In the comment discussion that took place for the previous post: Pre-Approved Individual Investigation of Truth an interesting concept was touched on.
Because it is worthy of further discussion, I wanted to spend some more time on it. Since I read a very good treatment of it by another Baha’i, I’d thought I’d simply share their thoughts with you, rather than try to rehash it myself.
Here’s a morsel to whet your appetite (the link at the bottom takes you to the complete post):
I was facilitating the class, and I pointed out that the last part of discussion question #12 was added in by the editors. The original text says nothing about “accepting the Truth of His Cause in its entirety.” Also, if you read the whole tablet, it’s kept ambiguous whether this is “Baha’u'llah’s Cause” or “God’s Cause” or whether we mortals can even make a distinction between those two, since God is unknowable to us. This use (by the Ruhi editors) of “His Cause” instead of “God’s Cause” or “This Cause” puts the focus on Baha’u'llah. This may be where the focus should be, or it may not. The point is, the discussion question has changed the ambiguity and higher-level abstractions in the original text and asked participants to react to a statement more clearly centered on Baha’u'llah and the Baha’i Faith, rather than God and the “changeless Faith of God, eternal in the past, eternal in the future.”
When I pointed out the problems with inserting the phrase “in its entirety” I met with some of the typical remarks I often hear from my co-religionists. A favorite one is “you can’t pick and choose. You must accept everything.” Bad logic, of course, but it’s a popular notion. I responded as I often do, with the idea that if you accept everything in its entirety, then you accept the Kitab-i-Iqan, our “Book of Certitude,” in which Baha’u'llah reveals to us that much scripture is in the language of metaphor, and not to be taken literally. You must also accept the idea that we should use science and our rational thinking to enhance our understanding of our religion. You can’t reject that, because if you take the Baha’i Faith in its entirety, you can’t get away from such fundamental teachings. And, with that said, we do in fact pick and choose. The Baha’i book of laws (the “Most Great Book”) suggests that we be buried in caskets of crystal, but few Baha’is do this. Arsonists are to be burned, but no Baha’i seriously advocates for us to use branding or burning-at-the-stake as a punishment for arson. A law that men should not grow their hair beyond their ears is probably a polite way of forbidding men from engaging in sex work, if you understand the 19th century Persian context into which that Book was revealed. Clearly one can see in photographs that ‘Abdu’l-Baha, our perfect example, didn’t follow that law literally. So, we Baha’is do pick and choose which rules or teachings we accept literally and which we take metaphorically, and without any authorized interpreter left on this mortal plane, we really don’t have any persons with authority to tell us when we are correct or incorrect in our interpretations and understandings of the many metaphorical teachings. So often the scriptures are abstract, and rarely are they concrete or specific. So, we’re left to be mature and thoughtful and rational, and take things as best we may. So, this is a religion where we do some picking and choosing.
The first thing that comes to my mind is, Why be a Bahá’í if you’re going to consciously pick-and-choose what laws to follow? It has always occurred to me that the distinction between someone who is a Bahá’í and an agnostic is that the latter can choose to adopt for himself whatever laws he finds worthy of assent in the writings of Bahá’u'lláh (et al.) without additionally committing himself to imperatives that do not appear useful or the truth of claims he cannot verify for himself. The Bahá’í does not have this luxury. The Bahá’í is committed (in virtue of being a Bahá’í) to the whole of the teachings of his religion. He does not get to pick and choose. As Shoghi Effendi unambiguously states:
Bahá’u'lláh is equally unambiguous when he writes in the first lines of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas:
Shoghi Effendi also reminds us that to have faith means to submit to every word and command of Bahá’u'lláh, no matter how ridiculous it may appear to you personally:
There is no ambiguity, as far as I can see — clearly, a person who becomes a Bahá’í is expected to submit to the whole of the Bahá’í Faith. Indeed, it would seem that Shoghi Effendi and Bahá’u'lláh went out of their way to leave no room for us to conclude that Bahá’ís can pick-and-choose what teachings to follow. So how did two educated young scholars like you and Eric come to the profoundly opposite conclusion? Let’s examine Eric’s arguments, shall we?
Eric writes:
As we have already seen from what I have written above, this claim is actually not “bad logic,” but is scripturally based. In fact, there’s no “logic” involved here at all. It is sufficient to simply refer Eric to the writings of Shoghi Effendi and Bahá’u'lláh.
Eric writes:
Yes, Bahá’u'lláh says in the Kitáb-i-Íqán that “much scripture is in the language of metaphor, and not to be taken literally,” but he never sanctions the individual believer to give authoritative interpretation or to reject the authority of interpretations made by himself, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, or the Guardian. As the UHJ summarizes:
So individuals are not given the right to pick-and-choose based on their own understanding. On the contrary, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá himself clearly forbids individuals from making any interpretation that might contradict the authoritative one:
Eric writes:
And what about science then? Aren’t Bahá’ís supposed to submit to the findings of science? No. Bahá’u'lláh’s famously prescribes circular logic as the standard whereby he be judged:
Shoghi Effendi also is clear that where science and religion come into conflict, believers must subordinate the authority of scientists to that of religion:
This was ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s whole basis for denying the validity of Darwinism on dogmatic, religious grounds (that if man was ever animal, it would mean that man was imperfect; and that is unacceptable). The UHJ also reiterates this doctrine when they write:
So despite all the admonitions of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá to the opposite, the Bahá’í Faith is dogmatic through and through. And what’s more relevant to our discussion is that Bahá’ís are expected reflect that dogmatism. Bahá’u'lláh’s words testify this fact:
In fact, only insofar as science agrees with what the Bahá’í Faith claims is science to be regarded with any respect at all. The UHJ expresses this point when they write:
Lastly, Eric writes:
First of all, I want to argue that the examples Eric gives (not here cited) are not instances of Bahá’ís picking-and-choosing. It’s true that Bahá’u'lláh prescribed that Bahá’ís be buried in crystal coffins, but he also gave them the option of being buried in “stone or hard fine wood.” Why did Eric ignore this? Moreover, the two laws that he mentions (burning arsonists and men’s hair length) are explicitly said by the UHJ to be for future generations. The UHJ, according to Bahá’u'lláh, has the right to postpone when laws become applicable (although they cannot repeal them once they have made them applicable). Thus, there is no “picking and choosing” going on here, since those laws aren’t even in application yet.
But let’s suppose that Eric was right that Bahá’ís do indeed pick and choose. Would that fact be relevant to our question? I will argue that it doesn’t matter. In this vein, it’s important to distinguish between what the Bahá’í Faith, as a religion, expects of Bahá’ís, and what expectations Bahá’ís actually fulfill. This is analogous to the distinction between what the state expects of its citizens and what laws the citizens actually follow. In a democracy, although the citizenry is (indirectly) responsible for what laws are passed, how the citizens behave at any one time nevertheless has no bearing on what laws they are expected to obey at that time. This is even more true in an authoritarian scheme like the one presented by the Bahá’í Faith. In a word, how Bahá’ís behave is utterly irrelevant with respect to the question of how they are expected to behave. To argue otherwise is to confuse is and ought, which surely does too much violence to the illustrious David Hume than we are willing to endure. Therefore, the (supposed) fact that Bahá’ís do actually pick-and-choose is irrelevant for answering the question of whether they can or whether they are allowed to pick-and-choose while remaining Bahá’ís.
In a sense, of course, you can pick-and-choose what laws to follow and which to ignore while calling yourself a Bahá’í. You “can” do whatever you like. But I think that beyond being profoundly dishonest intellectually, it also contradicts the expectation of being a Bahá’í as found in the writings of the Central Figures, UHJ, and Shoghi Effendi.
For these reasons, I think that a Bahá’í who wants to pick-and-choose should instead consider surrendering his membership and severing his affiliation with the religion. He will not only free himself of a lingering cognitive dissonance, but he will be happier for freeing his mind to think for himself and taking responsibility for his own imperatives. In this state, he can adopt for himself what he finds worthy of assent from the blissful writings of Bahá’u'lláh (or anyone else who he finds inspirational) while refraining from committing himself to doctrines of whose truth he cannot convince himself.
On his blog, Eric also mentions a fourth reason why picking-and-choosing is (supposedly) justified:
It would seem that the implicit argument that Eric is making is that since truth is relative, and Bahá’ís are expected to be intelligent people; therefore, individual Bahá’ís are responsible for deciding what scriptures are relevant for the age in which they live. Although intuitively plausible, this is manifestly contrary to the intention of the actual Bahá’í scripture. The whole idea behind the Bahá’í Faith is that humanity is too stupid to figure out what is good or bad, right or wrong, true or false without the help of Divine manifestations to guide us aright.’Abdu’l-Bahá summarizes this point when he writes:
Never mind the obviously contradictory nature of this doctrine (it considers humanity utterly depraved morally without the help of God while simultaneously expecting us to be able to identify God’s manifestations by their goodly signs). Just notice that the Bahá’í view of humanity is one of depravity. Thus, that truth is relative only means that the manifestation of God has the right to change what laws are imperative depending on the exigences of the time. It does not follow that humanity has the right to do the same independent of God’s sanction. So the fact that Bahá’ís are expected to be intelligent only means that they are expected to be able to recognize that the Bahá’í Faith is the “correct” religion for today, not that they are supposed to think for themselves or decide what laws of Bahá’u'lláh are relevant.
On the contrary, (as we see in my above post) they are told to submit completely and unconditionally without regard for whether they understand why the particular laws are true. In short, the relativity of truth in the Bahá’í Faith does not allow room for free thinking about what laws are imperative and what descriptions about humanity and the world are truths. If you want to be a free thinker, be a freethinker. But don’t call yourself a Bahá’í if you expect people to understand that you are a freethinker. The two are mutually exclusive.
If I would have read all of that nearly three years ago when I began my membership in the Baha’i Faith, I would have hit the ground running as far as possible in a completely different direction.
It took nearly three years to really understand the game’s rules, and I discovered that I did not want to play anymore.
But if Shoghi Effendi said Baha’is should accept all of the Texts without question, then does that not also go for the Texts that free-thinkers and liberals like to quote?
Admittedly, I am used to the people who discourage individuality and autonomy at the altar of dependency and conformity using the “You can’t pick and choose” argument. But, if what I just quoted is also part of the Baha’i Scriptures, then that as well has to be “taken with the whole.” I couldn’t reconcile it, so I decided to leave the Faith because I couldn’t both be an independent searcher and a blind submitter at the same time.
peace,
Matt,
Simply put, Bahai scripture is inconsistent and self-contradictory, precipitating cognitive dissonance in individuals who actually read the scriptures (beyond just “The earth is but one country and mankind its citizens”) and think seriously and deeply about them.
I, too, decided that being a freethinker and a Bahai are mutually, and irredeemably, at odds.
A polite term for apologetics is mental gymnastics, but in essence it is sophistry and prevarication. Apologetics requires the fabrication of justifications for why God or his alleged Manifestation does or does not mean what his scriptures appear to state or imply he means. The apologist tactic is to accuse the skeptic of being misinformed or of taking the scriptures out of context. The apologist will switch between literal and spiritual interpretations and redefine the meaning of words as needed. Thank you for helping to clarify the confusion.
I think some are missing Eric’s and Baha’u'llah’s point in all this: namely that the path to Gnosis (Irfan in the original) or the True Understanding of the believer (as Shoghi Effendi translated it) must account for all the natural contradictions in man–but the result of such a full accounting is not a contradiction, rather it is what we term wisdom.
Cheers, Randy
You’re totally on the mark, Andrew.
Scriptural ambiguity and contradiction give rise to the industry of priestcraft, particularly theology and apologetics (partisan exegetes).
When a believer or investigator flags an inconsistency or contradiction, the apologist reassures the individual by appropriating discursive vernacular to offer convoluted explanations and covers. When the individual remonstrates, his or her motives and spiritual “receptiveness” are maligned.
It’s generally a simple matter to select quotations from the Writings that support both a given position and its opposite. In the present context, we have:
God has endowed man with intelligence and reason whereby he is required to determine the verity of questions and propositions. If religious beliefs and opinions are found contrary to the standards of science they are mere superstitions and imaginations; for the antithesis of knowledge is ignorance, and the child of ignorance is superstition. Unquestionably there must be agreement between true religion and science. If a question be found contrary to reason, faith and belief in it are impossible and there is no outcome but wavering and vacillation.
`Abdu’l-Bahá, “MAN AND NATURE”, Bahá’í World Faith p. 235-242
“Polysyllabic pretentious 10 cent words”
Awful lot of syllables there to make a point about terse writing.
Just want to add another quote. This one clearly claims that there is an asymmetric relationship between science and religion, that is, religion must yield to science, not vice versa.
Religion must conform to science and reason; otherwise, it is superstition. God has created man in order that he may perceive the verity of existence and endowed him with mind or reason to discover truth. Therefore, scientific knowledge and religious belief must be conformable to the analysis of this divine faculty in man.
(Abdu’l-Baha, The Promulgation of Universal Peace, p. 287)
Yes, you are right, of course. That a single source of literature can provide both support and opposition to the same conclusion is the technical definition of contradiction. What we see here is a single example of contradiction in a religion full of contradictions. The believers, not willing to admit of internal struggle in their religion, take these contradictions as two extremes between which they are supposed to “moderate” themselves, as if the text never means what it says. Why the authors of the religion didn’t simply prescribe the moderate path explicitly is, of course, never explained.
It seems to me that Bahá’u'lláh, Shoghi Effendi, and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá sincerely struggled with these issues and grappled with them in their minds. In certain contexts, they were more assured of one position than the other, but in those contexts, they would forget that they had already committed themselves to the opposite position. For example, when speaking generally, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá freely admitted that religion should submit to the findings of science. He readily makes this admission in many places and he seemed to take it seriously.
And yet, when it came time for him to abandon his dogmas in the face of opposing scientific evidence, he clung ever more fervently to his mythical presupposition that man has always been separate from the animal kingdom. Never mind that he had no formal training in biology, never read Darwin nor conducted any investigation into the matter. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá was convinced on a priori grounds, without any evidence, that humans were distinct from animals.
This same general principle is used by Shoghi Effendi, the UHJ, and by Bahá’ís today. When faced with the contradictions between modern scientific findings and the Bahá’í teachings (e.g., regarding the nature of homosexuality, life on other planets, the biological ancestry of humans, or the luminiferous aether), Bahá’ís will always “hold out” for “better science” that confirms their presuppositions, rather than submit to the findings of modern science. This is because their beliefs are not based on evidence or reason, but rather on trust in the dogmas of their religion.
These innumerable conceptual tensions, idealogical battles and blatant contradictions that the Bahá’í central figures had with one another (and with themselves) is the surest sign of the lowly origins of this religion. That they didn’t even realize that they were contradicting one another is even surer evidence yet.
Anyway, the point is simply that even though Shoghi Effendi and Bahá’u'lláh taught that people should investigate the truth for themselves, they nevertheless also taught that, in the final analysis, no one should question their authority. It is not meant for man to question his lord, and to that extent, it does seem that investigation of truth within the Bahá’í Faith is (at best) limited. But I think the situation is more sinister than that.
Randy, could you clarify what you mean here? It seems like you’re just asserting that there is no contradiction between the things I’ve written and Eric’s claim that Bahá’í can pick and choose. But isn’t this just begging the question? It sure seems like there is a contradiction, right? So how do you reconcile it? Do you simply ignore the problem and assume there is a solution? Surely an apparent contradiction is not justifiably termed “wisdom” unless we can see why it is not a contradiction, right?
And what are these “contradictions in man” that you speak of? Do you mean opposing tendencies? But surely opposing tendencies are not contradictions, per se, but merely conflicts of interest within people. Unless a person simultaneously entertains both tendencies (that are supposedly at odds), then there is no contradiction. Am I understanding you? Can you clarify?
Thanks!
Hi Mavaddat, Well I don’ think Eric is saying it is “Okay” to pick and choose, rather he is saying we “must” pick and choose because no one of us is “big” enough to encapsulate the entire revelation. You have to start where you are and proceed onwards, that always entails picking and choosing. Nature itself forces us to pick and choose, its not by choice–so to pretend otherwise, to pretend that we can somehow avoid this picking and choosing is to willfully ignore the human condition.
So how do we “solve” this problem of the human condition? By accepting it in all its contradictory aspects, by approaching it “holistically.” That is the entrance to the hallway of wisdom. Part of that acceptance is to understand that people will always pick and choose because it is human nature, there is no way to change that.
The resolution to all the contradictions then is simply that by nature we are hybrid creatures, an amalgam of spirit and dirt, and that full acceptance of this dualistic or hybrid nature can bring inner peace. The idea here is that the two natures must be fully fused by the fire of experience, so that the soul of man (enriched by the two fundamentally opposed elements of spirit and matter) can arise like the Phoenix to a new life.
To attempt to divorce the two parts of the human being, and either become all dirt or all spirit, is not the path of success, at least according to Baha’u'llah. Of course to “become what you already are” means gaining a full understanding of all aspects of the self, both high and low, and life generally does a pretty good job of that if we accept all our life lessons in full.
Anybody with an interest in really discussing these things might want to get on Talisman9 at Yahoo. I have also started a group for discussing the Iqan, but no one is there yet:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Iqan/
If you have any interest, just join.
Peace, Randy
Mavaddat wrote:
“‘Abdu’l-Bahá was convinced on a priori grounds, without any evidence, that humans were distinct from animals.”
How does one define Truth? Truth (in the theological sense) depends entirely on the parameters one uses to define it. Both the Catholic Church and the Baha’i Faith are locked into an Aristotelian philosophical orientation that has led their collective thinking to certain conclusions. It was Aristotelian philosophy that reigned during the Middle Ages, a mode of thinking that sought Turth through inference from pre-existing premises, rather than Facts from hypotheses based on observed phenomena.
In his book “Intellectual Traditions in Islam,” Farhad Daftary writes:
“The Bab wrote a tafsir of the Surat Yusuf (Sura 12) of the Qur’an. What he seems to have done is to express his opinion, at least in the end. There are, in his work, some vestiges of what might be called the orthodox technique, but in the end he simply used the Qur’an as a prompt to express his own religious experience. In the course of his lifetime, he was both perceived to be, and in the end claimed to be, the founder of a new religion. It was a deviation from orthodoxy, an abandonment of tradition, which is symbolized in his failure to acknowledge in his tafsir the experience of the community — I mean here the intellectual experience represented in generations of exegetical activity. It is perhaps odd, and it does not sound like the religion we so often hear about, and yet it is insistently the case: the intellectual tradition of Islam is one which makes it a requirement that each succeeding generation look at and take into consideration the work of the preceding generations. It is not a religion which, from generation to generation, goes back to the original words of scripture and revelation. When a scholar makes this attempt to go back to the original sources and to look at them with an unprejudiced eye (if there is such a thing), people are not sure about this and, in the case of the Bab, he is liable to rejection.” Likewise, Jesus is not accepted as an exponent of Judaism, nor are the Christian Gospels accepted within Judaism, because Jesus is seen by them as anti-nationalistic, cosmopolitan, antinomian and accepting of foreigners and persons with perceived impurities.
As one wag has written, “A lot of modern legalists would cringe at the idea that Jesus was antinomian, but that seems to be the most fair interpretation of his life we can give him. To Jesus, principles were always above the law and its specifics.” I believe it was Eric Stetson who once wrote, “The Bab was a lunatic.” Precisely. And if the Bab was a lunatic, Tahirih was a moonstruck madwoman. The Bab was martyred and the Babi community was demoralised. How could this be reconciled with the promises of scripture? A literalist approach to scripture interpretation would seek and even require such reconciliation, but an antinomian one would not. These questions gave Baha’u'llah was able to consolidate his position within the Babi community through his interpretation of passages about the promised Day of God in both the Qur’an and the Bayan: thus his adamant insistence on the recognition of his station as the source of his spiritual legitimacy and his appropriation of religious power as a personal privilege. Opportunists create religions in order to gain power; religious institutions need stable communities over which to exercise their authority. Jesus rejected all attempts to invest him with political power; Tahirih announced “no commandments, no prohibitions and no castigation.” Hardly a recipe for theocratic religion, but quite amenable to change and highly congruent with modernity.
I agree with this statement that picking and choosing is part of our human nature, and to avoid it would be to willfully ignore the human condition. I don’t think your solution will work within the Baha’i context because you used the phrase “accepting it in all its contradictory aspects, by approaching it ‘holistically.’”
In my understanding, the Baha’i System does not allow for a holistic approach to spirituality and/or the Baha’i Teachings. It also will not admit of contradictions. Any perceived contradiction is “evidence” of the person’s mis-understanding of what the Text “really” means. What I think is one of the main causes for confusion is the lack of historical context in regards to the Texts.
In the Islamic tradition, there is an entire system devoted to finding the exact historical context for each verse that was written in the Qur’an. This was because the Qur’an was recited with the assumption that the hearer already knows the context, unlike the Bible which has the history built in the book itself. I see no tradition in the Baha’i context. I’m not implying that we would still disagree with some of the Writings, but we would at least know what was going on so it doesn’t just appear to be a bunch of books that came out of nowhere during a period of forty years.
Once again I agree with what you write, but it seems to me that Baha’u'llah abandoned this mysticism in favor of mystic-legalism, which is not very different to the solution that Al-Ghazali proposed some centuries before Baha’u'llah. It’s the idea that following the Law can be a mystical experience itself. This was supposed to bridge the gap between the mystics and the orthodox. The mystics didn’t like the Law much and favored spiritual experiences over correct ritual practice. The orthodox saw the Law as something that must be followed regardless if it makes them happy or not. Whether it gives them a spiritual experience or not, whether they feel depressed or not; they must practice the rituals with correct precision. God demands it. Both Al-Ghazali and Baha’u'llah observed this division and sought to mystify the Law so that the mystics would be bound by some limits, and the orthodox would feel the “essence” of their faith and not just follow rituals for the sake of following rituals. It sounds good in theory, but it can get scary at times. For instance, when a Baha’i boldly believes that burning an arsonist as punishment for committing arson is part of the “choice wine unsealed by the fingers of Might and Glory”; is a bit scary.
And the same goes for Muslims who think cutting the hands off of thieves is “glorious.” Crime and Punishment serve a purpose in any justice system, yes. But, to mystify Law is irksome to me.
Really sad to read your wife’s reality. I think there are other religions besides Bahai that would teach the same garb… Religion to me is a fish desiding to submit itself to living in a glass fishbowl in the middle of the sea… Here is an interesting Bahai quote for your wife about her religion:
Thought this one is a keeper…
Religion should be the Cause of Love and Affection
Religion should unite all hearts and cause wars and disputes to vanish from the face of the earth, give birth to spirituality, and bring life and light to each heart. If religion becomes a cause of dislike, hatred and division, it were better to be without it, and to withdraw from such a religion would be a truly religious act. For it is clear that the purpose of a remedy is to cure; but if the remedy should only aggravate the complaint it had better be left alone. Any religion which is not a cause of love and unity is no religion. All the holy prophets were as doctors to the soul; they gave prescriptions for the healing of mankind; thus any remedy that causes disease does not come from the great and supreme Physician.
Sacred Writings of the Bahai Faith
I’d also like to thank you for sharing the example of your wife with us. It is very sad what happened to her, but I think it illustrates well what evil can come from such a banal ideal as unity.
I disagree, however, that the cause of unity is misunderstood. I think the problem here is the Bahá’í adoption of the old Platonic dogma that unity by itself is somehow a good thing. But it’s not. Unity by itself is neutral, and it can often lead to extreme violence and genocide (the examples are too many here, but think of fascism or communism as a start). I would argue that, rather than being a good, unity is the product of the good, something like sugar. For example, scientists and doctors are in agreement about a great many things because they subject their ideas to a rigorous and convincing process of empirical testing. If scientists or doctors got together and agreed to be united about the truth (or falsity) of some conclusion prior to testing it, the results would be utterly disastrous. And yet, the religious are still somehow convinced that unity is both a means to achieving the good, and a good in itself. Well, I’m sorry, but this is just false.
Unity is subservient to its prerequisite: justice
“O SON OF SPIRIT! The best beloved of all things in My sight is Justice; turn not away therefrom if thou desirest Me, and neglect it not that I may confide in thee. By its aid thou shalt see with thine own eyes and not through the eyes of others, and shalt know of thine own knowledge and not through the knowledge of thy neighbor. Ponder this in thy heart; how it behooveth thee to be. Verily justice is My gift to thee and the sign of My loving-kindness. Set it then before thine eyes.”
Mavaddat ,
I fully agree with your analysis. But I can honestly say that the current concept of “Stepford Unity” in the Baha’i Faith did NOT exist in the 1960’s and 1970’s.
Unity back then was thought to come from frank and open discussion in bottom up real consultation to find the truth of any situation. The current “Stepford Unity” or “Borg Unity” du jour comes from the abysmal fact that the Baha’is cannot consult at ANY level of the Institutions. The facts speak for themselves. That faith in North American is at ZERO GROWTH. Very long time, once very dedicated Baha’is, are leaving in droves. The Funds will eventually go into true free fall crisis. People are fed up.
This manufactured cosmetic “Unity” comes from this appalling failure of the Institutions of the Baha’i Faith at EVERY level of the Administrative Order to be able to freely and openly consult. The people currently on our Institutions could not consult their way out of a paper bag. You have a religion run by people living in a bubble who haven’t been out for dinner and a movie for 40 years!
Anyone living in Israel (or anywhere in the Middle East for that matter) is guaranteed to be paranoid within one year. After five years Electro Shock Therapy would not even have any effect whatsoever on serotonin transmitters. It is all about deranged brain chemistry. No one can think straight and no one will speak out at any level.
You have to have a system of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis to grow and progress at any level in life in human affairs. The Baha’i Faith in it’s current form no longer has such a mechanism. The result is spiritual death. The system can deal with nothing. Therefore, it is going to go further and further into free fall and no one will be able to do ANYTHING whatsoever to address this condition.
Unity comes from the justice of finding out the truth from free and open consultation. That is now completely unthinkable in the top down moribund pre-approved thought Ruhiized NewSpeak Faith.
It could change if there is a revolution in thinking worldwide in the Faith. But right now the odds of that ever happening are almost entirely non-existent in the now completely top down lock step Faith.
Your analysis is spot on regarding the currently existing problem.
Thank you for your post.
Craig
I’m sorry Justin, but there is no reason to think that unity is subservient to justice in the Bahá’í Faith, and especially in a Bahá’í family. Consider this advice written on behalf of the UHJ, 1 August 1978, to an individual:
This is precisely the advice that Ruhi Roo’s wife’s family was following. I see no mention of justice in the UHJ’s advice. Yes, the irony is sickening.
Your quotation proves nothing, as these kinds of overriding and contradictory superlatives are innumerable in the Bahá’í scriptures.
Consider the idea of a Bahá’í’s “first duty” for example. You would think that there should be agreement among the authorities of the religion regarding what this first duty is, right? And yet, they disagree with themselves on the question! In different places, for example, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá says that the first duty is “[to] strive by all possible means to educate both sexes,” “to investigate reality,” and then, “to effect their own unity and harmony.”
For his own part, Bahá’u'lláh says concurrently that the first duty is “steadfastness in His Cause,” “the recognition of Him Who is the Day Spring of His Revelation,” “to recognize the one true God,” and lastly, “to choose for himself that which no other may infringe and none usurp from him [the love of God]”.
And Shoghi Effendi says that the first duty of the believers is “loyalty to this foundation principle [of the oneness of mankind],” “to endeavour to uphold and promote [the standards of Bahá’í conduct],” and, “to teach His Cause with righteousness, conviction, understanding and vigor.”
Well, I’m sorry friends, but there cannot be nine separate first duties, and unity cannot be both above and below justice in importance. And yet, the subservience of unity to justice in one place in the writings is contradicted by its superiority in another. The Bahá’í writings want to have it both ways. And as we all know, there is no defence of religion more convincing than to blame all the problems of the religion on its followers (who correctly apply its principles) by providing a contradictory quote that says they should not have done what they did.
This is an excellent discussion. One that I’ve been looking forward to.
I like to try to simplify things; I feel that the basic questions in life are at their root inherently simple.
Eric quotes Baha’ullah:
“Immerse yourselves in the ocean of My words, that ye may unravel its secrets, and discover all the pearls of wisdom that lie hid in its depths. Take heed that ye do not vacillate in your determination to embrace the truth of this Cause—a Cause through which the potentialities of the might of God have been revealed, and His sovereignty established.”
Firstly, we are told to immerse ourselves in an ocean or words. This metaphor implies that we cannot comprehend Baha’ullah’s words completely — if one is immersed in an ocean it is impossible to embrace it entirely.
And what are we doing in this ocean — we are cherry picking! We are looking for pearls of wisdom, another way of saying cherry picking.
I wonder what constitutes the revelation Baha’ullah refers to? My conclusion so far is it is not every word he wrote. Nor is it all within the Baha’i writings. What if the revelation came from God and many received it? Anyway this is my current belief; that to understand what was revealed one must seek pearls of wisdom from the ocean and the rest of the world as well.
I am convinced that Baha’ullah was not always revealing wisdom from God when he wrote. Sometimes he seems completely inspired — The Hidden Words — other times he seems to be writing to fulfill a human need — The Aqdas. In the first case he is full of enthusiasm and is spiritually coherent, in the second he seems to be laboring and is quite inelegant. His mystical writings are very spiritual, his doctrinaire writings are administrative.
In the Tablets Revealed after the Aqdas we have what appears to be a confluence of the two voices of Baha’ullah. But here he is self conscious, perhaps because he is aware, late in life that he has established (God help us) a new religion wherein people must understand and be motivated by the reward and the punishment. Not a very spiritual outlook on life.
Discernment is one of the highest virtues. As we immerse ourselves in Baha’ullah’s words we need to seek the pearls of wisdom therein. Baha’ullah speaks of veils and clouds that make discernment difficult. These are not separate from the Ocean of his words: the veils and clouds are part of the ocean as well as the pearls. It is up to us to find them. In addition its not a bad idea to seek dry land for the diamonds and other gems that can be found there as well.
Peace,
Frank
It’s refreshing to read what others have to say on this subject. Frankly, I suspect that some of you have an agenda, but I don’t find it disagreeable; I’m ready to “pursue truth even if it leads me into the jaws of Hell.” I started reading the Writings when I was 14. I kept finding contradictions within them, and it troubled me. When I asked Baha’is about it, I was told that it was only apparent contradiction; that the quotations were taken from different occasions and were directed to different audiences with different needs and capacities.
The most obvious was ‘Abdu’l-Baha’s direct self-contradiction, regarding the means by which we can know what is true. In one case, He says that the four approaches to truth (reason, intuition, tradition, and senses) are flawed, and that the only way we can know the truth is if the truth approaches us, through the Holy Spirit. Yet in another talk, He says that if a statement agrees with all four, then it’s certain to be true!
I don’t pretend to know what it means.