The Archeology of the Kingdom of God: Diving a Bit Deeper into a Baha'i Approach to Metaphysics

[Tony Bristow-Stagg]

This started off as a discussion of a work by Jean-Marc Lepain.

It’s now become a sustained critique of Christian scripture and exegesis. As I get the sense we’re walking round in circles, I suggest we end the discussion here, or continue it elsewhere?

Would it not depend on the reader and the poster as to how far one will consider if they will want to choose the given option of discussing "Diving a Bit Deeper into a Baha'i Approach to Metaphysics".

Ahanu can also offer if there is a path that the discussion was to take.

Metaphysics is about as broad as it gets, as I understand it, we are examining the basic structure of reality as given by God.

Regards Tony

 

[Ahanu]

No-one says otherwise. Such terms are used figuratively.

You asserted that terms like "ascent" and "descent" are used figuratively, claiming, "No-one says otherwise." I must express my doubt, given several inconsistencies in our discussion.

First, you initially suggested a "broad range of opinion" among early Christians regarding the nature of the firmament. However, the evidence you offered was weak, primarily a single fourth-century text from Basil of Caesarea that addressed the composition of the firmament, suggesting it is not solid. This conveniently ignored the overwhelming consensus, explicitly stated by figures like St. Ambrose, who affirmed in his commentary on Genesis 1.7 that "the specific solidity of this exterior firmament is meant." St. Augustine, while exploring what lay beyond the firmament, likewise accepted its physical existence. The debate was not whether the firmament was solid, but what existed beyond it. You eventually conceded this point, acknowledging that "just about everyone accepted the solid firmament idea," even dismissing Basil's dissenting view as that of "just one person," despite his influence (with his view on the firmament not gaining traction until the 12th century). Before Basil, you couldn't find anybody else that disagreed with the common view of in ancient Christian circles.

Second, you attempted to reframe Paul's ascent to the third heaven as a figurative "out-of-body" experience. This interpretation is directly contradicted by the Greek text (οἶδα ἄνθρωπον ἐν Χριστῷ πρὸ ἐτῶν δεκατεσσάρων εἴτε ἐν σώματι οὐκ οἶδα εἴτε ἐκτὸς τοῦ σώματος οὐκ οἶδα ὁ θεὸς οἶδεν ἁρπαγέντα τὸν τοιοῦτον ἕως τρίτου οὐρανοῦ), which explicitly states Paul's uncertainty about whether the experience occurred "in the body" or "out of the body." This ambiguity itself demonstrates the possibility of a literal interpretation. Augustine himself acknowledged this possibility, stating, "Perhaps then we must infer that he ignored whether, when he was rapt to the third heaven… his soul went out of his body altogether, so that his body lay dead." This reflects a cultural milieu in which literal ascents and out-of-body experiences were readily conceivable, especially within first-century Jewish thought in the Greco-Roman world.

Third, you initially argued that even the dove at Jesus' baptism was merely a figurative appearance, stating things like "the Spirit descended with the appearance of a dove, not as a physical dove." You even claimed the text said "as if a dove," emphasizing the word "as if" here. This conveniently ignored the fact that early Church Fathers like Tertullian or Augustine and later theologians like Thomas Aquinas explicitly affirmed the dove's physical reality. Aquinas, drawing on Augustine and Cyprian, explained the dove's symbolic significance but definitively concluded that it was a real animal, created by God for this specific purpose, arguing that the Holy Spirit, being the Spirit of Truth, would not manifest through a deceptive illusion.

These examples—the firmament, Paul's ascent, and the dove—demonstrate a consistent pattern: you initially downplayed or dismissed the literal interpretations of these events in ancient Christian thought. And you expect me to believe you when you say "no-one says otherwise" regarding the figurative nature of "ascent" and "descent" in ancient Christianity, especially when we consider their cosmology and have already reviewed Origen's view of the literal ascent of the pneumatic body through the celestial spheres?!

As Litwa observes, "The literal language of God-making in the ancient world should chasten the tendency to too quickly metamorphize ancient thinking."

 

[Thomas]

To me, this is the fundamental purpose of God's Messiah, "Christ", is to show us how the Messengers transcendent all names and in our reality they are all of what we do know of and about "God", (but in the human station they are not God).

Not to me.

I have no issue with you seeing Jesus Christ as God, I would only observe that this view will never be able to reconcile with the knowledge that many Messengers have been given by the One God, and all can be seen in that light, if we so choose.

Well, anyone can see anyone in any light they like, but whether there's an element of the 'real' or 'true' involved is another matter – and as the Prophets, for example, do not and would not accept the claim that they are God, the Son of God, they refute you.

And as for reconciling that view, you're quite wrong, in fact I rather think we are more open than you!
"Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares" Hebrews 13:2.

A saying of the Fathers is: "Where your neighbour is, there God is also"

We do not confine God's ability to communicate with humanity to 'Messengers'.

Baha'u'llah explains how they can be seen as God in the divine station, but in the human station they are a man like us'

Explains to whom?

Has his audience never read the Hebrew Scriptures? the New Testament? The noble Qran? Any of the sacred texts of the East? I'm assuming not, because if they had, they would already know this.

".... Were any of the all-embracing Manifestations of God to declare: “I am God,” He, verily, speaketh the truth, and no doubt attacheth thereto.

OK. But they don't. Only Christ does declares His own divinity, so the rest of this argument is redundant.

And were any of them to voice the utterance, “I am the Messenger of God,” He, also, speaketh the truth ... Viewed in this light, they are all but Messengers of that ideal King, that unchangeable Essence.

OK, but they do not claim Sonship, or Divinity.

And were they all to proclaim, “I am the Seal of the Prophets,” they, verily, utter but the truth, beyond the faintest shadow of doubt. For they are all but one person, one soul, one spirit, one being, one revelation.

This is where we part ways. This assumes, against all the evidence of Scripture and Tradition, that all messengers of God are the same in every respect, which metaphysically, is simply a failure to discern distinction with regard to the 'stations' you talk of.

The Abrahamics all refute this, so I will not waste time belabouring the point, you've just made Baha'ism irreconcilable with those traditions. I could demonstrate the metaphysical error, but it would be too time consuming, to no end.

They are all the manifestation of the “Beginning” and the “End,” the “First” and the “Last,” the “Seen” and the “Hidden”—all of which pertain to Him Who is the Innermost Spirit of Spirits and Eternal Essence of Essences.

But they do not all claim to be the “Beginning” “End,” “First” and “Last,” “Seen” and “Hidden” – this is right, but leads to your error in claiming what belongs to the Essence as equally belonging to its Manifestation.

 

[Thomas]

You asserted that terms like "ascent" and "descent" are used figuratively, claiming, "No-one says otherwise." I must express my doubt, given several inconsistencies in our discussion.

OK, let's try and recoup.

First, you initially suggested a "broad range of opinion" among early Christians regarding the nature of the firmament.

OK. I offered one as an example, that's not enough, OK.

But I agree that generally, in the GrecoRoman world, and through into the Middle Ages, the firmament was conceived as 'solid', one sphere within a hierarchy of spheres of containment, with the earth in the middle.

My only comment here is we should not assume the ancients had the same understanding of 'matter' as we do today – our common understanding treats matter as a given, and that's about it. The ancients were not quite so definitive, they lacked the scientific data, so they speculate upon the nature of matter, and we discussed, at length, the Stoic notion of matter residing as the passive principle, material prima, formless and inchoate, the basic substrate of the Cosmos, which is unified and organised by the active principle via the medium of pneuma, and it is the presence of pneuma the permeates this base matter and makes it what it is, a rock, a man, a star, accordingly – and everything that is exists in a tension between the active and passive principle ... but the point here is that while pneuma is regarded as a substance by the Stoics, it is not the same substance that is visible of rocks. Pneuma is thoughts and ideas ...

Second, you attempted to reframe Paul's ascent to the third heaven as a figurative "out-of-body" experience.

Then that was my error. Rather, I thought I was saying we don't know what experience it was, as Paul himself is not sure.

Subsequent to that, does 'in the body or 'out of the body' mean that he left his body and 'rose' (spiritually, astrally?) to the third heaven, or that he had a vision of the third heaven while in the body, as it were? That 'in the body' means the vision came to him, or out of the body meaning he was transported to some celestial place?

As an aside – 2 Corinthians 5:6-8 –
"Therefore having always confidence, knowing that, while we are in the body, we are absent from the Lord. (For we walk by faith, and not by sight.) But we are confident, and have a good will to be absent rather from the body, and to be present with the Lord."
Do your commentaries have anything on this?

which explicitly states Paul's uncertainty about whether the experience occurred "in the body" or "out of the body." This ambiguity itself demonstrates the possibility of a literal interpretation.

Yes, and the possibility of a figurative one. A literal interpretation could be, as I suggest above, that he means whether he was somehow lifted up, or that heaven came to him, D'you see?

Like saying, "Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again" – does that mean she astral travelled to manderley, or that it came to her ion a dream?

I'm not wedded to either reading, just highlighting the ambiguity.

Augustine himself acknowledged this possibility, stating, "Perhaps then we must infer that he ignored whether, when he was rapt to the third heaven… his soul went out of his body altogether, so that his body lay dead." This reflects a cultural milieu in which literal ascents and out-of-body experiences were readily conceivable, especially within first-century Jewish thought in the Greco-Roman world.

OK. But if his soul did not go 'out of his body', was his body taken up with his soul?

As you've argued, GrecoRoman culture does not exclude bodily ascent. Nor does the Old Testament.

Third, you initially argued that even the dove at Jesus' baptism was merely a figurative appearance, stating things like "the Spirit descended with the appearance of a dove, not as a physical dove."

OK, let's address this, using the DBH translation, which is a bit more raw and literal:
Mark 1:10 – "And, immediately rising up out of the water, he saw the heavens being rent apart and the Spirit descending to him as a dove"
Matthew 3:16 – "And, having been baptised, Jesus immediately rose up out of the water; and look: The heavens were opened [to him], and he saw a Spirit from God descending as a dove, alighting upon him"
Luke 3:22-22 – "... heaven was opened, and the Spirit, the Holy one, descended in the corporeal form (Gk: somatikos eidos) of a dove"

So what are the sacred scribes saying? That the heavens – your solid firmament – were opened, and the Holy Spirit descended 'as' a dove, indeed 'in the corporeal form of' – but it was, in fact, the Holy Spirit.

The rent heavens are easily passed over – the Holy Spirit, the highest grade of pneuma, can pass through solid matter, so the 'rent', I suggest, is a description of the passage between two worlds that have, since the exclusion from the Garden, be closed to each other.

With regard the dove, then I still say the text does not explicitly state a physical dove, but the Holy Spirit as a dove, and that dove, assumes increasing corporeality as it descends, until to the eye it is a dove ... and not a crow or an eagle, which in the language of symbol carries different connotations, the dove being the symbol of peace and divine benevolence.

John 1:29-34 says:
"The next day he (the Baptist) sees Jesus coming toward him, and says, “See the lamb of God? who is taking away the sin of the cosmos. This is he concerning whom I have said, ‘A man is coming after me who has surpassed me, for he was before me." And I myself did not recognise him, although I came baptising in water so that he might be made manifest to Israel.”
John also testified by saying: “I have seen the Spirit descending as a dove from the sky, and it rested on him. And I did not recognise him; rather he who sent me to baptise in water, that one said to me, ‘On whomever you see the Spirit descending, and resting upon him, this is he who baptises in a Holy Spirit.’ And I have seen and have borne witness that this man is the Son of God."
A lot to unpack here, but briefly:
John testifies here, according to the Johannine tradition, so we might assume that Mark, Matthew and Luke are based on this testimony at least, plus, possibly, that of other witnesses – although not all the Baptist's followers went on to follow Jesus.
We read 'I saw' regarding this event, and that he was foretold of this event 'that one said to me' – so there is no necessary reason to assume that anyone else actually saw anything (although I would assume they might well have), and that there was no celestial announcement at the time, but rather the baptist's putting things together, which the synoptic scribe later augmented.

So regarding the corporeality of the dove, I'd say, following Stoic understanding, that perhaps a light coalesced into the form of a dove and was indeed a material dove, in as much as a material thing is the coalescing of the materia prima by the pneuma into a dove.

But really, the dove is immaterial, other than as a recognisable symbol, it's the Spirit that's happening ...

So if I insisted on the dove as figurative alone, then I apologise for by myopia.

It is a symbolic actuality.

... arguing that the Holy Spirit, being the Spirit of Truth, would not manifest through a deceptive illusion.

OK, although I don't for a moment though the audience thought it 'just' a dove. They would have understood it as a form of the Holy Spirit.

These examples—the firmament, Paul's ascent, and the dove—demonstrate a consistent pattern: you initially downplayed or dismissed the literal interpretations of these events in ancient Christian thought.

Then if I've done that I am truly sorry ... I thought I was trying to say thje events have both a literal reality and a transcending spiritual actuality.

Like the miracles of Christ – say the blind man's sight restored – I accept and believe the figurative interpretation that Jesus is talking about spiritual sight, or illumination, enlightenment, and so forth, but more importantly, I accept that an actual man, blind from birth, actually had his sight restored – the miracle was an actual literal miracle, with spiritual implication.

I would also add, in that instance, the argument that it means enlightenment alone, does not actually stand, as the rest of the text makes clear. The man has no idea who or what Jesus is, only that he was blind, and now he's not.

And you expect me to believe ...

What I was asking is that you accept both the literal and the figurative implication – you seemed to be arguing the impossibility of the literal thus precludes any figurative significance.

I think the ancients were more 'insightful' than you allow – they didn't see things quite so 'hard' as we do. The Platonic theory was the cosmos was matter and there was spirit; the Stoic theory is more both matter and spirit.matter is just spirit in a given form, and furthermore the cosmos was orchestrated, from the top down, by God and His hierarchy, and everything was in God, and God was in everything, whereas the Platonists were a little firmer in the idea of an absolute divine transcendence – so there was a sliding scale from pantheism to panentheism.

Jesus said: "Therefore do I speak to them in parables: because seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand" (Matthew 13:13)

The use of figurative language was widespread in Antiquity.

"Solomon also spoke three thousand parables: and his poems were a thousand and five" (3 Kings 4:32).

"I will open my mouth in parables: I will utter propositions from the beginning" (Psalm 77:2).

The Book of Proverbs opens:
"The parables of Solomon, the son of David, king of Israel. To know wisdom, and instruction: To understand the words of prudence: and to receive the instruction of doctrine, justice, and judgment, and equity: To give subtilty to little ones, to the young man knowledge and understanding. A wise man shall hear and shall be wiser: and he that understandeth, shall possess governments. He shall understand a parable, and the interpretation, the words of the wise, and their mysterious sayings" (1:1-6).

To them the literal world was an appearance of the mysterious world – it's not a case of literal or figurative, but literal and figurative.

 

[Ahanu]

The Divine is immensely exalted beyond every attribute, being One, Simple and Undifferentiate, yet clearly the Divine can and does work in and through the human according to the Divine Will (cf eg 1 John 4:7).

You assert God is beyond attributes, yet acts in the world. The question is how God acts. The concept of self-limitation, as understood in the context of the Incarnation (or "little pantheism" as some Christians call it), suggests a change in God's being or nature to facilitate this action. This contradicts the idea of a truly "simple and undifferentiated" God. The Baháʼí perspective, and that of Shaykh Ahmad, offers an alternative: God acts through His Will and through His Manifestations, without any change in His essence.

In ascribing qualities to the Divine, the understanding is that for us these terms are relative and contingent, whereas in the Divine they are Absolute and Infinite (cf eg Mark 10:18). Thus we have the Ninety Nine Names in Islam – the All-Knowing, the All-Hearing, the All-Seeing, the All-Speaking, and so on, yet Islam understands God does not 'know', 'hear' 'see' or 'speak' in the corporeal sense.

You state that divine attributes are understood differently in God than in humans. While this is true, the Incarnation goes beyond simply ascribing attributes. It involves the taking on of human nature, which is a concrete act, not merely a difference in how we perceive divine attributes. This taking on of humanity implies a real change in God's relationship to creation, a "descent" into the human realm, which is difficult to reconcile with a truly transcendent and unchanging God.

The Unknowable Essence of God is immensely exalted beyond 'being' as such, which is itself an attribute.

The Incarnation, as understood in Christian theology, involves not just the unknowable essence but the divine nature becoming united with human nature. This union, this "becoming flesh," is a concrete event that implies a change or taking on of something new, even if the divine essence itself is said to remain unchanged.

If "unknowable" and "immensely exalted above every human attribute" then surely there is no possibility of any kind of communication between Creator and creature, between the Divine and human?

No covenant with Israel, no prophecy, no scripture...

This is a false dilemma. You present only two options: complete detachment or Incarnation. The Baháʼí Faith offers a third option (as expressed above): God communicates through intermediaries - Manifestations or Prophets - who perfectly reflect His attributes without being incarnations of His essence. This allows for divine communication without compromising God's absolute transcendence.

Relevant excerpts from Catechism of the Catholic Church:

• "The Word became flesh for us in order to save us by reconciling us with God... Sick, our nature demanded to be healed; fallen, to be raised up; dead, to rise again. We had lost the possession of the good; it was necessary for it to be given back to us. Closed in the darkness, it was necessary to bring us the light; captives, we awaited a Saviour; prisoners, help; slaves, a liberator. Are these things minor or insignificant? Did they not move God to descend to human nature and visit it, since humanity was in so miserable and unhappy a state?" (CCC 457)
• "Taking up St. John's expression, 'The Word became flesh,' the Church calls 'Incarnation' the fact that the Son of God assumed a human nature in order to accomplish our salvation in it." (CCC 461)
• "The unique and altogether singular event of the Incarnation of the Son of God does not mean that Jesus Christ is part God and part man, nor does it imply that he is the result of a confused mixture of the divine and the human. He became truly man while remaining truly God. Jesus Christ is true God and true man." (CCC 464)
• "The Son of God therefore communicates to his humanity his own personal mode of existence in the Trinity... The Son of God. . . worked with human hands; he thought with a human mind. He acted with a human will, and with a human heart he loved. Born of the Virgin Mary, he has truly been made one of us, like to us in all things except sin." (CCC 470)

 

[Ahanu]

No-one says otherwise. Such terms are used figuratively.

While you claim these terms are used figuratively, the very doctrine of the Incarnation, as presented in the Catechism, describes a real event - God becoming man - which implies a change or taking on of something new by the divine nature. This is not simply a matter of figurative language; it's a core theological claim about the nature of God and His relationship to creation.

Baháʼu’lláh states in the Kitáb-i-Íqán: "To every discerning and illumined heart it is evident that God, the unknowable Essence, the divine Being, is immensely exalted beyond every human attribute, such as corporeal existence, ascent and descent, egress and regress." This statement directly contradicts the idea of God undergoing any form of self-limitation or descent.

 

[TheLightWithin]

The ancients experienced spiritual realities, but their capacity to express those experiences was limited by the available language and concepts, leading to the use of physical descriptions like pneuma as a subtle, mobile substance

Then the burden of proof is upon you to evidence this.

Isn't what Ahanu saying at least in this specific passage, more or less consistent with Perennialism?

 

[TheLightWithin]

Third, you initially argued that even the dove at Jesus' baptism was merely a figurative appearance, stating things like "the Spirit descended with the appearance of a dove, not as a physical dove." You even claimed the text said "as if a dove," emphasizing the word "as if" here. This conveniently ignored the fact that early Church Fathers like Tertullian or Augustine and later theologians like Thomas Aquinas explicitly affirmed the dove's physical reality. Aquinas, drawing on Augustine and Cyprian, explained the dove's symbolic significance but definitively concluded that it was a real animal, created by God for this specific purpose, arguing that the Holy Spirit, being the Spirit of Truth, would not manifest through a deceptive illusion.

I can easily see how it is figurative, it is worded as a simile, it is figurative poetic language.
I'm not sure I can see how anything meaningful is harmed by recognizing the literary and poetic language of this passage rather than inferring a real animal showed up or was created for a moment or something.

 

[TheLightWithin]

???
What is he doing here?
Just to offer an incredulous disapproving expression?

 

[Ahanu]

So what are the sacred scribes saying? That the heavens – your solid firmament – were opened, and the Holy Spirit descended 'as' a dove, indeed 'in the corporeal form of' – but it was, in fact, the Holy Spirit.

The rent heavens are easily passed over – the Holy Spirit, the highest grade of pneuma, can pass through solid matter, so the 'rent', I suggest, is a description of the passage between two worlds that have, since the exclusion from the Garden, be closed to each other.

With regard the dove, then I still say the text does not explicitly state a physical dove, but the Holy Spirit as a dove, and that dove, assumes increasing corporeality as it descends, until to the eye it is a dove ... and not a crow or an eagle, which in the language of symbol carries different connotations, the dove being the symbol of peace and divine benevolence.

You stated that the Holy Spirit can "pass through" solid matter and "descend as a dove," even suggesting that the dove can "assume increasing corporeality." Note you are ascribing physical actions - such as passing through, descending, assuming corporeality - to an entity you claim is non-physical, while simultaneously asserting that this spatial terminology is entirely figurative. This directly clashes with your earlier statement in post #248: "It's the language of symbol… and… should not be interpreted in physical terms." You were specifically addressing the language of ascending and descending there.

While the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy states, "Pneuma passes through all (other) bodies," this refers to krasis (blending), a concept widely understood in the Hellenistic world. Krasis describes interpenetration and coexistence within the same space, not a literal passage through a solid object. Pneuma influences and qualifies other matter, not by displacing it or moving through it like a barrier, but by complete intermixture at every level, interpenetrating the particles themselves. The analogy of fire permeating red-hot iron illustrates this: they occupy the same space yet retain distinct properties.

How can a non-physical entity perform physical actions like descending or assuming corporeality? If the Holy Spirit is truly non-physical, then the language of descent and ascent is not simply symbolic; it is incoherent.

As I previously stated, Abdu'l-Baha offers a more coherent explanation: "It is absolutely impossible that the Holy Spirit should ascend and descend, enter, come out, or penetrate, it can only be that the Holy Spirit appears in splendour, as the sun appears in the mirror." This analogy avoids the contradiction of a non-physical entity engaging in physical movement, as we see in Paul's Greco-Roman world. The sun's image appears in the mirror without the sun literally traveling there.

You previously stated that this language of ascent and descent is "the language of symbol" and should not be interpreted physically. However, the symbols you are using - such as descent - rely on physical experiences. Either the Holy Spirit is capable of physical movement (contradicting its non-physical nature), or the language of descent must be understood in a way that doesn't imply literal movement in space. The Stoic understanding of pneuma as a subtle yet material substance, capable of manifestation within the existing cosmos, offers a more consistent explanation of ancient understandings of pneuma in Pauline thought, suggesting they did not exclusively interpret descent and ascent of pneuma figuratively.