreted in light of some background knowledge gleaned from the natural and social sciences. If an interpretation of the Bahá’í position on racism were advanced which entailed or presupposed that the earth was flat, then that would count against the interpretation in question–insofar as the scientific evidence suggests that the earth is not flat.(5)

End Notes

1. This is a favourite rhetorical tool used when one is too fearful to hold one’s own beliefs up to the light of consultative scrutiny, and wishes instead to silence others into submission.

2. For the reader not familiar with the terminology, I offer the following explication of a “reason for belief”, a “reason for action”, and a “peremptory” or “preemptive” reason, as these concepts are used in moral and political philosophy. For example, consider a possible claim in political philosophy that (1) a legitimate authority’s commands give you a “peremptory reason for action”, but (2) not a “peremptory reason for belief”. This dual claim means the following. Let us say that there are a set of (say, moral) reasons why you ought to do x, and a set of other (moral) reasons why you ought not to do x, but do y instead (where x and y are distinct actions). And let us say that after careful reflection, you think the balance of moral reasons tells you that you ought to do x, rather than y. But then the Local Spiritual Assembly (LSA), after independent consideration, tells you that the balance of moral reasons means that you ought to do y, and commands you to do this. Now, on the account of the legitimacy involved in the dual claim we are examining, the LSA, as a legitimate authority, does not simply add one more reason to the balance of reasons in favour of doing y. Rather, (1) its authoritative command provides a reason for action that preempts - replaces and overrides - all other reasons in the previous balance of reasons that you were considering; i.e., you ought to do y. The LSA telling you that the balance of moral reasons requires y might also provide you with a reason for believing that the original balance of moral reasons was in favour of y after all. But the second part of the dual claim above says that (2) the LSA does not provide you with a peremptory reason for belief - in other words, you might still believe that the LSA’s evaluation of the original balance of reasons was mistaken, but (1) your reason for action (in accordance with the command of the LSA) is independent of that belief, because the LSA’s authority is legitimate.

What is important about the above is not that one accepts the philosophical claim about the nature of (an LSA’s) legitimacy; rather, what is important, for the purposes of this essay, is that one understands the difference between peremptory and non-peremptory reasons, and between reasons for action and reasons for belief. These distinctions are discussed more fully by Joseph Raz, The Morality of Freedom, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986.

3. Of course, this is an ancient debate, going at least as far back as Plato (cf. Euthyphro 10a).

4. A fallibilistic qualification is due even here. Because our understandings of the Writings are always subject to the fallible limitations of our own interpretations, this means that even those interpretations, which give rise to reasons for belief, must always be held to be subject to revision.

5. I should also like to make brief reference to appeals to “faith” in moral argument. Appeals to faith to settle moral questions have almost exactly the same structure as appeals to the divine say-so; indeed, this essay could have been written, in much the same form, about appeals to faith. Just as the faulty appeal to the divine say-so that I have tried to identify here often serves as a way of ending further moral reflection and consultation, so too does a faulty appeal to faith as the justification for some ethical claim. It is a fundamental Bahá’í belief, as I understand it, that faith has an important role in moral life. For example, just as appeals to the divine say-so may partially explain our reason for belief, an appeal to faith may also partially explain that belief, or even better, help explain our reason for action. But, as this essay has attempted to argue, neither an appeal to the divine say-so, nor an appeal to faith, plays a role in the philosophical justification of particular moral principles (as the doctrine of immediate application would have us believe). Such appeals might, on the other hand, partially account for one’s commitment to an ethical theory as a whole, though this essay has failed to argue for a position on this question one way or the other.

Thanks to that troublemaker, “mavaddat” on Baha’i LJ forum for the tip