I was curious the other night and decided to google apologetics against the Baha'i faith from an Orthodox viewpoint. I was surprised that I didn't find anything.
So, I figured that this would be a good place to discuss the Baha'i faith in regards to Orthodoxy. I'm not sure if everyone has heard of these folks, but given their own statements about growing numbers, I figure it won't be long before someone runs into them.
Pretty much everything about them flies in the face of traditional Christian understanding and (from what I've seen from other forums) infuriates those inclined to apostolic tradition.
Looking in from the outside, the religion seems to be a grand syncretism of pretty much every world religion. They attempt to make a case that Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, Christianity, Judaism, and Zoroastrianism are all sourced in the same beliefs, and that all great messengers are all equally valid. Thus, Zarathustra, Moses, Noah, Muhammad, Jesus, the Buddha, and to a lesser extent, Lao Tzu and various Native American writings are all preaching similar messages.
They refer to "Manifestations" in their description of messengers. They believe that a Manifestation reflects God the way that a mirror would reflect the light of the Sun.
They tend to interpret world scriptures in an unequal way from what I've seen. Anything that is complimentary to their understanding is considered valid. They view passages that others consider literal to be symbolic.
From their own viewpoint, they are NOT a syncretic religion, but a valid Abrahamic (and Dharmic) religion with their own holy writings and their own prophets.
They add to the list of Manifestations with the Bab (meaning, the Gate who is seen to be a precursor the way St John the Forerunner was, along with the Madhi of Shi'ah Islam) and Baha'u'llah (who is seen to be the return of Christ).
Here's the wiki article:
Baha'iAnyone wanting to read the Baha'i view of Jesus can go
here and follow the links at the bottom (note: it is okay to give out links relevant to the topic of discussion, yeah?)