THE BAHAI FAITH

by John WorldPeace

Copyright 1998 by John WorldPeace
Houston, Texas USA

All rights reserved.

The following is a brief description of the Bahai faith along with some
important questions.

About 150 years ago, there appeared a man in Persia (Iran) by the name of
Baha'U'llah. He is alleged by the Bahai's to be the World Savior for all
religious faiths. A close examination of his available writings shows a man
who was heavily influenced by Judaism, Christianity and especially Islam.
Much of what he had to say, and much of what the Bahai's claim make him
unique, are simply a repetition of the words of Muhammad.

I am not speaking for or against this new faith. I am just holding it up to
the light to see what I can see. Shortly, you will see that one of the
principles of the Bahai faith is the independent investigation of truth. And
so consider this short essay my personal investigation of the truth along
with what I consider to be critical questions of this new faith.

I have no doubt that the Bahai faith will continue to attract adherents and
so the faith provides a unique perspective into the evolution of religious
institutions. Had we been present 150 years after the foundation of
Christianity, Islam or Buddhism, we would see most of the same stages of
evolution that manifest in every religion as it tries to bureaucratize the
spiritual teachings of its founder. As we watch the Bahai's we will gain
some contemporary insights into the development of religions that were
established thousands of years ago.

The 10 basic principles of the Bahai faith are:

1) The oneness of mankind.

This is summed in the following statements of Baha'U'llah: "The world is
but one country, and mankind its citizens" and "You are all fruits of one
tree and leaves of one branch."

In these two statements Baha'U'llah eclipsed all the founders of the
Western religions. Moses and Jesus came to the Jews and Muhammad to
the Arabs. Only Baha'U'llah formally embraced the world. In the East,
Buddha also had a world embracing religion but he never specifically stated
that humanity is one.

The hope of humanity and the manifestation of WorldPeace are dependent
on the acceptance of these simple statements. Until we acknowledge our
differences within an understanding of our oneness, we will never live in
peace on this planet.

I embrace the statement that, "The world is but one country, and mankind
its citizens" and I add, "How can we manifest peace on earth, if we do not
include everyone (all races, all religions, all nations, both sexes) in our
vision of peace?"

It is important here to note that this is more of a social as opposed to a
religious statement. There is nothing here about God. It is inferred but
what is being talked about is social justice and social equality. Since it uses
the word "world" in its metaphor, it is not speaking about spiritual peace.

Moses also had a social message in the Ten Commandments; do not kill,
steal, lie, commit adultery. But Moses tied these commandments to God
from whom he said he received them. Baha'U'llah did not incorporate
God into the above statement; but as I said, it can be inferred.

2) Universal peace upheld by a world government.

World government is about power. It is about the releasing of local power
to a centralized power. Every government on the earth understands this.
Local governments come together as states and states come together in a
union of states. The levels of government vary from country to country,
but these levels exists world wide.

As the local governments coalesced into states, and the states coalesced
into nations, a lot of politicking was necessary; States rights vs. A Federal
Union. This is a common experience.

Now we have reached the point where a World government is becoming
necessary. As the states fought against a national government, now we
have nations fighting a world government. In the end, a world government
will manifest because it is required if there is going to be justice and
equality world wide. Until there is a world government, there will never be
universal justice and equality.

Again this is a social statement from Baha'U'llah and one which I agree
with. All we have to do is to look at history and the organization of nation
states to see verify that we are headed toward a world government.

3) Independent investigation of the truth.

This is a foundation of peace. Only when there is access to information can
those who are so inclined get to the truth.

Unfortunately, as regards to the Bahai's who advocate independent
investigation of the truth, they have refused to make available to the
average person ALL the writings of Baha'U'llah. There is no excuse for
this. It is alleged that all these things are in the process of being translated
but in this day and time it would seem that within less than one year all
these writings could be translated.

How can we investigate the truth if we do not have access to all these
writings? Answer: We can't.

The holding back of these writings amounts to censorship. It is a fatal
paradox to the Bahai credibility that they advocate independent
investigation of the truth and at the same time censor the truth.
What is the point of this censoring? I submit that the Bahai faith is
manifesting as all other religious institutions have manifested and
developed. There is a carefully orchestrated manipulation of information in
order to present a picture of the founder as perfect or close to it.

Unfortunately, in all the sacred scripts which quote the founding father,
there are contradictions. This is especially true in Christianity where Jesus
says "love one another" and in another place say to "hate your parents." Or
in Islam where Muhammad says that Christians and Jews are one because
of their common heritage and the later refers to them as Infidels.

An independent investigation of the truth comes to the conclusion that the
Bahai institution is an impediment to the independent investigation of the
truth. Like in all the other major religious institutions of the world; their
ideals do not manifest even within their own institution.

4) The common foundation of all religions.

Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam and Bahai, the religions of the
West do have a common foundation. But the religions of the East of
Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Tibetan and Zen Buddhism and even
Confucius have a different foundation.

Baha'U'llah speaks of progressive revelation and points to the successive
revelation from Zoroastrianism to Judaism to Christianity to Islam to Bahai
as a case if point. However, Baha'U'llah never ties these religions to those
of the East which developed a quite different spiritual orientation. So
Baha'U'llah's progressive revelation becomes, after independent
investigation of the truth, progressive revelation of the West.

Here it seems that independent investigation of the truth indicates that
Baha'U'llah is not the World Savior that he is touted to be because he was
never about to speak to the people of the East in their own metaphor and
cosmology. He was not able to show the oneness of the East and West
philosophies.

There is a common foundation of all religions and that is the belief in one
God. That God can only be defined as the Infinite Potential which is ever
changing, ever manifesting, diversifying and disintegrating and of which the
Gods of Allah, Jehovah, Krishna, Yahweh are no more than manifestations.
In Hinduism, this Infinite Potential is called Brahma; in the Tao, The Way;
and in Buddhism, the Dhammapada.

What is interesting here is that it is Hinduism that acknowledges a world
wide progressive revelation which sees Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, Lao
Tsu, Padma Sambhava, Bodhidharma, Buddha, Baha'U'llah, Joseph Smith
and so on as avatars. What is interesting is that it is Hinduism that
encompasses Bahai's as the followers of another avatar and not the Bahai's
which acknowledge Krishna as another messenger from God.

5) The essential harmony of science and religion.

This is an old argument whose hard dichotomy is dissolving. Science only
believes what it can create in the laboratory. What is silly about this is that
since we are created from the same essence as the earth, we cannot
separate ourselves from the experiment. So in theory, we always effect the
outcome.

Science and religion are both manifestations of the Infinite Potential.
Religion focuses on the intangible nature of the universe and science
focuses on the tangible. They are two sides of the same coin. Science
does not believe what it cannot prove and refuses to define the
unexplainable as God.

It is a ridiculous argument because inert chemicals come together to form a
conscious being. No scientist will state that we are unaware of our
existence and no scientist will acknowledge that maybe it is the intangible
Infinite Potential that manifests the tangible.

6) Equality of men and women.

I agree with this 100% but again we have a problem in the Bahai faith.
Equality of men and women does not mean complete equality.
Independent investigation of the truth shows that while the Bahai's
advocate equality, they deny women the ability to sit on the Universal
House of Justice which is the Bahai governing body.

As in all the other major religions of the world, we have religious double
talk. Again we have a pseudo lie being foisted as Truth. The lie is
"equality of men and women" and the truth "inequality of men and women
regarding the governing body of the Bahai institution."

7) Elimination of prejudice of all kind.

As I have just said, this principle conflicts with the sanctioned prejudice
against women at the heart of the Bahai institution.

I believe in total equality of race, religion, nationality and sex.

In addition to sex, the Bahai faith is also prejudiced in regards to religion.
They, like all the other religionists, are an exclusive and elitist faith. They
want to eliminate all prejudice, including religious, and yet if you question
them regarding the manifestation of WordPeace, they will tell you that it
will happen when the whole world is Bahai. (Christians believe
WorldPeace will manifest when the world is all Christian and Muslims
when the world is Muslim.)

There is no doubt that Bahai's are generally more tolerant of other
religions than are religionist of other faiths, but their ultimate utopia does
not include other faiths. Further, if you question a Bahai about a covenant
breaker (a Bahai that does not completely follow the Bahai philosophy)
you will find that there are restrictions about talking to alleged covenant
breakers. They are dealt with the same way that ex-Jehovah Witnesses are
dealt with and also ex-Mormons are dealt with within those faiths.

So here again we have a proclamation of tolerance but a reality of
intolerance. Independent investigation of the truth will verify this.

8) Universal compulsory education.

Again this is fundamental to the manifestation of WorldPeace. But again
when you censor information, like the Bahai's have done with the writings
of Baha'U'llah, you have to ask what exactly will be the Bahai educational
curriculum. Will all religions have equal time?

Although Baha'U'llah is touted as the World Savior it is only the teaching
of Baha'U'llah that will be found in the Bahai Houses of Worship.

9) A spiritual solution to the economic problem.

The nature of the world is that most people want to be rewarded in relation
to their efforts. This is the only system, on a large scale, that has proven
to work. There is no spiritual solution to the economic problem.

What must manifest is an acknowledgment that those who are
economically successful have simply received dollars from other human
beings. Without the others who bought goods, there would be no
accumulation of wealth. The spiritual consciousness that must manifest is
that one should return a portion of one's wealth to the general welfare.

The spiritual solution is a consciousness that we are at one with each other
and when we eat while others, who are not as motivated or as fortunate as
we, starve, we bring down all of humanity and therefore bring down
ourselves because we are one with humanity.

10) A universal auxiliary language.

This is a carry over from Islam which foists the idea that one cannot really
get the fully impact of the Koran unless one understands Arabic.

There will never be one religion, race, nation or language. The Infinite
Potential loves diversity. This is the way things are within all aspects of
this reality.

The closest thing that we have to a universal language is that of the
computer. Through the computer we will one day soon be able to
communicate with those who speak languages other than ours. When this
happens, the chances for WorldPeace will greatly increase because we will
not be bound by our language.

Along these lines, WorldPeace will come closer to manifesting when we
learn the religious metaphors of others and try to communicate to others in
these metaphors as opposed to, "converting them to our faith and beliefs."


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