The following is reposted from the soc.religion.bahai board on Freenet: Enclosed is a compilation I prepared from the Baha'i writings on the Baha'i principle, Independent Investigation of Truth principle. Happy reading! Michael Kafes jmk5@lehigh.edu --------------------------------------------------------------------------- INDEPENDENT INVESTIGATION OF TRUTH "God has given man the eye of investigation by which he may see and recognize truth. He has endowed man with ears that he may hear the message of reality and conferred upon him the gift of reason by which he may discover things for himself. This is his endowment and equipment for the investigation of reality. Man is not intended to see through the eyes of another, hear through another's ears nor comprehend with another's brain. Each human creature has individual endowment, power and responsibility in the creative plan of God...It is the duty of everyone to investigate reality and investigation of reality by another will not do for us." (`Abdu'l-Baha, _Foundations of World Unity_) "...no man should blindly follow his ancestors and forefathers. Nay each must see with his own eyes, hear with his own ears and investigate truth himself in order that he may follow the truth instead of blind acquiescence and imitation of ancestral beliefs." (`Abdu'l-Baha, _Promulgation of Universal Peace_, 450) `Abdu'l-Baha explained, "know ye that God has created in man the power of reason, whereby man is enabled to investigate reality. God has not intended man to imitate blindly his fathers and ancestors. He has endowed him with mind, or the faculty of reasoning, by the exercise of which he is to investigate and discover the truth, and that which he finds real and true he must accept. He must not rely implicitly upon the opinion of any man without investigation; nay, each soul must seek intelligently and independently, arriving at a real conclusion and bound only by that reality. The greatest cause of bereavement and disheartening in the world of humanity is ignorance based upon blind imitation." Further, "man must endeavor in all things to investigate the fundamental reality. If he does not independently investigate, he has failed to utilize the talent God has bestowed upon him." `Abdu'l-Baha explained that the concept of the independent investigation of truth refers to the investigation of the underlying unity of the fundamental, original teachings of all the religions of the past: "Man must cut himself free from all prejudice and from the result of his own imagination, so that he may be able to search for truth unhindered. Truth is one in all religions...All the peoples have a fundamental belief in common. Being one, truth cannot be divided, and the differences that appear to exist among nations only result from their attachment to prejudice. If only men would search out truth, they would find themselves united." (`Abdu'l-Baha, _Paris Talks_, 129) "In order to find truth we must give up our prejudices, our own small trivial notions; an open receptive mind is essential. If our chalice is full of self, there is no room in it for the water of life. The fact that we imagine ourselves to be right and everybody else wrong is the greatest of all obstacles in the path towards unity, and unity is necessary if we would reach truth, for truth is one... "Science must be accepted. No one truth can contradict another truth. Light is good in whatsoever lamp it is burning! A rose is beautiful in whatsoever garden it may bloom!... "...we must be willing to clear away all that we have previously learned, all that would clog our steps on the way to truth; we must not shrink if necessary from beginning our education all over again." (`Abdu'l-Baha, Paris Talks, 136)