originally posted by heart
What makes you think your god is THE god? You can't prove his existence to make me think he is any more sound and real than the easter bunny. The bible is FILLED with contradictions, Jenyar. We have no proof if the writers interjected their own opinions or not.
The Bible
is a collection of the writers' opinions - they "injected"
all of it. Or do you think God's "opinions" were somehow spun around their own agendas?
Most of the "contradictions" are the result of different people in different contexts having different problems, and different perspectives. It's like saying "history contradicts itself", which is often true. Some are only paradoxes. But bone of the contradictions present a different view of God or the execution of His judgement. Sometimes it's "right" to punish your child, and sometimes it isn't, that doesn't mean you are giving a contradictory message (or worse, that you don't exist) - it means you are
aware, and you want to form your child's own ability to judge.
I have no proof that my God is THE God. The only reasoning I can apply, is that I believe in the God who created the world and everything in it, who has been followed by Abraham, and subsequently by the Israelites, the Jews and the Christians. I don't believe a giant green headed turtle ever made any claims about creating humanity.
Of course my parents have something to do with my faith. As did their parents and their parents before them. These same parents were honest enough about why my uncle was dressed up in a red suit at Christmas (we don't have reindeer, December snow or sleighs in South Africa), and explained that the real gift was Jesus. That is how the Bible was created, after all. Some people are in a more favourable position to come into contact with God, others aren't - originally this was largely a result of ancestry. There still are enough gods around to make it hard
not to come into contact with the concept, at least, and those who look for God will find Him (although they might not necessarily also
believe in Him).
If you weren't ever told, you would have found out about Him here, wouldn't you? I'm sure many Romans died thinking Caesar was god, even though the Jews said otherwise.
You choose and pick what YOU think is literal in it or not. The bible doesn't say, "this part is figurative, this is literal...etc You are taking and molding the information in the bible to "fit" your own beliefs. If you do this, what makes you think the authors didn't?
It's not so hard or cryptical, really. Depending on what type of literature you are reading, it's pretty easy to see what its intention was. Many people forget that there is such a thing as apocalyptic literature, and therefore read Peter and Revelation literally. Job is an epic poem. This determines how you treat what you read: if you want to find out how the text is relevant today, you have to identify the types and symbols, do a study about how they were used elsewhere, and see what you learn. If you want to find out what it meant when it was written, you identify the probable context, look at similar types of literature, and build up a picture from there. When you start doing this critically, it will actually blow your mind how consistent the message is, even if two passage seem irreconcilable.
The "contradictions" actually allow you to "triangulate" the intention in most cases. If A is true, and you assume B is also true, what do both point out? What possibilities do they exclude, and which do they include? Of course, making such projections without study is dangerous. But they provide a reference for living and thinking that you can also triangulate with other parts of the Bible and test their applicability and truth. The Bible is filled with these "checksum clauses". But in the end, they all seem very alien if you don't try to live consistently, and as a result God will seem very alien as well.
Hell just isn't a story, it's a bloody nightmare for any child. It's a CONTROL method, and I'm sorry, but I just can't see a true and real God using threats like that. I think He would be above that.
So should any parent. Any person who threatens his children with hell is working for the wrong god. I personally think hell is no worse a "threat" than death. You can dislike it all you want, it's still there. Hell used to mean
sheol "the grave". The hell you have in mind is probably the Roman underworld. Nobody said Greek mythology and Christianity did not rub off on each other, but nobody should think they are the same religion either. Unfortunately, "Hades" (with all its connotations) was the only available Greek word for the concept of a death that wasn't final.
If the biblical "god" was real...and he truly wanted people to believe in him...why wouldn't he come to each and every single person and make himself known? Don't jump the gun- by that, I mean for those who find the bible a touch too much to believe. Why not meet every person on a level where they believe and understand PRIOR going to hell? He's "god" right..so he can do anything. I can't tell you how many times I've heard christians state, "well, you might not believe in him now, but you sure will when you are burning in hell.
Do you really think you would believe in a god that didn't require "belief"? That's like saying you want to see the invisible to believe it is really invisible. If God took on a human form, stood before you, and talked about His invisible nature, you wouldn't be any better off than you are already. You wouln't gain any knowledge. If God took on the form of a giant green headed turtle, you would believe in a miraculous giant green headed turtle, not in God. To believe in God, you have to believe in God, unfortunately.
I think you expect too much from the Bible and too little from God. The Bible is relevant to everybody who is looking for God because it represents the sum of human experience with God throughout history - paradoxes included. Its function is to lead people into a living relationship with God. When you isolate it from a living God, you will only be reading one half of the dialogue. If you don't apply what you read, you have gained nothing at all.
Someone once used the allegory of the Bible as a metal detector for sin at the gates of heaven. It presents an "attendant" who offers to take all the metal on your person and let you pass through. The more you try to look for gaps in the law, the less you'll find - if you don't find and produce every last bit of metal on you, and give it to the attendant, the alarm will go off every time and you will not be able to enter.
I don't believe you will "burn in hell", and I'm a Christian. You might feel more than a little exasperated when you are unable to escape the one thing you
were forced to believe in - death. But what I believe makes little difference to you, doesn't it?
