The Bible is supposed to be the infallible word of God. It is supposed to be perfect. However, it was written by man, who is by all means imperfect and corruptible. The content of the Bible was passed down verbally over many centuries, until finally composed as written text. It was edited and altered an unknown number of times throughout many religious communities, and canonized several times by events like the Council of Nicaea and the personal preference of several emperors, kings, and archbishops. It's quite possible that Emperor Constantine so blended the original Christian church with the institutionalized pagan practices of the time that it became almost unrecognizable as the original church established by Jesus. And we'll never know either, because burning the documents of old religions was always a favorite past time of conquering emperors wishing to force their religion onto their new subjects.
Also, some parts of the bible are supposed to be historical – they're a manifest of real events, real people, and real times. Others are supposed to be allegorical – stories or fables, told as a metaphor to convey a specific message or lesson. Unfortunately, the bible only sometimes makes a clear distinction between the two. Other times we just have to guess, but I think more often than not most people lean toward the historical and factual nature of things if it's not clear.
The bible is supposed to be the end-all, tangible embodiment of the Christian faith, and it is supposed to shape your life as a Christian. But how can one be expected to put their whole faith into a book that is imperfect? If it was originally written by God, it was most certainly edited by man later – either by accident, by personal agenda, or by both.
Here's my response: if some of the factual information is contradictory, it could easily be because the people of the time wrote what they knew based on the information available to them at the time. I'm ok with the fact that many of the laws written for the Jews were applicable only to their culture 5,000 years ago, and that maybe they don't apply to us today. I'm not about to sell my daughter off to slavery, and I don't go stand outside the city walls every time I sit near a woman on her period, but if that worked for them then great. I'm ok with the fact that Noah didn't really get EVERY species of animal onto his boat, but he did get every one that he could think of, and to him that was everything, so he told his story that way. Maybe it's not the literal facts that are that important, but the underlying message that we're supposed to be hearing. From what I've heard, the message is this: God is love. Everything else is circumstantial.
But here's the problem: how do we know what's accurate and what's not? If you can accept that Noah didn't actually didn't get every animal on his boat, why can't you shoot the moon and say that maybe Jesus didn't actually come back from the dead? (cue blood boiling at my last comment). And how do we know what laws to follow and what to ignore? Most Christians still consider homosexuality a terrible sin, but they eat shrimp and bacon all day long (mmmmmm... bacon...) It all jeopardizes the validity of the entire book, and hence, the entire faith. It's definitely a paradox that's hard to wrap your brain around.
Somebody throw me a bone here.
This feeds my disdain for holier than thou Christians. My take away from years of going to church is this:
ReplyDeleteThe bible is set of stories meant to give the reader guidance in the decisions they make. The crux of the entire religion is to be a good person and good to your fellow man.
When people begin to literally interpret passages is when they lose touch with reality. Take for instance:
2 Corinthians 6:14: Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness?
In my opinion, this is the most abused verse in the bible. People take it to mean they should not associate or befriend nonbelievers. This creates divisions and resentment with non-Christians. I am sorry but no one want to be a part of a religion which turns you into an a-hole.
Contrast that with this verse, which I believe holds the true aims of Christianity:
"By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." John 13:35
Be a good person, love one another. Christianity is not practiced through sunday church services and bible studies, but everyday of your life in the good deeds you do for your fellow man.
I don't know if I helped at all Chris, but this was a long overdue rant I felt the need to express.
First off, AWESOME fine on that bacon-wrapped shrimp picture.
ReplyDeleteI think most "liberal" Christians do interpret the bible just as you described - good ideas, the world of God via the filter of man, and generally true, but in a "story" kinda way.
The rub comes when the bible literalists say that the bible is necessarily true and accurate, and why not: God is all powerful, and guided the hand of man as he wrote it. He wouldn't allow weird changes to take place, so the current bibles we have are the literal Word of God.
This, of course, is absurd, but I've met many a Christian who believe it. You can show them differences between translations, historical evidence (like you described above), and even point out specifics in the text that contradict, and they'll STILL say that the bible is the uncorrupted Word. I'm a pretty firm believer that this type of belief is a mental illness.
Ah, but you haven't addressed is how because of Jesus the old rules have changed. For thousands of years after the Israelites received the 10 Commandments (and a number of other instructions from God) the temple leaders began to add their interpretation of the law to the laws themselves so that by the time Jesus was born there were thousands and thousands of laws controlling every aspect of life. Under the new system that Jesus started many of the old rules (like no bacon) no longer applied. The Apostle Paul wrote about this; that because of Christ he was free to eat and drink whatever he felt like UNLESS it caused a fellow believer a moral dilemma, in which case he would rather be a vegetarian for the rest of his days.
ReplyDeleteThe other thing to keep in mind is that many of the laws that don't make sense to us were because God wanted to protect his people. Laws about what animals couldn't be eaten and about special cleansing ceremonies were because God knew about germs spreading disease and the people did not. Now that science has advanced we are able to stay healthy (more or less) so the spirit of the law is still there even if we don't follow what was written.
And, just to touch on one more thing, who says Noah didn't get every species on the ark? The Bible says (emphasis mine) "Pairs of clean and unclean animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground, male and female, CAME TO NOAH and entered the ark, as God had commanded Noah." Noah didn't have to go find anything, God brought the animals to Noah and I suspect that Noah had no idea what half the animals were! Which is just another example of God providing the resources we need to carry out His plans when we obey and follow Him with what we have.
reply to worcutt: the yolked together verse is usually taken out of context and an excuse to stay away from people who are different, I agree. But what it means is to not enter into serious relationships (i.e. marriage and possibly business partnerships) with someone who doesn't follow your same faith. This makes SO much sense! If you firmly believe one thing and your spouse firmly believes something else that is going to cause conflict. Or if I start a business and because of my beliefs I want to be as fair to my customers as possible and I have a partner who is most concerned about making a profit, again there will be conflict. That's all the verse is trying to say, not avoid everyone.
@Laura spot on, I completely agree.
ReplyDeleteChris! This are some very excellent questions and i'm so glad you're asking them! And while I will not tackle all of them, there was one that i wanted to see if i could clarify for you a little bit and somewhat imperfectly...
ReplyDelete"[The Bible] was written by man, who is by all means imperfect and corruptible. The content of the Bible was passed down verbally over many centuries, until finally composed as written text"
I personally believe that every word of the text of the bible as we have it today is infallible according to will of God. But in order to believe this, you must ask yourself a question: Do I believe that the God who created the universe, who is infinate in power and love, is ABLE and WILLING to preserve a perfect and trustworthy textual revelation of Himself for His people? If you can believe that the answer to this question is yes, then as you begin to investigate the historical preservation of the bible, you will begin to see that the bible is indeed more trustworthy than you know.
Though the bible was PENNED by men, the words and the spirit of the text came from the Holy Spirit who filled each of these men as they wrote. Each book is consistant with all the others as they reveal God's character, his will, and his ways, though they were written by people from many different nations, over thousands of years, from every economic class and profession. And while the bible has been translated many times, each translation is (with a few exceptions) pulled from the original language using THOUSANDS of manuscripts as confirmation.
I'm really so excited that you are investigating these things so earnestly! If you are interested, Lee Strobel has written some excellent books investigating some of these very foundational issues with Christianity. He IS a christian, but when he began his investigation, he was an atheist investigative journalist and was looking to disprove christianity once and for all.
Hope my comment was helpful and not to vague or confusing :)
P.S. I definitely think you hit on the main point: GOD IS LOVE. That is the central message of the bible. All those other parts of the bible is just an elaboration on that point, to show us HOW MUCH we are loved and forgiven, and how beautiful our Creator is!
ReplyDeleteArielastar, which version (and which translation) of the bible is "infallible according to will of God"? All of them? Or only some?
ReplyDeletei'm thinking you want me to get technical here...so here's my own personal breakdown. I use the English Standard Version for my own bible study, but I also love the New International Version because the wording is a little more friendly. The problem with either of these versions, however, is that they are not the original language. To get the FULL meaning of the scriptures, i would need to study hebrew, greek, and aramaic, and read the texts that way. Fortunately there are commentaries, and dictionaries that help us to do some "original language study" even without knowing the original language.
ReplyDeleteMy point, however, is that the scriptures were meant to be compared to one another, in order to gain complete understanding. We should compare one english version to another in order to get the full picture, and we should see what the nuances of original words were in original language.
Even scriptures of the same version can be interpreted differently by two different people however. If one person isolates the verse, it is easy to twist it to mean anything they want. The scriptures must be read holistically, and with an open mind. If you read them with an agenda, you will see only what you want to see, and not what was really intended.
The same God who had those word written down, has given men the wisdom to understand what he was saying by them. My confidence is in Him that He will continue to speak only the truth through them. And as we put those truths into practice by faith, we begin to see how real and true they really are in a real and practical way.
Chris: I really appreciated your post from today too, about the robot, and I agree with you! There are many Christians who believe only because they have been told what to believe, and they never investigate for themselves whether it is the truth or even if make any practical sense. God has not called us to set our intelligence aside when we read the scriptures or go to church. He want us to worship Him not with just our hearts but with our MINDS too, especially since He IS the author of wisdom and intelligence. (Consider Solomon, who was supposed to be the wisest man to ever live! He not only was a great philosopher and scientist, but also wrote many parts of the scripture, including the Proverbs which are all practical truths that we can still apply today!)
I am really enjoying reading your thoughts on Christianity! It's helping me solidify in my own head what I believe. Thankyou! :)
--Natalia