The main reason I stopped posting a few months back is because I ended up regretting half my posts because they were not well thought out, so I felt it more appropriate to observe silence.
Everyone has the same problem. I always think of other things afterwards I wish I would have included. If we all observed silence for the sake of wisdom, there wouldn't be much to read. I think of this as a learning process, a chance to further refine my thoughts and get feedback. I think everyone's posts improve with practice, and I hope you will not be discouraged from continuing.
the idea that HIV positive patients deserve their disease is disgusting. (My other life is that of a physician who has many close and warm friendships with people suffering from these illnesses.) I also do not believe that there is any support in the Writings for such a view (thankfully!)- the judgemental view that you and I both deplore.
Yes, if I remember correctly, aren't you an internist at U. Pitt who was considering a heme/onc fellowship last year? The fascinating thing about the Bahai writings, or any religious scripture for that matter, is that bits and pieces can be put together to support almost any position. But it helps to stand back and place any argument within the context of the all the writings for consistency.
The point I tried to make is that the Writings do occasionally express naturalistic events in a metaphorical way as coming from God. I think the idea here is that God is the "causer of causes" and that everything that happens is part of His Will.
I agree with naturalistic interpretations as a way of understanding the world and illness, but there is one word from the Tablet of Wisdom missing in your argument--contingency--which Abdul-Baha also mentions in SAQ in relation to the natural world. Randomness and chance play a role as well, as in spontaneous mutations, for example. I agree that God is the cause of everything, but at what stage? When Baha'u'llah and Abdul-Baha speak of the contingent world, I think they are suggesting that God built in the elements of randomness and chance, which were necessary for evolution and can explain the seeming randomness of disease or other bad events happening to good people. For example, there are wonderful prospective parents, who by all outward appearances are healthy and care for their unborn child, and yet some children are born with birth defects. We know the how: sometimes both parents carry a deleterious gene for a hidden trait that then appears in their child. Sometimes there is a new genetic mutation or developmental abnormality in utero. We don't know the why, or do we?
In "Tablets of Baha'u'llah Revealed After the Kitab-i-Aqdas [TB]," in the "Tablet of Wisdom," Baha'u'llah states, "Say: Nature in its essence is the embodiment of My Name, the Maker, the Creator. Its manifestations are diversified by varying causes, and in this diversity there are signs for men of discernment. Nature is God's Will and is its expression in and through the contingent world. It is a dispensation of Providence ordained by the Ordainer, the All-Wise. Were anyone to affirm that it is the Will of God as manifested in the world of being, no one should question this assertion. It is endowed with a power whose reality men of learning fail to grasp. Indeed a man of insight can perceive naught therein save the effulgent splendour of Our Name, the Creator. Say: This is an existence which knoweth no decay, and Nature itself is lost in bewilderment before its revelations, its compelling evidences and its effulgent glory which have encompassed the universe." Note His use of "the contingent world."
In SAQ Chapter 2, the Master states, "The contingent world is the source of imperfections: God is the origin of perfections. The imperfections of the contingent world are in themselves a proof of the perfections of God. . . . It is certain that the whole contingent world is subjected to a law and rule which it can never disobey; even man is forced to submit to death, to sleep and to other conditions--that is to say, man in certain particulars is governed, and necessarily this state of being governed implies the existence of a governor. Because a characteristic of contingent beings is dependency, and this dependency is an essential necessity, therefore, there must be an independent being whose independence is essential.
In the same way it is understood from the man who is sick that there must be one who is in health; for if there were no health, his sickness could not be proved.
Therefore, it becomes evident that there is an Eternal Almighty One, Who is the possessor of all perfections, because unless He possessed all perfections He would be like His creation."
Couple "the contingent world is the source of imperfections [SAQ]" with "nature is God's Will and is its expression in and through the contingent world [TB]," and you have an explanation for birth defects, genetic mutations, and virtually everything else that goes awry in the natural world.
Sincerely, Marleen
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