posted
is there any way i can get a dana filter installed on my copy of ie? then she won't have to keep coming along and cleaning up my muddled posts.
Posts: 318 | Registered: Apr 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
huh, and i appear to be peter in this lab instead of celia. i wonder who i am on the third floor?
Posts: 318 | Registered: Apr 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
dkw I can't help it, my interpretive bias has issues with projectile objects in the cannon.
AJ
(This is a great conversation. Don't stop. I like Bob's take on it where getting us upset with God is what the writer wanted us to do.)
Posts: 11265 | Registered: Mar 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
You know, that's why I love Hatrack. Anywhere else I know of in the world, we couldn't have this kind of theological discussion without having plates flying in the all room
[ October 08, 2004, 01:32 PM: Message edited by: Anna ]
Posts: 3526 | Registered: Oct 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
suntranafs: Chris, you are thinking in far too obvious terms.
Um, actually I just read the text. Are there special codes in Scriptures to let me know which bits are historical and which bits are just stories? The stuff in Leviticus, was that historical or mythological? What about the cruxificion? If Job was metaphorical (as I sincerely hope it was) why wasn't it presented as such?
Humans need to suffer in order to learn, more than that in order to simply live, otherwise they really are not living...
Remind me to never leave my kids anywhere near you. Thanks.
"If he had lost his family, his servants, his holdings in a natural disaster and yet he loved and thanked God anyway, despite it all, I think it would have been a very inspiring story."
Yeah see that's exactly what happened. They were all natural causes. And all natural causes come from God, as well as everything else.
As presented in the text, they came as a targeted attack from Satan, condoned by God.
I don't think you've studied the Christian faith very well, or are ignoring its tenants, as well as the tenants of the vast majority of religions that have ever existed- which generally have a severe tendancy to believe in life after death.
I appreciate the confidence. There's always the possibility that I studied it from several angles over a period of several years, even continue to study it although I don't believe, and rejected it wholesale anyway.
Or are you going out and assuming that God took Job's children and servants and chucked them in eternal hellfire?
I'm reading that Job's children were killed to prove a point. I make no judgment about their afterlife. I do find it incredibly callous, cruel, and unnecessary. I grant you that I do not know God's will, plan, or state of mind during this. But I do submit that for the purposes of this metaphor, it would have been infinitely more inspiring to me if either a) they died without direct attack, as I said before, or b) there were taken away and Job was allowed to believe they were dead, which would have had the same effect on him for our purposes but would not have sacrificed innocents, or c) we had been told, as part of the "metaphor," enough of God's will in this instance so the slayings wouldn't be an issue. As written, the God of Job is a cruel child.
I assure wherever God put them it was in the right place and it was good for their eternal souls, somehow, in the long run, though to explain it to a human could very well be like Calculus to a one-year-old, because God is infinite, God is perfect and God does not make mistakes; that is the definition of God.
Or he just flushed them and told us they went to heaven. That works with kids, too.
Now, About the garden of Eden, the story everybody's been telling you through the course of your life is crap.
Which one is that? Which faith? How do you know what I've been taught, or what faiths I've studied, or what philosophies I've read? Although I am relieved to know that you possess the One Truth about it. It's a huge load off my mind.
Everyone, sorry to sound so snippy, but in a three page thread that's been very informative and interesting this was the only "you don't know what you're talking about" type of post and it just jumped out at me. Please, carry on. I'll go back and read Bob's and Dana's excellent comments again instead.
[ October 08, 2004, 01:37 PM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
Posts: 7790 | Registered: Aug 2000
| IP: Logged |
quote: Um, actually I just read the text. Are there special codes in Scriptures to let me know which bits are historical and which bits are just stories? The stuff in Leviticus, was that historical or mythological? What about the cruxificion? If Job was metaphorical (as I sincerely hope it was) why wasn't it presented as such?
Chris, Job is in the "Poetry" section of the Bible. Unfortunately the English translations are't as poetic, but I believe the Hebrew is in a distinctly poetic style, giving us hints as to the nature of the story being different from the truly "historical" stuff like I-II Chronicles for example. dkw knows far more about that then I do though. The Poetic books are Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Eclesiasties and Song of Solomon.
quote:Now, About the garden of Eden, the story everybody's been telling you through the course of your life is crap
How nice of you to make this blanket statement, sun, when you yourself say you are not Christian or Jewish. Who are you to decide that the stoy I've been told or the one I believe is "crap?"
Posts: 14428 | Registered: Aug 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
Celia, I appreciate that, and I agree with you, a "pick and choose" method is going to give you only want you wanted to find, not any new information (since you would simply ignore the new information). Unfortunatly, I feel that the Bible is niether literally true, due to numerous translations and non-exact replicas (copying down in percisely or incorrectly), but on the other hand, I think that the base, or the orginal Bible is indeed, true as the word of God. I try to use this as my lens, but of course, it is incredibly easy to abuse and turn into a pick and choose method, of everything I don't like becomes "improperly translated" or whatever. I see no real way around that, so I just try and discern what is truth and what isn't, or more to the point, keep myself open to any truth, and assume that what I'm reading is factual until it appears contradictory, and if I have a problem with something in the scriptures, instead of dismissing it, I try to pray about it, to determine for myself the accuracy. It's imperect, I know, but that's the best I can think to do.
However, when we come to a story that was not a literal truth, even when written (the story here obviously being Job) my interpretation becomes much more ... much heavier filtered. Especially when a wisdom literature story refers to a conversation between God and the Devil, being a wisdom story instead of an account from a prophet, such a conversation becomes merly imagined, perhaps inspired, but not true revlation as I measure it. So my lens puts the story of Job into the context of my pre-existing beliefs. This does make the story less powerful in terms of changing my mind about something, but it doesn't make in ineffectual. It's a story that helps remind me that trials and suffering is not a sign that the Lord no longer cares for me, but rather if I keep strong in faith I will be delievered.
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
![[Embarrassed]](redface.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
