Posted by anon on July 03, 2101 at 12:07:40:

In Reply to: Re: Request For Aswer anon (# 3) posted by Munir A. Qureshi on July 03, 2101 at 08:34:18:

Well, no where in the Baha'i writings is this station of Adam or His creation contradicted. And also, no where in science is there proof of the "first man" and where he came from etc.

Religion is to explain some things and Science is to explain others, but there should not be contradiction.

I have also writen before about human knowledge and understanding. To summarize what I have said, earthly learning is not dependent on religious understanding. And do Divine Revelation or guidance is not based on human earthly knowledge. Revelation is based on though the capacity of humankind. For if the full Splendor and knowledge of God was revealed through Jesus, humankind would have been incapable to understand and believe in Him. (Plus there would be no need for future manifestations). So the conditions at the time of Christ differed from the conditions of Prophet Muhammad.

Ao I think what I finally want to say about this is that Science is not an important basis to judge or understand a religion. I think we have agreed on that.

I think we can also agree that Divine Knowledge does not change... and Human knowledge changes. The amount of Revelation from each Messenger differs in the amount of the message given.

I think I understand what you are saying and I think there is no disagreement.

Messengers of God do not contradict previous messengers, They may Reveal more from God. That I think we both agree.

**So is your main argument against the Baha'i Faith that Baha'u'llah contradicts the Messengers of the Past by changing the meanings of Past Scripture?

**If that is what you believe, I think we can start from there and move on with that in mind. If that is so, you are trying to prove this contradiction.

**I also am trying to figure out, are you trying to prove that the "Harmony of Science and Religion" is false?

This is very difficult to tackle... because then we get into the issue of "interpreting the Holy Scriptures". As you saw by the website I refered you to (which it appeared to me to be very reputable), then those people interpret certain verses as meaning "the fact that the universe is expanding, which is now proved was mentioned in the Qur'an" and "embryology which is now commonly accepted was revealed in the Qur'an" etc. Your interpretation is different. So who do we go by?

Also, there is then the issue of Science. What is science? It is trying to prove hypotheses. Often there is something accepted just because it is the only rational hypothesis - that does not make it proved. And there are scientists that are very anti-religious, so they are trying to use the same methods to disprove all the miracles and happenings in religion. So who do we trust there and what theories are accepted?

It boils down to the fact that "Science and Religion should be in Harmony". I don't think by science was meant the entire and exact corpus of scientific knowledge at the time, or at any time. Just that, instead of working apart from each other as opposites and being viewed as completely different, they should be seen together. Certainly you can agree that they both have the same Divine Source... the laws of nature and the building blocks for all things had to be created and enforced somehow - this is done by God. Science is simply trying to fathom the perfections of God's creation.

I want to say that I have nothing against you trying to prove against the Baha'i Faith - it is actually a wonderful thing because it gives you and I both the oppurtunity to learn for ourselves! I wanted to also note that I really and truly feel that we are agreeing on many thing and that in many cases we are stuck on the terminology (on the certain words we used where the other would use another word).

So I am looking forward to your next response.. and please outline what your argument or statement is because we have had this conversation so long that I think we are losing focus! Please look at the items I have put with ** and confirm or deny so we can get focussed.

-anon

this topic is closed - post at bahai-library.com/forum