Jun 11, 2012 -- 7:51PM, chevy956 wrote:

Jun 11, 2012 -- 7:36PM, Aka_me wrote:

Jun 11, 2012 -- 7:31PM, wohali wrote:

Atheism is the lack of belief in any god(s).

Period.

thank you for your opinion, but it belongs in the Discuss Atheism forum.

The subject of the thread is speculation on why Baha'i's here on Bnet are interested in Atheism. Wo isn't off topic.

Amen to that, sibling!

Jun 11, 2012 -- 12:33AM, Aka_me wrote:

Atheism is, in a broad sense, the rejection of belief in the existence of deities.

Deities are depicted in a variety of forms, but are also frequently expressed as having human form.

in respect to corporeal gods (Odin, Zeus, Ra, Baal, Green Man, or Kolobian heavenly father)...

Baha'i reject belief in their existence. making them figurine atheists. when there's 37 different flavors of atheism, what difference does one more type make?

obeying the Great Commandment, and believing Jesus to be Christ makes them Christian.

"if thou callest them all by one name and dost ascribe to them the same attribute, thou hast not erred from the truth."

implicitly makes them believers in the prophets all major religions: Zoroaster, Moses, Buddha, Jesus, Muhammad, Abraham, Krishna

culminating in the sum total of Baha'i.

yes... this causes great suffering for some people. and I can't make that my problem. because the suffering was already there before it became directed at me and it will be there long after I'm gone.

Couldn't find any site discussing "figurine atheist". Is that a neologism available somewhere or did you create the term yourself?

Jun 10, 2012 -- 1:36AM, steven_guy wrote:

I would like to know why some Bahais are so interested in atheism?

Maybe it is because many of us are the first people to become Bahá'ís in our families and the rest of us grew up with one of our major principles "The independent search after truth".

The new believers had made a sincere search and choice. Those brought up as Bahá'í children still had to choose and declare themselves independently. That probably meant curiosity and questionning was an early habit/instinct with both groups.

Since Bahá'í children are taught respect for religions and since Atheism has only recently been promoted, in the "free" world anyway, neither group would have much familiarity with it. Consequently there could be a desire to know and discuss the unfamiliar.

Maine:

"Figurine atheist???? What in the world would that be?"

Someone who doesn't believe in the plastic Jesus glued to the dashboard of their car.

Jun 12, 2012 -- 5:14AM, in_my_opinion wrote:

Couldn't find any site discussing "figurine atheist". Is that a neologism available somewhere or did you create the term yourself?

created it myself after studying implicit/explicit, positive/negative, strong/weak, soft/hard, practical/theoretical, pragmatic, apatheism, ontological, epistemological, agnostic atheism, theological noncognitivism, metaphysical atheism, axiological atheism, atheistic existentialism

and thought why not create a term just for superman corporeal gods.

19 bloody terms atheists themselve can't even determine the correct true denomination of, what difference is one more term and who has any authority to "bust" me for diluting the meaning of any further than it's already diluted? exactly, nobody!

also thought about the word EXISTS. my pencil exists, my watch exists...

does love exist? prove it.

in one sense God IS absolute existence

yet in the material sense of the word God (like love) does not exist. ergo atheist.

I believe in both love and God, yet make no attempt to prove they exist.