This guy gives me hope for the future of true Christianity

[Vincent Vega]

But it's interesting to see how thinking, intelligent people can base their judgement on this book and how they interpret this book.

[financeguy]

Originally posted by Vincent Vega
But it's interesting to see how thinking, intelligent people can base their judgement on this book and how they interpret this book.

To me, it's vaguely disturbing, particularly and especially when they otherwise appear to be thinking and intelligent.

[Vincent Vega]

Yes, I'm often quite confused.

[maycocksean]

Originally posted by financeguy


To me, it's vaguely disturbing, particularly and especially when they otherwise appear to be thinking and intelligent.

We try to keep the craziness hidden. . .but sometimes it SLIPS OUT!!!! Mwuhahahahahahahhaha!

Did I just do that?

[Vincent Vega]

[Ormus]

Originally posted by maycocksean
Geez, this is worse than waiting for the final Harry Potter book. . .

And it feels like it's going to be just as long...heh.

Well, I won't be as bad as St. Thomas Aquinas, whose definitive work (and the one that earned him his sainthood), Summa Theologica, took something like 17 years to write...and he died before he could finish it completely.

[phillyfan26]

Originally posted by AEON


You can read quite a bit of it by doing a search on this forum. Ormus/Melon has written volumes on it - much of it is very compelling and well thought out.

I have, in fact, read much of his writings, and I frequently link to his posts when people bring up these misguided arguments, in fact, I did so in this thread.

I enjoy each one.

[yolland]

The Deuteronomic injunction to kill a rebellious son was abrogated well before Jesus' time anyway, and capital punishment, period, lost rabbinic sanction in 30 AD and never regained it afterwards. Numerous other laws have been rabbinically abrogated since then; my own denomination is currently in the process of doing so for the Levitical laws traditionally applied to justify denying gay Jews the right to marry in synagogue. In Judaism, if in the present environment it's perceived to be impossible to apply a law without violating the precepts underlying it (or another law), then the rabbinate has the authority to abrogate it. Christianity didn't formally inherit this concept (la'akor davar min haTorah), although Jesus' death and resurrection is taken to effectively "abrogate" most of the 'Old Testament' laws and as for the rest, I don't see why the same principle couldn't be applied, though that's not my affair.

I don't understand why it should seem disturbing or mysterious that people continue to find value and meaning in longstanding social and cultural institutions...we don't reject the Constitution because many of its framers owned slaves and supported dispossessing Native Americans, or dismiss the long list of formative works in Western thought which draw upon Greek philosophy because they owned slaves too, or refuse to take Heidegger seriously because he was a Nazi. Of course one can argue whether any god exists at all, whether souls exist, against the intrusion of religion-based ethical concerns into the civic sphere, etc., just as one can critique the assumptions underpinning particular articulations of any other worldview; but the general human tendency to find great meaning and value in familiar ideas and institutions, even as many aspects of those are transformed or at times overriden by new ones, doesn't strike me as particularly surprising. Culture isn't an empirical process anyhow; more of an endless series of related conversations.

[MadelynIris]

Yolland rocks.

[phillyfan26]

My biggest problem is not with the Bible itself, but with the misinterpretations (homosexuality being a sin) that cause unnecessary injustice. All because people refuse to look at the context, or even look for themselves.

[BVS]

Originally posted by financeguy
The Bible says a lot of things - Iron Horse's statement is only 'controversial' to those who choose to identify with the 'liberal' strand within Christianity.

It may make liberal Christians uncomfortable when they are reminded of the strictures on homosexuality as set out by St Paul - in a similar fashion, Christians of a conservative bent may recoil when, whilst appealing to Biblical junctures to buttress their support for the death penalty against adult criminals, precepts from the same book which advocate child-killing are brought to their attention.

When all is said and done, the debate is largely irrelevant to those of us who prefer not to believe in a story book written by sheep-herders two thousand years ago.

I'm sure that's very true in the, conservatives once used it to justify slavery and interracial marriage illegal type of thinking.

[phillyfan26]

Originally posted by financeguy
It may make liberal Christians uncomfortable when they are reminded of the strictures on homosexuality as set out by St Paul

*waits for Ormus' post to address this*

Oh, I'm not liberal by the way.

[Vincent Vega]

Originally posted by yolland

I don't understand why it should seem disturbing or mysterious that people continue to find value and meaning in longstanding social and cultural institutions...we don't reject the Constitution because many of its framers owned slaves and supported dispossessing Native Americans, or dismiss the long list of formative works in Western thought which draw upon Greek philosophy because they owned slaves too, or refuse to take Heidegger seriously because he was a Nazi. Of course one can argue whether any god exists at all, whether souls exist, against the intrusion of religion-based ethical concerns into the civic sphere, etc., just as one can critique the assumptions underpinning particular articulations of any other worldview; but the general human tendency to find great meaning and value in familiar ideas and institutions, even as many aspects of those are transformed or at times overriden by new ones, doesn't strike me as particularly surprising. Culture isn't an empirical process anyhow; more of an endless series of related conversations.

I'm not confused by people believing in the Bible or taking it as an advice.
But what disturbs me is when people base their thinking only on what the Bible tells them, and argue only with the Bible.
For example with the issue of homosexuality, you often see the only reason why they reject homosexuality is because they interpret the Bible as going against it. And they don't even accept Ormus pointing out how this is a misconception based on bias of writers, mistranslation and leaving out context.
Even though they might read the Bible as condemning homosexuality, why is it impossible to say in that case: "Well, what the Bible tells me here goes against my personal belief."?
We like to take other books or people as advice, and look up to then. But at the same time we need to have the strength to stand up and say No! when we see something wrong.
So it might be that they see the condemnation of homosexuals not as wrong, but don't see a better justification for their bias as taking the Bible as a source. I really don't know.

So, it's not the person that believes, or uses the Bible for advice, but the person who bases his perception on more or less everything on what the Bible tells him.

[Irvine511]

Originally posted by yolland
TI don't understand why it should seem disturbing or mysterious that people continue to find value and meaning in longstanding social and cultural institutions...we don't reject the Constitution because many of its framers owned slaves and supported dispossessing Native Americans, or dismiss the long list of formative works in Western thought which draw upon Greek philosophy because they owned slaves too, or refuse to take Heidegger seriously because he was a Nazi.

but no one claims that the constitution or greek philosophy are inerrant expressions of Divine will. these are viewed as human things, written by humans for humans, and properly understood in their historical context.

not so, for many, with the Bible. it's the ultimate trump card, the rock from which the feel they can stand with certainty and understand an uncertain, confusing world. a security blanket, of sorts.

for some.

[AEON]

Originally posted by yolland
Culture isn't an empirical process anyhow; more of an endless series of related conversations.

This is one of the best quotes that I have read in this forum!

[yolland]

Originally posted by Irvine511
but no one claims that the constitution or greek philosophy are inerrant expressions of Divine will.

The Constitution can be amended, yes, but it would be wrong to say that the presumptions about human beings underpinning it are based on reason alone. Can you prove empirically that we possess inalienable human rights?

[Irvine511]

Originally posted by yolland

The Constitution can be amended, yes, but it would be wrong to say that the presumptions about human beings underpinning it are based on reason alone. Can you prove empirically that we possess inalienable human rights?

i'd consider the Constitution/DOI perhaps the culminating documents of the Age of Reason and logical expressions that buttress what might be termed faith-based beliefs. and there seems to me to be a great big chasm in attitude between a document written by humans that expresses their inalienable human rights versus a book that humans assert was written by God that tells them they have inalienable human rights.

and i don't see anyone insisting upon the inerrancy of these documents, or others. and, in the context of this discussion, no one takes the "spirit" of the Bible in the way that you -- and i -- take the "spirit" of ancient philosophy or Heidigger or the Constitution. when we're talking about notions of sin in here, we've had assertions based upon specific scriptural passages that are used to create a very literal picture of Hell. because it comes from an inerrant source.

[yolland]

Yes...I wasn't making a case for Biblical literalism, much less for the Bible as a legislative source; just pointing out that the argument for democracy from natural law (which is the source of our concept of inalienable human rights; the utilitarian Bentham famously derided it as "nonsense on stilts") also relies on a taken-for-granted absolute. The concept proper comes from English common law via social contract theory, though, not from the Bible itself.

[unico]

sorry, i know this isn't part of the discussion, but i had to look up more about Jay Bakker. dude is HOT! He gives me hope for Christianity too



thanks for sharing Britt!

[U2isthebest]

Originally posted by unico
sorry, i know this isn't part of the discussion, but i had to look up more about Jay Bakker. dude is HOT! He gives me hope for Christianity too



thanks for sharing Britt!

Down girl...he's married!