The Divinity of Scripture

[trippymonkey]

Of course it does - that's how well it's been written OR RE-written over the centuries !?!?!

[Owlswing]

No, I mean that they believe that every word is true in the way in which it was written - so, for instance, a common Jewish literary technique was hyperbole; research is increasingly showing that the early chapters of Genesis was never written as history, but as theology.  Then you get wisdom (Proverbs) and poetry (Psalms) which often use language in other than its everyday usage.

Literal interpretations need to take all of these complexities into account!!

Yes, especially when they back up YOUR point of view! When tey don't it is, of course a mis-translation, backed up, again of course, by one of your many (never named) sorldwide circle of academic friends.

See, this is the problem with words, Hope! You can make themsay whatever you want them to! Whether what they say is the proof-positive truth is an entirely different matter.

[jeremyp]

Jeremy,

You really have no clue, do you! You betray your ignorance of the scriptures and have fallen for the lies of Judaism.

No, you have fallen for the lies of Christianity.

Read the gospels and the epistles. Christ is the temple.

Nope. The Temple was a building in Jerusalem. The gospels do not form part of the Messianic prophecies, the "Christ is the temple" meme is just an attempt at fudging the fact that he does not qualify as the Messiah.

[trippymonkey]

And THAT'S why Jesus was executed as per Jewish ruling - the Failed Messiah.
To fail just just ONE of the criteria meant death and now 'christians' have turned it all around by changing into this 'dying for our sins' ridiculous statement.

The Jews quite rightly felt that each one of us is totally responsible for our own business.

[ad_orientem]

Nope. The Temple was a building in Jerusalem. The gospels do not form part of the Messianic prophecies, the "Christ is the temple" meme is just an attempt at fudging the fact that he does not qualify as the Messiah.

As I said, you have fallen for the lies of the Jews. They have a veil over their hearts which is why they do not understand the scriptures.

Let us pray also for the faithless Jews: that Almighty God may remove the veil from their hearts; so that they too may acknowledge Jesus Christ our Lord. Almighty and eternal God, who dost not exclude from thy mercy even Jewish faithlessness: hear our prayers, which we offer for the blindness of that people; that acknowledging the light of thy Truth, which is Christ, they may be delivered from their darkness. Through the same our Lord Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with thee in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.

[Owlswing]

As I said, you have fallen for the lies of the Jews. They have a veil over their hearts which is why they do not understand the scriptures.

Let us pray also for the faithless Jews: that Almighty God may remove the veil from their hearts; so that they too may acknowledge Jesus Christ our Lord. Almighty and eternal God, who dost not exclude from thy mercy even Jewish faithlessness: hear our prayers, which we offer for the blindness of that people; that acknowledging the light of thy Truth, which is Christ, they may be delivered from their darkness. Through the same our Lord Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with thee in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Sorry Ad_O but one size does not fit all - right for you is NOT right for me.

I will never understand the brainwashed arrogance of those whose minds are so closed that they cannot see any alternative to their beliefs.

Communist Russia was willing to go right up to the brink of the nuclear destruction of the world (time counted in hours) to try to impose their political/religious belief on everyone else.

Just how far the various sects of Christianity are willing to go is yet to be seen. Or maybe their failure in the past 2,000 years has shown them that no matter how hard they try they are doomed to fail, but for the sake of their consciences and to escape eternal damnation they have to keep trying.

Good luck, buddy!

[Sebastian Toe]

As I said, you have fallen for the lies of the Jews. They have a veil over their hearts which is why they do not understand the Scriptures.

And yet some would say that you have fallen for the lies of the early Christian Church. They had a veil over their hearts and did not understand the true nature of God.

[Hope]

And yet some would say that you have fallen for the lies of the early Christian Church. They had a veil over their hearts and did not understand the true nature of God.

Seb, haven't you noticed that the Old Testament is full of situations where the Jewish religious hierarchy is challenged as to its inability to understand the true nature of God?  The New Testament isn't much better - Jesus gets angry with the traders who have taken over the Court of the Gentiles ('because the Jewish God is only for the Jews'), and then Stephen lambasts the leadership of his day regarding their inability to understand God and follow his instructions (Acts 7).  Even Paul, who initially disagreed with Stephen, eventually takes what he says on board

By the way. and this is aimed more generally, Stephen's sermon in Acts 7, combined with Peter's in Acts 2 sum up the Christian faith suggesting that it was in rude health some time before Paul came on the scene.

[Sebastian Toe]

Seb, haven't you noticed that the Old Testament is full of situations where the Jewish religious hierarchy is challenged as to its inability to understand the true nature of God? 

Challenged, maybe.
Successfully challenged?
Jewish people would disagree with you on that one!

[Brownie]

They would indeed. 

The members of the elite hierarchy who were criticised by Jesus were of the type who stuck to the letter of the law rather than the spirit but they couldn't all have been of that mind. 

I've frequently come up against that inflexible attitude in some Christians who hold to their traditions so rigidly, it obscures their humanity.

People forget Jesus and his followers were all Jews and Jesus had great respect for Judaism as long as they were sufficiently flexible when humanitarian situations arose, hence him saying that the sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath.

[trippymonkey]

Who actually 'wrote' the Bible anyway ?!!?!?

[Brownie]

Who actually 'wrote' the Bible anyway ?!!?!?

http://www.biblica.com/bible/bible-faqs/who-wrote-the-bible/

[Walter]

http://www.biblica.com/bible/bible-faqs/who-wrote-the-bible/

Oh ffs.

[Brownie]

Why  ffs?  I only posted a link.

There are other sites if you google, "Who wrote the Bible?", I wasn't going to copy and post all of them.

[SusanDoris]

It doesn't really matter who wrote the words - which of course were later translated, re-written, added to, subtracted from, etc - since every single one of those words was thought of and written down by a human being. No god wrote any of it or 'inspired' anyone to write any particular words and since only a small proportion of the people were literate, the stories were transmitted to other orally. 

P.S. And the word 'divinity' is meaningless since there is nothing to support it!

[floo]

It doesn't really matter who wrote the words - which of course were later translated, re-written, added to, subtracted from, etc - since every single one of those words was thought of and written down by a human being. No god wrote any of it or 'inspired' anyone to write any particular words and since only a small proportion of the people were literate, the stories were transmitted to other orally. 

P.S. And the word 'divinity' is meaningless since there is nothing to support it!

Good post.

[Sassy]

Can one be a Christian, say, & STILL know about fossils etc?

TM,

If you kept upto date with all that is happening you would know that fossils are not what you think they appear to be.

[Walter]

Why  ffs?  I only posted a link.

There are other sites if you google, "Who wrote the Bible?", I wasn't going to copy and post all of them.

I'm so sorry I was referring to the info in the link , not you

[Brownie]

Aw firgit it, Walter....

....as Susan said: 

It doesn't really matter who wrote the words - which of course were later translated, re-written, added to, subtracted from, etc - since every single one of those words was thought of and written down by a human being. No god wrote any of it or 'inspired' anyone to write any particular words and since only a small proportion of the people were literate, the stories were transmitted to other orally. 

P.S. And the word 'divinity' is meaningless since there is nothing to support it!

I certainly agree the Bible has been translated many times (obviously don't agree about it not being inspired).  I have several copies of the Bible and, apart from a couple of small things (at least one in the Good News, from what I remember, and I hate the paraphrasing in the Living Bible), they all say the same thing, merely phrased differently.

It doesn't matter all that much which people were involved in writing it all down but at one time I found that sort of thing very interesting.

[Khatru]

TM,

If you kept upto date with all that is happening you would know that fossils are not what you think they appear to be.

I thought fossils were the preserved petrified remains of prehistoric flora and fauna.

You're saying they're not this.

Please tell me what they are then............

[Brownie]

Here is some up to date data on fossils:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/news/fossils_ruins/fossils/

[Harrowby Hall]

Why  ffs?  I only posted a link.

There are other sites if you google, "Who wrote the Bible?", I wasn't going to copy and post all of them.

I think that you post perhaps the least helpful link imaginable. Did you bother to check it? It went straight to heart of literal-bible land. The Wikipedia article Authorship of the Bible would have been more useful.

[Brownie]

I didn't want to post wiki because people always say wiki is unreliable.
The link I posted wasn't as bad as some but do pardon me for living and breathing.

[Ricky Spanish]

HOPELESS:

You have had TWO/2 responses to your sneering/mocking post:

Even in the earliest versions of the NT we see two synoptic evangelists responding to the earlier text of Mark, and deliberately changing it, because the earlier text does not accord with their idea of Jesus. A typical example of this is Mark stating that "Jesus was angry"*. Matthew and Luke obviously didn't like the implication of this**.

*Mark 1:41
**Nor did many translators. The NIV is honest enough to translate this "Jesus was indignant", though early texts prefer to skew the Greek to mean "Jesus was moved by pity". Since Jesus has just been asked by a leper to be cured, it's easy to see why from the earliest times the text has caused translators and commentators a degree of confusion. After all, Jesus has just informed the assembled crowds, via a text from Isaiah, that he has come to "heal the sick" and all kinds of other wonderful things.

Perhaps you can provide the Greek phrase that you believe means 'Jesus was angry' in Mark 1, Dicky.

A number of early manuscripts have "splagchnistheis", which does mean "moved by compassion". But some also read "orgistheis", which means "moved by anger". A number of modern commentators think this is the original and correct reading. It is significant that neither Matthew or Luke have either reading in their references to the incident, though one might suppose that "moved by compassion" would have been their immediate choice in quoting Mark. That may suggest some equivocation, or indeed that the text in front of them did indeed read "orgistheis" - angry, and they didn't like it.

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=ZcUUAAAAIAAJ

And from me:

In most texts, that phrase would be splagxnízomai/σπλαγχνισθεὶς (compassion/pity) but we also have the Codex Bezae in which it is written that Jesus, instead of showing compassion displayed anger: orgízō/ὀργισθείς which correlates with the end of the passage where Jesus orders the guy not to tell anyone.

There is good reason to accept the original phrasing was orgízō over splagxnízomai as the scribes of the later stories chose not to include either phrases in their writings; Matt 8:3 and Luke 5:13 respectively. If the original they were copying from had used compassion instead of anger they would have had no difficulty in saying so, but an angry Jesus at a reasonable request from a sick man was not the sort of Man they wanted to portray.

Which also explains why the later copyists of Mark chose to replace angry with pity!!

Which you have chosen to ignore.... any particular reason why, or are you going to claim the usual apologist claim of "I have already answered it" without supplying any evidence of doing so?

[SusanDoris]

Thank you, JeremyP.

Brownie: Inspiration for written ideas comes from within the human brain. Where else would it come from and how?