Idol Chatter

Here be Bahá’u'lláh’s most commonly cited verses from the Sura of the Cow, his favorite chapter of the Qur’án.

Although they had before prayed for victory over those who believed not, yet when there came unto them He of Whom they had knowledge, they disbelieved in Him. The curse of God on the infidels! (2.89; Book of Certitude; Gems of Divine Mysteries)

Yea, damn those unbelievers! Even though they were educated, they didn’t become believers! How could that ever happen?

Wish ye then for death, if ye be men of truth. (2.94; Book of Certitude; Sura of the Temple)

Perhaps men should not fear death, but to wish for death is simply self-destructive. It is not heroic; it is suicidal.

Whichever way ye turn, there is the face of God. (2.109/115; Book of Certitude; Questions and Answers)

This is my hands-down favorite verse in the Qur’án, but I don’t believe that Bahá’u'lláh interpreted it as I do.

We did not appoint that which Thou wouldst have to be the Qiblih, but that We might know him who followeth the Apostle from him who turneth on his heels. (2.143; Book of Certitude; Tabernacle of Unity)

God helps those who blindly follow.

Verily we are God’s, and to Him shall we return. (2.151/156 Rodwell; The Seven Valleys; The Four Valleys; Gems of Divine Mysteries [twice]; Tabernacle of Unity)

I don’t mind this one, really, in a Heraclitean or Stoic, ekpyrotic sense.

What can such expect but that God should come down to them overshadowed with clouds? (2.210; Book of Certitude [2x])

Be they clouds of ignorance, cognitive dissonance, and idolatry? Yea, ’tis to be expected.

Fear God and God will give you knowledge. (2.282; Book of Certitude; The Seven Valleys; The Four Valleys; Gems of Divine Mysteries)

I have found that experience and reason have failed to support this assertion.

Some of the Apostles We have caused to excel the others. (2.253; Book of Certitude [2x]; Tabernacle of Unity)

And why should I care? Is this a spiritual education, medieval angelology, or fantasy league baseball?

No distinction do We make between any of His Messengers. (2.285; Book of Certitude; Tabernacle of Unity)

Again, what business is this of mine?

It’s official! Here are the top ten suras in the Qur’án, according to Bahá’u'lláh:

The following list was compiled by calculating the ratio of citations to each sura in Bahá’u'lláh’s writings (AFAIK) to the number of verses in that sura, giving some slight weighting to the absolute number of citations. A verse used by Bahá’u'lláh is selected for each sura, with preference given to verses according to the number of times each was cited.

1. The Cow (2): 42/286

   Verily we are God’s, and to Him shall we return.

2. The Kneeling (45): 5/37

   And when he becometh acquainted with any of Our verses he turneth them to ridicule. There is a shameful punishment for them!

3. The Spider (29): 9/69

   Whoso maketh efforts for Us, in Our ways shall We assuredly guide him.

4. Abraham (14): 6/52

   We had sent Moses with Our signs, saying unto him: ‘Bring forth thy people from darkness into light and remind them of the days of God.’

5. Cattle (6): 18/165

   SAY: “It is God:” then leave them to their pastime of cavillings.

6. KAF (50): 5/45

   On that day will We cry to Hell, “art thou full?”, and it shall say, “are there more?”

7. The Merciful (55): 7/78

   Verily, His ways differ every day.

8. The Emigration (59): 4/24

   And be ye not like those who forget God, and whom He hath therefore caused to forget their own selves. These are the wicked doers.

9. Iron (57): 4/29

   He is the first and the last; the seen and the hidden; and He knoweth all things!

10. Man (76): 4/31

    Verily the righteous shall drink of a winecup tempered at the camphor fountain.

Honorable mention: The Made Plain (41) 5/54, The Family of Imran (3) 17/200, & Houd (11) 10/123.

Religion is often juxtaposed against conscience. There is a good reason for this: religion is truth that descends upon man, whereas conscience is truth that emerges from within man.

That said, it should not be maintained that moral intuition is intrinsically antagonistic to faith. The Zoroastrian religion uses conscience synonymously with religion—and quite literally: the Avestan word for religion, “Daena” (akin to the Persian-Arabic “Din”), is also the Avestan word for conscience.

“Conscience” has two related meanings. First, it is a moral intuition (literally, a “knowing”). Secondly, it is a sense of shame. In religious circles, the latter usage is often employed, inasmuch as moral intuition is often rejected. Zoroastrianism appears to use the concept in both senses.

In Christianity, there is of course plenty of shame, but though men are seen as flawed, conscience is treated more as a moral intuition than a capacity for shame:

When the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another … —Epistle of Paul to the Romans

And again:

Love worketh no ill to his neighbor: love therefore is the fulfilment of the law. —Epistle of Paul to the Romans

From such sayings of Paul, “examination of conscience” has become orthodox Catholic practice. It does not presume a state of guilt, but rather presumes a capacity to distinguish right from wrong:

Directly, this examination is concerned only with the will, that is, with the good or bad intention that inspires one’s thoughts, words, and actions. — Catholic Encyclopedia: Examination of Conscience

Again, some other scriptures focus more on incapacity and shame. This appears to be the case with Baha’u'llah, who emphasized the Judeo-Islamic notion of religion as revelation of and adherence to divine law.

Regarding the incapacity of man, Baha’u'llah said:

Man is unable to comprehend that which hath streamed forth from the Pen of Glory and is recorded in His heavenly Books. Men at all times and under all conditions stand in need of one to exhort them, guide them and to instruct and teach them. —Lawh-i-Maqsud

Regarding fear and shame:

The fear of God hath ever been a sure defence and a safe stronghold for all the peoples of the world. It is the chief cause of the protection of mankind, and the supreme instrument for its preservation. Indeed, there existeth in man a faculty which deterreth him from, and guardeth him against, whatever is unworthy and unseemly, and which is known as his sense of shame. This, however, is confined to but a few; all have not possessed and do not possess it. —Words of Paradise

The Pahlavi term for the Glory of God, “Farrah” (originally the Avestan “Khvarenah”), is sometimes translated in Arabic-Persian as nūr (“light”):

Fundamental to the concept of khvarenah are its connections with light and fire, attested in the root from which it is derived, khvar (“to burn, to glow”), which is probably … connected with the same root as hvar, “sun” (Duchesne-Guillemin, 1963, pp. 19–31). This explains why khvarenah is sometimes translated in Greek as doxa (“glory”) and in Arabic-Persian as nūr (“light”). —Encyclopedia of Religion

The Zoroastrian Faravahar, thought by some to represent the “Glory of God”

Though this concept of divine glory, light, and bounty was dominant in the native religion of Iran, there is little or no indication that the Iranian nobleman and prophet Mirza Husayn ‘Ali Nuri was consciously aware of it when he was given the Arabic title Baha’ (Glory) by his religious leader Sayyid Ali Muhammad Shirazi (the Bab). The nobleman of Nur later extended that title to Baha’u'llah, “Glory of God”.

We might well wonder how such a coincidence occurred, that a man’s title might correspond so well with the name of the home town of his ancestors, but this ought to come as no surprise, for the name of his ancestral home was part of his name from birth. When the Bab heard his name end in Nuri, the name Baha’ must have come naturally to the Prophet of Shiraz.

Shoghi Rabani made much of the correspondence between his great-grandfather’s ancestral home and spiritual title, reporting in his history God Passes By that Bahá’u’lláh, when asked to report his name and origin,

… spoke with majesty and power these words:“My name is Bahá’u’lláh (Light of God), and My country is Núr (Light). Be ye apprized of it.”

Of course Bahá’u’lláh didn’t have any control over the fact that he was born a nobleman from Nur, so the fact that he had such an auspicious ancestry might be seen as divine providence, but it might also be seen as a circumstance that might give a man an elevated sense of personal destiny; that is, it might be seen as a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Though I don’t believe anything supernatural was involved in the naming of Bahá’u’lláh, I have not counted out the power of cultural values. In a land with such a history of fire and sun worship, where the “Glory of God” was once one of the central concepts of the dominant religion, is it too much of a stretch to assert that this name Bahá’u’lláh is a subconscious expression of Iranian heritage?

I recently heard a radio program that touched upon the Muslim Ummah (the community or nation of Islam). I don’t recall whether it was an NPR, PRI, or BBC program. A variety of Muslims were interviewed about what being a Muslim means to them. For many of them, being a Muslim meant being a member of a worldwide community. They spoke with a profound sense of connection to Muslim brothers and sisters throughout the world. At any time, one observed, a Muslim would be praying somewhere in the world.

It’s something like the religious equivalent of Walmart, the difference being that, rather than a shopping experience that transcends locality, Islam offers a religious culture that does the same. Rather than making a business of replacing local businesses, Islam has made a religion of replacing local cultures.

The notion of Ummah is quite similar to a familial concept that I was raised on as a Baha’i. I have often heard the terms “Baha’i family” and “worldwide Baha’i community” used. I daresay I’ve seen that Baha’i family exalted above traditional (natural and otherwise) family units more than once. The Baha’i community is a little more formal than the Muslim Ummah in that it demands universal loyalty to a single administrative order, but the idea is similar to, and perhaps derived from, the Muslim concept.

All this reminds me that I have an Ummah too, and it’s even bigger than the Muslim Ummah.

It’s called the human race, of course.

My neighbor casually tells me, “Dan, some people are believers and some people aren’t.” Neurologist Robert Burton, likewise, says “some people are naturally doubters, and nothing feels as though it’s certain.” Burton, unlike my neighbor, sees the gap between believers and skeptics as more as a spectrum; a continuum.

I’ve been listening to a fascinating interview with Robert Burton on KQED’s Forum. Give it a listen. Burton appears to be suggesting that faith is a physiological impulse. This may sound reductionistic, and perhaps it is. Less reductionistically, you might say that faith is a “feeling”. I find it interesting because I have such a hard time—how should I put it—believing that believers really believe. This doubt is so strong that I often wonder whether believers are just lying about their belief. It sounds rather like a paranoid fantasy, doesn’t it? Well, so be it.

You see, I used to be a believer. That is, I was raised as a believer. When I was young, I suppose it might have been that I accepted my indoctrination as a factual education. It’s hard to tell, but I do remember having a sense of faith being a willful effort to conform to my upbringing. I considered myself a believer, in a doubtful sort of way. Maybe in an envious sort of way.

Thanks to the testimony of Dostoevsky and others, science has come up with the notion that many mystical experiences are related to epileptic seizures. Can I try one of those? I feel quite deprived. Honest! I wonder what it feels like.

What’s peculiar in my case is that my mother is an epileptic, and she had some bad seizures back around the time she became a Baha’i and married the man who spoke at the first Baha’i meeting that she attended. I wonder how different the world feels to her. Does she really have a sense of certainty about the faith that she seems so overly confident about?

I must admit that this gives me a new sense of tolerance for believers, as obnoxiously overbearing as they can be. Maybe believers aren’t a load of liars. Maybe they really do believe. Maybe belief is just part of being human; or rather, maybe belief is just part of being mammalian?

Hey all you eschatological detectives out there in cyberspace! Still looking for your Thief in the Night? Here’s an insightful how-to on thinking prophetically by XBOSS (Ex-Baha’i-of-Sorts) fringe celebrity Barry Smith:

This blog got its name “Idol Chatter” for a reason, or even a couple of reasons. First of all, the blogger is a rather militant unitarian (note lowercase ‘u’). Secondly, he tries not to take his own chatter too seriously.

By “unitarian” is here meant anyone who recognizes the tendency of leaders, doctrines, and ideologies to become idols that stand in the way of our search for truth. Idolatry, according to this school of thought, is a mighty sly shape-shifting devil. As a former Unitarian minister once challenged us:

“We boast our emancipation from many superstitions; but if we have broken any idols, it is through a transfer of the idolatry.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson

Similarly, a Greek philosopher once cautioned:

“It is wise to listen not to me, but to the Logos, …” — Heraclitus

I use the term “unitarian” because this cautious mode of thinking is embodied in the Unitarian tradition, in which some Christians long ago determined that worshiping Jesus is missing the message of Jesus, who did not forbid blasphemy against himself, but rather forbade blasphemy against “the spirit”. It is the spirit of the message that gives life, he said, not the flesh of the messenger; not even the letter of the message.

In this sense, we can see that Jesus, whom some identify with the Logos, was not so different from Nietzsche’s anti-prophet Zarathustra:

“All the names of good and evil are parables: they do not declare, but only hint. Whoever among you seeks knowledge of them is a fool!” — Thus Spoke Zarathustra

The Great Iconoclast

Imagine if you will a medieval man, centuries after Christ, who was familiar with Judaism and Christianity. Imagine that this man was impressed by the Judaic aversion to idolatry, but also recognized Christ as a man—or messenger—of Truth. Imagine that he rejected the Trinity, and the notion that Jesus is God. Imagine that this man became quite well known for his opinion that Jesus is not God, such that we might consider him the first Unitarian. Imagine that he was a man of his time, and realizing the efficacy of power, mustered an army and ordered that army to pursue idolators and smash idols to the ends of the earth.

Let us call this man, for lack of a better name, Muhammad. Maybe this man was so single-minded about smashing idols that he might be called a prophet. Perhaps he was such a dedicated Unitarian that he rejected the very possibility of any religion other than the religion of Unitarianism, going so far as to call himself “the Seal of the Prophets”:

“Muhammad is not the father of any man among you, but he is the Apostle of God, and the seal of the prophets: and God knoweth all things.” Qur’an (Rodwell translation)

Let us further imagine that this man was seen by by his enemies as a militant religious fanatic and his followers as a crusader for his god Allah. Perhaps we can imagine that they had him wrong. Perhaps we can imagine that he was after something more fundamental, and that the rest—his doctrines, methods, and even his personal beliefs—was all circumstantial.

The man in the painting is not going bowling. If we look closely enough, we find that even Muhammad was an idolator; but who isn’t? Shall Muslims be permitted to rise above the man? Not if they continue to idolize him.

It is commonly understood that Islam means “submission”, but submission to what? Submission to Islam? Certainly not. That would be circular, would it not? It has always been understood to mean “submission to God”; but what is God? Is God to be taken as the Islamic image of God, “Allah”, or is God to be taken as that ultimate, unknowable creative essence behind—or within—things? Perhaps the core meaning of Islam is “submission to no idol, however subtle”.

“Seek knowledge even unto China” — Muhammad

If we were to take this as the essence of Islam, could this not be a religion of the future? Could we go so far as to say that Islam is faith in Reason? If this seems like too much of a stretch, can we at least see how Islam might be seen as a medieval attempt to free humanity of idolatry?

Let the true Muslims step forward to smash the idols of Islam.