Let’s say you’re sitting around talking with a group of friends, some of whom are Christians and some aren’t.
A subject comes up; for example, marriage. People share their stories, their thoughts, their accumulated wisdom.
After a moment, one of the Christians present begins to speak. He speaks longer. His tone is different. He’s quoting verses…and more verses.
There’s a sense of finality and authority to this talk. You can sense a reaction, even before anyone says anything.
Some present are annoyed. Some are angry. Some want to move on to a topic as far away from the Bible as possible.
Then another Christian speaks. This person validates that the quoted verses are crucial and important for Christians to understand. But this person raises questions. She interacts with the scripture AND with the comments of the other participants. From ideas in the verses- like submission, for instance- she asks the group to explore what submission might mean in a non-abusive context?
The room relaxes a bit. This Christian wasn’t authoritative. She wasn’t ending the discussion. She was continuing it. She was curious. She didn’t have all the answers, but still had questions. She wanted to listen to others; to hear their insights and experiences.
Somehow, this second Christian seemed to think Christianly, but to think differently. The scripture was the beginning of her thought process; a place to launch out from, not just a place to stop.
Of course, when the evening is over and everyone is walking out to their car, the first Christian stops the second, reads her more verses and suggests she may not be a Christian.
(I know….that was ugly. I’m sorry.)
Here’s my thought. It seems that for some people, the Bible is the end of the thinking/exploring process, while for others it is not the end, but a place from which to continue learning, thinking and exploring. For one the Bible is a very short anchor; for the other, a kind of map.
One kind of Christian seems to feel that the Christian life is “lived” by accumulating Bible passages and talking about them frequently and loudly. (Yes, blogs were made for this kind of person.) This is called “honoring” the Word of God and “living the Godly life.” As a long-time observer, this looks less like living the Christian life and more like turning it into a particular kind of activity that bookish, obsessive, aggressive types are very good at.
The other kind of Christian arrives at the Bible, gains bearings, affirms truth, then launches out into the many different worlds that are part of human experience. They aren’t accumulating verses or listing them in long diatribes, but they are living in such a way that the meaning of the Bible’s message is put into practice.
The other day, a young earth creationist challenged me, as they have done many, many times before. The challenge is always the same: why don’t I take the Bible as seriously as they do? (I’m an old earth/old universe guy.)
Now, by “taking the Bible seriously,” they mean get to the answers by getting to the verses, establish the meaning of the verses and stop there. If you go any further, you’ve abandoned the authority of the Bible and are making a dangerous mistake.
But what if the creation passages are a starting place for my own encounter with the world? Can I study science and still say I believe those passages? Can I believe them if the record of God’s creation leads me to believe in an old universe? Does a person have to stop with the Biblical material at its most literal and then only affirm science that affirms those verses?
I don’t think so. I believe that thinking and living Biblically is far more than stopping at passages and saying “this far and no more.” I prefer to say “This is my map of what matters most in creation, and from here I will read the record of creation and rejoice in what God has made.”
I’m not going to worry if a conclusion seems to bring me to more questions or to a need for more study and more light. I won’t make my faith and my experience into an “either/or” where I have to ignore my mind to believe God’s Word. I’m not going to act like I have arrived ahead of everyone else because I believe Genesis 1-3.
I especially won’t believe that God wants me to know the Bible, but not know literature, relationships, beauty, work, sacrifice, science, art and service. I will approach all those things as a Biblically thinking Christian, with a grid of God and the Gospel giving cohesion and hope to all I experience and encounter.
I want to suggest that “Bible study” that amounts to an obsessive concern with what the Bible says and no more is not the way we live the Christian life. If we know God and the Gospel, we should raise our sails in the winds of human experience, creativity and discovery, expecting God’s truth to be there as well.
I experience this frequently. I will teach a poem or story and realize I am in the Biblical world. I will sense in human brokenness the Biblical story. In a thousand ways I see the face and compassion of Jesus. In explorations and discoveries I see the marvel of God’s power and detail in creation.
None of these thing take the Bible away from me. I take the Bible with me into these parts of my life. I take the Bible, its “map” of reality and truth, its message of hope and most of all, its Gospel of redemption, resurrection and a new world begun in Christ.
Is the Bible a stopping place or a starting place for Christian thinking?
Here is a comparative analogy for how God reveals himself to the world and one that I believe makes the obsessive need to believe in Biblical innerancy seem odd. Nearly all Christians would agree God uses human men and women to make Himself known to others. Likewise, most would readily acknowledge the depth of imperfection in those same people. If God is able to use imperfect people to reveal himself, why would he be limited by a less than perfect Bible? By less than perfect, I simply one that is not inerrant as commonly defined. The demand for this kind of innerancy easily leads to honoring (or making an idol of)the book before Christ. The scripture itself becomes a means by which we shield ourselves from the living presence of God. In a well intended effort to honor God, we dishonor him. In trying to protect Him, He is weakened. He is not weakened or limited in Himself of course, but we inadvertently provide the means for ourselves and others to keep Christ at a distance. We make ourselves sovereign through our demand that a particular view of scripture is the key by which God acts.
What I’m writing here will look to some like liberalism, but is nothing of the sort. Liberalism says the world must be understood according to the rational reasoning of men and women. The argument for innerancy is more nearly related to liberalism than the one I advocate, for it presupposes a sort of enlightenment logic by which scripture must conform to. In contrast to this, the living presence of the Holy Spirit makes alive the words of scripture to a reader open to hearing, and Christ is thereby made alive in her through a vital, life giving, and life forming relationship.
This way of approaching scripture is, I feel, far more worshipful and honoring to Christ than the commonly held views of Biblical innerancy.
Internetalias — do you know that some chimpanzees smell more like certain individual humans (analyzed by a molecularly sensitive digital device) than those individual humans smell like any other humans?
I’m glad that you are so taken with the “science” of the Bible — but if that’s all we had — if that’s all people ever stuck with — where would we be?
Darwin, Copernicus, Galileo — they weren’t coming up against the Bible — they were up against the conventional interpretation of the Bible. It was the non-negotiability of those interpretations that caused the scandal when these theories were proved correct. They didn’t disprove the existence of God — the situations displayed the level of arrogance of some religious authorities.
“In contrast to this, the living presence of the Holy Spirit makes alive the words of scripture to a reader open to hearing, and Christ is thereby made alive in her through a vital, life giving, and life forming relationship.”
So I’m guessing you’re a fan of Karl Barth then.
http://www.internetmonk.com/archive/karl-barth-link
http://www.internetmonk.com/archive/mark-devine-on-karl-barth
I’m actually a fan of the Holy Spirit.
Many of the comments posted here prove my point. iMonk writes a post to elicit a discussion about how (and how not) to include the Bible in our conversations with non-Christians, and much of it turns into an esoteric theological debate about how to interpret Genesis. Wake up people!
What would death be like before the Fall? Would there have been a physical death, or a form of assumption?
We don’t know. What we do know is what death is like for us *now*; why we say we believe in the resurrection of the body (if we do believe it).
Is anyone going to fall over in a swoon if told that the famous apple probably wasn’t an apple at all, but really a pun by the translators? (Latin apple ‘malus’, evil ‘malum’)
But that there is a breach, a fall, a disconnect between what we are and what we should be – can that be doubted? Even a hard-core atheist materialist can still agree that no, one should not steal/rape/murder.
Some of you may wish to watch the five minute video by Bishop Kallistos Ware listed below. He deals with the Orthodox and modern thought.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1vuBUIvHCk
Brian,
One doesn’t have to know anything of Barth to approach scripture in this way. Most Bible believing churches will teach their people to pray to God for understanding before they begin a reading of the Bible. The Bibles words are ink on paper, and as such no different from any other book without God’s active presence making them alive to someone. They can be read, memorized, studied, and so on, yet this discerning reader may never come to know Christ. Something must occur between the words and the reader only made possible by Christ through the Spirit. The Bible is different from other books in that the Holy Spirit was somehow active and present in its writing, and in that He continues to be present to many who read it today, and will continue to be present in this way until the final consummation of His work. My point is simply that Christ is the one in charge and running the show, not us, our theories, nor a view of scripture I do see advocated by that same scripture, and which I feel too often leads to things that distract the church from its faithful witness of Christ.
Martha: No, especially since scripture never says it was an apple
I meant to say “do not see advocated” in my above comment. I don’t want to create any more confusion to the discussion than necessary.
“One doesn’t have to know anything of Barth to approach scripture in this way. ”
I just asked because your position on Scripture echoes his nearly verbatim.
Which is fine; if I had to define my view as of February 2009 it would Barthian-Methodism-sticking-toe-in-Golden-Horn.
The general revelation that Romans 1 refers to is “immediate” knowledge–not mere knowledge one in time comes to discover as he observes God’s creation textbook.
If it isn’t immediate, then Romans could not say all men are accountable.
Plus, any “reading” of the creation beyond the immediate knowledge needs to be read with Bible lens glasses on instead of taking those off and putting on your own “arbitrary” lens glasses.
Ya can’t ever justify arbitrariness no matter how many philosophers, doctors, scientists, you want to quote because they are ALL finite and thus do not know everything and hence cannot justify anything since there might be something the “all” don’t know about that might contradict what they think they know with certainty.
Probably a run on sentence, but I don’t care:)
It is so silly for any of us to read Genesis 1-3 feeling as if Darwin’s “shadow” is hovering over us.
Personally, I prefer the hovering of the Holy Spirit–Gen. 1:2.
If no literal first Adam, why the need for a literal last Adam?
Surf,
Still waiting for that “really” special revelation you must be receiving [cough, cough, cough...]
“Even today, if a person was stranded on an uninhabited island, as the cloths wore away over time, exposure of the naked body to element extremes….especially that of direct sunlight….would grow hair which would completely cover the whole body. It’s nature’s way of protecting from the elements and so forth. If you don’t believe me…try it
”
Years of issues of National Geographic are full of images that would seem to testify otherwise.
I have no idea why you’d believe this.
“Frued’s description of the psychological is clearly given in scripture as the Word records the differences in the motives of man, as well as his predictable behaviors, depending on the ‘high’ spiritual influences on the thinking of man.”
You really should stop listening to whatever pastor is telling you this stuff. Freud’s account of the mind is NOTHING like anything implied in Scripture, and is actually quite antagonistic in some ways to your “traditional” reading of Scripture – and, besides, is widely considered not-useful in practice nowadays anyhow. Referencing Freud is just not really apropos to any discussion of modern psychology, theory or practice, and referencing Freud (or Einstein or Marx any other “big name” in science.. from 70+ years ago..) wrongly is sort of a Christian science-fearing cliche… It’s a mistake that’s easy to make if you’re just quoting smart people you’ve heard in church, but saying stuff like that sort of marks you out.
thanks! best regards
This relates to the conversation in way that I’ll not take the time to try to work out as it would take too long. If it is a distraction, ignore it.
Why some hear Christ in a saving way and not others, and the mystery of how it is that God makes the words of scripture alive in a saving way has caused me to think about Camus. His story bears perhaps tangentially, perhaps not, on the points I previously made. He (Camus) wrote with gentleness and wonder concerning the person of Jesus. It was with deep respect that he spoke of Jesus profound uniqueness and goodness as a man, and also with greater sensitivity of Jesus suffering love than many Christians I’ve read. He even, according to a pastor that had conversations with Camus near the end of his life, desired to be a believer. Yet it would appear that he was never able to do so. My heart aches when I read his writing for I see a man who would have come to know Christ had he the power in himself to do so. Trusting in the goodness of God as I do, I maintain hope for Camus.
For me, this illustrates the utter humility and reverence we must bring, not to scripture itself, but to our dependence upon Christ whenever we come to the Bible.
I was thinking MDS’ statement about scripture sounded kind of like Robert Barclay who I did quote verbatim.
Karl Barth is cool, but boring to read.
Brian,
Just saw your latest response. Yes. A living faith has more movement to it than often I am comfortable with. Not that God changes, but my understanding of him certainly has and does. Another reason for us to keep as near Christ as possible don’t you think? I can’t trust in my own moving target of understanding, and I sure as (bleep) don’t trust in anyone elses. A lot of you are even goofier than me. God save the queen and all the rest of us.
Just a comment on a subtlety about evolutionary theory that Surfnetter mentioned. There is actually no such thing as a “Darwinist” theory concerning for the origin of life on earth. Evolutionary theory (classical Darwinist or modern) has never addressed the origin of life or tried to – it addresses only how life changes over time. Surfnetter is correct that we currently have no generally agreed upon scientific theory that adresses the origin of life.
I mention this only because the “origin question” is often (sometimes intentionally) conflated with evolution in discussions of this type. The fact that evolutionary theory doesn’t and can’t explain life’s origin is a talking point often cited by young earth asherents to “prove” that evolution is bunk. The two issues are actually completely different.
“Piaget’s Developmental Stages are not so profound. He just watched his own kids and came to common sense conclusions. Every parent knows there are differences in personalities and intellectual applications among their various children.”
Piaget’s Developmental Stages aren’t about ‘differences in personalities’ – they are stages describing progressive psychomotor development and perception. The reason Piaget was profound isn’t because he noticed that “all kids are different”, but it’s that he provided us with a sketch of how they unfold, in terms of their self-awareness, physical capability, and psychology – one that we’ve progressively built on and the science of which has given us everything from advances in early childhood education to early detection for neurological diseases. That’s what theories of cognition are good for.
In short, Piaget wasn’t so dumb, either. He didn’t “just take time to record his observations” – he structured them in a way we could observe for ourselves, test, and make use of.
The Bible doesn’t actually give us what Piaget gave us, which is why he did what he did.
Denying the gifts other people have made to mankind seems prideful to me, even if you want to take credit from them and assign it to God.
Sorry, that was supposed to be “young earth adherents,” above.
“Does a monkey understand the labels of all the trees within the garden….so he can avoid The Tree of Knowledge or to eat of the one named The Tree of Life?”
Animals of all kinds have calls or utterances for tree species that are important to them. Apes have been known to come up with their own names for other animals, people, and things.
As for people, we’re still in the process of naming plants and animals, aren’t we?
“Does a female monkey travail in childbirth?”
Mares do.
etc. etc.
sorry, an earlier comment had an alias for me, so DaveD’s last comment was a partial response to me:
You see, here’s an illustration of the problem the original post is all about. DaveD, I didn’t ask you what you believe. So these statements don’t actually respond to what I asked, which was: what is the QUESTION to which Genesis 1-3 is the answer? iMonk gave his reply. What did you think of it? Agree or disagree? How would you formulate the question differently, if at all?
How’s this for a definition?
Fundamentalist: Somebody who runs you over with their opinion in the name of theology.
Shall we update Websters on that one?
M. S. here is that Amen!
Chaplain Mike, we have a bit of ADD over here, but it proves the bible is the starting point, look what it started.
Joel, I answered the question/proposal in your first paragraph to clarify the position I was expressing. It is the view taken in Genesis 1-3.
I agree with imonk’s response.
I do think you’re playing games here. What does it matter what the question is if the answer is a lie? Either God created man out of the dust of the ground or He lied about it. Evolving from monkeys can not, even with great poetic license can not be contrued as forming man from the dust and breathing life into him. If the statement about Creation can be taken as simply symbolic, why then can’t we take the Ressurection as symbolic or simply “spiritual”? What becomes the solid rock of our faith? Jesus can’t be. The only records we have of him and his teaching are writings. Writings that may just be symbollic or fabricated to answer questions people had about the world and the way it is and should be.
It’s a slippery slope, it seems to me, when we start to take things meant as history (like Genesis and the Gospels) and relegate them to Symbolic Truth instead of Actual Truth.
Maybe I’m wrong. Simply screaming that I and those who believe like me are anti science or nuts or ignorant is just arrogant. There is plenty of science on the Creationist side and so far the best rebuttals to it I’ve seen is hand waving by folks who just proclaim, essentially, “There’s no God in Science”.
Patrick Lynch: Using the Freud thing as “a Christian science-fearing cliche” is supremely arrogant. Most people I know, Christian and not, believe Freud is still THE source for psychological studies. Even in college classes about child development, a quarter to half the time is devoted to discussing Freud’s theories only to throw in their debunking as an aside.
DD
DD
“Most people I know, Christian and not, believe Freud is still THE source for psychological studies.”
With respect, they’re still wrong.
“Even in college classes about child development, a quarter to half the time is devoted to discussing Freud’s theories only to throw in their debunking as an aside.”
That sounds highly impractical, but hey – why not?
Hi iMonk,
Hope this does not defer your argument, but let’s use the Bible. The Apostle Paul in Acts would address people that were much more aware of what the word of God said than most people today. I can think of people like Felix where it was said they had multiple discussions. I gather from their encounters that Paul began with scriptures, because I am sure Felix had questions that were about the scriptures, then observed the surroundings for applications and solidified his point by going back to the scriptures.
My concern is not so much how one starts or where one ends as much as it is the scripture being used appropriately as it was with Paul. Paul was not a “Superman.” He was a man. Yet, he loved God so much that to him it was paramount to know what God had to say more than his own opinions.
Those in Christ are all students (disciples) of His. I take that to mean what we know today may not be where we land up tomorrow. Peter was not the same man before and after Pentecost for example. But, there needs to be one essential to all of this. That is Christ is the way, the truth, and the life. That no matter where you place your ramp, either to jump off or land upon, no one can come to the Father without first swallowing this truth.
From there, discussions make for seasoning on your favorite meal. We can enjoy the flavor in the diversity of mankind and our view points trusting fully upon the rest of knowing that is is only by His grace and His mercy that truly saves!
“If the statement about Creation can be taken as simply symbolic, why then can’t we take the Ressurection as symbolic or simply “spiritualâ€? What becomes the solid rock of our faith? Jesus can’t be. The only records we have of him and his teaching are writings. Writings that may just be symbollic or fabricated to answer questions people had about the world and the way it is and should be.”
This is basically where i am at. I’ve come to believe that Genesis is a metaphor and not to be taken literally. This has also caused me to wonder if Jesus’s resurection is simply a symbol as well. I don’t know where this is going to lead me, but it seems very unlikely I will ever go back to viewing Genesis as literal.
I’ve been reading Michael Dowd’s ‘Thank God for Evolution’ and it seems to say that ‘God’ is just a word for ‘the Universe’ – which also consists of a lot of Dark Matter that science can’t account for.
Dowd’s religion is pantheism, despite his noble efforts to not appear to be one.
“This has also caused me to wonder if Jesus’s resurection (sic) is simply a symbol as well.”
To a first-century Hellenistic-Judaic mind, the idea of “just a symbol” is incoherent. In that worldview, the symbol invokes its archetype and is real. But since you almost certainly mean to say that it is a metaphor, I won’t belabor the point.
To borrow from N.T. Wright, if a Jewish person back then were to go around proclaiming that Jesus was resurrected metaphorically in the sense of some kind of spiritual renewal he was experiencing, his fellow Jews might say they were happy for him that he was enjoying such an experience, but why would he call it a “resurrection?” That word had a specific eschatological and BODILY meaning in Second Temple Judaism relating to the reinstitution of the Kingdom.
I guess if one were to come to the conclusion that Christianity isn’t really true, but that it has some life principles that one still rather likes, one could attach metaphorical values to its stories, but that is not the same faith that the first Christians practiced. It would be a shame to come to that conclusion because one knew no kind of faith besides fundamentalism, and therefore lost faith when the cognitive dissonance therein could no longer be sustained.
I agree. I wish he’d just come out and say so. Still, maybe he is right. For evolution to be true and the biblical idea of God to also be true, then the only theory that allows you to hold to both would be Intelligent Design, which I don’t know much about. Dowd isn’t for Intelligent Design, he is for Evolution. Still, I don’t want to say that he is wrong just because the bible tells me that he can’t possibly be right. Honestly i don’t know how to be a Christian and still believe in evolution. If honesty requires that I give up on being a Christian in the event that the bible and intelligent design are proven false, that can’t be a bad thing. Honesty can never be a bad thing.
DaveD, I should simply retreat into my erroneous, flippant, game-playing ways and let your serious declaration stand without further challenge. But you contradicted yourself.
You claim to be in agreement with iMonk’s response: “Why is the world the way it is? (And why is Jesus the only way to rescue and restore it?) That’s it and that’s all.” You then ask rhetorically what does the question matter if the answer is a lie. If you think iMonk’s answer is not a lie, then you are agreeing with him that the truth to which Genesis 1-3 aspires, its literal meaning, is just what iMonk said. But the litany you go on to recite has nothing to do with that, and in fact entails that you disagree with iMonk about the question Genesis 1-3 is answering. Evidently, you believe from the agreed-upon fact of divine creation that any number of theological consequences hinge in addition on the means of that creation. Your chain of reasoning is built on precisely that questionable exegetical move, and the truths you stack up behind it are all waiting to fall like a single line of dominoes. You are insistent on reading the creation narrative as a documentary description, which, I submit for your consideration, is most assuredly NOT a literal reading of the text. Reading it as a documentary description yields a whole different set of questions than the one iMonk stated. You have constructed a system like the Hindenburg, and making the entire structure of Christian belief depend on reading off the means of creation from Genesis 1-3 is like the hydrogen gas that fills it. Again, I would point back to Augustine for a better approach. (Lawson Stone is the originator of the Hindenburg metaphor.)
Now, I have not been “screaming” at you or playing games with you. In fact, I think some of your defensiveness has been provoked by others who have thrown the “fundamentalist” label around. I think that is unfair to you and such labels often get applied when someone just disagrees with you and would like to take the shortcut and just shame you into silence or capitulation. In the larger context of how the world uses the term, we’re all fundamentalists here because we believe stuff like Jesus rising from the dead happened. So all the flinging of names back and forth is really accomplishing is stating the obvious: we all have lots of strong beliefs about lots of things and they don’t perfectly coincide. So let’s all just admit to being fundamentalists in this sense and proceed to reason together.
Dowd’s issues are Biblical, Tim. The foundations of the Bible are Theism. The painting is NOT the painter. Dowd is a great guy who does some good work, but he tries to resolve religious tensions that can’t be resolved without foundational compromise. Dowd needs to just become a Buddhist if he’s going to say God is the universe in the process of becoming. The Christian faith is meant way past the breaking point with that premise.
“Honestly i don’t know how to be a Christian and still believe in evolution.”
Change your grammar of Scripture. Rather than reading it in terms of sparse rationality, like stereo instructions, or an account of the geography of Finland, read it from the perspective of Easter. Genesis 1-3 tells us how Creation looks in terms of the Resurrection. Exodus tells us how the Hebrews came out of Egypt in terms of the Passion. Leviticus serves as a juxtaposition to grace. And so on.
This would have been difficult for me to grasp three years ago. Maybe it just sounds like mumbo-jumbo or a circular argument to readers. The best way that comes to mind right now is a partial derivative in calculus. If you’re not an engineer or mathematician, I’m probably about to lose you. But, here goes. In the real world, functions to measure something depend on several variables at once. You can’t easily do the calculus when you simultaneously juggle all the variables. So you hold all the variables constant except for one and calculate the derivative with respect to that one. The result you get for the partial derivative with respect to one variable is different from that of another, but they both come from the same function. Neither is “wrong;” both are mathematically true.
Say that reality is the complex function. When we evaluate its meaning in terms of science, it looks one way; when we evaluate it in terms of theology, it looks different. Both are true.
Tim W, I see that my comments about the meaning of “literal” and other related terms applies to you as well. With respect, I think you, DaveD and a few others here in the thread are making the same mistakes. I really do commend Lawson Stone’s essay on this subject to you. (He’s a much clearer writer than me!)
Martha – you asked, “what would death be like before the fall?” I don’t know, but:
If there was no possibility of death before the fall, then God’s warning to Adam (“the day you eat of it you shall surely die”) would be devoid of meaning. “Death? What’s that?”
Whatever Adam’s experience or witness of death, it was enough to be consider God’s statement as a kind of warning of consequence. Plus, there was also the “Tree of Life” – perhaps existing there to prolong life? – - and if so, why would this be significant unless there was potential for life to not be prolonged (i.e. death)?
What Genesis said was that upon eating of the forbidden tree, death would become a CERTAIN outcome for man (“surely dieâ€).
Anyway, I used to think that Garden of Eden = perfection = nothing ‘bad’ = therefore, no death, no thorns, no carrion birds, no decay (but what about fruit and seeds?), etc. I have since realized that was more like my wishful thinking imposed onto scripture. It wasn’t so much that I had made scripture my “stopping placeâ€; it’s more that I hadn’t really made it my starting place.
First, show me that you believe the Bible by the way you live your life (love God and your neighbor as yourself), and then tell me about it. Better yet, let me read it. If I don’t have one, give me a nice one.
But please, please, please don’t bang me over the head with it. Don’t insist that you have the correct interpretation. I know that there are many interpretations and that they are all over the map.
The previous two paragraphs summarize what a non-Christian friend tells people who want to bang him over the head with the Bible regarding what they consider to be his “issues”.
I agree with him. I try to avoid discussing the Bible with that type of people. Since that causes them to assume I must not know anything about it, some insist on persisting. Actually, I know the Bible quite well, and if pressed hard enough will point out the parts of the Bible that contradict what they are saying. Without exception, this makes them mad, often so mad that they will not speak to me again. Now isn’t that strange as can be? If I don’t agree with your “interpretation” you will punish me by not talking to me? Is that how you interpret Christ-like behavior?
My observation: religious people love to hit other people over the head with Bible verses. Followers of Jesus live the Bible because they really know and believe what it says. They tell people what the Bible says when those folks ask.
“Anyway, I used to think that Garden of Eden = perfection = nothing ‘bad’ = therefore, no death, no thorns, no carrion birds, no decay”
This is what is taught by the AIG/Ken Hamm crowd. And much of the SBC seems to have adapted it in full.
Steve – I have to reiterate — Adam didn’t die biologically the “day” he ate of it — he left his body for his eternal rewards some 900+ years later, according to the account. The death he died was separation from God and it happened as soon as he took a bite. God kicked the two of them out of the Garden, lest they eat of the Tree of Life and live forever. Then there would be this race of the immortal “living dead.” Couldn’t have that.
When Lazarus “died” Jesus told the disciples that he hadn’t died, but was sleeping. He then had to explain to them that — yes — as they understand it, he died. Death for believers is not “the Death” — it is rest in Christ.
If there was no death in the Garden, where are all these lush gardens and immortal animals in Iraq? Looks like a desert to me.
Or maybe the Garden of Eden was a state of being that we all can relate to because we all lived it in childhood and all lost it in crossing over to responsible adulthood.
Patrick Lynch
>>>“Frued’s description of the psychological is clearly given in scripture as the Word records the differences in the motives of man, as well as his predictable behaviors, depending on the ‘high’ spiritual influences on the thinking of man.â€
You really should stop listening to whatever pastor is telling you this stuff.
Patrick: My degree includes an endorsement in “Mental Retardation.” I used Piaget applications in depth for eighteen years..just didn’t include all that in my comment. My point is that FOR ME…not for you, wisdom is found in the Word. Experience has taught me to recognize inward struggles from outward behaviors. The Bible is helpful in these areas. Also, I’ve never heard a pastor so much as mention Frued. I seek out life and death truths for myself…..from the Father.
“My point is that FOR ME…not for you, wisdom is found in the Word”
I guess.
I’d like to posit that neither Christian 1 nor Christian 2 is truly stopping with the Bible. Christian 1 is simply less conscious of his or her own position within culture, space, time, etc. and how this effects his or her own thinking. I do not believe complete critical objectivity is possible. We can either search for truth, aware of our own limitations and in faith, or we can take our own preconceived (and culturally conditioned) notions as the defacto norm and judge all else by how well it accords with these preconceived notions. I remember being on another forum where some Independant Baptists were arguing about whether or not Augustine and Luther were “saved,” since these men held theological positions which were drastically different than their own. Never once did they think of turning the mirror on themselves.
I read it suggested that, were it not for having read certain scientists, one would necessarily come to a new earth position. I would like to ask, however, were a person not conditioned by a post enlightenment empiricism as he or she approached the Bible, would he or she necessary come to a new earth position? Shockingly, many of the Church Fathers were old earth or ambivalent and had no problem reading much of the Old Testament metaphorically.
Fr. Ernesto,
this is sort of flippant and off-topic, but I have to say that Bishop Kallistos has one of the coolest voices in the world. I just love listening to his talk. He reminds me of some wise old wizard– a Gandalf/Dumbledore figure. The big white beard helps too.
I don’t mean any of this disrespectfully. I’m not Orthodox, but I think Kallistos Ware is awesome. Thanks for posting that link.
“If there was no death in the Garden, where are all these lush gardens and immortal animals in Iraq? Looks like a desert to me.”
Hmmm… lush gardens and immortal animals, hidden in the desert… sounds like the premise of another Hollywood summer blockbuster… sign up Brandon Fraser and let’s green-light this baby… whos’ with me?!
Josh,
For the record, I did not refer to Imonk’s answer as “a lie”. You seemed to think so in your response….or maybe it was just late and I misread.
My point was that in the creation account is a lie, what does it matter what the question it answers is?
You are still wanting to play word games over the use of “literal”. I get it, you have a mad on for using the word incorrectly. Get over it and move to the real point: If the creation story is to be taken as mere myth or symbolism, what else in the Bible can we take that way?
My stance is clear, that once we relegate part of the Bible to “fiction that illustrates a real world need” then there’s no reason not to lump it all there. There are all sorts of theological ideas that hinge on the truth of God making us out of dust.
If God did not create us but Adam was simply the first evolved monkey we have two problems. 1: In the very first book of what we considered God’s revelation of Himself, He LIES. What ramifications are there from that?
Two, if God did not create us but found us, then the atheists I have encountered are right: it’s a might makes right scenario. He has no legitimate claim over our lives or to judge us, but because He’s more powerful than any of us, we have to go along with it.
I don’t care if believing in Creation gets me laughed at. There is science to back up the idea but it almost always gets ridicules simply because it begins, not with the idea that there is no God, but with the belief that there is. If someone else finds it easier to believe in a theory that even it’s creator said was anti- God, so be it.
DD
The Bible is a faith book, not a fact book. It’s path to God, not a science or history text.
It’s hard for me to understand those who say that if one single iota isn’t literally and factually true then all Christianity must collapse.
Because 1) it’s pretty easy to google up scriptural inconsistencies and contradictions and 2) here I stand, a Christian, with my faith not shaken one bit by wrong historical record.
My faith does not rest on a book. My faith rests on God. I don’t follow Jesus because his resurrection proves He was the son of God and therefore I had better follow Him or else. I follow Him because He is a presence in my life.
Well we’ve now officially persecuted the creationists. Where have I heard that before? Hmmm…about every time they discover another Bible-believing Christian disagrees with them and doesn’t buy their “one option and only one option” approach to Genesis.
Dave: Read the Roman Catholic Catechism on the inspiration of scripture. Then read it on creation. Whatever creationists may think, the most ancient Christian traditions don’t buy Hamm/Hovind creationism. The most recent Christian sects do.
All of us believe in creation. Not one denominational confession I know of except the LCMS requires anyone to believe in more than that: God created. The interpretation of texts can and does vary and always has. Theologians playing scientists has always been entertaining.
I don’t care if not believing the speed of light is hoax gets me laughed at. It’s a matter on which Christians differ. And it’s a prime example of where you can start at the Bible, study the world, come to a conclusion and still have your faith.
God have mercy on the thousands and thousands and thousands of Christian young people forced out of the faith by being told that it was ICR/Hamm/Hovind Creationism or nothing.
That’s officially causing one of the little ones to stumble in my opinion.
ms
“Elijah must come first.” “He will turn the hearts of the children back to the Fathers.”
Joseph — The faith that you describe above is the Faith of the Fathers. All Abraham had was the presence of the One True God in his life. Abraham heard His voice, believed what He heard was true and then acted upon that belief. For this he was rewarded with many confirming proofs and future promises for his progeny.
DaveD — In order to have the faith you profess, you must start with these premises: that God inspired all of Scripture; therefore everything described in Scripture is factual and actually true; and that everyone who believes in God must believe not only the ethical, moral and spiritual basis of all the accounts and stories in the Bible, but also all the background details, even those completely unknown and unknowable to those who originally wrote the accounts, despite what has been discovered since. And the only confirming proofs are other Bible verses (which empirically confirms nothing).
Abraham had to deal with people who clung to conventional beliefs in that way — they were the pagan idol worshipers, among whom he was the first and only exception.
I do believe that God inspired all of Scripture. I also believe that God inspired C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. Don’t think I’d advocate the development of of K-12 science curriculum based on their writings, however.
Sorry, Dave — I’m sticking with the Faith of Abraham.
IM…>>>After a moment, one of the Christians present begins to speak. He speaks longer. His tone is different. He’s quoting verses…and more verses.
Imonk…you are so right about the wrongness of the scenerio above. Lovers of God and his ‘lost’ children approach those ‘lost’ with a tone of love and deeds of caring. They remind of the loving redemptive act of Christ. They remember their own ‘lostness.’ The self-righteous use the preachy, judgemental, and ‘pounding’ of select verses. Also, the ‘lost’ can’t be won unless the spirit of God draws them. So the scenerio above is a lose…lose situation. And the #1 so outnumbers the #2. That’s why ‘Love never fails’. Few who truly are brought to a spiritual encounter with the Christ….seldom reject its wholesome deliverances.