About the Bahá’í Faith
Alláh-u-abhá Reader/Friend,
Whenever someone asks me about the Bahá’í Faith, I am faced with a moment of bewilderment. The explanation should be simple; something so close to my heart should be easy to explain and should flow freely from my lips. Reality never quite acts like it should (Life lesson from Gerald). So many questions pop into my head that I am instantly more confused than the person who first posed the question. I have no idea what their religious background is, what their interests are, what their social or political concerns are; in short, I have no idea what part of the Faith to tell them about! (Plus, my powers of locution tend to leave something wanting . . . ) Recently I was taught a quick and effective method to get the main points of the Bahá’í Faith across. In my opinion it leaves a lot lacking, but I don’t see how you could explain more about the Faith in a quick encounter, or how else you could cover all your bases when talking about the Faith to someone you don’t know intimately. So, understand that this is not a codified set of Bahá’í beliefs, and a quick Google search will give you more intimate details. (Wikipedia. ftw.)
- The Oneness of God – Bahá’ís believe there is one God, that all the names for God refer to this selfsame diety, and the idea of “False Gods” is an oxymoron. Bahá’ís believe God is understood many different ways, and all are ultimately lacking and partial, that man cannot fully understand God, yet these differences in belief should not lead us to assume that we worship different Gods.
- The Oneness of Man – Bahá’ís believe that all men are one race (And have believed this before this idea started to gain footing), that ethnic and national divides should not and cannot be allowed to cause dissension and strife. Bahá’ís believe that all men, regardless of gender or age, are made in the image of God and ultimately equal and like parts of one organism.
- The Oneness of Religion – Bahá’ís believe that despite man’s propensity to apply seperate labels to things that seem different, we all follow one religion, that all religions originate from the same source and are merely chapters in the same book. Bahá’ís believe no religion has a monopoly on either truth or salvation and both these concepts must be regarded as relative if they are to be of any use.
Like I said, if you want more information, ask my friend G to the oogle (Fo’ sho’!).
God Bless,
Gerald
First came to your blog to read the post about Deitrich Bonheoffer. Good quote.
Then read your post about the Baha’i faith. Can you help me understand the last sentence? How can truth be useful, much less defined if it is only relative?
Rebekah
30 July, 2008 at 4:41 pm