We met with the Baha'i ladies yesterday and it's been messing with my brain ever since. I like what they say about society: prophets come at a particular time and place to guide people; as humans we don't find absolute truth but its reflection; the purpose of religion (and life) is to find unity in our humanity. This is all verygood, veryverygood. I get hung up on some of the fundamentals: God is absolute and all-knowing (and so on - they derive many of these ideas from Islam); Humans have eternal souls; Baha'u'llah is the "promised one" of this age. I was reading a Baha'i pamphlet last night and some of the words of Baha'u'llah are compelling, but some just sound like the same old BS, and if Baha'is become the dominant world religion, I fear they'll be just like the others. Examples below.
Compelling: Baha'is say people reject prophets because they want the prophets to affirm what they already believe. So people think that when Jesus comes back, he'll reward them (and their fellow believers in truth) and punish everyone else. But prophets do not return to tell people what they already know/think. They come and are persecuted and rejected by the powerful (who, today, all think that Jesus would reward them).
Maybe not so much: Mankind has been progressing through various spiritual stages. Progressivism is repugnant to me; why would a faith that values all previous prophets also claim progression? Baha'is are explicitly monotheistic, and the assumed animistic - polytheistic - monotheistic progression is unconvincing. It raises a question: as we progress materially, do we progress spiritually?
Blah: Mankind is ready for one, unified faith. This is where I could see Baha'is becoming just another religion. I mean, everybody thinks that their faith will "unite" mankind, so long as all mankind adopts their faith. I know that Baha'is have been persecuted horribly in Iran - but incipient faiths always start from the bottom (see "prophets" above) and become more and more rigid and self-righteous as they gain power.
We're going to a devotional tonight, and I'm looking forward to it. I want to keep my mind open to this religion, for whatever reason. I like the ideas behind Baha'ism, I just don't know whether I can accept the tenets. Also, everyone I've met who's a Baha'i is thoughtful and educated. But so were the Rajneeshees. (I do not mean to seriously compare the two. But I do remember lots of people in The Dalles commenting on how "educated" the Rajneeshees were).
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Hi Erin and Lauren,
I'm glad you're taking the oppotunity to size up the Baha'is. Check out this link to see Baha'is from around the world.
http://news.bahai.org/story/675
Baha'is are educated butit is their spiritual education that distinguishes them.
George
at http://bahaiviews.net
Great pic of you of getting ready for the Second Coming, BTW. It gave me a good chuckle.
I couldn't resist posting on you on my blog Baha'i Views.
http://www.bahaiviews.net/2008/12/09/on-meeting-with-the-bahai-ladies-its-been-messing-with-my-brain-ever-since/
Hi - some thoughts....
you say "Baha'is are explicitly monotheistic, and the assumed animistic - polytheistic - monotheistic progression is unconvincing. It raises a question: as we progress materially, do we progress spiritually?"
Yes and no. We don't keep slaves and that has a material and spiritual dimension but we still have economic indenture. Baha'i writings outline progression but without blemish on prior revelation. The limits are ours. But that doesn't mean the religion continued without error. As you say - eventually religions became self-righteous and became the oppressors the prophets themselves had to overcome. In fact in general the Baha'i writings support a cyclic, or spiral, aspect to history - that religions go through seasons and the cold grip of winter is broken by the divine springtime with a new prophet.
However there is a substance to that cycle which is missing in your analysis. If religion can become degraded then it is a mistake to judge religion and its condition and contribution by only that winter. And animism and polytheism and etc could be examples of the degradation of the original teachings. Baha'i writings refer to everything having within it a sign of God, given to every thing by God, which is capable of reflecting some attribute of God (similar to but different from animism) and then elsewhere of the highest expression of those attributes themselves, acting with voice and personality, being distinct from God (similar to but distinct from polytheism). Now perhaps the approach is to note that these teachings have been more or less present in all religions at all times and that humanity has partly "gotten it" but also later lost it. As such the religion of God is always the same and we are in that springtime of "getting it" afresh. I'm not aware of any commentary that says animism and polytheism and so on are themselves the progression Baha'is speak of. Instead there is more emphasis on the scale of the organization of humanity each religion has tackled.
Now, Baha'is claim, we are at a new threshold not approached in the past. Not only are these teachings more apparent than before and suited to our times, but we must wrestle with these issues in a world now encountering itself and these histories from one end to the other without limit. That is why we are talking about getting the world united. We have reached a level of world wide awareness that didn't exist in Jesus time or Moses - or rather the extent of that awareness in those times defined the horizon of that progress. In that sense we are in the same place - we have our horizon and they had theirs. It's the same issues.
One refinement to the above though - the cyclic quality is not some arbitrary force from the outside. It's part of us too. In groups when we organize our society away from God then we enter winter. But in that fact we could pursue a global warming - if we can find a way, we could keep our society oriented towards God. We could keep away from the ice ages perhaps. How well we go about this task depends on how well we "get it". No different from the past but taking place an a whole wider arena. Today we are encountering Buddhism and Islam and Christianity and tribal animism and first nations spirituality, and "I don't believe in God just like I don't believe in Santa Clause and the tooth fairly." In some respect they all are right. We just need a framework to bring us into oneness about it.
Hi George - thanks so much for linking our post to your Baha'i website. I'll read some of the other information there.
And hello SMK - thank you for your thoughtful post. The global reach of information certainly marks an exciting time for humanity, and I am glad that Baha'ism looks at the opportunities afforded by this change. I'll be able to say more, I suppose, as I learn more. I'm still a neophyte, but as I mentioned in my post, I'm pretty open to some of the teachings.
In terms of progression, I think it's something that exists in most modern religions, as well as in all 19th century social sciences (anthropology, sociology). It is an increasingly contentious notion within the social sciences (and I consider myself a sociologist) and so it tends to raise a red flag for me. But I will take your words into consideration.
I noticed in some of the other info on the blog a connection with Latter Day Saints. Is there something there you'd like to explore with respect to your survey of other religions? The Baha'i Faith and LDS have some links - and more depending on the interpritation.
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