Freemasons & Bahaism

..... I will be stepping on a few people's toes here. Your Christians are really unaware of where their concept of the millenium came from. They think that it comes from the bible, but if they go back historically they will see that William Miller, who started the Adventist movement and started talking about millenium, was a high ranking Freemason. He predicted that Christ would return in 1844. The question is, did Christ return in 1844? Most people, because we have a limited perspective on things, would say no, he didn't.

But there was a man called Nabob (Bab) who appeared in Persia, and he said I am Christ, and he started the Baha'i religion. He fulfilled William Miller's prophecy. The Freemasons were the ones who introduced the Bahai religion to America, and they did it through the Chicago Masonic Temple around the turn of the century. The Bahai religion is committed to a one world government, a new world order, and a one world religion. There was this Masonic Oriental Order of the Magi and they were the hardcore group within the Chicago Masonic Temple who started the Bahai religion in this country.

Sourced from :
http://threedeadwords.blogspot.com/2010/01/jan-2310-illuminati-formula-used-to.html

Shundamentalism

One of the distinguishing doctrines of the Bahá'í Faith is its characterization of rebellion against religious authority, what it calls covenant breaking, as the most pernicious, contageous form of evil. Other religions have their outcasts and their devils, but there's nothing out there quite like a covenant breaker.

Apostasy is the great spiritual crime of Islám. It was once considered a capital crime, and still is in some circles. The Bahá'í Faith uses its own definition for the term apostasy. The Bahá'í usage of the word implies that apostasy is equivalent to covenant breaking. It is not a capital crime, but is considered a highly contageous spiritual disease, and is therefore subject to severe shunning.

The doctrine of covenant breaking and the accompanying practice of shunning is traceable to Bahá'u'lláh and `Abdu'l-Bahá, but it was formalized by Shoghi Effendi:

Apostates, rebels, betrayers, heretics, had exerted their utmost endeavors, privily or openly, to sap the loyalty of the followers of that Faith, to split their ranks or assault their institutions.

God Passes By, page 408.

When a person declares his acceptance of Baha'u'llah as a Manifestation of God he becomes a party to the Covenant and accepts the totality of His Revelation. If he then turns around and attacks Baha'u'llah or the Central Institution of the Faith he violates the Covenant. If this happens every effort is made to help that person to see the illogicality and error of his actions, but if he persists he must, in accordance with the instructions of Baha'u'llah Himself, be shunned as a Covenant-breaker.

From a letter dated March 30, 1957 on behalf of Shoghi Effendi, "Messages to Canada," p. 64

Bahá'u'lláh and the Master in many places and very emphatically have told us to shun entirely all Covenant-breakers as they are afflicted with what we might try and define as a contagious spiritual disease ...

From a letter dated 30 November 1944 written on behalf of the Guardian to an individual believer

Shunning is typically done on an individual level, but Bahá'í authorities have also been seen exhibiting this practice. In a recent dispute between the United States National Spiritual Assembly (NSA) and the Second International Bahá'í Council, the WIPO panel that oversaw the dispute voiced some disapproval over the unwillingness of the conplainant (the NSA) to communicate with the other party:

Complainant did not send a copy of its request directly to Respondent, apparently believing Respondent had a “religious objection” to communicating with it. While the Panel appreciates Complainant’s sensitivity, it did not interpret the statement that Respondent had, consistent with Respondent’s religious beliefs, ignored Complainant’s cease and desist letter, to be an objection to receiving communications. Moreover, the Panel reminds Complainant of Rule 2(h): “Any communication by . . . a Party shall be copied to the other Party, the Panel and the Provider, as the case may be” (emphasis added).

The Century of Peace !!!

"One of the great events," affirms `Abdu'l-Bahá, "which is to occur in the Day of the manifestation of that incomparable Branch is the hoisting of the Standard of God among all nations. By this is meant that all nations and kindreds will be gathered together under the shadow of this Divine Banner, which is no other than the Lordly Branch itself, and will become a single nation. Religious and sectarian antagonism, the hostility of races and peoples, and differences among nations, will be eliminated. All men will adhere to one religion, will have one common faith, will be blended into one race and become a single people. All will dwell in one common fatherland, which is the planet itself." "Now, in the world of being," He has moreover explained, "the Hand of Divine power hath firmly laid the foundations of this all-highest bounty, and this wondrous gift. Whatsoever is latent in the innermost of this holy Cycle shall gradually appear and be made manifest, for now is but the beginning of its growth, and the dayspring of the revelation of its signs. Ere the close of this century and of this age, it shall be made clear and evident how wondrous was that spring-tide, and how heavenly was that gift."

The Unfoldment of World Civilization

Baha'i World Government

"... A single, organically-united, unshattered World Common wealth."

- Shoghi Effendi, Messages to America, p. 81

“... a stage which, in the fullness of time, will culminate in the establishment of the World Baha’i Commonwealth, functioning in the plenitude of its powers”

- Shoghi Effendi, Baha’i World. Vol. XIII, p. 138

"... the precautionary and defensive measures to be devised, coordinated, and carried out to counteract the full force of the inescapable attacks which the organized efforts of ecclesiastical organizations of various denominations will progressively launch and relentlessly pursue; and, last but not least, the multitudinous issues that must be faced, the obstacles that must be overcome, and the responsibilities that must be assumed, to enable a sore-tried Faith to pass through the successive stages of unmitigated obscurity, of active repression, and of complete emancipation, leading in turn to its being acknowledged as an independent Faith, enjoying the status of full equality with its sister religions, to be followed by its establishment and recognition as a State religion, which in turn must give way to its assumption of the rights and prerogatives associated with the Baha'i state, functioning in the plenitude of its powers, a stage which must ultimately culminate in the emergence of the world-wide Baha'i' Commonwealth, animated wholly by the spirit, and operating solely in direct conformity with the laws and principles of Baha’u’llah."

- Shoghi Effendi, The Advent of Divine Justice, p. 12

"It is the structure of His New World Order, now stirring in the womb of the administrative institutions He Himself has created, that will serve both as a pattern and a nucleus of the World Commonwealth which is the sure, the inevitable destiny of the peoples and nations of the earth."

- Shoghi Effendi, The Promised Day is Come, p. 122

"It is the superstructure of that self-same order, attaining its full stature through the emergence of the Baha'i World Commonwealth — the Kingdom of God on earth —which the Golden Age of the (Baha'i) Dispensation must, in the fullness of time, ultimately witness."

- Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, p. 26

"As the authority with which Baha’u’llah has invested the future Baha'i Commonwealth becomes more and more apparent, the fiercer shall be the challenge which from every quarter will be thrown at the verities it enshrines."

- Shoghi Effendi, World Order of Bahaullah, p. 18

"And as the Baha'i Faith permeates the masses of the peoples of East and West, and its truth is embraced by the majority of the peoples of a number of the Sovereign States of the world, will the Universal House of Justice attain the plenitude of its power, and exercise, as the supreme organ of the Baha'i Commonwealth, all the rights, the duties, and responsibilities incumbent upon the worlds future super state."

- Shoghi Effendi, World Order of Baha'u'llah, p. 7

"Haifa, Israel - 'permanent world Administrative Centre of the future Baha'i Commonwealth, destined never to be separated from, and to function in proximity of the Spiritual Centre of (the) Faith'... "

- Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, p. 348

"... To us, the 'generation of the half-light', living at a time which maybe designated as the period of the incubation of the World Commonwealth envisaged by Baha’u’llah, has been assigned a task whose high privilege we can never sufficiently appreciate, and the arduousness of which we can as yet but dimly recognize."

- Shoghi Effendi, World Order of Baha’u’llah, p 168

"... the Faith of Baha’u’llah is now visibly succeeding in demonstrating its claim and title to be regarded as a World Religion destined to attain, in the fullness of time, the status of a world-embracing Commonwealth, which would be at once the instrument and the guardian of the Most Great Peace, announced by its Author."

- Shoghi Effendi, World Order of Bahaullah, p. 196

"The Declaration of Trust and By-Laws of the National Spiritual Assembly of the United States, stands in its final form as a worthy and faithful exposition of the constitutional basis of the Baha’i communities in every land, foreshadowing the final emergence of the World Baha’i Commonwealth of the future."

- Shoghi Effendi, Bahai Administration, p. 135

"This final and crowning stage (Commonwealth) in the evolution of the Plan wrought by God Himself for humanity will, in turn, prove to be the signal for the birth of a world civilization, incomparable in its range, its character and potency, in the history of mankind ... "

- Shoghi Effendi, Baha’i World, Vol. XI, p. 138

"There is no God but Me, the Peerless, the Informed." - Baha'u'llah

The: "I am God", statement only makes sense and doesn't cross the line into idolatry if stated in the sense: "I am naught but God", meaning I have no existence apart from God.

Mirza Husayn Ali (alias Baha'u'llah) did make it clear though that he believed his station to be: "beyond" that of a Manifestation:

The purpose of God in creating man hath been, and will ever be, to enable him to know his Creator and to attain His Presence. To this most excellent aim, this supreme objective, all the heavenly Books and the divinely-revealed and weighty Scriptures unequivocally bear witness. Whoso hath recognized the Day Spring of Divine guidance and entered His holy court hath drawn nigh unto God and attained His Presence, a Presence which is the real Paradise, and of which the loftiest mansions of heaven are but a symbol. Such a man hath attained the knowledge of the station of Him Who is "at the distance of two bows," Who standeth beyond the Sadratu'l-Muntaha. Whoso hath failed to recognize Him will have condemned himself to the misery of remoteness, a remoteness which is naught but utter nothingness and the essence of the nethermost fire. Such will be his fate, though to outward seeming he may occupy the earth's loftiest seats and be established upon its most exalted throne.

(Baha'u'llah, Gleanings from the Writings of Baha'u'llah, p. 70)

To claim to the station of one who: "standeth beyond the Sadratu'l-Muntaha", is to claim a station greater than the Sadratul'-Muntaha, greater than a Manifestation of God.

It is such statements of Mirza Husayn Ali/Baha'u'llah's which led that 'major' school of Baha'i thought to mistakenly equate Baha'u'llah with God Himself. I do wonder why Baha'u'llah did not correct this error or perhaps if he truly believed that his station was greater than Manifestationhood, as he put it: "beyond the Sadratu'l-Muntaha", ?

Cheers

Larry Rowe

[1 The Sadratu'l-Muntaha, translated inter alia as the Sidrah Tree which marks the boundary, and the Lote-Tree of the extremity. Cf. Qur'án 53:14. It is said to stand at the loftiest point in Paradise, and to mark the place beyond which neither men nor angels can pass. In Bahá'í terminology it refers to the Manifestation of God.]

(Abdu'l-Baha, Memorials of the Faithful, p. 175)

328. By my life! This is a day wherein the Sadrat doth not desire but to utter to the world, "There is no God but Me, the Peerless, the Informed." Had it not been for My love unto thee, I would not have mentioned what is herein. Know, therefore, this station! Then keep it as thou keepest thine own eyes and be grateful.

(Compilations, Baha'i Scriptures, p. 197)

Daughter of Baha'i minister fled Iran, found new hope in America

Dana Point, Calif.: January 05, 2010, (PCTV Newsdesk)

She was a math whiz who defied female stereotypes in Iran by becoming a civil engineer. But after Iran's 1979 revolution, this daughter of a Baha'i minister was forced to run for her life.

"As a child, I always thought there was something wrong with the world," says Maheen Vardakostas. Even at five-years-old, she asked her parents "Who is God?" When her mother tried to buy her nice clothes she protested, saying, "I want something that lasts, something eternal."

She grew up within the strict confines of the Baha'i religion, with prayers three times a day in Arabic.

The Bahai faith teaches the spiritual unity of all mankind, with Jesus portrayed as one of a number of divine messengers who included Abraham, Buddha and Mohammad. Founded by Bahaullah in Persia, its adherents represent themselves as seekers of truth, but Maheen disagrees.

"Baha'is become Baha'is because they were born to Baha'i families, they don't seek the truth," she maintains.

Despite the strong spiritual influences of Maheen's home, God's love always seemed remote to her. "There was always a distance," she says. "I wanted to know him, but there was no possibility of an intimate relationship."

Maheen was unusually gifted with numbers, and became a national champion in a math competition. At 15, with few prospects for rigorous study in her small town, she talked her father into sending her to Tehran to pursue her academic interests.

"Dad raised me as a tomboy," Maheen recalls. "In high school and college, I wore men's clothing. I was tough, not very gentle."

Maheen decided to become a civil engineer, and entered a program with only two women enrolled among 300 men. After her graduation, she landed a high-paying job and seemed to have a bright future ahead of herself, until the onset of the Iranian revolution.

"While the Shah was alive, he protected the Baha'is, because his personal physician was a Baha'i," Maheen notes. "After the revolution, the Muslims started burning the houses of Baha'is, and they killed some of our relatives."

Beginning in the early 1900s, Baha'is faced continual persecution in Iran. After the revolution of 1979, Baha'is were banned from attending universities, holding government jobs, and many were sent to prison for their beliefs.

"They started looking for my dad to kill him," Maheen recalls. "All my family ran for their lives." In addition to the increase in persecution, the revolution also brought economic calamity.

"The Americans left; there was no money, no one left to run the economy," she says. Food shortages were rampant, with long lines for basic commodities. "In the winter, I stood in line for seven days to get petrol (heating oil) to burn. I could see my breath in my apartment."

A small cottage industry developed in Tehran - selling admission papers for U.S. colleges to Iranians desperate to leave. Maheen managed to obtain admission papers to study at a small private college in Los Angeles, but she had idea how she might get there.

The U.S. Embassy had been closed, but Maheen's attention was riveted one day by a rumor that it might reopen. She joined a long line in the street outside the embassy that began to form. "I slept on the street for one week to apply for a visa," she says.

Maheen considers it a miracle that she and her sister got visas to leave. "I told them we were persecuted as Baha'is and the Lord gave us favor," she says. In her excitement and jubilation, she ran all the way from the embassy to her apartment after she got the good news.

In the summer of 1979, Maheen and her sister arrived in Los Angeles. "We were traumatized," she recalls. "We lost everything and we didn't know if we would see my parents again. If we returned, we didn't know if they would kill us."

To stay in the U.S., Maheen needed to fund her education. "Every month my dad was supposed to send us $1000, but he was running for his life." As she tried to adjust to life in the U.S, the reality of her strange existence brought on a depression. "I didn't know the Lord, and it seemed like a nightmare. I hoped a car would hit me."

Unexpectedly, her desperation began to ease. A friend helped her win asylum, get a work permit, and eventually a green card. She found work at a restaurant in Dana Point, California. "The owner respected me because I was a hard worker," she says. "Because of my math background, I added all the numbers in my mind."

Customers and fellow-workers marveled at her numerical ability. Someone said, "There's a girl there who has wires in her brain."

Despite her success, Maheen planned to leave the restaurant and resume her career path and earn a PhD. One day she told the owner, Angelo Vardakostas, of her plans to leave.

"I'm going to have to leave in two months," she told him.

Angelo studied her carefully, then told her, "You will never leave this place."

Immediately, something touched Maheen in the depths of her soul. "There was a gentleness and a love in his voice that touched my spirit," she recalls.

Maheen married Angelo and they had two sons together. She continued to attend a Baha'i church occasionally, but still felt empty in her soul. "The Baha'is were not satisfying me." She began to study self-improvement and other philosophies.

One day, one of her friends asked her, "What's wrong with you? You're always thinking."

"There is something wrong with this world," Maheen retorted. "Something is missing. I'm looking for that."

"All the philosophers have looked for that and you're not going to find it," her friend said.

Angelo and Maheen placed their first son in St. Margaret's Episcopal School, an elite private school in San Juan Capistrano, California. When the school invited them to an academic award ceremony where their son would receive an award, Maheen was dismayed because the ceremony would take place in a chapel.

She stood outside nervously, thinking it would violate her Baha'i faith to go inside. Then she thought, 'This is stupid,' and stepped into the back of the building. Immediately she noticed the students kneeling and reciting a prayer, "I believe in God the Father who created the world. I believe in God the Son who loved me and died for me."

When Maheen heard the prayer, she broke into tears. Their God seemed so intimate, she thought. "A God who loves me and died for me? - I never heard of this."

As Maheen drove away from the school, she kept repeating one line of the prayer: "God the Son who loved me and died for me, God the Son who loved me and died for me." Could this be the missing piece of life she had been searching for?

Angelo and Maheen enrolled their second son at Capistrano Valley Christian School - only a short distance away, because there was no room for him at St. Margarets.

Every day when she picked her son up at school she asked, "What did you do today?"

"We learned about the Bible," he replied. Day after day, he repeated the same thing, until Maheen became exasperated.

"We're paying $6000 a year and all they're teaching you is the Bible?" she exclaimed.

Soon they moved their second son to Capistrano Valley Christian School, and one of the boys' teachers, Mrs. Mulligan, invited Maheen to visit the Life Church in Mission Viejo, California.

When Maheen arrived at the church, she noticed many were praying with their eyes closed, so Maheen decided to do the same. When she opened her eyes she was shocked to see the guest speaker standing in front of her. He invited her to come up on the stage with him.

She felt compelled to go with him, but suddenly embarrassed as all eyes in the room fell on her.
"Where do you go to church?" he asked.

"I don't go to church," Maheen replied. In her discomfiture, she couldn't help but ask, "What do you want me to do?"

The pastor looked intently into her eyes and said, "I want you to repeat after me," and he began to lead Maheen in the Sinner's Prayer.

"I said I was a sinner and I accepted Jesus as my Savior," Maheen recalls. "But after I said this I felt like my body was a piece of paper." She tried to control herself so she would not fall down, but she fell backward.

"I was so happy, so excited, I think I entered the Lord's presence. I got up and he said another prayer and I fell down one more time."

After the service, Maheen went to a prayer room where several women prayed for her. They showed her where to begin reading the New Testament.

When she got home, she picked up the Bible and began devouring the pages. She read until 4 a.m.

In the next few days and weeks, Jesus entered her dreams at night. "At that time, my husband and I were very close," she recalls. "We had a good relationship."

"But my intimacy with Jesus Christ was much greater." In one of her dreams, Jesus looked at all the books she collected in the Baha'i faith, then he compared those with the truth found in the Bible. "Make sure they give you the real Jesus," he said to her.

"He was never condemning with me," Maheen extols. "It was the compelling love of Jesus Christ that led me to repentance," she says. "His humility knocked me down. I once was very tough, but now, I'm much more gentle."

Maheen still works at the same restaurant, which she owns with her husband. She believes God has seen her perseverance and is training her for ministry. "I meditate on Him while I'm working on the grill," she says.

"I took action and sought after the truth. I knocked on every door and found none completely fulfilling. Finally, when I was not seeking, the Lord found me."

News source: www.assistnews.net

http://pakistanchristian.tv/news/2010-01-05_Daughter_of_Bahai_minister_fled_Iran_found_new_hope_in_America.cfm

http://www.freechristianpress.com/world/daughter-of-baha%E2%80%99i-minister-fled-iran-to-new-hope-in-america/