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From: <nima_hazini@my-deja.com> Subject: Re: The root of the problem (was Re: Baha'u'llah's grammer and Mahdi's gwammer) Date: Tuesday, September 07, 1999 2:06 AM "David Fiorito and Jennifer Spotila" <fiospots@pond.com> wrote: > If I independently investigate the postulation the Baha'u'llah speaks >with Divine authority and I reach the conclusion that He does how am I >supposed to disregard His writings in favor of my own interpretation? Because other than very specific areas of the Law, Baha'u'llah gives you the right to do so. Read the Kitab-i-Iqan. And how would a given conclusion necessarily disregard or negate His Writings? It would be a highly narrow, circumscribed view of the nature of Revelation to argue that it is. The range and scope of what He says is so infinitely vast in any given context, that a multiple and plurality of conclusionary applications are possible at any given time (so long as they are not touted as being authoritative). This is the difference between seeing progressive Revelation also applicable in the domain of our understanding of the Book, and one that sees it only in one domain (i.e. history) and insists the Book is closed until further notice. It's the difference between holding to a Logos that is forever active and immanent and engaging with and within us, and one who has no real connection to it other than in a peripherally superficial way. > To me once an investigation has reached a conclusion and the Truth is >found then all you are left with is the duty to obey and the duty to >retest your conclusion, but not to disregard some ordinance that you >dislike. That's assuming that any given conclusion is a once and for all, one time-only affair, static and immutable from further understanding(s) or refinement or fluidity. And who is saying that an ordinance has been disregarded? Any ordinace itself (because of its spiritual Divine nature) has a vast applicational range. But if a conclusion is skewed, it is skewed (no matter where the motivating premises derive from - albeit that does not negate the underlying principle itself, i.e. ordinance). No amount of justification is going to make it otherwise. And certainly Baha'u'llah never meant "rida" (acquiescence) to imply some sort of blind obediance or sheepish abeyance. That's Calvinism, ultra-montanist Roman Catholicism, usuli Twelver Shi'ism, but definitely *not* Baha'u'llah. > If one does not agree with Baha'u'llah how can that person possibly >be a Baha'i? This is a serious non sequitor. A fallacy of reasoning. The premises you seem to be setting out to justify in your conclusion are not borne out by facts in the world. And it also happens to be a red herring easily refutable. You're claiming that anyone who does not subscribe to a particularly closed hermenuetical vision of the Baha'i religion is ipso facto not a Baha'i. Baha'u'llah Himself already challenged that notion implicitly in the Aqdas, Iqan, his Tablet to Jamal Borujerdi and elsewhere. > Independent investigation of the truth does not mean constantly >challenging authority and having things your own way. Again a non sequitor. It's not simply a matter of someone having their own way or challenging authority for its own sake. Independent investigation of truth entails that it be unfettered and not fettered; unbound, not bound. Meaning, you follow the line of investigation wherever it might lead. If it be fettered as many fundamentalists would have us believe (doesn't matter what religion they belong to), then it's not an independent investigation of truth, but something else. So if it's something else (or, since there's failure to apply the unfettered standard to the quest), why call it 'independent' or an 'investigation', let alone of the truth. The type of pseudo-reasoning that is being called independent investigation of the truth by some within the Baha'i public sphere these days is in reality some sort of vacuous tautological doublespeak which does not care to think outside of its own narrow framework or paradigms. It sets out to demonstrate that which is already known to it, or rather that which it already has demonstrated to/and for itself. Now, how would this make it the same independent investigation of the truth of the sort lauded by Baha'u'llah? It simply isn't. > It means deciding for yourself > and living with the consequences of your decision. So what's the problem? Regards, Nima Sent via Deja.com https://www.deja.com/ Share what you know. Learn what you don't. Homepage |