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By u/The_Goa_Force
Posted on October 21, 2015
Hello.
These past few weeks, I've been digesting the words of the Bayan, and I have discovered that the great strength of this holy Book is that it provides keys to understand the world of the Quran, and an analysis to comprehend the world of religion. So here I share with you a short analysis that I made of the Middle-Eastern crisis relying on my comprehension of the Bayan. I wrote it on another forum, but translated it for you to show you why I think it is important to promote the writings of the Bab.
Religion is not meant to be eternal and has to be renewed, because when too much time passes by, the believers start to idolize the verses. Henceforth, God manifests again when the believers in the former religion are on the verge to abandon their faith for their religion ; thus He sent a prophet amongst men to "harvest the fruits" of the religion. These fruits are the believers who are ready to recognize the new prophetic manifestation, and the progress accomplished by mankind throughout the former revelation. (This latter idea does not come from the Bayan but from Baha'u'llah).
At a critical moment (XIXth century), Islam is delivering its fruits, and as Muslims grow proud of their religion, God teaches them humility by recalling His might over humans. He makes them feel that he is Superior to every religion that He will ever dispense to mankind. Thus, he gives the believers a choice : accept the new verses and submit to the One God, or clinging to the ancient religion.
It is henceforth a Judgement Day, because those who stay into the Islamic religion enter Hell, whereas those who sacrifice what they hold most dear - their very religion - as a proof of submission, He gives them a new one, a better one, which is a new Tree."
These people have successfully crossed the Bridge of Sirat, which separates Faith from Heresy, and they become the depositary of a new Tree which wil produce new fruits at the approach of an upcoming prophet.
The accomplishment of the believers in this new religion is called the Paradise. The Islamic Golden Age, for instance, is Heaven on Earth, as it has produced the best doctors, the best philosophers, wonderful palaces, and rivers of milk and honey that run under beautiful trees.
But when the Mahdi is come, the Tree of Islam falls into Hell and becomes the Tree of Zaqqum that produces bitter fruits shaped like human heads, as it is growing in the negation of God.* ("And what Fire is more intense than the negation of God ?" PB)
Those bitter fruits are the negators, and the boiling water that they drink, it is the bad actions they commit (in the name of the religion ?). Henceforth, the Islamic religion begins to produce Hell on Earth, in the very name of the Quranic verses. The unsatieted milleniallism of the past centuries transforms into a destructive power, and Islam becomes a force of destruction.
There are two people so far who have raised the black flags of the Last Days : the Babis and ISIS, whom we have been warned against, (if you read this hadith, you might have an explanation about why Baha'i males shall keep their hair short).
The establishment of a new caliphate under the Tree of Negation necessarily leads to the establishment of a Hellish Kingdom, the Hell of Islam.
Where today are the great souls of the Muslim world ? Islam ceases to produce good fruits (Al-Ghazali, Ibn Sina, Saladdin) and produces bitter fruits with human head (Ben Laden, Al-Baghdadi), who becomes the representatives of their religion in the post-Mahdi world.
[Deleted]:
Very interesting. I really wish there were scholarly works that laid out in clear detail the relationship between Islam and Baha'i. One day soon.
u/The_Goa_Force:
> I really wish there were scholarly works that laid out in clear detail the relationship between Islam and Baha'i.
You don't really need that kind of works. The Babi theology is mostly a science that studies Islam. The first writings of the Bab (Qayyum al Asma...) are commentaries of the Quran, and most of his writings are based on a "bâtin" (secret reading) of the Quran and the Hadith, and the Bayan is full of that stuff.
The Bab's stuff is, by itself, a scholarly work illustrating the relastionship between Islam and Baha'ism.
u/finnerpeace:
I love your interpretation!
Although surely you're a bit harsh on the Muslim world not bearing fruits, eh? Surely there are still great humanitarians and great souls?
I think of the process you've described as past religions losing the power of the Covenant. The Manifestation was always Divine and remains so; the Faith created still has that Divine spark; the Teachings are still Divine; but the power of the Covenant is gone, as it's with the latest Manifestation's Faith. I think it's the power of the Covenant that preserves the Integrity (perhaps in both meanings) of the Religion fruiting from God's seed. Much like the life force is what holds a tree together: after it's removed the tree will decay, and eventually turn into lovely compost. ;)
u/The_Goa_Force:
> Although surely you're a bit harsh on the Muslim world not bearing fruits, eh?
Yeah, it's very harsh.
Though I'm more trying to understand the verses than being judgemental. I love Islam and the Muslims, and I hate being harsh with them, so I sincerely hope that I am wrong, but in fact I notice that the Islamic world (but not only this one) does not deliver a lot of Islamic remedies to the crisis of our world.
See that interpretation more like a poetic prose than a trully serious thing.
u/The_Goa_Force:
Also, if I push the reasoning further, I could say that the European Middle-Ages were a kind of Christian Hell, and that the Jewish Diaspora (Temple destruction in 70 CE, exile and repression) was a Judaic Hell.
u/finnerpeace:
Yes, exactly. These kinds of things happen, I think, when religions lose the protection of the power of the Covenant.
u/The_Goa_Force:
It might be.
What is interesting however is how the Bab's view complete the one of Baha'u'llah. They both advocate for progressive revelation, but Baha'u'llah shows that each religion is a stage of developpement (he insists on the continuity of religions) while the Bab insists on the rupture between each prophetic religion (the Whole Universe, everything that exists in this world was created FOR humans to accept the new manifestation on the Judgement Day). It's very interesting.
u/The_Goa_Force:
> Although surely you're a bit harsh on the Muslim world not bearing fruits, eh? Surely there are still great humanitarians and great souls?
Also, think about this.
There are commandments that only apply in one religion (islam > jihad), and others that are intemporal (islam, christianity, baha'i faith > charity, compassion, etc.).
If the Muslim do the Jihad, and that it has been abolished by the Mahdi, it is cursed. If the Muslims are compassionate and that they feed the poor, they respect an intemporal commandment.