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 Posted: Wed Feb 02, 2005 2:44 pm
QuizMiz chaoticpuppet xdarktigress The bible has lot of faults and errors in it. It was written by man, man is prone to error. Even the pope, supposedly the most holy men around, has to go to confession once a week. So how could man NOT mess the bible up some way or another? That's why the bible can't be taken literally. Its more of a large scale parable to how we should live our lives. Again, if the bible were divinely inspired, that would mean that god told the author at that time, exactly what to put in, and how to write it, etc. Again, the question is, was it divinely inspired? Unless it was purposly altered for the control of the population. Ever read 'handmaid's tale'? If the bible was divinely inspired, that would mean that god kind of broke one of his own rules. God doesn't come down to earth often, the bible is an excuse for him to do so. If the bible was divinely inspired that means that god pulled out all the stops (so to say) on the authors freewill. That author had to write exactly what god told him to write, exactly how god meant it. Again, the question is, was the bible truelly divinely inspired?
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Posted: Wed Feb 02, 2005 5:40 pm
it was dictated by god, but peolpe dont always here right(as in a joke i know about a priest dying and finding out it was celebrate and not celebate)and can make small errors that can change the whole meaning(agin the joke).
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Posted: Fri Feb 04, 2005 8:45 pm
My personal approach is to look at it in its historical context.
Much of the Old Testament, I do not take literally. Between the oral tradition and the fact that it was not originally written in English, I don't see how taking it literally is helpful.
How many ancient cultures have a creation story? How many have stories that explain why the worl is the way that it is? The ancient Hebrews had their Creation stories, as did the Greeks/Romans, the Egyptians, the Native Americans...having a creation story is part of culture. Why shouldn't the Hebrews have their creation story?
In fact, there are actually TWO creation stories in the Bible. In one, God creates the universe and everything in it in seven days. In the other, the world has basically already been made. God creates Adam first and Adam names all the animals and plats that are created afterwards. Plus there's the Fall of Man bit included.
The important message contained in this for me, is not that God created everything in seven days, but rather that he created everything and that humans are special, but still vulnerable to doing bad deeds.
Also, the Bible is not to only text to contain a flood story. The Epic of Gilgamesh has a flood story and I believe the Greeks have a flood story as well.
Even if you don't believe in Christianity, the Bible really is a great study on ancient civilizations. It's got poems, songs, parables, stories, letters, geneology, laws...you name it. It's quite an anthology.
The New Testament is considerably more accurate considering that the authors were either apostles or close friends of apostles so the time they were written was far closer to the event then those of the Old Testament. And the fact that there are four accounts of Christ's life contained in the NT, three of them are quite similar to each other. That is another indication of accuracy. Again that does not mean that I take it completely literally, however I feel safe taking it more literally than the Old Testament.
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Posted: Sun Feb 06, 2005 10:18 am
it is disrespectful to ancient traditions to say that they mangle the truth. just exactly why should oral tradition be less reliable or truthful than what is written down? is not our society today filled with written lies and disinformation?
a man named kenneth bailey tested the accuracy of two-thousand year old oral trsitions in palestine, by comparing them with archeological findings. it turned out that the oral traditions were more accurate than the written records.
the same thing has been discovered in the country of Mali in Africa which used to be the kingdom of Timbuktu. Ancient oral traditions handed down from one generation to another were more accurate than written records, according to archeological discoveries.
the eason they are accurate is that a shamn, priest, or (in mali) storyteller would paintakingly teach all his or her lore to an apprentice through constant memorization and repetition. any mistakes were punished. there were horrible taboos and threats against anyone who dared change any of the stories. so nobody did.
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Posted: Wed Feb 09, 2005 10:34 am
I would definitely have to agree with the OP on this one. I study the bible as well, but I don't take any of it as being meant literally. A man as spiritually advanced as Jesus surely was teaching on a deeper level than just the surface of what is being said. Of course I'm looking at this from the viewpoint of a Kriya Yogi, so I don't have the same background as most Christians, since I moved away from Christianity about two years ago and never really got into it much other than going to church occasionally. Hell, last night I read the NIV bible for like half an hour, which was the longest I'd read the bible for in my entire life!
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Posted: Wed Feb 09, 2005 4:06 pm
by comparing traditional stories told in Palestinian villages to archeological records, scholar Kenneth Bailey of the American University in Beirut was able to prove that oral records are more accurate than writtem ones.
because there was not other way for ancient people to record important truths, they surrounded the transmission of these tales with powerful taboos, and preserved the transmission of them with painstaking memorization and training from master (shaman, storyteller) to apprentice.
it is a western european bias to prefer writing to oral tradition, ia bias ironically especially among the people who invented (written) propoganda, the Germans.
by the way, Moses had nothing to do with Sarah; that would have been Abraham.
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