Theological Opinions , PART II

[Lief Erikson]

Well, tell me why you reject the 6,000 year old Earth, women submitting to men, and the passages about Moses and the golden calf, and then I expect I'll be able to explain.

[brownjenkins]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

Actually, brownjenkins has just told everyone on the Theology thread in one of his recent posts that he doesn't believe in a god. That statement indicates that either no god has spoken to him (as he believes), or he is hearing God and just doesn't know it, or he is tuning God out. So I think BJ will agree with me that my statement, that he doesn't "talk with God or hear his voice" (or at least doesn't understand it as God's voice, if he does hear it) is valid.

You are correct. I don't hold conversations with myself.

[hectorberlioz]

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

You are correct. I don't hold conversations with myself.

Sherlock: Then there's a mystery to be solved Watson, because BJ converses with someone in the darkness...(Hint---> )

[Gwaimir Windgem]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

I expected that those who read my post would understand the statement you've quoted about literalism and metaphor in the context of the rest of my post, which includes the exceptions I had previously noted .

Of course, it does makes me wonder what you mean by "When the Lord is speaking"...*nudge nudge*

The Fall of Lucifer is described in two places in the Bible I can think of right off the bat, and I suspect that in Revelation there's a third mentioning of it that I'm forgetting.

I'm pretty sure those are the only two, and in one it is far from clear that that is what is described.

For a harmless example, literal interpretation would include believing the world is roughly 6000 year old.

Oh, yeah, that's another thing that its hard to take literally. The cited ancestral lines do not match up, so that it seems you either have to say A) one is false, or B) "son of" means "descendant of", etc.

[Lief Erikson]

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

You are correct. I don't hold conversations with myself.

I certainly don't ask you to .

*Waits for BJ to respond to the rest of his post. Impatiently . . . *

Originally Posted by Gwaimir Windgem

Of course, it does makes me wonder what you mean by "When the Lord is speaking"...*nudge nudge*

Of course, God speaks through every part of every book of the canonical Bible. But that's not what I was referring to. I was referring to statements by Jesus or the Lord which the text itself says he says.

Originally Posted by Gwaimir Windgem

The cited ancestral lines do not match up, so that it seems you either have to say A) one is false, or B) "son of" means "descendant of", etc.

I think they often did mean "descendent of". Remember that Jesus himself is referred to as the "son of David." Frequently they skipped generations, preferring to refer to the more important ancestors. Which doesn't mean an error exists.

Originally Posted by Gwaimir Windgem

I'm pretty sure those are the only two, and in one it is far from clear that that is what is described.

Hmm. As regards the Revelation one I mentioned, I guess it depends how you interpret chapter 12, whether one says it's strictly chronological or says the events aren't necessarily all in order.

The one in Isaiah 14, I agree isn't exactly explicit. Many of the prophecies of the Messiah aren't explicit either. Yet the Protestants I know do think of the Isaiah verses as referring to Lucifer.

The other one, it seems we agree is pretty clear. I'd assume you're thinking of the same one as I am, where Jesus said, "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven."

When Protestants think of the fall of Satan, those I've met always refer to scripture to explain the belief. It may have been established in Catholic tradition also, but if it wasn't in the Bible, I doubt that Protestants would be as likely to hold to it.

[Nurvingiel]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

Well, tell me why you reject the 6,000 year old Earth, women submitting to men, and the passages about Moses and the golden calf, and then I expect I'll be able to explain.

No prob.

1. 6000 year old Earth.

The 6000 year-old Earth theory [link] was formed by a mathematically-inclined person (or people?) who, IIRC, added up all the time periods mentioned contigiously in the Bible starting from Genesis to arrive at the Earth's age which is slightly less than 6000 years. (Though I think Young Earth Creationists say between 6000 and 10'000 years.) I think it's more complex than that, but that's the gist of the theory.

I don't have a problem with the scholarship employed in formulating the theory, however one key point was missed. The parts of the Bible around generations were not meant to be taken literally. In the social context of the time, when knowledge was passed down from oral histories, the exact year wasn't always imortant. This might seem stupid to us now, but it's simply a different way of transmitting knowledge, and is actually not stupid at all.

Along similar lines, Adam did not really live to be 930 years old, and Seth did not live to 912 years, etc.

Personally I subscribe to the theory that the earth is approximately 4.5 billion years old, because we understand the cultural context under which the theory was formulated, so we can say that this theory really means what we think it means, rather than misinterpreting what the original authors meant when describing generation lengths.

That said, I don't think it's stupid to subscribe to this theory, I just think there are better theories.

2. Women submitting to men

When I read the Bible (on those rare occasions, hahaha) or pray successfully (by which I mean I hear what God is saying to me), God is speaking to me. God has never told me that I am of less worth than my husband or of any man.

I was looking for what Paul wrote about marriage when I found this instead, and I am drawing a huge blank on this passage:

Originally Posted by Corinthians 11:1 - 5

1 Become imitators of me, even as I am of Christ. 2 Now I commend YOU because in all things YOU have me in mind and YOU are holding fast the traditions just as I handed [them] on to YOU. 3 But I want YOU to know that the head of every man is the Christ; in turn the head of the woman is the man; in turn the head of the Christ is God. 4 Every man that prays or prophesies with something on his head shames his head; 5 but every woman that prays or prophesies with her uncovered shames her head, for it is one and the same if she were a [woman] with a shaved head.

(Written exactly as it appears in the New World Translation, minus the footnotes.)

Questions on these passages:
Co 11:1 Who is this author exactly? Why does he (they?) claim to be an imitator of Christ? What would that entail?

Co 11:3 This passage seems to be describing a hierarchy from God to Christ to men to women. But why? As far as I know, neither God nor Jesus ever directly describe such a thing. What is this passage really about? What is the point? Similairly...

Co 11:4 - 5Shaved head? Covered? Uncovered? Humans have continued to worship God, but our cultures have evolved over time. The only thing Canadian society has to say about head gear, or lack thereof, is that it's rude to wear a hat at dinner. It's generally considered impolite to wear hats indoors, but no one really minds if women wear hats in church, probably because of this passage.

So, how is this relevant to society now? For that matter, how is any of the passages of Corinthians I quoted relevant?

If God really meant for men to be the bosses just because they have a twig and berries, I'll eat my hat. Or at least a large meal near my hat.

The Bible is holy, but that does not mean we have to follow every last detail even if they do not make sense to us. I think it's dangerous to go along with something that you don't understand simply because you feel you should. I feel the quoted Corinthians passages illustrate my point; if I undermined my own self-worth because I think Corinthians is saying that the man is in charge of the woman, I would do a great deal of harm to myself and other women (such as a possible future daughter) who might follow my example. And if this passage was not saying men are in charge of women, I would have done great harm for no reason at all.

Some day, I'm going to sit down and really study the Bible, because I want to know what the heck everyone is talking about, and why.

[Lief Erikson]

Nurv, you'll have to do some emptying of your PM box. I can't respond to your most recent message!

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

No prob.

1. 6000 year old Earth.

The 6000 year-old Earth theory [link] was formed by a mathematically-inclined person (or people?) who, IIRC, added up all the time periods mentioned contigiously in the Bible starting from Genesis to arrive at the Earth's age which is slightly less than 6000 years. (Though I think Young Earth Creationists say between 6000 and 10'000 years.) I think it's more complex than that, but that's the gist of the theory.

I don't have a problem with the scholarship employed in formulating the theory, however one key point was missed. The parts of the Bible around generations were not meant to be taken literally. In the social context of the time, when knowledge was passed down from oral histories, the exact year wasn't always imortant. This might seem stupid to us now, but it's simply a different way of transmitting knowledge, and is actually not stupid at all.

Along similar lines, Adam did not really live to be 930 years old, and Seth did not live to 912 years, etc.

Personally I subscribe to the theory that the earth is approximately 4.5 billion years old, because we understand the cultural context under which the theory was formulated, so we can say that this theory really means what we think it means, rather than misinterpreting what the original authors meant when describing generation lengths.

That said, I don't think it's stupid to subscribe to this theory, I just think there are better theories.

I'll need a source for your claim that people in Biblical times didn't care about dates and years. Maybe they didn't care always about the exact year-I've read instances where they rounded off the years to the closest decade every now and then-but I certainly haven't heard that about numbers as large as hundreds of years or many decades. Which doesn't mean it isn't true, of course. I'd just like to see the evidence that it's true.

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

2. Women submitting to men

When I read the Bible (on those rare occasions, hahaha) or pray successfully (by which I mean I hear what God is saying to me), God is speaking to me. God has never told me that I am of less worth than my husband or of any man.

I was looking for what Paul wrote about marriage when I found this instead, and I am drawing a huge blank on this passage:
(Written exactly as it appears in the New World Translation, minus the footnotes.)

Questions on these passages:
Co 11:1 Who is this author exactly? Why does he (they?) claim to be an imitator of Christ? What would that entail?

Co 11:3 This passage seems to be describing a hierarchy from God to Christ to men to women. But why? As far as I know, neither God nor Jesus ever directly describe such a thing. What is this passage really about? What is the point? Similairly...

Co 11:4 - 5Shaved head? Covered? Uncovered? Humans have continued to worship God, but our cultures have evolved over time. The only thing Canadian society has to say about head gear, or lack thereof, is that it's rude to wear a hat at dinner. It's generally considered impolite to wear hats indoors, but no one really minds if women wear hats in church, probably because of this passage.

So, how is this relevant to society now? For that matter, how is any of the passages of Corinthians I quoted relevant?

If God really meant for men to be the bosses just because they have a twig and berries, I'll eat my hat. Or at least a large meal near my hat.

The Bible is holy, but that does not mean we have to follow every last detail even if they do not make sense to us. I think it's dangerous to go along with something that you don't understand simply because you feel you should. I feel the quoted Corinthians passages illustrate my point; if I undermined my own self-worth because I think Corinthians is saying that the man is in charge of the woman, I would do a great deal of harm to myself and other women (such as a possible future daughter) who might follow my example. And if this passage was not saying men are in charge of women, I would have done great harm for no reason at all.

Some day, I'm going to sit down and really study the Bible, because I want to know what the heck everyone is talking about, and why.

This is really a good example of what I was talking about, as regards making up one's own religion. Those passages were written as literal, so even if they don't coincide with our own belief systems, we must accept them as the literal Word of God. Interpreting them as metaphors or just refusing to follow them means we're allowing our own views of morality to govern us and not God's view of morality. Much better is to come to understand them, rather than just skipping them, and that can only be done through the Holy Spirit. I'll explain more about that when I submit the continuation of this post.

This said, I think all the questions you asked about these passages are GREAT questions, and we should come to understand the passages and God's morality through them. We must humbly keep in mind that his ways are not always our ways, though.

I agree with you that some parts of what's written there are cultural. Which doesn't mean they weren't the perfectly right thing for people to do at that time, but in this culture they make less sense. In their culture, having the head uncovered in public, for a woman, meant that she was sexually promiscuous and had loose morals. So for women to go to church in that fashion would be incredibly disrespectful- rather like showing up in church today in a bikini. Nowadays, head covering doesn't have anywhere near the same cultural implications, so it isn't necessary. And that's a literal response to a literal reading of that passage.

I'll respond to the rest of your post soon!

[hectorberlioz]

Nurvvy, I have an important message to relay...please hurry

[brownjenkins]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

Which doesn't mean they weren't the perfectly right thing for people to do at that time, but in this culture they make less sense. In their culture, having the head uncovered in public, for a woman, meant that she was sexually promiscuous and had loose morals. So for women to go to church in that fashion would be incredibly disrespectful- rather like showing up in church today in a bikini. Nowadays, head covering doesn't have anywhere near the same cultural implications, so it isn't necessary.

But who makes the decision as to whether or not certain restrictions are "necessary" anymore? The individual?

It seems to me like you are trying to have it both ways again.

[brownjenkins]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

You mean robots without the ability to think, feel, and experience life?

I wouldn't say robots. Maybe animals would be a better analogy. A dog can think feel and experience life, and even make some day to day decisions that might end up being good or bad, but it's future completely depends upon the whim of it's owner.

You seem to be painting humans as little more than god's pets.

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

Free Will is basically random chance. For according to that belief, God didn't pick us up out of the rat cage, but rather he just opened his hand and said, "anyone who wants to come aboard can come aboard." Which means he was leaving it to random chance who would come to heaven and who would not. That, to me, is not the act of a very loving God. By the predestination standpoint, however, God reached down into the rat cage and picked up the one he wanted with him, so that it would be with him forever. Which is a kind and loving act that shows real caring about the creature's future.

As you know, I'm not religious, but my impression is that most catholics see free will as god giving people the ability to choose salvation for themselves. Not just by random chance, but by guiding them towards the right path.

Take Adam and Eve for example. In a nutshell god says, "you can do whatever you like, but don't eat the fruit or you are going to be sorry." They have a choice to make and they know, at least to some extent, what choice god expects of them.

Are you saying that Adam didn't really have a choice? That he was predestined by god to eat the apple. This would mean, logically, that god intended for him to eat the apple. That's all fine and well, but it kind of throws the idea of responsibility out the window. There's no pride, but there is also no humility, all that is left is pure obedience.

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

You suggest that the predestination standpoint means we are under bondage. However, we have as much freedom as God does. We have the freedom to act according to the natures and personalities that God gave us. We cannot act in any way outside of our own personalities and natures. The same is true of God. He can act only according to his own nature, according to his own personality. Perhaps all of God's actions are eternally predestined, for he does only what is within his personality for him to do and can do no other. This is the same for us.

In a strange way I kind of agree with this. Ultimately, I have never thought free will existed. But my reasoning has nothing to do with god. It has to do with the idea that we are basically creatures shaped by our genetics and our environment.

If you are broke and really want a new CD, whether or not you try to shoplift it from the store has nothing to do with "choice". It is a result of a combination of genetics (which influences personality) and upbringing (which also influences personality). In the end, you always make one "choice". Humans just believe that they would have been free to make another because they have a mind that is developed enough to be able to imagine having made the other choice.

All that said, in terms of religion and the rules that surround most of them, it seems as if you must believe in free will. If not, why bother to preach to people all the time about how they should act when it comes to important decisions if they are not really in control of that decision-making?

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

Here is a vitally important point to understand: God does not impose upon our personalities.

Have you ever read the Harry Potter books? In those books, there is a curse that the bad wizards use on some good wizards to get complete control over them, so that they behave in exactly the ways that the bad characters want them to behave. People can become puppets on strings when controlled by this curse. They have no personalities, no free will, nothing.

Compare them to the "free" characters of the Harry Potter books. Those characters are full of vibrancy, with their own personalities, their own wills. Yet J.K. Rowling controls them. Nonetheless, there is a significant difference between them and the cursed characters. The ones that J.K. Rowling controls act according to their own personalities and their own natures. They are themselves, and Rowling does not impose herself upon them (usually ), whereas the others are not themselves. The characters in J.K. Rowling's book have their own personalities and natures, just as J.K. Rowling does, and have the same freedom within the book as Rowling has outside the book. They have the freedom to be themselves, just as Rowling does, and no "freedom" to be other than themselves, to act according to someone else's personality, for instance. The main difference between Rowling and the people she has created in her book is that she has life, whereas they don't.

This is a point at which my analogy falls short, for book characters don't have life, but God can give life to people.

Authors and readers can love characters in books and gain strong emotional attachments to them. These characters are not real people, yet even without reality, they still can create that attachment in us and be considered precious.

How much more, then, would real, living creatures that God has created and predestined be precious and valuable?

Rowling's characters act the way they do because she chooses to write them that way. If she wanted, she could have Harry have a change of heart from all the stress and in the next book choose to join Voldermort in his evil ways.

Everything someone does is their "personality", from what they choose to have to drink on a given evening to how they make decisions that may effect others. Take away one and you take away all.

Back to the religious point of view, there are only so many options:

1) Total free will: You can do whatever you like, and if you make the right choices, god saves you.

2) Predestination: You have no control over the important decisions in your life and it is god that will determine whether or not you are saved, and make you act accordingly.

How, from your point of view, can anyone be held responsible for their salvation, either by another human or by god himself, if they have no control over that salvation?

Or do you believe that we are not responsible for it?

I'm sure that if Harry Potter turned evil, all except the most-demented would blame Rowling, and not the character Harry Potter.

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

Now, I cannot act like my brother for the rest of my life, no matter how much "free choice" one might suspect that I have. I'm bound to be myself. And even if I chose to attempt to be like my brother all my life, that choice would be coming from my personality, which means I'm still being myself. All the freedom that any of us have is the freedom to be ourselves, and predestination does not hinder that. The Imperius Curse in Harry Potter may be capable of taking away free will, and so can sin. But predestination does not.

I suppose you could have some kind of "partial free will" as in, "we can do whatever we like, but god will control the salvation part." But again, this removes responsibility completely from us since, if god instead based his decision on anything we did, it would no longer be completely predestined.

Is the above what you believe, more or less?

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

Sin is what keeps us from acting according to our own personalities, for it imposes evil upon us. We therefore must act in evil ways, when under the power of sin, even though we may not want to. We find ourselves bound to it. Not one person alive can choose through force of will to do what is right all the time. That is because sin enslaves.

So again, we are not really responsible for it then?

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

I agree with you that there can be a magical beauty in human interactions.

I have some issues though, with this. Some people in the course of human history have genuinely believed that blacks were subhuman, and thought it an act of kindness, of empathy, that they should experience Western control over their lives.

Anti-Semitism comes from the interaction of human beings with one another, and might be considered to be empathy with one's fellows, though not the Jews, who were not fellows but rather were evil. In fact, from the perspective of a number of Anti-Semites, killing Jews and mistreating them was doing good and being kind to one's fellow people against those who were just manifestations of evil.

Most people who have done what are now considered to be atrocious wrongs have believed that they are doing right, and even often done it out of empathy with their fellows from their nation/race/religion/economic position, etc. Many even out of empathy with humanity as a whole, as they don't consider those they are attacking to be "human." I believe the same thing is happening today through abortion in civilized West, except on a larger scale than ever before in history.

Many other crimes have been committed, but the important point is that many of them involve people doing what they believe is right. Empathy is not always involved, of course. But these interactions of humanity must be considered to be part of the total sum of human experience, and indeed one so endemic in our experience that the 20th century had in it the two World Wars, the bloodiest conflicts in history. The most recent of those took place only about sixty years ago, and it was immediately followed by the Cold War, the most terrifying event for humanity, with the greatest risks to survival, of all time. Yet the governments decided, because of mutually assured destruction, not to launch that war.

Mutually assured destruction is no longer a barrier to holocaust, however. For now it's terrorism, small groups of fanatics who want to use WMDs against vast numbers of people. These WMDs are becoming more and more easy to come by.

Humanity's total experience is partly magical and beautiful, I agree. But it also has a lot of great blackness and ugliness. That ugliness often causes people to doubt that there is meaning.

It may be easy to say this about religion from an outsider's perspective. But then, you don't talk with God or hear his voice. The personal relationship with the outside force is not a human construction, I can tell you from my personal experience. And I can tell you you'd know it for yourself from your own personal experience, if you asked God to open your heart to him and further asked him to reveal himself to you in a way that could convince you.

Who defines what's a "responsible manner" or a "positive contributor" to society? Who's to say what's responsible and what's positive? If humans define it, then so do the parents you'd say are being irresponsible or are bringing their children up to be negative influences on society. They'd probably say they're doing right. And who's to say they're wrong? The majority? The majority's view of practical experience? That view might be different fifty or a hundred years from now.

But about utilitarianism . . . are you saying that no one has ever gotten away with a crime? Or that no one has ever gotten away with any big crimes?

You told me in another thread that even if individuals might sometimes get away with it, the society they live in may crumble. But who cares? Since individuals can get away with it, even where their society pays the penalty, why shouldn't they get away with it?

And after it's all gone to dust and no one remembers it, and the vast forces of the universe continue with complete disregard for anything that happened, where then is the importance or meaning? It might have meaning to us humans, but after we're gone, no one would be there to view it as having meaning, and the cosmic forces would continue heedlessly.

It's ironic you'd say that, because what I've always been hearing from you is that humanity is constantly improving, which would make pride justified.

They'll always be good people and bad people. And by that I mean good for society as a whole or bad for it. What has changed when I say "improved" over the generations are the ideas of democracy, inclusiveness, equality and just the general understanding that we all depend and need one another.

I'm sure that any small human society is probably the same today as it was 10,000 years ago. And by "small society" I mean what might have been your clan in the stone age and today is your family and coworkers, or even your internet friends. A vast majority are good, respectful people. Most think about themselves first and foremost, but they have a lot of concern for those around them as well because they realize, whether conciously or subconciously, the interdependance.

What's developed over the years are better forms of large human societies. Call it societal evolution. An understanding that what's good for the clan is good for the town, is good for the country, and is ultimately good for the world.

This is why you see that the most successful countries in our time tend to be the most democratic and the most respectful of individual's rights. This does not mean that another Hitler couldn't pop up tomorrow. But I'd say that it is much more unlikely these days, especially in the countries that have established democracies, for a Hitler to be able to take over and thus enforce the will of one individual, for good or evil, over a vast population. Contrast that to a few thousand years ago when almost every society was more or less authoritarian.

On all humanity being dust one day? Sure, we could get hit by an asteroid 100 years from now and no one might survive it. But, in my mind, that's like worrying about the afterlife. Don't lose sleep over what you can't control.

Pride? That's a word with many meanings. You can be proud of a certain accomplishment while still acknowledging that you could never have succeeded without all the people that helped along the way, which is a certain humility as well.

Sometimes you can have it both ways.

[Lief Erikson]

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

But who makes the decision as to whether or not certain restrictions are "necessary" anymore? The individual?

It seems to me like you are trying to have it both ways again.

Humans don't get to decide which moral restrictions they can follow. There is a difference in the Bible between cultural and moral restrictions, however. Cultural restrictions can change from society to society. Given a little knowledge of the culture of the time, it is clear that the passage Nurvi was citing was one of the latter. Moral restrictions, on the other hand, are universal.

The Apostle Paul said, "I become all things to all men that I might win them for Christ." He was referring to his taking on the different customs of other cultures and ways of life and accepting them, differ though they did from his own, in order to bring the essential truth to those involved in those societies that it might change their lives. God, according to the Bible, doesn't change. His principles, his morality, is likewise universal and unchanging, as are the moral laws he established that span the universe. We don't get to play with that at all.

Human cultures are an altogether different matter, though.




I'll respond to your next post when I may .

[Nurvingiel]

Hector and Lief, I have flushed the box.

I don't have time to respond to your post now Lief, but I bet I will tomorrow when I'm at the university campus.

Edit:

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

I agree with you that some parts of what's written there are cultural. Which doesn't mean they weren't the perfectly right thing for people to do at that time, but in this culture they make less sense. In their culture, having the head uncovered in public, for a woman, meant that she was sexually promiscuous and had loose morals. So for women to go to church in that fashion would be incredibly disrespectful- rather like showing up in church today in a bikini. Nowadays, head covering doesn't have anywhere near the same cultural implications, so it isn't necessary. And that's a literal response to a literal reading of that passage.

I agree with this.

I suppose there are different way to take things literally, then. But you seem to use the word "literal" interchangeably with the word "correct". When you say "I read this passage literally" what I am hearing is "I read this passage in the correct manner."

A literal interpretation of the above passage would be saying that because this passage says it's wrong for a woman to pray with her head uncovered, it is therefore wrong for a woman to pray with her head uncovered.

This is obviously not your approach to the Bible; I get the impression you put a lot more thought into it than that.

[Lief Erikson]

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

I suppose there are different way to take things literally, then. But you seem to use the word "literal" interchangeably with the word "correct". When you say "I read this passage literally" what I am hearing is "I read this passage in the correct manner."

I definitely do apologize for coming across that way- it was not my intent. I am very likely incorrect in some parts of my understanding of scripture. I definitely didn't mean to imply that I'm flawless.

I think there also are metaphors in Bible passages that are written as literal, and there probably are also double meanings and triple meanings, etc. I believe every part of the the Bible that is written as literal is literal history, but I think metaphors and second meanings also exist in these stories. I think there are many, many layers in scripture and the literal is one true one, but the non-literal often exists there as messages as well.

This isn't a contradiction of anything I was saying earlier. I do think the literal interpretation is correct, but I don't limit the Bible to say that that's all that those passages include. I think that a lot about God and the world around us, and the laws that govern it, as well as truths about humanity and our relationships with God are to be found in the literal reading, which is a true reading. And times when someone has trouble stomaching what he or she reads and consequently interprets the scripture as a metaphor instead of in the literal way it is written, to suit that person's own values, is, in my view, a heretical way of approaching scripture. A lot of liberal Christians of my acquaintance do that.

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

A literal interpretation of the above passage would be saying that because this passage says it's wrong for a woman to pray with her head uncovered, it is therefore wrong for a woman to pray with her head uncovered.

Not if you take it in the context of the scripture in which Paul says he becomes all things to all men so that he might save them. That shows that cultural differences can be overcome and culture can change. There are actually a number of places in the epistles I can point to where Paul talks about that the acceptability of certain kinds of differences between people. You'd have to interpret Paul's words non-literally in those places if you were going to say that cultural differences such as the one you mentioned must be responded to by us now in a literal fashion .

As I told brownjenkins, there is a difference in the New Testament between cultural and moral changes. Cultural changes are acceptable, so long as they don't involve changing the moral standard. The moral standard in the Bible doesn't change.

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

This is obviously not your approach to the Bible; I get the impression you put a lot more thought into it than that.

It's easy to take isolated scriptures and make mistakes in interpreting them when one doesn't consider other passages to enhance one's understanding of the first.

I personally feel that I am responding to the passage you mentioned in a literal way. I do believe that Paul literally wanted women to wear head coverings in church, and seeing as this is the Word of God, I think it was genuinely God's will. It also makes sense, and I agree with Paul wholeheartedly. If uncovered heads for women meant sexual license at that time, then it would have been shockingly disrespectful in the house of God, a place committed to holiness. I sure hope they obeyed Paul's teaching on that!

But we also know that this was a cultural difference, and we'd have to be interpreting the Bible non-literally in more than one passage if we were to say that cultural differences were not allowed to change. We can see why it would change, here.

On an interesting sidenote, there was not only a cultural principle in that particular passage- there also was a moral principle, and that cannot change. That moral principle was that we should respect God in his sanctuary. We could also take this scripture and say that based on it, women shouldn't wear bikinis into church, men shouldn't wear pants that display their buttocks, and people should all dress and behave in a way that shows respect to God in the sanctuary. That all is based on the moral principle involved in the passage, though the particular cultural manifestation is different now.

In view of the passages referring to differences between moral and cultural changes, I think a literal approach to them requires that a literal approach to cultural passages be willing to take the changes into account .

[Count Comfect]

Originally Posted by Lief

I personally feel that I am responding to the passage you mentioned in a literal way. I do believe that Paul literally wanted women to wear head coverings in church, and seeing as this is the Word of God, I think it was genuinely God's will. It also makes sense, and I agree with Paul wholeheartedly. If uncovered heads for women meant sexual license at that time, then it would have been shockingly disrespectful in the house of God, a place committed to holiness. I sure hope they obeyed Paul's teaching on that!

But we also know that this was a cultural difference, and we'd have to be interpreting the Bible non-literally in more than one passage if we were to say that cultural differences were not allowed to change. We can see why it would change, here.

Just a query - where do we draw the line on calling something a cultural change? Is acceptance of homosexuality allowed? If not, why head covering (which apparently was symbolic of sexual licentiousness) and not homosexuality (also considered sexually inappropriate)?

[brownjenkins]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

Humans don't get to decide which moral restrictions they can follow. There is a difference in the Bible between cultural and moral restrictions, however. Cultural restrictions can change from society to society. Given a little knowledge of the culture of the time, it is clear that the passage Nurvi was citing was one of the latter. Moral restrictions, on the other hand, are universal.

The Apostle Paul said, "I become all things to all men that I might win them for Christ." He was referring to his taking on the different customs of other cultures and ways of life and accepting them, differ though they did from his own, in order to bring the essential truth to those involved in those societies that it might change their lives. God, according to the Bible, doesn't change. His principles, his morality, is likewise universal and unchanging, as are the moral laws he established that span the universe. We don't get to play with that at all.

Human cultures are an altogether different matter, though.

That seems like a convenient way to pick and choose what you wish to follow. If it doesn't make sense to you, it is a temporal "cultural" rule, yet if it does make sense to you, it is an absolute "moral" rule.

Who decides what passages of the bible are cultural and which are moral?

Could something like the ever-popular homosexual marriage restriction be seen as purely cultural at some future point in time when it becomes more widely acceptable?

I've read the bible, and I don't remember any footnotes that say, "this is an absolute moral, but this is just a cultural thing." Are you saying we are all allowed to create our own?

That's an awful lot of free will for followers that don't have free will.

[Nurvingiel]

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

I'll need a source for your claim that people in Biblical times didn't care about dates and years. Maybe they didn't care always about the exact year-I've read instances where they rounded off the years to the closest decade every now and then-but I certainly haven't heard that about numbers as large as hundreds of years or many decades. Which doesn't mean it isn't true, of course. I'd just like to see the evidence that it's true.

Your asking for a source made me think, "Where the heck did I learn that anyway?" I learned it from either my Dad or at church, but I think I'm misremembering or misinterpreting what was said.

But, the world being 4.5 billion years old makes more sense to me than the world being 6000 years old. So why then do I think that?

Well, geological records reveal that the Great Ice Age occured approximately 1 million years ago. IIRC, the Little Ice Age (or one of?) was 10'000 years ago. These two events mean the Earth could not have come into existence only 6000 years ago, as one example.

I really don't think this contradicts anything said in the Bible. The Creation story is a metaphor (my favourite word ). Obviously all of humankind did not arise out of only two human beings. Different genetics between people show us that. There are many wonderful and important lessons in the story of Creation, and it tells us things like God made all of creation, and it is very beautiful and wonderful, and God gave us intelligence and a capacity for reason beyond, as far as we know, any other creature. This means we have a great responsibility, but as the lesson of the apple and the Devil tells us, it gives us the capacity to commit sins and disobey what God has asked us. It also shows us

The phrase, "In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth," does not rule out this being done over a vast period of time.

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

This is really a good example of what I was talking about, as regards making up one's own religion. Those passages were written as literal, so even if they don't coincide with our own belief systems, we must accept them as the literal Word of God.

I disagree that they were meant to be taken literally (in the sense of "reproduced word for word" synonyms: exact, verbatim).

Therefore I'm not just "making up my own religion" which implies that I'm not putting any thought into this discussion at all, and implies that I have no evidence for what I'm saying. Both these implications are completely off the mark, and I resent the implication that I'm full of crap, frankly.

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

Interpreting them as metaphors or just refusing to follow them means we're allowing our own views of morality to govern us and not God's view of morality. Much better is to come to understand them, rather than just skipping them, and that can only be done through the Holy Spirit. I'll explain more about that when I submit the continuation of this post.

I'll give a longer response when you're done your own response.

You said yourself that the Bible contains metaphors. Obviously it does. Therefore it's not wrong to read a metaphor in the Bible and obtain a life lesson from it.

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

This said, I think all the questions you asked about these passages are GREAT questions, and we should come to understand the passages and God's morality through them. We must humbly keep in mind that his ways are not always our ways, though.

Yes, I completely agree. And thanks for the nice complement!

On submission, if God really made people of different inherent value, then God can go jump in a lake. I do not believe in any God that made some people less valuable than others. Happily, I do believe that the Christian God that I worship made all people equal in His eyes. I believe this strongly, and see no evidence in the Bible that demonstrates otherwise. Confusing passages yes (I'm looking at you Leviticus for crying out loud, and Corinthians), but evidence? None.

This discussion has really got me thinking. Awesome. I love this discussion.

Your comments got me thinking about this question: do I put my own beliefs and knowledge of the world above what is said to me in the Bible?

The answer is, no.

I do not believe in anything that does not make sense. The Bible, and its message as a whole, does make a lot of sense to me, therefore I believe in it. Since I believe in the entire Bible, I do not reject anything that is written in the Bible.

However, some passages in the Bible don't make sense to me. In order to avoid believing something that is incorrect (which would arrive from following something that I don't understand, ie. I would be risking following the passage in the wrong way), I will study the passage until I do understand what it's saying, and then follow it.

I'm sure the whole Bible makes complete sense, but it isn't exactly rocket science - it's more complex than that. I don't understand it all now, but that doesn't mean I think it's wrong. What this means is I won't risk doing harm by following something I don't understand, because this would mean doing the wrong thing. You can't follow instructions properly if you don't get them.

Does that make sense, about my beliefs? I've given this a lot of thought. Go ahead, ask me anything. Anything at all.

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

I agree with you that some parts of what's written there are cultural. Which doesn't mean they weren't the perfectly right thing for people to do at that time, but in this culture they make less sense. In their culture, having the head uncovered in public, for a woman, meant that she was sexually promiscuous and had loose morals. So for women to go to church in that fashion would be incredibly disrespectful- rather like showing up in church today in a bikini. Nowadays, head covering doesn't have anywhere near the same cultural implications, so it isn't necessary. And that's a literal response to a literal reading of that passage.

Yes, of course. I completely agree with this.

Originally Posted by Lief Erikson

I'll respond to the rest of your post soon!

I'm looking forward to it buddy.

[Rían]

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

Obviously all of humankind did not arise out of only two human beings.

But you believe in evolution, which states that EVERY living thing came from a one-celled prototype thing? Why can't all of humankind arise out of two human beings?

Originally Posted by Count

Just a query - where do we draw the line on calling something a cultural change? Is acceptance of homosexuality allowed? If not, why head covering (which apparently was symbolic of sexual licentiousness) and not homosexuality (also considered sexually inappropriate)?

I think that's an excellent question, Count. I'd have to say consider context and the book as a whole. I think the only reference on head coverings is in a letter addressed to the Corinthians, who were quite lively and gave Paul some headaches (as well as a great love for them!) OTOH, the references to sexuality and marriage are numerous throughout the Bible, across time and cultures, and NOWHERE is homosexuality referred to as something good, and EVERYWHERE, marriage is described as between a man and a woman. Now waaaaay back in Abraham's time, there were multiple wives, but God's revelation was over time - he didn't just grab Abraham and give him a Bible (which didn't even exist) - and it was a process to call Abraham out of his culture.

[Nurvingiel]

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

But you believe in evolution, which states that EVERY living thing came from a one-celled prototype thing? Why can't all of humankind arise out of two human beings?

Because:

1. We didn't arise out of two one-celled prototype things.
2. The genetic variation among different humans versus the genetic variation between a parent and off-spring is much greater. See also: the visible affects of successive in-breeding, which is what would happen if everyone married their siblings and produced offspring.

I was also going to say, Didn't Adam and Eve's children marry people who were not their siblings, but I looked it up, and according to this website, not all of them are named.

How many children did Adam and Eve have? The Bible does not give us a specific number. Adam and Eve had Cain (Genesis 4:1), Abel (Genesis 4:2), Seth (Genesis 4:25), and many other sons and daughters (Genesis 5:4). With likely hundreds of years of child-bearing capability, Adam and Eve likely had 50+ children in their lifetime.

First of all, ow. Second of all, hundreds of years? What?

Maybe this website is not the best place to go for answers about Adam and Eve...

Anyway, good question.

[brownjenkins]

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

But you believe in evolution, which states that EVERY living thing came from a one-celled prototype thing? Why can't all of humankind arise out of two human beings?

Theoretically, all of humankind can have arose from two beings, more or less. The issue with the biblical hypothesis is the time frame. Six thousand years isn't nearly enough time for two people to result in the kind of population we have in the world today.

Scientific estimates put the world population at around a total of five million people 10,000 years ago, in order to end up with the amount of people that are living in the world today. Obviously, it's a very rough estimate, but jumping down from five million to two people is so much outside the margin or error as to be laughable.

Evolution, by comparison, takes place over billions of years.

[Count Comfect]

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

First of all, ow. Second of all, hundreds of years? What?

They're assuming God suspended menopause for Eve, I guess. Although taking the Bible literally, when combined with what we can observe of our own bodies, would leave to the impression that she lives to be in her hundreds (Adam passes 900, IIRC), but the childbirths stop when she's at most 60ish... so double ow if she had that many kids in 60 years.

And Rian, I wasn't proposing that homosexuality should necessarily be allowed under the "cultural differences" idea, just showing that it itself is a fuzzy idea that doesn't exactly bind the text closely.