One of our more fundamentalist brothers has made a recent attempt at humor, suggesting that liberals have "tiny Bibles..."
There used to be a video store near us that rented movies with objectionable parts removed so the whole family could watch them. I remember thinking, “What a time saver – you can watch Pulp Fiction in 5 minutes!”
In the same way, you can read the Theological Liberal Bible in about that time, and that is barely an exaggeration. Thomas Jefferson famously made his own religion with his “Jefferson Bible.” Theological Liberals just go many steps further. I’m pretty sure this post is longer than their Bible.
Funny Pulp Fiction and liberal joke aside (and I DO think it's humorous, as a stereotypical joke), I think if we were to look at it as a serious commentary, we might have to flip the insight over.
Progressive Christians tend to try NOT to tie God down. We recognize the Bible as the Word of God, profitable for teaching and correction, but we don't think it's some magical book that contains ALL the "Word of God" of an infinite and all-powerful God. Rather, we tend to look at the Bible as God's revelation to humanity from the folk who wrote these accounts thousands of years ago.
But God will not tied down to a few hundred pages.
I find God writ large in each and every mountain and hill, and each and every leaf, blade, flower and needle upon each plant and tree upon each of those mountains; in poems and prose so large that one million million hikes would not allow me to begin to read, much less comprehend.
I find God writ upon the billions of stars across millions of galaxies scattered across an infinite universe.
I find God writ in the little acts of love shown by children throughout the ages, as well as the great acts of selfless bravery and giving by humanity throughout time.
I find God's Word written throughout all of God's creation, in big and small words and they are always written with that tell-tale evidence of love and grace of its Author.
Do Progressive Christians have a tiny sense of the Word of God? No, I can't say that I have found this to be true. Nor do most good conservative Christians that I know and have known.
However, some fundamentalist types have managed to trap the word of a God in a few hundred pages, or at least they seem to think so.
I kind of have to doubt it.
288 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 288 of 288Geoffrey, in Doug's defense, he did answer that question by saying that the people of the OT didn't have Scripture, but prophets who would speak "and God said". He goes on to say that God has now changed the way he relates..."I see no evidence in the New Testament that we are to be instruments of God's judgment."
But the thing that gets me is this...Doug you said... "He hasn't changed; we have."
Say what? First you say he changed then you say He didn't. Did He or didn't He?
So if God really hasn't changed, what makes you think that we mere humans were ever told by Him to be instruments of His judgement?
Dan:
It's just that instead of a literal, linear story with every facet being basically factual, you extend beyond the ordinary.
I understand that. My issue with overlaying this style on the OT is that one is then able to essentially excise certain parts by writing them off as part of the 'epic' style. I know that you don't do it capriciously, but it can really open the door to deciding what you will and won't take as...gospel, so to speak.
I'd say we certainly DO have prophets still.
Of a sort, perhaps. But not of the type in the Old Testament, where they were assigned the role, typically by the previous prophet, and hand-picked by God. Their role was to communicate God's will to His people. The Spirit does that now, to each of us. Indeed, some are more in touch with the Spirit than others, but that is a matter of degree, not role.
Do you think that could explain why polygamy was acceptable back then and not now? Because cultures change?
I don't think that God interacts differently with us now because of the change in culture, but because of the change in relationship between us and Him. The temple veil was torn when Jesus died, signifying we no longer need a designated priest to approach the throne of God.
I believe God did permit some thing of the early patriarchs, because of their immaturity in their knowledge of God. But the more God revealed Himself, He got more strict with us, for our own good, rather than more lax. The Mosaic Law allowed you to simply give a certificate of divorce to get it one. Jesus told us the rules had changed, that God hates divorce, and through Paul we got a very small set of circumstances that He found it permissible. He reigned in those things that He initially permitted as we came to know Him better. Again, He didn't change, but He clarified the rules for us, because He is sovereign, and we were weak. (In fact, that's explicitly why He permitted divorce early on; mankind was weak.)
And thus I don't see this as an opening for permitting gay marriage. Every mention of marriage in the Bible, even the polygamous ones, and every time it's defined, even in regards to divorce, it is heterosexual. I don't see where the rules, changing from "eye for an eye" to "love your enemies", and from divorce certificates to the word that He hates it, would go from heterosexual to being more permissive, without some rather explicit Word.
If you hold to the position that it IS in God's nature to sometimes command US to kill babies, then you and I hold different views of God's nature on that point.
Again, I don't think God would command "us", as in you or I or our contemporaries, to kill a child. Nonetheless, that statement in itself points out precisely why a proper reading of the Old Testament is so critical. Far from being a form of idolatry, it is absolutely required to get a clear picture of God. Whether you are right or I am, or there is some third alternative, how you approach the actual text really is of great importance.
Geoff:
Doug actually wrote the following, even as he claims to follow Scripture literally: "God's judgment, holiness and wrath are seen in the OT, God's love, grace and forgiveness in the NT."
Um, Doug, what about that whole Jesus-on-the-cross-abandoned-by-God-to-die-and-go-to-hell thing, which is kind of an important story.
A 30,000 foot view of the entire Bible, a generalization; I'm sure you've heard of it. And yet, even in that, with regards to God interacting with humans, the OT is indeed about rules and judgment, and the NT is about love and forgiveness. The crucifixion would be the ultimate expression of those New Testament qualities.
If you are reading the Bible to get insight in to the history of the ancient Near East...
As I, too, have "repeatedly stated", I don't read the Bible to get insight into history. Instead, I read the Bible to get insight into God through, by way of, in seeing how He worked in the history of the Israelites.
As I noted to Dan, our different views of God hinge rather closely on how we deal with the text of the Bible itself. Whether you or I are right, or something else is the truth, much indeed turns on the the text. Indeed, the Spirit has an equal role in these New Testament times, but the Word is just as important.
I missed the following from Doug, but thankfully, Marty caught it, so I tip my hat to you: ""So yes, I believe that God could ask me to do something that would otherwise be a sin for me if I did it of my own volition. That is a key distinction."
The Christian churches have so much blood on their hands because far too many people have bought this line of crap.
And Marty also noticed that I covered the potential problems with this later on. I will reiterate the "of my own volition" phrase, something I called a "key distinction". I do not believe the Spirit would guide people to microwave their babies. (I do not believe I have to actually say that so that you understand my meaning.)
Why would God ask His people to take out cities then, and not now? I would refer you to that 2-part post from which you quote for the answer.
Marty:
But the thing that gets me is this...Doug you said... "He hasn't changed; we have."
Say what? First you say he changed then you say He didn't. Did He or didn't He?
So if God really hasn't changed, what makes you think that we mere humans were ever told by Him to be instruments of His judgement?
I think it's one of the bedrock beliefs of God that He is unchanging. However, mankind's understanding about God, and with that understanding, more faith, has certainly changed.
As I said in the 2-part comment you're quoting, God had a purpose for everything He did in the OT. That purpose had been completed (Israel occupying and defending the land God gave them), and a new era is ushered in by the Redemption. A new message, not of law and judgment (by which we realize that we are sinners), but of grace and forgiveness (by which we are saved from being sinners).
So He Himself hasn't changed, but humanity understands more and more of him, and in the fullness of time, the Redemption comes. I would imagine that both you and I find that event somewhat significant, no?
Doug: "I think it's one of the bedrock beliefs of God that He is unchanging. However, mankind's understanding about God, and with that understanding, more faith, has certainly changed."
Well thank God for that then!
The writers of the OT are so freakin' archaic in their understanding of just about everything, imo. And what's to say that what they attributed to God... "and God said".. commanding them to kill babies, etc was, in fact, their own imaginings and/or desires.
I have no doubt that they believed God was telling them to do those atrocities. But I doubt God had anything to do with it.
"So He Himself hasn't changed, but humanity understands more and more of him, and in the fullness of time, the Redemption comes. I would imagine that both you and I find that event somewhat significant, no?"
What I find significant are the teachings of Jesus and what they mean to me in the 21st Century. How do I, as a follower of Jesus, live that out in the here and now. It matters not to me what God did or how God did thousands of years ago.
If you want to believe that God literally destroyed an ancient people over some land then knock yourself out.
People are still fighting and dying over land and I can't see that God has much to do with it today either.
Doug: "A 30,000 foot view of the entire Bible, a generalization; I'm sure you've heard of it. And yet, even in that, with regards to God interacting with humans, the OT is indeed about rules and judgment, and the NT is about love and forgiveness. The crucifixion would be the ultimate expression of those New Testament qualities."
No. No 30,000 foot view of the Bible, no separation of the Testaments. No distinction concerning the human understanding of God's revelation of who God is. The kind of dispensationalism on display here was dispensed with, oh, in the second or third centuries, when first the Marcionites, then the Gnostics, got rid of the Hebrew Scriptures and the Hebrew LORD out of a combination of misreading the Scriptures and ancient anti-Semitism (to use an anachronistic term). While the Protestant Reformation certainly offered an ontological distinction between Gospel and Law (as opposed to historic, dispensationalist view on offer here), they certainly understood them to be inseparably linked within the one revelation of God in Jesus Christ.
Jesus could be, then, read back in to the Old Testament, speaking thru the prophets, present at the Creation (as he was already presented in the Fourth Gospel). To insist this distinction is necessary is to ignore the abundant evidence within the Hebrew Scriptures themselves, a singular narrative thread, pointed out most fully by Old Testament scholar Gerhard von Rad, of promise and fulfillment. God promises - to Cain, to Abraham, to Jacob, to Moses, to the people through the prophets - and fulfills those promises. This reading comes not from some "angel's eye view" (to quote Hegel), but from the reality of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and taking seriously and faithfully his insistence that he is the fulfillment of the Law and prophets. Not that his ministry is, not that his passion, death, and resurrection are; that he, in himself, is that fulfillment.
This is demonstrated most clearly in the narrative arc of the Gospel of St. Matthew, but is also present in the others.
None of this is secret. Since I figured it out when I was 12 or thirteen, after given an introduction to these ideas during confirmation classes, it seems neither controversial nor even all that interesting. The idea that I am offering "a 30,000 foot view" is wrong. Period. I am offering a deeply Biblical, deeply Christological, deeply Trinitarian view of how the Bible is to be understood.
That you find this odd, or surprising, or a "30,000 foot view" of how the Bible is to be read says absolutely nothing about me, but quite a bit about you and your understanding of the Scriptures.
Geoff:
I'm pretty much done with this thread, as I've said, re-said, and finally distilled what I think on the topic. Think of it what you will. But I do want to clear one thing up.
Jesus could be, then, read back in to the Old Testament, speaking thru the prophets, present at the Creation ...
I believe all of this. I would have loved to been on the road to Emaus when Jesus explained how He was spoken of and alluded to throughout the Old Testament. Our pastor, incidentally, is preaching through the Bible, one book a week, and prominent in each set of sermon notes is "Jesus in Genesis", "Jesus in Exodus", etc.
Which is much easier for us, with 20/20 hindsight. For those living in those times, not so much. Further, as I have already noted, there was something that changed because of the Redemption. See my mention of the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus contrasts the old Law with the new Grace. Don't just love your friends, love your enemies. Don't just take and eye for an eye, pray for those that hate you. Jesus often contrasted the message He brought with the message from the Mosaic Law. Now we were ready for it.
And just as a matter of the timeline, the Law came first and the Redemption that was promised and alluded to by creation and the prophets, came physically and both proclaimed the message of grace and forgiveness, and then provided the means by which they came.
From the same, unchanging God, but to humans who had to learn it over time, and had to mature in their knowledge of God, waiting for "the fullness of time" for the Redemption to come.
Marty:
How do I, as a follower of Jesus, live that out in the here and now. It matters not to me what God did or how God did thousands of years ago.
Which sounds like you believe God Himself has changed, if understanding what He was like thousands of years ago is irrelevant to you today. I just don't buy that.
Doug...
My issue with overlaying this style on the OT is that one is then able to essentially excise certain parts by writing them off as part of the 'epic' style.
Yes. We are all responsible for discerning, by God's grace as best we can, the writing style being used throughout the Bible. And when we discern, for instance, that Jesus was using hyperbole when he commanded lopping off your hand, we "write off" that as a literal command and get that it is, instead, emphasizing the danger of sin in our lives.
We all do this, right?
You are, in fact, doing this when you write off "God won't tempt you to sin" as a way of saying, "God MIGHT command us to kill babies - or at least that's the way God used to work..."
We are responsible for striving to understand the Scriptures as best we can and sometimes, that means deciding that a given passage is not a literal command or story. Parables are not literal stories - even when they're not identified as parables. Hyperbole is not a literal command.
We all do this, and rightly so. And so, all we're striving to see here in some of these OT stories is, do they make sense in the greater biblical narrative as literal stories? I don't think they do, clearly not, for the reasons I've given...
1. No one was telling stories back then in the manner you're suggesting. I would expect people then to tell stories the way people told stories then.
2. You have too large a break from clear moral teachings of the Bible and have to ignore clear passages in favor of reading this as literal history.
I just don't find it convincing, GIVEN WHAT THE BIBLE AS A WHOLE says.
Doug...
with regards to God interacting with humans, the OT is indeed about rules and judgment, and the NT is about love and forgiveness.
Here, I would disagree. I'm fine with saying that the folk in the NT had the advantage of Jesus clearing up misunderstandings from the OT, but "love your enemies" is just as much a part/command in the OT as it is in the NT.
If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat;
if he is thirsty, give him water to drink. ~Proverbs 25
Jesus helped clarify this, but grace, mercy, forgiveness and love our all throughout the Bible.
"For I have desired MERCY, not sacrifice." One of the greatest of the OT teachings, seems to me. The rules were and always have been about love and grace: "THIS WAY/these rules are the way to live in harmony with God and humanity...," that was the OT teaching.
Jesus DID, however, help clear up the wrong emphases on rule-following.
"The sabbath is for humanity, not humanity for the sabbath," he taught, pointing out that we aren't slaves to rules and rule-following, but that striving to walk in God's ways are for our sake.
So, while I can agree that there is more of an emphasis on rule-following and condemnation in the OT, that the point has always been grace and mercy.
Doug...
But not of the type in the Old Testament, where they were assigned the role, typically by the previous prophet, and hand-picked by God. Their role was to communicate God's will to His people.
Again, this is off-point (sort of... although actually, it does get back to how we read the Bible), but I don't think you can find a biblical case that prophets as spoken of in the Bible were a temporary thing that have gone away. I can think of SOME cases where there were prophets "assigned" the role, or inheriting the role. But as a rule, a prophet was merely one who was speaking God's truth. OT, NT, then and now.
I don't think you can make the case for a special office of biblical prophet that no longer exists.
Marshall...
Dan's rejection of the accuracy of these stories has impacted his understanding of God and His nature.
I'm still waiting for you to provide even ONE way in which you think I have a poor understanding of the nature of God.
Doug: "Which sounds like you believe God Himself has changed, if understanding what He was like thousands of years ago is irrelevant to you today. I just don't buy that."
Well, I'm not selling. But, He has changed if he deals with the ancients differently than the modern.
I personally don't think God has changed. He wouldn't have ordered atrocities in those days any more than He would order them today. Do I think we can learn a truth from those horrid stories? Probably. The verdict is still out for me on just what it is we are supposed to learn from some of that stuff though. It's just not something I'm particularly interested in mulling over in my mind.
Marty, for my part, I think those stories were conveyed for the purpose of giving comfort to a small, oft-oppressed, oft-fearful nation. God IS on your side. God is watching out for you.
Now, is that a primitive and short-sighted way to think of God? Sure, but these were much more primitive times. As I'm sure you've heard pointed out: "An eye for an eye" sounds barbaric, until you consider that in those days/cultures, it was not uncommon to wipe out a family if one of them had put out someone's eye. So, an "eye for an eye" is a pull-BACK away from violence. It was a moderating voice.
Later, the prophets and still later, Jesus made it clear, do not undertake to do ANY harm to your enemies. Let God deal with them. Because God is the God of us all, God loves us all - Israelite and "enemy," too.
But for those people at that time: storytelling that emphasized that there was a God of justice and love who was concerned for your people, that was a big deal. And THAT, it seems to me, is the purpose of these stories, NOT modernistic history-telling in the sense that we are used to today.
And to call such storytelling "lies" and denigrating that sort of storytelling is just modernistic hubris.
Seems to me.
And, as perhaps you've noticed, we've been posting on this topic so long that my comment moderation has kicked in, requiring that I approve each message that comes through. So, if anyone is still wanting to comment and you notice a delay in the post appearing, that is why.
Dan, just hitting a final note here:
I don't think you can make the case for a special office of biblical prophet that no longer exists.
The presence of them in the OT, specifically chosen and referred to as such, and the absence of said choosing in the NT, suggests to me that there was indeed such a position with a specific purpose.
Marty:
But, He has changed if he deals with the ancients differently than the modern.
Which is like saying a teacher of a particular subject should hold a novice to the same exacting standards as an expert. The same teacher will treat the two students differently.
Doug...
The presence of them [prophets] in the OT, specifically chosen and referred to as such, and the absence of said choosing in the NT, suggests to me that there was indeed such a position with a specific purpose.
1. There are prophets referenced in the NT. Jesus called himself one, for instance. Acts 11 and 13 both reference early church prophets. Judas and Silas are NT prophets (Acts 15). Acts 21. Paul tells us that prophet is one of the roles in the church (SECOND in his list, which seems to suggest it is a role of some importance)...
Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it. And God has placed in the church first of all apostles, second prophets, third teachers... 1 Cor 12
2. Not all OT prophets are recorded as being "chosen." Although, I'm not sure what you mean by "chosen" that would in anyway differentiate OT prophets from NT prophets or modern prophets. I'd suggest ANY prophet who is a true prophet, speaking the Word of God, is chosen by God for that role. Do you think Silas and Judas were not chosen by God for their roles? How are you differentiating between OT prophets and NT prophets?
3. All of this to reiterate: I don't think you can make a sound biblical case for "prophet" as merely a Biblical-time and certainly not an OT-time role.
Geoffrey wrote, "This is demonstrated most clearly in the narrative arc of the Gospel of St. Matthew, but is also present in the others."
Not to mention that, in Romans, Paul goes out of his way to preach exactly against the sort of dispensationalism evident in Doug's comments.
Geoffrey,
Nice try. Be dismissive if you can't deal with the honest commentary of your opponents, but don't pretend there's anything dangerous or insane about them. How cowardly!
To both you and Marty, it would be helpful if you'd acknowledge that there was no claim that God is telling either Doug or anyone else to commit any acts whatsoever, besides what He tells us through Scripture. We reject those who have used the Bible to justify heinous actions, such as racism, as being liars and false teachers with no true justification for their teaching. Indeed, we are prepared to argue against their weak and/or twisted interpretations, just as we do in these here discussions.
So to put us in the same camp as the Klan and all others who distort Scripture to further their wicked agendas is cheap and cowardly, not to mention bearing false witness. Dan doesn't go for that.
To answer Marty's question, we've had THIS discussion before. If a hypothetical question is asked regarding what one would do if God told one to do it, you cannot then ask, "how do know it is really God asking?" We answer based on the assumption inferred by the hypothetical that there is no doubt it IS God asking. Thus, the question is answered and yes, I agree with Doug, that if God asks, I respond. His asking absolves me from any eternal responsibility for the actions his command compels me to take, just as the various Hebrew armies were absolved for wiping out entire populations at His command.
This is what makes Geoffrey's last comment so lame. It assumes that Doug just "thinks" God is talking to him, when the hypothetical assumes it IS God talking. I doubt that Doug, and I know it is true of me, would ever act on anything less. The fact that history shows people claiming God spoke to them in order to get their way is irrelevant to the hypothetical.
Marshall...
It assumes that Doug just "thinks" God is talking to him, when the hypothetical assumes it IS God talking.
This demonstrates a profound lack of understanding of the human mind and how easily it can convince itself that it KNOWS BEYOND ALL DOUBT that God is speaking. Sure, if God should decide to speak audibly to you, you'd know it. The problem is, that the mentally deluded ALSO "know" it with absolute certainty.
How do you ("you," the one who hears God's voice) differentiate between the "true" hearer of God's voice and the deluded? For myself, if I heard God telling me to kill babies, THAT would be evidence that it is NOT God's voice because God does not tempt us to sin.
This is where your argument falls apart, where it lacks enough substance to be convincing in the least. It fails a basic biblical exegesis test.
It seems that I have responded to a comment from the previous page, these having totaled so many. Anyway...
Dan,
I think you have a problem with the concept "God will not tempt us to sin".
First, there is a difference between "tempt" and "command".
Secondly, there is a difference between God's will and a command from Him to further it, and that which is a rule of behavior for us to follow when He is NOT directly commanding us. (Bear with me here, I'm in a hurry as I usually am these days)
Suffice to say that tempting us to sin is not the same as God commanding us to do what we are otherwise forbidden to do on our own volition. Sin, by virtue of it conflicting with the will of God, cannot be what we would be doing by His direct command, even if we would otherwise be forbidden from doing it on our own volition.
The distinction really isn't as vague as my words would suggest, but you make it so to support your point. It doesn't work, however.
As to how it has impacted your understanding of God's nature to reject those OT stories as factual history, obviously you do not believe God was capable of ordering His Chosen People to wipe out entire populations. Thus, it is not part of His nature to do so according to you, whereas the OT stories clearly say otherwise. You have subtracted that little bit of understanding about His nature because of your own biases and rejected it, thereby shrinking your Bible.
A quick response to Alan.
I have always conceded that different styles of writing exist in the Bible. This does not have anything to do with whether or not the stories of which we now speak were factual or written in some fictitious style. We're talking specifically about stories that Dan rejects as evidence of him having in effect, a smaller Bible after the rejection of those stories.
Marshall : "To both you and Marty, it would be helpful if you'd acknowledge that there was no claim that God is telling either Doug or anyone else to commit any acts whatsoever"
Ummm...I did acknowledge it..: "Geoffrey, in Doug's defense, he did answer that...."
Guess you missed it. Easy to do with over 200 comments.
Art, I have absolutely no idea to what you might even remotely be referring. Please clarify.
Marshall...
As to how it has impacted your understanding of God's nature to reject those OT stories as factual history, obviously you do not believe God was capable of ordering His Chosen People to wipe out entire populations.
As I have stated frequently, God is God and CAN do whatever God wants.
I'm not speaking of what God CAN do, but what God WILL NOT do. God will NOT do something against God's nature. I'm sure you agree on that point.
Commanding us to kill babies is NOT in God's nature, I contend. You believe otherwise.
We have no way of "proving" I'm right or you're right. So, it just comes down to you thinking that it is in God's nature to sometimes command us to kill babies and me disagreeing.
And there it stands.
Thus, it is not part of His nature to do so according to you, whereas the OT stories clearly say otherwise.
Well, that is what is at question. YOU THINK the Bible teaches that it is in God's nature to sometimes command us to kill babies. I disagree, I think such a position is laughably horrifying.
You have subtracted that little bit of understanding about His nature because of your own biases and rejected it, thereby shrinking your Bible.
No, I have disagreed with your hunch based upon my careful prayerful Bible study. I find your position horrifyingly unbiblical. You disagree, obviously. And yet, if you can produce no better arguments than you have thus far, I shall remain unconvinced by your argument.
It has nothing to do with pre-existing biases (remember, my pre-existing biases were of a more conservative/fundamentalist nature and it was bible study that led me AWAY from my biases, so that charge is ridiculously baseless) and everything to do with Bible study done for the purpose of seeking God's will.
I was not referring to anything Doug ever claimed to do. I was referring, and I thought it was clear enough, to the wording itself. I do not believe that Doug is either a psychopath or sociopath, for the perfectly legitimate reason that I know absolutely nothing about him.
His statement, however, concerning the will of God clearing the way for all sorts of heinous acts, has been the excuse of such people. It was a blase attitude toward such a belief that I was writing about.
Geoffrey,
I began my 3/18/11 2:49PM response not realizing that I was still reading comments from the previous page, but not the most current. It was in response to your comment of 3/17/11 4:30 PM which, as I write this, was the last comment before comments 201-228 showed up on a second page. I realized this after I had posted the comment. Sorry for the confusion.
Dan,
"I'm not speaking of what God CAN do, but what God WILL NOT do."
You're insisting that God could not have done what Scripture says He did. This means that you have eliminated those facts from the Bible. It is stated as an actual occurance and you resolve it by assuming it is written in some style practiced by some other ancient people, but never provide proof that it explains these stories. And the "truth" you infer from these supposedly fabricated records of Hebrew history is different, or a lesser degree of what the text says about the nature of God. Hence, you have a distorted understanding of God and His nature.
"God will NOT do something against God's nature. I'm sure you agree on that point."
I do. But where we disagree is whether or not these stories accurately describe God's nature. I say it does until it can be proven otherwise. You aren't concerned with such proofs but instead make assumptions based on what you believe some, but I doubt all, ancient people may have done. You then choose to believe that the ancient Hebrews then had to do things the same way, even after being reminded of how God mandated behaviors to separate them from the behaviors of all other people of the time.
"Commanding us to kill babies is NOT in God's nature, I contend. You believe otherwise."
Not quite. It is dishonest to insist on framing it this way. God commanded the destruction of entire populations, as well as having carried out such destruction on His own through miraculous events. In doing so, infants died as well. The command is not "go kill babies", which is a dishonest construct to distort the truth into something human and wicked. Rather, He said, for example, "I will send the Angel of Death to take the first born..." some of whom may have still been infants. As similar situations occur numerous times, the question becomes, how many times must such situations occur for Dan to realize it is ineed part of God's nature to decide at His own pleasure that His sovereignty allows Him to end the lives of whomever He chooses for reasons we might not understand? Indeed, the lesson of these stories, if we go with Geoffrey's opinion of there being layers upon layers of meaning (not needed since this meaning is obvious), is that it is indeed within God's nature to do just that.
"We have no way of "proving" I'm right or you're right."
I just did. But you have no logical way of disproving this truth, no justifiable reason to pretend it isn't true. You just choose to in order to maintain a fantasy about the nature of God.
"YOU THINK the Bible teaches that it is in God's nature to sometimes command us to kill babies."
I believe I have just demonstrated the lie inherent in your continued use of the phrase "God commands us to kill babies". I believe I have just explained how He can and did command that the lives of infants be ended, not as a direct command to do so, but as part of a more sweeping command or action on His part.
"I disagree, I think such a position is laughably horrifying."
What's laughable is your refusal to accept the horrifying extent of God's wrath. By doing so, you entertain a distorted perception of God's nature and reject parts of the Bible that offend your delicate sensibilities, thereby shrinking the size of the Bible.
"And yet, if you can produce no better arguments than you have thus far, I shall remain unconvinced by your argument."
I doubt you'll find any that say anything different, so they couldn't be better. You remain unconvinced because of your biases despite your claims about past beliefs, which current explanations indicate were no better thought out than what we see from you today.
Marshall...
You're insisting that God could not have done what Scripture says He did. This means that you have eliminated those facts from the Bible.
No, I'm not. Read slowly and try to get my point:
1. God is God. God can do anything.
2. Marshall is NOT God. Marshall is human and entirely capable of not understanding the Bible.
3. Marshall thinks (ie, it is his hunch, his best guess) that Scriptures suggest God literally commanded people to slaughter whole cities of people, including babies (which I shorten to just "kill babies," now you know what I mean when I say that - nothing dishonest).
4. DAN THINKS that this is poor exegesis. The Scriptures DO say that God commanded people to kill babies, to cut off their hands and other points that we don't take literally. Dan thinks Marshall's hunch that THAT particular story ought to be taken literally is poor understanding and missing the point.
5. In other words, Dan and Marshall disagree on how best to interpret stories where the author has God commanding people to kill babies. Marshall thinks that it is in God's nature to sometimes command such behavior. Dan thinks Marshall is wrong.
It is a disagreement with no way of proving who is right and wrong. If Marshall is comfortable with saying his god sometimes commands people to kill babies, then that's the god that Marshall worships and Marshall is welcome to that hunch, no matter how patently ridiculous it appears on the face of it.
6. Given all this, Dan has eliminated no facts from the Bible, any more than Marshall has eliminated facts when he considers Jesus' command to cut off hands as hyperbole. Rather, we have both interpreted as best we can.
7. Given all that, Marshall has not sufficiently made the case that God sometimes commands people to kill babies, so Dan is writing off Marshall's position as just plain poor biblical exegesis because Marshall is setting aside the clear in favor of the obscure.
Marshall...
It is stated as an actual occurance and you resolve it by assuming it is written in some style practiced by some other ancient people, but never provide proof that it explains these stories.
Jesus states "Cut off your hands" as an actual command, and yet you wildly choose to "ignore" it and "cast out those facts from the Bible" (to use your argument style). It is MARSHALL'S HUNCH that it is to be taken literally, even though he can produce NO EVIDENCE that it ought to be considered literal.
Since Marshall can produce no evidence whatsoever to support his hunch and since it is patently ridiculous to me on the face of it and since it appears to employ poor biblical exegesis, I'm not taking it as a serious or valid interpretation of those scriptures.
Dan,
I'm not surprised you so quickly dismiss my far more logical arguments considering how easily you dismiss the clear words of Scripture. I doubt you pondered for one second my arguments, much less weighed them objectively against your own. Let's review what you wanted me to read slowly to get your point, and you'll see how your point is well understood and shown to be poorly developed:
1. "God is God. God can do anything."
No disagreement here.
2. "Marshall is NOT God. Marshall is human and entirely capable of not understanding the Bible."
None here, either with the exception of the obvious implication of the latter portion. I may be capable of not understanding the Bible, but it's never been shown to be the case that I haven't understood it.
3. "Marshall thinks (ie, it is his hunch, his best guess) that Scriptures suggest God literally commanded people to slaughter whole cities of people, including babies (which I shorten to just "kill babies," now you know what I mean when I say that - nothing dishonest)."
No. I KNOW that Scripture, doesn't "suggest", but say outright, that God literally commanded His chosen people to destroy entire populations, including babies, which you shorten to just "kill babies" to imply a wickedness in the notion that it actually happened, so therefor it couldn't have because God isn't wicked.
4. "DAN THINKS that this is poor exegesis."
But for subjective reasons based on your own personal feelings regarding a God who would command such a thing. You do not support it with sound arguments of your own, only that you prefer to believe that God wouldn't do such a thing, and you base that on what He expects of us. You demand that He bind Himself to what He expects of us, all the while insistingin you believe your point #1, "God is God. God can do anything." (Kinda makes a mockery of that stated belief.)
"The Scriptures DO say that God commanded people to kill babies..." no, it doesn't "...to cut off their hands..." no, it doesn't "...and other points that we don't take literally." because not all points are meant to be taken literally, and honest, reasonable people don't need to jump through hoops to know which is which in order to understand that the OT stories in question are not metaphors or allegories, but are indeed accurate records of actual events.
moving on...
" Dan thinks Marshall's hunch that THAT particular story ought to be taken literally is poor understanding and missing the point."
Yet Dan offers no reasonable alternative, doesn't explain what a better point would be and has nothing more than hunches of his own, poorly fabricated hunches, to offer instead.
5. "In other words, Dan and Marshall disagree on how best to interpret stories where the author has God commanding people to kill babies."
Generally no disagreement here, aside from the childish insistence on reframing God's commands in order to taint the command of God itself. There's a world of difference in saying that God commanded the killing of babies when He commanded the destruction of entire populations. Dan chooses the dishonest version and does so over and over again.
"Marshall thinks that it is in God's nature to sometimes command such behavior. Dan thinks Marshall is wrong."
Marshall KNOWS it is within God's nature to not only command others to exact His judgement upon others, even when innocents may suffer, as well as doing the same Himself through miraculous works, because Scripture plainly says He does. Therefor, Marshall cannot be wrong in KNOWING this until it can be proven that these stories never happened. It would not be logical to believe otherwise as nothing exists in Scripture to suggest that these stories COULDN'T have happened. Indeed, even Jesus says nothing to counter them, even going so far as to mention Sodom without making corrections to the tale.
"It is a disagreement with no way of proving who is right and wrong."
But in the absence of such proof, and no logical argument for believing otherwise, as none has been offered, taking these stories literally must be the default position regardless of the implications.
"If Marshall is comfortable with saying his god sometimes commands people to kill babies..."
If Dan is comfortable reframing the commands of God in order to dismiss the logical arguments of his opponents, then may God have mercy on him for his blatant and willful dishonesty.
6. "Given all this, Dan has eliminated no facts from the Bible, any more than Marshall has eliminated facts when he considers Jesus' command to cut off hands as hyperbole."
The difference here, as any honest reasonable person can explain, is that the OT stories in question are not said in a hyperbolic manner, but as a literal telling of events. Meanwhile, Jesus is not commanding anyone to cut off their hands because He is smart enough to know that one needs no hands to sin, and that a blind man can still lust. Furthermore, there is no story of anyone gouging out their eyes, cutting off their hands, of Jesus insisting that anyone does, or of any subsequent sect or denomination practicing this as a means of remaining pure and sin-free and faithful to Christ's teachings.
"Rather, we have both interpreted as best we can."
That doesn't speak well for your ability to do so.
continuing...
7. "Given all that, Marshall has not sufficiently made the case that God sometimes commands people to kill babies..."
Because I never said He did. Those are YOUR words, meant to taint the intent of God's command in order to dismiss them as "epic writing" of the OT authors to avoid facing the extent to which God's wrath might be have been made manifest, because you don't like the sound of it.
"...so Dan is writing off Marshall's position as just plain poor biblical exegesis because Marshall is setting aside the clear in favor of the obscure."
I already explained why Dan is writing it off, and it has nothing to do with any imaginary setting aside of the clear in favor of the obscure by me. There's nothing obscure about that which occurs numerous times in the OT. Enough such events occur to make it perfectly clear that it is well within the nature of God to destroy large groups of people including their children. This blatant fact so disturbs Dan's sensibilities that he goes to great lengths to pretend it didn't happen. This isn't unique to Dan by any means. But it is truly the case. By doing so, he has rejected those parts of the Bible, diminishing it's size.
Between the two of us, the hunches and poor exegesis are Dan's.
Marshall...
for subjective reasons based on your own personal feelings regarding a God who would command such a thing.
That's a fine if crazy hunch, Marshall, but I've said NOTHING to support that conclusion. I've not mentioned my personal feelings at all, so far as I can recall. I've spoken only of sound biblical exegesis. I don't think your conclusion can be reached using sound biblical exegesis and I think my conclusion is a reasonable one.
If you can find any mention of "personal feelings" in any of that, feel free to support your hunch with something other than voodoo and wishes, but I don't think you can.
Marshall...
You do not support it with sound arguments of your own, only that you prefer to believe that God wouldn't do such a thing
I've given the reasons that have nothing with what I prefer, only with what is a reasonable conclusion from reading the Bible reasonably, using standard orthodox biblical exegesis.
You can have all sorts of hunches and whimsical feelings about what you THINK I'm thinking, but I would suggest you'd sound more reasonable if you dealt with what I've said and not your hunches about what I'm thinking.
To reiterate:
The Bible is clear that God won't tempt us to sin. God will not ask us to commit sinful, evil actions. This is a solid orthodox Biblical and rational position to hold.
To take the passages in question literally would require that we set aside this clear point.
We have no reason to presume that these passages are intended to be literal, factual representations of how the stories went down. It's modernistic chauvinism to presume that it would be written that way, especially when there is NO EVIDENCE to support that hunch that I have seen thus far.
Dan...
"The Scriptures DO say that God commanded people to kill babies..."
Marshall...
no, it doesn't
The Bible...
This is what the Lord of hosts has to say: 'I will punish what Amalek did to Israel... Do not spare him, but kill men and women, children and infants..."
How is that NOT God apparently commanding the killing of babies? In fact, taken literally, that is EXACTLY what God is commanding here. So, it is rather disingenuous of you to be so shocked that I would point out the gaping hole in your argument by calling it what it is.
It is YOUR hunch that God literally commanded people to "not spare him, but kill men and women, children and infants..."
I think good biblical exegesis requires that we set aside a literal interpretation of this passage as it is contradicted by a more clear NT teaching. God does NOT tempt us to sin. God does NOT command us to sin. God does NOT cause us to sin. Nothing in that ballpark.
No amount of you denying that I've offered reasons (even if you don't find them convincing) will change that I have offered what many concerned Christian seekers believe is a reasonable explanation why your hunch on how to interpret this is not valid.
Marshall...
because not all points are meant to be taken literally, and honest, reasonable people don't need to jump through hoops to know which is which in order to understand that the OT stories in question are not metaphors or allegories, but are indeed accurate records of actual events.
Again, you're begging the question. You are CORRECT when you agree with me that there are points in the Bible that need to be interpreted as non-literal. You just disagree with my/our interpretation of these sorts of passages as non-literal history. But it is begging the question to say, "These are accurate records of actual events, so we can KNOW that these are accurate records of actual events, which is how I know that these are accurate records..."
Circular reasoning and poor use of logic.
Marshall: "honest, reasonable people don't need to jump through hoops to know which is which in order to understand that the OT stories in question are not metaphors or allegories, but are indeed accurate records of actual events."
You're gonna have a hard time proving that.
So, Marshall, do you believe current natural disasters are God's judgement?...Since the ground is still cursed and all.
Marshall...
I already explained why Dan is writing it off, and it has nothing to do with any imaginary setting aside of the clear in favor of the obscure by me.
As to this ridiculous line of whimsy, Marshall, you are not a god. You can't read my mind. I've stated right out front my reasons for interpreting these passages the way I do. It has nothing to do with my secret wishes to subvert the Bible like you have happening in your fevered imagination.
You just sound ridiculous when you start pronouncing you have "discerned" my secret reasons for thinking the way I do. I don't think of you as lightweight enough to actually think you have secret powers of seeing into my mind.
I don't presume to guess at your motives, you'd do best to quit guessing at mine.
Marty,
I don't have to prove it. You all have to prove it didn't happen. I happen to trust that God would not lead the authors of the OT stories to sin by lying about the nature of God and the extent of His wrath and the manner in which He carries out His will. Dan has yet to show how doing anything God directly commands us would be equal to sin, particularly if it is His will that we do so. Sin is what WE do that is apart from God's will, not what we do that is in line with God's will. Dan insists that God adhere to laws He gives to us to follow, as if they are binding on Him as well.
Note in this excerpt:
"This is what the Lord of hosts has to say: 'I will punish what Amalek did to Israel... Do not spare him, but kill men and women, children and infants...""
That unlike Dan's common portrayal, God does not simply command anyone to kill infants. He is telling the people to kill EVERYONE, and is defining what that means. This supports what I've been saying rather than overturns it. In other words, it is far different than merely saying, "God commands people to kill babies."
What's more, this is a very clear, hardly obscure rendering of the events. Dan tries to contrast this with his poorly understood offering of God never tempting us to sin, which I've explained above. But rather than deal directly with my objection and corrections of his bad interpretations, he answers with the following crap:
""These are accurate records of actual events, so we can KNOW that these are accurate records of actual events, which is how I know that these are accurate records...""
...which doesn't even rise to the level of a cheap representation of my position, but is merely a lame attempt to denigrate it due to an absence of a real counterpoint.
Dan,
That your beliefs regarding these stories are based on your personal preferences is giving you something upon which you can hang your now battered hat, as I've countered every other angle you've tried to put forth, be it your attempts to connect these stories to those of other ancient people, or trying to negate them by virtue of bad interpretations of NT verses and of course by showing how you fail even your own trio of rules for Biblical interpretation.
You have no reason NOT to take these stories literally. You only have the weakest of arguments that require major leaps of logic to swallow.
Marshall...
I don't have to prove it. You all have to prove it didn't happen.
And for the final time: We have. We have proven it to ourselves. We have sought God's teaching only wanting to know what God wants of us and that has been our conclusion. One that seems quite obvious to me.
IF you want others to believe, as you do, that God commands the slaughter of whole cities, including children and babies (that make you happy?), you'll have to present something better than you have thus far.
Cheap and false attacks about our intentions only serve to undermine your whimsical, weak, emotion-based (as opposed to logic-based or bible-based) position.
Dan:
Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it. And God has placed in the church first of all apostles, second prophets, third teachers... 1 Cor 12
True enough. Whether that role is the same as that in the OT (and I'd suggest that Jesus in the NT was a very special case) is probably a discussion for another time.
Marshall : "I don't have to prove it. You all have to prove it didn't happen. I happen to trust that God..."
That's all we've got Marshall...our faith and trust. It's all any of us have. But it's not proof.
You didn't answer my question btw..Do you believe natural disasters are God's judgement?
Marty noted the following from Art: "honest, reasonable people don't need to jump through hoops to know which is which in order to understand that the OT stories in question are not metaphors or allegories, but are indeed accurate records of actual events."
And Art wrote the following at the beginning of a response: "I don't have to prove it. You all have to prove it didn't happen."
In the first instance, it should be easy enough for most people beyond grade-school education that a person cannot prove a negative, for the logical reason that alternative explanations are always possible. It is, then, always logically possible for Event E to have occurred, in the manner presented by an author, regardless of evidence to the contrary.
First of all, to the extent that Art is correct about anything in this extremely long conversation, I should admit that my position - that the events depicted in the stories of the OT are not, in fact, the kinds of historical reports one finds in contemporary history books - is, indeed, arbitrary. It is so for the simple reason that alternative understandings, in my experience, all too often get far too caught up in secondary matter, eg, how did Joshua stop the earth the Bible says Joshua stopped the sun, but we all know the earth circles the sun, right, Art?); how did Noah get a hold of koatamundis from South America and moas from New Zealand, living, as he seems to have, in the Levant?; where did Cain's wife come from?; was Goliath a giant, one of the nephilim written about in Genesis, or was he just a really big Philistine warrior?
These are questions I have seen discussed and debated in reputedly serious fundie journals over the years. I have to say, for myself, these questions, which only emerge if one takes the texts at face value, distract this reader from the main point of the narrative flow. Setting aside the question of historical reportage allows one to read them without concerning oneself with trivia.
cont'd (sigh)
While there is abundant archaeological and other evidence from the ancient Near East from which one can get an interesting, more historically accurate picture of the political, social, military, and religious history of the region, one need not get too tangled up it all to read the Bible faithfully. It is no less interesting, and irrelevant, that the first Creation story bears remarkable resemblances to Assyrian and Sumerian creation stories than it is that there is no archaeological evidence that the walls of Jericho fell after the tribes marched around it for a while then blew their horns.
I can read both the first creation story and the book of Joshua and find myself encouraged and challenged, find my faith strengthened and shaken by what I read there without reference to these interesting details - which do, at least, have the merit of providing a background against which one can consider the way the texts were constructed, etc. - because the point of these stories is not about what God did on day 3 in and for itself; the point is not that the walls of Jericho fell. The point, rather, is who God is. God is a God who creates through will, through the Word, bringing out of the chaos that was before not just order, but loved, good order. Order is God's preference over chaos. This order is what God not only created, it is what God creates continuously, constantly, each nanosecond of the existence of the Universe. This order, this goodness, is an expression of who God is. God is a creating God, but moreso, God is a loving God, which we would never know if we focused solely on Genesis 1.
Joshua and the battle of Jericho is a story about the faithfulness of the people and God to the mutuality of the covenant. Just as God told Moses that Moses would know God was who He said He was when Moses brought the people back to Mt. Horeb for more instructions, so God told Moses that the people would possess the land they were being given, driving out the current inhabitants, even though they were a rag-tag bunch of nomads facing entrenched opposition in cities. God makes a promise to the people, and God fulfills this promise. Like the people laughing at Noah while he builds the Ark in the sunshine, the folks at Jericho jeered at the people marching around the city walls for days on end. They stopped laughing when the horns blew and the walls crumbled.
The point of the story is about how God fulfills the promises God makes. It doesn't make sense sometimes. It might even seem ridiculous. People are going to laugh and jeer because, honestly, there just seems no connection between what we might be doing and achieving the goal God set out for us. Faith includes setting aside our own predisposition toward means and accepting God's means, which might seem silly and counterproductive.
That's the story from the siege of Jericho.
I do not need to know whether or not it actually happened to get all that - and so much more - from the story. In fact, as I have said repeatedly, I don't care whether it happened or not because I get the point of the story.
One final note. Art says something further down in the response in which the second quote above sits about the authors being "liars" if they aren't reporting historically accurate fact. So, I'm guessing Art doesn't read novels, since they are, from start to finish, lies. Made up stories about people who never existed.
Sorry Marty. I didn't notice that question regarding natural disasters. I know it's somewhat routine these days that for every disaster there is some public figure of some sort coming out with such suggestions. I take them for what they are: mere suggestions of a possibility offered as no more than verbal wondering. I don't see it as harmful to consider the possibility as the purpose is to further steer mankind toward serving Him. But we have no reason to seriously assume that is the case with disasters. That is, beyond the realization that the Fall had brought about such things at the beginning. But for the most part, I don't spend much time with such things.
Geoffrey,
I can't believe you actually are trying to compare the OT authors to the authors of novels. Novelists, by virtue of the name, are not recording actual events. They are not putting forth their stories as actual events. Thus, because they start out saying their stories are made up (Novels being fiction and all), they could not be said to be liars.
And again, you rely on archeology to help you determine the truthfulness of the OT stories, as if science can detect whether a miracle has happened. For example, if a cripple was miraculously healed and made to walk, would a medical exam detect that he ever had a problem? I suppose so if the subject was only partially healed, or mostly healed, but I'm talking "healed". If a miracle turned water into wine, could science detect that the wine was once water? Thousands of people witnessed the miracle at Fatima, Portugal and the only evidence of it having occured is the testimony of the witnesses, including journalists present at the time. Science cannot confirm that it happened.
As to proving the stories are true, and my stance that it is up to you naysayers to prove they are false, I simply start with the belief that it is true because it is illogical that false stories of God are present in the Bible. Even according to Dan's criteria, wherein God would not tempt us to sin, one must believe that God would allow lies to be told about Him. This is particularly notable considering all the stories of Him having made direct contact with various character througout the OT, not to mention Christ's own support for the Scriptures as they were known back then, without one word about any of it having been falsely recorded.
You seek to bring up similar creation stories from other ancient cultures and religions. You use these as some support for the argument that things didn't happen as the Bible says. Seems to me that these stories support the Genesis because of their similarities.
But to use these, as well as stories about how many animals Noah rounded up, how Cain came up with a wife, etc. would be worthy questions if the discussion centered on those stories. They don't. The inability to resolve those questions have nothing to do with the subject of God destroying populations.
We have no proof that God said anything to anyone, including Christ. We have only the testimony of Scripture, which we must regard with some degree of reliability in order to justify our belief that God even exists. Intelligent Design doesn't speak of the God of the Bible. Creation doesn't either, though for some us, we do take it as proof that God, or something like Him, must exist.
So yes, you do have to prove it didn't happen in order to justify not taking it as reality. Assuming it happened in a manner not described as it did is to alter the nature of God. It claims God acted in a certain manner. That means something. You claim it didn't have to happen as described without the resulting inferences being altered. Not only does that not make sense, but it makes you foolish to infer what is not intended.
If God did not destroy the people the Bible says He did in the manner it says He did, it is a dishonest portrayal of His nature and ANY inference from the story is worthless.
You say that the Jericho story shows God keeps His promises, but that is only true if it happened as stated, for if it didn't, then you have to question if the promise was ever even made to begin with, because the same epic story teller is doing the telling.
"1. No one was telling stories back then in the manner you're suggesting. I would expect people then to tell stories the way people told stories then."
Dan,
You keep repeating this, and yet you offer no support for your opinion. Please, provide something to support your contention that "NO ONE" was telling stories that were factual. Or that EVERY ONE told stories only in the manner you suppose they did.
"And to call such storytelling "lies" and denigrating that sort of storytelling is just modernistic hubris."
Of course this isn't.
"Now, is that a primitive and short-sighted way to think of God? Sure, but these were much more primitive times."
If only those darn ignorant primitives know what we enlightened moderns knew.
Modernistic hubris, indeed.
Craig...
If only those darn ignorant primitives know what we enlightened moderns knew.
Craig, are you saying that 3000-4000 BC was NOT a more primitive time?
I'll remind you of the definition of "primitive," from MW:
of or relating to the earliest age or period...
of, relating to, or produced by a people or culture that is nonindustrial and often nonliterate and tribal
"Primitive," at least as I was using it, is not a slur, but as a descriptor. Are you viewing it as such?
Craig...
You keep repeating this, and yet you offer no support for your opinion. Please, provide something to support your contention that "NO ONE" was telling stories that were factual
Earlier in this conversation, I kept referring to seeing NO EVIDENCE that any stories were told in the modern historic sense of history-telling that we speak of today. By saying "no one," was my shorthand way of referring back to "no evidence of any early storytelling that was of a more modernistic, literate, linear history telling style that is common today."
I'm sorry if I was not clear enough for you.
So, lacking ANY EVIDENCE so far produced by Marshall's side that story-telling back then was of the more modernistic style, do you think I ought to presume a modernistic, literal, linear style of history-telling amongst these earlier peoples? If so, why?
Beyond a modernistic hubris that storytelling that is not linear, literal and fact-based is only the twisted boasts of "liars," I see no logical reason to presume what Marshall's guessing.
"This is what the Lord of hosts has to say: 'I will punish what Amalek did to Israel... Do not spare him, but kill men and women, children and infants..."
Dan,
Please note the first phrase of your quote. "This is what the LORD OF HOSTS HAS TO SAY"
Now, this statement leaves few options for interpretation.
1. The Lord of Hosts (in other words God) did in fact say what is attributed to Him.
2. Someone put words into God's mouth.
If #1 is correct, then your hunch has no basis.
If #2 is correct then your hunch that the Bible is a book of Truth and truths is incorrect in this one case.
Either God said what is attributed to Him or He didn't. If he didn't then what possible truth can you glean from someone who felt compelled to lie about what God commanded, or a God who is incapable or unwilling to correct this huge misrepresentation.
Geoffrey, well said and I really can't see why we should carry on much further. We're not denigrating OT stories by not being interested in the factual accuracy, but in the Truths being passed on. Team Marshall appear unable to get past that point, despite a paucity of rational, biblical reason to do so.
And so, he keeps repeating his talking points, failing to make a convincing case and relying, instead, on personal attacks and false guesses about my/our motives.
Marshall (and friends), unless you has something more substantial to add or some respectful question that remains unanswered, I think we've gone around about as much as we can.
"Earlier in this conversation, I kept referring to seeing NO EVIDENCE that any stories were told in the modern historic sense of history-telling that we speak of today. By saying "no one," was my shorthand way of referring back to "no evidence of any early storytelling that was of a more modernistic, literate, linear history telling style that is common today."
Dan,
I am well aware of your hunch in this matter, yet you have provided no evidence to support your hunch.
Simply saying "I haven't seen any evidence that I will accept" is not evidence in any sense of the word evidence.
If you actually have evidence to support your hunch that no one ever recorded history in a way that factually captured actual events prior to some unknown arbitrary date, please provide it. If you actually have a date when the recording of history changed, please provide that. So far you have not provided anything to support your modernistic hubris.
I'm not asking you to presume anything, I'm asking you to support your contention that the fact based recording of history is solely a modern convention.
Craig...
Either God said what is attributed to Him or He didn't. If he didn't then what possible truth can you glean from someone who felt compelled to lie about what God commanded, or a God who is incapable or unwilling to correct this huge misrepresentation.
Here we get back to my original (less than serious) premise: That conservatives have a smaller Bible than liberals.
You see only two options, I see more than that Craig.
1. Either God said that literally
2. Or, God didn't say that literally
3. Or, the author was trying to relate that God was concerned about Israel and her oppressors, and the accuracy of the statement is beyond the point
4. Or, the author was trying to relate that God was a God of Justice, striving to end oppression, and the accuracy of the statement is beyond the point
...For instance.
Just as Geoffrey pointed out, you are getting hung up on the facts of the story and missing the truth of the story.
Israel was a small, oft-oppressed people attacked by other peoples from all sides. This oppressed people wanted assurance of justice in the world, of a just God, of a concerned God. A storyteller who tells assuring stories or stories of justice is NOT LYING, he's telling a story. A God who would "allow" a reassuring story is only allowing a people to find some hope.
Storytellers have always imparted truths through stories. They still do today.
I don't know about you, but in my family and community, we often tell and re-tell stories from our history. We do so for humor, for reminiscing sake, for comfort, for courage, for encouragement. And when we re-tell these stories from our history, sometimes we embellish or just change the story because of poor memory.
"And then, this cop pulled us over and said, 'ma'am, I don't care if you play your banjo while you drive, but you have to buckle up while you do it!'" That's the punchline in one of our stories. It's not exactly accurate - I don't recall at all what the cop said exactly and it just doesn't matter!
The point is NOT what the cop said or didn't say, but the humor in being pulled over for playing a banjo in a car (and, actually, it was a hammered dulcimer she was playing, but I changed it just now because not everyone knows what a hammered dulcimer is and because it just doesn't matter!
The point was the humor and funny memory. If someone were to start questioning me about that story, they could find literal, factual inaccuracies, but they could not find a liar and they would have missed the point and shame on them.
I said...
"And then, this cop pulled us over and said, 'ma'am, I don't care if you play your banjo while you drive, but you have to buckle up while you do it!'"
And I just noticed ANOTHER factual inaccuracy in my example story! I was driving, not my wife, but the way I wrote it, it sounds like SHE was driving. That's not what I meant, but it's not a big deal because that's not the point of the story and reasonable people get that.
Let me repeat for the umpteenth time, for the sake of Art who seems quite unable to understand what I have repeated over and over again - I do not "use archaeology" to either prove or disprove anything in the Bible. That is neither its function, nor do I find it relevant to how one reads Scripture.
So, again, with feeling: I. Do. Not. Care. What. Archaeologists. Find.
I would add, as I did in a comment above, that I don't really care that some of the creation stories in the Bible were cribbed and edited from other civilizations. That is neither surprising nor relevant.
As to comparing the Hebrew Scriptures to reading novels, first, it was you who stated that, if these stories are not historically accurate in some contemporary understanding of those two words, the authors would be "liars" (a quite funny way of thinking, actually). If false stores are, indeed, "lies", then you, like the New England Puritans, weren't too gung-ho about stories, fables, and later on, novels (Nathaniel Hawthorne, the first serious American author of fiction, got a lot of flack from his New England contemporaries who had left much of their religion behind, but dragged along some of their moral opprobrium for people who made a living at what Mark Twain called, "tellin' stretchers).
The Hebrew Scriptures are texts. To be read. So, yeah, I read them the way I read anything - novels, history, theology, biography, blog comments - because it is, after all, the same activity. Are you suggesting that reading the Bible is qualitatively distinct as an activity, from any other reading?
All reading concerns words, constructing meaning. Authors, including the Biblical authors, wanted to make a point through the telling of various stories. Their point concerned God. The point, say, of Melville concerned good and evil, and the way it can warp human beings as we pursue one or the other. The point, say, of Dostoevsky, was the emptiness of human existence outside any disciplined moral framework, and the results on late-19th century Russia of stripping away that social fabric. I could continue, but none of this is either controversial or surprising.
Except, perhaps, to people who think that there is some kind of difference between reading a book a biography of Charles DeGaulle and reading the book of Jeremiah. At its most basic level, there is no difference. Pretending otherwise begs far too many questions that have no answer.
Craig...
yet you have provided no evidence to support your hunch.
My hunch is that the storytellers in some of the OT employed mythic or epic or other non-literal, non-linear, not fully factual storytelling devices. Why do I think this?
Because I have seen NO EVIDENCE of anyone writing history in a more modernistic, linear, factual style from that time period. What evidence would you like me to produce of a negative?
I'm not saying linear, factual history-telling didn't exist back then. I'm saying, "I see NO EVIDENCE of it existing." That is factual. Could it have happened? Sure, it could. Have you provided even ONE SHRED of evidence that it DID happen? No.
Do I have any reason, therefore, to presume that the OT authors wrote in a style apparently not common to the day? No, I don't.
Craig, do you have ANY reason to presume the authors of the OT wrote/told stories in a style apparently not common to the day?
And by "reason," I don't mean this modernistic chauvinism against traditional storytelling styles.
One reason I've seen offered thus far is, "Well, Jesus referenced these stories later on without the caveat that they were non-literal," but my response to that has been, I reference these stories all the time without that caveat, so that is not exactly compelling evidence. But, at least that's a stab at it.
Beyond that reason, do you have any reason that I should presume a more modernistic, literal history-telling style? And do me a favor and make it easy for me: Be concise and reasonable in your explanation.
Like this:
1. One reason to believe a literal style is...
2. I think this because...
3. Another reason is...
If you want to take a stab at it.
George Washington is said to have chopped down a cherry tree. When questioned about it, he is supposed to have said, "I cannot tell a lie." As best we know, this never happened.
Now, can you, based on this story, tell me anything factual about what George Washington was like? If it appeared in a biography of George Washington, surrounded by other information about him, this story would, in fact, still be useless in understanding who he was. Other information about his honesty might, but this story would not. It's just a story.
The children of Israel were said to have marched around Jericho for a week, and then on the last day, marched 7 times, blew their trumpets, and the walls fell down. According to current archeological knowledge, this never happened.
Now, can you, based on this story, tell me anything factual about what God is like? Even though this appears in a book about how God dealt with the Israelites, surrounded by other information about Him, this story would, in fact, still be useless in understanding who He was and is. Other information about his promise-keeping and miraculous signs might, but this story would not. It would be just a story.
If God only keeps promises in stories, this does not tell me anything about His promise-keeping. Mixed in with other stories where He did keep His promises, this story, by itself, could not be used to honestly glean any information at all about what He is truly like, any more than trying to glean any information about George Washington from a legend is useful. And understanding God is many orders of magnitude more important than understanding George Washington.
My main point here is not to contend about your idea of the OT being an epic tale. I disagree with that, of course, but the real point I'm making is that if indeed some it epic and some portions are just made up to create a good story for the period, then you can't glean any information about God from the fanciful parts. They tell you nothing about God. If they are a story, there is as much truth in them as their is about our first President trying out a new axe. We can not infer that Washington liked chopping trees, that he may have had a deep-seated hate of cherries, or that he was hoping to make something of the wood. Any inference made from the false portion of an otherwise accurate biography is itself highly suspect.
And when it comes to understanding God, we should clearly not want our inferences to be of that quality.
That is why, when I hear Geoff say that it doesn't matter to him whether a particular story is true or not, and then claim it tells him something about God, it just makes no sense to me.
This is entirely different than the idea of parables. For starters, the characters in parables are entirely fictional. Also, the intent of parables are to make clear a difficult concept. They don't present history, or even an 'epic' version of it. I see Dan like to define terms, so let's do that with 'parable'. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/parable
"a short allegorical story designed to illustrate or teach some truth, religious principle, or moral lesson. "
It is a work of complete fiction, even if God makes a cameo appearance (which is extremely rare). So unless you are suggesting that a story of complete fiction told by Jesus to explain a difficult concept is comparable to a record of the history of Israel (even granting a epic telling of it), bringing them up is disingenuous.
If you want an epic OT, knock yourself out. But I find it incredibly self-duplicitous to both claim that, for example, you agree with the current archeological thought that the Jericho did not fall as the Bible says it did, and then claim you can glean information about the nature of God from what you consider a false tale. Claiming you simply don't read the Bible that way seems to me to be cop-out of the highest order.
Doug...
can you, based on this story, tell me anything factual about what God is like?
Based upon that story, I can tell...
1. That the people of Israel believed God was with them in a special way.
2. That the people of Israel no doubt felt cheered, encouraged, hopeful to think of a mighty victory like this in their past.
3. Not every story need be telling a truth about God, but in this story, we get that Israel considered God to be faithful, that this is one of the points of the story to the hearers.
For starters.
Doug...
Other information about his promise-keeping and miraculous signs might, but this story would not. It would be just a story.
Did you read my little example of a story from my own life? About the banjo/cop incident? Is it enough for you that this is a story we enjoy telling? That it reminds us of our joined history together? Does it matter to you if the facts in that story are not literally correct?
Not every True story need be factual. This seems to be what you all aren't getting.
the real point I'm making is that if indeed some it epic and some portions are just made up to create a good story for the period, then you can't glean any information about God from the fanciful parts.
And where does the Bible promise that each line of the Bible has the purpose of imparting "information about God?" SOME stories in the Bible are imparting insight into the human condition, agreed?
And, WHY is imparting values through non-literal stories not a valid way of imparting values?
Any inference made from the false portion of an otherwise accurate biography is itself highly suspect.
Why? Why, why, why?
I hear that non-factual story about Washington and learn that he was supposedly an honest guy. That the story itself is not true does not make his character suspect to me. Now, if I were to read factual story after story that Washington was a tyrant and liar, then this one story to the contrary would be suspect. That is not the case with the stories in the Bible.
Values CAN be imparted using non-literal stories.
Doug...
So unless you are suggesting that a story of complete fiction told by Jesus to explain a difficult concept is comparable to a record of the history of Israel (even granting a epic telling of it), bringing them up is disingenuous.
You DO know that not every story/parable told by Jesus is identified as a fictional parable with a moral purpose. He simply told stories with the purpose of teaching TRUTHS. IT DOES NOT MATTER if the stories he told were literally true or intended to be parables, the TRUTHS are there regardless.
Doug...
But I find it incredibly self-duplicitous to both claim that, for example, you agree with the current archeological thought that the Jericho did not fall as the Bible says it did, and then claim you can glean information about the nature of God from what you consider a false tale.
Two points:
1. That YOU don't see how we can get valuable truths from a non-literal story does not mean that we don't. Fair enough?
2. WE DON'T CONSIDER IT A FALSE TALE! The factual veracity or lack thereof is NOT THE POINT. The point is the TRUTH and WE GET THE TRUTH, WE UNDERSTAND THE TRUTH AND WE VALUE THAT TRUTH. Therefore, to me (and others here, I'm sure) Jonah and the Whale IS a True story.
Just not factual. Maybe. Or maybe it is, but that's not the point. I'm FINE with a factual Jonah and I'm fine with a non-literal whale, either way, the TRUTHS are imparted in that story.
If that doesn't make sense to you, it doesn't mean it doesn't make sense to us or, I suspect, most of the world.
Doug: "That is why, when I hear Geoff say that it doesn't matter to him whether a particular story is true or not, and then claim it tells him something about God, it just makes no sense to me."
I explained the story of Jericho, the meaning of it, quite plainly and clearly. You don't get it? Read it again.
After several weeks and over 260 comments, we are still arguing over this point, and I, for one, cannot imagine why. The truth of the story is not contained in the words of the story. The truth is offered in faith through grace, through the Holy Spirit working in us as we read and hear the story.
The truth is external to the physical aspects - the paper, the words on the page - and the psychological aspects - the reading, the understanding. The truth comes from God, Doug. You said before you believed that.
Yet, you continue to argue that truth is a lie if the words on the page are factually false. OK, then, did Joshua command the sun to stand still or the earth to stop revolving? The words on the page say the first, our understanding of celestial mechanics says the second, so which is it?
If I read one word that, well, you know, the authors were working with their understanding of the universe, yadda-yadda, then I know that every single word you have uttered against Dan and me is utter nonsense, since we have pretty much been saying the same thing. So, either put up - defend a geo-centric solar system with reference to the Bible or at least pretend to grasp some small part of what we are talking about.
"1. Either God said that literally
2. Or, God didn't say that literally
3. Or, the author was trying to relate that God was concerned about Israel and her oppressors, and the accuracy of the statement is beyond the point
4. Or, the author was trying to relate that God was a God of Justice, striving to end oppression, and the accuracy of the statement is beyond the point"
The problem is that your 3&4 simply restate #2. What ever motivation someone might have for putting words is God's mouth, the fact remains that the words they put there remain made up.
"...you are getting hung up on the facts of the story and missing the truth of the story."
No I'm not. If the truth is (your hunch) that God WOULD NOT command people to do X,Y,or Z, then what truth can be gleaned from a made up story about something (you say) God would not do. I understand that you have offered a psychological "reason" for these fabrications (the Jews felt inferior), this does not equate to how one would get Truth (or truths) from falsehood.
"A God who would "allow" a reassuring story is only allowing a people to find some hope."
Yet, you contend that the "hope" offered is false. How does one find comfort is something that didn't happen. "OK guys here's the deal. We're all oppressed but here's a story about what we'd like for God to have done so that we can feel like God will protect us in the future." Just because they were primitive doesn't mean they were stupid.
I'm glad you have so little regard for factual accuracy. Great so you tell funny stories, is it somehow less valuable/funny to use the facts of the situation. Personally this is a weak analogy, the Israelites were not just telling some funny stories around the campfire, they were relating their national history.
You're correct, the point of the OT stories is something more than a cheap laugh.
"My hunch is that the storytellers in some of the OT employed mythic or epic or other non-literal, non-linear, not fully factual storytelling devices. Why do I think this?"
Actually as you put it earlier, your hunch is that the storytellers used these types of stories exclusively to the exclusion of all other types of stories. I do not doubt that there are some stories from antiquity that are told in a "epic" style. The issue is that you insist that ALL storytelling and specifically ALL of the OT stories MUST have been written in this style.
Now you slightly change your stance.
"I see NO EVIDENCE of it existing."
Yet no one has any way to determine what this nonsense statement means. You haven't even demonstrated that you have looked for evidence.
"Craig, do you have ANY reason to presume the authors of the OT wrote/told stories in a style apparently not common to the day?"
Yes, I've given it to you before, and you've not been able to refute it. I see no reason to go through that again. I not going to spoon feed it to you again. If you want you can look around.
"1. One reason to believe a literal style is..."
The stories are not presented in a way that would suggest any other style. "The Lord God said..." is a simple declarative sentence that purports to impart factual information.
2. I think this because... "The preponderance of research which I have seen indicates that there was a great concern for accurately conveying actual historical events.
3. Another reason is... "Jesus appeared to treat these stories as factual, so if we are to look at scripture through the lens of Jesus, then why would I treat these stories differently then He did?
Once again, you have not provided any support for your hunch.
"I haven't found any evidence" isn't support.
It is also disingenuous. You may not have found any evidence that you agree with or that you don't dismiss, but you can't say that there is no support for a contextually literal reading of the OT.
(This may be repetitive, but I had to break up a long comment)
"Craig, do you have ANY reason to presume the authors of the OT wrote/told stories in a style apparently not common to the day?"
Yes, I've given it to you before, and you've not been able to refute it. I see no reason to go through that again. I not going to spoon feed it to you again. If you want you can look around.
"1. One reason to believe a literal style is..."
The stories are not presented in a way that would suggest any other style. "The Lord God said..." is a simple declarative sentence that purports to impart factual information.
2. I think this because... "The preponderance of research which I have seen indicates that there was a great concern for accurately conveying actual historical events.
3. Another reason is... "Jesus appeared to treat these stories as factual, so if we are to look at scripture through the lens of Jesus, then why would I treat these stories differently then He did?
Once again, you have not provided any support for your hunch.
"I haven't found any evidence" isn't support.
It is also disingenuous. You may not have found any evidence that you agree with or that you don't dismiss, but you can't say that there is no support for a contextually literal reading of the OT.
"WE DON'T CONSIDER IT A FALSE TALE! The factual veracity or lack thereof is NOT THE POINT."
It seems as though Truth and Falsehood are objective. Either God said X or He didn't. Whether or not you consider something accurate or not makes no difference to the actual truth of falsehood of the statement.
"I'm FINE with a factual Jonah and I'm fine with a non-literal whale, either way, the TRUTHS are imparted in that story."
Let's try this on for size.
I'm FINE with a factual Jesus and I'm fine with a non literal resurrection, either way the TRUTHS are imparted in that story.
MA writes, "So yes, you do have to prove it didn't happen"
Prove it DIDN'T happen? Are you kidding me with that?
Wow.
And, while denying that ancient writers were smart enough to use sophisticated story-telling techniques, Craig writes, "If only those darn ignorant primitives know what we enlightened moderns knew." Gotta love the irony.
Double wow.
"This is entirely different than the idea of parables."
Craig, I think Doug needs your help. He seems to believe that ancient writers could write a fictional story to express an underlying truth. Obviously you believe they were too dimwitted to have done so.
And he doesn't believe it either, except that he does. Apparently something interesting happened to human writing between the OT and the NT. Though Doug can't seem to explain what that was.
Maybe he can prove why it didn't happen, eh MA? LOL
The logical fallacies, internal contradictions, and just plain wackiness of these comments is truly remarkable.
My congratulations! Every time I think we've plumbed the depths of ignorance in one of these threads, one of you all posts another comment to demonstrate that we haven't yet begun.
Bravo.
Craig...
I'm FINE with a factual Jesus and I'm fine with a non literal resurrection, either way the TRUTHS are imparted in that story.
I think that the story of Jesus is quite factual, including his death and resurrection.
Nonetheless, I STILL believe that the gospel message found in the Bible (that we are saved by/are being saved by grace through faith in Jesus to be a strong, powerful and true enough message that I would believe in that Gospel even if I found that the facts of Jesus' were less than literally true.
Now, having said that, I would also point to those pesky facts: One of my problems with a literal interpretation of OT stories is that I've seen no evidence that anyone told stories in our modern linear, factual style at the beginning of written history. However, that began changing over the years.
As we approach the birth of Christ, we see a more linear, factual approach to history-telling. For one thing, in Jesus' day, we had HISTORIANS - people who tried to record history for history's sake.
We don't really have that in the ~4000-~1000 BC time period. Not that I'm aware of.
From a description of a book on ancient historians...
If Greece and Rome are held to be the cradles of Western civilization, this is in part due to the fact that they are the cradles of written history. Between 500 B.C. and 500 A.D. men such as Herodotus, Thucydides and Tacitus virtually invented the discipline of history as we know it. To these men history was a dual art; the art of recording the truth as accurately as possible and the art of writing as lucidly as the great men of letters.
Darn facts DO so get in the way, sometimes.
All of that to say: I read history stories in the NT in a different manner than I do in the OT. Why? Because of that basic biblical exegesis rule: Strive to understand the style of writing being employed.
So, there is a stylistic difference between NT stories and OT stories. I take that into account and read accordingly.
Craig...
It seems as though Truth and Falsehood are objective.
Craig, I'm striving to differentiate between "facts" and "truths." You DO agree, don't you, that a story can pass on great truth and not be factual, yes?
Obviously, it can.
So, yes, Truth and falsehood are objective. But what of it?
I asked Craig if he had any support for his position and he said...
I've given it to you before, and you've not been able to refute it. I see no reason to go through that again. I not going to spoon feed it to you again. If you want you can look around.
Perhaps you're not understanding: I'm entirely comfortable with my position. I've prayed over it, researched it, read the Bible, studied on it, prayed over it some more and changed my position from yours to the one I currently have. I'm comfortable with it. I find nothing compelling in any of the arguments offered thus far in opposition to my position.
Thus, if you truly want to make your case, you'll have to make your case. I'm not doing the work for you. If you are comfortable that you've presented it well enough already and are comfortable with knowing that I found it un-compelling, then fine: we're both comfortable with our positions.
Craig...
1. One reason to believe a literal style is...
The stories are not presented in a way that would suggest any other style.
I disagree. Now what?
I think the way Genesis is presented, for instance, looks VERY MUCH like a mythic portrayal of the truth of God the Creator. I think the "war stories" found in the OT look very much in fitting with the Epic style of writing.
You DO know that Epic stories don't say, "And NOW I shall begin this made up, epic story of a mix of facts and fiction from my time..." They present themselves as stories to be read, with no such disclaimer. That the Bible stories don't present a disclaimer is not "proof" that they are written in a modernistic linear factual style.
Craig...
The preponderance of research which I have seen indicates that there was a great concern for accurately conveying actual historical events.
And what I'VE read about ancient storytelling practices is that there was TREMENDOUS effort put into exactingly accurate RETELLING of the story, without missing parts and pieces. But if the story being retold was told originally in an epic form, then they are faithfully retelling an epic story.
Craig...
Jesus appeared to treat these stories as factual, so if we are to look at scripture through the lens of Jesus, then why would I treat these stories differently then He did?
As I said already, I ALSO appear to treat these stories as factual, generally. That is, I often tell the story of Jonah and the Whale or of the battle of Jericho without a disclaimer saying, "This story may have fictionalized portions..." So, the fact that Jesus issued no such disclaimer is not "proof" that Jesus considered them factual stories, is it?
Dan:
Based upon that story, I can tell...
1. That the people of Israel believed God was with them in a special way.
2. That the people of Israel no doubt felt cheered, encouraged, hopeful to think of a mighty victory like this in their past.
3. Not every story need be telling a truth about God, but in this story, we get that Israel considered God to be faithful, that this is one of the points of the story to the hearers.
For starters.
1. If the story was an embellishment that didn't happen, the people of Israel who came later and heard that story were being fed a fiction, intentional or not, that did not actually explain anything about God's relationship with them.
2. That's the definition of a pep talk, not something you can glean spiritual truths from. And if that victory didn't actually happen, they were being fed a false hope by it, again, intentional or not.
3. God was faithful in so many ways, an embellishment should never be necessary.
What I find interesting is that the story of Jericho, to you, is more a story about Israel that it is about God. It's what Israel believed, how Israel felt, and what Israel considered God to be. I see it as a story about God and God's works, God's faithfulness and God's promise-keeping, even if He has to perform a miracle to do it. In epic-izing this, I believe you lose the idea that God will do things like this in my life (not necessarily literally take down a stronghold, but similar things) because He did do it.
If God did do it, He will do it. If He didn't, how does a story about what He might do if He had the chance (at least, in the mind of the author writing the story) really explain anything about His character?
Me: Any inference made from the false portion of an otherwise accurate biography is itself highly suspect.
You: Why? Why, why, why?
If you can't understand how a false premise can lead to a false conclusion, wow. Just, wow. I guess that's a point of disagreement we're not going to settle here.
You: Values CAN be imparted using non-literal stories.
I have stated over that I agree with this, and yet you continue to state it like I don't. I think the misunderstanding is that I'm not talking about imparting values when I speak of the literalness of the OT. Yes, a good Max Lucado book for kids, or a novel like The Shack, can impart spiritual truths. I can listen to the author's ideas about the Trinity, about love and healing, but it has to jive with my understanding of God Himself and how He is revealed in the Scriptures. I'm free do chuck who sections of this tale. But yes, values can be imparted in something like that. It appears you can't or won't get past this point of ... agreement.
Here's the difference. God in The Shack is fictional, in that He didn't really reveal Himself to the other fictional characters in that way. The events never happened. While it can give me the author's idea of what God is like, it cannot tell me what God really is like because God didn't really do that, so there is no expectation at all that God would do that in the future.
For teaching values, non-literal stories are useful. For understanding a person -- how they think, feel, and act -- non-literal stories are essentially useless.
The point of the banjo story is not to understand who you are, or your wife, or the cop. I could tell you of my heroic deeds, but they tell you nothing about me if they didn't happen. The story of Washington and the cherry tree tells you nothing about him. If you find out from other factual sources that he was an honest man, that's a happy coincidence. But he could really be a liar. At best, you have a 50/50 chance of knowing what George was like, which is no better than without the story. How do you find out which it is? You use literal, factual stories, just like you said, and thus throw out the inferences made from the embellishment because it is useless.
But better to not make inferences about the character of a real person from a fictional tale in the first place. And that is what I have been trying to get across to you. You keep pulling the conversation back to a point on which I agree with you (while presenting it as some sort of disagreement), and after 200+ messages, I, too, am tired of it.
"Thus, if you truly want to make your case, you'll have to make your case. I'm not doing the work for you. If you are comfortable that you've presented it well enough already and are comfortable with knowing that I found it un-compelling, then fine: we're both comfortable with our positions."
Dan,
I've made my case in great detail elsewhere, I see no reason no reason to make the case again when you refused to deal with it before.
I'm glad your comfortable in your position, I had no doubt otherwise. I just keep hoping for some actual support for your hunch.
Sorry but "I've never found blah, blah blah" doesn't count as support.
Alan,
I'd point out that my comment regarding the "primitives" was a restatement of Dan's position, not a statement of my own perspective, but it would be a waste of time.
Geoff:
. The truth of the story is not contained in the words of the story. The truth is offered in faith through grace, through the Holy Spirit working in us as we read and hear the story.
The Holy Spirit was not available to those who listened to these stories before Jesus left and sent the Spirit. All they had were what the Scriptures told them. And the Scriptures told them that God commanded certain things, which tell us certain things about His character. I guess you're saying that the ancient Israelites knew where the historic record stopped, where the epic line started, and where the historic picked up again.
I also suppose you're saying that the same God who inspired the writers to pen what they did, comes back a thousand years later with His Spirit who breaks down all that "God-breathed" scripture (Paul's description) into 3 categories:
1. Things that happened that do tell us what God is like.
2. Things that didn't happen, but still tell us what God is like.
3. Things that didn't happen that are just outright false and don't tell us what God is like.
(Please read what I wrote to Dan about imparting truths vs understanding God's character. I'm speaking about leaning who God truly is. Values are a different story, which I explain there.)
#3 teeters close to what Satan may try to tell us. It means that God told us information about Him one way to the Israelites, and to us it's the exact opposite. The same God. And #2 is like trying to infer Washington's love for cherry wood furniture from a false tale. That's all I'm saying.
Your last paragraph leads me to believe you still don't really understand what a literalist means when he talks about literalism, so I'll explain it to you one more time, and that'll be it.
* I believe the children of Israel marched around Jericho just as God commanded them. I believe on the last day, after marching around it 7 times, they blew their trumpets and the walls came down. That the story, and I'm sticking to it. How that happened -- earthquake, perhaps all that marching loosened the ground, however -- is not mentioned and is thus immaterial. But I believe the story to be true and factual as recorded.
* I believe that Joshua commanded the sun to stand still in the sky, and that it did. I believe that, if I'd been there and looked up, I would have seen the sun stop moving. How that happened -- God intervening in nature, however -- is not mentioned and is thus immaterial. But I believe the story to be true and factual as recorded.
(And by the way, you do not have to believe a geo-centric view of the solar system to say that the sun stopped in the sky. Credentialed weathermen all over the world talk about the sun rising and setting all the time. This is where you want to make the word "literalism" mean what you want it to mean, rather than what those who profess it.)
You apparently believe that neither of these stories are in fact true; that if you had been there you would not have seen anything like this. I do. That is what I take as "literalism", and it's apparent that this is news to you. If I've been defending your definition of literalism that you set up as a straw man, then this really has been a waste of time.
I'VE POSTED A NEW COMMENTARY ON STORYTELLING. IF YOU'RE INTERESTED IN CONTINUING THIS CONVERSATION, WHY NOT GO AHEAD AND POST THERE, SINCE THIS ONE IS SO LONG AND OLD...
THANKS!
"I'd point out that my comment regarding the "primitives" was a restatement of Dan's position, not a statement of my own perspective, but it would be a waste of time."
Except, it wasn't a restatement of Dan's position. It was, as your blathering so often is, simply dumb.
So I mocked it as it deserved.
But yes, I agree, your posting of comments is always a waste of time.
Doug wrote, "Credentialed weathermen all over the world talk about the sun rising and setting all the time."
Um, no. According to you, that is factually inaccurate therefore it cannot impart any truth whatsoever.
How DO you manage to contradict your own statements every other paragraph and not even realize it? It is utterly impossible for me to understand how someone can possibly be so completely out of it that they don't see from one sentence to the next how their opinion is internally inconsistent.
BTW, That God "shelters us under His wings", as the Psalmist writes, definitely tells us something absolutely truthful about God's nature, even though I do not believe it is true that God has wings.
Based on what you've written, you however, must necessarily believe God is some sort of Giant Chicken of the Sky. That's fine. But how you are not only surprised, but apparently offended that reasonable people find such notions to be absurd, is your issue not ours, Doug.
Alan:
Based on what you've written, you however, must necessarily believe God is some sort of Giant Chicken of the Sky.
This one statement says more about your intellectual honesty in the midst of debate than I could ever say.
"Now, is that a primitive and short-sighted way to think of God? Sure, but these were much more primitive times."
Since Dan's point was that we enlightened modern folks know so much more that the shortsighted primitives, is exactly the kind of "modernistic Hubris" that he was condemning. I guess it's just bad form to point out contradictions.
Sorry Doug, but *I'm* not the one arguing that we can't know anything true about God unless the stories in the Bible about him are factually accurate.
If you've got a problem with your own opinion, then perhaps you shouldn't hold such a dumb opinion. I'm not surprised that the innumerable contradictions of your position cause you trouble, but they're your troubles, not mine.
Your failure to recognize the obvious contradictions of your own opinions tells me more about your own intellectual prowess in the midst of a debate than I could ever say. ;)
In the sense that Dan is using the term (which he explains, though even after his explanation you still refuse to get it) I would say that indeed that human understanding of God is shown to evolve over the course of the texts contained in the Bible and that, indeed, an understanding of God mediated through the lens of Jesus is less primitive than the views that came earlier. As Dan points out (but you refuse to acknowledge) primitive doesn't mean stupid.
Yet at the same time you demand that the Bible must be read according to your view of what history should be like, which not only makes your continued harping on this point ironic (as usual) but hilarious.
So please, carry on.
"I guess it's just bad form to point out contradictions."
Please do, by all means. Doug could use your help.
Oh wait, you only mean "contradictions" in the sense of "things you don't understand and/or intentionally misrepresent", not real contradictions.
Gotcha. ;)
Alan,
Apparently there is a misunderstanding which I regret. I'm sure I didn't communicate as well as I had hoped. Please forgive me.
Revisting one question on this topic that I was reminded of this morning.
I'm subscribed to the Ravi Zacharias International Ministries podcast. Mostly it's Ravi speaking, recordings of is apologetics talks, but this time they had a different speaker who's topic was "Violence in the Old Testament", and he hit on a few issues that were touched on in this (and a couple other) threads.
I reall recommend this to anyone troubled by that particular question. I've only heard the first part so far, but just that was really worth the listen. You can download them from here:
Part 1
Part 2
And I would highly recommend subscribing to the RZIM podcast in iTunes.
Just one of the points speaks to the question often raised here, about God asking Abraham to sacrifice his sone Isaac. Here's the thing. Other cultures around Abraham did perform child sacrifices to their gods. But here, God doesn't just tell Abraham that He doesn't want child sacrifices; He demonstrates it by providing the sacrifice for him miraculously. The question has been raised here "Would you sacrifice your child if God supposedly told you to?" The answer, provided via object lesson, is that He won't ask that.
There are 5 other points in part 1, not all as specific as this, but all of which are equally good. The original topic is how to answer atheists who point to violence in the OT (Dawkins, et. al.) and how a contextual reading of the OT answer some of their criticisms. It also covers the idea that there are still some examples from the OT that are still that don't have a good answer, but then there are some examples from the fossil record that evolution doesn't have a good answer for either, but that doesn't automatically cause their respective believers to throw out the belief.
Anyway, thought of this thread here while listening to this on the way to work and would post it for what it's worth. Part 1 is 30 minutes, but at 2X speed on the iPod it's still very understandable, and only 15 minutes. Enjoy.
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