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.

 

[Thomas]

The concept of self-limitation, as understood in the context of the Incarnation (or "little pantheism" as some Christians call it)...

Well I've never heard it called 'little pantheism', nor is that an accurate description of the Christian idea of Incarnation.

... suggests a change in God's being or nature to facilitate this action.

The doctrine clearly asserts there is no change. Nor is there. God has not changed, the Incarnation is a union of two natures – divine and human. What is understood is that this possibility of Divine Union is eternally in God, who is eternally Creator.

You state that divine attributes are understood differently in God than in humans.

One way of saying it. We can predicate attributes to the Divine – God is True, God is Real, God is Good, and so forth – but God as such transcends all categories, all determinations. It's kataphatic language.

... 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.

Following, then, the holy Fathers, we all unanimously teach that our Lord Jesus Christ is to us One and the same Son, the Self-same Perfect in Godhead, the Self-same Perfect in Manhood; truly God and truly Man; the Self-same of a rational soul and body; co-essential with the Father according to the Godhead, the Self-same co-essential with us according to the Manhood; like us in all things, sin apart; before the ages begotten of the Father as to the Godhead, but in the last days, the Self-same, for us and for our salvation (born) of Mary the Virgin Theotokos as to the Manhood; One and the Same Christ, Son, Lord, Only-begotten; acknowledged in Two Natures unconfusedly, unchangeably, indivisibly, inseparably; the difference of the Natures being in no way removed because of the Union, but rather the properties of each Nature being preserved, and (both) concurring into One Person and One Hypostasis; not as though He was parted or divided into Two Persons, but One and the Self-same Son and Only-begotten God, Word, Lord, Jesus Christ; even as from the beginning the prophets have taught concerning Him, and as the Lord Jesus Christ Himself hath taught us, and as the Symbol of the Fathers hath handed down to us.

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.

I see no difficulty. That the world is contingent and change, and God is in the world, that in him we live and move and have our being, does not mean that He who is the source and origin of all is Himself subject to contingency and change.

If God is truly Infinite, then finitude cannot be other than the Infinite.

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.

The essence is unchanged, It is united to a human nature. We call it hypostatic Union.

This is a false dilemma. You present only two options: complete detachment or Incarnation.

Ah, no, the false dilemma is yours.

I assert that the Divine Essence is transcendent, and equally and simultaneously Immanent.

As i said, Baha'i logic seems to assert transcendence at the expense of Immanence, and overcomes the difficulty by the idea of 'messengers' as intermediaries between the divine and human state.

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.

Know that the Holy manifestations, though they have the degrees of endless perfections, yet, speaking generally, have only three stations. The first station is the physical; the second station is the human, which is that of the rational soul; the third is that of the divine appearance and the heavenly splendor.The physical station is phenomenal; it is composed of elements, and necessarily everything that is composed is subject to decomposition.... The second is the station of the rational soul, which is the human reality. This also is phenomenal, and the Holy Manifestations share it with all mankind.... The spirit of man has a beginning, but it has no end; it continues eternally....The third station is that of the divine appearance and heavenly splendor: it is the Word of God, the Eternal Bounty, the Holy Spirit. It has neither beginning nor end....the reality of prophethood, which is the Word of God and the perfect state of manifestation, did not have any beginning and will not have any end; its rising is different from all others and is like that of the sun.
'Abdu'-Baha

So the manifestations have a 'third nature' which renders them apart from and more than human, but less than divine – a demiurge, by another name, or one could almost argue, and incarnation?

 

[Thomas]

While you claim these terms are used figuratively,

Context, old chum, context!

the very doctrine of the Incarnation, as presented in the Catechism, describes a real event

Yup.

it's a core theological claim about the nature of God and His relationship to creation.

Yup.

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.

I can see why he would assume that ... but as argued, he's wrong.

Baha' theology limits any kind of Immanence to the Manifestations only, whereas Biblical and Islamic theology asserts God is close to His creation.

Augustine among many, many others waxed lyrical on this ... the noble Qran says it succinctly:
"And We are closer to him than his jugular vein" (50:16)

"Then the King will say to those to his right, ‘Come, you blessed by my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the cosmos. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you gave me hospitality, naked and you clothed me, I was ill and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ Then the just will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry ... And in reply the King will say to them, ‘Amen, I tell you, inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.” Matthew 25:34-40.

 

[Thomas]

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

I don't think so, in that Ahaunu is suggesting our spiritual understanding is liomited because our scientific understanding is limited.

The Perennialist would say the spiritual understanding conveys itself in outward forms, but in that sense the forms are not the point – it's a 'finger and the moon' kind of thing.

 

[Ahanu]

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

I don't think so, in that Ahaunu is suggesting our spiritual understanding is liomited because our scientific understanding is limited.

I'm not suggesting that spiritual understanding is limited by our current scientific understanding (the extrinsic perspective). Instead, I'm arguing that our capacity to articulate spiritual experience (the intrinsic perspective) has evolved alongside our language and conceptual frameworks (which could also be influenced by our scientific understanding too). As Erik Hoel points out, there's a difference between our experience itself and our ability to express it. In ancient times, these frameworks were heavily reliant on physical and sensory descriptions, resulting in metaphors like "breath" or "wind." This wasn't necessarily because they lacked the same depth of inner experience, but rather because they lacked the cognitive tools and language to articulate it in the nuanced ways we can today. As Hoel explains, ancient people were "steeped in myth and metaphor," and their "reality model was so different it looks as if they themselves were different." They may have experienced similar spiritual realities, but their way of understanding and expressing them was shaped by their cultural context and the available conceptual tools. Again, just as our descriptions of inner life have become more nuanced over time - compare the flat descriptions in "The Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor" to the complex inner world of characters in "Ulysses" - so too has our ability to articulate spiritual experience.

Excerpt from an interview with Erik Hoel:

One could go over the evidence for this forever, but it’s most salient to take a single example: essentially the same story told over and over throughout the ages.

We can use “The Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor,” a tale from Ancient Egypt. It’s about a shipwreck on an island that contains a monstrous snake. Here’s from a translation:

I uncovered my face and found that it was a snake that was coming. It was thirty cubits long… He opened his mouth to me while I was on my belly in his presence. He said to me, “Who brought you? Who brought you, commoner, who brought you to this island in the sea whose sides are in the water?”

“The Story of the Shipwrecked Sailor” basically gets retold throughout the millennia, so many aspects of it in later tales, like the run-in with a monster, the strange island, crop up in The Odyssey. Odysseus and his men famously wander into the cave of a dangerous cyclops. But in the Odyssey, at least some of their intrinsic perspective is actually noted and told.

But when he had busily performed his tasks, then he rekindled the fire, and caught sight of us, and asked: “Strangers, who are ye? Whence do ye sail over the watery ways?” … So he spoke, and in our breasts our spirit was broken for terror of his deep voice and monstrous self; yet even so I made answer and spoke to him.

Let’s look at the same encounter between a man and a beast, this time in Ulysses by James Joyce. Ulysses is, of course, a heavily modernized retelling of The Odyssey. What follows is sometimes called the “cyclops” part of Ulysses, with a pub being like the cave, and it’s also guarded by a “monster”—except it’s a dog—and owned by the “cyclops”—except it’s just a huge guy with an eyepatch.

. . . and there sure enough was the citizen [“cyclops”] up in the corner having a great confab with himself and that bloody mangy mongrel, Garryowen, and he waiting for what the sky would drop in the way of drink.

There he is, says I . . .

The bloody mongrel let a grouse out of him would give you the creeps. Be a corporal work of mercy if someone would take the life of that bloody dog. I’m told for a fact he ate a good part of the breeches off a constabulary man in Santry that came round one time with a blue paper about a licence.

That’s the development of the intrinsic perspective, from what is a flat and unemotional reaction to a legitimate monster to describing every speck of thought in reaction to a common dog.

 

[Ahanu]

Context, old chum, context!

Oh, what did I take out of context? Explain.

 

[Thomas]

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.

Not 'entirely', no, you keep insisting this, I keep correcting you.

You were specifically addressing the language of ascending and descending there.

Then I was wrong. Mea culpa.

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."

So the Holy Spirit cannot under any circumstance "ascend and descend, enter, come out, or penetrate", but it can be reflected, but you don't see any incoherence here?

Furthermore, Abu Abba said:
Know that the Holy manifestations, though they have the degrees of endless perfections, yet, speaking generally, have only three stations.
OK. So manifestations of the Divine have three stations:
The first station is the physical;
So this assumes a physical manifestation of the divine, which you say is impossible.

the second station is the human, which is that of the rational soul;
Ditto.

the third is that of the divine appearance and the heavenly splendor.
OK, so a tripartite hierarchy – 'heavenly' is always and everywhere assumed 'above'.

The physical station is phenomenal; it is composed of elements, and necessarily everything that is composed is subject to decomposition....
So this physical station is relative, contingent and ephemeral, is nevertheless a degree of perfection and a Holy manifestation.

The second is the station of the rational soul, which is the human reality. This also is phenomenal, and the Holy Manifestations share it with all mankind.... The spirit of man has a beginning, but it has no end; it continues eternally....
So this rational station is also relative, contingent and ephemeral, with the addition of a soul which has a beginning but no end, and is eternal (the contradiction here being anything that has a beginning cannot be eternal – if it has a beginning there was a 'when-it-was-not) and, again, is a Holy manifestation.

The third station is that of the divine appearance and heavenly splendor: it is the Word of God, the Eternal Bounty, the Holy Spirit. It has neither beginning nor end....the reality of prophethood, which is the Word of God ...
OK up to this point
and the perfect state of manifestation,
How? It is essentially unmanifest; the Eternal Word transcends all forms, the Eternal Bounty/Divine Plenitude transcends all forms, the Holy Spirit transcends all forms, it is timeless, without beginning, without end ... it is all these things, but at this level it is not manifest, rather, it gives rise to all that manifests, as the Logos contains within Itself the logoi of all things.

There's a metaphysical error here in conflating two distinct orders.

its rising is different from all others and is like that of the sun.
So now it is given a physical description which, if not figurative, assumes a materiality.

The Biblical doctrines refute the Baha'i belief that only the Manifestations have any Immanent contact with the Divine Nature. And the above text confounds and contradicts that belief as it is expressed by yourself and by Tony.

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.

Again and again you rob the the Greco-Roman world because you lack cohesive and holistic insight. They did not see the world in terms of 'this' and 'that', of 'either' and 'or', of 'spirit' and 'matter' being two absolutely disassociated entities – they saw the world as both, this and that, spirit and matter (cf Genesis 2:7), in the same way some saw the Homeric epics as wonderful stories, and others, from as early as six centuries before Christ, saw them as allegories.

You previously stated that this language of ascent and descent is "the language of symbol" and should not be interpreted physically.

If I implied that, my error. I've written extensively on symbology here over the years, and not as that. A symbol unites, that's the very definition of the term.

However, the symbols you are using - such as descent - rely on physical experiences.

Yes. Metaphor or simile. In speaking of the dove, all four Gospels sat 'like' a dove (Gk: hosei) – 'as it were', 'as though', 'as', 'like as', 'like' – the term goes back to Homer.

Either the Holy Spirit ... or ...

False dilemma.

... suggesting they did not exclusively interpret descent and ascent of pneuma figuratively.

Nor did they exclusively interpret the descent and ascent as physically ...

 

[Thomas]

I'm not suggesting that spiritual understanding is limited by our current scientific understanding (the extrinsic perspective). Instead, I'm arguing that our capacity to articulate spiritual experience (the intrinsic perspective) has evolved alongside our language and conceptual frameworks (which could also be influenced by our scientific understanding too).

And I'm suggesting an over-emphasis of the 'finger' occludes the 'moon'.

 

[Ahanu]

Not 'entirely', no, you keep insisting this, I keep correcting you.

Where did you state not entirely in post #248?

 

[Thomas]

I've just seen your response to my post #571:

I may have misread its intent, but I think we're done here.

 

[Ahanu]

I've just seen your response to my post #571:

I may have misread its intent, but I think we're done here.

I saw your , and I thought it was hilarious.