Religion

[paulsimpson]

@paulsimpson your formatting needs work.

If you break it up into paragraphs it might be at least readable.

No point in quoting a piss taking one line question if you aren't going to respond to answer it or say something smart in reply.

I was going to reply to your post but then got sidetracked and somehow included it in reply to Octavian. Sorry. Unintentional mistake.

 

[ZenHalfTimeCrock]

All this stuff about Biblical literalism falls flat when applied to the ‘I am’ sayings in John’s gospel, and surely it would be hard to make sense of Jesus’s use of parables without appealing to symbolism and allegory, as well as his insistence on describing himself as the ‘Son of Man’.

Interestingly, Terry Eagleton – echoing an argument found in the writings of the philosopher Slavoj Zizek – argues that the fundamentalist/Biblical literalist ‘is not really a believer at all. Fundamentalists are faithless. They are, in fact, the mirror image of sceptics. In a world of extreme uncertainty, only copper-bottomed, incontrovertible truths promulgated by God can be trusted.’

 

[paulsimpson]

All this stuff about Biblical literalism falls flat when applied to the ‘I am’ sayings in John’s gospel, and surely it would be hard to make sense of Jesus’s use of parables without appealing to symbolism and allegory, as well as his insistence on describing himself as the ‘Son of Man’.

Interestingly, Terry Eagleton – echoing an argument found in the writings of the philosopher Slavoj Zizek – argues that the fundamentalist/Biblical literalist ‘is not really a believer at all. Fundamentalists are faithless. They are, in fact, the mirror image of sceptics. In a world of extreme uncertainty, only copper-bottomed, incontrovertible truths promulgated by God can be trusted.’

Should we understand you literally ?
Or figuratively ? ;-)

 

[Octavian]

All this stuff about Biblical literalism falls flat when applied to the ‘I am’ sayings in John’s gospel, and surely it would be hard to make sense of Jesus’s use of parables without appealing to symbolism and allegory, as well as his insistence on describing himself as the ‘Son of Man’.

Interestingly, Terry Eagleton – echoing an argument found in the writings of the philosopher Slavoj Zizek – argues that the fundamentalist/Biblical literalist ‘is not really a believer at all. Fundamentalists are faithless. They are, in fact, the mirror image of sceptics. In a world of extreme uncertainty, only copper-bottomed, incontrovertible truths promulgated by God can be trusted.’

It’s entirely possible to be a dedicated Christian and believer whilst also believing the books of the New Testament were written by humans who were trying to figure out what had happened and therefore making some mistakes.

It’s also obvious to those who have done a bit of research into textual criticism that manuscripts have thousands of small differences due to scribes copying by hand for centuries and centuries. The original gospels likely told the same story as we have now but the wording would have been different. Therefore you cannot surely, as our friend Paul Simpson does, take each word as the literal word of God.

This shouldn’t change the overall narrative for Christians and as Ehrman said about himself, nothing he researched about scripture convinced him it wasn’t true, it was the combining of suffering and and omnipotent God that did away with his faith 30 years ago - which I think was likely a personal bereavement or something like that for him.

I joined a Bible class not so long ago to brush up on my knowledge and the class was full of Christians as you’d expect. Even they accepted manuscripts would vary significantly and even my Bible at home states “some manuscripts vary wildly”.

It’s why I cannot get my head around the fundamentalist argument.

 

[Octavian]

It can be translated as if He falls prostrate after landing - most likely first of all on the legs and then falling forward on his face. It doesn't change the sense of the betrayal,Judas' motivation, his subsequent guilt, field of blood as in blood money and blood spilt from his bursting middle.
International Standard Version has this: Now this man bought a field with the money he got for his crime. Falling on his face, he burst open in the middle, and all his intestines gushed out. It doesn't matter where the authors got their sources. Biblical literalism is the method of interpreting Scripture that holds that, except in places where the text is obviously allegorical, poetic, or figurative, it should be taken literally. Biblical literalism is the position of most evangelicals.

Biblical literalism goes hand-in-hand with regarding the Word of God as inerrant and inspired. If we believe in the doctrine of biblical inspiration—that the books of the Bible were written by men under the influence of the Holy Spirit (2 Timothy 3:16–17; 2 Peter 1:20–21) to the extent that everything they wrote was exactly what God wanted to say—then a belief in biblical literalism is acknowledgement that God wants to communicate to us via human language.
It is an extension of the literalism that we all use in everyday communication. If someone enters a room and says, “The building is on fire,” we don’t start searching for figurative meanings; we start to move and exit. No one stops to ponder whether the reference to “fire” is metaphorical or if the “building” is an indirect reference to 21st-century socio-economic theories! So when we open the Bible and read, “The Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left” (Exodus 14:22), we shouldn’t look for figurative meanings for sea, dry ground, or wall of water; we should believe the miracle.
If you deny biblical literalism and try to interpret Scripture figuratively, how are the figures to be interpreted? who decides what is and is not a figure? Were Adam and Eve real people? What about Cain and Abel? If they are figurative, where in Genesis can we start saying the people are literal individuals? Any dividing line between figurative and literal in the genealogies is arbitrary. Or take a New Testament example: did Jesus really say to love our enemies (Matthew 5:44)? Did He say it on a mount? Was Jesus even real? Without a commitment to biblical literalism, we might as well throw out the whole Bible. If part of it is only true then none of it is true.
If biblical literalism is discarded, language becomes meaningless. If “five smooth stones” in 1 Samuel 17:40 doesn’t refer to five aerodynamic rocks, then what did David pick out of the stream? More importantly, if words can mean anything we assign to them, there are no genuine promises in the Bible. The “place” that Jesus said He is preparing for us (John 14:3) needs to be literal, or else He is speaking nonsense. The “cross” that Jesus died on needs to be a literal cross, and His death needs to be a literal death in order for us to have salvation. Hell needs to be a literal place—as does heaven—if we are to have anything to be saved from. Jesus’ literal resurrection from a literal tomb is as equally important (1 Corinthians 15:17). Saved from guilt when Jesus takes away literally every wrong ever done by humanity. Fessing up to Him means that healing and freedom comes. The writer of Ecclesiastes bewails the meaninglessness of worldly pursuits apart from God. When we are spiritually dead, life is ultimately empty. Nothing in this world will fully satisfy the deepest longings of our hearts Psalm 73:25. But, in Christ Messiah Jesus, we have purpose. He said, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full”. Yes real Life.(John 10:10). The Christian life is a meaningful life in that life goes on after death but also starts immediately after the bending of the knee , admit sin which we all are prone to and confess that He is Lord. Its liberating.
Even when walking through “the valley of the shadow of death,” we need fear no evil (Psalm 23:4). Our Good Shepherd never abandons us, and our suffering is always purposeful (Psalm 56:8). The Lord can take the broken bits of our lives and create a mosaic that encourages people. He has sent a Helper-the Spirit whom we forget so often. It is often our darkest pain that becomes our brightest light when we entrust it to Him. Joy comes in the morning when we awaken to our purpose and see that even our mistakes, sorrows, and confusion are obliterated in His light. Dark nights can last a very long time, but they are never ultimately permanent for those who are in Christ Jesus.

Can you give me a single example of another person who had died from hanging that ended up head/face first and their intestines split open?

 

[tonea2003]

It’s entirely possible to be a dedicated Christian and believer whilst also believing the books of the New Testament were written by humans who were trying to figure out what had happened and therefore making some mistakes.

It’s also obvious to those who have done a bit of research into textual criticism that manuscripts have thousands of small differences due to scribes copying by hand for centuries and centuries. The original gospels likely told the same story as we have now but the wording would have been different. Therefore you cannot surely, as our friend Paul Simpson does, take each word as the literal word of God.

This shouldn’t change the overall narrative for Christians and as Ehrman said about himself, nothing he researched about scripture convinced him it wasn’t true, it was the combining of suffering and and omnipotent God that did away with his faith 30 years ago - which I think was likely a personal bereavement or something like that for him.

I joined a Bible class not so long ago to brush up on my knowledge and the class was full of Christians as you’d expect. Even they accepted manuscripts would vary significantly and even my Bible at home states “some manuscripts vary wildly”.

It’s why I cannot get my head around the fundamentalist argument.

how much pious fraud are we attributing to the new testament in amongst all the scribal errors? as we know around 7 of pauls letters are forgeries

 

[ZenHalfTimeCrock]

It’s entirely possible to be a dedicated Christian and believer whilst also believing the books of the New Testament were written by humans who were trying to figure out what had happened and therefore making some mistakes.

It’s also obvious to those who have done a bit of research into textual criticism that manuscripts have thousands of small differences due to scribes copying by hand for centuries and centuries. The original gospels likely told the same story as we have now but the wording would have been different. Therefore you cannot surely, as our friend Paul Simpson does.

This shouldn’t change the overall narrative for Christians and as Ehrman said about himself, nothing he researched about scripture convinced him it wasn’t true, it was the combining of suffering and and omnipotent God that did away with his faith 30 years ago - which I think was likely a personal bereavement or something like that for him.

I joined a Bible class not so long ago to brush up on my knowledge and the class was full of Christians as you’d expect. Even they accepted manuscripts would vary significantly and even my Bible at home states “some manuscripts vary wildly”.

It’s why I cannot get my head around the fundamentalist argument.

I agree. A fundamentalist/literalist view of scripture seems debauched to me. If there is a God, I doubt that He would express Himself with all the eloquence and profundity of an accountant authoring an auditor's report.

The great mystics from within the world faiths - the full-time, professional contemplatives, in other words - actually tend to emphasise a via negativa or letting go of conceptions of ultimate reality in their writings, with Meister Eckhart perhaps being the most well-known example from within the Christian tradition:

“The Ultimate and Highest leave taking is leaving God for GOD, leaving your notion of God for an Experience of That which transcends all notions.”

The emphasis is on moving beyond words and concepts, even those enshrined in alleged revelation, that are only of provisional worth in attempts to express what that ultimate reality is.

Examples from other traditions:

'Not this, not this' - The Upanishads

Words are not just wind. Words have something to say. But if what they have to say is not fixed, then do they really say something? Or do they say nothing? People suppose that words are different from the peeps of baby birds, but is there any difference, or isn't there? - Chuang Tzu

'Scripture is no more than waste paper' - Kaiten Nukariya (in his book The Religion of the Samurai)

'Form is emptiness, emptiness is form' - Nagarjuna

Of course, mysticism could be BS as well. Not ruling that possibility out. And it by no means certain that they are all talking about the same ultimate reality.

For me personally, it is the puritanical literalists/fundamentalists that cause all the problems and that get people's backs up.

I have quoted Malise Ruthven before in this thread but it is worth doing so again in relation to fundamentalists, as he reckons that '...they have had a baleful influence on American foreign policy, by tilting it towards the Jewish state, which they eventually aim to obliterate by converting righteous Jews to Christ. They have damaged the education of American children in some places by adding scientific creationism, or its successor ‘intelligent design’ to the curriculum. They inconvenience some women, especially poor women with limited access to travel by making abortion illegal in certain states. On a planetary level, they are selfish, greedy and stupid, damaging the environment by the excessive use of energy and lobbying against environmental controls. What is the point of saving the planet, they argue, if Jesus is arriving tomorrow?

Significantly, Salafi-jihadists within Islam also subscribe to a literal, in this case anthropomorphic image of Allah. In other words, He really does have 'hands', 'eyes' and a 'face' because the Qur'an says so.

 

[arfurclue]

It’s entirely possible to be a dedicated Christian and believer whilst also believing the books of the New Testament were written by humans who were trying to figure out what had happened and therefore making some mistakes.

It’s also obvious to those who have done a bit of research into textual criticism that manuscripts have thousands of small differences due to scribes copying by hand for centuries and centuries. The original gospels likely told the same story as we have now but the wording would have been different. Therefore you cannot surely, as our friend Paul Simpson does, take each word as the literal word of God.

This shouldn’t change the overall narrative for Christians and as Ehrman said about himself, nothing he researched about scripture convinced him it wasn’t true, it was the combining of suffering and and omnipotent God that did away with his faith 30 years ago - which I think was likely a personal bereavement or something like that for him.

I joined a Bible class not so long ago to brush up on my knowledge and the class was full of Christians as you’d expect. Even they accepted manuscripts would vary significantly and even my Bible at home states “some manuscripts vary wildly”.

It’s why I cannot get my head around the fundamentalist argument.

You could also say that each translation/copying may pass through a filter that is the context of the scribe’s (lack of) understanding.
Is it also possible that each person would come to a text such such as the bible from their own level of understanding? Each has their own starting point yet the destination us the same, so the the text may have to contain many, many different (even contradictory?) sets of instructions, even if the essential gist of them may be the same?
eg let’s meet at a new pub tonight. But we live in different part of own. Do we follow the exact same instructions to get there ir do we follow the instructions that are appropriate for each of us?
Just a few thoughts…:)

 

[arfurclue]

I agree. A fundamentalist/literalist view of scripture seems debauched to me. If there is a God, I doubt that He would express Himself with all the eloquence and profundity of an accountant authoring an auditor's report.

The great mystics from within the world faiths - the full-time, professional contemplatives, in other words - actually tend to emphasise a via negativa or letting go of conceptions of ultimate reality in their writings, with Meister Eckhart perhaps being the most well-known example from within the Christian tradition:

“The Ultimate and Highest leave taking is leaving God for GOD, leaving your notion of God for an Experience of That which transcends all notions.”

The emphasis is on moving beyond words and concepts, even those enshrined in alleged revelation, that are only of provisional worth in attempts to express what that ultimate reality is.

Examples from other traditions:

'Not this, not this' - The Upanishads

Words are not just wind. Words have something to say. But if what they have to say is not fixed, then do they really say something? Or do they say nothing? People suppose that words are different from the peeps of baby birds, but is there any difference, or isn't there? - Chuang Tzu

'Scripture is no more than waste paper' - Kaiten Nukariya (in his book The Religion of the Samurai)

'Form is emptiness, emptiness is form' - Nagarjuna

Of course, mysticism could be BS as well. Not ruling that possibility out. And it by no means certain that they are all talking about the same ultimate reality.

For me personally, it is the puritanical literalists/fundamentalists that cause all the problems and that get people's backs up.

I have quoted Malise Ruthven before in this thread but it is worth doing so again in relation to fundamentalists, as he reckons that '...they have had a baleful influence on American foreign policy, by tilting it towards the Jewish state, which they eventually aim to obliterate by converting righteous Jews to Christ. They have damaged the education of American children in some places by adding scientific creationism, or its successor ‘intelligent design’ to the curriculum. They inconvenience some women, especially poor women with limited access to travel by making abortion illegal in certain states. On a planetary level, they are selfish, greedy and stupid, damaging the environment by the excessive use of energy and lobbying against environmental controls. What is the point of saving the planet, they argue, if Jesus is arriving tomorrow?

Significantly, Salafi-jihadists within Islam also subscribe to a literal, in this case anthropomorphic image of Allah. In other words, He really does have 'hands', 'eyes' and a 'face' because the Qur'an says so.

Interesting read. Jesus is sometimes called the prince of peace. The sermon of the mount has him speaking of ‘blessed are the peacemakers.’ The Bible speaks of the peace that passeth understanding. Might this point to a path that is founded in peace, whereas fundamentalism is rooted in (mis)understanding? And the peace that is spoken of may involve a letting go of a conflict between a way of love and a way of fear? Who knows? Or maybe how to know peace involves a willingness to let go of certain understandings - both to know peace and to allow space for understandings to enter that are more in alignment with this peace. Ascendant letting go and descendant embracing/transformation perhaps…

 

[Octavian]

You could also say that each translation/copying may pass through a filter that is the context of the scribe’s (lack of) understanding.
Is it also possible that each person would come to a text such such as the bible from their own level of understanding? Each has their own starting point yet the destination us the same, so the the text may have to contain many, many different (even contradictory?) sets of instructions, even if the essential gist of them may be the same?
eg let’s meet at a new pub tonight. But we live in different part of own. Do we follow the exact same instructions to get there ir do we follow the instructions that are appropriate for each of us?
Just a few thoughts…:)

Well Christianity is more of a religion of advice rather than instruction other than the main determining factor being accepting Jesus for salvation. Everything else (apart from blasphemy of the Holy Spirit) can be forgiven by repentance and accepting the free gift of salvation.

The general premise of the Gospels is fairly accurate enough I feel.