Tony Bristow-Stagg
One Planet One People Please
Baha'u'llah explains this in detail and Abdul'baha gave many talks on this topic.
In the end, the source is the best reference.
Regards Tony
The Mystery of God’s Will Unfolding in this Matrix 2
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In the end, the source is the best reference.
Regards Tony
Modesty
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I'm actually curious about this, because I thought Baha'i doesn't believe in angels, but it does believe the Quran is completely accurate...isn't the angel Gabriel mentioned in the Quran?
Tony Bristow-Stagg
One Planet One People Please
It is great, we can now forget the demons. Personally I see the Baha’i teachings have no place for Lucifer, Satan, the Devil, etc, except as a symbolic personification of human evil, our remoteness from God.
Angels are the Holy Souls that have passed on, who gave their lives for the Messengers.
In this age Baha'u'llah has names them as part of the Surpreme Concourse on High, their influence spreads into this matrix.
"...The faithful are ever sustained by the presence of the Supreme Concourse. In the Supreme Concourse are Jesus, and Moses, and Elijah, and Baháʾuʾlláh, and other supreme Souls: there, also, are the martyrs..." - ʿAbduʾl-Bahá in London, page 97
Wonderful topic that one. Regards Tony
..are you sure?
What about those people who lead others astray .. aren't they demons?
Tony Bristow-Stagg
One Planet One People Please
Muhammad was told to Recite the Quran by the Angel Gabriel. It is the foundation of Islam.
Each Messenger has such an experienced when it is time for them to deliver the Message to Humanity.
Moses,the Burning Bush.
Jesus, the Dove
Muhammad the Angel Gabriel
Bab, the severed head of Imman Ali
Baha'ullah, Maid of Heaven
The Maid of Heaven is explained here.
Maid of Heaven - Bahai9
bahai9.com
Regards Tony
Tony Bristow-Stagg
One Planet One People Please
As you would know, yes, we still do have to live with the bad choices. Yet in this knowledge we can Love all people in the light that they are given of God to fulfill God's Will...are you sure?
What about those people who lead others astray .. aren't they demons?
To me it explains this Bible verse.
Isaiah 45:7 "I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things."
It is a great gift to know that we are the best of things, or we are the worst of things, that no independent force of evil exists. We move closer to God and reflect the light of God, or we move away from God and become the darkest of evil.
In Paris Abdul'baha showed us how to genuinely forgive, without being hypocritical.
In 1911, `Abdu’l-Bahá was in Egypt for one year to recuperate from prison life and to prepare for his travels to the West. He travelled by ship to Europe. One day when `Abdu’l-Bahá was in Europe, he stayed in a town not far from Geneva. At the same time, Zillul-Sultan was in the same town. Zillul-Sultan was the oldest son of Nasirid-Din Shah and he would have been the heir of the throne if his mother had not been a woman outside of the Qajar family. Nevertheless, the sultan had prominent governmental position in Iran. His father, Nasirid-Din Shah, as you know, ordered the imprisonment of Bahá’u’lláh, His exile and was responsible for the ruthless killing of many Babis and Bahais. The sultan was also responsible for many Bahais being martyred, among them the King and the Beloved of Martyrs in Isfahan. So these two had caused a lot of suffering for `Abdu’l-Bahá and his family.
When the sultan was in the same town as `Abdu’l-Bahá, he noticed that there was another Persian (from the clothes) and he asked who that was. He was told it was `Abdu’l-Bahá and he asked to meet him. He was granted permission to meet `Abdu’l-Bahá. When they met, `Abdu’l-Bahá took him in his arms and said: "All that is of the past, Never think of it again." Then `Abdu’l-Bahá invited him to spend the day with him. Think for a moment about this. This was the sultan who had cause so much grief and hardship for the friends and
`Abdu’l-Bahá, and the Master says, never think of it again.
Interestingly the Sultan had two sons who would visit Abdul'baha after that. One became a Baha'i.
When the sultan was in the same town as `Abdu’l-Bahá, he noticed that there was another Persian (from the clothes) and he asked who that was. He was told it was `Abdu’l-Bahá and he asked to meet him. He was granted permission to meet `Abdu’l-Bahá. When they met, `Abdu’l-Bahá took him in his arms and said: "All that is of the past, Never think of it again." Then `Abdu’l-Bahá invited him to spend the day with him. Think for a moment about this. This was the sultan who had cause so much grief and hardship for the friends and
`Abdu’l-Bahá, and the Master says, never think of it again.
Interestingly the Sultan had two sons who would visit Abdul'baha after that. One became a Baha'i.
Regards Tony
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Modesty
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That's really interesting. So sort of similar to the saints in Catholicism?
Tony Bristow-Stagg
One Planet One People Please
Yes, I see the Concourse on High contains all the holy souls from the past.
An interesting story was told by two Bahai which is told here if you wish to have a read.
The Story Behind 'The Followers' — SHADI TOLOUI-WALLACE
Normal 0 false false false EN-AU JA X-NONE
www.shaditolouiwallace.com
Many great stories like this. Regards Tony
Faithfulservant
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I've been reading a lot of threads today and Isaiah 45:7 is just everywhere. It's like an epiphany or validating something for you? Maybe that Satan isn't a real being despite all the scriptures I posted in #237?
If God created Satan and Satan is evil then God created evil. Just saying..
I personally prefer the translation as He created calamity instead of evil but without knowing how the Hebrew word was used originally I can only have an opinion based on my ignorance.
We can always use the logic He gave us.
Darkness is the absence of Light
Cold is the absence of Heat
Evil is the absence of Good.
If God created Satan and Satan is evil then God created evil. Just saying..
I personally prefer the translation as He created calamity instead of evil but without knowing how the Hebrew word was used originally I can only have an opinion based on my ignorance.
We can always use the logic He gave us.
Darkness is the absence of Light
Cold is the absence of Heat
Evil is the absence of Good.
Faithfulservant
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Angels as people that had passed before? Makes me think of those TV shows Touched by an Angel or Highway to Heaven. Fanciful thinking but biblically not sound. When Lucifer fell he took 1/3 of the angels with him.
And look.. Jesus saw it Himself.
Luke 10:18 18 And he said to them, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.
They were at the beginning of creation
Job 38:4-7
“Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell Me, if you have understanding.
Who determined its measurements?
Surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? To what were its foundations fastened?
Or who laid its cornerstone,
When the morning stars sang together,
And all the sons of God shouted for joy?
And look.. Jesus saw it Himself.
Luke 10:18 18 And he said to them, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.
They were at the beginning of creation
Job 38:4-7
“Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell Me, if you have understanding.
Who determined its measurements?
Surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? To what were its foundations fastened?
Or who laid its cornerstone,
When the morning stars sang together,
And all the sons of God shouted for joy?
Tony Bristow-Stagg
One Planet One People Please
Yes, I see the wisdom of all this is in this passage.
Isaiah 45:7 KJV I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.
This creation is a reality of opposites. Personally I see that is how free will works, it is the concious relative capacity to choose between the animating forces of Love and the lack of them.
Regards Tony
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TheLightWithin
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I think it's a common folk belief. I don't know if it has any scriptural basis or perhaps basis in old tradition.
Or any history in Judaism?
Maybe a conflation of the beliefs in saints? (Catholic and Orthodox)
Tony Bristow-Stagg
One Planet One People Please
I see this fall is Spiritual and there has been many Antichrists. Baha'u'llah faced a formidable Antichrist.
I see it is those that embrace the Christ and then deny the Christ and try to take that power for their own self. History is littered with these attempts.
This is part of God's Creation, God's major plan.
We can Love, we do not have to choose any hate, with Love there is no evil.
Regards Tony
Tony Bristow-Stagg
One Planet One People Please
This is what Baha'u'llah offered
"..Thou hast, moreover, asked Me concerning the state of the soul after its separation from the body. Know thou, of a truth, that if the soul of man hath walked in the ways of God, it will, assuredly, return and be gathered to the glory of the Beloved. By the righteousness of God! It shall attain a station such as no pen can depict, or tongue describe. The soul that hath remained faithful to the Cause of God, and stood unwaveringly firm in His Path shall, after his ascension, be possessed of such power that all the worlds which the Almighty hath created can benefit through him. Such a soul provideth, at the bidding of the Ideal King and Divine Educator, the pure leaven that leaveneth the world of being, and furnisheth the power through which the arts and wonders of the world are made manifest. Consider how meal needeth leaven to be leavened with. Those souls that are the symbols of detachment are the leaven of the world. Meditate on this, and be of the thankful." – Baha’u’llah, Gleanings from the Writings of Baha’u’llah, p. 161.
Abdul'baha elaborated on this theme of spiritual influences and inspiration from the next world when he answered the question: “How should one look forward to death?”
"How does one look forward to the goal of any journey? With hope and with expectation. It is even so with the end of this earthly journey. In the next world, man will find himself freed from many of the disabilities under which he now suffers. Those who have passed on through death, have a sphere of their own. It is not removed from ours; their work, the work of the Kingdom, is ours; but it is sanctified from what we call time and place. Time with us is measured by the sun. When there is no more sunrise, and no more sunset, that kind of time does not exist for man. Those who have ascended have different attributes from those who are still on earth, yet there is no real separation.
In prayer there is a mingling of station, a mingling of condition. Pray for them as they pray for you! When you do not know it, and are in a receptive attitude, they are able to make suggestions to you, if you are in difficulty. This sometimes happens in sleep." – Abdu’l-Baha, Abdu’l-Baha in London, pp. 95–96.
Regards Tony
It's called ancestor worship and has always been practiced by ancient tribal societies. African tribes used to have to dig up the skulls of their ancestors before relocating to a new area and transport them in a cart for reburial, or else it was believed the tribe would be dispersed and scattered.
Sorry it's necessary as usual to expose the proselytizing sleight-of-hand being practiced here. This Baha'i belief is nothing new or enlightened. Some would call it superstition?
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Tony Bristow-Stagg
One Planet One People Please
Sorry, but now it is neccessary to expose that is why Christianity persecuted wonderful Native traditions, as they tried to eradicate native identities and stolen generations away from their parents.
The Aboriginals have traditions that are very complementary to biblical concepts.
If only they had the humility to learn, not dominate.
Regards Tony
So what about the past? History is good and bad. All religions have skeletons. It's a diversion, sleight-of-hand as always.
Point is it doesn't take Baha'u'llah Christ the Father to make up the sort of stuff you wish to foist on others as God's fixed truth for the next 800 years for all humanity.
Bye Tony
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Then why use it if he means something else?
You can't just reinvent the definitions of theological terms and ideas that have been constant for millennia. If you want to dismiss the idea, then say so, but this is not the way, it just causes confusion ...
As argued, the failure to see the play of Divine Immanence in the lives of people is a spiritual opacity.
According to your doctrine, the best you can hope for is copy the 'Manifestations'.
It's a humanist manifesto, Tony, and I applaud it, but it's not a spiritual one – there is no allowance for the Immanent Presence in the soul in your ideology.
Tony Bristow-Stagg
One Planet One People Please
I see our knowledge is being expanded, as foretold, we will be guided unto all Truth.
There is an ancient tradition that knowledge is of 27 letters.
It is recorded that up to the Bab only 2 letters had been released and the Message of the Bab released the remains 25 letters.
In the material world we marvel of the advancement mankind has made since the 1800's, yet many still not ponder if there was a cause of that advancement.
Regards Tony
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