You think there are problems with the Old Testament! Have you heard of the Jesus Seminar? It's a group of people--some of them actual NT scholars--who decided to winnow the wheat from the chaff from a distance of 2000 years. One might wonder why the Gospel writers weren't able to separate the wheat from the chaff say, 40 years distance from the death of Jesus.
These imminent worthies have concluded the following:
Jesus of Nazareth was born during the reign of Herod the Great.
His mother's name was Mary, and he had a human father whose name may not have been Joseph.
Jesus was born in Nazareth, not in Bethlehem.
Jesus was an itinerant sage who shared meals with social outcasts.
Jesus practiced faith healing without the use of ancient medicine or magic, relieving afflictions we now consider psychosomatic.
He did not walk on water, feed the multitude with loaves and fishes, change water into wine or raise Lazarus from the dead.
Jesus was arrested in Jerusalem and crucified by the Romans.
He was executed as a public nuisance, not for claiming to be the Son of God.
The empty tomb is a fiction – Jesus was not raised bodily from the dead.
Belief in the resurrection is based on the visionary experiences of Paul, Peter and Mary Magdalene.
The seminar's criteria for authenticity was:
Orality: According to current estimates, the gospels weren't written until decades after Jesus' death. Parables, aphorisms, and stories were passed down orally (30 – 50 CE). The fellows judged whether a saying was a short, catchy pericope that could possibly survive intact from the speaker's death until decades later when it was first written down. If so, it's more likely to be authentic. For example, "turn the other cheek".
Irony: Based on several important narrative parables (such as the Parable of the Good Samaritan), the fellows decided that irony, reversal, and frustration of expectations were characteristic of Jesus' style. Does a pericope present opposites or impossibilities? If it does, it's more likely to be authentic. For example, "love your enemies".
Trust in God: A long discourse attested in three gospels has Jesus telling his listeners not to fret but to trust in the Father. Fellows looked for this theme in other sayings they deemed authentic. For example, "Ask – it'll be given to you".
The Seminar's criteria for Inauthenticity were:
The seminar looked for several characteristics that, in their judgment, identified a saying as inauthentic, including self-reference, leadership issues, and apocalyptic themes.[4]
Self-reference: Does the text have Jesus referring to himself? For example, "I am the way, and I am the truth, and I am life" (John 14:1–14).
Framing Material: Are the verses used to introduce, explain, or frame other material, which might itself be authentic? For example, in Luke, the "red" parable of the good samaritan is framed by scenes about Jesus telling the parable, and the seminar deemed Jesus' framing words in these scenes to be "black".
Community Issues: Do the verses refer to the concerns of the early Christian community, such as instructions for missionaries or issues of leadership? For example, Peter as "the rock" on which Jesus builds his church (Matthew 16:17–19).
Theological Agenda: Do the verses support an opinion or outlook that is unique to the gospel, possibly indicating redactor bias? For example, the prophecy of the sheep and the goats (Matthew 25:31–46) was voted black[clarification needed] because the fellows saw it as representing Matthew's agenda of speaking out against unworthy members of the Christian community.
So, one might ask whether everyone on the Jesus Seminar was actually an authentic New Testament scholar, and the answer to that would be a short fact:
What is one to believe about the Jesus Seminar findings?
One could certainly believe that they don't know, either.
By the time the Gospels were written, three distinct periods had occurred:
1. The active years of Jesus before his death (maybe 4 years, but we don't really know)
2. A partially undocumented growth period following Jesus' death
3. A period of consolidation, contained within a century of Jesus' death.
Jesus was remembered. The individuals who assembled the oral, and perhaps written, accounts of Jesus, circulating among the believers who regularly met to remember Jesus, were not remembered. We know almost nothing about the writers or the material they had at hand. So, if we have faith in God, that Jesus existed, that Jesus did what the Gospels say he did, then we must also have faith that the Gospel authors were divinely inspired.
If you mean it is not the word of God, then either that is your opinion (that I share), or you can prove it. If the latter, please do so.
See, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentary_hypothesis.
The OT is a combination of a number of writings that were written over many years.
By way of example, there are two entirely seperate Noah stories strewn contradictorily together in Genesis, providing proof these were two works pieced together by an editor. http://www.awitness.org/contrabib/torah/flood.html
If the words in a given sequence of words are intelligible - understandable – how do you get past that to something else and preserve the qualification?"
Those who hold the bible is the word of God believe every word is impregnated with divine meaning and would therefore demand scholarly interpretation of every passage, with recognition their interpretation may be flawed. Such traditions often rely upon sages or particularly learned people for biblical interpretation.
Belief in the resurrection is based on the visionary experiences of Paul, Peter and Mary Magdalene.
How do they know for sure that Paul didn't invent Jesus? I know that's not a popular view, but some interesting points have been made along those lines. The first thing to note is that the writings known to be Paul's predate the Gospels. Paul is the oldest NT writer.
The second thing being that Paul didn't know Jesus during his life. Paul's theology is largely based on revelation. And that included a risen savior who died for sins and to overcome death, which is the same thing the Gospel writers have to say about his crucifixion (well maybe not Mark but definitely the other three).
The funny thing about the bible is that the only people that even bother to discuss its meaning are the ones that believe it to be the word of god, and by doing so call into dispute its validity and his all-mightiness.
Who in his right mind would follow a god that could not even speak clearly enough so that his words would be completely and clearly understood. A god that leaves his followers in a daze about what he meant should be disqualified as a god for incompetence.
"Now it’s a simple question: how does the word of God come to fall under any interpretation at all?
One reason is that God has spoken over the course of many years, in disparate circumstances. As the years and the reasons pass out of immediate memory, we have no choice but to ask "What did God mean when He said such and such to Moses (or whoever it was)?"
Another reason is that while God is straight up and down about obedience, we are equivocators par excellence.
A third reason is that people just disagree about what God said, or what God meant. Not only that, just because "what God said" was settled theology this year doesn't mean it will stay settled theology.
A fourth reason is that for various and sundry reasons, people engage in special pleading "Well sure, God said no work on the Sabbath, but what about feeding the oxen? They get hungry and thirsty." "True, God said no lusting after thy neighbor's manservant, but by Jove, he is SUCH A HUNK. How could anybody be expected to not lust after this crown of creation?"
call into dispute its validity and his all-mightiness
I think what they call into question is meaning. If it wasn't the valid word of God, then there wouldn't be any reason to struggle to get it right for 3,000 years.
Reply to Marchesk I hadn't heard that Paul invented Jesus, but in certain circles it isn't surprising that somebody would claim such a thing. Could be, I suppose, but I doubt it. Even by the time of Paul there were already Christians (whatever they called themselves at that point). It was a rapidly growing group. I am not going to claim that Jesus had to have been divine, but something very compelling had to have happened to result in quite a few people scattered around the Aegean Sea, Asia Minor, the area around Jerusalem, and Rome thinking Jesus was the a real and important person.
Maybe Plato invented Socrates? Does that sound reasonable? I doubt Plato invented Socrates.
I am inclined to think the Jesus Seminar people have it at least somewhat right: Some things claimed in the Gospels probably didn't happen--like Jesus walking on water. That seems to be fabulistic. Causing someone to think they were healed, sure. Hysterical blindness for example. (Curing leprosy? Leprosy is/was a real disease, but the term used also covered a variety of skin diseases that were not malignant like Hansons Disease is.) Raising Lazarus? Lazarus wasn't merely dead -- he was most sincerely dead, and was well on the way to decomposition when he was allegedly rousted out of his tomb. I doubt any such thing happened.
Paul inventing Jesus and springing a fictional character on the world and in an historically very short period of time having the Roman Empire take up the religion of the fictional Jesus just doesn't seem plausible. (It's as implausible as the ghost of Jesus showing up at the disciples' condo on the Sea of Galilee.)
Paul inventing Jesus and springing a fictional character on the world and in an historically very short period of time having the Roman Empire take up the religion of the fictional Jesus just doesn't seem plausible.
Even by the time of Paul there were already Christians (whatever they called themselves at that point). It was a rapidly growing group
Maybe there were, but is there any actual evidence to this? I mean, is there anything definitively showing the existence of Christians, Jesus, or his disciples before Paul wrote?
My understanding is there isn't. That doesn't mean they didn't exist, but it does lend some credence to the Paul invention theory (which is admittedly rare and controversial).
Paul is the oldest material we have about Jesus (maybe there is older like the Q gospel, but it hasn't survived or been found), and that's something people have overlooked.
Maybe Plato invented Socrates? Does that sound reasonable? I doubt Plato invented Socrates.
Probably not. The one difference here is that Plato was a student of Socrates, but Paul never met Jesus in the flesh! Paul's Christianity is revelationary. He does mention arguments with Peter and James, two of the disciples, and contact with other Christian groups. And he said he persecuted Christians before, so that's evidence of a pre-existing community.
Where I'm coming from is the proposition that with most texts meaning is in play.
Well, I don't think that proposition is valid. Most of the Bible is quite clear. How can I say that? Well, you can take the liturgical books: The Psalms are not loaded with ambiguity, it's a hymnal. Then there is the prophetic material. The prophets generally do not speak in riddles. There are the law books -- the rules and regs. They are pretty clear. There are the wisdom books - Proverbs, Ecclesiastes. They are not real mysterious either. There are the historical accounts. There's the Apocrypha narratives. Most of this stuff is straight forward.
Of course, one can suppose that there are hidden meanings in any particular verse, just as one can believe that the television is sending you secret messages. Some people have gone that route -- both with the Bible and their TV set.
A lot of the debate is focused in the law (in the Pentateuch -- Gen, Ex, Lev, Num, Deut. -- where interpretation is critical. (Lawyers are always chewing over the law.) There is a lot of debate over law texts because the circumstances of the Jews kept changing, and how to obey the law in Babylon (no temple, for example) was quite different from obeying the law in Jerusalem.
Then in the diaspora, (66 A.D.) the Jews were evicted from Jerusalem, more or less, and the temple was taken over by the Romans for pagan worship of Jupiter--the Abomination of Desolation.
(Before the destruction of the temple even occurred) there were synagogues and rabbis teaching. After the diaspora the synagog and the rabbis didn't "take the place of" the Temple, animal sacrifice, the priestly order, and the worship activities that went on there. Judaism without the cult of the temple required a wholesale reinterpretation. The early Christians, deprived of the physical Jesus, also had a disjuncture which required some deep re-interpretation.
My view of the Bible is that it was written by humans, lock, stock, and barrel, and that God himself is our creation. Of course, the people "in the Bible" never looked at things that way. Whoever the prophets were believed they were speaking for God. They didn't think they were engaged in some sort of pious fraud.
Most religious people don't think they are engaged in some sort of elaborate theatrical scheme without any reality. One either has to "get with the program", just play along (not believing a word of it, but acting as if one does), or one needs to admit one just doesn't believe it. (Actually, quite a few Christians don't really believe the doctrine.) What they do believe in is Jesus, and they like the model he offers. For that approach, you don't have to think of him as a supernatural being from heaven, any more than one has to consider Nelson Mandela, Gandhi, or Angela Merkel as heaven-sent.
but something very compelling had to have happened to result in quite a few people scattered around the Aegean Sea, Asia Minor, the area around Jerusalem, and Rome thinking Jesus was the a real and important person.
Not necessarily. Think about modern day conspiracy therorists; the rise of wacky and not so wacky religions...
DEPARTMENT...HEBREW...REVEALS . . .BELONGS TO . . .
Peshat... ???... Simplest meanings... World of Action
Remez... ???... Hinted meanings... World of Formation
Derush... ????... Deeper meanings... World of Creation
Sod... ???... Secret meanings... World of Emanation
But the question is whether the supposed divinity of a text can even in principle survive the activity of interpretation
Your question is valid. The Divine speaks, we hear it, what's to interpret? But your view is that of the outsider. For the insider (the believer in the Divine Being) a second, third, or fourth look at the text is a friendly, cooperating-with-God project. Interpretation isn't an adversarial process. For the believer, there can't be a conclusion of "this doesn't mean anything". Rather, it's an attempt to obtain the full meaning.
This is true of all scripture -- whether it be the speech of the Sybil at Eleusis, Zoroaster, Buddha, Jesus, Jeremiah, Deuteronomy, Mohammed, the Vedas, and so on.
Time always places a requirement on scripture for interpretation because realities change. Some people have said that one of the problems of Islam is that it has not gone through a reformation where the Koran would be reinterpreted -- not rewritten -- for the modern age (now several hundred years old.
Another thing about scripture is that it periodically needs to be lifted out of its tribal setting. Jews in pre-Roman Israel didn't have the same culture as the Jews in medieval Spain, and the Spanish Jews didn't have the same culture as the post-Spanish-expulsion Jews of Poland and Ukraine. Buddhists in Boston have different cultural problems than the Buddhists of Beijing, and so on.
We secular non-believing people don't usually buy into the truth of the various scriptures in the first place, so all that scriptural study seems counterproductive. When we are insiders, the situation is different.
Look how much debate goes into the scripture of the U.S. Constitution. Endless debate about what the authors meant. Did they mean that everybody is entitled to carry a gun around with them everywhere, or did they mean that the citizens of the new country were entitled to form armies with which to defend themselves from foreign threats?
how does the word of God come to fall under any interpretation at all? If the words in a given sequence of words are intelligible - understandable – how do you get past that to something else and preserve the qualification?
I don't understand your question. Any text, regardless of what it is, must be interpreted. Even a simple command such as "Fire!" must be interpreted. It could mean a series of different things. Words are symbolic, and the meaning(s) they hold vary according to how they are used, the context, the culture, etc. To get at the meaning of any text you have to interpret it. So to perceive the meaning of the Word of God you have to interpret it. There's no problem here.
It's funny how all the insecure atheists jump in here to add their vote to the ballot that it's not the Word of God, without probably understanding what that even means :P
Even a simple command such as "Fire!" must be interpreted. It could mean a series of different things. Words are symbolic, and the meaning(s) they hold vary according to how they are used, the context, the culture, etc. To get at the meaning of any text you have to interpret it.
Reply to Agustino It's like the Protestants bitching about the Catholics doing away with the Latin Mass. Or the lapsed Catholics complaining that the priests are not doing the folk liturgy in the right way, or yes, atheists worrying about the interpretation of scriptures.
It's like the Protestants bitching about the Catholics doing away with the Latin Mass. Or the lapsed Catholics complaining that the priests are not doing the folk liturgy in the right way, or yes, atheists worrying about the interpretation of scriptures.
Most of these Christians do not disagree about the general meaning of the Word of God though. I think if you look carefully you'd be surprised.
But you imply an understanding of a meaning that's lacking, probably, in some people. What meaning is that?
You have to follow the Biblical story from beginning to end. Without understanding the whole, you cannot understand the part. You have to look at the entire picture that is painted. The Bible is like a puzzle - if you look at pieces separately, you won't be able to distinguish the real meaning. And then you must also understand the Judaic culture in which the Bible was written. This is a very good resource:
No Christian claims they are the words of God. The Bible is divinely inspired, not written by God like the Qu'ran claims to be. So I think you're confusing two different claims.
"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." This text is well-known. As to what it says, I think it's reasonably transparent.
Yep, but again, to break everything into pieces and analyze them separately is to fail to see the meaning of the whole. You asked what is the meaning of the Word of God? A short answer for that is Christ. But yet, you cannot find Christ by looking atomically at each individual sentence extracted from its context. You must look at the overarching meaning of the entire narrative.
Analysing each book of the Bible separately will reveal different and separate meanings in addition to the role they play in the overarching narrative. However, the Biblical text is revelatory - its aim is to reveal many things that are hidden. That's part of what makes the Bible different than any other text in history - and that's what makes it the most influential narrative in history, by far.
If I cannot understand any part, on what fulcrum do I lever myself into an understanding of the whole - which apparently is not gained by parts, but only as a whole?
A non-question. You don't understand any part of the puzzle, but you do understand how they can fit together, and once every piece is in place suddenly - insight strikes - you get the meaning.
And closer to the point, it would appear you argue that the Bible (perhaps all books) are more than the some of the parts - the words.
Yep, just like a puzzle. And meaning is always more than the sum of the words. Meaning isn't the same as the words, I think you understand that. The meaning of "fire" isn't the letters that compose the word. That's why the same meanings can sometimes be conveyed by very different words. The letters have no intrinsic/necessary connection to the meaning. Neither do the words for that matter.
When did interpretation ever become part of the Bible?
At the very beginning.
How do you think the Bible came into existence? You must think the High Priest of the Temple went into the Holy of Holies one Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) and found a stack of scrolls on the Mercy Seat with a Post-It Note™ stuck to it saying, "Hot off the press -- the Old Testament. Hope you like it. Love, YHWH ps: working on New Testament now"
How do you think the Bible came into existence? You must think the High Priest of the Temple went into the Holy of Holies one Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) and found a stack of scrolls on the Mercy Seat with a Post-It Note™ stuck to it saying, "Hot off the press -- the Old Testament. Hope you like it. Love, YHWH ps: working on New Testament now"
The Hebrew Scriptures probably came about as an evolution of fragments and wholesale revisions. Parts of Genesis, Exodus, and Numbers were probably the oldest parts. They may have been written by Israelite and Judahite priests stitching together both region's traditions of various accounts by the end of the 700s (after Assyrian destruction of Northern Kingdom of Israel and influx of Israelite priests to Jerusalem in the Southern Kingdom of Judah).
Then there was the Deuteronomic author (possibly the author being mentioned in The Book of Kings itself as Shaphan) who more-or-less consolidated the earlierhenotheistic Israelite-Judaic tradition into a strictly monotheistic one around 600s under the reign of King Josiah of Judah.
Leviticus probably came last, written by the Solomon priesthood who were descended from the Sons of Zadok and who probably inserted the idea of Aaron as Moses' brother and being descended in some way from Moses' family, thus giving themselves legitimacy as priestly rulers. Further redactions probably took place in the Babylonian Captivity as traditions were consolidated, the very final version being stitched together by Ezra and his team of scribes to be brought back to Jerusalem with Nehemiah and the governorship under the appointment of Persia's King Cyrus.
Thus early Judaism took on many interpretations even within the Torah's text itself as it was pieced together to make a more coherent narrative. For a while, in early Second Temple Judaism the Temple Priests were essentially the conveyors of the law, but eventually "men of letters" (who essentially were learned in the art of hermeneutics) became a large faction of authority. Their interpretation was evolutionary in method as they applied what was written in the text of the Law to a contemporary problem that was beyond the original text or rather to a situation which had "outgrown" the time period that the text was written in. This evolutionary-hermeneutics approach was developed by the Pharisees, and their compendium of evolutionary interpretation became known eventually as the Oral Law or Talmud.
The elite Temple priestly class was mainly championed by Sadducees, those who rejected such methods. They fought often under the Hasmonean Dynasty from 160 BCE- 63 BCE. By the time of the Romans, the Pharisees were seen by the populace in and around Jerusalem as the most trusted faction for legal interpretation. When the Romans destroyed the Temple around 70 CE, the Pharisees reconstituted Judaism in a way without a Temple complex, priestly caste, and sacrifices.
Reply to Bitter Crank If it wasn't the valid word of God, then there wouldn't be any reason to struggle to get it right for 3,000 years.
If it was the valid word of some god, don't you think he would have made it absolutely obvious what he wanted from us and for us instead of letting a bunch of ignorant, illiterate barely out of monkey stage goons decide what it meant for him?
Reply to Agustino However, the Biblical text is revelatory - its aim is to reveal many things that are hidden.
This is only your opinion of what the bible is, how you interpret it. Personally I think the bible means to say exactly what it says and anything you add to it as "meaning" is actually a corruption of the original writing. Not that I actually believe a word of it.
People that try to find hidden meaning in things can be found by the dozen in museums, looking at the paintings of long dead artists and telling anyone that will listen what the paint was actually trying to express in the work. They have not got a bloody clue either.
Reply to schopenhauer1 Parts of Genesis, Exodus, and Numbers were probably the oldest parts. They may have been written by Israelite and Judahite priests stitching together both region's traditions
Several African origins myths are almost exactly like genesis, and hundreds if not thousands of years earlier.
Several African origins myths are almost exactly like genesis, and hundreds if not thousands of years earlier.
Yep, funny how ancient human cultures devise similar myths in different regions. Some may have been influenced by others (Israelite traditions definitely influenced by previous Babylonian myths, etc.). Makes you want to read Joseph Campbell!
The last bloody thing I would want would to be a god. But I would bet that given his supposed powers I could probably do better.
Good post, as usual.
The Cohens, Kahns, Cahanes, Levites... these Jewish names are connected to the priestly caste of Israel, and there are genetic similarities linking the various families.
Nothing to do with the price of matzo ball soup, but interesting.
The Cohens, Kahns, Cahanes, Levites... these Jewish names are connected to the priestly caste of Israel, and there are genetic similarities linking the various families.
Nothing to do with the price of matzo ball soup, but interesting.
Reply to schopenhauer1 I believe Heinz is owned by Kraft, foods. Kraft was part of Phillip Morris for a while, but the smoke folks decided it didn't make sense for them to own a food company, after all.
It's hard to keep track of who owns who, what with all the conglomerates.
Like most good products, Heinz Ketchup is made with high fructose corn syrup.
Reply to Agustino "the Biblical text is revelatory - its aim is to reveal many things that are hidden."
As Thomas Paine (not an atheist) pointed out, if any text is revelatory, it is only revelatory to the person that witnessed God directly speaking those words. To anybody else, it is just hearsay.
This is only your opinion of what the bible is, how you interpret it.
Sure, if you consider the tree that I see outside to be only my opinion, then you can say this too is only my opinion. :-} The truth is that all Christians have believed this to be so, so whether it's actually true, it certainly isn't "only my opinion". To say it is is to be ridiculous.
Personally I think the bible means to say exactly what it says and anything you add to it as "meaning" is actually a corruption of the original writing.
I don't think you understand exactly what it says, that is precisely the problem. You think this understanding what it says is a straightforward matter that involves just reading the words. That's not true, anymore than you can understand what "Fire!" means just by reading that word.
I never talked about a hidden meaning. I referenced hidden things that are revealed by the Biblical text. That's why other areas - art, science, philosophy etc. - need to be interpreted in the light of Biblical revelation.
A god that leaves his followers in a daze about what he meant should be disqualified as a god for incompetence.
— Sir2u
Do you think you could do any better with no experience of the job?
Well, if I were a god, I'd try. But I am not. So... why do you ask Sir2u to perform a task which only gods are required to do? This is like asking a sea mollusk to solve a second degree equation system with five unknowns. You simply can't ask a mortal to perform the job of a god. That is not fair.
I am with Sir2u on the issue. The bible is so badly written, with so many infactuals, so many logical impossibilities, that one's hair stands on end when one thinks it has been inspired by a god.
In my private opinion the bible was written by uneducated, stupid men and women, and there is nothing godly about it. It is a badly written book for guidance and knowledge, and that's about the size of it.
Yep, funny how ancient human cultures devise similar myths in different regions. Some may have been influenced by others (Israelite traditions definitely influenced by previous Babylonian myths, etc.). Makes you want to read Joseph Campbell!
The Biblical story is not a myth. And this isn't only because the Biblical story is true (whereas myths are false), but rather because it serves exactly the opposite function to that of myth. It is true that the Biblical story is dressed in the clothes of myths, but its function is not obfuscation and removal of traces of the founding violence of culture and society - but rather their revelation. This is the reason why the Bible cannot but be inspired by a transcendent God - the Bible cannot come from humans, its source cannot be immanent.
I am with Sir2u on the issue. The bible is so badly written, with so many infactuals, so many logical impossibilities, that one's hair stands on end when one thinks it has been inspired by a god.
In my private opinion the bible was written by uneducated, stupid men and women, and there is nothing godly about it. It is a badly written book for guidance and knowledge, and that's about the size of it.
This opinion is hardly worth even refutation. If you cannot see the intricacies and wisdom of Ecclesiastes, Proverbs, or the Book of Job to name just three books of the Bible - and perceive that these texts could not under any circumstances be written by stupid and uneducated men and women, then you're just deluding yourself.
As Thomas Paine (not an atheist) pointed out, if any text is revelatory, it is only revelatory to the person that witnessed God directly speaking those words. To anybody else, it is just hearsay.
A text is revelatory if its meaning shows or points to things that are otherwise hidden. The Biblical text does this.
I never talked about a hidden meaning. I referenced hidden things that are revealed by the Biblical text. That's why other areas - art, science, philosophy etc. - need to be interpreted in the light of Biblical revelation.
A text is revelatory if its meaning shows or points to things that are otherwise hidden. The Biblical text does this.
So you claim. Like I (or rather, Mr Paine) said, hearsay. Quoting Agustino
If you cannot see the intricacies and wisdom of Ecclesiastes, Proverbs, or the Book of Job to name just three books of the Bible - and perceive that these texts could not under any circumstances be written by stupid and uneducated men and women, then you're just deluding yourself.
This sounds similar to the claims in the preface of my Quran, which say that the numerological patterns in the surahs, the language etc, are so intricate that they could not have been constructed by any human - hence they must have been written by Allah.
Well, if I were a god, I'd try. But I am not. So... why do you ask Sir2u to perform a task which only gods are required to do? This is like asking a sea mollusk to solve a second degree equation system with five unknowns. You simply can't ask a mortal to perform the job of a god. That is not fair.
Exactly my point. You admit you couldn't do any better, so how is it fair to ask a god to do the same thing just because of their title?
So you claim. Like I (or rather, Mr Paine) said, hearsay.
A revelation has nothing to do with who it is coming from. You seem to think that if someone hears the voice of God, and the other reads the same thing in the Bible, for the latter it is not revelation. It absolutely is, if what is revealed is not known before.
This sounds similar to the claims in the preface of my Quran, which say that the numerological patterns in the surahs, the language etc, are so intricate that they could not have been constructed by any human - hence they must have been written by Allah.
His claim was that the Bible was written by stupid and uneducated men and women. That claim, given the text, is absurd, and not even worth debating. It's like claiming that the works of Shakespeare were written by an analphabet.
You seem to think that if someone hears the voice of God, and the other reads the same thing in the Bible, for the latter it is not revelation. It absolutely is, if what is revealed is not known before.
Yes, of course it is my position that the former can be revelation and the latter cannot. There's no 'seems' about it. I stated that position already, and furthermore it's the only reasonable one.
In the latter case, all they know is that somebody wrote down a claim about something. They have no reason to believe it is true, so they don't know something that they did not know before. Whereas if they hear the voice of God, and they know that it is God speaking, it is reasonable for them to assume that what the voice says is true, so they can learn something new.
In the latter case, all they know is that somebody wrote down a claim about something. They have no reason to believe it is true, so they don't know something that they did not know before. Whereas if they hear the voice of God, and they know that it is God speaking, it is reasonable for them to assume that what the voice says is true, so they can learn something new.
Right, I expect you to then renounce all scientific truths, because you just read them in some books and don't hear them directly from God. Therefore you have no reason to believe them.
And by the way, something is still a revelation if it's true and you are exposed to it, even if you don't believe it.
In my private opinion the bible was written by uneducated, stupid men and women, and there is nothing godly about it. It is a badly written book for guidance and knowledge, and that's about the size of it.
Your reputation as an educated intelligent man or woman would have been better served by keeping your private opinion private.
Uneducated? No Harvard degrees, true. They may or may not have written or read script, but they were literate the same way Homer was literate--verbally. They had a solid grasp of their cultural history, and they wrote fine poetry (Psalms, for instance). They were "inspired" -- and by inspired I mean creative in ordinary human terms, not that they were telegraphing dictation from God.
Open the Bible to any page, and there is a good chance that whatever text your eyes land on will not be very compelling. The same thing goes for just about every published work in the history of civilization. You have to read and study any book to give it a fair evaluation.
Right, I expect you to then renounce all scientific truths, because you just read them in some books and don't hear them directly from God. Therefore you have no reason to believe them.
No, I verify them for myself, and if they survive the verification process, I (provisionally, being a sceptic) believe them. Admittedly, that does make me a slow reader. But when I read something, it stays read.
The Bible, on the other hand, is qualified as the “Word of God.” Now it’s a simple question: how does the word of God come to fall under any interpretation at all? If the words in a given sequence of words are intelligible - understandable – how do you get past that to something else and preserve the qualification?
To even read it is an act of interpretation. The idea that it has a monolithic, single meaning is one of the unfortunate characteristics of American fundamentalism, in particular. Origen, one of the Church Fathers, ridiculed biblical literalism in the second century AD, saying there were three levels or layers of meaning and woe betide unto those who confused them. Have a look at a book on Amazon, The Bible Made Impossible, by Christian Smith, http://a.co/0cQfwHu.
The other point is, hermeneutics or exegesis both require an interpretive framework which is obviously not objective in the modern sense. I mean, it's not like reading the instructions for a device, or for an experiment. The intended aim is spiritual, and in the case of such texts, the reader is also the subject in an important sense.
Reply to Agustino "The truth is that all Christians have believed this to be so, so whether it's actually true, it certainly isn't "only my opinion"
I was not addressing the rest of the christians or I would have included them as well. And as far as I know there is no such thing as a group opinion, only a group with the same opinion.
"You think this understanding what it says is a straightforward matter that involves just reading the words."
And just how do you know this not to be true? Do you have access to some secret bible readers manual that the rest of us have been denied a chance to see? Just where does it say anywhere that the bible has hidden things or ways to interpret the writings of long dead people?
Reply to Agustino "That's your non-expert opinion ;) - to adopt one of your favorite tropes X-)"
Have I ever actually ever used that phrase? Don't think so, but I do like it.
Please name one person that has had the right to call him/herself an expert on the meaning of the bible. But let's apply a couple of conditions that could be applied to anyone trying to verify a work of art.
1. Has had direct access no the original writings of the people that are supposed to have written the bible. Including non biblical writings to act as benchmarks for style and so on.
2. Has been allowed to review the writings that were either removed from the bible or are contemporary, and of similar content to it and not allowed to be included.
3. Has been allowed to review historical, psychological, personality, educational records of those writers to try to deduce veracity of their existence and competence to write the book of a god.
4. Someone that has not been trained by someone that does not have the above.
Then where does meaning come from? I agree that there is something called "interpretation," but in order to interpret, you need something to interpret. And if it's all interpretation, then what is meaning?
The Bible contains an enormous wealth of stories, historical accounts, mythological accounts, anecdotes, parables, prophecies. So it's not only a matter of interpretation, you're interpreting all of that material.
Nowadays, in a post-religious culture, I think there is a general lack of spiritual literacy. I'm not talking down saying that, or holding myself up as an authority. But I have studied religions, mainly to make sense of certain questions that always struck me as important. But 'spiritual literacy' is comparable to the 'computer literacy' that you need to understand how to interact with computers - internet terminology and the like. It's like a general background understanding, and in this case, is often absent.
God itself is the title I'm referring to. Did you purposefully dodge my point?
God is His name. Not His title. I am not dodging anything. You may refer to God as His job title, or occupation name, which is not quite the same as "title". For instance, Mr. President: Mr. is his title, President is his job title.
You asked me if I were dodging your point. I ask you: Do you get most of your reading comprehension and language skills honed by reading the Gospel and/or the Old Testament?
Sorry to be so pointed. But your "yes" would explain a lot.
Your reputation as an educated intelligent man or woman would have been better served by keeping your private opinion private.
I have to admit that my values are more precious to me than reputation.
And I do proselytize my way; the religious do it their own way. I do it by fighting the mental and intellectual sludge-lodge of miasma of religious teaching and dogma by pointing out exactly what they are.
You asked me if I were dodging your point. I ask you: Do you get most of your reading comprehension and language skills honed by reading the Gospel and/or the Old Testament?
First, that answers neither of my questions. Second, no.
First, that answers neither of my questions. Second, no.
Both of your questions were so worded that they defied a reasonable answer. First you appealed to me to perform a job a deity can only do (to your credit, at that time you were not aware I am a mere mortal). Secondly, your question involved a concept which does not exist (title of God). Your attempt at, and then later your abandoning attempting to, meaningfully respond to my criticism of your questions' nature leaves no question by you to be answered.
First of all, please explain on what ground you expect a mortal to do the job of a God; in my opinion it's an expectation that is too high. On the other hand, expecting God to be better than what a mortal can do is only reasonable, and that's exactly where the God of the Christian Bible fails its call.
Second of all, you asked why I defer the quality of workmanship expected in thought to God's title, and I replied there is no title that God uses. After that you abandoned the title issue, and demand an answer from me anyway.
Your questions were so worded and the thoughts behind them were so wrong that no reasonable person could come up with a direct answer to them.
Please, if you want me to answer any of your questions, ask some that can be answered by applying reasonable thought.
First of all, please explain on what ground you expect a mortal to do the job of a God
As I have stated, I don't. I'm asking on what ground you expect a god to do that job, as you wouldn't expect anyone else, including yourself, to be able to do that.
Second of all, you asked why I defer the quality of workmanship expected in thought to God's title, and I replied there is no title that God uses.
Given that part of the question didn't make sense, as I wasn't aware of the existences of both terms title and job title, one could have, especially on the basis of the sentence structure, considered the question without that part. That being said:
No, I verify them for myself, and if they survive the verification process, I (provisionally, being a sceptic) believe them. Admittedly, that does make me a slow reader. But when I read something, it stays read.
My point still holds, something being a revelation has nothing to do with whether you believe it or not.
I was not addressing the rest of the christians or I would have included them as well. And as far as I know there is no such thing as a group opinion, only a group with the same opinion.
Okay, but it's not "only" my opinion as you said ;)
Just where does it say anywhere that the bible has hidden things or ways to interpret the writings of long dead people?
Here:
Matthew 13:35:So was fulfilled what was spoken through the prophet: “I will open My mouth in parables; I will utter things hidden since the foundation of the world.”
What is that belief/claim? That the Bible is the word of God. How do they begin to start to know that? Well, they read it. So far so good. Then quite a few of them undertake to be sources of information on what it says, the content often departing from the plain meaning of the words. This new content I call interpretation. The question I am asking is, when you re-present meaning beyond the scope of the words of a text and that text is supposed to be the word of God, then have you not turned the text into something that is not the word of God? And at the same time invalidated the claim that the text is the word of God?
First they believe it is the word of God, rich with spiritual meaning. And then they endeavour to interpret it in the right spirit, knowing that no human interpretation can be perfect, but that some will be closer to the truth than others.
You are looking at the wrong way; as though its being the word of God is some kind of propositional claim that could be validated or falsified; this is a trivialization of the text.
something being a revelation has nothing to do with whether you believe it or not.
That use of the word 'revelation' is completely different from how I have ever seen it used. You are free to define the word however you want, but with that definition it becomes a weak and trivial word that is of no interest to philosophical discussion. It cannot convey anything of the power and significance of what the stories say happened to Saul on the road to Damascus.
It cannot convey anything of the power and significance of what the stories say happened to Saul on the road to Damascus
If you read a text, whether that be a work of philosophy, a poem or a religious work, and something is revealed to you in the form of insight; the intensity of that experience may be relatively slight or very profound. The difference between that order of experience and Paul's experience on the road to Damascus may be one of degree, but not so much one of kind.
Doesn't anyone here recognize a distinction between reading and interpreting?
I suspect everyone here knows the difference between reading and interpreting--though sometimes interpretation is concurrent with reading.
One reads the words (word recognition, identify meaning, part of speech, etc -- all pretty much automatic once one is an accomplished reader) then there is interpretation. "Do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God." Hosea said. All pretty common words; no accomplished reader will pause over their connotative meaning.
But... What does "Do Justice" mean? Start the revolution? Vote for Donald Trump? What? That's the interpretation part. What does "love mercy" mean? The Jerusalem Bible translates the phrase "Love tenderly". Then the "walk humbly with God". Keep God company? What? I've never been sure exactly what that means.
Reply to Janus Yes, something is revealed, but the word 'revelation' is not used unless that something is significant. In English one does not say 'I was just browsing through the telephone book and had the revelation that the number of Esme Brown is 9876 5432', unless that piece of information is of particular interest.
Doesn't anyone here recognize a distinction between reading and interpreting?
The distinction is crucial in a child's early education. For many children there is a phase - sometimes prolonged - when they can read the words of a paragraph but not get the meaning of it. Getting from just reading the words to getting the meaning - we use the word 'Comprehension' in the schools I've been involved with - is a crucial step, and is tested by giving children a passage to read and then asking questions about its meaning.
Mercifully, those questions are sensible things like 'why did Suresh go back to the tennis court?' or 'How do you think Lakshmi was feeling?' rather than 'Does that mean that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son or just from the Father?'
Because no text is understood just by reading the words.
So if I write "The cat is black and was a year old when she had kittens" you would not be able to understand it just by reading the text?
Of course your brain would understand it once it was processed. It means exactly what it says.
So when it says in the bible that "Mary was a virgin when she had a baby" your brain would process it and it too would mean exactly what it says.
So why should everything else be a mystery that has to be unraveled before it can be understood?
Matthew 13:35:So was fulfilled what was spoken through the prophet: “I will open My mouth in parables; I will utter things hidden since the foundation of the world.”
parable; a simple story used to illustrate a moral or spiritual lesson, as told by Jesus in the Gospels
10 The disciples came to him and asked, “Why do you speak to the people in parables?”
11He replied, “Because the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them.
12 Whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.
13 This is why I speak to them in parables:
“Though seeing, they do not see;
though hearing, they do not hear or understand.
14 In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah:
“‘You will be ever hearing but never understanding;
you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.
15 For this people’s heart has become calloused;
they hardly hear with their ears,
and they have closed their eyes.
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
hear with their ears,
understand with their hearts
and turn, and I would heal them.’
16 But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear.
17 For truly I tell you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.
18 “Listen then to what the parable of the sower means:
And he goes on to explain.
Keeping things in context helps understanding.
Jesus was talking about things that ordinary everyday people might not understand. Complicated explanations would not have worked so he used parables to place the ideas into to day to day situations that the people could relate to.
But did he ever transmit any super secret information through them? He used parables to make sure that nothing was hidden.
Reply to andrewk That's true, but by "insight" I was referring to something that is evoked or alluded to by a text, but would (mostly) not be propositionally stated. If I am reading and something like this happens it would be perfectly in accordance with ordinary usage to say "It was a revelation".
But "reading" then according to you just refers to the act of reading. That act obviously involves skills including knowing the conventional meanings of words. Of course the possession of such reading skills and the act of reading itself must precede any interpretation, but so what? I still don't see how that rather obvious and mundane fact has any bearing on what you seem to have been trying to argue.
So if I write "The cat is black and was a year old when she had kittens" you would not be able to understand it just by reading the text?
Of course you would know what those words mean (if you did). The revelatory aspect of texts which may be experienced in the (all the more so by informed) act of interpretation consists in gaining insight into what is intended by the text; into what it is, in an overall sense, trying to convey. That is why Agustino is right to say that one must know the whole Bible (or any allusive unified literary work that contains meaning beyond the merely so-called literal) to understand most fully any part of it.
Obviously you couldn't even get started if you did not know the meanings of the words (or in other words were not literate in the language the text was written in). So, your objection here seems trivial and ill-founded. Have you ever heard of hermeneutics?
Then the "walk humbly with God". Keep God company? What? I've never been sure exactly what that means.
I think you're being disingenuous if you claim not to know what that is intended to mean and instead offer such a flippant, obviously ridiculous, interpretation. You don't have to feel empathy with the sentiment to know that it is intended, and how it is conveyed by the words.
"Do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God." Hosea said.
I don't know what that means either. Does God walk humbly and want me to do that too? I have never thought of the biblical version of God as particularly humble.
Of course you would know what those words mean (if you did). The revelatory aspect of texts which may be experienced in the (all the more so by informed) act of interpretation consists in gaining insight into what is intended by the text; into what it is, in an overall sense, trying to convey.
So let's try something. interpret this for me. What is the special hidden meaning here
1 Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. 12 When Zechariah saw him, he was startled and was gripped with fear. 13 But the angel said to him: “Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to call him John. 14 He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, 15 for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He is never to take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even before he is born. 16 He will bring back many of the people of Israel to the Lord their God. 17 And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the parents to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous—to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.”
I think you're being disingenuous if you claim not to know what that is intended to mean and instead offer such a flippant, obviously ridiculous, interpretation. You don't have to feel empathy with the sentiment to know that it is intended, and how it is conveyed by the words.
No, wasn't being disingenuous, flippant, ridiculous, or anything else. You tell me what you think it means.
These passages from Leviticus 16 and Leviticus 23 are pretty straightforward about Yom Kippur.
But the thing is mate that you and me just don't know how to interpret them. They are full of hidden meanings that god put there so that we poor humans can spend our whole lives trying to figure out what the hell they mean.
Of course you are right, they are pretty straight forward. There is absolutely no reason to think that there should be any meanings other than those that are clearly visible. And most of the bible is just like that plain and clear.
Reply to Sir2u
But wait, there's more!. What about how to APPLY the words to make it an everyday thing? So the "Oral Torah" (essentially, traditions surrounding the text) arose out of disagreements and ambiguities. See below:
The Mishna was a compendium of Pharisidic tradition of the "Oral" disputes as to how to interpret the law going back to disputes that started at least by 200s BCE, but written down around 190 CE:
MISHNA : Seven days before the Day of Atonement the high-priest is to be removed from his house to the Palhedrin Chamber (????????), and another high-priest is appointed to substitute him in case he become unfit for the service by becoming unclean. R. Jedudah says another wife is to be appointed for him also, in case his own wife dies, whereas it is said [Lev. xvii. 11], "and shall make atonement for himself and for his house"; "his house"--that is, his wife. But it was objected that in this manner there will be no end to the matter. (The other wife may die too.)
But wait! There's more! What about how to understand what the Mishnaic interpreters said. There was another layer of scholars that tried to properly understand the previous interpreters! This layer is called the Gemara.. AND there's two additions with variations in interpretations! There's a Jerusalem one finished in 400 CE and a Babylonian one finished in 500 CE!
GEMARA: We have learned in a Mishna (Tract Parah, III., 1): "Seven days before the red cow 1 was to be burned, the priest who had to perform this ceremony was removed from his house to the northeastern chamber of the Temple," etc. "Whence do we deduce this?" said R. Miniumi bar Helviah in the name of Mahassia b. Iddi, quoting R. Johanan: "It is written [Lev. viii. 34]: 'As they have done this day, so hath the Lord commanded to do farther, to make an atonement for you.' 'To do farther' signifies the red cow; 'to make an atonement for you', signifies the Day of Atonement." But perhaps it signifies the atonement of sacrifices generally? Could we know, in this case, which priest is going to perform the rite? How, then, could he be removed from his home? But perhaps other festivals are meant? We infer the removal seven days before one day from the removal, seven days (before) for the service of one day, 1 but not seven days (before) for a service of seven days [of the festivals of Passover and of Tabernacles]. Perhaps Pentecost, which also is only one day, is meant? Said R. Abba: "We infer a day of one bull and one ram (when one such is sacrificed) [as on the days of consecration], from a day of one bull and one ram, which is the offering for the Day of Atonement; but for Pentecost two rams are prescribed." Perhaps New Year's Day is meant (which is also only one day)? Said R. Abahu: "We may infer a day of the bull and the ram at the priest's own cost from a day when the priest must act likewise, and that is the Day of Atonement. But on the days of Pentecost and of New Year the bull and ram are at the public cost." R. Ashi, however, said: "We may infer a day on which the bull is a sin-offering, and the ram a burnt-offering (as on the day of consecration and on the Day of Atonement), but on New Year's Day and Pentecost both are burnt-offerings."
.....
MISHNA: During all the seven days he sprinkles the blood [of the daily offerings, to become practised], fumes the incense, trims the lamps, and offers the head and the leg. During all the other days, he sacrifices, if he chooses, since the high-priest offers the first portion as he prefers, and takes for his own use a portion of the first offering.
GEMARA: Who is the Tana who holds so? Said R. Hisda: That is not in accordance with R. Aqiba. For R. Aqiba holds that when a clean man is sprinkled upon, he thereby becomes defiled. And since the high-priest was sprinkled upon all the seven days, how could he perform the service? As we have learned in the following Boraitha: It is written [Num. xix. 19]: "And the clean person shall sprinkle upon the unclean." Infer from this (since unclean is written, not him), that only an unclean person becomes clean; but if a clean person is sprinkled on, he becomes unclean. So is the decree of R. Aqiba. But the sages said: This only applies to things subject to defilement. Abayi, however, said: It may be said, the Mishna can be even in accordance with R. Aqiba; and the case is, the whole day he can perform the service, in the evening he bathes, and when the sun has set, he becomes clean.
But wait, there's more! The Geonim were a group of scholars in 600-1000 CE who made further interpretations of the Mishna/Gemara (Talmud).
But wait, there's more! The Rishonim, people like Maimonides, wrote books like the Mishneh Torah about the previous Talmud tracts and Geonim.. Etc. etc.
The Bible, on the other hand, is qualified as the “Word of God.” Now it’s a simple question: how does the word of God come to fall under any interpretation at all? If the words in a given sequence of words are intelligible - understandable – how do you get past that to something else and preserve the qualification?
Well he didn't sit down to write the words, and if it is revelation, what is/was/will be revealed is provided by the hands of the men who wrote these stories and their ability to convey that inspiration. To best of my knowledge none of it was written by women.
Where is the feminist interpretation of the bible?
It apparently was written by men, from a male pov and seems to be mostly about men. When women do show up they seem to be mostly portrayed as weak, evil or as chattel.
Does that mean that even the knowledgeable, the enlightened, the blessed ones don't agree on what religious texts mean. :s
That sounds just like a person that wants to keep his cushy job trying to convince everyone else that only he can do it because he is the only one that has been taught to read QBasic.
Not necessarily. The sentence may be code for something else for example.
Yes you are right, it could be talking about the color of the stool I just left in the bathroom.
Oh dear I have done it again. Talking in code is such a problem. I did not mean that I left an object used for sitting on in the bathroom, I meant the pooh.
Blimey I did it again, sorry. Let me explain. I went to the bathroom for a pooh, but not Winnie-the-Pooh, shit. No, shit is not used as an expletive there, I just stated what I did actually leave in the bathroom.
Oh, in case you are wondering what a bathroom is, it is a place where people go to get clean.
Wait a minute, if a bathroom is a place to get clean why did I take a crap there. Language is so complicated, I think I need an interpreter to help me get through my day.
Unless you are some sort of a pervert that gets off reading behind the text, between the lines or looking for hidden meanings in every sentence text usually means what it says and needs no further explanation.
You do not need to know which cat is black to understand the sentence. There is no hidden meaning nor is there any need to interpret it. People do not usually say things like "The cat is black" in the middle of a conversation unless they are actually talking about cats and this is what gives context to the words.
A person that suddenly burst out, or even a person walking along the street muttering "The cat is black" would usually be considered to have some sort of mental problem. What does that say about people that write books that say one thing and mean something different?
I've stated that it must be read in context, taking care to go back to the way it would have been understood in the Judaic culture in which it arose.
Putting words into context and giving words other interpretations are not the same thing. And the people that wrote the bible would have known exactly what god and Jesus were saying. They must have written their exact words and both god and jesus must have been very careful about what they said because they wanted, needed people to understand and follow their way of thinking. So why should they include hidden meanings?
A parable is not another hidden meaning and is not subject to interpretation, it is just a simpler explication of a topic so that simple people can understand.
You do not need to know which cat is black to understand the sentence.
A sentence isn't some Platonic object that lives off in some separate realm and can be understood apart from its context. The meaning of a sentence is in the intention of its author. If a monkey typed that sentence, I'd tell you it means nothing, it's gibberish. If a secret agent typed that sentence, I may think it means something different than is at first apparent. Etc.
Meaning is context dependent, and interpretation aims at deciphering the intention of the author.
And the people that wrote the bible would have known exactly what god and Jesus were saying.
Nope, that's not actually the case. The Bible makes the opposite to be quite evident actually. For example:
Acts 10:9-23:On the next day, as they were on their way and approaching the city, Peter went up on the housetop about the sixth hour to pray. But he became hungry and was desiring to eat; but while they were making preparations, he fell into a trance; and he saw the sky opened up, and an object like a great sheet coming down, lowered by four corners to the ground, and there were in it all kinds of four-footed animals and crawling creatures of the earth and birds of the air. A voice came to him, “Get up, Peter, kill and eat!” But Peter said, “By no means, Lord, for I have never eaten anything unholy and unclean.” Again a voice came to him a second time, “What God has cleansed, no longer consider unholy.” This happened three times, and immediately the object was taken up into the sky.
Now while Peter was greatly perplexed in mind as to what the vision which he had seen might be, behold, the men who had been sent by Cornelius, having asked directions for Simon’s house, appeared at the gate; and calling out, they were asking whether Simon, who was also called Peter, was staying there. While Peter was reflecting on the vision, the Spirit said to him, “Behold, three men are looking for you. But get up, go downstairs and accompany them without misgivings, for I have sent them Myself.” Peter went down to the men and said, “Behold, I am the one you are looking for; what is the reason for which you have come?” They said, “Cornelius, a centurion, a righteous and God-fearing man well spoken of by the entire nation of the Jews, was divinely directed by a holy angel to send for you to come to his house and hear a message from you.” So he invited them in and gave them lodging.
So again, your ignorance of the Bible only shows itself.
They must have written their exact words and both god and jesus must have been very careful about what they said because they wanted, needed people to understand and follow their way of thinking. So why should they include hidden meanings?
"Truly, You are a God who hides Himself, O God of Israel, Savior!"
A parable is not another hidden meaning and is not subject to interpretation, it is just a simpler explication of a topic so that simple people can understand.
You have never heard of Kierkegaard's indirect communication? The point of parables is precisely that their meaning cannot be communicated otherwise, since it's not a matter of reason, but of direct perception and intuition, which requires to look and see via images as it were - to have a direct insight.
Nope, that's not actually the case. The Bible makes the opposite to be quite evident actually. For example:
balh, blah.
So again, your ignorance of the Bible only shows itself.
How does this example prove anything? Did Peter not know what god was saying to him? Did he fail to understand that someone came to get him?
I honestly don't see how this is relevant to anything, please enlighten me.
The point of parables is precisely that their meaning cannot be communicated otherwise, since it's not a matter of reason, but of direct perception and intuition, which requires to look and see via images as it were - to have a direct insight.
No. You implied that parables are just a simple way to communicate something that would otherwise be very difficult to communicate and would require one to be very educated, etc.
Are you saying that god is the kind of being that deliberately tries to confuse the people he wants to praise and adore him?
I'm not saying anything, I'm just saying that the text makes it clear that God isn't the kind of being that appears very clearly at the whims and wishes of people. He is a Hidden God.
A parable is not another hidden meaning and is not subject to interpretation, it is just a simpler explication of a topic so that simple people can understand.
The point of parables is precisely that their meaning cannot be communicated otherwise, since it's not a matter of reason, but of direct perception and intuition,
No, he did not know what God communicated to him through the vision he had. That's why he was perplexed.
When I dream about someone I know telling me something, I understand what they are saying. Why I had the dream is another question entirely. Does the dream have a meaning is something else again. But I still understood the words that the person spoke.
If god did not bother to explain what the vision meant then how are mere mortals ever going to know. So basically I think what you mean when you say interpretation is guessing at or assigning other meanings which might not necessarily in line with gods words.
I'm not saying anything, I'm just saying that the text makes it clear that God isn't the kind of being that appears very clearly at the whims and wishes of people. He is a Hidden God.
Apart from actually denying that you are saying something while doings so, which in itself is ridiculous, the rest of this is the same pitiful excuse so many use to make people do things. From politicians and preachers to parents and kids, it is always the same. "You don't know so I am right, listen to me"
I have asked you quite a few questions and for several explanations which you have failed to reply to, am I supposed to think that there is some unknowable message in you none replies or do you not think them worth replying to?
Does that mean that even the knowledgeable, the enlightened, the blessed ones don't agree on what religious texts mean. :s
That sounds just like a person that wants to keep his cushy job trying to convince everyone else that only he can do it because he is the only one that has been taught to read QBasic.
I think it shows the historical nature of the document and its evolution.
Historically, this just proves that the Bible and its interpretations have always been an evolving document. It was stitched together in steps most likely and redacted to a whole unit by the time of Ezra and the Great Assembly period c.400 BCE. Then even after this, how the nuances of ceremony, law, and custom, are to be followed exactly, and the precise meaning of the text itself was highly debatable. Was there ever a "pristine" way of understanding the text? Arguably, those rabbis would suggest that they were trying to nail this down, but clearly there was no way of knowing which tradition was absolutely correct. I believe it was mainly voted on majority opinion or the most respected scholar, or something of that nature.
I guess historically, if there was ever a case as to when the most "pristine" understanding of the Bible's text was had, it would be around the time of Ezra and the Great Assembly around 400s BCE. Ezra (and probably other scribes) were probably the final redactors and compilers of the traditions into a cohesive unit- probably in the attempt to reestablish a more or less Jewish theological state under Nehemiah (the Jewish governor sent to reestablish the district under Artaxerxes). I am sure with this, there was probably certain guidelines set down during Ezra's time, but then questions arose and different traditions or differing opinions came along, and then this evolved into more debates, and none of it was written down, so like a game of telephone it was always trying to get the interpretation right. Not only this, but new situations that were not thought of before arose and they had to be incorporated into the already existing interpretation, etc. etc. The point being it was probably never really pristine, even at its most pristine point but always evolutionary.
For some context you can read:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ezra
I think it shows the historical nature of the document and its evolution.
I agree, and that is about all the modern bible is. A historically document that has been corrupted so that no one alive today can ever hope to interpret it because we have no idea what it was really like at the beginning or what it its real meaning or purpose was.
Any modern interpretation would be nothing more than speculation.
When I was younger, I read many of these histories of the bible's writers. But that was long ago. I found that even putting a lot of the bible into historical context, the known facts about history not the traditional history, much of it did not make a lot of sense. If you read it as it was then it was a just bunch of stories. You had to add to the reading to get it to make sense as something spiritual. Why should divinely inspired writing need to be added to or looked at from a different point of view for it to make sense?
In the bible Jesus talks in parables, some get explained but most don't.
If the purpose of jesus's teaching was to instruct the people why did he not explain them all? Surely if even the enlightened disciples needed an explanation of them it would serve a good purpose to explain them.
If the purpose was to make the people think, then any and every interpretation would be valid.
But if he was only telling stories then no interpretation is necessary.
I think the bible is a bunch of stories and that anyone that wants to try to INTERPRET them has some sort of self serving motive.
When I dream about someone I know telling me something, I understand what they are saying. Why I had the dream is another question entirely. Does the dream have a meaning is something else again. But I still understood the words that the person spoke.
Apart from actually denying that you are saying something while doings so, which in itself is ridiculous, the rest of this is the same pitiful excuse so many use to make people do things. From politicians and preachers to parents and kids, it is always the same. "You don't know so I am right, listen to me"
I haven't actually said that, I merely drew your attention to the fact that the Bible itself doesn't paint the picture of God that you have in your mind for the purposes of this conversation. This isn't about me or listening to me, it's about reading the Bible.
I have asked you quite a few questions and for several explanations which you have failed to reply to, am I supposed to think that there is some unknowable message in you none replies or do you not think them worth replying to?
I fail to see the questions that I failed to reply. I've replied to everything it seems to me. Is there some unknowable message? I'm not sure what you mean, and why you brought unknowable messages in the discussion in the first place.
In the bible Jesus talks in parables, some get explained but most don't.
Oh yeah, you're actually expected to think for yourself and relate it to your own experiences, wow, who would ever do that! You should get a room for yourself and put a sticker on the door reading "kids only" :-}
1 Corinthians 13:11:When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I set aside childish ways.
Why do you think it is unreasonable to expect a God to do for what I criticized Him for not doing?
A very good question. For the same reason you think it's unreasonable to expect mortals to do it, I assume. I think it'd be a nirvana fallacy to expect and accept nothing but the best instead of one trying their best.
Historically, this just proves that the Bible and its interpretations have always been an evolving document.
Wow. Hold on. The words of the Bible do not change. Do you mean to say that previous interpretations were wrong, or that the interpretations were right for the time?
I mean, times are different now. Nobody gets to be burnt at the stakes any more for insisting that the Earth is round. I understand that by your saying that the bible is an evolving (?) document, you mean that human knowledge makes it necessary to re-evaluate parts of the bible for keeping it compatible for the new undeniable truths of the world, which the bible contradicts.
Fair enough, everyone knows that. But why use the word "evolution", or rather, a derivative of it, if neo-Darwinist evolution is still so vehemently denied by the religious? Are you not blaspheming by using this concept, which, by force of faith, is a wrongful, impossible thing to happen? If it is impossible, why can the document do it (without even changing itself) but not the biosphere?
So the document is evolving, without changing... that's not a Darwinist evolution then. What kind of evolution are we talking about?
Or are you using the word in a colloquial sense? In that case, how come the bible still insists that the Earth is flat? Or that a virgin can bring forth a child, or some people back 6000 years ago or so could live to be 600 years old or more, etc? Or that a man built a boat with the help of his family which was able to house all species of animals and plants for six weeks, with no food?
This is what you call evolution? I think new and more and more new interpretations are not a process of solving any mystery; it is, instead, merely rationalization in a very forced manner to stop the holy text from getting ridiculed by the faithful. Others are already astonished how reasonable people can believe it's a word of god, merely by looking at its description of events proven to be impossible which it boasts as historical truth.
I decided to close the argument at a point that we can both claim victory. If you don't like that, we can continue, but basically I find it pointless because now we are both saying the same thing, which is, the almighty could have done a better job, and I couldn't have, so what is the point of further arguing? To carry on an argumentative debate, the two parties have to disagree, which you and I don't.
So what do you want to talk about next? If it's a different topic, then please start one and I'll do my darndest to contribute. (Not a perfect guarantee.)
No, wasn't being disingenuous, flippant, ridiculous, or anything else. You tell me what you think it means.
Interpretations could be nuanced in various ways but for me its central meaning is to live with humility keeping God in your heart and mind instead of being consumed by worldly concerns for their own sake or for your own ego's sake. This is a pretty standard message common to many religions, although couched variously in somewhat different forms. I find it hard to believe you are not erudite enough to be well aware of that. You don't have to agree with it as a prescription for living, but it's not hard to understand its meaning, and understanding is not precluded by disagreement.
?Janus I suggest you give it up. I'm not arguing anything, I was asking what I thought was a simple question that would have a simple answer, and am astonished that you still haven't got it.
What's the question? It's in the OP and repeated a couple of times through the thread.
Here is your question:"Now it’s a simple question: how does the word of God come to fall under any interpretation at all? If the words in a given sequence of words are intelligible - understandable – how do you get past that to something else and preserve the qualification?"
And I have asked you to explain why you think the word of God should not be subject to interpretation. If you can answer that, then do so. If you can't answer, then be honest and admit it instead of trying to dismiss my question by insinuating that it is me that is being either obtuse or evasive.
My guess is that you think that in order to qualify as the word of God a text could have just one literal meaning. To me to think this would be absurd. If God is infinite, why would his Word not have infinite meaning?
"This is why I speak to them in parables: "Though seeing, they do not see; though hearing, they do not hear or understand"Matthew 13:13
[i]"THE VISION OF CHRIST that thou dost see
Is my vision’s greatest enemy.
Thine has a great hook nose like thine;
Mine has a snub nose like to mine.
Thine is the Friend of all Mankind;
Mine speaks in parables to the blind.
Thine loves the same world that mine hates;
Thy heaven doors are my hell gates.
Socrates taught what Meletus
Loath’d as a nation’s bitterest curse,
And Caiaphas was in his own mind
A benefactor to mankind.
Both read the Bible day and night,
But thou read’st black where I read white."[/i]
Excerpted from 'The Everlasting Gospel' by William Blake
We arrive at a question "What, exactly, is the standard by which to measure/establish the value of any interpretation of the Bible? Is there one, or many? Are they universal and necessary, or contingent?
I doubt if there was ever ONE standard by which to judge the meaning, value, interpretation, or efficacy of a given biblical passage. I am guessing that as the texts accumulated over the coarse of several hundred years there was considerable divergence.
Internal consistency would be one standard. Is this particular law treated in this passage the same way that it is treated in the other 10 passages where it is mentioned.
Consistency with the cult (in this case, the religion of the Jews). The texts of the OT were probably not the only source of cultic content--just as the NT is not the only source of Christian cultic content. For instance, animal sacrifice conducted by a priestly type of some sort probably existed before the beginning of the Jewish cult. The Eucharist might have been part of the early cult of Christianity and was then (possibly) read into the NT).
For a couple of obvious examples, rabbits and eggs have nothing to do with the resurrection, and pine trees have nothing to do with the birth of Jesus. None the less, they are part of the cult of Christianity -- at least for those parts of the Christian world under the influence of German and English culture -- which is the pagan source of rabbits and decorated pine trees.
Consistency with the believers' understanding of their religion. This standard was critical in sorting out the various scriptures at the time the NT was formalized. There were various 'sub-cults' in early Christianity, like the Gnostics. The committee that put the NT together wasn't especially fond of Gnosticism, Arianism, and a dozen other heresies, so those type of narrative were left out. The book of Revelations was not readily accepted, not for heresy, but because it concerned relatively local administrative matters (and, incidentally, was put into metaphorical form). It's got some great lines, and was eventually accepted, and all those metaphors have come in handy innumerable times -- for better and worse.
Consistency with the surrounding culture which was pagan. A lot of Greek philosophy (neoplatonism) worked its way into the New Testament, because whatever Jews and early Christians might believe, Greek Philosophy was pretty much de regueur for the thinking elite -- and it was the thinking elite who edited the NT. It wasn't a populist document.
Finally, for later Christians (including 21st century Christians) there is the standard of whether the scripture stands the test of time. People ask, "When we read the Bible (if we were to do that) does it speak to us in language and concepts that are meaningful to us?" For many people, the scriptures are not so meaningful that everybody who reads them finds them compelling. For many people the scriptures do not stand the test of time. (Though one must add, for many it does. Christianity is growing in total number of believers, just not in the US and western Europe. The disbelievers, or lapsed Christians, are in the advanced capitalist societies where culture has been pretty heavily secularized, alienated, pummeled by incessant commercial messaging, social deterioration, etc. etc. etc.).
But "reading" then according to you just refers to the act of reading. That act obviously involves skills including knowing the conventional meanings of words. Of course the possession of such reading skills and the act of reading itself must precede any interpretation, but so what? I still don't see how that rather obvious and mundane fact has any bearing on what you seem to have been trying to argue
Why should I be necessarily able to claim that my interpretation of a text that I believe to be "the Word of God" is itself the Word of God? If my interpretation were the Word of God, then it would, equally as the text, be inspired by God, and could not be inconsistent with the text. You do seem to be thinking in terms that a text, to be the Word of God, must have just one literal meaning, but I think that is wrongheaded as I already pointed out.
What do you think a text being the Word of God means? Do you think that idea itself has just one literal meaning, and if so, what do you think that meaning is?
I merely drew your attention to the fact that the Bible itself doesn't paint the picture of God that you have in your mind for the purposes of this conversation. This isn't about me or listening to me, it's about reading the Bible.
So do you have any new image of god that the bible portrays or is your image the same one everyone else uses? I have read the bible, it is interesting but as a work of fiction, historical fiction maybe, but still fiction. And the picture I have of god is about the same as I have of Zeus, but not as colorful.
Oh yeah, you're actually expected to think for yourself and relate it to your own experiences, wow, who would ever do that!
Ok, so he does talk in riddles and even his groupies did not understand him. What kind of a teacher is he then? If god was supposed to have sent him to collect souls to the cause would it not have been easier to speak clearly and make sure the people got the right message instead of saying think for your selves and risk them getting it wrong.
You should get a room for yourself and put a sticker on the door reading "kids only"
You are one of the children of god that has to have everything interpreted for you, so maybe you should be the one to do this.
1 Corinthians 13:11:When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I set aside childish ways.
When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I set aside childish ways and stopped believing in Santa Claus.
It seems fairly obvious that it is a prophecy of the coming of John the Baptist.
Thank you, So it is clear, there was no need to do any fancy interpretations, just read it. It is nice to know that even ordinary people can read the bible and not worry about whether they are understanding it properly.
You meant to write "not worry..." I presume? But yes, anyone should be able to read it with an open heart and mind, and find its poetry working on them to some degree. What you quoted was a straightforwardly prophetic passage, but there are many others which are much more parabolic, and hence open to various interpretations, which although different need not be exclusive of one another. This is the beauty of poetic language; it does not characteristically present the reader with a bunch of propositions to be either affirmed or negated.
Interpretations could be nuanced in various ways but for me its central meaning is to live with humility keeping God in your heart and mind instead of being consumed by worldly concerns for their own sake or for your own ego's sake. This is a pretty standard message common to many religions, although couched variously in somewhat different forms.
I live with a great deal of humility, I am not consumed by world concerns for my own sake nor for my ego's sake. And I don't have to blame god for the way I am.
I find it hard to believe you are not erudite enough to be well aware of that. You don't have to agree with it as a prescription for living, but it's not hard to understand its meaning, and understanding is not precluded by disagreement.
The meaning of it was well understood, the need for nuances in a holy work are what I do not understand.
And I have asked you to explain why you think the word of God should not be subject to interpretation. If you can answer that, then do so.
Why should anyone even be allowed to try to decide what a god really means by his words. Unless there is doubt about them actually being his words.
It looks as if some people think that they are above god and that they can make his words fit to the occasion as necessary. If these people are supposed to be inspired by god, then should he not get his act together and inspire them all in the same way so as to avoid confusion
It seems pathetic to say that it is necessary because of changing times, because then it means that god did not take into account that time would make a difference to the way people live. If he all knowing then isn't it silly to say "he did not do that for __" insert any reason you can think of. If his plan was for mankind to go out and populate the world would he not have known already the changes that would be coming?
My guess is that you think that in order to qualify as the word of God a text could have just one literal meaning. To me to think this would be absurd. If God is infinite, why would his Word not have infinite meaning?
Hot dog about those window blame humperdinkle bald.
If words can have infinite meanings, try to find out if I just insulted you.
I live with a great deal of humility, I am not consumed by world concerns for my own sake nor for my ego's sake. And I don't have to blame god for the way I am.
If this is truly how you live, then you are already walking with God. And no right thinking person would blame God for how they are.
The meaning of it was well understood, the need for nuances in a holy work are what I do not understand.
The passage you are responding to was directed to BC. In any case, why should a holy work not be nuanced, just as all good poetry, indeed literature, is?
Why should anyone even be allowed to try to decide what a god really means by his words. Unless there is doubt about them actually being his words.
It seems to me that you are misunderstanding, and trivializing the notion of words being Words of God. You are looking at this notion as some kind of empirical or propositional claim, which is inappropriate and is only the stuff of fundamentalism. Words are the Words of God when they speak to the open-hearted in ways that allow them to see, hear and feel God. There is a plethora of literature in many traditions that attests to this. What do you think being "the Word of God" really means?
In any case, why should a holy work not be nuanced, just as all good poetry, indeed literature, is?
I heartily agree that most good poetry and literature is nuanced and that it does in fact improve the writing most of the time.
But I also realize that it is fiction.
A biography of Winston Churchill could be told in so many ways to make his life seem bigger than it actually was, to make him appear romantic or sexy or even stupid. It could be biased to suit the opinion or needs of almost any political group. The writer could emphasize some parts of his life while ignoring other parts to give his life different meanings. All of this could be done, but if the writer tells a lie then it is no longer the biography of Winston Churchill.
If the bible is the word of good then it can contain nothing that is not the word of god. Human interpretations of his meanings would make a mockery of him.
Is it my intelligence or your own that you have insulted?
I would not insult you. And I have no reason to insult myself. But it is impossible for words to have infinite meanings, even for a god. There would be no meaning to anything said.
If the bible is the word of good then it can contain nothing that is not the word of god. Human interpretations of his meanings would make a mockery of him.
The Bible might be the Word of God for some and not for others. Who is right? One must decide for oneself whether and to what degree the Bible, in all its parts, is the Word of God. If it is not the Word of God for you, then to be sure it is not the Word of god for you. Can you explain what you think it could mean for a work to be the Word of God beyond that? Think about a poem (or any text) that is revelatory for someone; is it necessarily revelatory for others? Potentially revelatory? That's a very important question in aesthetics and hermeneutics right there.
But if the open-hearted need to have it spelled out for them by some authority then it does not fill its objective
It's not a matter of being "spelled out for them by some authority" but rather of being seduced by the Word. This is something that must be experienced in order to be understood, just as the revelations of great literature must be experienced in order to be understood.
Can you explain what you think it could mean for a work to be the Word of God beyond that?
You have asked that question a few times now, could you answer it.
I have done this many times before and have been given the same answers usually.
If I said that the word of god should reflect his being and therefore should be perfectly written you would tell me that it is so. It is I that fail to understand the meanings because I will not open my heart to it.
If I said that the word of god should be all-encompassing as he is. Then you would tell me it is so because it is not lacking in any way. Obviously, because it can be interpreted to mean almost anything it is all-encompassing.
If I said that the word of god should be useful and guiding to his people. You will tell me that it is so, that the bible contains many helpful and educational resources. So why is it that only a few of those people know how to get the good stuff out of it and the rest have to listen to them.
If humans are the work of god then anything written by man is the word of god, because we are all influenced by him. Why can't the Hobbits be treated with the same reverence as the bible?
It's not a matter of being "spelled out for them by some authority" but rather of being seduced by the Word. This is something that must be experienced in order to be understood, just as the revelations of great literature must be experienced in order to be understood.
You have asked that question a few times now, could you answer it.
Firstly, I asked what you think being the Word of God means, and secondly I have not been sparing in saying what I think it means, which is to say what the more philosophically sophisticated, who understand that it is not an empirical matter, will say it means. The answer is given in the only terms that can really make any sense; in terms of human experience.
If humans are the work of god then anything written by man is the word of god, because we are all influenced by him. Why can't the Hobbits be treated with the same reverence as the bible?
I would say that in a sense insofar as any work is an authentic expression of the human spirit and experience, that it is a Word of God. But then there are many texts that are not specifically concerned with religious experience, with the good life in the spiritual, that is to say the redemptive and transformative, sense.
Note that we are not talking about what is objectively the case here; there is no such thing. To think there is, constitutes the first fundamentalist mistake.
Anyway it is inevitable, given our very different starting presuppositions that we will continue to talk past one another, which would be a further waste of time and energy, so I think this conversation has run its course.
Wow. Hold on. The words of the Bible do not change. Do you mean to say that previous interpretations were wrong, or that the interpretations were right for the time?
So the document is evolving, without changing... that's not a Darwinist evolution then. What kind of evolution are we talking about?
I think you are misinterpreting me.. the parallel there is funny. Easy to misinterpret any text ;).
So I hold a historical-critical approach. What I meant was that both the written text and the application (and interpretations) of the written text evolved over time. So if you were to rewind back to 700s BCE, you would have a possible text that was an amalgam of traditions and mythical texts from the Israelite and Judahite sources. This would resemble to some extent the stories in Genesis, Exodus, and Numbers. If you were to fast forward to the 600s BCE, you would probably see influence from the Cohens/Levites in Leviticus and Deuteronomy written in more or less full form (possibly influencing the previous texts to conform to the later narrative). Then in the 500s-400s BCE, you may have seen the various sources redacted, edited, and added to so that it came in its final form of the Torah we know today- the Five Books of Moses. These books were probably presented in final redacted form by Ezra the Priest who was trying to institute a fully-formed theocratic state under the auspices of the Shah-an-Shah in Persia who ruled over Judah at this time (called the province of Yahad in Persian).
Now, let's also add some more historical understanding. Who were "the prophets" (the neviim in Hebrew)? They were probably guilds of "seers" who were dedicated to the god Yaweh. By the 600s, the main power structure was the King, the Priests, and the Prophets. The prophet guilds sometimes had more influence like in King Hezekiah and King Josiah's time, and around this time, they convinced the power structure to mainly ditch the other gods in favor of the patron god Yaweh. They probably also maintained a moral element in the religion. In other words, they may have aligned the ritualistic aspects with moral aspects such that morality was tied up in Divine Command.
In 586 BCE, Babylonia under Nebuchadnezzar conquered Judah and took the elite classes (priests, kings, prophets, etc.) with them, leaving some Jews behind. Again, this is when the "Bible" was redacted and put together. When Ezra came back, he brought with him scribes, priests, and even "prophets" who would help establish a theocratic state of sorts. This council was called the Great Assembly. Just like the Constitution of the US, the Torah in its final form was considered the Law of the land and main source for tribal history. However, they still had to "show" people how to follow it. So they probably had "oral" traditions decided upon by the Great Assembly (like the Supreme Court makes judgements about the written Constitution which is also considered binding law). These oral traditions explained certain rituals, holidays, prayers, and how to follow the text itself. This was supposed to get passed down from priests/scholars/prophets down to the next generation in a game of telephone. It was never thought to be written down. This is what I meant by "pristine" state, because my argument is the religion as it was set up was really put together by this Great Assembly more or less, and thus the original intention of the Torah by Ezra and Great Assembly (just like the original intention of the Constitution) may have had slight variations which harbored more traditions that may not have been in the original or changed the context of the original document to fit new situations (just like the Supreme Court with the Constitution.. The 6th Amendment says right to counsel for defense, but it was Gideon v. Wainright in 1963 that made it mandatory for states to provide a public defender).
You realize, that this would be anathema to Orthodox Jews and Fundamentalist Christians who would say, no the traditions go back to Moses who wrote it down many years earlier (1200 BCE). So, my argument was it was myths, laws and traditions that were redacted and edited over time, with its final form around 400 BCE and was redacted by Ezra and scribes, with certain "unwritten" laws and judgements made by Ezra, scribes, and Great Assembly that itself evolved over time with newer judgements or replacements with older ones, or perhaps changed as the information was transmitted in different ways the original, etc. etc. I hope this answers your question about what I mean that it was an evolving document.
With this approach, you cannot interpret our understand the history or intention of the Bible, without understanding the civilization, the people, the culture, the context, and the history from which it came.
I think I agree. But just a comment I expect no answer to.
The lord of the rings is a grand story. It contains most of the situations found in the bible, from war to love, friendship to enemies, loyalty to betrayal, images of god like beings doing things that no mortal human can do, and so on.
In many thousand years when the archeologists are digging in the remains of our utterly destroyed civilization looking for any clue as to what life was like in our times. They find some books, a bible a Koran, the Talmud and the Lord of the rings. Do you think that they would be able to tell the difference between them?
Do you think that they would be able to tell the difference between them?
I think they piece it together and Gandalf provides the sacred texts to Moses in the Shire and they go on a great adventure to Egypt where Sauron and his Orcs enslave the Israelites, and save them and lead them to the Lonely Sinai Mountain where Smaug lives. Meanwhile Moses' nephew Mohammad finds some elves and angels and fights Sauron again and brings with him dwarves in the battle of Mirkwood.. The messiah, Aragorn returns and reestablishes a sacred kingdom reuniting the two kingdoms of men and elves or something like that.
I think they piece it together and Gandalf provides the sacred texts to Moses in the Shire and they go on a great adventure to Egypt where Sauron and his Orcs enslave the Israelites, and save them and lead them to the Lonely Sinai Mountain where Smaug lives. Meanwhile his Moses' nephew Mohammad finds some elves and angels and fights the return of Sauron brings with him dwarves in the battle of Mirkwood.. Aragorn comes back and reestablishes a kingdom and brings the Kingdom of Men together again with the elves and angels or something like that.
Bloody marvelous, where is the thumbs up button when you need it? (Y) (Y)
Reply to Sir2u
Thanks :D! I cleaned up the post a bit, I think you copied my original one. The Elves fought with the evil Amelakites and Edomites in the Battle of Beleriand in which the Angels were employed from Valinor to help defeat them and their evil king Morgoth. Later the Angels asked the Elves to come back with them to Valinor but some remained behind in Babylonia instead of going back to the Holy Land and established mystical schools which kept the secrets and traditions of the First Age.
Comments (148)
These imminent worthies have concluded the following:
The seminar's criteria for authenticity was:
The Seminar's criteria for Inauthenticity were:
The seminar looked for several characteristics that, in their judgment, identified a saying as inauthentic, including self-reference, leadership issues, and apocalyptic themes.[4]
So, one might ask whether everyone on the Jesus Seminar was actually an authentic New Testament scholar, and the answer to that would be a short fact:
- No.
.One could certainly believe that they don't know, either.
By the time the Gospels were written, three distinct periods had occurred:
1. The active years of Jesus before his death (maybe 4 years, but we don't really know)
2. A partially undocumented growth period following Jesus' death
3. A period of consolidation, contained within a century of Jesus' death.
Jesus was remembered. The individuals who assembled the oral, and perhaps written, accounts of Jesus, circulating among the believers who regularly met to remember Jesus, were not remembered. We know almost nothing about the writers or the material they had at hand. So, if we have faith in God, that Jesus existed, that Jesus did what the Gospels say he did, then we must also have faith that the Gospel authors were divinely inspired.
See, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentary_hypothesis.
The OT is a combination of a number of writings that were written over many years.
By way of example, there are two entirely seperate Noah stories strewn contradictorily together in Genesis, providing proof these were two works pieced together by an editor. http://www.awitness.org/contrabib/torah/flood.html
Those who hold the bible is the word of God believe every word is impregnated with divine meaning and would therefore demand scholarly interpretation of every passage, with recognition their interpretation may be flawed. Such traditions often rely upon sages or particularly learned people for biblical interpretation.
How do they know for sure that Paul didn't invent Jesus? I know that's not a popular view, but some interesting points have been made along those lines. The first thing to note is that the writings known to be Paul's predate the Gospels. Paul is the oldest NT writer.
The second thing being that Paul didn't know Jesus during his life. Paul's theology is largely based on revelation. And that included a risen savior who died for sins and to overcome death, which is the same thing the Gospel writers have to say about his crucifixion (well maybe not Mark but definitely the other three).
Who in his right mind would follow a god that could not even speak clearly enough so that his words would be completely and clearly understood. A god that leaves his followers in a daze about what he meant should be disqualified as a god for incompetence.
One reason is that God has spoken over the course of many years, in disparate circumstances. As the years and the reasons pass out of immediate memory, we have no choice but to ask "What did God mean when He said such and such to Moses (or whoever it was)?"
Another reason is that while God is straight up and down about obedience, we are equivocators par excellence.
A third reason is that people just disagree about what God said, or what God meant. Not only that, just because "what God said" was settled theology this year doesn't mean it will stay settled theology.
A fourth reason is that for various and sundry reasons, people engage in special pleading "Well sure, God said no work on the Sabbath, but what about feeding the oxen? They get hungry and thirsty." "True, God said no lusting after thy neighbor's manservant, but by Jove, he is SUCH A HUNK. How could anybody be expected to not lust after this crown of creation?"
And more besides.
I think what they call into question is meaning. If it wasn't the valid word of God, then there wouldn't be any reason to struggle to get it right for 3,000 years.
Maybe Plato invented Socrates? Does that sound reasonable? I doubt Plato invented Socrates.
I am inclined to think the Jesus Seminar people have it at least somewhat right: Some things claimed in the Gospels probably didn't happen--like Jesus walking on water. That seems to be fabulistic. Causing someone to think they were healed, sure. Hysterical blindness for example. (Curing leprosy? Leprosy is/was a real disease, but the term used also covered a variety of skin diseases that were not malignant like Hansons Disease is.) Raising Lazarus? Lazarus wasn't merely dead -- he was most sincerely dead, and was well on the way to decomposition when he was allegedly rousted out of his tomb. I doubt any such thing happened.
Paul inventing Jesus and springing a fictional character on the world and in an historically very short period of time having the Roman Empire take up the religion of the fictional Jesus just doesn't seem plausible. (It's as implausible as the ghost of Jesus showing up at the disciples' condo on the Sea of Galilee.)
It did take over three centuries.
Quoting Bitter Crank
Maybe there were, but is there any actual evidence to this? I mean, is there anything definitively showing the existence of Christians, Jesus, or his disciples before Paul wrote?
My understanding is there isn't. That doesn't mean they didn't exist, but it does lend some credence to the Paul invention theory (which is admittedly rare and controversial).
Paul is the oldest material we have about Jesus (maybe there is older like the Q gospel, but it hasn't survived or been found), and that's something people have overlooked.
Probably not. The one difference here is that Plato was a student of Socrates, but Paul never met Jesus in the flesh! Paul's Christianity is revelationary. He does mention arguments with Peter and James, two of the disciples, and contact with other Christian groups. And he said he persecuted Christians before, so that's evidence of a pre-existing community.
Well, I don't think that proposition is valid. Most of the Bible is quite clear. How can I say that? Well, you can take the liturgical books: The Psalms are not loaded with ambiguity, it's a hymnal. Then there is the prophetic material. The prophets generally do not speak in riddles. There are the law books -- the rules and regs. They are pretty clear. There are the wisdom books - Proverbs, Ecclesiastes. They are not real mysterious either. There are the historical accounts. There's the Apocrypha narratives. Most of this stuff is straight forward.
Of course, one can suppose that there are hidden meanings in any particular verse, just as one can believe that the television is sending you secret messages. Some people have gone that route -- both with the Bible and their TV set.
A lot of the debate is focused in the law (in the Pentateuch -- Gen, Ex, Lev, Num, Deut. -- where interpretation is critical. (Lawyers are always chewing over the law.) There is a lot of debate over law texts because the circumstances of the Jews kept changing, and how to obey the law in Babylon (no temple, for example) was quite different from obeying the law in Jerusalem.
Then in the diaspora, (66 A.D.) the Jews were evicted from Jerusalem, more or less, and the temple was taken over by the Romans for pagan worship of Jupiter--the Abomination of Desolation.
(Before the destruction of the temple even occurred) there were synagogues and rabbis teaching. After the diaspora the synagog and the rabbis didn't "take the place of" the Temple, animal sacrifice, the priestly order, and the worship activities that went on there. Judaism without the cult of the temple required a wholesale reinterpretation. The early Christians, deprived of the physical Jesus, also had a disjuncture which required some deep re-interpretation.
My view of the Bible is that it was written by humans, lock, stock, and barrel, and that God himself is our creation. Of course, the people "in the Bible" never looked at things that way. Whoever the prophets were believed they were speaking for God. They didn't think they were engaged in some sort of pious fraud.
Most religious people don't think they are engaged in some sort of elaborate theatrical scheme without any reality. One either has to "get with the program", just play along (not believing a word of it, but acting as if one does), or one needs to admit one just doesn't believe it. (Actually, quite a few Christians don't really believe the doctrine.) What they do believe in is Jesus, and they like the model he offers. For that approach, you don't have to think of him as a supernatural being from heaven, any more than one has to consider Nelson Mandela, Gandhi, or Angela Merkel as heaven-sent.
Good overview.
Not necessarily. Think about modern day conspiracy therorists; the rise of wacky and not so wacky religions...
Which wiki? Wikipedia?
Quoting tim wood
Sorry, but what does this mean?
Do you think you could do any better with no experience of the job?
Your question is valid. The Divine speaks, we hear it, what's to interpret? But your view is that of the outsider. For the insider (the believer in the Divine Being) a second, third, or fourth look at the text is a friendly, cooperating-with-God project. Interpretation isn't an adversarial process. For the believer, there can't be a conclusion of "this doesn't mean anything". Rather, it's an attempt to obtain the full meaning.
This is true of all scripture -- whether it be the speech of the Sybil at Eleusis, Zoroaster, Buddha, Jesus, Jeremiah, Deuteronomy, Mohammed, the Vedas, and so on.
Time always places a requirement on scripture for interpretation because realities change. Some people have said that one of the problems of Islam is that it has not gone through a reformation where the Koran would be reinterpreted -- not rewritten -- for the modern age (now several hundred years old.
Another thing about scripture is that it periodically needs to be lifted out of its tribal setting. Jews in pre-Roman Israel didn't have the same culture as the Jews in medieval Spain, and the Spanish Jews didn't have the same culture as the post-Spanish-expulsion Jews of Poland and Ukraine. Buddhists in Boston have different cultural problems than the Buddhists of Beijing, and so on.
We secular non-believing people don't usually buy into the truth of the various scriptures in the first place, so all that scriptural study seems counterproductive. When we are insiders, the situation is different.
Look how much debate goes into the scripture of the U.S. Constitution. Endless debate about what the authors meant. Did they mean that everybody is entitled to carry a gun around with them everywhere, or did they mean that the citizens of the new country were entitled to form armies with which to defend themselves from foreign threats?
I don't understand your question. Any text, regardless of what it is, must be interpreted. Even a simple command such as "Fire!" must be interpreted. It could mean a series of different things. Words are symbolic, and the meaning(s) they hold vary according to how they are used, the context, the culture, etc. To get at the meaning of any text you have to interpret it. So to perceive the meaning of the Word of God you have to interpret it. There's no problem here.
History, grammar, and context.
Quoting Agustino
Well said.
Most of these Christians do not disagree about the general meaning of the Word of God though. I think if you look carefully you'd be surprised.
Quoting tim wood
You have to follow the Biblical story from beginning to end. Without understanding the whole, you cannot understand the part. You have to look at the entire picture that is painted. The Bible is like a puzzle - if you look at pieces separately, you won't be able to distinguish the real meaning. And then you must also understand the Judaic culture in which the Bible was written. This is a very good resource:
No Christian claims they are the words of God. The Bible is divinely inspired, not written by God like the Qu'ran claims to be. So I think you're confusing two different claims.
Quoting tim wood
Yep, but again, to break everything into pieces and analyze them separately is to fail to see the meaning of the whole. You asked what is the meaning of the Word of God? A short answer for that is Christ. But yet, you cannot find Christ by looking atomically at each individual sentence extracted from its context. You must look at the overarching meaning of the entire narrative.
Analysing each book of the Bible separately will reveal different and separate meanings in addition to the role they play in the overarching narrative. However, the Biblical text is revelatory - its aim is to reveal many things that are hidden. That's part of what makes the Bible different than any other text in history - and that's what makes it the most influential narrative in history, by far.
Quoting tim wood
That doesn't follow. Interpretation is the process by which the meaning of the text is understood.
A non-question. You don't understand any part of the puzzle, but you do understand how they can fit together, and once every piece is in place suddenly - insight strikes - you get the meaning.
Quoting tim wood
Yep, just like a puzzle. And meaning is always more than the sum of the words. Meaning isn't the same as the words, I think you understand that. The meaning of "fire" isn't the letters that compose the word. That's why the same meanings can sometimes be conveyed by very different words. The letters have no intrinsic/necessary connection to the meaning. Neither do the words for that matter.
Quoting tim wood
Many people, most Christians for example.
At the very beginning.
How do you think the Bible came into existence? You must think the High Priest of the Temple went into the Holy of Holies one Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) and found a stack of scrolls on the Mercy Seat with a Post-It Note™ stuck to it saying, "Hot off the press -- the Old Testament. Hope you like it. Love, YHWH ps: working on New Testament now"
The Hebrew Scriptures probably came about as an evolution of fragments and wholesale revisions. Parts of Genesis, Exodus, and Numbers were probably the oldest parts. They may have been written by Israelite and Judahite priests stitching together both region's traditions of various accounts by the end of the 700s (after Assyrian destruction of Northern Kingdom of Israel and influx of Israelite priests to Jerusalem in the Southern Kingdom of Judah).
Then there was the Deuteronomic author (possibly the author being mentioned in The Book of Kings itself as Shaphan) who more-or-less consolidated the earlierhenotheistic Israelite-Judaic tradition into a strictly monotheistic one around 600s under the reign of King Josiah of Judah.
Leviticus probably came last, written by the Solomon priesthood who were descended from the Sons of Zadok and who probably inserted the idea of Aaron as Moses' brother and being descended in some way from Moses' family, thus giving themselves legitimacy as priestly rulers. Further redactions probably took place in the Babylonian Captivity as traditions were consolidated, the very final version being stitched together by Ezra and his team of scribes to be brought back to Jerusalem with Nehemiah and the governorship under the appointment of Persia's King Cyrus.
Thus early Judaism took on many interpretations even within the Torah's text itself as it was pieced together to make a more coherent narrative. For a while, in early Second Temple Judaism the Temple Priests were essentially the conveyors of the law, but eventually "men of letters" (who essentially were learned in the art of hermeneutics) became a large faction of authority. Their interpretation was evolutionary in method as they applied what was written in the text of the Law to a contemporary problem that was beyond the original text or rather to a situation which had "outgrown" the time period that the text was written in. This evolutionary-hermeneutics approach was developed by the Pharisees, and their compendium of evolutionary interpretation became known eventually as the Oral Law or Talmud.
The elite Temple priestly class was mainly championed by Sadducees, those who rejected such methods. They fought often under the Hasmonean Dynasty from 160 BCE- 63 BCE. By the time of the Romans, the Pharisees were seen by the populace in and around Jerusalem as the most trusted faction for legal interpretation. When the Romans destroyed the Temple around 70 CE, the Pharisees reconstituted Judaism in a way without a Temple complex, priestly caste, and sacrifices.
If it was the valid word of some god, don't you think he would have made it absolutely obvious what he wanted from us and for us instead of letting a bunch of ignorant, illiterate barely out of monkey stage goons decide what it meant for him?
The last bloody thing I would want would to be a god. But I would bet that given his supposed powers I could probably do better.
This is only your opinion of what the bible is, how you interpret it. Personally I think the bible means to say exactly what it says and anything you add to it as "meaning" is actually a corruption of the original writing. Not that I actually believe a word of it.
People that try to find hidden meaning in things can be found by the dozen in museums, looking at the paintings of long dead artists and telling anyone that will listen what the paint was actually trying to express in the work. They have not got a bloody clue either.
Several African origins myths are almost exactly like genesis, and hundreds if not thousands of years earlier.
Yep, funny how ancient human cultures devise similar myths in different regions. Some may have been influenced by others (Israelite traditions definitely influenced by previous Babylonian myths, etc.). Makes you want to read Joseph Campbell!
Ahh, the chutzpah, the effrontery, the gall, the delusions of grandeur...
literally >:)
Good post, as usual.
The Cohens, Kahns, Cahanes, Levites... these Jewish names are connected to the priestly caste of Israel, and there are genetic similarities linking the various families.
Nothing to do with the price of matzo ball soup, but interesting.
>:O . Interesting articles on that:
http://www.nytimes.com/1997/01/07/science/finding-genetic-traces-of-jewish-priesthood.html?mcubz=0
http://www.nytimes.com/1999/05/09/us/dna-backs-a-tribe-s-tradition-of-early-descent-from-the-jews.html?mcubz=0
Is he the soup guy? X-)
Don't try to tell me that you could not at least keep the oceans clean if you had his "POWERS". Anyone could.
And I am not delusional, I just know how fucking great I am. >:)
For some critics, Joseph Campbell is as pedestrian as Campbell's soup. Meant for the masses.
Nothing to do with the price of matzo ball soup
Oh didn't see the other soup connection, duh.. I was trying to keep up.. couldn't think of too many soup-mythology analogies. Primordial soup?
Blame that one on Heinz.
I guess they do own Campbell's. I like that ketchup product of theirs.
It's hard to keep track of who owns who, what with all the conglomerates.
Like most good products, Heinz Ketchup is made with high fructose corn syrup.
As Thomas Paine (not an atheist) pointed out, if any text is revelatory, it is only revelatory to the person that witnessed God directly speaking those words. To anybody else, it is just hearsay.
Sure, if you consider the tree that I see outside to be only my opinion, then you can say this too is only my opinion. :-} The truth is that all Christians have believed this to be so, so whether it's actually true, it certainly isn't "only my opinion". To say it is is to be ridiculous.
Quoting Sir2u
I don't think you understand exactly what it says, that is precisely the problem. You think this understanding what it says is a straightforward matter that involves just reading the words. That's not true, anymore than you can understand what "Fire!" means just by reading that word.
Quoting Sir2u
I never talked about a hidden meaning. I referenced hidden things that are revealed by the Biblical text. That's why other areas - art, science, philosophy etc. - need to be interpreted in the light of Biblical revelation.
Quoting Sir2u
That's your non-expert opinion ;) - to adopt one of your favorite tropes X-)
Well, if I were a god, I'd try. But I am not. So... why do you ask Sir2u to perform a task which only gods are required to do? This is like asking a sea mollusk to solve a second degree equation system with five unknowns. You simply can't ask a mortal to perform the job of a god. That is not fair.
I am with Sir2u on the issue. The bible is so badly written, with so many infactuals, so many logical impossibilities, that one's hair stands on end when one thinks it has been inspired by a god.
In my private opinion the bible was written by uneducated, stupid men and women, and there is nothing godly about it. It is a badly written book for guidance and knowledge, and that's about the size of it.
The Biblical story is not a myth. And this isn't only because the Biblical story is true (whereas myths are false), but rather because it serves exactly the opposite function to that of myth. It is true that the Biblical story is dressed in the clothes of myths, but its function is not obfuscation and removal of traces of the founding violence of culture and society - but rather their revelation. This is the reason why the Bible cannot but be inspired by a transcendent God - the Bible cannot come from humans, its source cannot be immanent.
This opinion is hardly worth even refutation. If you cannot see the intricacies and wisdom of Ecclesiastes, Proverbs, or the Book of Job to name just three books of the Bible - and perceive that these texts could not under any circumstances be written by stupid and uneducated men and women, then you're just deluding yourself.
A text is revelatory if its meaning shows or points to things that are otherwise hidden. The Biblical text does this.
Quoting Agustino
So you claim. Like I (or rather, Mr Paine) said, hearsay.
Quoting Agustino This sounds similar to the claims in the preface of my Quran, which say that the numerological patterns in the surahs, the language etc, are so intricate that they could not have been constructed by any human - hence they must have been written by Allah.
Exactly my point. You admit you couldn't do any better, so how is it fair to ask a god to do the same thing just because of their title?
A revelation has nothing to do with who it is coming from. You seem to think that if someone hears the voice of God, and the other reads the same thing in the Bible, for the latter it is not revelation. It absolutely is, if what is revealed is not known before.
Quoting andrewk
His claim was that the Bible was written by stupid and uneducated men and women. That claim, given the text, is absurd, and not even worth debating. It's like claiming that the works of Shakespeare were written by an analphabet.
Yes, of course it is my position that the former can be revelation and the latter cannot. There's no 'seems' about it. I stated that position already, and furthermore it's the only reasonable one.
In the latter case, all they know is that somebody wrote down a claim about something. They have no reason to believe it is true, so they don't know something that they did not know before. Whereas if they hear the voice of God, and they know that it is God speaking, it is reasonable for them to assume that what the voice says is true, so they can learn something new.
Right, I expect you to then renounce all scientific truths, because you just read them in some books and don't hear them directly from God. Therefore you have no reason to believe them.
And by the way, something is still a revelation if it's true and you are exposed to it, even if you don't believe it.
Your reputation as an educated intelligent man or woman would have been better served by keeping your private opinion private.
Uneducated? No Harvard degrees, true. They may or may not have written or read script, but they were literate the same way Homer was literate--verbally. They had a solid grasp of their cultural history, and they wrote fine poetry (Psalms, for instance). They were "inspired" -- and by inspired I mean creative in ordinary human terms, not that they were telegraphing dictation from God.
Open the Bible to any page, and there is a good chance that whatever text your eyes land on will not be very compelling. The same thing goes for just about every published work in the history of civilization. You have to read and study any book to give it a fair evaluation.
The god has no title. God God. Or the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord is not unique to God.
So you are appealing to something I missed which does not even exist.
-----------------------
Sir God. Lady God. Mr. God. Rev. God. The Right Honourable God. President God. None of these ring right.
The only title I can think of that sticks is E-Gad, which stands, I guess, for Electric God.
No, I verify them for myself, and if they survive the verification process, I (provisionally, being a sceptic) believe them. Admittedly, that does make me a slow reader. But when I read something, it stays read.
To even read it is an act of interpretation. The idea that it has a monolithic, single meaning is one of the unfortunate characteristics of American fundamentalism, in particular. Origen, one of the Church Fathers, ridiculed biblical literalism in the second century AD, saying there were three levels or layers of meaning and woe betide unto those who confused them. Have a look at a book on Amazon, The Bible Made Impossible, by Christian Smith, http://a.co/0cQfwHu.
The other point is, hermeneutics or exegesis both require an interpretive framework which is obviously not objective in the modern sense. I mean, it's not like reading the instructions for a device, or for an experiment. The intended aim is spiritual, and in the case of such texts, the reader is also the subject in an important sense.
I was not addressing the rest of the christians or I would have included them as well. And as far as I know there is no such thing as a group opinion, only a group with the same opinion.
"You think this understanding what it says is a straightforward matter that involves just reading the words."
And just how do you know this not to be true? Do you have access to some secret bible readers manual that the rest of us have been denied a chance to see? Just where does it say anywhere that the bible has hidden things or ways to interpret the writings of long dead people?
"That's your non-expert opinion ;) - to adopt one of your favorite tropes X-)"
Have I ever actually ever used that phrase? Don't think so, but I do like it.
Please name one person that has had the right to call him/herself an expert on the meaning of the bible. But let's apply a couple of conditions that could be applied to anyone trying to verify a work of art.
1. Has had direct access no the original writings of the people that are supposed to have written the bible. Including non biblical writings to act as benchmarks for style and so on.
2. Has been allowed to review the writings that were either removed from the bible or are contemporary, and of similar content to it and not allowed to be included.
3. Has been allowed to review historical, psychological, personality, educational records of those writers to try to deduce veracity of their existence and competence to write the book of a god.
4. Someone that has not been trained by someone that does not have the above.
The Bible contains an enormous wealth of stories, historical accounts, mythological accounts, anecdotes, parables, prophecies. So it's not only a matter of interpretation, you're interpreting all of that material.
Nowadays, in a post-religious culture, I think there is a general lack of spiritual literacy. I'm not talking down saying that, or holding myself up as an authority. But I have studied religions, mainly to make sense of certain questions that always struck me as important. But 'spiritual literacy' is comparable to the 'computer literacy' that you need to understand how to interact with computers - internet terminology and the like. It's like a general background understanding, and in this case, is often absent.
God is His name. Not His title. I am not dodging anything. You may refer to God as His job title, or occupation name, which is not quite the same as "title". For instance, Mr. President: Mr. is his title, President is his job title.
You asked me if I were dodging your point. I ask you: Do you get most of your reading comprehension and language skills honed by reading the Gospel and/or the Old Testament?
Sorry to be so pointed. But your "yes" would explain a lot.
I have to admit that my values are more precious to me than reputation.
And I do proselytize my way; the religious do it their own way. I do it by fighting the mental and intellectual sludge-lodge of miasma of religious teaching and dogma by pointing out exactly what they are.
First, that answers neither of my questions. Second, no.
Both of your questions were so worded that they defied a reasonable answer. First you appealed to me to perform a job a deity can only do (to your credit, at that time you were not aware I am a mere mortal). Secondly, your question involved a concept which does not exist (title of God). Your attempt at, and then later your abandoning attempting to, meaningfully respond to my criticism of your questions' nature leaves no question by you to be answered.
First of all, please explain on what ground you expect a mortal to do the job of a God; in my opinion it's an expectation that is too high. On the other hand, expecting God to be better than what a mortal can do is only reasonable, and that's exactly where the God of the Christian Bible fails its call.
Second of all, you asked why I defer the quality of workmanship expected in thought to God's title, and I replied there is no title that God uses. After that you abandoned the title issue, and demand an answer from me anyway.
Your questions were so worded and the thoughts behind them were so wrong that no reasonable person could come up with a direct answer to them.
Please, if you want me to answer any of your questions, ask some that can be answered by applying reasonable thought.
As I have stated, I don't. I'm asking on what ground you expect a god to do that job, as you wouldn't expect anyone else, including yourself, to be able to do that.
Quoting szardosszemagad
Given that part of the question didn't make sense, as I wasn't aware of the existences of both terms title and job title, one could have, especially on the basis of the sentence structure, considered the question without that part. That being said:
Quoting BlueBanana
Ie. what justifies the unreasonable expectations set on deities by us mortals?
My point still holds, something being a revelation has nothing to do with whether you believe it or not.
Quoting Sir2u
Okay, but it's not "only" my opinion as you said ;)
Quoting Sir2u
Because no text is understood just by reading the words.
Quoting Sir2u
Here:
First they believe it is the word of God, rich with spiritual meaning. And then they endeavour to interpret it in the right spirit, knowing that no human interpretation can be perfect, but that some will be closer to the truth than others.
You are looking at the wrong way; as though its being the word of God is some kind of propositional claim that could be validated or falsified; this is a trivialization of the text.
That use of the word 'revelation' is completely different from how I have ever seen it used. You are free to define the word however you want, but with that definition it becomes a weak and trivial word that is of no interest to philosophical discussion. It cannot convey anything of the power and significance of what the stories say happened to Saul on the road to Damascus.
How do you understand the distinction between reading and interpretation, and how do think it is relevant to what I have said here?
If you read a text, whether that be a work of philosophy, a poem or a religious work, and something is revealed to you in the form of insight; the intensity of that experience may be relatively slight or very profound. The difference between that order of experience and Paul's experience on the road to Damascus may be one of degree, but not so much one of kind.
I suspect everyone here knows the difference between reading and interpreting--though sometimes interpretation is concurrent with reading.
One reads the words (word recognition, identify meaning, part of speech, etc -- all pretty much automatic once one is an accomplished reader) then there is interpretation. "Do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God." Hosea said. All pretty common words; no accomplished reader will pause over their connotative meaning.
But... What does "Do Justice" mean? Start the revolution? Vote for Donald Trump? What? That's the interpretation part. What does "love mercy" mean? The Jerusalem Bible translates the phrase "Love tenderly". Then the "walk humbly with God". Keep God company? What? I've never been sure exactly what that means.
Mercifully, those questions are sensible things like 'why did Suresh go back to the tennis court?' or 'How do you think Lakshmi was feeling?' rather than 'Does that mean that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son or just from the Father?'
So if I write "The cat is black and was a year old when she had kittens" you would not be able to understand it just by reading the text?
Of course your brain would understand it once it was processed. It means exactly what it says.
So when it says in the bible that "Mary was a virgin when she had a baby" your brain would process it and it too would mean exactly what it says.
So why should everything else be a mystery that has to be unraveled before it can be understood?
parable; a simple story used to illustrate a moral or spiritual lesson, as told by Jesus in the Gospels
10 The disciples came to him and asked, “Why do you speak to the people in parables?”
11He replied, “Because the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them.
12 Whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.
13 This is why I speak to them in parables:
“Though seeing, they do not see;
though hearing, they do not hear or understand.
14 In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah:
“‘You will be ever hearing but never understanding;
you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.
15 For this people’s heart has become calloused;
they hardly hear with their ears,
and they have closed their eyes.
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
hear with their ears,
understand with their hearts
and turn, and I would heal them.’
16 But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear.
17 For truly I tell you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.
18 “Listen then to what the parable of the sower means:
And he goes on to explain.
Keeping things in context helps understanding.
Jesus was talking about things that ordinary everyday people might not understand. Complicated explanations would not have worked so he used parables to place the ideas into to day to day situations that the people could relate to.
But did he ever transmit any super secret information through them? He used parables to make sure that nothing was hidden.
But "reading" then according to you just refers to the act of reading. That act obviously involves skills including knowing the conventional meanings of words. Of course the possession of such reading skills and the act of reading itself must precede any interpretation, but so what? I still don't see how that rather obvious and mundane fact has any bearing on what you seem to have been trying to argue.
Of course you would know what those words mean (if you did). The revelatory aspect of texts which may be experienced in the (all the more so by informed) act of interpretation consists in gaining insight into what is intended by the text; into what it is, in an overall sense, trying to convey. That is why Agustino is right to say that one must know the whole Bible (or any allusive unified literary work that contains meaning beyond the merely so-called literal) to understand most fully any part of it.
Obviously you couldn't even get started if you did not know the meanings of the words (or in other words were not literate in the language the text was written in). So, your objection here seems trivial and ill-founded. Have you ever heard of hermeneutics?
I think you're being disingenuous if you claim not to know what that is intended to mean and instead offer such a flippant, obviously ridiculous, interpretation. You don't have to feel empathy with the sentiment to know that it is intended, and how it is conveyed by the words.
I don't know what that means either. Does God walk humbly and want me to do that too? I have never thought of the biblical version of God as particularly humble.
So let's try something. interpret this for me. What is the special hidden meaning here
1 Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. 12 When Zechariah saw him, he was startled and was gripped with fear. 13 But the angel said to him: “Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to call him John. 14 He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, 15 for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He is never to take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even before he is born. 16 He will bring back many of the people of Israel to the Lord their God. 17 And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the parents to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous—to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.”
That is so true, it means exactly what it says, "walk humbly with God"
No, wasn't being disingenuous, flippant, ridiculous, or anything else. You tell me what you think it means.
http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0323.htm#27
These passages from Leviticus 16 and Leviticus 23 are pretty straightforward about Yom Kippur.
But the thing is mate that you and me just don't know how to interpret them. They are full of hidden meanings that god put there so that we poor humans can spend our whole lives trying to figure out what the hell they mean.
Of course you are right, they are pretty straight forward. There is absolutely no reason to think that there should be any meanings other than those that are clearly visible. And most of the bible is just like that plain and clear.
But wait, there's more!. What about how to APPLY the words to make it an everyday thing? So the "Oral Torah" (essentially, traditions surrounding the text) arose out of disagreements and ambiguities. See below:
The Mishna was a compendium of Pharisidic tradition of the "Oral" disputes as to how to interpret the law going back to disputes that started at least by 200s BCE, but written down around 190 CE:
MISHNA : Seven days before the Day of Atonement the high-priest is to be removed from his house to the Palhedrin Chamber (????????), and another high-priest is appointed to substitute him in case he become unfit for the service by becoming unclean. R. Jedudah says another wife is to be appointed for him also, in case his own wife dies, whereas it is said [Lev. xvii. 11], "and shall make atonement for himself and for his house"; "his house"--that is, his wife. But it was objected that in this manner there will be no end to the matter. (The other wife may die too.)
But wait! There's more! What about how to understand what the Mishnaic interpreters said. There was another layer of scholars that tried to properly understand the previous interpreters! This layer is called the Gemara.. AND there's two additions with variations in interpretations! There's a Jerusalem one finished in 400 CE and a Babylonian one finished in 500 CE!
GEMARA: We have learned in a Mishna (Tract Parah, III., 1): "Seven days before the red cow 1 was to be burned, the priest who had to perform this ceremony was removed from his house to the northeastern chamber of the Temple," etc. "Whence do we deduce this?" said R. Miniumi bar Helviah in the name of Mahassia b. Iddi, quoting R. Johanan: "It is written [Lev. viii. 34]: 'As they have done this day, so hath the Lord commanded to do farther, to make an atonement for you.' 'To do farther' signifies the red cow; 'to make an atonement for you', signifies the Day of Atonement." But perhaps it signifies the atonement of sacrifices generally? Could we know, in this case, which priest is going to perform the rite? How, then, could he be removed from his home? But perhaps other festivals are meant? We infer the removal seven days before one day from the removal, seven days (before) for the service of one day, 1 but not seven days (before) for a service of seven days [of the festivals of Passover and of Tabernacles]. Perhaps Pentecost, which also is only one day, is meant? Said R. Abba: "We infer a day of one bull and one ram (when one such is sacrificed) [as on the days of consecration], from a day of one bull and one ram, which is the offering for the Day of Atonement; but for Pentecost two rams are prescribed." Perhaps New Year's Day is meant (which is also only one day)? Said R. Abahu: "We may infer a day of the bull and the ram at the priest's own cost from a day when the priest must act likewise, and that is the Day of Atonement. But on the days of Pentecost and of New Year the bull and ram are at the public cost." R. Ashi, however, said: "We may infer a day on which the bull is a sin-offering, and the ram a burnt-offering (as on the day of consecration and on the Day of Atonement), but on New Year's Day and Pentecost both are burnt-offerings."
.....
MISHNA: During all the seven days he sprinkles the blood [of the daily offerings, to become practised], fumes the incense, trims the lamps, and offers the head and the leg. During all the other days, he sacrifices, if he chooses, since the high-priest offers the first portion as he prefers, and takes for his own use a portion of the first offering.
GEMARA: Who is the Tana who holds so? Said R. Hisda: That is not in accordance with R. Aqiba. For R. Aqiba holds that when a clean man is sprinkled upon, he thereby becomes defiled. And since the high-priest was sprinkled upon all the seven days, how could he perform the service? As we have learned in the following Boraitha: It is written [Num. xix. 19]: "And the clean person shall sprinkle upon the unclean." Infer from this (since unclean is written, not him), that only an unclean person becomes clean; but if a clean person is sprinkled on, he becomes unclean. So is the decree of R. Aqiba. But the sages said: This only applies to things subject to defilement. Abayi, however, said: It may be said, the Mishna can be even in accordance with R. Aqiba; and the case is, the whole day he can perform the service, in the evening he bathes, and when the sun has set, he becomes clean.
But wait, there's more! The Geonim were a group of scholars in 600-1000 CE who made further interpretations of the Mishna/Gemara (Talmud).
But wait, there's more! The Rishonim, people like Maimonides, wrote books like the Mishneh Torah about the previous Talmud tracts and Geonim.. Etc. etc.
No. I need to know, to begin with, which cat.
Quoting Sir2u
Not necessarily. The sentence may be code for something else for example.
Quoting Sir2u
I've stated that it must be read in context, taking care to go back to the way it would have been understood in the Judaic culture in which it arose.
Quoting Sir2u
Ah yes, indeed. I've been saying this for awhile.
Quoting Sir2u
Yes, parables are indeed a way to communicate information that cannot be communicated otherwise. What's your point?
Well he didn't sit down to write the words, and if it is revelation, what is/was/will be revealed is provided by the hands of the men who wrote these stories and their ability to convey that inspiration. To best of my knowledge none of it was written by women.
Where is the feminist interpretation of the bible?
It apparently was written by men, from a male pov and seems to be mostly about men. When women do show up they seem to be mostly portrayed as weak, evil or as chattel.
Does that mean that even the knowledgeable, the enlightened, the blessed ones don't agree on what religious texts mean. :s
That sounds just like a person that wants to keep his cushy job trying to convince everyone else that only he can do it because he is the only one that has been taught to read QBasic.
But that is only lack of data, not a way of interpretation.
Quoting Agustino
Yes you are right, it could be talking about the color of the stool I just left in the bathroom.
Oh dear I have done it again. Talking in code is such a problem. I did not mean that I left an object used for sitting on in the bathroom, I meant the pooh.
Blimey I did it again, sorry. Let me explain. I went to the bathroom for a pooh, but not Winnie-the-Pooh, shit. No, shit is not used as an expletive there, I just stated what I did actually leave in the bathroom.
Oh, in case you are wondering what a bathroom is, it is a place where people go to get clean.
Wait a minute, if a bathroom is a place to get clean why did I take a crap there. Language is so complicated, I think I need an interpreter to help me get through my day.
Unless you are some sort of a pervert that gets off reading behind the text, between the lines or looking for hidden meanings in every sentence text usually means what it says and needs no further explanation.
You do not need to know which cat is black to understand the sentence. There is no hidden meaning nor is there any need to interpret it. People do not usually say things like "The cat is black" in the middle of a conversation unless they are actually talking about cats and this is what gives context to the words.
A person that suddenly burst out, or even a person walking along the street muttering "The cat is black" would usually be considered to have some sort of mental problem. What does that say about people that write books that say one thing and mean something different?
Quoting Agustino
Putting words into context and giving words other interpretations are not the same thing. And the people that wrote the bible would have known exactly what god and Jesus were saying. They must have written their exact words and both god and jesus must have been very careful about what they said because they wanted, needed people to understand and follow their way of thinking. So why should they include hidden meanings?
Quoting Agustino
A parable is not another hidden meaning and is not subject to interpretation, it is just a simpler explication of a topic so that simple people can understand.
One cannot interpret or understand without context.
Quoting Sir2u
A sentence isn't some Platonic object that lives off in some separate realm and can be understood apart from its context. The meaning of a sentence is in the intention of its author. If a monkey typed that sentence, I'd tell you it means nothing, it's gibberish. If a secret agent typed that sentence, I may think it means something different than is at first apparent. Etc.
Meaning is context dependent, and interpretation aims at deciphering the intention of the author.
Quoting Sir2u
Nope, that's not actually the case. The Bible makes the opposite to be quite evident actually. For example:
So again, your ignorance of the Bible only shows itself.
Quoting Sir2u
"Truly, You are a God who hides Himself, O God of Israel, Savior!"
Quoting Sir2u
You have never heard of Kierkegaard's indirect communication? The point of parables is precisely that their meaning cannot be communicated otherwise, since it's not a matter of reason, but of direct perception and intuition, which requires to look and see via images as it were - to have a direct insight.
How does this example prove anything? Did Peter not know what god was saying to him? Did he fail to understand that someone came to get him?
I honestly don't see how this is relevant to anything, please enlighten me.
Quoting Agustino
Not even his followers agree with some of his ideas, maybe because he failed to write them clearly and wrote with hidden meanings included.
Quoting Agustino
Is that not the same thing I said?
Quoting Agustino
Are you saying that god is the kind of being that deliberately tries to confuse the people he wants to praise and adore him?
No, he did not know what God communicated to him through the vision he had. That's why he was perplexed.
Quoting Sir2u
He is a philosopher, not a guru, so he doesn't have "followers".
Quoting Sir2u
No. You implied that parables are just a simple way to communicate something that would otherwise be very difficult to communicate and would require one to be very educated, etc.
Quoting Sir2u
I'm not saying anything, I'm just saying that the text makes it clear that God isn't the kind of being that appears very clearly at the whims and wishes of people. He is a Hidden God.
Quoting Agustino
Quoting Agustino
Quoting Agustino
So we do agree on what a parable is.
Quoting Agustino
When I dream about someone I know telling me something, I understand what they are saying. Why I had the dream is another question entirely. Does the dream have a meaning is something else again. But I still understood the words that the person spoke.
If god did not bother to explain what the vision meant then how are mere mortals ever going to know. So basically I think what you mean when you say interpretation is guessing at or assigning other meanings which might not necessarily in line with gods words.
Quoting Agustino
Apart from actually denying that you are saying something while doings so, which in itself is ridiculous, the rest of this is the same pitiful excuse so many use to make people do things. From politicians and preachers to parents and kids, it is always the same. "You don't know so I am right, listen to me"
I have asked you quite a few questions and for several explanations which you have failed to reply to, am I supposed to think that there is some unknowable message in you none replies or do you not think them worth replying to?
I think it shows the historical nature of the document and its evolution.
Historically, this just proves that the Bible and its interpretations have always been an evolving document. It was stitched together in steps most likely and redacted to a whole unit by the time of Ezra and the Great Assembly period c.400 BCE. Then even after this, how the nuances of ceremony, law, and custom, are to be followed exactly, and the precise meaning of the text itself was highly debatable. Was there ever a "pristine" way of understanding the text? Arguably, those rabbis would suggest that they were trying to nail this down, but clearly there was no way of knowing which tradition was absolutely correct. I believe it was mainly voted on majority opinion or the most respected scholar, or something of that nature.
I guess historically, if there was ever a case as to when the most "pristine" understanding of the Bible's text was had, it would be around the time of Ezra and the Great Assembly around 400s BCE. Ezra (and probably other scribes) were probably the final redactors and compilers of the traditions into a cohesive unit- probably in the attempt to reestablish a more or less Jewish theological state under Nehemiah (the Jewish governor sent to reestablish the district under Artaxerxes). I am sure with this, there was probably certain guidelines set down during Ezra's time, but then questions arose and different traditions or differing opinions came along, and then this evolved into more debates, and none of it was written down, so like a game of telephone it was always trying to get the interpretation right. Not only this, but new situations that were not thought of before arose and they had to be incorporated into the already existing interpretation, etc. etc. The point being it was probably never really pristine, even at its most pristine point but always evolutionary.
For some context you can read:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ezra
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nehemiah
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Assembly
I agree, and that is about all the modern bible is. A historically document that has been corrupted so that no one alive today can ever hope to interpret it because we have no idea what it was really like at the beginning or what it its real meaning or purpose was.
Any modern interpretation would be nothing more than speculation.
When I was younger, I read many of these histories of the bible's writers. But that was long ago. I found that even putting a lot of the bible into historical context, the known facts about history not the traditional history, much of it did not make a lot of sense. If you read it as it was then it was a just bunch of stories. You had to add to the reading to get it to make sense as something spiritual. Why should divinely inspired writing need to be added to or looked at from a different point of view for it to make sense?
In the bible Jesus talks in parables, some get explained but most don't.
If the purpose of jesus's teaching was to instruct the people why did he not explain them all? Surely if even the enlightened disciples needed an explanation of them it would serve a good purpose to explain them.
If the purpose was to make the people think, then any and every interpretation would be valid.
But if he was only telling stories then no interpretation is necessary.
I think the bible is a bunch of stories and that anyone that wants to try to INTERPRET them has some sort of self serving motive.
No.
The dream itself contains the message.
Quoting Sir2u
Nope.
Quoting Sir2u
I haven't actually said that, I merely drew your attention to the fact that the Bible itself doesn't paint the picture of God that you have in your mind for the purposes of this conversation. This isn't about me or listening to me, it's about reading the Bible.
Quoting Sir2u
I fail to see the questions that I failed to reply. I've replied to everything it seems to me. Is there some unknowable message? I'm not sure what you mean, and why you brought unknowable messages in the discussion in the first place.
Oh yeah, you're actually expected to think for yourself and relate it to your own experiences, wow, who would ever do that! You should get a room for yourself and put a sticker on the door reading "kids only" :-}
I don't think the expectations are unreasonable. Why do you think it is unreasonable to expect a God to do for what I criticized Him for not doing?
You implied that you did. You asked me if I could do a better job. That's a loaded question, not merely a simple inquiry.
The question and its phrasing implied more that I assumed the answer to be no than yes.
Quoting szardosszemagad
A very good question. For the same reason you think it's unreasonable to expect mortals to do it, I assume. I think it'd be a nirvana fallacy to expect and accept nothing but the best instead of one trying their best.
There you go. 8-)
Uh?
Wow. Hold on. The words of the Bible do not change. Do you mean to say that previous interpretations were wrong, or that the interpretations were right for the time?
I mean, times are different now. Nobody gets to be burnt at the stakes any more for insisting that the Earth is round. I understand that by your saying that the bible is an evolving (?) document, you mean that human knowledge makes it necessary to re-evaluate parts of the bible for keeping it compatible for the new undeniable truths of the world, which the bible contradicts.
Fair enough, everyone knows that. But why use the word "evolution", or rather, a derivative of it, if neo-Darwinist evolution is still so vehemently denied by the religious? Are you not blaspheming by using this concept, which, by force of faith, is a wrongful, impossible thing to happen? If it is impossible, why can the document do it (without even changing itself) but not the biosphere?
So the document is evolving, without changing... that's not a Darwinist evolution then. What kind of evolution are we talking about?
Or are you using the word in a colloquial sense? In that case, how come the bible still insists that the Earth is flat? Or that a virgin can bring forth a child, or some people back 6000 years ago or so could live to be 600 years old or more, etc? Or that a man built a boat with the help of his family which was able to house all species of animals and plants for six weeks, with no food?
This is what you call evolution? I think new and more and more new interpretations are not a process of solving any mystery; it is, instead, merely rationalization in a very forced manner to stop the holy text from getting ridiculed by the faithful. Others are already astonished how reasonable people can believe it's a word of god, merely by looking at its description of events proven to be impossible which it boasts as historical truth.
I decided to close the argument at a point that we can both claim victory. If you don't like that, we can continue, but basically I find it pointless because now we are both saying the same thing, which is, the almighty could have done a better job, and I couldn't have, so what is the point of further arguing? To carry on an argumentative debate, the two parties have to disagree, which you and I don't.
So what do you want to talk about next? If it's a different topic, then please start one and I'll do my darndest to contribute. (Not a perfect guarantee.)
It seems fairly obvious that it is a prophecy of the coming of John the Baptist.
Interpretations could be nuanced in various ways but for me its central meaning is to live with humility keeping God in your heart and mind instead of being consumed by worldly concerns for their own sake or for your own ego's sake. This is a pretty standard message common to many religions, although couched variously in somewhat different forms. I find it hard to believe you are not erudite enough to be well aware of that. You don't have to agree with it as a prescription for living, but it's not hard to understand its meaning, and understanding is not precluded by disagreement.
Here is your question:"Now it’s a simple question: how does the word of God come to fall under any interpretation at all? If the words in a given sequence of words are intelligible - understandable – how do you get past that to something else and preserve the qualification?"
And I have asked you to explain why you think the word of God should not be subject to interpretation. If you can answer that, then do so. If you can't answer, then be honest and admit it instead of trying to dismiss my question by insinuating that it is me that is being either obtuse or evasive.
My guess is that you think that in order to qualify as the word of God a text could have just one literal meaning. To me to think this would be absurd. If God is infinite, why would his Word not have infinite meaning?
"This is why I speak to them in parables: "Though seeing, they do not see; though hearing, they do not hear or understand" Matthew 13:13
[i]"THE VISION OF CHRIST that thou dost see
Is my vision’s greatest enemy.
Thine has a great hook nose like thine;
Mine has a snub nose like to mine.
Thine is the Friend of all Mankind;
Mine speaks in parables to the blind.
Thine loves the same world that mine hates;
Thy heaven doors are my hell gates.
Socrates taught what Meletus
Loath’d as a nation’s bitterest curse,
And Caiaphas was in his own mind
A benefactor to mankind.
Both read the Bible day and night,
But thou read’st black where I read white."[/i]
Excerpted from 'The Everlasting Gospel' by William Blake
I doubt if there was ever ONE standard by which to judge the meaning, value, interpretation, or efficacy of a given biblical passage. I am guessing that as the texts accumulated over the coarse of several hundred years there was considerable divergence.
Internal consistency would be one standard. Is this particular law treated in this passage the same way that it is treated in the other 10 passages where it is mentioned.
Consistency with the cult (in this case, the religion of the Jews). The texts of the OT were probably not the only source of cultic content--just as the NT is not the only source of Christian cultic content. For instance, animal sacrifice conducted by a priestly type of some sort probably existed before the beginning of the Jewish cult. The Eucharist might have been part of the early cult of Christianity and was then (possibly) read into the NT).
For a couple of obvious examples, rabbits and eggs have nothing to do with the resurrection, and pine trees have nothing to do with the birth of Jesus. None the less, they are part of the cult of Christianity -- at least for those parts of the Christian world under the influence of German and English culture -- which is the pagan source of rabbits and decorated pine trees.
Consistency with the believers' understanding of their religion. This standard was critical in sorting out the various scriptures at the time the NT was formalized. There were various 'sub-cults' in early Christianity, like the Gnostics. The committee that put the NT together wasn't especially fond of Gnosticism, Arianism, and a dozen other heresies, so those type of narrative were left out. The book of Revelations was not readily accepted, not for heresy, but because it concerned relatively local administrative matters (and, incidentally, was put into metaphorical form). It's got some great lines, and was eventually accepted, and all those metaphors have come in handy innumerable times -- for better and worse.
Consistency with the surrounding culture which was pagan. A lot of Greek philosophy (neoplatonism) worked its way into the New Testament, because whatever Jews and early Christians might believe, Greek Philosophy was pretty much de regueur for the thinking elite -- and it was the thinking elite who edited the NT. It wasn't a populist document.
Finally, for later Christians (including 21st century Christians) there is the standard of whether the scripture stands the test of time. People ask, "When we read the Bible (if we were to do that) does it speak to us in language and concepts that are meaningful to us?" For many people, the scriptures are not so meaningful that everybody who reads them finds them compelling. For many people the scriptures do not stand the test of time. (Though one must add, for many it does. Christianity is growing in total number of believers, just not in the US and western Europe. The disbelievers, or lapsed Christians, are in the advanced capitalist societies where culture has been pretty heavily secularized, alienated, pummeled by incessant commercial messaging, social deterioration, etc. etc. etc.).
Have you been reading my responses to you? Here is one regarding the question of the difference between reading and interpretation:
Quoting Janus
Why should I be necessarily able to claim that my interpretation of a text that I believe to be "the Word of God" is itself the Word of God? If my interpretation were the Word of God, then it would, equally as the text, be inspired by God, and could not be inconsistent with the text. You do seem to be thinking in terms that a text, to be the Word of God, must have just one literal meaning, but I think that is wrongheaded as I already pointed out.
What do you think a text being the Word of God means? Do you think that idea itself has just one literal meaning, and if so, what do you think that meaning is?
So why then?
Quoting Agustino
Damn, I should have figured that out. Do I need an interpreter to explain it for me. Not unless I am stupid.
Quoting Agustino
So do you have any new image of god that the bible portrays or is your image the same one everyone else uses? I have read the bible, it is interesting but as a work of fiction, historical fiction maybe, but still fiction. And the picture I have of god is about the same as I have of Zeus, but not as colorful.
Quoting Agustino
Ok, so he does talk in riddles and even his groupies did not understand him. What kind of a teacher is he then? If god was supposed to have sent him to collect souls to the cause would it not have been easier to speak clearly and make sure the people got the right message instead of saying think for your selves and risk them getting it wrong.
Quoting Agustino
You are one of the children of god that has to have everything interpreted for you, so maybe you should be the one to do this.
When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I set aside childish ways and stopped believing in Santa Claus.
Thank you, So it is clear, there was no need to do any fancy interpretations, just read it. It is nice to know that even ordinary people can read the bible and not worry about whether they are understanding it properly.
You meant to write "not worry..." I presume? But yes, anyone should be able to read it with an open heart and mind, and find its poetry working on them to some degree. What you quoted was a straightforwardly prophetic passage, but there are many others which are much more parabolic, and hence open to various interpretations, which although different need not be exclusive of one another. This is the beauty of poetic language; it does not characteristically present the reader with a bunch of propositions to be either affirmed or negated.
I live with a great deal of humility, I am not consumed by world concerns for my own sake nor for my ego's sake. And I don't have to blame god for the way I am.
Quoting Janus
The meaning of it was well understood, the need for nuances in a holy work are what I do not understand.
Quoting Janus
Why should anyone even be allowed to try to decide what a god really means by his words. Unless there is doubt about them actually being his words.
It looks as if some people think that they are above god and that they can make his words fit to the occasion as necessary. If these people are supposed to be inspired by god, then should he not get his act together and inspire them all in the same way so as to avoid confusion
It seems pathetic to say that it is necessary because of changing times, because then it means that god did not take into account that time would make a difference to the way people live. If he all knowing then isn't it silly to say "he did not do that for __" insert any reason you can think of. If his plan was for mankind to go out and populate the world would he not have known already the changes that would be coming?
Quoting Janus
Hot dog about those window blame humperdinkle bald.
If words can have infinite meanings, try to find out if I just insulted you.
Yes, thank you for pointing it out. (Y)
Fixed it.
If this is truly how you live, then you are already walking with God. And no right thinking person would blame God for how they are.
Quoting Sir2u
The passage you are responding to was directed to BC. In any case, why should a holy work not be nuanced, just as all good poetry, indeed literature, is?
Quoting Sir2u
It seems to me that you are misunderstanding, and trivializing the notion of words being Words of God. You are looking at this notion as some kind of empirical or propositional claim, which is inappropriate and is only the stuff of fundamentalism. Words are the Words of God when they speak to the open-hearted in ways that allow them to see, hear and feel God. There is a plethora of literature in many traditions that attests to this. What do you think being "the Word of God" really means?
Quoting Sir2u
Is it my intelligence or your own that you have insulted?
No, I walk without him. He would not walk anywhere with me after the number of times I have denied his existence.
Quoting Janus
But so many do. I'll let you think about it.
Quoting Janus
Yes I know it was directed at someone else, I just could not resist answering though.
Quoting Janus
I heartily agree that most good poetry and literature is nuanced and that it does in fact improve the writing most of the time.
But I also realize that it is fiction.
A biography of Winston Churchill could be told in so many ways to make his life seem bigger than it actually was, to make him appear romantic or sexy or even stupid. It could be biased to suit the opinion or needs of almost any political group. The writer could emphasize some parts of his life while ignoring other parts to give his life different meanings. All of this could be done, but if the writer tells a lie then it is no longer the biography of Winston Churchill.
If the bible is the word of good then it can contain nothing that is not the word of god. Human interpretations of his meanings would make a mockery of him.
Quoting Janus
But if the open-hearted need to have it spelled out for them by some authority then it does not fill its objective.
Quoting Janus
I would not insult you. And I have no reason to insult myself. But it is impossible for words to have infinite meanings, even for a god. There would be no meaning to anything said.
I think you underestimate him; or overestimate his peevishness.
Quoting Sir2u
The many you refer to are not right-thinking persons then. But thanks for letting me think about it anyway.
Quoting Sir2u
The Bible might be the Word of God for some and not for others. Who is right? One must decide for oneself whether and to what degree the Bible, in all its parts, is the Word of God. If it is not the Word of God for you, then to be sure it is not the Word of god for you. Can you explain what you think it could mean for a work to be the Word of God beyond that? Think about a poem (or any text) that is revelatory for someone; is it necessarily revelatory for others? Potentially revelatory? That's a very important question in aesthetics and hermeneutics right there.
Quoting Sir2u
It's not a matter of being "spelled out for them by some authority" but rather of being seduced by the Word. This is something that must be experienced in order to be understood, just as the revelations of great literature must be experienced in order to be understood.
Quoting Sir2u
Note, that it is 'in-finite meaning' that is intended not 'infinitely many meanings.
You have asked that question a few times now, could you answer it.
I have done this many times before and have been given the same answers usually.
If I said that the word of god should reflect his being and therefore should be perfectly written you would tell me that it is so. It is I that fail to understand the meanings because I will not open my heart to it.
If I said that the word of god should be all-encompassing as he is. Then you would tell me it is so because it is not lacking in any way. Obviously, because it can be interpreted to mean almost anything it is all-encompassing.
If I said that the word of god should be useful and guiding to his people. You will tell me that it is so, that the bible contains many helpful and educational resources. So why is it that only a few of those people know how to get the good stuff out of it and the rest have to listen to them.
If humans are the work of god then anything written by man is the word of god, because we are all influenced by him. Why can't the Hobbits be treated with the same reverence as the bible?
Quoting Janus
That sounds like a commercial for cake mix.
Firstly, I asked what you think being the Word of God means, and secondly I have not been sparing in saying what I think it means, which is to say what the more philosophically sophisticated, who understand that it is not an empirical matter, will say it means. The answer is given in the only terms that can really make any sense; in terms of human experience.
.Quoting Sir2u
I would say that in a sense insofar as any work is an authentic expression of the human spirit and experience, that it is a Word of God. But then there are many texts that are not specifically concerned with religious experience, with the good life in the spiritual, that is to say the redemptive and transformative, sense.
Quoting Sir2u
Great rebuttal!
Note that we are not talking about what is objectively the case here; there is no such thing. To think there is, constitutes the first fundamentalist mistake.
Anyway it is inevitable, given our very different starting presuppositions that we will continue to talk past one another, which would be a further waste of time and energy, so I think this conversation has run its course.
Quoting szardosszemagad
I think you are misinterpreting me.. the parallel there is funny. Easy to misinterpret any text ;).
So I hold a historical-critical approach. What I meant was that both the written text and the application (and interpretations) of the written text evolved over time. So if you were to rewind back to 700s BCE, you would have a possible text that was an amalgam of traditions and mythical texts from the Israelite and Judahite sources. This would resemble to some extent the stories in Genesis, Exodus, and Numbers. If you were to fast forward to the 600s BCE, you would probably see influence from the Cohens/Levites in Leviticus and Deuteronomy written in more or less full form (possibly influencing the previous texts to conform to the later narrative). Then in the 500s-400s BCE, you may have seen the various sources redacted, edited, and added to so that it came in its final form of the Torah we know today- the Five Books of Moses. These books were probably presented in final redacted form by Ezra the Priest who was trying to institute a fully-formed theocratic state under the auspices of the Shah-an-Shah in Persia who ruled over Judah at this time (called the province of Yahad in Persian).
Now, let's also add some more historical understanding. Who were "the prophets" (the neviim in Hebrew)? They were probably guilds of "seers" who were dedicated to the god Yaweh. By the 600s, the main power structure was the King, the Priests, and the Prophets. The prophet guilds sometimes had more influence like in King Hezekiah and King Josiah's time, and around this time, they convinced the power structure to mainly ditch the other gods in favor of the patron god Yaweh. They probably also maintained a moral element in the religion. In other words, they may have aligned the ritualistic aspects with moral aspects such that morality was tied up in Divine Command.
In 586 BCE, Babylonia under Nebuchadnezzar conquered Judah and took the elite classes (priests, kings, prophets, etc.) with them, leaving some Jews behind. Again, this is when the "Bible" was redacted and put together. When Ezra came back, he brought with him scribes, priests, and even "prophets" who would help establish a theocratic state of sorts. This council was called the Great Assembly. Just like the Constitution of the US, the Torah in its final form was considered the Law of the land and main source for tribal history. However, they still had to "show" people how to follow it. So they probably had "oral" traditions decided upon by the Great Assembly (like the Supreme Court makes judgements about the written Constitution which is also considered binding law). These oral traditions explained certain rituals, holidays, prayers, and how to follow the text itself. This was supposed to get passed down from priests/scholars/prophets down to the next generation in a game of telephone. It was never thought to be written down. This is what I meant by "pristine" state, because my argument is the religion as it was set up was really put together by this Great Assembly more or less, and thus the original intention of the Torah by Ezra and Great Assembly (just like the original intention of the Constitution) may have had slight variations which harbored more traditions that may not have been in the original or changed the context of the original document to fit new situations (just like the Supreme Court with the Constitution.. The 6th Amendment says right to counsel for defense, but it was Gideon v. Wainright in 1963 that made it mandatory for states to provide a public defender).
You realize, that this would be anathema to Orthodox Jews and Fundamentalist Christians who would say, no the traditions go back to Moses who wrote it down many years earlier (1200 BCE). So, my argument was it was myths, laws and traditions that were redacted and edited over time, with its final form around 400 BCE and was redacted by Ezra and scribes, with certain "unwritten" laws and judgements made by Ezra, scribes, and Great Assembly that itself evolved over time with newer judgements or replacements with older ones, or perhaps changed as the information was transmitted in different ways the original, etc. etc. I hope this answers your question about what I mean that it was an evolving document.
With this approach, you cannot interpret our understand the history or intention of the Bible, without understanding the civilization, the people, the culture, the context, and the history from which it came.
I think I agree. But just a comment I expect no answer to.
The lord of the rings is a grand story. It contains most of the situations found in the bible, from war to love, friendship to enemies, loyalty to betrayal, images of god like beings doing things that no mortal human can do, and so on.
In many thousand years when the archeologists are digging in the remains of our utterly destroyed civilization looking for any clue as to what life was like in our times. They find some books, a bible a Koran, the Talmud and the Lord of the rings. Do you think that they would be able to tell the difference between them?
I think they piece it together and Gandalf provides the sacred texts to Moses in the Shire and they go on a great adventure to Egypt where Sauron and his Orcs enslave the Israelites, and save them and lead them to the Lonely Sinai Mountain where Smaug lives. Meanwhile Moses' nephew Mohammad finds some elves and angels and fights Sauron again and brings with him dwarves in the battle of Mirkwood.. The messiah, Aragorn returns and reestablishes a sacred kingdom reuniting the two kingdoms of men and elves or something like that.
Bloody marvelous, where is the thumbs up button when you need it? (Y) (Y)
Edit ; What do they Elves do?
Thanks :D! I cleaned up the post a bit, I think you copied my original one. The Elves fought with the evil Amelakites and Edomites in the Battle of Beleriand in which the Angels were employed from Valinor to help defeat them and their evil king Morgoth. Later the Angels asked the Elves to come back with them to Valinor but some remained behind in Babylonia instead of going back to the Holy Land and established mystical schools which kept the secrets and traditions of the First Age.