By Vorjack
During the early part of the 20th century, many conservative Christian groups amused themselves by publishing lists of the “fundamentals” of the faith. These bulleted creeds are the basis for our word “fundamentalists,” though the word has been stretched since its creation. Near the top of each of these lists was biblical inerrancy. For example, here is part of the 1921 Christian Fundamentals Association creed:
We believe in the plenary and verbal inspiration of the Bible as the Word of God; that it is authentic in its matter, authoritative in its counsels, inerrant in the original writings, and the only infallible rule of faith and practice.
Modernists vs. Traditionalists
Pullquote: The truth is staring the Christian world in the face: the stories of the old Hebrew books cannot be taken as literal statements of fact.
Biblical inerrancy was important in forming the fundamentalist movement. It was a reaction to liberal Christians who were beginning to approach the bible with a more rational eye. Higher criticism was the order of the day. Miracles were being explained away, traditional theology was being scrapped, and the cross was moving away from the center of the faith.
The fundamentalists were clearly right that this was a move away from traditional Christianity. However, their response was an odd fusion of tradition and modernism: they began to defend and reinterpret traditional concepts with modern ideas. Thus we say that fundamentalism is a reaction to, and a product of, modernity.
Problems of Philosophy
Pullquote: The Bible Says It.
I Believe It.
That Settles It.
While most traditional Christians of the pre-modern period would not have used the phrase “inerrant,” I believe it’s safe to say that they would have accepted the concept if it were explained to them. Certainly the bible was considered the ultimate authority.
But fundamentalism went off the rails when it unconsciously employed the Scottish “Common Sense” philosophy. This school of thought was a rejection of the radical skepticism of philosophers like Kant and Hume, and stated that there was no reason to doubt such basic facts as the existence of the external world, cause and effect, and the continuity of the self. This philosophy had an anti-elitist tone and greatly influenced Americans — not surprising since both the nation and the philosophy took shape at the same time.
As American Christians absorbed this philosophy they began applying it to their religion, and in particular their bibles:
Common Sense philosophy affirmed their ability to know “the facts” directly. With the scriptures at hand as a compendium of facts, there was no need to go further. They needed only to classify the facts, and follow wherever they might lead. (George Marsden, Fundamentalism in American Culture, p. 56)
Results
Pullquote: In attacking a group that was undermining traditional Christianity, fundamentalists became unmoored from the traditions of Christianity.
By asserting their ability to know the simple “facts” found in the bible, they were unconsciously throwing out millennia of traditional theology involving allegorical interpretations, historical traditions and complex Greek philosophy. While traditional Christians may have accepted the bible as without error, fundamentalists were creating a new concept under the guise of the old. Inerrancy was now essentially literalism, and the fundamentalists put it front and center in their faith.
In attacking a group that was undermining traditional Christianity, fundamentalists became unmoored from the traditions of Christianity. Further, by embracing the anti-elitist undertones in “Common Sense” philosophy, fundamentalists were making every man his own biblical critic. The results of this are odd new “traditions” like pre-millennial dispensationalism and literal six-day creation.
Modernity Strike Back
Pullquote: Inerrancy is a zombie concept that has remarkably persisted for decades in spite of long having died the death of a thousand qualifications.
There is now a great deal of controversy within Christian circles over the meaning of inerrancy. For example, see the lively discussion linked to on James McGrath’s blog Exploring Our Matrix.
Many Christians wish to separate inerrancy from the popular understanding of literalism. Others suggest scrapping the phrase altogether. While these arguments have deep meaning for individuals and specific communities, it remains to be seen if they will penetrate down to the average layman. Literalism seems to have a strong attraction from the average American evangelical, and any attempt to redefine inerrancy may get dismissed as a “wishy-washy” approach to the bible.
Vorjack is a librarian/archivist and a public historian, living with his wife in history-soaked Albany, New York.
Well, I certainly learned something. Very nice article.
There are two distinct brands of Christianity (and religion in general), and I think we atheists tend to lump them all together. The vast majority of Christians and people who think of themselves (however mildly) as Christians ‘believe in’ Noah’s Ark precisely as much as atheists do – ‘it’s a fun story that’s a bit silly if you stop to think about it’.
It’s really easy to target literalist/fundamentalists, because what they believe is simultaneously both easily-defined and self-evidently ridiculous. The only sensible approach is the FSTDT one – point and laugh, with the occasional caveats about conmen and worries that the ‘mentalists might have political influence.
But that’s not to let the mainstream Christians off the hook.
The problem with *mainstream* Christianity that both atheists and fundamentalists have identified is that it’s *so* vague, *so* wishy-washy, *so* badly-thought-through that it’s barely a belief system at all. ‘Evolution happened just like the scientists say, but God was involved’ is as nonsensical a statement as ‘I’ve got a dog, it’s a cat’.
It’s a tricky one, though – a section of the population is always going to have irrational, happy-clappy beliefs. If they’re not doing any harm, where’s the harm? Clearly, fundamentalism and creationism and evangelism (Christian and Muslim) causes harm. Clearly, the Pope saying condom use in Africa spreads AIDS causes harm. Clearly, priests in it for the money and the access it gives them to choirboys do harm. But the vast majority of mainstream Christians aren’t that. They might, at times, unconsciously enable that, but they are not that.
I think atheists have to reach an accommodation with mainstream Christians. The archbishop of Canterbury and Richard Dawkins agree completely about fundamentalism, and are only a sentence or two apart on everything else. I think there’s a common enemy, and we need to be pointing our (non literal) guns at the fundamentalists, not at each other.
And that means we have to know the enemy – atheists aren’t ‘fundamentalists’, any more than most Christians aren’t literalists.
The problem that I experienced in church was a distinct ignorance of church history and biblical formation. We were indoctrinated into thinking the Bible was “inerrant” and “inspired”–as though there was a form of celestial dictation. Our preachers knew nothing of the many languages that comprised the original texts and knew nothing about canon formation. Go to a fundamentalist church and start talking about the Apocalypse of Peter or the Infancy Gospel of St. Thomas; you’ll likely get blank stares.
This is thre reason that C.S.Lewis (of whom I was a great fan, back in the day), despite his popularity among evangelicals, really has such a different flavour than fundamentalist writings. His conservative Christianity was in touch with that historical tradition that pre-dates fundamentalism, and allowed for more nuanced and non-literal readings of the Bible.
inerrant in the original writings
Excellent, I’m down with that. Now if someone could supply me a list of books of the Bible which are available “in the original writings…”
This is a good piece.
I wonder how much attachment to Biblical literalism is cultural. I think this form of Christianity has become so tied with Americana and apple pie that people are more tied to it for cultural reasons than religious ones. I realize it is not only an American thing but it does seem to be more prevalent in English speaking outposts of colonialism – Canada, Australia, the US – where rugged individualism is part and parcel of the society. I think it has the same feel as when gun owners say you’d have to pull the gun out of their cold, dead hands. It’s part of who they think they are and who they want their children to be – on almost a DNA level.
Good post Vorjack
I don’t think that Common Sense Realism was accepted unwittingly though, I think at least for some such as Schaeffer it was a conscious adaptation as well as his use of Kuyper’s thought.
I’m going to be gone for the rest of the day, but I would like to know how you break down inerrancy/literalism from your viewpoint. I know there are different ways to view the debate, but I think that modern evangelicals have a viewpoint predicated on the reformation idea of sola scriptura, hence the idea of a “paper” pope. Even the Westminster Confession seems to hold the ideas of what you are seeming to call literalism.
The problem to me is not the anti-elitist tones of common sense realism, in essence that’s what Jefferson did as well. The problem was the anti-intellectual bias that crept into the fundamentalist movement. D.A. Carson, Os Guinness, and many other Christians document the flight from scientific inquiry and philosophical thought that marked the church during the university and enlightenment settings. I know that most here hate the Discovery Institute and the such, but what most don’t realize that they would be persona non grata at some churches today for even trying to do “science” because that’s the realm of the devil according to some churches. That anti-scientific bias has roots in around the fundamentalist controversy.
Inerrancy – Christians are brainwashed by the elite group.
Fundamentalism – Christians are told to brainwash themselves.
Thank you, Vorjack. The McGrath article (following Vorjack’s links) makes the important point that the issues of literalism and inerrancy aren’t simply about a conflict between science and religion; they’re also about interpretive issues arising solely from the ancient texts themselves.
Some of these literalism issues echo earlier Christian debates. The youthful Augustine rejected Christianity because he thought Christians interpreted the Bible literally–and obviously no one with half an ounce of sense could accept those texts literally, even before Copernicus and Darwin came onto the scene. As an older, non-literalist Christian, Augustine argued in De Doctrina Christiana that people who insist on interpreting the Bible literally are carnally-minded and unfit for spiritual things.
I suppose what I find most staggering, though, is that fundamentalists can insist on interpreting the Bible literally when not even the apostle Paul did so. When the apostle Paul quotes the books of Moses he frequently interprets those texts in non-literal ways. (See, for example, 1 Cor. 9:9-10 [referencing Deut. 25] and 1 Cor. 10:4 [referencing Exodus 17].) And, I always thought fundamentalists took the apostle Paul to be the final word on every issue.
I have a Christian friend who calls this belief in the absolute inerrancy of the Bible to be “a form of idolatry,” which, of course, goes against one of them commandment thingies.
@Vorjack:
Good post! I’d love to have read more, but I know what a stickler Daniel is on the word count. ;) (JK Daniel, I know I’m a windbag.)
@Devysciple:
This is a good question for everyone to ask themselves, I think. I’ve been thinking about this lately for two reasons. The first is that one of my housemates is in AA, and at the core of the program is a devotion to some kind of higher power one can look to for guidance. So while I would normally revel in being a heathen, I feel obliged to hold back. Not that I think I would shake his faith; I simply think it would be a vulgar thing to do.
The other was from work. A coworker said to me “I think morality comes from God,” and I was ready to go off. Actually, I started. I said: “Yeah, morality. A guy in long, flowing opulent robes, covers himself in gold jewelry, lives in a castle, gets in front of crowds of thousands and tells them that poverty is a virtue. F— him.” The man wasn’t a catholic and took it in good stride, but I guess what struck is me is how offended I was.
Thinking about this, I came to realize that it was essentially because my coworker claimed that the only way that I could be a decent human being was that my coworker’s imaginary friend forces me to be that way. I guess it made me realize that no one really knows what sort of statement is going to offend someone else, and that the sort of flippant dismissals of theism I’m personally disposed to make have a time and a place to be made: within the context of this sort of discussion. In short, I realized that I don’t want to evangelize (though I’ve resolved to try not to be offended so easily).
@John C:
You keep insisting we adopt a child-like mentality. Let me explain why that is not good advice if you’re trying to make us Christians.
I was not a “born atheist” to use Devysciple’s phrase. I was born into a Catholic family, and although we weren’t terribly observant, I had a first communion and so forth. But by the time I was getting my first communion, I had already decided that I didn’t believe in God (this is somewhere age 10-12, so my mind was plenty child-like).
I remember a particular conversation with my mother where I protested the amount of time I had to spend memorizing stupid prayers and rituals and so forth. “I don’t believe in God,” I told her. She started crying and said “You haven’t even given it a chance!”
I hope she realized how much bullshit that was, even if it only happened later. In reality, I had never questioned the existence of God from the time I was old enough to learn the word up until a particular incident. I’d never heard an adult question the existence of God, and everyone seemed to devote so much time and energy to this “belief” thing, I guess I just assumed there was something to it.
I was a little distracted by learning everything else small children learn, so I didn’t dig TOO deeply into it. Although, there was always something fishy about it. The little bit of scripture I’d heard and a lot of mythology seems to suggest that heaven is in the sky, so I asked my parents: “Does God live in the sky?” They equivocated. They wouldn’t tell me yes or no. So I began to realize that maybe adults didn’t know as much as they seemed to know.
And then one day I said something about God to my older brother (I bet I was about 7 or 8 at the time). He said: “I’m an atheist. I don’t believe in God.” I was blown away. I hadn’t realized that was even an option. But immediately, the world made more sense to me. There was a reason why things like heaven not being in the sky and the trinity didn’t make sense to me: they were made up. It was pure victory for my child-like perspective of the world; i.e. a perspective free of prejudice, presuppositions, and bullshit.
You, I, and Albert Einstein all agree that people should try to think like children. The difference is, Al and I know what that really means.
Another really well written piece, Vorjack.
Excellent post. I would add that the ‘average evangelical’ not only believes in the inerrancy of the bible, but also in the inerrancy of his own interpretation.
Vorjack – I should have said this earlier, but this really is an excellent article.
Seeing you are in Albany is making me miss my days at the capitol.
@Steve…
To answer your question…No, I do not think my words will be received as rational or coherent on this forum. My heart is to share the beautiful in truth, in love. Reason is not the realm in which we receive spiritual truth. There is nothing wrong with reason, its just limited to its practical purposes. I have often used the following to illustrate how reason and faith are not in competition, rather they are different utilities altogether:
Upon the plane of the mystical, reason no longer possesses that strength and power, which it has within philosophy, for then it is upon a trans-rational plane. A man, caught up into the mystical plane, into a mystic contemplation, then “becomes bereft of the reliance upon reason”, he surmounts reason.
Does reason become altered or otherwise enlightened by revelation in what has been received upon the mystical plane?
At some point in our lives we all come to the place where we ask ourselves, is this all there is? There must be more? The good news is that there is so much more, not just because we want there to be but because He is the very more we are searching for. It’s all about His presence, His life…in us.
Rational? no…truthful? yes and thank God.
Bill…
No, its not simply the verses. Man, in his original construct was fashioned in and by Truth. Truth is a Person, Christ Jesus. You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. The word “know” is translated in an intimate, even sexual kind of union way. But its referring to a spiritual context not a physical one although scripture employs the symbolism of sexual union to illustrate the point of our union and oneness with Christ.
We “know” the truth because He (His spirit) is united with ours and now we are…one. Each man can know this truth in and for himself. The verses are more like beliefs but the spirit union, that knowing experience is much more intimate, definitive.
He does not dwell in temples made with human hands. Religion with all its external rule keeping dogma can never give this to man, only the Life-giver Himself who dwells within. I have said that Truth can not be substantiated by our inferior means, that is by reasoning and physical testing alone. It can only be received by faith which operates in the unseen realm wherein truth resides, the realm of the heavenlies, or spirit realm. But, as with everything else, God supplies the faith in the form of a gift.
So how do I know? By revelation (revealing) of the spirit of the indwelling Christ by the faith that God supplies as promised.
We can all know. Its our birthright, if we want it.
Winter…Philology
A really interesting post. This is one of the few posts I’ve found on the internet that treats Evangelical Fundamentalism as a historical trend, not a general ‘condition’ that religious people might suffer from. I personally believe in a qualified ‘inerrancy’ of the Bible, but not in literalism.
This is an excellent introductory post on the history of fundamentalism.
For further reading (which includes several of the themes highlighted by Vorjack), I suggest Karen Armstrong’s “The Battle for God”, especially pp. 167-182.
Check out a limited preview (which omits a few of these pages) on google – http://bit.ly/rdq5P.
@ John C
“The “New Jerusalem” is in you, the garden of your inner man.
You see, this kind of meaningless twaddle is exactly why you are a figure of fun and not of respect. It sounds “deep” and “meaningful” but it means nothing. You will never be taken seriously if you offer this glib fortune-cookie drivel as an answer to rational debate. I understand why you do it (you have nothing intelligent to say) but you Christians are going to have to come up with something better than this to lose your “looney” status.
Oh,and lose the “Christianity is not a religion” nonsense – of course it is. And just as ridiculous as all the others.
CS Lewis believed that you couldn’t possibly be a Christian if you lived in a Republic:
http://thinkexist.com/quotation/there-right-in-the-midst-of-our-lives-is-that/761498.html
He was an Oxbridge don, exactly the same tradition as Dawkins and Pullman. He ‘believed in’ Adam and Eve, but the way he believed in it was infinitely more sophisticated than ‘it’s in the Bible’. His Christianity was reflective, massively intellectual, well-read, comparative, questioning and deeply personal. He’s basically exactly the opposite of a fundamentalist.
Ah, but without the original writings, you can’t prove they aren’t inerrant! ;)
When they say ‘original writings’, they often mean the King James Version of the Bible.
Yeah, I know. But that’s what they mean. There is the urban myth that a politician in some Southern state spoke out against bilingual signs with the line ‘if the English language was good enough for Jesus Christ, it is good enough for us’.
Biblical literalism ought to be a coherent belief system – there is something, I think, in Muslims insisting not only that the Koran means the Koran in Arabic, but also acknowledging that words change meaning over time. If it’s the word of God, it’s as well to get those words right. So there’s a thousand years of scholarship and exegesis.
The problem is that the Christian literalists tend to be what might be termed ‘ignorant, illiterate pigf-ckers’ who are basing their beliefs on what they vaguely remember their pastor saying last Sunday.
I know (am related by marriage to) some people who believe that the KJV is obviously the correct bible, because “God’s wouldn’t allow his word to be copyrighted”. Which raises two questions that I’ve yet to get a decent answer to:
1) Do you think that anyone should be able to produce their own version of the Bible that says whatever they want (cf the “Wicked Bible” which accidentally left the word “not” out of the 7th commandment) and market it as the King James Bible without anyone having a legal right to object?
2) What bible should be used in Britain, where the KJV remains under perpetual copyright? Why should two countries with the same language use different translations just because they have different intellectual property laws?
Well, and has been pointed out elsewhere, there was Christianity for many decades before there even was a Bible. So how mandatory is it really?
Many (probably most but I didn’t check them all) SBC churches list Biblical inerrancy first in their statement of faith before acceptance of Jesus as Savior. As I was leaving my own church, I actually did my own survey of church websites from around the country. Biblical inerrancy is demonstrably more important to fundamentalist churches than Jesus.
And now a few words about the King James version:
“Council of Nicaea”
“Second Council of Constantinople” (learned of this from bloggers here!)
And Finally:
“Lost in Translation”
(Hmmm… Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, English…. and, of course, subjective interpretation, and personal and institutional agendas!…)
Go to Amazon and look up the Queen Jane’s Version of the Bible. It’s quite sacreligious!
Regarding your comments about the various translations…remember its not so much about the external print (bible) but the internal blue…print, His nature within.
But when I look at ancient Holy writ…I prefer the Resultant Greek Testament in modern speech, otherwise known as the Weymouth translation from early 20th century work. It’s just a NT.
The KJ is not my favorite, the NLT is a nice modern translation and the NASB is pretty good imho.
All the best Winter. Hey, its almost springtime, should we call you “springmute”? lol…bad joke I know…
I’ll check it out. I wonder if they allow animals into heaven like the KJV does….
Steve: You bring up a very good point. My problem with ‘mainstream’ Christians (by and large tending to be good people, in my experience) is that they provide a background attitude of respect towards religious beliefs and institutuions that permeates society, providing a cover under which the truly sociopathic elements of contemporary religion flourish. For example, if a large private company, such as GM, say, or even a large private club such as the Boy Scouts, harbored known pedophiles and actively provided them with new opportunities to recruit fresh victims, the leaders would be in jail and the organization disbanded under the anti-racketeering laws. However, since it is the Catholic Church, its leaders continue to be treated with deference, and the Pope contunies to be welcomed throughout the world as a head of state.
First of all, kudos to vorjack for another interesting read. It’s always nice to learn something new, to erase one white speckle on my personal map of knowledge. Thank you very much.
Second, as to what Steve has said. I have to agree, except for one thing: You divide christianity into two camps, the fundies and the, for lack of a better expression, liberal christians. I think that does not depict reality. For example, a close friend of mine has no problems with homosexuals, but rejects abortion as murder. She understands evoultion and is accustomed to critical/scientific thinking, while at the same time firmly believes that god created the world (not in six days, but he did it nonetheless), and that prayer can result in miraculous results, despite the lack of empiric evidence.
Is she a fundamentalist?! Or a liberal? It is, I think, the problem of line-drawing again. Which in this case amounts to the question of: Is there actually a line to be drawn. Now I don’t want to insinuate that you are intentionally not willing to, or are not able to admit that there are probably as many varieties of christianity (or any other religion) as there are believers. What I am trying to say (in a rather incoherent and needlessly complicated way) is that Atheists should challenge/oppose/…/battle/persuade all believers.
We should carefully choose our weapons, be it open war with fundamentalists, or just motivating ‘liberal’ religious people to ask (the right) questions. It is not an easy task, especially when it comes to family and friends. But especially ‘converted’ atheists (who often report how relieved they felt after they finally struck off the yoke of religion) should aim to show others the light in Enlightenment.
For all ‘born’ atheists (for all I know, we all are born that way), just think whether you’d have any moral problems with convincing close relatives and friends that leprechauns/faeries/…/astrology/conspiracies are just superstitions or nonsense. And then think if curing that from their god delusion is another moral category. I think it is not.
I agree with that. Every day there seems to be some new example of a crazy person doing something psychopathic and people being fine with it, because they ‘have faith’. If, say, a Hollywood star had said that condoms help spread AIDS, that star would never work again. Meanwhile the Pope is seen as a great moral authority.
Now … it’s dangerous territory. I, personally, don’t feel that the average Western Muslim needs to ‘distance himself’ from Muslim terrorists. I’d take that for granted, and I don’t see how some Muslim guy in London or Bradford saying ‘I don’t agree with the people in charge of Iran’ really changes anything.
So I’m wary of saying ‘moderate Christians need to crack down on fundamentalists’. But I do think that we need to show courtesy and generosity to, say, the Church of England when they honor Darwin and state explicitly that evolution is true and they have nothing to fear from science. It’s great that the French government have expressed anger at the Pope’s statement on AIDS.
Instead of calling reasonable people crazy, we need to acknowledge when we’re fellow travelers and encourage them to see others who call themselves ‘Christian’ as a problem.
You miss the proverbial forest for the trees there Rog. “Church” is not about any of the things you mentioned, sorry. The real problem is, you dont know what it is about, no one here does.
Its not an external thing. If you knew what it was really all about you might actually be interested, in fact if you really knew the scope of the true offer you couldnt help but be interested.
Keep living, there is more.
The words of Holy Writ are spiritually discerned, they are written in a heavenly language.
If you want to comprehend, you have to know the language. Of course, that would first require a humble, childlike faith, even a belief that you so despise.
I tell you it’s the key, the gateway to a life of bright awakenings in the spirit realm. Eye opening, soul satisfying adventures and oh the spirit of wisdom (I know I know you are laughing) but these things are hid from the self-wise. Most “christians” have never penetrated the veil of the flesh to peer into this realm of the spirit where the Life resides…so they end up “giving up” on the so called christian life too soon when Father had so much in store for them. Jer 29:11, Jer 33:3.
Some day these words may mean more to you than they do now, cuz I know they couldnt mean less…lol.
All the best my unfaithful friends…you are loved.
Ah, so the heavenly language is Hebrew, a language without vowels, and Koine Greek, a language without lowercase letters, spaces, or punctuation.
Perhaps that is why I get so many emails from Christians that are missing vowels, lowercase letters, and punctuation? All this time I thought it was because they were barely literate, but maybe it was because they were speaking the Heavenly Language and I’m not spiritually discerning enough to comprehend it.
Perpetually proselytizing Xian, John C., writes….
“The words of Holy Writ are spiritually discerned, they are written in a heavenly language.”
and….
“If you want to comprehend, you have to know the language.”
i.e….one cannot understand the bible, unless one first adopts the view that the contents of the bible are the inerrant “Word of God”. Once you make this (dishonest) committment to yourself, it doesn’t matter if you “comprehend” the contents, or not. It’s TRUE!
How convenient.
Continues…..”Of course, that would first require a humble, childlike faith, even a belief that you so despise.”
Being “humble” has nothing to do with seeking what is objectively true about the Universe; being intellectually *honest* has everything to do with it.
John C., I’ve said it time and time again; I/we cannot simply “choose” to believe something that I/we do not find believable. It would require that we LIE to ourselves, “childlike faith”, or not. To suggest to a grown adult for them to adopt the mentality of child, is simply ridiculous. You cannot simply “scrub” all of the knowledge you’ve accumulated over a lifetime from your brain, like you can “scrub” a harddrive. As a child, I used to believe that a giant bunny wabbit layed chocolate eggs, and put them in a green nest every Easter. For anyone to suggest that I can simply “choose” a “childlike faith” with which to re-adopt such a belief, is completely asinine.
Also, I must add—-when the suggestion to be “humble” comes from a self-righteous, judgmental, zealot like you…..my goodness, how laughable!!!
Continues…..”…you are loved.”
Yes, thank you for that reminder. My friends and family love me—and I, them. And thankfully, we can all demonstrate this love to each other with REAL, live, physical interaction—thus, there’s no need for “codes”, “heavenly language”, “faith”, or “Holy Writs”.
Praise Reality, Amen!
“If you want to comprehend, you have to know the language. Of course, that would first require a humble, childlike faith, even a belief that you so despise.”
And what language is “heavenly” anyways? I have always liked latin, the language of science and reason. Maybe you should try it some time. Of course you would have to be an adult and take responsibility for your own thoughts and actions instead of pawning them off on some amorphous sky daddy.
Could you give a few examples of where the Bible we have is subject to translation errors, then, please?
Okay, suppose I adopt this humble, childlike faith, and I walk into the Westboro Baptist Church because, for the sake of discussion, it happens to be the church closest to my home.
The church uses genuine Biblical quotes. With childlike faith, I take them as they are told to me.
With this faith, I would not be allowed the critical thinking skills necessary to conclude that these people are dangerously insane.
The children of this church, literally humble and childlike, are brainwashed and beaten, and grow up to be some of the most vile and hateful people on the planet.
There is something wrong here. Can you clarify it for me?
Augustine argued in De Doctrina Christiana that people who insist on interpreting the Bible literally are carnally-minded and unfit for spiritual things.
I just ran into a conservative Christian friend who was reading a Harvard theologian (Gomes I think was the author’s name). I guess his premise is similar, saying that an exacting, literal read of the Bible makes an idol out of the Bible. It was causing my literal interpreting Bible Christian friend to rethink his own position.
As for Paul though, there are other verses where Paul seemed to take the OT literally, like when he references Adam. These are the ones that I have seen used to defend the literal read.
I tried to talk about Augustine with one of my fundamentalist co-workers once. What I got was a rejection – even a hostility – to the Church Patriarchs. He believed that he could go directly back to Paul and sidestep all the early church theology, yet still keep the trinity and all the rest.
I can’t decide if it was anti-intellectualism or anti-Catholicism. I think it was a bit of both. It’s very difficulty talking to someone who refuses to admit that his ideas have a history.
Daniel, maybe I can forgive their typing skills.
But a human parrot, maybe he is talking about speaking in tongues.
I can’t decide if it was anti-intellectualism or anti-Catholicism. I think it was a bit of both.
Which is why I think some of the attachment to a literal read of the Bible is cultural. I just read a book on the Salem witch trials. So many of the early American settlers were Puritans, fresh off Cromwell’s battle to overthrow royalists and catholic influences. I think those sentiments were institutionally absorbed and still impact how we approach religion and tradition today.
I’ve seen this with Islam too. Part of discarding religion – even if it is just discarding a certain interpretation – can also be discarding culture. And that runs psychologically very deep for many people.
“I’ve seen this with Islam too. Part of discarding religion – even if it is just discarding a certain interpretation – can also be discarding culture. And that runs psychologically very deep for many people.”
Good point.
And for the record, that’s the main reason that I’m not buying the Christine Wicker/Michael Spencer theory about the collapse of evangelical Christianity. I think that there are core values in evangelical thought that is shared by American culture. Things like anti-intellectualism and practicality.
Maybe iMonk and his friends are right, and the Baptist Church will soon shrink. But I think that there will be many people who look, sound and behave like evangelicals in the country for a long time to come.
You know what, John C, I heard exactly that line constantly from the independent “community” church I was a member of for 15 years – the mainstream churches have lost the way, they aren’t really Christian, it’s about God’s work in you, find your true identity, the true church is not a law-bound organisation, if you but accept the true offer of Christ you would be free, you need to lose your self…etc, ad nauseam. The only problem was that they were a controlling, restrictive, borderline cult who did me and my family a lot of damage. I can’t for the life of me see any difference between what you say and what they said.
Yay, John C. the eternal woomonger rides in to tell us that “no one” (but him, OF COURSE!) knows the Truth! Yippee, I dance for joy, knowing that John C., eternal woomonger has the gnosis!
But wait. For all his woomongering, he cannot and has not yet produced one shred of credible, verifiable, scientific evidence or proof of the existence of and qualities/properties of his alleged deity. But yet he plods along, like a woomongering drug dealer, hoping to get us all “hooked” on whatever metaphysical crack he’s smoking.
Keep trying, you’re full of crap.
I’ve said that for a while–actually had a big blowout with another blogger about it, which indirectly led to the deletion of my own blog, as I didn’t like him lying about me, calling me unnecessarily cruel names, making unfounded assumptions, and banning me from commenting on or linking to his site, thus removing my ability to refute him at the source. I called it “bibliolatry,” and it was my first big step away from my Baptist upbringing.
No “sky-daddy”, Christ didnt teach that, quite the opposite.
The sky is falling…
Christ in you is the mystery of the ages.
This guy sounds like a real, stand-up christian.
Dan…
Thanks for sharing more about your story. First, there are several key contrasts to commonly held misconceptions that naturally, dont ring true with us. Unfortunately, many of these erroneous teachings come from a “religious” history.
First…Christ did not teach a “sky-God” concept, actually quite the opposite. See John Chapters 14 & 17 to start with and then Colossians 1:27 where we read Pauls writing that “Christ in you is the mystery of the ages”. I think the “sky-God concept gains momentum thru the many art works from the supposes masters depicting us down here and Him somewhere up there.
Secondly, the childlike state I speak of is more closely tied to a trusting of the nature of Father God, not a silly, immature thinking for no good reason. The “promised land” was both a geographic region and a spiritual “high place”. The writer of the book of Hebrews tells us the children of Israel that didnt see that destination couldnt enter in due to “unbelief”. We have trust issues but if we knew the true nature and heart of God toward us we could then be “childlike” and trust His intentions, His leadings but as it is we dont trust Him, mostly due to the institutional and external church.
It has been my experience that when people truly understand the true offer and message of Christ, then the “religious” objections fall away in light of this new appreciation. Its an internal (change of nature) spiritual life, not an external, rule keeping dogma kind of offer.
As far as heaven goes, the word translated as heaven has in its meaning in the following – lifted up, elevated, happiness, eternity, power. Now consider this new understanding in light of Christ telling us the “kingdom” of heaven is in the here and now, not some pie in the sky notion. Established religion does more to keep people from the truth than atheism and unbelief ever did. This is why often close my posts with the silly sounding “there is more” meaning that we really dont know the offer, we only think we do, think we have heard it and naturally we reject a “religious” dogmatic life cuz it goes against our hearts desire for freedom. I dont fault anyone for rejecting religion in its cultural context…I’m just trying to share the “more”…the truth, that’s all.
Thx Dan, all the best.
Very well said, Dan, thank you.
Morality does NOT come from God. It’s a product of the fall, the rebellion where living from the tree of independence (tree of self wanting to be like God knowing right from wrong) was planted in our being as opposed to the innocence of never knowing anything but His purity, innocence.
It’s a striation, a tearing away from, a division from the whole and a poor substitute for what we once had which was the (whole, one) mind of Christ. That restoration of innocence, purity is an aspect of the true message & offer of Christ.
So what’s left but for us to try and “be moral”, knowing, deciding for ourselves what is good & evil, right & wrong which plays a major part in the worlds problems today. So we come up with our own morals which are fractured values, etc attempting to establish our own righteousness.
There were two trees in the garden (we are the garden, our inner man) and there still are today, the tree of Self and the tree of life Christ. We choose which we will eat (live from).
“[Morality] is a product of the fall, the rebellion where living from the tree of independence (tree of self wanting to be like God knowing right from wrong) was planted in our being as opposed to the innocence of never knowing anything but His purity, innocence.”
“…There were two trees in the garden (we are the garden, our inner man) and there still are today, the tree of Self and the tree of life Christ. We choose which we will eat (live from).”
Where do you get this stuff from? Are you actually arguing that there was no such thing as morality before the ‘fall’, or are you saying that there was no set of behaviors that could be called moral before the ‘fall?’ (Is your claim about people or about the existence of objective morality?) What is the fall anyway, and how exactly does it fit into history? If it doesn’t fit into history, what distinguishes this story from one of Aesop’s fables? Or any number of nice old stories that have a good moral but dubious truth value?
I’m not entirely sure what you’re saying here. And you’re making my point for me. All you ever do is quote scripture and babble mythology. The point I’m trying to make is that to the mind of a child, the Bible is just another book. I wish you would just stop quoting scripture at everyone; if it was actually a discussion of scripture, it would be fine. But almost everyone here thinks that the book is a load of bollocks, and no points that you make based on scripture are going to be given any credence.
‘Jesus didn’t teach the sky god concept’.
‘Matthew 8:20 – And Jesus saith unto him, The foxes have holes, and the birds of the heaven ‘have’ nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head’
So, when Jesus says that, ‘heaven’ isn’t synonymous with ‘sky’?
I just can’t think where people have got the idea that Heaven is in the sky …
‘Matthew 14:19 He commanded the multitudes to sit down on the grass; and he took the five loaves and the two fish, and LOOKING UP TO HEAVEN, he blessed, broke and gave the loaves to the disciples, and the disciples gave to the multitudes.’
Matthew 16:2, 3 But he answered and said unto them, When it is evening, ye say, ‘It will be’ fair weather: for the heaven is red. In the morning, ‘It will be rough weather to-day, for the sky is red and murky.’ You learn how to distinguish the aspect of the heavens, but the signs of the times you cannot.
Matthew 24:30 And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.
Matthew 28:2 And, behold, there was a great earthquake: for the angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door, and sat upon it.
Mark 7:34 Looking up to heaven, he sighed, and said to him, “Ephphatha!” that is, “Be opened!”
Luke 3:22 And the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon him, and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased.
Luke 9:51 Now when the time drew near for Him to be received up again into Heaven, He proceeded with fixed purpose towards Jerusalem, and sent messengers before Him.
Luke 9:54 And when his disciples James and John saw this, they said, Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them, even as Elias did?
Luke 10:15 You, Capernaum, who are exalted to heaven, will be brought down to Hades.
Luke 10:18 He said to them, “I saw Satan having fallen like lightning from heaven.
Luke 17:24 For as the lightning, that lighteneth out of the one part under heaven, shineth unto the other part under heaven; so shall also the Son of man be in his day.
Luke 17:29 But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all.
Luke 18:13 But the tax collector, standing far away, wouldn’t even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying,’God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’
Luke 24:51 It happened, while he blessed them, that he withdrew from them, and was carried up into heaven.
John C.
I’ve been biting my tongue and not responding to your babble for a while now because I don’t want to encourage you, but I can’t help but feed the troll on this one:
“First…Christ did not teach a “sky-God” concept..”
Youv’e been harping on this one for a while, and it is a complete strawman. Whether your religion (I know you hate religions) or spirituality, or “in-dwelling love,” or whatever you are calling it this week, is based on a “sky-God” or the “inner light of love and happiness” existing on a “spiritual plain,” is of absolutely no consquence to the discussion. You have no evidence for any of it.
Get over the evidence hurdle first and then we can have a discussion about what form the all loving god takes.
Then let me ask you a question…why do you think it is that you all talk about Him and His supposed “babble” book so often? Even your guest writers speak about this man and the myth, do they not? Why does this forum exist…really?
Why is He so fascinating to you? Is it just a matter of trying to disprove Him or His words, the foolishness of His followers to have believed such obvious bunk?
I have been on here for a long time now so I think I have some understanding on this matter, some insight. The truth is you are all searchers regardless of your self-titleing…you seek for truth. You seek it in science, in fact, in one another…you are seekers. This is part & parcel of the nature of man, to regain his true identity, to know his origins, his paternity.
He is a seeker too. But He is seeking for you. He is Truth.
Thanks for that post.
I’m a born atheist, I’ve never been religious. I want an end to religion, and all forms of superstition.
I think the pressing problem is the anti-rational. Many Christians have thought about their faith, come to what I think is a wrong conclusion, but they are involved in post-Enlightenment thinking – they weigh evidence, can be persuaded.
I firmly believe that such people, or their kids, will eventually just see that the world makes more sense without gods in it. They may need to talk it through with a friendly neighborhood atheist, but they are rational. If their world and their theory don’t match up, they change their theory. As the world is atheistic, eventually and inevitably, rational people will come to accept that.
I can see why people would be anti-abortion. I know non-religious people who are anti-abortion. It’s the *reason* they hold that opinion that’s important, not the opinion. ‘I have thought it through and concluded that … ‘ is a good reason, ‘it says in this book that I should. What? It doesn’t actually say it in my book? Well, I’ve never actually read the book, but my pastor tells me that it says that, and I believe him’ is not.
I’d define fundamentalism, and distinguish it from other Christian beliefs this way: it involves some form of personal revelation that overrides all other concerns. Including critical thinking. If you adopt the belief that the Bible is right, whatever it says, you are not thinking.
I know so very smart Christians. And they are troubled by their religion, they research and they’re critical, they balance all sorts of different pressures and factors. I’ve told some of them that it’s way easier to answer the questions they have with ‘He doesn’t exist’, but they don’t like that answer. I respect that, even though I think they’re wrong.
But ‘it says it in the King James Version, therefore scientists are wrong and bats are actually birds’ lot? No, they are actively dangerous. We were within a few percent of having one of those as a Vice President of the United States. It will happen that an actual evangelical, not someone just conning evangelicals, will gain power in the US, just as they have in the Middle East. That can only be doubleplus bad. We need to make sure ‘liberal Christians’ see the threat, and that such people are against everything they believe, that they don’t just see the label ‘Christian’.
Because Christianity is a powerful force in society, and that power is not always used for the good of all. Do we not have a right to express our opinions on the matter in a privately-owned forum?
Not enough insight, it seems, to distinguish “Dan L.” from “Daniel Florian”.
John: The reason this subject is so fascinating (to me, anyway) is that religion in all forms, from the fanatic jihadist to the fuzzy-thinking New Age do-gooder in my office, has real consequences in the real world.
After having been conventionally devout in my youth, I eventually came to realize that religion is, at best, a myth unconsciously generated by the human condition, and at worst a vicious lie and con job perpetrated on the innocent and naive by the crass and cynical. For many years I ignored the whole subject, and was content.
In the US, we have just come out of 8 long years of Christian fundamentalists of one stripe or another wielding great power and influence in the country, and therefore in the world. Many or most of the results of this influence, in my opinion, have been negative, and have damaged both my country and the world. Although the dead hand of religion seems to be loosening its grip in some ways, the desire for power, influence and control is still strong in some circles, and must be opposed.
I am fascinated by this process for the reasons that we are all fascinated by a good drama. Will Good triumph over the forces of darkness? Will the hero save the heroine?
Sometimes I feel like a sober person at a party, marveling at the asinine antics of the inebriated. I feel this way most especially when those such as you, drunk with imaginary holy spirit, mouth endless pious and nonsensical formulas to the sober onlookers, and, their logic numbed by holy intoxication, stumble through the halls of logic and reason, making themselves and their religion look foolish to all.
Yes, I’m pretty sure I read a story just the other day about some idiot in a funny hat visiting Africa to reaffirm to the HIV-infected masses that HIV-preventing condoms were bad in the eyes of God.
Am I fascinated by the foolishness? I am working to bring it crashing down.
Well, John, I’d like to point out that as someone completely distinct from Daniel Florien, I almost never bring up the text of the Bible myself. I’ve never read beyond exodus, and I don’t really care to, at least not any time soon. I have nothing invested in the Bible whatsoever.
I do find the Bible interesting from a historical perspective. The Bible itself is, as far as I can tell, useless as a historical text, but as a historical artifact, it sheds a lot of light on what religious thought was like around the time of Caesar and the few centuries afterward. Ancient history fascinates me — that’s the only reason I have for considering the Bible anything but a waste of paper.
Anyway, you’re absolutely right I’m seeking truth. Unfortunately, you’re not helping. You make baseless assertions. You godbot like you’re getting paid for it. You can’t engage in a discussion except to blather a bunch of superstitious nonsense at everybody. I gave you the opportunity to make an argument that I would actually listen to (re: dualism) and you completely missed the point of it.
In short: you bum me out. Really, reading what you say depresses me, because you can’t break out of your usual pattern for two paragraphs and have a conversation like an adult. Don’t bother responding to anything else I write; I’ll do you the same courtesy.
@Daniel:
I don’t like being that harsh with someone as well-intentioned as John C, but I really can’t take him any more.
Tom…
I appreciate your thoughtful response. Religion, in its cultural context is not what Christ came to bring, not the true offer. I define religion as pointless, endless, rule-keeping dogma devoid of the motive of love. Its external. Christ offers a restoration and an internal change of nature, His like it was in the beginning, a wholeness, a One…again to what and who we were in the original paradaisical condition.
We are all turned off by this dead thing called “religion”. It’s manipulative, oppressive and most unfortunate it masquerades in the stead of Christ. If I hope to make one point here its that religion is not the true offer, that there (truly) is more to this Christ. Spirituality is liberating, religion is binding.
As far as me looking like a “fool” I no longer have an identity of my own to protect and that is very freeing.
Unlike myself, you have a nice, fluid writing style…that last parargraph of yours was wonderfully written…thx.
Iasiah 7:14. The Hebrew uses the world “alma’h”, which means “young woman” and does not imply virginity – that would be “pereh’k”.
The Greek Septuagint used the word “parthenos” which unambiguously means “virgin”, and this error is continued in the majority of English translations.
Sorry, wintermute, I didn’t mean in, er, real life. I know the Bible we have is cobbled together and shonkily translated.
It was a question for John C – he says he has access to the Bible in the original heavenly tongue, so I was just wondering if there were any big differences between that and the Bible the rest of us can buy from Amazon or Goodwill or wherever.
Ah, my apologies.
wintermute, that is fascinating. I’ve learned a lot from your posts.
Since I love language and etymology, I envy your study of language. Greek and Hebrew studies, or somehting else?
claidheamh mor:
I’m afraid it’s nothing so formal. I’ve just picked up a few pieces here and there, and I have a decent memory for details.
I’ve spent fair fair amount of time over the last decade involved in this kind of internet discussion with anti-evolutionists and Biblical literalists, and I’ve absorbed a few little nuggets here and there, from those better educated than me.
I’d love to be able to study ancient languages in more detail, but I’ve never been able to make the time. Maybe one day, though.
Steve…
Are you asking on what basis I say that Christ didnt teach a “sky-God” concept? Is that your “translation” question??
If so, John Chapters 14 & 17, Ephesians, and then of course Colossians 1:27 where we hear (if we want to) Paul declaring that “Christ IN you is the mystery of the ages”.
Religion stinks…
Am I the only one that thinks John’s description of his belief system sounds a lot like gay porn?
Not that there’s anything wrong with that…
“Are you asking on what basis I say that Christ didnt teach a “sky-God” concept? Is that your “translation” question??”
The Bible I have makes it abundantly clear that God lives in Heaven, Heaven is in the sky. It uses words like ‘up’ to describe the direction of Heaven and ‘down’ to describe the direction away from Heaven and towards Earth.
You’re working from a different text: “The words of Holy Writ are spiritually discerned, they are written in a heavenly language.”
I wasn’t asking specifically about the sky god. The Bible says God’s a sky god, you say he isn’t. I was just wondering if there’s anything else where the ‘heavenly language’ actually makes things mean the exact opposite of what the Earth languages say.
If ‘up’ and ‘down’ don’t mean what every single human being (and all but the least primitive animals) understand them to mean, where else are we going wrong?
When the commandment says ‘thou shalt not commit adultery’, does it mean we can, but adultery isn’t what we thought it meant, it means something completely different?
EXACTLY!
Thank you.
It is why I couldn’t stay in Christianity.
And, I’ve observed, the most intelligent, operational, functioning, learning minds are the ones that will recognize the difference b/n believing and knowing, and notice cognitive dissonance.
Which means: the less functional minds that don’t think as well are the ones that will be drawn to, or stay in (and defend), Christianity.
This carries the weight of some very real observation, and is the only explanation I’ve got to answer my question: “How can people possibly drown out their doubts, pretend to themselves that they know rather than believe something, and tolerate all that cognitive dissonance?”
The problem starts when you talk to John C as if they are a real person, and not the parody of a rational human being.
Can we please just ignore it?
The point is this Boomslang…IF you knew Him, that is His character/nature/Person/heart there would no longer be any reason NOT to trust…
There was a person who taught that to ancient Isrealites in OT and another who mentioned that in NT, his name is Yeshua.
The bible is the proof, 2 examples:
God made the expanse, and separated the waters which were below the expanse from the waters which were above the expanse; and it was so.
God called the expanse HEAVEN. And there was evening and there was morning, a second day.(Gen1:7-8)
But he answered and said unto them, When it is evening, ye say, ‘It will be’ fair weather: for the heaven is red. In the morning, ‘It will be rough weather to-day, for the sky is red and murky.’ You learn how to distinguish the aspect of the HEAVENS, but the signs of the times you cannot. (Matthew 16:2, 3)
Oh, Steve. Don’t you know that Jesus wasn’t talking about “Heaven”, but was talking about the heaven that is within when the light of Gawd shines down upon you? Do you want to see? Do you REALLY? Really truly? With sugar on top?
There is more. There is a life. The voices in my head tell me so.
Additionally, if Jesus did not teach the sky god concept then why did he rocket off into space and why will he supposedly bring a new Jerusalem down to earth?
As I say, the great thing about Biblical literalists is that we at least know what they’re talking about and how they justify it.
It’s hard to discuss anything with someone if they say they don’t believe birds live in the sky or rain falls, but that all of those things are subject to special meanings that only those who understand are allowed to understand.
I know what a metaphor is, I know what symbolism is, I know that something is lost when an abstract is discussed in concrete terms.
But … when you are trying to understand someone who says that ‘up’ is not the opposite of ‘down’ – a concept that scientists now know the first *worms* to evolve had grasped, incidentally – how do you reach any sort of conclusion other than ‘he’s talking gibberish’?
The Bible says God lives in Heaven and that Heaven is in the sky. This is (a) completely consistent with what we know of scientific thought at the time[s] the Bible was written and compiled (b) a load of rubbish. We’ve been to the sky now, using science, God wasn’t there.
Is Westboro a real church? I saw their website and it seems very Poe-ish to me!
It is a real “poe-ish” church, I believe.
Did some research.
Apparently it is a real hate group. They are also a church, but they were listed as pseudo christians (meaning not orthodox) here:
http://www.apologeticsindex.org/111-westboro-baptist-church
I followed the links on that page to what was considered orthodox for Christians, listed here:
http://www.apologeticsindex.org/o00.html#orthodoxy
“Alan Gomes writes:
”Central doctrines” of the Christian faith are those doctrines that make the Christian faith Christian and not something else.
The meaning of the expression ”Christian faith” is not like a wax nose, which can be twisted to mean whatever the speaker wants it to mean.
The Christian faith is a definite system of beliefs with definite content (Jude 3)
Certain Christian doctrines constitute the core of the faith.
Central doctrines include the Trinity, the deity of Christ, the bodily resurrection, the atoning work of Christ on the cross, and salvation by grace through faith. These doctrines so comprise the essence of the Christian faith that to remove any of them is to make the belief system non-Christian.
Scripture teaches that the beliefs mentioned above are of central importance (e.g., Matt. 28:19; John 8:24; 1 Cor. 15; Eph. 2:8-10).
Because these central doctrines define the character of Christianity, one cannot be saved and deny these.
Central doctrines should not be confused with peripheral issues, about which Christians may legitimately disagree.
Peripheral (i.e. non-essential) doctrines include such issues as the timing of the tribulation, the method of baptism, or the structure of church government. For example, one can be wrong about the identity of “the spirits in prison” 1 Peter 3:19) or about the timing of the rapture and still go to heaven, but one cannot deny salvation by grace or the deity of Christ (John 8:24) and be saved.
All Christian denominations — whether Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, or Protestant — agree on the essential core. The relatively minor disagreements between genuinely Christian denomination, then, cannot be used to argue that there is no objectively recognized core of fundamental doctrine which constitutes the Christian faith.”
How, then, is Westboro NOT orthodox? Hating gay people seems like a “peripheral” issue, according to this source. So long as these people believe the central beliefs, don’t they still count?
The Westboro Baptist Church is very much a hate group, and they are universally condemned by all other churches as not being true to their religion. (Just do a quick search on the church on YouTube, and I guarantee that whatever you come up with will curl your milk).
My point is not whether they are orthodox or not, it is that, with childlike faith, the question orthodoxy doesn’t matter. Childlike faith basically means taking the words that the pastor is speaking and the words that you are reading as 100% true. Well, Fred Phelps (the “Pastor”) uses the bible to project his message. He picks out specific passages and ignores others (nothing new there) to pass along a truly despicable message.
Childlike faith can be a very, very dangerous thing.
Absolutely! I agree 100%! Childlike faith = no good!
My problem is how to tell “real” churches from “cults”. They look alike to me. They all make irrational claims.
@LRA
There is no need to distinguish; the line is as fuzzy as their thinking.
Yeah, that’s why I reject them all…
@ LRA, regarding the difference between “true” churches and cults – I came to the conclusion, after leaving a group that can be classified as a cult, doing a lot of research and spending some time in a mainline church, that the difference is only one of degree. “Cults” just use stronger psychological tactics to get people to feel they have to detach themselves further from mainstream society and commit to more extreme or unorthodox interpretations of doctrine.
Right- so if we can’t trust cults, then how can we trust “mainstream” churches? I don’t see how we can since they aren’t different in kind, only in degree. Hence I reject all religion for this reason.
in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. (eph2:2)
Using science, that was why Jesus zoomed out to space to avoid evil unseen organisms with naked eye that kill or destroy. His written word is a reminder to scientists to find another world.
I don’t have problem with this teaching, but the churches do, they are disobedient.
The “New Jerusalem” is in you, the garden of your inner man.
The physical realm is illustrative, symbolic of the spiritual. When we see Him going “up” that is a higher realm or the spirit realm which is higher than above the natural, physical realm we live in.
There is always another, higher level in Him that we may ascend to. Of course, in the paradoxical paternity we must first lower (humble) ourselves before we can go higher. God’s ways are “higher” than ours.
‘that is a higher realm or the spirit realm which is higher than above the natural, physical realm we live in.’
… where birds live. And rain comes from. And there are clouds. That you are looking towards when you look up to the sky. According not just to the Bible, but to words attributed to Jesus in the Bible.
Simple question: Jesus describes heaven as something that’s ‘up’, that you literally look up to face, that has birds and clouds in it, that rain comes down from, that you travel to by going up and travel away from by coming down. Don’t you at least agree that it *sounds* like the sky he’s describing there?
When I divided Christians up into two categories – literalists and rational – I clearly missed a category that’s the opposite of literalist: Christians who irrationally ignore, actively contradict or redefine beyond any of the tolerances of the language pretty much everything it says in the Bible.
He wants to take…your form Bill. We are simply containers for His presence, that’s the secret.
We never really become like Jesus, but rather as we empty oursleves, of ourselves He becomes Himself…in us.
Christ IN you is the mystery of the ages. Col 1:27
One word: CRAAAAZY.
Yea, Love is like that, He’s crazy about us.
Bill asked you a question: what’s your evidence?
You’ve accepted that you can’t offer evidence based on personal revelation.
So you seem to be arguing from ‘Biblical authority’, given that you cite Bible verses. But then ignore the bits of the Bible that say the exact opposite of what you’re saying.
I suppose the question is this: do you think that your own beliefs are rational and/or coherent?
@Steve Jeffers: John C isn’t going to provide a response (at least, not one recognizable by humans) because he friggin’ CAN’T. So. All he will continue to do until he gets tired and finds another blog to plague with his nonsense or Daniel boots him is proffer gross distortions of already insipid biblical texts and pedantic woobabble the likes of which would make Counselor Deanna Troi sound positively academic.
And yeah, HE thinks his mental gymnastics are perfectly rational–because, if you hadn’t seen him say this solipsistic nonsense before, “there is a life. There is more. Gawd looooves you (you’re just too plebian to know it).”
“that’s the secret”
And what is the basis for your understanding this “secret?”
Because I know Him in exactly the way he says we can. Christianity is not a “self” effort to aspire to some impossible high and holy standard, its Him living His uncreated life through us, in us and as us.
We died on the cross in Him and were resurrected with Him (Romans 6:6) and now all that separated us from God is no more, He has done away with it.
The good news, when understood aright, is liberating beyond comprehension and it is true. God loves us so very much and has made provision for us to live His kind of (uncreated, not subject to death & decay, etrnal) life.
The kingdom of heaven is not meat and drink (tangible things of matter) but righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. Romans 14:17.
There is a whole story, and many beautiful secrets that he longs to share if we will only believe, only trust the Fathers heart for us.
He IS Love, 1 John 4:16
So bible verses are the basis of this “secret” you know?
If you like the Weymouth, let’s check it for ‘sky god’ stuff.
‘Then I saw another strong angel coming down from Heaven. He was robed in a cloud, and over his head was the rainbow. His face was like the sun, and his feet resembled pillars of fire.’
OK.
‘And a great marvel was seen in Heaven– a woman who was robed with the sun and had the moon under her feet, and had also a wreath of stars round her head’
Uh-huh.
‘So the Lord Jesus after having thus spoken to them was taken up into Heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God.’
‘There is no one who has gone up to Heaven, but there is One who has come down from Heaven’
‘When Jesus had thus spoken, He raised his eyes towards Heaven’
You do accept, at least, that that Bible does make God *sound* like a sky God? It’s playing fair to read the Bible and believe it’s at least relevant to Christianity, isn’t it?
If there’s stuff in the Bible saying god’s a sky god and no stuff in the Bible saying he isn’t, then … it’s fair enough to consider him a sky god, isn’t it?
If Jesus raises his eyes and looks towards Heaven … where’s he looking? It’s not a trick question, it’s basic language comprehension, surely? Is he looking at the sky or is he looking into a different dimension?
Steve…I appreciate your response and the numerous references, thx for whatever investment in time you made for us to have a high level discussion.
First, lets translate the very word “Heaven” in the original text…the word translated as Heaven has in its meaning has the following – lifted up, elevated, happiness, eternity, power. Now view this in light of Christ saying that this “heaven” was a here & now kingdom as opposed to merely some future pie in the sky “place” or destination if we measure up.
John 14:17…That Spirit the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him. You know Him, because He remains by your side and is IN you.
John 14:20 states (Jesus speaking of after His crucifixion)…At that time you will know that I am in my Father, and that you are IN me, and that I am IN you.
Vs 23…(jesus speaking) If any one loves me,” replied Jesus, “he will obey my teaching; and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home IN him.
John 15:4…(Jesus speaking) Continue IN me, and let me continue IN you.
John 17:21…(Jesus speaking) even as Thou art IN me, O Father, and I am IN Thee; that they also may be IN us…
John 17:23…(Jesus speaking) I IN them and Thou IN me; that they may stand perfected IN One.
John 17:26…(Jesus speaking) and that I may be IN them.”
Ephesians 1:3…who has crowned us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms IN Christ.
Colossians 1:27…Christ IN you is the mystery of the ages.
Notice the Ephesians reference about “heavenly realms IN Christ”. To answer your question, yes while there is another (unseen) dimension or realm, the “heavenly realms”. There is a natural, seen realm and a heavenly or spiritual realm.
The irony is, until He opens our (spiritual) eyes we cling to the temporal, seen realm over the unseen spiritual realm of eternal substance and truth. So Paul says…we “look not” at that which is seen for that which is seen is temporal (fading away, subject to death & decay) but we look (anchor our lives in) that which is unseen for it is eternal, everlasting. 2 Cor 4:18. Also, that we walk (live) by faith and not by sight. 2 Cor 5:7.
The physical realm illustrates the spiritual realm. So, as the “sky” is above the earth so is the unseen spiritual realm above the natural, seen realm. The spirit within allows us to penetrate and operate in the unseen when we learn to TRUST the Father. This is why I drive everyone bonkers by often ending my posts with the annoying (but true) saying…there is more. I say this because I have personally experienced it, not because I’m so special but because I have simply believed and trusted.
Thanks Steve…all the best.
“First, lets translate the very word “Heaven” in the original text…the word translated as Heaven has in its meaning has the following – lifted up, elevated, happiness, eternity, power.”
Do you have a reference for this?
The Greek word for heaven is Ouranos, which means literally “The sky.”
There are a couple of instances of epouranos, meaning “above the sky, celestial”
And I think Revelation uses mesouranema, meaning “mid-sky” in a couple of places
I have never seen a Greek word translated as “Heaven” that means the list of things you wrote.
I think, like usual, you’re making this all up.
In fact, in the exact scripture Steve quotes, “When Jesus had thus spoken, He raised his eyes towards Heaven” you can look at the following interlinear translation and see that the word they are using for heaven is indeed Ouranos.
http://www.scripture4all.org/OnlineInterlinear/NTpdf/joh17.pdf
See, when you make shit up, you get caught.
Ty: You mean that the Bible literally says that heaven is in the sky? That John C doesn’t know what he’s talking about?
My gast is well and truly flabbered.
EXCELLENT point!!!
Bill wants to know from resident, proselytizing Christian, “John C.,”…..
“So bible verses are the basis of this ‘secret’ you know?”
Yes, that, and because he “believes” what he believes. Wow!!!!
But don’t let this confuse you. John C. is NOT religious; he is “spiritual”. Only Christians who extract and promote scripture to support their *own* personal, subjective take on Christianity(as John C. does, practically, daily) are “religious”. See ?!?!?!
Boomslang…have you ever heard such things, specifically about this “christianity” before?
Do you think I come on here, spend time, endure hostility and name calling just to lead you astray or speak lies?
I am here to share the bright, the beautiful, the true. I am here because of Love.
Resident, proselytizing “Christian”, John C., says…
“that post of yours is basically a duplicate, but I suppose you already know that.”
Yes!…..of course I know it’s a duplicate, and the point was evidentally lost on you.
There is an entire entry dedicated to a Christian who was caught lying, in the sense that he was being deliberately dishonest in an attempt to validate his theological stance. Well, I’m pointing out that you have been caught numerous times being less than honest, as well, in an attempt to validate *your* theological stance.
Just because you are mild-mannered does *not* change the fact that you use disingenuous tactics in your attempted conversations with nonbelievers here. You’ve contradicted yourself too many times to even begin to count, and when people point these contradictions out to you, you simply ignore them, and commence to (obtusely) repeating yourself over and over and over, when it’s been explained to you, in great detail, by myself, and others, why your tactics/methods will not work here.
WILL. NOT. WORK. HERE.
Thus, in my view, your only purpose here is to be deliberately provocative. It’s clear—-you have zero intention of entertaining any view that opposes your own.
So it’s the verses?
Bill wants to know from resident, proselytizing Christian, “John C.,”…..
“So bible verses are the basis of this ’secret’ you know?”
Yes, that, and because he “believes” what he believes. Wow!!!!
But don’t let this confuse you. John C. is NOT religious; he is “spiritual”. Only Christians who extract and promote scripture to support their *own* personal, subjective take on Christianity(as John C. does, practically, daily) are “religious”. See ?!?!?!
Boomslang…see below, I describe this “knowing” in more detail. Btw…that post of yours is basically a duplicate, but I suppose you already know that.
Take care…
GBM…
Yes, morality is a fallacy. We are left with the fragments and we dont see clearly, our vision is clouded, hence we have so many distorted right and wrongs, various “values” etc. This is all a separation from the…One Mind we had in the beginning. This “morality” of ours also leads to religion (external dogma) and wars, division, etc. Religion is external, Christ internal and the result is a change of nature/person within which is the ultimate remedy for mankind. Christ in you is the mystery of the ages.
It’s interesting that you mentioned the fables. The fairy tales are powerful stories and are trying to tell us something. We have lost our innocence so we no longer hear very well in this realm of ancient, spiritual truth. This is why children can “hear” them so clearly and we adults have a harder time hearing with our spirits, our heart’s original language.
This is why Christ said that we would need to become like “little children” if we wanted to enter this spiritual kingdom of God in the here and now.
We can talk about the significance of the fall next time if you are still interested in having a dialogue…thx.
But JC!
This world steals our innocence! And if we remain “child like” we cannot protect ourselves! You know about the things I’ve been through. I had no choice but to learn from them if I wanted to survive. It’s not fair to insist that we remain innocent. That would preclude gaining wisdom. I’ll take my wisdom over childlike innocence any day!
If god wanted me to remain innocent, then he/she shouldn’t have put me in a world where innocent children suffer (have you ever read the Brothers Karamazov by Dostoyevsky?). Seriously! It is so easy to cling to innocence when you haven’t been put through the ringer. But don’t blame those of us who have for giving up on a silent counselor– a failure of a prince of peace– an unmighty god who won’t even protect us from our own parents.
Just put yourself in my shoes for one minute and understand my doubt.
Seriously… check out the Grand Inquisitor…
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/pol116/grand.htm
Ivan’s primary objection to Christianity is the suffering of innocent children…
And you know what? I kind of agree!
You’re tough, I’ll give you that. But I gotta ask, do you ever get tired of saying the same things over and over again?
You only have two, maybe three, arguments. They don’t work, of course, but you keep using them dutifully.
I don’t think you’re aware of this, but. When you’re in a discussion with someone… when trying to make them see your point of view it helps if your stance is backed up by a wide variety of evidence/information/knowledge. Especially considering what it is that you, specifically, are arguing in favor of.
If your belief was more mainstream, it’d be easier for you to defend, and you wouldn’t be seen as a whackjob. At least, not as big a whackjob.
When you’re arguing with a vast majority of people who do not put any stock in the Bible, then you have to understand that it will not be accepted as a viable source to support your case.
It hurts your case when you cherry-pick from the Bible. Your belief seems to be centered strongest on one verse (Colossians 1:27) and all others you pick out merely to support your stance. You then turn a blind eye to all the Bible verses that are against your particular interpretation. This practice, actually, is why I put absolutely no stock in the Bible. I am sure that many others here share that stance with me.
No matter how many times you say it, that you think that your particular Buddy Christ wants to fill our spirit with love, you cannot demonstrate it beyond words. And your words are not convincing. The only two pieces of evidence that you have for your stance is;
The Bible says it!
I says it!
So it’s the verses plus warm feelings.
John – I hate to be a jerk (I mean that seriously) because I think you mean well, but you bring absolutely nothing to the conversation around here. In many ways you are worse than the bible thumper types who show up because you hide your true intent and thought in flowery new age language that borders on incomprehensible.
I should have known I would regret feeding the troll.
OK. Thanks for your answer.
Here’s an example of what I mean by ‘reason’ and ‘rationality’:
There’s a principle in logic that something can’t both have a property and not-have it. Something couldn’t be both ‘red’ *and* ‘not red’. If we take a very simple definition of ‘alive’ as ‘not dead’, something alive can’t simultaneously also be dead.
It seems to me that God has to be bound by this. God couldn’t make 2+2=5, because that’s not what ’2′ means. It might be part of his great powers to adjust the value of 2, but the idea of *value* itself transcends that.
I can see how there might be a plane where *I* can’t understand the values or untangle what properties apply – but, for me, when you say there’s a plane where *that kind* of rationality doesn’t apply at all, it just becomes meaningless. It’s like saying ‘feline dog’. God could not create a feline dog or an unmarried husband. It’s not that I can’t comprehend that realm, it’s not *transcending* rationality, it’s just nonsense.
I do agree with the point you’re maing, but the pedant in me has to point out Scrödinger’s Cat. Sorry.
Thx Steve…of course its nonsense to you, I already admitted as such. Reminder…I stated that we dont come to comprehend this sort by our typical utility of reason, thats all I’m saying. I appreciate your comments, the high level of discourse you maintained with this fool, take care.
You know, I tend to think of myself as a pretty smart guy. I’ve had no formal schooling in anything, but I’ve always been pretty quick to grasp concepts.
The cat eludes my understanding, though. The wikipedia page does me no good.
If you’ve the time and interest, would you care to explain it to me?
Well, there’s no way you can have an omniscient God and Schrodinger’s Cat – God would know, resolving the event.
Schrodinger’s Cat is a great example of rationality, though.
The terms are defined, the maths is simple, the problem is simple to explain, the consequences are completely headbending.
It’s the complete opposite of a religious mystery, and far more satisfying. It’s also, very clearly, something that we need to think more about, and which, at some point, we’ll have a satisfying answer to (even if it’s, ‘yeah, it seems crazy, but that’s really how it works’).
When John C talks about ‘heavenly language’, I get excited about the linguistics – what’s the grammar, what’s the vocabulary? Umberto Eco wrote a book about the quest for the ‘perfect language’ that angels are meant to speak in Heaven, and it was a preoccupation of some of the smartest people in history. But the point is this: a language is, by definition, a rational system.
When religious types talk about the ‘limits of the scientific worldview’, they miss the point. The scientific worldview has limits, yeah – over there, light years over the horizon. Every religious preoccupation and claim is well within those boundaries, and when they’ve been rejected it’s for lack of ambition, not too much. The weather is created by Thor? The truth is *way* more complicated than that. The universe is six thousand years old? Try fourteen billion. God toppled the Tower of Babel because it nearly reached Heaven? Well … I guess that means Heaven’s a hundred miles beneath the ISS.
If you think a ‘heavenly language’ is beyond science, you don’t know what a language is. Simple as that.
Scrödinger proposed the thought experiment to demonstrate that Quantum Mechanics leads to illogical conclusions and must therefore be false. It’s somewhat ironic that it’s become the best example of how QM actually works…
In short, you have a trigger that is controlled by a quantum-scale event; for example, the decay of a single radioactive atom. QM says that, until you look, this atom is not in a single state of “decayed” or “not decayed”, but all of the different states it’s in are superimposed on top of each other. It’s only when you make a measurement that the atom is in a single, definitive state. It’s not that we don’t know, before we measure, it’s that we can’t know, that there’s nothing to know.
Now, if you take that single quantum event, and use it to trigger a macro-scale event, such as releasing fast-acting poison gas into a sealed box with a cat in it, this uncertainty get replicated on the macro level. Just as the atom is in a superpostion of “decayed” / “not decayed”, the cat is in a superposition of “dead” / “still alive”, and it won’t collapse into a single state until we open the box and look inside.
Like much of the last century of physics, it’s very counter-intuitive, and can easily make you go cross-eyed if you think about it too much. I don’t claim to understand the underlying maths, so I can’t be much more help, really. You can try reading up on the Copenhagen Interpretation, and maybe the Many Worlds Hypothesis.
But if that doesn’t make you go crazy, consider an extension to this thought experiment called Wigner’s Friend: The original researcher looks in the box, and the cat-waveform collapses into a cat, which is either alive or dead, as the case may be. However, he has a friend waiting outside the laboratory, anxiously waiting for the researcher to put his head out the door and tell him what happened to the cat. From his point of view, the uncertainty is not yet resolved, and the cat-waveform is not yet collapsed.
And from there, you get to Einstein’s Mouse, who remakes the entire universe every time he opens his eyes…
For those interested in reading more about an oversimplified description of Schrödinger’s cat, I point you to my short story, Feline Blue (http://alphonsuspeck.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/feline-blue.pdf). The story basically involves using a variation of Schrödinger’s cat as part of a fifth grade science fair experiment. I have some difficulties with the concepts suggested by quantum physics. I feel that I have the right to be a little skeptical because the theory comes up with some outright paradoxes and violations of “Logical Absolutes” (i.e. Something cannot be itself and not itself at the same time in the same sense.)
So I attempt to address some of this stuff in my story. Further analysis can be found in my post (http://alphonsuspeck.wordpress.com/2009/01/30/feline-blue-part-4-of-3/)
Well, that depends on what you mean by “omniscient”. If an omniscient being knows literally everything, then you’re right.
But if they merely know everything that can be known, then that’s not incompatible with QM. Though it does raise the question of whether or not the future can be known, even assuming the future doesn’t rely on quantum events in the present.
My money’s on either Adamic or Enochian.
Which is it, John?
Or…we have lost our capacity to comprehend this ancient “language” which is, ironically our native tongue.
This is another consequence of the fall.
All we lost in the original matrix is restored in Christ. I understand the language very well. The more I live from the spirit/heart life the more fluid I become, the more I remember this ancient “language” of ours.
Is your understanding of this language what enables you to decide for yourself what Greek words actually mean?
Sock…thx for the comments. Actually, that was not my end conclusion in the description of how I “know” in my response to Steve/Bill. I shared in detail and it wasnt simply because the external print (bible) says so…but thx for joining in…take care.
While I don’t agree with the logic of John C, let me say that, while he may not bring much in the way of new knowledge to a conversation, he does serve as an excellent springboard from which new conversations can … um … spring. I would estimate that we can thank much of this very interesting thread due to the influence of John C. He acts rather as a piece of ancient dust around which we can build our beautiful atheistic / agnostic snowflakes.
For example, in one of my responses to John C, I brought up the Westboro Baptist Church, which is a hate group that any good citizen of this world should be aware of. Many did not know of this group, and it would not have been brought up without John C.
So, even if Mr. C does not change his arguments, it behooves us to vary ours in counterpoint, so that we may explore the nature of our reality a bit more completely.
Bill…do I really qualify as a “troll”? I mean thats fine if I do, the label doesnt bother me its just that I picture a troll as someone who roams from one forum to the next injecting venom, opposing worldviews, etc. This is the only atheist forum I have ever visited…lucky you huh? lol
Anyway…if the shoe fits…I will wear it but not sure I meet all the qualifications.
john if what you claim is true. How come your all powerful god dosent inspire a more convincing line of reasoning from you.
Or to put it simply, if your concept of god is accurate. If god wants all of us to understand him as you do, then how come your god only leaves invisible and non testable evidence for us.
If god and wants man to know who he is I would think that god would leave physical evidence that squarely and unambigiously points to him.
The letters YHWH repeated over and over in our genetic code would be a good one. Or spelled out in stars across the night sky. Or on the moon.
I can think of lots of ways.
Cuz God is not reasonable to the natural man. We lost this sensitivity in the fall. The only time He “reasons” with us is when it comes to our sins:
“Come, let us REASON together, though your sins be as scarlet, I will wash them white as snow”. Isaiah 1:18
He much prefers to simply lavish His great love upon us. After all, thats who He is…Love.
“God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him” (1 Jn 4:16).
Too cool…
Interesting.
The sand around which our pearls form?
Thx Alphons…I think, lol. Glad I could be of service to you in some way.
Precisely!
It reminds me of the Gary Larson cartoon, in which God, standing over the world He has just created, shakes a sprinkle of “IDIOTS” over the world while commenting, “Now, just to make things interesting.”
Let’s be honest. Atheists and agnostics LOVE to argue. There is no shame in this. It demonstrates that we like to be intellectually challenged.
John C acts as catalyst for our arguments. By presenting very little challenge by way of his arguments, we are challenged in ourselves to make our counter arguments more interesting.
Now, I can’t honestly say whether or not I’m make a valid point or just being a facetious shit head, but either way, its still interesting to think about. :)
“Let’s be honest. Atheists and agnostics LOVE to argue. There is no shame in this. It demonstrates that we like to be intellectually challenged. ”
mark: I agree, I wish more christians would post here because that would give us more of an oppurtunity to refute theocratic bullshit.
I just wish those posting who are Pastors/reverend/Preachers would identify themselves as such.
I would think that if god actually existed then the debating of church officials would be stronger than most non christian officials.
But this is not the case at all.
“I would think that if god actually existed then the debating of church officials would be stronger than most non christian officials.
But this is not the case at all.”
I agree!
And that is another point. Without the John Cs of the world, this blog would be rather pointless. It would just be a bunch of people saying “I agree” to each other all the time. It would get SOOO dull after a while.