February 8-14, 1996
Talisman emails received 2/8/96-2/9/96
---------------------------------------------------------
From: belove@SOVER.NET
Date: Wed, 7 Feb 96 08:33:27 PST
Subject: humor, sex, fuzzy logic.
To: talisman@indiana.edu, "Hannah E. Reinstein"
Dear Hannah/Cary,
The punctuation posting is a real gem. Thanks so much.
I teach a course in communication and I was trying to explain
punctuation to them and this is a perfect teaching tool.
By the way, I've been reading a book on Fuzzy Logic. As a systems
engineer, you'd probably know something about this stuff, neural
nets, and all that.
As you know, it's about the difference between strict bi-valent
logic, where something is either a or not-a, where the middle is
deliberately excluded and the kind of thinking where the middle is
basically all there really is. It is a logic that involves a large
gray scale.
This fuzzy logic, it is argued, is a more accurate mirror of the way
life really is, than the either/or logic, which mirrors thinking.
(An incidently, does any one here know the relationship between fuzzy
logic and the work of G. Spencer Brown *Laws of Form*?)
The distinction between men and women, male and female, is an example
of old, Aristotelian, bi-valent logic. This new thinking suggests
that there is rather a continuum between male and female and that we
all exist on this continuum.
I had a personal experience of this only yesterday. I am a third or
forth degree black belt in jitterbug dancing and, accordingly, I am
expert in both leading and following, in dancing both the "male" part
and the "female" part. In my classes here in town, I insist that men
and women learn both sides from the very beginning. My logic is that
you can't understand smooth and considerate and effective leading
unless you know how to follow and you can't really follow unless you
understand what leading is all about. And further, at advanced
levels, leading and following becomes much more complex and
interconnected.
The classes are very effective because there is no squabbling. In the
past, when I've taught in the traditional manner, couples would come
and he would only learn to lead and she only to follow and then, in
the class, she would criticize his leading and he would demand that
she follow better. But in my class, they have to learn a step and
then switch sides and they have to practice on both sides. What
happens is that they become fascinated with the process, spend a lot
of time talking about what happens and comparing notes on the
experience of leading and following and there is no squabbling.
But, I'm on my way to a story about the continuum between the
genders. As a consequence of the success of my classes I began
talking to the gay and lesbian community about offering a similar
class to them: gender free swing dancing. And I am finding that there
is a subtle pressure for me to declare myself as to where I exist on
that continuum.
These are people used to thinking in terms of the continuum, I think.
But really I don't think they are able to think about it without some
feelings of shame and guilt. I'm not sure I am either.
But as I thought about myself, I did feel that I am somewhere in the
middle. Even though I am a committed heterosexual, on the MMPI I have
a very high femininity score, more than three standard deviations
from the mean. Many men in the helping professions do, but mine is
exceptionally high.
I never had sex with a man but, as I look back on my life, I can see
where the right combination of circumstances could have led to it. I
recognize the capacity within myself. I think I'm fortunate that I
didn't because it would have made it so much more difficult for me to
arrive at a comfortable understanding of who I am. And that's been a
hard road anyway, in part, probably because so much of me is female
-- if I can speak so imprecisely for a moment.
These are random thoughts of mine, as I try to sort out my position
on sex and gender and as I try to incorporate these ideas about fuzzy
logic and sex.
I address them to you because, as a computer person, I imagine you
know something about fuzzy logic and I know you've given a lot of
thought to gender identity. So I wonder what you might have to say to
me about my story and about the relationship between fuzzy logic and
sexual and gender self definition..
And finally, to the Talisman audience, I don't know whether this
thread fits Talisman. I am attempting to address these issues of
gender identity, mystical self-realization and spirituality but I am
trying to do it in a way that recognizes not only scholarship but
also my deep personal stake in these matters. I think that means that
my contributions tend to be a bit confessional. I worry about the
appropriateness of such musings. But I'm not sure what can come of
spiritual conversations that are not a bit like that.
Thoughtfully, Respectfully yours
Philip
-------------------------------------
Name: Philip Belove
E-mail: belove@sover.net
Date: 02/07/96
Time: 08:33:27
This message was sent by Chameleon
-------------------------------------
Things should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler -- A.
Einstein
=END=
From: belove@SOVER.NET
Date: Wed, 7 Feb 96 21:42:23 PST
Subject: FW: Returned mail
To: talisman@indiana.edu
On Wed, 7 Feb 96 07:37:17 PST belove@sover.net wrote:
>
>On Wed, 7 Feb 96 07:20:57 PST belove@sover.net wrote:
>>
>>------------Transcript of Session-------------
>>
>>
>>
>>-------------Undelivered Message--------------
>>
>>Date: Mon, 5 Feb 96 08:36:24 PST
>>From: belove@sover.net
>>Subject: FW: Sinaic Imagery
>>To: talisman@indiana.edu
>>X-Mailer: Chameleon V0.05, TCP/IP for Windows, NetManage Inc.
>>Message-ID:
>>MIME-Version: 1.0
>>Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
>>
>>
>>On Thu, 1 Feb 1996 15:18:35 -0800 SFotos@eworld.com wrote:
>>>Dear friends,
>>>
>>
>>>
>>>And there is no doubt that the male sex drive, with its
derivatives
>
>>of
>>>territoriality and dominance, is a prime motivator in human
>affairs,
>>Some
>>>(WARNING--INFLAMMATORY TERM) sociobiologists have suggested that
>>most
>>>institutions today are structured to mirror male dominance
rituals,
>
>>power
>>>acquisition and maintenance, gatekeeping functions etc.
>>>
>>
>>
>>This is a highly questionable, incomplete, reductionistic, and
>>accusatory characterization of male gender roles.
>>
>>I, for one, am not willing to accepts this assertion that
>>territoriality and dominance are part of *male sex drive* with its
>>implications that these attributes, characterized here only in
their
>>most negative connotations, are genetically inherent.
>>
>>I think it is important that we recognize and acknowledge female
>>anger and distrust and criticism of male ways, but I think it is
>>equally important that we do so explicitly and that we not accept
>>these buried, implicit attacks as though they were true. The
result
>>would be a kind of sexism that is to be avoided.
>>
>>
>>Philip
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>-------------------------------------
>>Name: Philip Belove
>>E-mail: belove@sover.net
>>Date: 02/05/96
>>Time: 08:36:25
>>
>>This message was sent by Chameleon
>>-------------------------------------
>>Things should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler -- A.
>>Einstein
>>
>
>-------------------------------------
>Name: Philip Belove
>E-mail: belove@sover.net
>Date: 02/07/96
>Time: 07:37:17
>
>This message was sent by Chameleon
>-------------------------------------
>Things should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler -- A. Einstein
>
-------------------------------------
Name: Philip Belove
E-mail: belove@sover.net
Date: 02/07/96
Time: 21:42:24
This message was sent by Chameleon
-------------------------------------
Things should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler -- A. Einstein
=END=
Date: Wed, 7 Feb 1996 22:11:29 -0500 (EST)
From: jwalbrid
To: Talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: Majnun: Reality checks
Gentlemen and lady:
I really must--uncharacteristically--agree with my good wife.
1. *Any* sort of an organization is an absolute nonstarter at this
point. That is the one thing that will not in any way be tolerated.
There is a clear precedent in the Guardian's handling of the New History
Society. It will just get us all thrown out on our ears, force the
decent people to back the scoundrels, and in all likely push the Faith
back into the intellectual ghetto, much like happened after the expulsion
of Sohrab. Let's forget it and erase the messages suggesting it.
2. Ditto *Modest Proposal II*. It didn't work last time and it won't
work this time. It will just polarize the situation.
3. Ditto direct attacks on individuals. Leave them to dig their own
graves; they have, after all, staff to help them. Attacks on members of
the NSA by organized or perceived-to-be-organized agitators, particularly
members of the notorious ex-West LA crowd, will force the House to rally
to the defence of the NSA.
4. Let us remember that we have won three rounds recently: Talisman was
not strangled in its cradle; the NSA seems to have backed down on
attacking David--according to rumor because they feared that Indiana
University would sue them, I am gratified to say; and the NSA is standing
its ground against the House on the issue of the Baha'i encyclopedia.
5. We have hit on a winning strategy, I think:
a) Avoid direct confrontations whenever possible.
b) If attacked, as in David's case, indicate that we are prepared
to stand our ground and make trouble.
c) Get information and ideas into circulation.
d) Keep the heat on whenever it can be done without direct confrontations.
e) Do not allow ourselves to be painted as bad Baha's.
f) Give the powers-that-be a graceful way out of their problems.
They're starting to eat their horses inside the fortress; let's stay
safely in the trenches and not jump up and charge the cannons. This
means that we need to keep doing what we are doing: no committees,
manifestos, or unnecessary martyrs. In particular, now is the time to
lay on earnest charm.
And, Nima, as for you, I do not want any more of these inflammatory
statements. You have no independent clout yet apart from whatever your
family connections might be, and we will need you for the next
generation's fights. There is no point in your getting thrown out now.
So lay off the manifesto-making and work on your Arabic verb tables, or I
will drop you from Talisman. What is the 8th form feminine plural
imperative of Q-R-B?
john walbridge
=END=
From: iskandar@ns.moran.com
Date: Wed, 7 Feb 96 23:33:21 PST
Subject: Tarjuman
To: Bahai-Discuss@BCCA.Org
What or where is Tarjuman?
How do I subscribe to it?
Thanks,
Iskandar
-------------------------------------
Name: Iskandar Hai, M.D.
E-mail: iskandar@ns.moran.com
Date: 02/07/96
Time: 23:33:21
This message was sent by Chameleon
-------------------------------------
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 96 13:19:50 JST
From: "Stephen R. Friberg"
To: Don_R._Calkins@commonlink.com
Cc: talisman@indiana.edu, jarmstro@sun1.iusb.edu
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Sexual Imagery not just Male
> > Er ... What is going on here?
>
> Steve -
> That by using the kind of logic that Jackson was referring to can be used to
> 'prove' that women are by nature 'conservative' and men, 'liberal'. While
> on the face of it, the arguments appear rational, they require the acceptance
> of some un-stated ideas that are never proven but simply accepted.
Dear Don:
Thanks. But please be careful about the words you use. I am afraid
that these types of comments sound exactly like the types of comments
that are used to keep women in their places!
I know you didn't mean that, and that we should be more clear about what
we say. But, phrasing is important, and not seeming to attack women is
important, too. I'm worried about backlash here.
The women on Talisman constantly complain about how unfriendly towards
women our attitudes are, and typically leave. I would like that to
change. So, if we were to lean more towards a positive assessment
of women, rather than these stereotypical archetypes of women as
maidens, etc., it would be best, I think. Does this mean offering
a more positive picture of women's characteristics? I think so.
Should we have to defend such a positive picture? Not unless we
are supporting a double-standard, which I am worried is the case
here.
Anyway, I always enjoy your postings and your contributions. If you
were to post more about these issues, it would be nice, I think.
Stephen F.
=END=
Date: Wed, 7 Feb 1996 23:10:11 -0600 (CST)
Subject: re: liberalism and free speech
From: "Richard C. Logan"
To: "Marie L. Procter" , "Talisman"
>Does practicing "radiant acquiesence" mean that we cannot raise questions
>about certain practices of our institutions through the legitimate channels
>available to us, i.e. Feast consultation and recommendations to our
>Assemblies, letters to our esteemed bodies and consultation with
>representatives of the Institution of the Learned.
Dear Marie,
No it does not, and I feel immensely depressed that you would even
suggest such a thing. The implication here is that I am the the worst of
Baha'is--Draconian in the extreme. I have been troubled all afternoon
and evening after receiving this. I tried to compose an answer to your
question but my strength finally failed me. Perhaps I can speak of it
another time.
Sometimes words just aren't enough.
Richard
Richard C. Logan nineteen@onramp.net
Maintain HomePape "The Baha'is of Lubbock"
http://rampages.onramp.net/~nineteen/
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
How manifold are the truths which must remain unuttered until the
appointed time is come! Even as it has been said:
"Not everything that a man knoweth can be disclosed, nor can
everything that he can disclose be regarded as timely, nor can every
timely utterance be considered as suited to the capacity of those who
hear it." --Gleanings from the writings of Baha'u'llah
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
=END=
Date: Wed, 7 Feb 1996 22:53:37 -0600 (CST)
From: Robert Lee Green
To: belove@sover.net
Cc: Steven Coles , talisman@indiana.edu,
Brooke Rolston
Subject: Re: Welcoming & Affirming Gays
In Selections from the writings of Abdu'l-Baha, Abdu'l-Baha writes,
"Treat everyone with whom you are concerned as a mother, or a father, a
sister or a brother, an uncle or an aunt, or as a child. All your
difficulties will vanish, and you will know what to do."
I had some trouble with this because my family was dysfunctional, and I
was treating people like members of my biological family. Geez what a
mistake :-) grin. But as Abdu'l-Baha said I, I reconsidered, maybe I
needed to look for a functional family to provide some modeling. Any way
that is part of this story at a later date. I finally chose his family
:-), at least the healthy functional ones :-)
On Tue, 6 Feb 1996 belove@sover.net wrote:
> So I have some confusion here. Do Baha'is really exclude gays. The
> answer is no and yes. "No" as people, as friends. "Yes" as Baha'i's
> if they wish to have a sex life as a gay person.
>
The answer is no. refer to the writings to discover exactly who Baha'is
can exclude. The answer is Liars, Thiefs, and Covenant Breakers. Period.
Sex life has nothing to do with these. Even the removal of rights does
not exclude people in any final kind of way. But may limit types of
participation.
The people who happen to be Baha'is must come to grips with
"unconditional love" for others. Baha'u'llah helps when He says, "Should
any differences arise amongst you, behold Me standing before your face,
and overlook the faults of one another as a token of your love for my
namesake, and this manifest and resplendent cause."
The question did not refer to sex, which is another issue. Baha'is are
commanded to love all people, even the liars, thieves and covenant
breakers whom we may not associate with,with few exceptions. Period.
The degree to which we are able to do this, will in large measure
encourage entry by troops. I post because for a long time, I couldn't
reconcile my place in the community with my understanding of the
communities actions.
It wasn't until I was able to separate the community from Baha'u'llah
that any real change occurred.
When as individual we realize that Baha'u'llah set the standards and only
Baha'u'llah is fit to judge whether we met His standard according to our
capacity. No one else has this privilege. So our answer must be to any
question like this is Baha'is exclude only Liars, Thieves and Covenant
breakers.
While it is true that homosexual expression is forbidden to assume that
an individual who identifies as homosexual is having sexual is
presumptuous, and I wouldn't recommend it.
Presuming usually highlights one's own stereotypes, which may or may not
apply to any given individual. Let us remember when we speak, that many
times the ideas we convey are our own, even if we feel they are inspired
by the writings. We must be careful not to allow personal understandings
to be represented as those of the Baha'is.
And here is my irony. I don't want to have to defend everything I say
with the writings, nor do I want the writings to do all my talking for
me, but I think the writings should inform every post.
It seems to me that this post begins to move us towards the idea of
affirmation, and what is the context which Baha'is can cheerfully and with
good conscious affirm gays. More on that later. Finding an acceptable
middle ground is one of my current grounds.
One the one hand I feel like my hands are tied but the community, and on
the other hand, I recognize a divine call to invite Gay people into the
commuity. For some reason, I seem drawn to those communities which
traditional have not been very welcome in America. Minorities. Imagine
entry by troops, whole communities transformed by sheer numbers. I want
to invite everyone to the wedding feast announced in the Bible.
> |
> >Robert Green | My first counsel is this: Possess a pure,
> |
> >rlg0001 | kindly and radiant heart, that thine may
> |
> >@jove.acs.unt.edu | be a sovereignty ancient, imperishable
> |
> > | and everlasting." - Baha'u'llah |
> > ------------------------------------------------
> >
>
> -------------------------------------
> Name: Philip Belove
> E-mail: belove@sover.net
> Date: 02/06/96
> Time: 15:15:16
>
> This message was sent by Chameleon
> -------------------------------------
> Things should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler -- A. Einstein
>
------------------------------------------------
| "O SON OF SPIRIT! |
Robert Green | My first counsel is this: Possess a pure, |
rlg0001 | kindly and radiant heart, that thine may |
@jove.acs.unt.edu | be a sovereignty ancient, imperishable |
| and everlasting." - Baha'u'llah |
------------------------------------------------
=END=
From: TLCULHANE@aol.com
Date: Wed, 7 Feb 1996 23:49:28 -0500
Message-Id: <960207234925_138792813@emout05.mail.aol.com>
To: talisman@indiana.edu
Dear Ahang and all ,
With all due respect am I to assume that the proposition that that there is
only *one* voice in the writings of Bahau llah and that it is always
*masculine* is an article of *Faith* and by what scriptural authority should
I *assume* this to be* true* .
Clearly if one assumes that THE MAIFESTATION of GOD is equivalent to
the biological maleness of Mirza Husayn Ali then one could say that their is
only one voice and it is always masculine . This leaves us with at last two
problems 1) It reduces the reality of Divinity to a Nasut level of existence
; the trancendent disappears . This would leave one with the reasonable
asumption that Bahau lah was a neat philosopher but not much more .
2) We could try and resolve this dilemna by invoking a re-worked version of
incarnationism whereby the Divine takes on human form . the probles here is
that we fall into conflict with the Guardain who states:" So crude and
fantastic a theory of Divine Incarnation is as far removed from and
incompatible with the essentials of Bahai belief as are the no less
admissable pantheistic and anthropomorphic conceptions of God."
It seems to me the *Reality* of the Manifestation transcends this
earthly plane - Nasut- and its Eternal or Deathless reality abides in Lahut .
When Bahau llah attempts to convey this Deathless reality to us He clearly
uses *feminine * imagery. As the earthly level of existence is the one from
which we derive our knowledge of existence - in the first place - Bahau llah
provides us with allegories which reflect our earthly existence. The poles of
this plane are male and female and these correspond to spiritual realities -
Attributes - which exist in the next dimension - Malakut - which are in turn
emanations of Jabarut which in turn is an emanation of Lahut .- The Station
of the Manifestation .
Bahau llah decribes this station and his - human rational soul - encounter
with God as Beloved in feminine imagery and clearly adopts a feminine persona
for the reality of the MANIFESTATION. He also uses masculine imagery for
this as well . It is , however, most significant that His experience of the
Beloved , the relationship of the lover and the Beloved, is cast in feminine
terms . Now if we can agree that Bahau lah characterizes the Divine Beloved
as the Maid of Heaven - Feminine mode - then it becomes clear that He has
adopted the feminine persona for Himself when he states in Gleanings :" For
whereas in days past every lover besought and searched after the Beloved, it
is the Beloved Himself Who now is calling His lovers and is inviting them to
attain His presence ."
There are numerous other examples of this but this one should suffice
for as Bahau llah might say "the fair-minded."
Why is this adoption of the feminine persona of such significance ?
1) because this is a truly universal manifestation and as slightly more
than half of the human race is female this revelation must needs address the
spiritual existence of women who constitute this half of a universal humanity
.
Why is that important ?
2) because this half of the human race has been historically relegated to
a status as something less than fully human . Bahau llah's adoption of the
feminine persona in the lover -beloved realtionship opens , validates and
*recognizes* the fully human staus of women and groungs this staus in Theos
- God .
Why is this important ?
3) because if one can exclude , directly or indirectly , half of the human
race from God -Talk then one can always call into question there status as
fully human . If the Divine Beloved is as fully feminine as it is masculine
then the *sacred * resides in both those realities . And as we all know to
*violate the *sacred* is blasphemous. This is the worst of sins as it is an
attack upon the Holy Spirit which is an attack upon THE* COVENANT * itself .
Given the level of violence towards women in history and currently I think
the importance of this becomes apparent . If in unmistabable language Bahau
llah grounds spiritual reality in the feminine as well as the masculine one
oppresses or perpetuates violence towards women at the peril of ones eternal
life.
Now considering that these attributes of feminine / masculine are
present in each soul , irregardless of which biological Temple within which
it may reside , Bahau lahs utterances regarding the end of conflict or more
stringly that it is "forbidden" take on more force. Those who perpetrate
violence or more generaly injustice towards any human being are endangering
the state of their soul . The ethical significance of Baha u llah adopting a
feminine persona - consider the Wronged one - ( a station btw which I
consider another example of the feminine persona ) is that women as a group
have been the recipients of horrors shared with men but also ones particular
to their being women . Bahau llah by asdopting the femnine persona redeems
the age old injustices perpetrated against this half of the human race .
This is not to suggest that men have not also been harmed . However it has
not been women as a group who have perpetrated injustice towards men . The
same cannot be said of men .
By adopting a feminine persona Bahau llah identifies with the non
recognition that has been the lot of women throughout history and this non
recognition parallels the life of the Prophet . As Im have said before the
"Great Reversal " .
A further example of Bahau lah and the feminine *voice * which is
literally sprinkled througout the Revelation has to do with the findings of
Carol Gilligan and her associates. She has found that men "tend" to process
moral issues from different perspectives than do women . men tend to use what
she cals an ethic of rights (or justice in her recent work) . Women tend to
do the same on the bais of an ethic of care and compassion ( or relationship
in her recent work .)
Throughout the writings of Bahau llah one finds continual evidence in His
language of this ethic of care / compassion / relationship. In the best
contemporary sense of language and moral philosophy Bahau llah adopts the
feminine *voice * in His ethical exhortations and descritptions of reality .
He also uses a masculine voice . That is not at issue si i choose not to
focus on it at the moment . For those who want *specific * examples of Bahau
llah speaking in the feminine *voice * a la Gilligan et al you will have to
come to Bosch for my BahaMaiden presentation.
OR
in the meantime read Iqan pgs 59- 61 Gleanings pg319 -322 and279 -284 as
wel as285. Seven Valleys esp. valey of love, knowledge and unity and to many
of the Arabic Hidden words for me to comment on at the moment . Friends ,
the feminine persona and voice of Bahau lah is literally sprinkled throughout
the Writings . Then one would expect that from a universal Manifestation who
is going to *recognize * women; and teach both men and women a new and
universal language of *Spirit * which includes and preserves both masculine
and feminine *voices* - and - shows us a world that transcends them both .
I had hoped to elaborate on all this before Bosch but my current economic
situation has talen my mental energires in more pedestrian channels .
Inshallah in the next few weeks I will get to it more fully . I have been out
of town the past couple of days or would have responded to this query sooner
. :)
warm regards,
terry
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 96 14:41:41 JST
From: "Stephen R. Friberg"
To: talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: Stereotyping
Dear Friends:
I note that Friberg can not even cleanse himself. How dare he criticize
others!
Claiming to perceive stereotypically male responses on Talisman, he
himself offers up this gem: "The women on Talisman constantly complain
. . . ".
Perhaps he should take some of his own medicine!
Yours sincerely,
An anonymous critic.
=END=
Date: Wed, 7 Feb 1996 22:35:25 -0700 (MST)
From: Sadra
To: Ahang Rabbani
Cc: talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: Re: The Tablet of Universe
Ahang jan--
Was this translation the same version of Lawh-i Aflakiyyih you posted mid
last year, or is this a revised one? I still can't get enough of this
particular piece of the Master's.
Nima
**************************************************************
* Paradox is a characteristic of truth. What communis opinio *
* has of truth is surely no more than an elementary deposit *
* of generalizing partial understanding, related to truth *
* even as sulphurous fumes are to lightning. *
* *
* --From the correspondence of Count Paul von Wartenburg *
* and Wilhelm Dilthey *
**************************************************************
=END=
Date: Wed, 7 Feb 96 21:57 PST
To: "Dan Orey"
From: burlb@bmi.net (Burl Barer)
Subject: Re: Dear Dr Burl
Cc: talisman@indiana.edu
>Dear Dr. Burl - is there any truth to the rumor that "Euthanasia" is a
>shortened term for "youth in Asia"?
***
No. It is a colloquial corruption of "Ethan Asian" -- a Korean
chain store that sells cheap knock-offs of Early American furniture.
***
>parents will be able to send their teenage sons and
>daughters for a year or more away from home? Isn't this what we have the
>Maxwell School for?
***
The Maxwell Baha'i School is where (a) wealthy Baha'is send their juvenile
delinquent children in hopes that wearing a uniform and freezing their
behinds off in British Columbia will bring the kid to some sort of maturity.
This of course, never works. The kids graduate with a degree in chain
smoking, straight edge music, and psychedelic experimentation and then
either go on a year of service to some hell hole in a third world country
which *does* bring them to some sort of maturity, or they just hang out and
get weird in some hippie grotto, crash pad, meth lab, or espresso bar (b)
poor Baha'is with high hopes for their pecious young send them to Maxwell
believing that wearing a uniform and freezing their behinds off in British
Columbia will bring the sweet young thing even closer to Baha'u'llah.
Instead, they get closer to the juvenile delinquents. Think of Maxwell as
Blackboard Jungle with obligatory prayers.
Any further questions, ask Sandy Fotos who is getting on a plane to track
down her sweet little Helen, a recent Maxwell Graduate, who was last seen
with a Lucky Strike dangling from her lips, having the Last Supper tattood
on her forehead.
Dr. Burl sent his daughter to Maxwell and discovered that it cost approx.
500 times more than tuition if you count all the collect calls from your
children complaining that a six-pack of Diet Coke costs $6.00 in Canada and
the phone call to tell you about it costs $6.50 and they call you in the
middle of the day collect just to say "I miss you, send money." Dr. Burl's
daughter did learn a great deal about the Faith while at Maxwell. What I
really wanted her to learn was how to clean her room. My expectations were
obviously unrealistic.
***
Probably clueless, but tastefully dressed in Sacramento
Yes, that is the Official Moto of the California State Capitol.
Dr. Burl
>
*******************************************************
MAN OVERBOARD by Burl Barer may be ordered on-line from Book Stacks,
Unlimited or from your favorite book store!
ISBN#1-56901-815-4 $19.95 Suggested Retail Price
********************************************************
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 96 05:52:42 UT
From: "Hannah E. Reinstein"
To: talisman@indiana.edu, "QUANTA DAWNLIGHT" ,
belove@sover.net
Subject: RE: Male and female attributes
I understand your question about androgyny but not about the level of the
Manifestation of the Creator/God. Be patient with me. I'm passing through an
androgynous stage. But it's just a phase. I'll grow out of it.
Androgynous persons are those that look like they have aspects of both the
male and female genders. They're inherently confusing to look upon. That
clearly does not apply to the Manifestation or at least to the recent ones for
whom we have historical records. Gender and sex are not the same thing. They
are usually congruent but they don't have to be. Except in the exceptionally
rare case of a true hermaphrodite, a person's sex is part of their genetic
fabric. It cannot be changed in humans even though surgery and medicine can
change some secondary sexual characteristics and the cosmetic functionality of
others. Gender can only be completely understood within a social context.
While a small part of it might be imprinted, most gender behavior is the
result of education and socialization. It has not been absolutely fixed
throughout history. It is even changeable. The Baha'i faith does not teach
that gender or sex is fundamental to the nature of God. The pronouns in
original and also translated scripture are simply linguistic conventions. Does
anyone want to argue that God is a male? Not likely. It is unproveable. God is
unimaginable, not to be comprehended, a pure mystery.
I know people who have adapted the affectation of referring to God as She.
They know it shocks a few people and they enjoy that. It's also
consciousness-raising and not that bad an idea. It knocks people out of their
boxes so it's kind of appealing. If I didn't feel that politically correct
language is so artificial (read: annoying) I might do it too.
How do you determine gender? Have men always had short hair and women long
hair, for example? Of course not. By apparel or color of its fabric? By what
adornment? By what criteria? In what society and what era? All of that is
non-essential.
You said: To refer to Manifestationhood as a state of being, co-existent with
the spiritual reality of a human, well, that seems to be news.
But I don't understand what you mean by that. Maybe I was fuzzy in my
language. I don't think I said that. I was taught that there are three levels
of creation. Two of them are contingent and one is not. There is the
Creator/God, the Manifestation of God, and the rest of us. We are only
connected by the Holy Spirit. I am only aware of the existence of the highest
level because it has a reflection (Manifestation). It wishes to be known by
way of that reflection. Its reflection is in the form of a unique individual
who can be either biologically male or female. God is sanctified above all
attributes as the prayer says. That tells me that God does not have a
biological sex or a specific gender. Once again, gender is just a way of
grouping a set of characteristics that mostly pertain to males or females in a
particular society. It's meaningless in terms of characterizing God. It serves
no real purpose.
I'm having tremendous difficulty trying to express my ideas. I can't
comprehend how the Manifestation of God can represent only one gender. It
doesn't make any sense. What purpose would it serve? I give up. I'll try again
later. Someone help me here. Dr. Burl? Sandy? Anyone? Help! We must stop
mixing up linguistic conventions with deeper realities. This is lower case and
that is in caps so it means thus and so. The things I've been reading the last
few days!
Hannah
MAMBNT (middle-aged mutant Baha'i ninja turtle)
============
"'Where do you get your ideas?' has always been the question I'm most
confronted with . . . I'm afraid the answer is much more mundane: I don't know
where my ideas come from. I will admit, however, that one key ingredient is
caffeine." -- Gary Larson (FarSide)
----------
From: belove@sover.net
Sent: Wednesday, 07 February, 1996 7:15 AM
To: talisman@indiana.edu; QUANTA DAWNLIGHT; Hannah E. Reinstein
Subject: RE: Male and female attributes
On Wed, 7 Feb 96 07:43:07 UT Hannah E. Reinstein wrote:
"Nonetheless, the Manifestation, as Mirror of the
>Divine, has
>no gender and therefore neither does the Holy Spirit, which is the
delivery
>medium of written revelation. Man and Woman do not mean the same
things to
>Baha'u'llah that they do to us."
>
This speaks to a sharp distinction between Manifestationhood and
Humanity. Such a distinction seemed to be implied by Jesus Christ
but seems to be blurred in popular representations.
Can this be supported by Scripture? I mean the whole thing, that the
Manifestation is separate from the Guy and that the Manifestation is
without Gender.
Also, big difference here between genderless and androgynous. Which
do you mean?
Philip
-------------------------------------
Name: Philip Belove
E-mail: belove@sover.net
Date: 02/07/96
Time: 07:15:21
This message was sent by Chameleon
-------------------------------------
Things should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler -- A.
Einstein
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 00:41:48 -0500 (EST)
From: Juan R Cole
To: talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: Baha'u'llah's feminine diction
I think there are many places where Baha'u'llah adopts a self-referential
feminine diction in Arabic (which shows gender in a way Persian does not).
One example that comes to mind is the beginning of the Tablet of Ahmad.
The "nightingale" is actually in Arabic the female Dove of Paradise (hadhihi
warqatu'l-firdawsi), and *She* singeth (tughanni) upon the twigs of the
Tree of Eternity, *She* proclaims (tubashshir) to the sincere ones, and
so forth throughout the first paragraph. Baha'u'llah here speaks of
Himself with feminine grammar, because of the referent of the female Dove
as the symbol of His Self (Self/nafs is also feminine and when He refers
to His "self" he likewise uses feminine grammar).
cheers Juan
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 96 06:08:07 UT
From: "Hannah E. Reinstein"
To: talisman@indiana.edu, belove@sover.net
Subject: RE: humor, sex, fuzzy logic.
For those of you not on my Humor List, here's the punctuation post:
The importance of correct punctuation...
From: Games Magazine (1984)
Dear John:
I want a man who knows what love is all about. You are generous, kind,
thoughtful. People who are not like you admit to being useless and
inferior.
You have ruined me for other men. I yearn for you. I have no feelings
whatsoever when we're apart. I can be forever happy--will you let me be
yours?
Gloria
Dear John:
I want a man who knows what love is. All about you are generous, kind,
thoughtful people, who are not like you. Admit to being useless and
inferior.
You have ruined me. For other men, I yearn. For you, I have no feelings
whatsoever. When we're apart, I can be forever happy. Will you let me be?
Yours,
Gloria
The rest of your thoughtful post I'll answer tomorrow. Too sleepy tonight to
be coherent.
Hannah
The Artist Formerly Known As Cary :-)
----------
From: belove@sover.net
Sent: Wednesday, 07 February, 1996 8:33 AM
To: talisman@indiana.edu; Hannah E. Reinstein
Subject: humor, sex, fuzzy logic.
Dear Hannah/Cary,
The punctuation posting is a real gem. Thanks so much.
I teach a course in communication and I was trying to explain
punctuation to them and this is a perfect teaching tool.
More tomorrow... same Bat-time. Same Bat-station.................whoosh......
=END=
Date: Wed, 7 Feb 96 22:10 PST
To: "Dan Orey"
From: burlb@bmi.net (Burl Barer)
Subject: Re: Dear Dr Burl
Cc: talisman@indiana.edu
>Dear Dr. Burl - is there any truth to the rumor that "Euthanasia" is a
>shortened term for "youth in Asia"?
***
No. It is a colloquial corruption of "Ethan Asian" -- a Korean
chain store that sells cheap knock-offs of Early American furniture.
***
>parents will be able to send their teenage sons and
>daughters for a year or more away from home? Isn't this what we have the
>Maxwell School for?
***
The Maxwell Baha'i School is where (a) wealthy Baha'is send their juvenile
delinquent children in hopes that wearing a uniform and freezing their
behinds off in British Columbia will bring the kid to some sort of maturity.
This of course, never works. The kids graduate with a degree in chain
smoking, straight edge music, and psychedelic experimentation and then
either go on a year of service to some hell hole in a third world country
which *does* bring them to some sort of maturity, or they just hang out and
get weird in some hippie grotto, crash pad, meth lab, or espresso bar (b)
poor Baha'is with high hopes for their pecious young send them to Maxwell
believing that wearing a uniform and freezing their behinds off in British
Columbia will bring the sweet young thing even closer to Baha'u'llah.
Instead, they get closer to the juvenile delinquents. Think of Maxwell as
Blackboard Jungle with obligatory prayers.
Any further questions, ask Sandy Fotos who is getting on a plane to track
down her sweet little Helen, a recent Maxwell Graduate, who was last seen
with a Lucky Strike dangling from her lips, having the Last Supper tattood
on her forehead.
Dr. Burl sent his daughter to Maxwell and discovered that it cost approx.
500 times more than tuition if you count all the collect calls from your
children complaining that a six-pack of Diet Coke costs $6.00 in Canada and
the phone call to tell you about it costs $6.50 and they call you in the
middle of the day collect just to say "I miss you, send money." Dr. Burl's
daughter did learn a great deal about the Faith while at Maxwell. What I
really wanted her to learn was how to clean her room. My expectations were
obviously unrealistic.
***
Probably clueless, but tastefully dressed in Sacramento
Yes, that is the Official Moto of the California State Capitol.
Dr. Burl
>
*******************************************************
MAN OVERBOARD by Burl Barer may be ordered on-line from Book Stacks,
Unlimited or from your favorite book store!
ISBN#1-56901-815-4 $19.95 Suggested Retail Price
********************************************************
=END=
From: SFotos@eworld.com
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 00:58:21 -0800
To: burlb@bmi.net
Cc: talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: Re: Deeeer Dr. Whatevah
Burl wrote:
----------------------------- Begin Original Text
-----------------------------
The Maxwell Baha'i School is where (a) wealthy Baha'is send their juvenile
delinquent children in hopes that wearing a uniform and freezing their
behinds off in British Columbia will bring the kid to some sort of maturity.
This of course, never works. The kids graduate with a degree in chain
smoking, straight edge music, and psychedelic experimentation and then
either go on a year of service to some hell hole in a third world country
which *does* bring them to some sort of maturity, or they just hang out and
get weird in some hippie grotto, crash pad, meth lab, or espresso bar.
>snip<
Any further questions, ask Sandy Fotos who is getting on a plane to track
down her sweet little Helen, a recent Maxwell Graduate, who was last seen
with a Lucky Strike dangling from her lips, having the Last Supper tattood
on her forehead.
----------------------------- End Original Text -----------------------------
Yes, I too spent enough to build an entire Arc terrace on Maxwell tuitions.
The only good thing was that it was less than the international school here.
Meanwhile I'm thinking of getting a tatoo myself.
Signed,
Angst is not enough
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 02:51:06 -0700 (MST)
From: Sadra
To: Talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: Baha'i & the Perennial Philosophy
Talizens--
Recently when I made the claim that the Baha'i Faith was no more than
Sufism and esoteric Shi'ism universalized, I seem to have rattled certain
sensibilities. The only person who truly understood what I was alluding
to was, of course, my soul-brother in Omaha, Terry. Mark also understood
what I was talking about with his reference to my *metalogic*.
Now what does "universalized" mean in my context; what is the universal
level I am talking about, phenomenologically? According to the
Perennialists (Guenon, Coomaraswamy, Schuon, et al), universalism
pertains to the inner, esoteric and vertically timeless dimension of
spiritual truth, as the outer, exoteric to a particular manifestational
_form_ occuring horizontally in historical time, as it were. In other
words, there is, what the perennialists call, the Primordial Tradition
(esoteric) (Baha'u'llah's "...Ancient Faith of God, Eternal in the Past,
Eternal in the Future...") which historically or horizontally permutates
like so many lights refracted through a prism (exoteric) deriving from
the One light. Dispensational norms and laws are the exoteric; the
dharmic kernel and eternal metaphysical truth at the heart of all the
sacred traditions, the esoteric.
Concomitantly, there are certain inner archetypal features to the
exoteric manifestational form of which are highlighted in each religion:
i.e. notions of redemption, grace, transcendece and immanence, chosen
people, covenant, three-in-one, etc. Now according to us perennialists
the inner dynamic of progressive revelation entails the following: That
each new dispensation in turn necessarily exoterize what was previously
esoteric while interiorizing the previously exoteric and transforming it.
Schuon says for example, that:
What characterizes esoterism to the very extent that it is absolute, is
that on contact with a dogmatic system, it universalizes the symbol or
the religious concept on the one hand, and interiorizes it on the other;
the particular or the limited is recognized as the manifestation of the
principal and the transcendent, and this in its turn reveals itself as
immanent. Christianity universalizes the notion of "Israel" while
interiorizing the Divine Law; it replaces circumcision of the flesh by
that of the heart, the "Chosen People" by a Church that includes men
every provenance, and outward prescriptions by inward virtues, all of
this having in view, not obediance to the Law, but the Love of God and,
in the last analysis, mystical union. These principles or these
transpositions could hardly have been unknown to the Essenes, and
possibly other Jewish initiates, but the originality of Christianity is
that it made a religion of them and sacrificed them to Mosaic formalism.
(Frithjof Schuon, _Esoterism as Principle and Way_ Perennial Books
(London: 1990), p. 37).
Now take Islam. Metaphysically Islam exotericizes the inner meaning of
the mystery of the trinity (which in itself is a highly esoteric doctrine
but is exotericized as a creed) by insisting on the absolute tawhid
(unity) of God while also positing His necessary immanence: i.e. "...we
shall show them Our signs in the horizons and in themselves..."
"..nothing is like unto him.." "...closer to you than your life-vein..." etc.
In Sufism, which as far as all of us perennialists are concerned is one
of the two penultimate forms of *quintessential Islam* (the other being
Twelver Shi'ism) the universal message of the Quran is taken to its
ultimate realization, namely through *taslim* or *Islam*
(surrender/submission) to the Real (al-Haqq). As such this
surrender/submission is existential (wujudi) in scope and not merely
confessional (the fundamental limitation of exotericism as a way of
life); gnosis (ma'arifa/irfan) is what is sought in this way of being and
not merely dogmatic belief (i'tiqad) -- not even faith (iman) works but
tasting (dhawq) is sought for since faith is also limited by its
unidimensional form -- faith in-itself can *only* capture one possible
form or object of belief at a time.
The existential nature of submission/surrender in Sufism means that it is
universal, and simultaneously universalizing of Islam as such: i.e. "My
heart can take on any form: a meadow for gazelles; for the idols sacred
ground, the Tablets of the Torah, the Scrolls of the Quran...etc" (Ibn
`Arabi, eleventh poem of the _Tarjuman al-Ashwaq_). Therefore in this
scheme all paths lead to the One; faith and infidelity are the same (that
is, when you've reached the summit); and all sanctifying paths are true
since there is *nothing but* the *Presence of Being* or tawhid.
Shi'ism is slightly a different phenomenon and manifests another
quintessential form of Islam, namely salvation. The function of Shi'ism
is fundamentally christic in nature since its very raison d'etre is
salvific: i.e one must know the Imam of ones age.
Anyway...this post is getting too long, I've probably bored you all to
sleep, but this is what I mean about the Baha'i Faith being universalized
Sufism and esoteric Shi'ism -- I am strictly speaking on the level of
archetypes and using a standpoint epistemology. A promise: if you can all
wait that long, the perennial aspect of the Baha'i world-view will be
fully dealt with in my article for Babi & Baha'i Studies Volume 10:
Mysticism, Metaphysics & Cosmological Perspectives.
Nima
**************************************************************
* Paradox is a characteristic of truth. What communis opinio *
* has of truth is surely no more than an elementary deposit *
* of generalizing partial understanding, related to truth *
* even as sulphurous fumes are to lightning. *
* *
* --From the correspondence of Count Paul von Wartenburg *
* and Wilhelm Dilthey *
**************************************************************
=END=
From: belove@sover.net
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 96 06:51:57 PST
Subject: apologies
To: talisman@indiana.edu
Dear all,
Sorry but for some reason I was receiving messages that the mail I
sent was being returned undelivered and I've re-posted a number of my
letters. And now it appears that people are getting some of the
messages. I don't want it to appear like I'm nagging.
I said, I don't want it to appear like I'm nagging.
Love,
Philip
-------------------------------------
Name: Philip Belove
E-mail: belove@sover.net
Date: 02/08/96
Time: 06:51:57
This message was sent by Chameleon
-------------------------------------
Things should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler -- A.
Einstein
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 09:19:31 -0500 (EST)
From: jwalbrid
To: Talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: Apology
Friends:
I inadvertantly sent out a private flame out over Talisman. It was
intended for a couple of individuals and was not very temperate anyway.
It would be a much welcome sop to my injured dignity if you would all
forget I ever wrote it, erase it from your systems, and think of me as I
am when I am not feeling dispeptic.
This plea for indulgence applies particularly to those I particularly
offended.
Yours awkwardly,
john walbridge
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 07:54:59 -0700 (MST)
From: Eric Indiogine
To: "K. Paul Johnson"
Cc: talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: Re: Borg and the Baha'is
Interesting posting Paul!
On Wed, 7 Feb 1996, K. Paul Johnson wrote:
> not-so-dubious assertions about Jesus, I'm starting to read the
> latest scholarship. Am getting my feet wet with Marcus Borg's
> Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time. He makes four positive
> assertions about the historical Jesus that tend to align him
> with Baha'u'llah, and two negative assertions that definitely
> put him at odds with what Baha'is have perceived him to be:
>
> 1. The historical Jesus was a *spirit person*, one of those
> figures in human history with an experiential awareness of the
> reality of God.
> 2. Jesus was a *teacher of wisdom* who regularly used the
> classic forms of wisdom speech (parables, and memorable short
> sayings known as aphorisms) to teach a subversive and
> alternative wisdom.
> 3. Jesus was a *social prophet,* similar to the classical
> prophets of ancient Israel. As such, he criticized the elites
> (economic, political and religious) of his time, was an
> advocate of an alternative social vision, and was often in
> conflict with authorities.
> 4. Jesus was a *movement founder* who brought into being a
> Jewish renewal or revitalization movement that challenged and
> shattered the social boundaries of his day...
>
> Well, all these four characterizations resonate with aspects of
> Baha'u'llah's life, and to the extent that they fit, I'm
> perfectly happy with Baha'u'llah. BUT:
So far, so very good. My becoming Bahai was stimulated by Biblical
research. It is a long story, which I will spare you. I would like to
disagree with your two following points:
> 1. Jesus was nonmessianic in his self-understanding, said
> nothing about being the Messiah or Son of God in some special
> sense.
That should not be a great problem for us. I think personally that we
could make an even stronger case for Baha'u'llah being the Messiah. He
was also of Davidic descend and His coming to the Holy Land was closely
intertwined with the national restoration of Israel. Indeed the Bahai
World Center with it's Holy Places would practically not exist were it
not for the State of Israel.
> 2. Jesus was noneschatological, not expected the coming of the
> Kingdom of God as an earth-shattering event. The growing
> scholarly consensus to this effect is a recent phenomenon.
I see no problem here either. We Bahais indeed believe that the Kingdom
of God started its appearance in 1844AD and that it is a gradual
unfolding of events.
> Since Baha'u'llah was not only messianic and eschatological but
> firmly insistent on seeing Jesus in this light, if the scholars
> are right they have pulled the rug out from under the Baha'is.
I do think that you can make these statements about Baha'u'llah without
giving us some evidence. Personally I have not seen but confirmations to
the Faith from Christian scholarly research.
Bye,
Eric Indiogine (sindiogi@nmsu.edu), Dept. Civil, Agricultural,
and Geological Engineering, New Mexico State University,
Las Cruces, New Mexico, U.S.A.
## True loss is for him whose days have been ##
## spent in utter ignorance of his self ##
-* Baha'u'llah, Words of Wisdom #21 *-
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 96 23:23:40 JST
From: "Stephen R. Friberg"
To: talisman@indiana.edu, friberg@will.brl.ntt.jp
Subject: ibn al Arabi, questions for Nima
Dear Nima:
Do you remember the books that you suggested to me to read when I visited you
in Albuquerque? I just checked what I bought, and was delighted and
surprised that I have Chittick's "The Sufi Path of Knowledge!"
Anyway, the complete list is below:
Claude Addas, "Quest for the Red Sulphur: The Life of Ibn Arabi,"
(Islamic Texts Society, Cambridge, 1993).
William C. Chittick, "The Sufi Path of Knowledge" (SUNY Press,
Albany, 1989).
Majid Fakhry "A History of Islamic Philosophy, 2nd Edition,"
(Columbia University Press, New York, 1983).
Toshihiko Izutsu, "Creation and the Timeless Order of Things," (White
Cloud Press, Ashland, Oregon, 1994).
Roy Mottahedeh, "The Mantle of the Prophet," (Pantheon, New York,
1985).
Seyyed Hossein Nasr, "Three Muslim Sages," (Caravan, New York, 1964).
I found William C. Chittick's "Imaginal Worlds: Ibn al Arabi and the Problem
of Religious Diversity" (SUNY, Albany, 1994) last week in a Tokyo bookstore
(Kinokuniya). So far, it's my favorite, as it addresses many themes I
consider to be important. Could you comment on some of the points that
Chittick in his introduction makes about Ibn Arabi's thought?
The diversity of our world's religions and ethnological backgrounds makes
acceptance of diversity very important. One of Ibn Arabi's major
contributions, according to Chittick, is his enthusiastic embrace of
diversity.
Nima, would it be correct to say that al Arabi viewed diversity itself, be it
in thinking, philosophy, religion, or culture, as a gift of God?
Chittick notes that religious pluralism, religious freedom, and cultural
diversity can cause problems, and that the "perception of difference,
diversity, and even antagonism is only intensified by the academic study of
religion." The bewilderment caused by this diversity "is accentuated by the
great variety of methodological approaches that ... make important
contributions to our understanding of religion's nature, but are firmly
rooted in the experience of modernity undergone by the West. ... modern
scholarship -- in contrast to traditional Islamic scholarship -- does not
presuppose an ultimate reality that unifies all of existence, a clear purpose
to human life, a moral dimension to both human activity and the natural
world, the divine origin of religion, or the truth of scripture."
In contrast, ibn al Arabi "... acknowledges the validity of every mode of
human knowing, and at the same time he recognizes the limitations of every
mode. Thus, he considers every perspective, every school of thought, and
every religion as both true and false." For ibn al Arabi, rational
investigation and prophetic revelation are both ways of gaining
knowledge. A third way, "unveiling" (kashf, which I take to be
mystical in character) also is important to his thought.
Nima, there seems to be a very important difference between modern
scholarship and ibn al Arabi's thought. How do you think about this?
Does modern scholarship miss or ignore important aspects of the world
because of its rejection of everything but rationality?
Chittick portrays the West as following Averroes, engaged in developing
the kinds of explanations where it is finally discovered that God is
expendable. The result "has been an ever-increasing fragmentation of human
knowledge, with a total divorce between science and ethics." Islam, in the
main, followed al Arabi and "the result was a harmony between reason and
spiritual perception. Muslim intellectuals were rarely able to conceive of
nature without seeing its roots in God. (Nature) cannot be studied without an
investigation of the moral and ethical demands that this rooting entails."
Nima, do you agree with this?
I'm excited by these statements, in part because it is what I have
long thought to be true: the Europeans originally borrowed their
philosophy and science from Islam, but rejected its spirituality,
thus insuring a conflict between science and religion that continues
to this day. Of course, this raises the next question. Were ibn
al Arabi's answers *too good*, thus stifling the growth of philosophy
and science in Islamic countries?
Anyway, I am hoping for your comments and explanations.
Yours sincerely,
Stephen R. Friberg
P.S. I am beginning to find al Arabi quite to my inclinations, and Chittick
as well!
=END=
From: Alethinos@aol.com
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 10:12:04 -0500
To: talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: Re: Apology
Dear Mr. Walbridge:
Wrote what?
jim harrison
Alethinos@aol.com
=END=
From: "QUANTA DAWNLIGHT"
To: talisman@indiana.edu
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 10:56:13 EST
Subject: I'll be back
Dearest friends,
I must admit that I am on the lower side of life among homosapiens.
I enjoy being with nature these days. I saw a red cardinal hopping
and skipping on the branches of the oak tree on my back yard the
other day and converse with it from my kitchen window. Yes!! you
little defiant and brave soul, walk on the ice in spite of the cold.
I too need to learn to do that in a spiritual sense. Walk on the icy
faces of cold homosapiens. Hop and skip, tickle their noses and make
them laugh whether they want it or not. Why people have these
lifeless stares at one another these days? Or, am I just noticing it?
We are flowers in one garden. Yeah! wilted and in need of water and
sun! I am tired of knowledge. The roots of the Tree of Life is
flooded. We need the sunshine (love) to come out and let it evaporate
or let the ground soak it down deeper. So, I am tired of words,
words, and words again and again. I am tired of meetings, plans.
I am tired of them all. That's the way I feel right now.
I will not proof read this and I will send it right now.
love, love, love
quanta
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 10:23:58 -0600 (CST)
From: Robert Lee Green
To: "Marguerite K. Gipson"
Cc: talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: Re: Welcoming & Affirming Gays
On Thu, 8 Feb 1996, Marguerite K. Gipson wrote:
We are never tested beyond our limits.
------------------------------------------------
| "O SON OF SPIRIT! |
Robert Green | My first counsel is this: Possess a pure, |
rlg0001 | kindly and radiant heart, that thine may |
@jove.acs.unt.edu | be a sovereignty ancient, imperishable |
| and everlasting." - Baha'u'llah |
------------------------------------------------
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 08:18:49 -0800
To: Robert Lee Green
From: margreet@margreet.seanet.com (Marguerite K. Gipson)
Subject: Re: Welcoming & Affirming Gays
Cc: talisman@indiana.edu
Hello All, Gads... Oh, my, oh my... I just have a question, and I would
like some clarity,--Thanks, My issue-- is that as a single, female I have a
"law" to abide by. Called the Law of Chasity. It not only make perfect
sense-- What man wants a women who has slept with every Tom, Dick, Harry,
George, Jeff etc... and it especially rings true to this day and age of
diseases that can kill--
I certainly do not want a man who has a *history* longer than his bank
account...
but what I am hearing is that for now, I am a single female, abiding by the
chasity law... but I can *switch* to the other side just to have sex with
another female, and that would make it OK, because of the *switch*? Trust
me, ain't no way that will ever happen... I don't care how 'bad' the men
are, or how scarce they become...
I don't think so.
And thru all this, no one has mention any thing about spiritual tests. We
all have them... And some are just blessed with the spiritual test of being
'gay' or 'lesbian'. And that is what they have to deal with, just like
some of us have to deal with other 'tests' going on in our lives. That
testing gives us strength, growth, renewal, a new 'closer to God' feeling
and what have you... We are never tested beyond our limits.
I agree with Philip on this Thank you Philip.
Warmly, Margreet
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 11:45:19 -0500 (EST)
From: Stephen Johnson
To: talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: KI pp.35 - 37
The term "suns" hath many a time been applied
in the writings of the "immaculate Souls" unto the
Prophets of God, those luminous Emblems of Detachment.
Among those writings are the following
words recorded in the "Prayer of Nudbih":+F1
"Whither are gone the resplendent Suns? Whereunto
have departed those shining Moons and
sparkling Stars?" Thus, it hath become evident
that the terms "sun," "moon," and "stars" primarily
signify the Prophets of God, the saints, and
their companions, those Luminaries, the light of
Whose knowledge hath shed illumination upon the
worlds of the visible and the invisible.
In another sense, by these terms is intended the
divines of the former Dispensation, who live in
the days of the subsequent Revelations, and who
hold the reins of religion in their grasp. If these
divines be illumined by the light of the latter Revelation
they will be acceptable unto God, and will
shine with a light everlasting. Otherwise, they will
be declared as darkened, even though to outward
seeming they be leaders of men, inasmuch as belief
and unbelief, guidance and error, felicity and misery,
light and darkness, are all dependent upon the
sanction of Him Who is the Day-star of Truth.
Whosoever among the divines of every age receiveth,
in the Day of Reckoning, the testimony of faith
from the Source of true knowledge, he verily becometh
the recipient of learning, of divine favour,
and of the light of true understanding. Otherwise,
he is branded as guilty of folly, denial, blasphemy,
and oppression.
It is evident and manifest unto every discerning
observer that even as the light of the star fadeth
before the effulgent splendour of the sun, so doth
the luminary of earthly knowledge, of wisdom,
and understanding vanish into nothingness when
brought face to face with the resplendent glories
of the Sun of Truth, the Day-star of divine enlightenment.
+F1 "Lamentation" attributed to the Twelfth &Imam.
=END=
From: belove@sover.net
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 96 10:38:31 PST
Subject: fem/mas imagery
To: TLCULHANE@aol.com, talisman@indiana.edu
Terry,
I really enjoyed your posting on all the reasons why Baha'ullah might
have used the feminine persona in certain of His writings.
And I was especially interested in your reference to Carol Gilligans
model of ethical thinking.
Two points.
I wonder where you might add Jung's idea of the transcendent function
into your analysis.
Let me clarify my question and review what I understand by
transcendent function.
Jung observed that we humans always have a relationship with our own
unconcious mind. He thought that when we are thinking, musing, making
decisions, going about our day, taking account of ourselves, when we
do all those things, it is like there are two entities in our
subjectivity. One entity was our self identity, our ego, our "I," or
our "me." The other entity was larger and included everything else
inside. Freud called that entity the id, or the "it," meaning, that
stuff that isn't "me." Jung called it the anima or the animus.
He was saying that if we experience our "me" as male, then we
experience our "other" as female, and vice versa.
The was in important way Jung build on the initial insights from
Freud. Freud started thinking of the "other," as alien, and
de-personalized, an "it," or "id." For Jung, the other was personal
and an entity that you could come to know and love, a "She," or a
"He." Also, the other was vast and extended beyond our individual
lives into the collective life of our genus, our species and perhaps
our planet. And yet, at the same time, our Other was a Living
Presence we could come to love and would have to come to love and
eventually marry.
And here I wonder how I might understand the inner maidens of
Baha'ullah's Manifestation, if I also understand these ideas from
Jung. For example, would Jung's theory predict that, were a
Manifestation to be a female, then the messenger and voice and
imagery She would speak would be Male? Is this a totally impudent
question? (I still say that the next Manifestation will be a
Couple.)
But moving on.
The marriage of the I and the Soul produces a third being. According
to Jung this new form is the goal of spirituality. When the Inner
Male and the Inner Female unity a new entity emerges, a transcendent
one.
When Hillman wrote about this he talked about how, in alchemy, when
the four essences of subjectivity were balanced and harmonious, a
fifth essence arose, a quint-essence. The quintessence was a
manifestation of spirituality.
I suspect that all this has something to do with the current thread
on the feminine and masculine imagery but I'm not sure how to trace
it from here.
Love
Philip
-------------------------------------
Name: Philip Belove
E-mail: belove@sover.net
Date: 02/08/96
Time: 10:38:31
This message was sent by Chameleon
-------------------------------------
Things should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler -- A.
Einstein
=END=
From: belove@sover.net
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 96 10:06:19 PST
Subject: RE: Male and female attributes
To: talisman@indiana.edu, QUANTA DAWNLIGHT ,
belove@sover.net, "Hannah E. Reinstein"
On Thu, 8 Feb 96 05:52:42 UT Hannah E. Reinstein wrote:
>I understand your question about androgyny but not about the level
of the
>Manifestation of the Creator/God. Be patient with me. I'm passing
through an
>androgynous stage. But it's just a phase. I'll grow out of it.
>
Hannah, it's been years since I was reading in this area but, as I
remember, androgyny was said to be a phase one grew into, a kind of
fulfillment in which it was possible to identify with what is
commonly called "both masculine and feminine sides." In more
ordinary language that might mean that, as a man, in maturity you
begin to feel comfortable acting in ways that you used to avoid
because they were feminine. And also, as a woman, you begin to feel
comfortable acting in ways you eschewed because you considered them
to be "masculine." So, in the old days in the United States when sex
roles were more rigidly deliniated than now, a mid-life or later man
might freely delight in fussy over grandchildren and in being very
"motherly" toward them. Or he might delight in nursing his wife
through a bad cold. And an older woman might take delight in
building a business or being a tough bargainer.
Androgyny meant that you would be free to realize parts of yourself
you had previously suppressed.
It wasn't merely a matter of outward appearances.
>Androgynous persons are those that look like they have aspects of
both the
>male and female genders. They're inherently confusing to look upon.
That
>clearly does not apply to the Manifestation or at least to the
recent ones for
>whom we have historical records.
Clearly Manifestations are a Sacred Mystery and I don't know what we
can learn from them as far as this matter is concerned. I suspect we
will learn more about it as this thread unfolds.
Gender and sex are not the same thing. They
>are usually congruent but they don't have to be.
Also this idea of congruency or non-congruency is, I now suspect, a
misleading idea. I'm not yet sure what is a better way to think about
it.
Except in the exceptionally
>rare case of a true hermaphrodite, a person's sex is part of their
genetic
>fabric. It cannot be changed in humans even though surgery and
medicine can
>change some secondary sexual characteristics and the cosmetic
functionality of
>others.
The point I'm raising here is that sex, even sex definition, the hard
wired part, is not clearly either this or that. Even sex definition
has a fuzzy boundary in the physical world. It is interesting to some
and unfortunate for others that the human community is so intolerant
of these gray areas.
...snip...
>You said: To refer to Manifestationhood as a state of being,
co-existent with
>the spiritual reality of a human, well, that seems to be news.
>
>But I don't understand what you mean by that. Maybe I was fuzzy in
my
>language. I don't think I said that. I was taught that there are
three levels
>of creation. Two of them are contingent and one is not
.... Here, Hannah, is where I am raising this question about fuzzy
logic. But maybe I need to ask it to a broader audience.
If all the material and biological world, the Nasut, if you will show
fuzzy boundaries. If there are no sharp either/or boundaries in the
world we live in, if all boundaries are semi-permeable, why would we
assume that the levels of manifestationhood are any different?
It's a big question.
>I'm having tremendous difficulty trying to express my ideas. I can't
>comprehend how the Manifestation of God can represent only one
gender. It
>doesn't make any sense. What purpose would it serve? I give up. I'll
try again
>later. Someone help me here. Dr. Burl? Sandy? Anyone? Help! We must
stop
>mixing up linguistic conventions with deeper realities. This is
lower case and
>that is in caps so it means thus and so. The things I've been
reading the last
>few days!
>
>Hannah
>
>MAMBNT (middle-aged mutant Baha'i ninja turtle)
>============
>"'Where do you get your ideas?' has always been the question I'm
most
>confronted with . . . I'm afraid the answer is much more mundane: I
don't know
>where my ideas come from. I will admit, however, that one key
ingredient is
>caffeine." -- Gary Larson (FarSide)
>
>----------
>From: belove@sover.net
>Sent: Wednesday, 07 February, 1996 7:15 AM
>To: talisman@indiana.edu; QUANTA DAWNLIGHT; Hannah E. Reinstein
>Subject: RE: Male and female attributes
>
>
>On Wed, 7 Feb 96 07:43:07 UT Hannah E. Reinstein wrote:
>"Nonetheless, the Manifestation, as Mirror of the
>>Divine, has
>>no gender and therefore neither does the Holy Spirit, which is the
>delivery
>>medium of written revelation. Man and Woman do not mean the same
>things to
>>Baha'u'llah that they do to us."
>>
>
>
>This speaks to a sharp distinction between Manifestationhood and
>Humanity. Such a distinction seemed to be implied by Jesus Christ
>but seems to be blurred in popular representations.
>
>
>Can this be supported by Scripture? I mean the whole thing, that the
>Manifestation is separate from the Guy and that the Manifestation is
>without Gender.
>
>Also, big difference here between genderless and androgynous. Which
>do you mean?
>
>Philip
>
>
>
>-------------------------------------
>Name: Philip Belove
>E-mail: belove@sover.net
>Date: 02/07/96
>Time: 07:15:21
>
>This message was sent by Chameleon
>-------------------------------------
>Things should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler -- A.
>Einstein
>
>
-------------------------------------
Name: Philip Belove
E-mail: belove@sover.net
Date: 02/08/96
Time: 10:06:20
This message was sent by Chameleon
-------------------------------------
Things should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler -- A. Einstein
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 96 12:35:00 EWT
From: LWALBRID@cluster.ucs.indiana.edu
Subject: apology
To: talisman@indiana.edu
Dear friends,
John and I became engaged during Ayyam-i-ha in 1972. We were married 3 months
later, according to Baha'i law. After so many years of marriage I believe that
two people, while perhaps being extremely different in temperament and style,
are never quite separate individuals. Though John and I are opposites in so
many respects, still we are oddly a continuation of one another as well.
And so, I feel a need to write today regarding John's posting to Talisman in
which he, so very uncharacteristically made accusations against people and said
such inflammatory things that we both are left blushing with shame. He
mentioned certain people by name - people of whom he is extremely fond. These
individuals posted him privately with some concerns - a couple of others joined
into a conversation. These individuals were at a point where they were
terribly distressed by certain things. They were ventilating and in a way
which should have done no one any damage whatsoever.
Alas, John did not take their words in the proper spirit and, instead of being
a careful, patient listener, he shouted back. And then he made the fatal
mistake of posting to Talisman instead of to the individuals involved.
As I said last week, our beloved son was hospitalized on an emergency basis. I
have noticed a pattern with John that, during a crisis, he is fine. However, a
few days afterwards, he does something totally out of character - usually
losing his temper. I think this is what happened today. Our life was becoming
increasingly stressful before this occurrence, but John's illness took him over
the brink.
John is mortified by this outburst and told me that he is considering retiring
from Talisman. Perhaps this is not a bad idea. I know I should let John write
his own messages. However, I felt a need to say something myself. He is so
very upset by this incident that I felt I needed to intervene. Love, Linda
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 96 09:22 PST
To: Sadra
From: burlb@bmi.net (Burl Barer)
Subject: Re: Baha'i & the Perennial Philosophy
Cc: talisman@indiana.edu
Sadra asserts, aided by Shuon,
"Christianity universalizes the notion of "Israel" while
>interiorizing the Divine Law; it replaces circumcision of the flesh by
>that of the heart, the "Chosen People" by a Church that includes men
>every provenance, and outward prescriptions by inward virtues, all of
>this having in view, not obediance to the Law, but the Love of God and, in
the last analysis, mystical union. These principles or these
>transpositions could hardly have been unknown to the Essenes, and
>possibly other Jewish initiates, but the * originality of Christianity is
>that it made a religion of them and sacrificed them to Mosaic formalism.*
>(Frithjof Schuon, _Esoterism as Principle and Way_ Perennial Books
>(London: 1990), p. 37).
>
Christianity made a religion of them, but Jesus never did -- this is one
more example of the corruption of religion. This view, historicaly the
"second attack" -- the election of Israel has been transferred to the Church
-- directed against the synagogue was aimed at the Holy Scriptures
themselves; specifically against all the passages of the Torah which teach
the election of the nation of Israel. God states quite clearly : "Ye shall
be Mine own treasure among all peoples; for all earth is Mine; and ye shall
be unto Me a kingdom of priests and a Holy Nation" (exod. 19:5-6) To this
summons is joined a condition: "if ye will hearken unto My voice indeed, and
keep my covenant." The most immediate course for the polemic of the Church
was to demonstrate that this condition had been broken by the sins of
Israel. Israels expulsion from the Land of Promise, her dispersion and
wretched estate were clearly an expression of divine rejection. The apostle
Paul never tires of declaring God's wrath has come upon them at last. This
connection of the cruxifixtion of Jesus with the rejection of the Jews and
the transfer of Israel's election to the Christian Church as the legitimate
heir determined by God is stated as an item of dogma by all the Church
fathers and brought foreward in numerous disputations by Christian
theologians of the Middle Ages as a threatening argumentum ad hominum, and
held as a present day doctrine of the Church -- much to the perpetual dismay
of Jews who get real fed up such misrepresentation of Holy Scripture.
*The Christians do not have the right to interpret scripture contrary to the
sense of the words in order to "prove" the REJECTION of Israel, and in this
manner claim Election for the Church. What is revealed is revealed, and God
is a God of truth. It is written in the Torah: "And yet for all that, when
they are in the land of their enemies, I will not reject them, neither will
I abhor them, to destroy them utterly, and to break my Covenant with them;
for I am the Lord their God." (Lev. 26:44) That is the point: punishment,
yes -- but not rejection.* That suffering would come upon Israel was
predicted by the prophet Isaiah: "I have tried thee in the furnace of
affliction." The destruction of the Temple and the dispersion among the
gentiles have their point of origin in the election, and are encompassed
within the Divine Plan.
Were it true that the Church has become Israel, it would be the Christian
Church that returned to the Holy Land and you would have a Christian State
in Israel. It is "a monstrous farce: to pull the Old Testament out from
under the Jews with the contention that it contains nothing but Christian
doctrine."
*******************************************************
MAN OVERBOARD by Burl Barer may be ordered on-line from Book Stacks,
Unlimited or from your favorite book store!
ISBN#1-56901-815-4 $19.95 Suggested Retail Price
********************************************************
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 08:40:59 -0900
To: talisman@indiana.edu
From: asadighi@ptialaska.net (Arsalan J. Sadighi)
Subject: Dear Dr. Uncle Derek
Recently, someone on Talisman indicated that he had pushed some hot
"bottoms." What are these hot "bottoms?" Are these used in Sufi literature,
or any other mystic manuscript?
Regards,
Mystic wan'a'be
Arsalan J. Sadighi
"Nothing adds excitement to your life like something
that is clearly none of your business!" Battista
=END=
Subject: Re: Apology
To: jwalbrid@indiana.edu (jwalbrid)
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 12:48:48 -0500 (EST)
From: "Donald Zhang Osborn"
Cc: Talisman@indiana.edu
> I inadvertantly sent out a private flame out over Talisman. It was
> intended for a couple of individuals and was not very temperate anyway.
>
> It would be a much welcome sop to my injured dignity if you would all
> forget I ever wrote it, erase it from your systems, and think of me as I
> am when I am not feeling dispeptic.
>
> This plea for indulgence applies particularly to those I particularly
> offended.
>
> Yours awkwardly,
> john walbridge
John & all, Allah'u'Abha! If the "private flame" you refer to was the
Majnun... message, then I too must apologize for replying to it publicly
(unless perchance I misaddressed the cc to Talisman, which I do sometimes when
in a hurry). I only now saw your apology. Usually I'm more deliberate in
replying, but couldn't get past your posting without replying. Sorry for
adding to your injured dignity.
Yours even more humbly, Don Osborn
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 10:47:50 -0600 (CST)
Subject: Speech vs Behavior: The Heart of the People
From: "Richard C. Logan"
To: "Talisman"
Dear Talismanists,
Dear Talismanists,
I recently composed a response to Professor Cole's "power and
anti-liberalism" that was met with a great deal of misapprehension. It
seems that because I recommended another course of action (radiant
acquiescence), other than one conceived as traditional parliamentary
opposition, free speech, and freedom of the press I am not viewed as
being in favor of a serious solution, to the problems facing Baha'is, in
their communities, and in regard to their institutions. I would also
briefly state that in regard to human rights my position is: that at
this stage in man's development, I do favor, as a general rule, absent
the Baha'i Administrative Order those rights prescribed in the UN
Declaration of Human Rights. Rights as we perceive them NOW are defined,
for the most part, as "unrestrained". I favor a reformulation of rights
with a heavy emphasis on CIVILITY as opposed to the kind of "free for
all" that takes place in America. I believe, however, the debate will
evolve towards, responsibilities, further down the road, as humanity
recognizes that rights are not a panacea for humanities problems. If
they were, America would be a much better place to live, and its
government would be a great deal more effective.
IOW, I am for the progress we have made so far (Western Democracy), but
I envision something far grander at a later stage (The Most Great Peace),
that need not be predicated NECESSARILY on rights (as some insist) AS WE
UNDERSTAND THEM TODAY.
It is quite possible, and from my view quite probable that a change in
human behavior (the human heart) and peoples regard for human dignity,
personhood, and the concept of the "heart of the people" as opposed to
the "will of the people" must make the idea of rights much less of a
burning issue on this globe. It will take Baha'is who are serious enough
about Baha'u'llah's message (not their own desires) to take the steps
that He has outlined, internalize His teachings, AND BEGIN THE PROCESS OF
SPIRITUAL TRANSFORMATION. Unfortunately, most of those who have been
successful in achieving some momentum in this area leave their
communities and go elsewhere--usually outside this country. IMHO, the
best of us are sent to fight the spiritual battle on soil other than our
own. Another part of the problem seems to be that the Baha'is have done
so little to get their act together that people WHO DO NOT CLAIM to be
Baha'is are doing the vast majority of the good work, while the majority
of the Friends (myself included) lay about on their "couch of
heedlessness" caught in the grip of the laxity of discourse and other
forms of distraction. If anyone doubts what I'm saying let them look to
their own hearts and not to me for an explanation. This is something the
NSA doesn't tell us and perhaps should. But they have tender hearts also
and probably could not bear the look of hurt that would appear in the
eyes of the Friends!
It has been suggested to me that the failings of our NSA can be ascribed
to a lack of free input from the believers at large. That it is time
for open criticism because the NSA's policies have failed and it is time
to rethink their policies so progress can be made. Actually I believe,
as I said before, that it is related to an unspoken apathy that has
gripped the believers, not some strange ossification the has overtaken
the NSA. The believers are discouraged at the slow growth of the Faith
over the last 15 years but I don't believe that this can be laid at the
doorstep of the NSA. That is the easy answer. Let the leaders assume
the responsibility for the peoples failure. I AM NOT SAYING THAT OUR
LEADERS or rather our institutions should not share in the responsibility
of the apparently dismal progress the Faith has been making in America;
because they are the people too! But there are a lot more of us (Baha'is
at the local level) than NSA members. The Friends discouragement needs
an explanation, but the facts seem too cruel. I wonder when the
believers will start to shoulder the responsibilities of this Cause.
They seem to want rights, they want to clean out the "Tories", but say,
"don't ask me to serve on a committee, I've got too much to do as it is."
Just let me play the blame game. That will fix things right up.
I have just exercised my right to speech and I pray that I have not
indulged in an excess of it. Forgive these words from my heart if they
seem harsh because they are aimed, as much at me, as at anyone else.
I've done all, and more of than these wrongs--much more--so dear friends,
consider these words as coming from a prisoner--one locked in the dungeon
of self--saying do not do as I have done.
Richard
Richard C. Logan nineteen@onramp.net
Maintain HomePape "The Baha'is of Lubbock"
http://rampages.onramp.net/~nineteen/
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
How manifold are the truths which must remain unuttered until the
appointed time is come! Even as it has been said:
"Not everything that a man knoweth can be disclosed, nor can
everything that he can disclose be regarded as timely, nor can every
timely utterance be considered as suited to the capacity of those who
hear it." --Gleanings from the writings of Baha'u'llah
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 10:56:28 -0700 (MST)
From: Sadra
To: Talisman@indiana.edu
Cc: frlw@midway.uchicago.edu, Masumian@mail.utexas.edu,
Noorbakhsh.Monzavi@hibo.no
Subject: Reuters 2/7/96 (fwd)
> 'IRAN' STORIES
>Transmission date: 96/02/07
> 1. 15:48 IRANIAN ACCUSED OF KILLING FAMILY UNDER SUICIDE WATCH
> 2. 15:47 IRAN NUCLEAR POWER PLANS INCLUDE 80 PROJECTS-PAPER
> 3. 12:13 MORE THAN 5,300 SIGN UP TO RUN FOR IRAN PARLIAMENT
> 4. 09:38 IRAN ANNOUNCES AMNESTY ON ILLEGAL ARMS
>
>=START= XMT: 15:48 Wed Feb 07 EXP: 5 :00 Sat Feb 10
>
>
> Iranian accused of killing family under suicide watch
> LOS ANGELES, Feb 7 (Reuter) - An Iranian immigrant accused of killing his
>wife and six children in a fire he is alleged to have deliberately started in
>his flat was under a jail suicide watch on Wednesday, authorities said.
> Jorjik Avenasian, 40, who emigrated to the United States from Iran with his
>family last year, was expected to be arraigned in court on seven charges of
>murder on Thursday.
> Police say he set fire to the one-bedroom family flat in suburban Glendale
>early on Tuesday morning then fled the scene. He went first to his sister's
>house and then to the offices of a Persian-language daily newspaper, Asre
>Emrooz.
> According to that newspaper, Avenasian said he started the fire out of
>jealousy because he believed his wife, Suzana, was having an affair with
>another man. He said the fire was only meant to hurt his wife and he had not
>intended to kill anyone.
> Avenasian's children were between the ages of four and 17.
> According to television and newspaper reports, Avenasian tried to stab his
>wife to death when the family was still living in Iran three years ago and
>spent several months in jail for that offence.
> He was arrested last November for allegedly beating one of his children and
>was ordered to undergo counselling.
> REUTER
>
>=END=
>
>=START= XMT: 15:47 Wed Feb 07 EXP: 5 :00 Sat Feb 10
>
>
> Iran nuclear power plans include 80 projects-paper
> TEHRAN, Feb 7 (Reuter) - Iran is working on 80 projects in the field of
>nuclear power plants construction, a newspaper said on Wednesday.
> ``A total of 80 projects related to building and completing atomic power
>plants are under way to provide the country's electricity needs by using atomic
>energy,'' the daily Salam said.
> The newspaper, quoting the Iranian news agency IRNA, said the projects were
>in the fields of civil, mechanical and electrical engineering and had advanced
>17.86 percent in the first six months of the Iranian year that began on March
>21, 1995.
> It said the projects were towards the construction of a nuclear power
>station in Bushehr and an ``Esteqlal (Independence) atomic power plant.''
> But a spokesman of Iran's national Atomic Energy Organisation told Reuters:
>``There must be a mistake, we do not have any Esteqlal atomic power plant.''
> Iran has an $800 million contract with Russia to complete a nuclear power
>plant in its Gulf port city of Bushehr.
> Washington has opposed the Bushehr deal, saying Tehran might use the
>technology to develop nuclear weapons. Moscow has said the project was of a
>peaceful nature and in line with international law.
> Iran denies the U.S. charges and says its nuclear installations are
>regularly inspected by the International Atomic Energy Agency.
>
>=END=
>
>=START= XMT: 12:13 Wed Feb 07 EXP: 2 :00 Sat Feb 10
>
>
> More than 5,300 sign up to run for Iran parliament
> TEHRAN, Feb 7 (Reuter) - More than 5,300 candidates, including 305 women,
>are registered to run in elections in March for Iran's 270-seat parliament,
>local media said on Wednesday.
> The daily Akhbar said the clerical Guardian Council was screening the 5,359
>candidates and would rule on their qualifications by Saturday.
> A total of 782 of them have registered to run in the March 8 elections for
>30 seats in Tehran, while 45 people are contesting five seats designated for
>non-Moslems, it added.
> Tehran radio said 34.6 percent of the candidates were university graduates,
>including 5.6 percent with doctorate degrees, and five percent studied at
>theology schools.
> About 10 percent did not give their education and the remainder had primary
>or secondary schooling.
> Election officials have accused unnamed candidates of trying to buy votes
>with gifts of cash or carpets, by distributing food or through ``the effective
>support of certain ladies,'' and warned that such candidates would be barred,
>the daily Abrar said.
> Guardian Council spokesman Ayatollah Mohammad Emami Kashani said on Tuesday
>candidates would be screened for their belief in Islam, the Islamic form of
>government including the principle that it is headed by a supreme spiritual
>leader.
> Critics, ranging from nationalists and liberal Islamists to radical
>clerics, have warned that the conservative Council might use its power to
>disqualify candidates on political grounds.
> Conservatives who were earlier poised to maintain their majority in
>parliament are expected to be challenged by centrist candidates supporting the
>liberal economic reforms of President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani.
>
>=END=
>
>=START= XMT: 09:38 Wed Feb 07 EXP: 9 :00 Sat Feb 10
>
>
> Iran announces amnesty on illegal arms
> TEHRAN, Feb 7 (Reuter) - Iran has announced an amnesty for people convicted
>on illegal weapons charges and granted a grace period for others to turn in
>arms, Tehran radio said on Wednesday.
> Iran's Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei approved the order, which
>covers those charged with weapons possession or arms smuggling and gives others
>six months to hand over unlicensed weapons to authorities, the radio said.
> It said the amnesty was granted to mark the anniversary of Iran's 1979
>Islamic revolution. It did not say how many people it covered. The order
>followed a previous amnesty in 1983.
> Large amounts of arms and ammunition fell into civilian hands in the
>revolution and during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war.
> Several Iranian tribal populations and other ethnic groups, such as the
>Kurds and the Baluchis, have traditionally been armed and occasional clashes
>are reported between government forces and armed rebels or drug smugglers.
> In one such clash on Tuesday, police seized 3,264 kg (7,180 lb) of opium, a
>rocket launcher and three rockets from smugglers in the southeastern
>Sistan-Baluchestan province which borders on Afghanistan and Pakistan, the
>Iranian news agency IRNA said.
> A security official in the province said last month that 300 ``bandits''
>had surrendered to authorities since last March.
> REUTER
>
>=END=
>
>
>
=END=
Date: Thu, 08 Feb 96 12:13:01 -0500
From: "Ahang Rabbani"
To: talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: transliteration fonds
[This message is converted from WPS-PLUS to ASCII]
My apologies to take bandwidth with this question, but do any of
the esteemed members have information on transliteration fonts
for WordPerfect (for Windows)? I have no problem with slanted
accent over "a", "i" and "u", but need help with (1) the dot
under as in "h.", "H.", "S.", "Z.", etc., and (2) line under as
in "_sh_", "_ch_", etc.
If anyone is in touch with Baha'i-tech (is that the right name?)
could you forward this note to them as well?
With many thanks in advance, ahang.
rabbana@bmoa.dnet.dupont.com
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 14:21:42 -0500 (EST)
From: Jonah Winters
To: Ahang Rabbani
Cc: talisman
Subject: transliteration fonts
Dear Ahang et al. Ahang asked "Do any of the esteemed members have
information on transliteration fonts for WordPerfect (for Windows)?"
May I draw your attention to the academic transliteration font called *New
World Transliterator* developed by our own Chris Buck. I only use this on
Mac, but I assume (?) that Chris has a PC-compatible version, as well.
If you want more info on this, you could check out a review of it by Kevin
Reinhart in the Dec. 1993 MESA Bulletin.
Last I heard, NWT was selling for $50 US. And hey, the more you buy, the
better supported Chris will be in finishing his dissertation and the
sooner he can join us again on Talisman!
-Jonah
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Jonah and Kari Winters
33 Endean Avenue / Toronto, Ontario / M4M-1W5 / (416) 461-3527
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 96 23:13:55+030
To: talisman@indiana.edu
From: dpeden@imul.com (Don Peden)
Subject: fiminine/masculine
Androgyny meant that you would be free to realize parts of yourself
you had previously suppressed.
It wasn't merely a matter of outward appearances.
>Androgynous persons are those that look like they have aspects of
both the
>male and female genders. They're inherently confusing to look upon.
That
>clearly does not apply to the Manifestation or at least to the
recent ones for
>whom we have historical records.
Gee, guys, I always thought that was called menopause!
Love,
Bev.
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 96 23:14:30+030
To: talisman@indiana.edu
From: dpeden@imul.com (Don Peden)
Subject: hot bottoms
Recently, someone on Talisman indicated that he had pushed some hot
"bottoms." What are these hot "bottoms?" Are these used in Sufi literature,
or any other mystic manuscript?
Regards,
Mystic wan'a'be
Arsalan J. Sadighi
"Nothing adds excitement to your life like something
that is clearly none of your business!" Battista
Only in erotic passages where there is a great deal of emotion being expressed.
=END=
From: "K. Paul Johnson"
Subject: Compassion vs. Purity
To: talisman@indiana.edu
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 96 16:21:33 EST
Having finished Marcus Borg's book last night, I'm reflecting
on its implications about Cayce, the Theosophists, and the
Baha'is. Of all the characterizations of Jesus which draw
scholarly consensus, none is more widely agreed upon than this:
Jesus explicitly and subversively challenged the prevailing
purity ethos of his culture with a compassion ethos. Incident
after incident, story after story attests to this. The purity
or holiness way of imitatio dei is "be ye therefore holy as God
is holy." In Jesus's time and place, this meant observing
ritual purity regulations about food, sex, associations, etc.
Women, gentiles, lepers, tax-collectors, etc. etc. were
impure. When Jesus said "be ye *compassionate* (a better
translation than merciful, which implies looking down on
someone) even as God is compassionate," he was taking a familar
formula and turning it upside down. Etymologically, compassion
derives from "womb" and this "be womblike even as God is..."
Also, the term Jesus used for God wasn't just "Father" but
quite intimate and informal and more like "daddy" or "papa"--
which shocking in cultural context of respect for YHWH.
I won't go into all the illustrations of this theme, but for
example, "it's not what you put in your mouth than can defile
you, but what comes out" and "was the sabbath made for man..."
and hanging out with women, and touching lepers, and having
large meals with all manner of people--- every day in every
way, Jesus was saying "I reject your whole culture of purity
and taboos."
The title is really appropriate: Meeting Jesus Again for the
First Time. This is a Jesus I really like better than Baha, or
Buddha, or you name it... and Borg brought his distinctive
liberationist ethos home to me. The Good Samaritan story is
one of the strongest. Since the man in the ditch might have
been dead, and to touch him would make the Pharisee impure,
this was a reason that it took a Samaritan to come help him.
Cayce comes out smelling like a rose, in terms of catching on
to the basic truth about who Jesus really was as evaluated by
contemporary scholars. Contemporary Theosophists, alas, have a
purity culture rather than a compassion culture. The secret
inner sanctum group enforces vegetarianism, teelotaling,
nonsmoking, etc. on premises of all Theosophical properties--
even though the Society per se has no such regulations--
because the Esoteric Section does, and they would be
contaminated if other people ate meat or smoked or drank around
them. More importantly, Theosophists are obsessed with
doctrinal purity, what's Theosophy and what isn't, etc. much
more so than with feeling "womblike" toward non-Theosophists.
Baha'is, however, IMO come off even worse based on this
measurement. The letter from the House about gays, for
example, reeks of purity ethos and lacks anything more than a
perfunctory nod toward compassion. Baha'i culture is
purity-obsessed in the extreme, from women's prayers being
related to their monthly cycle, to women contaminating the
House and therefore not being allowed on it (deny it till
you're blue in the face-- that's the root problem), to
grotesque anxiety about "spiritual contagion" by covenant
breakers. Except for some nice comments re compassion from Baha'u'llah and
plenty of respite from `Abdu'l Baha, the purity-obsession of
Baha'i culture starts with the Bab wanting to burn all the
non-Babi books and continues down to the House's proud
intransigence about gays and women.
Therefore, it is difficult in the extreme, in light of Borg's
interpretation of Jesus-- which is that of a scholarly
consensus-- to imagine him coming back to reinstate the very
thing that he devoted his entire life to attacking and
undermining.
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 17:07:27 -0500 (EST)
From: Juan R Cole
To: "K. Paul Johnson"
Cc: talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: Re: Compassion vs. Purity
Aw, c'mon Paul. You can fault Baha'is if you like for a "purity"
complex, but you cannot fault Baha'u'llah.
Shi`ite Islam is pervaded by concerns for ritual purity (najasat). I've
annoyed ulama by shaking their hands, which meant they had to then go do
purifying ablutions. A lot of Iranian Baha'is can tell you horror
stories about being treated as the objects of fear of ritual pollution in
Iran.
One of the major points of the Ridvan Declaration was Baha'u'llah's
abolition of the concept of ritual impurity. Everything is now pure from
his point of view, and this is explicit in the Aqdas.
At no point does he indicate that women's exemption from some ritual
duties during menstruation has anything to do with ritual impurity.
Those with bad PMS are after tired and in discomfort. Likewise,
Baha'u'llah urged non-association with Azalis, not because they were
ritually impure, but explicitly in order to avoid conflict and contention.
If your point is that Baha'is have not absorbed this teaching of
Baha'u'llah, that is possible. However, Baha'u'llah every bit as much as
Jesus put compassion first and denied the saliency of ritual pollution.
cheers Juan Cole, History, Univ. of Michigan
=END=
From: SFotos@eworld.com
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 14:05:36 -0800
To: talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: Dire warning for Dr. Burl
Hey there Dr. Burl,
You are in deep trouble!
When my daughter Helen heard your comments about her on Talisman she was not
pleased that such misinformation was posted on a Baha'i discussion list and
asked me to set things straight (and mentioned something about Dr. Burl
getting a life).
Helen has been a vegan for the past two years. FYI, a vegan takes no drugs,
eats no animal products, doesn't even wear leather or drink coffee or tea,
and certainly doesn't smoke. As she says, "tell him that there's no such
thing as a vegan cigarette."
Helen is working for the Sierra Club and attending Central Community
college. She is not in any sort of trouble and is doing very well. Any
remarks made to the contrary on this list are the result of Dr. Burl's deep
confusion...
As a mom, I'm proud of her and the way she is taking charge of her life.
Sandy Fotos
>
>Any further questions, ask Sandy Fotos who is getting on a plane to
>track down her sweet little Helen, a recent Maxwell Graduate, who
> was last seenwith a Lucky Strike dangling from her lips, having the >Last
Supper tattood on her forehead.
=END=
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 1996 17:00:30 -0500 (EST)
From: Juan R Cole
To: talisman@indiana.edu
Subject: Jesus and Baha'u'llah, pt. 2
"Behold the Man" by Juan R.I. Cole, pt. 2
Jesus' Arrest and Trial
The seventh-century Meccans boycotted the Prophet
Muhammad and his followers, then attempted but failed to have him
assassinated, and finally fought a series of battles with him, which they
lost. He thus avoided ever having been arrested or tried by them. The
Bab, on the other hand, as we have seen, was both imprisoned and
tried. Baha'u'llah suffered imprisonment twice, in Tehran in 1852, and
in Acre in 1868-70, as well as being exiled and often kept under virtual
house arrest during much of his life, though he never received a proper
trial. The story of Jesus' arrest and trial therefore had many
resonances with the lives of the Bab and Baha'u'llah.
In one of his meditations Baha'u'llah says his eyes were
"cheered" by the tribulations God had decreed for him, and he recalls
the scene of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, after the last supper
and shortly before his arrest by the High Priest, paraphrasing Mk.
14:36: "He Who was Thy Spirit (Jesus), O my God, withdrew all alone
in the darkness of the night preceding His last day on earth, and falling
on His face to the ground besought Thee saying, `If it be Thy will, O
my Lord, my Well-Beloved, let this cup, through thy grace and
bounty, pass from Me.' By Thy bounty, O Thou Who art the Lord of
all names and the Creator of the heavens! I can smell the fragrance of
the words which, in His love for Thee, His lips uttered . . ."
(Baha'u'llah 1971b:192-193; 1981:130-131). Here, Baha'u'llah sees in
Jesus' simultaneous plea for relief and expression of resignation to the
will of God an archetypal spiritual attitude, which he himself shared.
Jesus' arrest and trial is a scene to which Baha'u'llah repeatedly
adverts in his writings. It may be that it reminded him of the Bab's
own trial in Tabriz, when the young heir apparent Nasiru'd-Din Mirza
presided and the Shi`ite clergy asked the Bab questions about his
claims to be the Mahdi and then declared him devoid of religion (that
is, an infidel). In that trial, the mujtahids or Muslim jurisprudents
represented the hierocracy, whereas the heir apparent personified
secular power, and it was the clergy who issued the legal opinion
(fatwa) that allowed the Bab's blood to be shed, while the government
of Nasiru'd-Din carried it out two years after his succession to the
throne (Amanat:385-400).
The Gospel accounts differ on the details of Jesus' arrest and
trial. The Synoptics tend to depict a convocation of the Sanhedrin, or
council of rabbis, but it has been pointed out that there are several
difficulties with this scenario. The Sanhedrin would not have met at
night (as in Mark and Matthew, which have it meet yet again after
daybreak), and would not have met on Passover, and certainly not at
night on Passover. In addition, that body lacked authority to try
capital crimes, since Jerusalem was directly ruled by the Romans at
that point. The Sanhedrin trial scene, it has been argued, must be seen
more as early Christian theology (Jesus was condemned for religious
rather than political reasons) than as history. The more likely account
is that of John (18:3-28), who has Jesus taken from the garden of
Gethsemane by a mixed group of Jewish "officers" and Roman soldiers
to the house of Annas (a Jerusalem notable and the father-in-law of the
Jewish High Priest Caiaphas). After his triumphal entry into
Jerusalem, Annas and Caiaphas appear to have been distressed over
the possibility that Jesus was a rebel or bandit who might be planning
to lead a zealot-style revolt against the Romans. His answers did not
assuage their fears, so he was taken first to the house of Caiaphas and
then delivered to Pilate so that Roman justice might be imposed on
him, since he had done nothing for which he could be sanctioned by
the Sanhedrin (Fredriksen:116-120).
In the Book of Certitude, Baha'u'llah draws on the Synoptic
accounts of the trial, emphasizing the manner in which Jesus retained
his sense of divine authority as the Son of Man even in the midst of his
humiliating questioning: "Similarly, call thou to mind the day when the
Jews, who had surrounded Jesus, Son of Mary, were pressing Him to
confess His claim of being the Messiah and Prophet of God, so that
they might declare Him an infidel and sentence Him to death. Then,
they led Him away, He Who was the Day-star of the heaven of divine
Revelation, unto Pilate and Caiaphas, who was the leading divine
(a`zam-i `ulama) of that age. The chief priests were all assembled in
the palace, also a multitude of people who had gathered to witness His
sufferings, to deride and injure Him" (Baha'u'llah 1970:132-133;
1980a:102-103). When pressed to say who he is before the High
Priest Caiaphas, Baha'u'llah observes, Jesus replied: "Beholdest thou
not the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of power and might?" (a
paraphrase of Mk. 14:61). Baha'u'llah is struck by Christ's bold
declaration of power at a time when he was to all appearances
completely vulnerable (Baha'u'llah 1970:133; 1980a:103). The
Synoptic image of the faithless crowd at the public trial of Jesus
appears elsewhere, as well. When, in 1879, the leading Muslim
jurisprudents of Isfahan condemned to death for their faith two
prominent Baha'is, Muhammad-Hasan and Muhammad-Husayn Nahri,
Baha'u'llah wrote a powerful denunciation of this act. He asked
Shaykh Muhammad Baqir, whom he branded "the Wolf," "Art thou
happy to see the abject and worthless as thy followers? They support
thee as did a people before them, they that followed Annas, who,
without clear proof and testimony, pronounced judgment against the
Spirit" (1988:210; 1980b:129).
In other passages, Baha'u'llah appears to draw more on John's
depiction of the High Priest and his father-in-law interrogating Jesus in
the latter's home. Baha'u'llah recalls the opposition met by Messengers
of God such as Muhammad and Jesus, writing, "Consider the
Dispensation of Jesus Christ. Behold, how all the learned men
(`ulama') of that generation, though eagerly anticipating the coming of
the Promised One, have nevertheless denied Him. Both Annas, the
most learned among the divines (`ulama') of His day, and Caiaphas, the
high priest (aqda al-qudat), denounced Him and pronounced the
sentence of His death" (1976:83; 1988:237). In the original it is clear
that Baha'u'llah powerfully identifies Jesus' persecutors with the
Muslim clergy of his own day, calling the rabbis "ulema" (the word for
Muslim learned men of religion) and making Caiaphas a "qadi" or
Muslim court judge.
In his Most Holy Tablet, written for the Christian community,
Baha'u'llah recalls this theme again: "call thou to mind the one who
sentenced Jesus to death. He was the most learned of his age in his
own country, whilst he who was only a fisherman believed in Him"
(Baha'u'llah 1988:10; 1980b:4; Sours 1990). There appears to be a
shift of emphasis in Baha'u'llah's imagery relating to the trial, from a
depiction in the Babi-period Book of Certitude of a large gathering of
Jewish rabbis in the Sanhedrin who condemned Jesus (after the
Synoptic Gospels), toward a focus in the Baha'i period in Acre on
Caiaphas and Annas as the chief villains of the piece (the Johannine
version). This shift may reflect the changing relationship of Baha'u'llah
to the Shi`ite clerics. In the early 1860s the Babi community of which
he formed a part had been violently and massively suppressed by the
joint action of the Shi`ite clergy and the state, partially in response to
the perceived militancy of the Babis. In forming the new Baha'i
religion from 1863, however, Baha'u'llah imbued it with a peaceful
ethos, and while Baha'is continued to be persecuted there was nothing
like the clashes that occurred in the Babi period. In some communities
it appears that Shi`ite clergymen were either sympathetic to the ideals
of the Baha'is or at least willing to look the other way. Still, powerful
clerics such as Shaykh Muhammad Baqir and his son Shaykh
Muhammad Taqi Najafi in Isfahan persecuted Baha'is on several
occasions, scapegoating them relentlessly. The Johannine account of
Jesus' trial, which placed blame for his condemnation primarily on the
Chief Priest and his family rather than on the entire Sanhedrin, could
be evoked to signal the wickedness of a few top clerics rather than
attacking the general run of Shi`ite learned men. In addition,
Baha'u'llah appears not to mention Pilate after the early 1860s, placing
most of the blame on the High Priest, and this emphasis may reflect his
desire to effect a rapprochement between the Baha'i community and
the Qajar state in Iran. In any case, the narrative of the arrest and trial
of Jesus certainly helped legitimate the incarcerations and examinations
suffered by the Bab and Baha'u'llah.
Jesus' Crucifixion
Because Baha'u'llah endorses the New Testament text as
authentic, he accepts the reality of the crucifixion, unlike most Muslim
thinkers. The general Muslim unwillingness to admit that Jesus was
crucified before bodily ascending into heaven is rooted in Qur'an
4:155-158, which castigates the Jews for "slaying the Prophets without
right" and for their saying, "`We slew the Messiah, Jesus son of Mary,
the Messenger of God'--yet they did not slay him, neither crucified
him, only a likeness of that was shown to them." Much controversy
has swirled about this difficult and ambiguous passage through the
centuries. Some have alleged that the phrase shubbiha la-hum, "a
likeness was shown to them," shows that the Qur'an accepted the
doctrine of the Gnostics that someone other than Jesus mounted the
cross in his stead, or that it accorded with the Docetists, Christian
heretics who denied that Jesus had a physical body. Medieval Muslim
commentators developed a Borges-like "substitutionist" theory, saying
that someone else was mistakenly arrested and crucified in Jesus'
stead; some suggested that it was Judas Iscariot himself. As B. Todd
Lawson has underlined, the medieval exegete and theologian Fakhru'd-
Din ar-Razi rejected the substitutionist theory as intrinsically unjust
and unworthy of God (Lawson 1991; cf. Ayoub 1980).
Docetism in the Qur'an is unlikely. The Qur'an is nothing if not
realistic about physical reality, and it at one point criticizes local
Arabian Christian sectaries (Docetists or Gnostics?) for denying that
Jesus and Mary ate food (5:75). It also affirms that Jesus was mortal
and died (19:33). A less literal interpretation of shubbiha la-hum
would be "it was made to appear to them [the Jews] thus." Several
plausible interpretations have been advanced along these lines. It
might mean that God hardened their hearts by allowing them to think
they had succeeded in having Jesus killed, when in fact his spirit is
immortal. After all, the Qur'an forbids Muslims to say of the martyrs
that they are dead: "Nay, they are living, only you are not aware"
(2:154). This interpretation would fit with a later phrase in the
passage, "and they slew him not of a certainty--no indeed; God raised
him up to Him." Or it might mean that they were not the actual agents
in his death, rather the Romans were, and some Medinan Jews and
their predecessors were under an illusion when they took credit for and
boasted of this accomplishment (Parrinder 105-121; Robinson:106-
141; Lawson 1991).
Some Muslims adhered to a minority view that accepted the
reality of the crucifixion and passion. This was true of the tenth-
century Isma`ili Shi`ite group, the Brethren of Purity, authors of the
influential Epistles (Rasa'il). They argued that only Jesus' human
nature (nasut) was crucified, and mentioned biblical details such as
Jesus being offered vinegar on the cross. Sufi mystics also often
suggested that it was only Jesus' human form that was crucified,
whereas his aspect as Spirit was received by God into heaven, and that
the Qur'an meant only to deny the death of the Spirit (Robinson:56-57,
184; Jandi:495-512)). In a less analytical vein, Persian poets
sometimes referred to Jesus and his cross, appearing to accept the
symbolism of the passion in their imagery (Ariyan).
In the Surah of Blood (Surat ad-Dam), written in Edirne
around 1866, Baha'u'llah represents the eternal Logos that was
manifest in each of the Manifestations of God as lamenting its
treatment through the millennia. It speaks of Pharaoh's persecution of
Moses as well as the Imam Husayn's death and decapitation at the
hands of the forces of Yazid the Umayyad. This Logos figure, as
Jesus, apostrophizes God, saying, "Thou didst lift Me up upon the
cross (arfa`tani ila as-salib)," an acknowledgment that God's will
permitted the crucifixion (Baha'u'llah 1976:89; 1892-1978, 4:9). In
the Book of Certitude, Baha'u'llah clearly speaks of Jesus having been
"persecuted and killed" (idha' va qatl) by his opponents (1980a:103).
Baha'u'llah affirms not simply the fact of Jesus on the cross, but
agrees with Paul in seeing the passion as redemptive. In one passage,
he discerns a similarity among the stories of sacrifice of Abraham,
Jesus and the Imam Husayn. God's command to Abraham to sacrifice
his first-born had as its purpose "to sacrifice him as a ransom [fida'i]
for the sins and iniquities [`isyan va khataha] of all the peoples of the
earth" (Baha'u'llah 1976:76; Ishraq-Khavari 1971-73, 7:77; cf. Cole
1993). He says that because of its treatment of the Prophets of God
and His chosen ones all humankind deserves to perish (halakat), but
that God's invisible and loving grace (altaf) has protected it from
retribution. The persecution of the prophets is thus both an occasion
of collective sin and an occasion of grace, since the sacrificed holy
figure ransoms humans from the bondage of their sins. "This same
honor [maqam], Jesus, the Son of Mary, besought the one true God . .
. to confer upon Him" (ibid.). Since Shi`ite Islam possessed an
elaborate theology of redemptive sacrifice centered on the martyrdom
of the Imam Husayn, it was easy enough for Baha'u'llah to meld that
tradition with the New Testament preaching about Christ crucified.
On the other hand, neither Islam nor the Baha'i faith accepts the idea
of original sin, so that humankind is here redeemed, not from Adam's
lapse, but from the historical guilt of having tortured and killed the
Messengers of God. Another cause for which Jesus is said to sacrifice
himself is the coming of the Day of God, that is, the world-historical
turning-point represented by Baha'u'llah's own advent. In the Surat as-
Sultan written in the early Acre period for the Baha'is of Sultanabad,
Baha'u'llah depicts Jesus upon the cross, confusedly noticing blood
upon his tunic and being questioned and taunted. The dove of holiness
then informs him of what will befall Baha'u'llah (al-ghulam) when he
arises in the station of Christ's return, and it is at that point that Jesus
cries out and departs from this world, ascending to the presence of
God (Baha'u'llah in Ishraq-Khavari 1967:193-194).
In a letter to a Christian clergyman of Istanbul, perhaps a
member of the Eastern Orthodox church, Baha'u'llah connects the
crucifixion with sacrifice and with human advancement. He writes,
"Know thou that when the Son . . . [al-Ibn] yielded up His breath to
God [sallama ar-ruh], the whole creation wept with a great weeping.
By sacrificing Himself, however, a fresh capacity was infused into all
created things. Its evidences, as witnessed in all the peoples of the
earth, are now manifest before thee. The deepest wisdom which the
sages have uttered, the profoundest learning which any mind hath
unfolded, the arts which the ablest hands have produced, the influence
exerted by the most potent of rulers, are but manifestations of the
quickening power released by His transcendent, His all-pervasive, and
resplendent Spirit" (Baha'u'llah 1976:85-86; 1892:93). Jesus' passion
is here identified as the motive force behind Christian civilization, the
unseen source of human advance. On the one hand, this passage
evokes something like the Eastern Orthodox image of Jesus as the
Cosmic Christ, as Pantocrator, the Ruler of All (Pelikan:57-70). On
the other, Baha'u'llah as a nineteenth-century thinker innovates in
linking the redemption gained by the cross to ideas such as civilization,
progress, and the arts and sciences. Christ not only saved individual
souls, but engendered by his teachings and self-sacrifice an entire
civilization.
Why does Baha'u'llah accept the crucifixion? Christian feelings
about and images of the crucifixion come closer to the religious
sensibilities of Shi`ites than they do to those of most Sunnis. But even
most Shi`ites, despite their passion plays for Imam Husayn, rejected
the idea that Christ died on the cross. A more relevant event might be
the execution of the Bab. Most Muslims thought the paradigmatic
prophet was Muhammad, a successful Prophet-Statesman who died of
old age in the capital of the incipient state that he created, and this
image may have made it difficult for them to concede that Jesus could
be summarily killed. Babis, on the other hand, knew very well that a
Manifestation of God could be so cruelly treated, since they daily lived
with the outrage at Tabriz. Indeed, the passion of Christ helped jusfify
the passion of the Bab.
I have found only one reference in Baha'u'llah's writings to the
resurrection of Christ. In a poetic passage, Baha'u'llah depicts himself
as having adorned the cross in his previous manifestation as Christ,
saying that he has now risen from the dead (Ishraq-Khavari 1982:148).
In short, he assimilates the resurrection to the second coming. In
accord with his symbolic approach to the miracle stories in the
Gospels, he apparently understood the resurrection narratives in
Matthew and Luke as a spiritual event in the lives of the disciples
rather than as a physical reality. This is certainly the interpretation of
his son and successor, `Abdu'l-Baha, who may well have received it
from his father (1981:103-105; 1983:76-78). Baha'u'llah does refer to
Christ's ascension into heaven, but seems to use it as a symbolic
manner of talking about his death upon the cross. In the Book of
Certitude, he says of the authorities' actions toward Jesus: "They at
last heaped on His blessed Person such woes that He took His flight
unto the fourth heaven" (Baha'u'llah 1970:133; 1980a:103). In Islamic
lore, Jesus was supposed to inhabit the fourth (sometimes the third) of
the seven heavens until his return at the end of time (Robinson:94). In
the Surah of Sultan Baha'u'llah depicts Jesus upon the cross as
severing himself from this world and "ascending" into the divine
presence (Ishraq-Khavari 1967:193-194).
The difference between the major Muslim treatments of Jesus'
arrest, trial, crucifixion and death and Baha'u'llah's could not be more
stark. Baha'u'llah's Jesus equivocates in Gethsemene, boldly replies to
Annas and Caiaphas, is delivered to Pilate, and is crucified to the death
on Easter Friday. His weary soul is raised up to God from the cross.
Few Muslim accounts indeed go so far or accord so intimately with
aspects of New Testament texts. Like modern Christian liberals,
Baha'u'llah sees the Resurrection not as a bodily but as a spiritual
event, an existential realization in the disciples.
Paraclete and Parousia
The New Testament writers, and most Christians ever since,
did not think the drama of Jesus ended with the ascension to his
Father. He was expected to return. The return (Gr. parousia) of
Christ is probably the Gospel theme to which Baha'u'llah himself most
frequently adverts. Since Baha'u'llah's idea of time is the gyre, the
spiral combining recurrent cycles and upward progression, Jesus' life is
unique from one point of view but subject to the Eternal Return from
another. There is a sense, he argues, in which the advent of each
subsequent Manifestation of God (Muhammad and the Bab) represents
a "return" of Christ. Of Muhammad, he says: "in the Dispensation of
the Qur'an both the Book and the Cause of Jesus were confirmed. As
to the matter of names, Muhammad, Himself, declared: `I am Jesus.'
He recognized the truth of the signs, prophecies, and words of Jesus,
and testified that they were all of God. In this sense, neither the
person of Jesus nor His writings hath differed from that of Muhammad
and of His holy Book, inasmuch as both have championed the Cause
of God, uttered His praise, and revealed His commandments. Thus it
is that Jesus, Himself, declared: `I go away and come again unto you.'
[John 14:28]. Consider the sun. Were it to say now, `I am the sun of
yesterday,' it would speak the truth" (Baha'u'llah 1970:20; cf. Buck;
Lawson 1987:342-343). In his Gems of the Mysteries, Baha'u'llah
quotes John 16:5-7 about the Counsellor or Comforter (Gr. paraclete)
who, Jesus promised his disciples, would come once he himself had
departed (Baha'u'llah 1890-1978, 3:11-12; cf. Lambden forthcoming).
These verses were very popular among Muslim apologists, who saw in
them a prediction of Muhammad's coming. On the one hand,
Baha'u'llah confirmed that Jesus gave them glad-tidings of a prophet
who would come after him, appearing to confirm that Muhammad was
the paraclete. On the other hand, in Baha'u'llah's cyclical schema of
the Eternal Return, the Counsellor would come again and again, first
as Muhammad, then as the Bab. This figure becomes another way of
referring to the spiritual return of Christ (Ishraq-Khavari 1971-73,
4:65; Lambden 1983:45-47; Buck). In the Book of Certitude,
Baha'u'llah presents a long excursus on the minor apocalypse from Mt.
24:29-31, which enumerates the signs that will accompany his
eschatological return, showing the symbolic ways in which the Bab's
advent had fulfilled them (Baha'u'llah 1970:20-93; see Buck).
Many Muslims expected that after the advent of the Mahdi (a
descendant of the Prophet who was expected to arise at the end of
time to fill the world with justice after it had been filled with tyranny),
Jesus would return shortly before the Resurrection Day. Muslim lore
even contains numerous miraculous acts and adventures that the
returned
