How do you view the Bible?

[spblat]

I became an adult without significant or prolonged exposure to the Bible. I recently picked up a copy in an effort to learn about this undeniably important volume, and I was somewhat taken aback by many passages in the Old Testament, which paint God in a light somewhat different than what we usually imagine today. I will refrain from naming the specific passages unless asked, as I do not wish to provoke.

My questions are: do Christians agree on the significance or meaning of controvertial passages? Is it agreed that some OT passages need not directly inform our view of God, his personality, or his wishes for us? If so, how do Christians reach agreement on this, and how are they sure that they are not excluding passages in violation of God's will?

If I am describing a conflict where none exists, I would be interested in hearing an analysis of this viewpoint as well.

Submitted with respect. I want people with differences to come together, not battle one another. Let's start understanding each other. Thanks!

 

[hlaltimus]

I became an adult without significant or prolonged exposure to the Bible. I recently picked up a copy in an effort to learn about this undeniably important volume, and I was somewhat taken aback by many passages in the Old Testament, which paint God in a light somewhat different than what we usually imagine today. I will refrain from naming the specific passages unless asked, as I do not wish to provoke.

My questions are: do Christians agree on the significance or meaning of controvertial passages? Is it agreed that some OT passages need not directly inform our view of God, his personality, or his wishes for us? If so, how do Christians reach agreement on this, and how are they sure that they are not excluding passages in violation of God's will?

If I am describing a conflict where none exists, I would be interested in hearing an analysis of this viewpoint as well.

Submitted with respect. I want people with differences to come together, not battle one another. Let's start understanding each other. Thanks!

Agreement among Christians as to proper Biblical interpretation has always been a problem, but it is a good problem in one sense: If a first grade teacher handed his class a first grade text book, then there would be little problem of acceptation among the students who have already passed through Kindergarten and are properly prepared for that book. If the same teacher, though, were to hand his first grade students an eighth grade text book, there would be instant disharmony among those very students, but not out of any defect in the text book. God has given us a book which stands worlds above us in the depth of the truth which it seeks to impart to us, and this is to our advantage if we ever wish to attain to that higher world some day when our own vanishing universe has depleted itself. The Bible is a book in which, really, God is speaking to us from eternity and this immense privilege brings with it some disadvantages for a race of barely first grade intellectuals. It is a problem, yes, but it is a good one in that sense.

 

[BigNorsk]

I became an adult without significant or prolonged exposure to the Bible. I recently picked up a copy in an effort to learn about this undeniably important volume, and I was somewhat taken aback by many passages in the Old Testament, which paint God in a light somewhat different than what we usually imagine today. I will refrain from naming the specific passages unless asked, as I do not wish to provoke.

My questions are: do Christians agree on the significance or meaning of controvertial passages? Is it agreed that some OT passages need not directly inform our view of God, his personality, or his wishes for us? If so, how do Christians reach agreement on this, and how are they sure that they are not excluding passages in violation of God's will?

If I am describing a conflict where none exists, I would be interested in hearing an analysis of this viewpoint as well.

Submitted with respect. I want people with differences to come together, not battle one another. Let's start understanding each other. Thanks!

You are right that lots of the Old Testament really sounds pretty horrible from an earthly standpoint. But you missed what is going on.

Adam and Eve sinned. At that point, for all eternity, all of mankind was doomed, spiritually dead, on their way to hell.

What the Bible is, is a story of God's might and how he does the impossible. By dying for us he brings the dead to life.

See those people for instance who were occupying the promised land. They were dead already, no faith in God, rather they had faith in their cities and their walls and their armies. That was nothing against God and they received that which what they had put their faith in could give them, death.

The Old Testament story is really for our benefit so we can see how the most worthless race on earth was invincible with God on their side. But those blessings come through faith.

There's alot of rich, powerful, beautiful people in the world, but that's really a hazardous thing. Because people put their faith in their money, and their power, and their looks. And they are all nothing, and they bring only death. But God choses the foolish things of this world, the poor, the ugly, the sick. They turn to him in faith and with him on their side, they are invincible. They will never die but will receive true wealth, true power, true beauty.

You take those poeple who were slain, they chose to be. Look again at the promised land, we see Rahab in the doomed city of Jericho. What happens when she turns to God in faith? She and her family are saved. And what were the people who were so scared they pretended to be from far away and made a treaty with the Israelites? I forget their name. But they too acted in faith recognizing God's power and so they too were saved.

God tells us he desires all people to be saved and he died for the sins of the world. That's not really some horrible unloving God, but he doesn't force you to be saved. If you insist on rejecting him and putting your faith in something else, you can do that. The punishment might not seem fair to you, but it is what it is. It certainly wasn't fair for Jesus to die for us. Yet he did it.

So when you read, particularly the Old Testament, things can seem different than they are. You have to step back to get perspective and realize why people died.

Marv

 

[spblat]

Thank you both for these answers. I admit that I am still confused. hlaltimus tells me (please let me know if I have misunderstood you) that the Bible in general and the Old Testament in particular are genuinely divine works that are beyond full understanding, particularly by such inferior and fallible creatures such as we. From this it is understandable and normal and expected that we might struggle with it. Indeed, if I understand your meaning, that's part of what God intended for us.

BigNorsk, I wonder if I could ask you for some clarification, as the questions I asked were not the ones you answered. Am I missing the point with my questions? What I'm most interested in is how Christians come to agreement on how they should reconcile their differences when it comes to passages in the Bible that could be seen to someone new to the faith as troubling for one reason or another. You gave one type of example, and of course you can anticipate that there are a few others sticking in my mind. Is there a place a new Christian can go to learn the truth of these troubling passages? How is the new Christian to be assured that the clarifications he or she receives are as divinely inspired as the original Word?

 

[tapero]

Thank you both for these answers. I admit that I am still confused. hlaltimus tells me (please let me know if I have misunderstood you) that the Bible in general and the Old Testament in particular are genuinely divine works that are beyond full understanding, particularly by such inferior and fallible creatures such as we. From this it is understandable and normal and expected that we might struggle with it. Indeed, if I understand your meaning, that's part of what God intended for us.

BigNorsk, I wonder if I could ask you for some clarification, as the questions I asked were not the ones you answered. Am I missing the point with my questions? What I'm most interested in is how Christians come to agreement on how they should reconcile their differences when it comes to passages in the Bible that could be seen to someone new to the faith as troubling for one reason or another. You gave one type of example, and of course you can anticipate that there are a few others sticking in my mind. Is there a place a new Christian can go to learn the truth of these troubling passages? How is the new Christian to be assured that the clarifications he or she receives are as divinely inspired as the original Word?

I guess I just wanted to answer one point in the blue highlighted text.

Some are troubled by things in the OT. However, from the whole bible we know that God is good, never does evil, is holy, righteous and just, and the many other attributes He has.

So, it is by faith, that when we come to difficult things, if we don't understand, that we trust God told others what was in His wisdom the right thing to command.

Meanwhile,am going to locate a text on one particular difficult passage of the bible and will get back here as soon as I can find it, or if I can't will erase this portion of text.

 

[tapero]

But, what about the children of nations that were destroyed by God for Israel or punishment for disobedience to God? All children before the age of accountability would go to heaven when we consider Romans 5:12-18.

But, if a nation was corrupted by fallen angelic contamination, especially considering the time in Genesis 6 when the fallen angels took wives of the women and had progeny who were called the nephilum, if the children were not contaminated, they would go to heaven if they had not reached the age of accountability.

.

 

[spblat]

So, it is by faith, that when we come to difficult things, if we don't understand, that we trust God told others what was in His wisdom the right thing to command.

This is the key to my question. Do I understand you to be saying that clarification regarding the most difficult passages is delivered by men, who have received this clarification from God? Since we know that men are weak and fallible, how can we be sure that they truly received this clarification from God, and are not deceiving us?

Some are troubled by things in the OT. However, from the whole bible we know that God is good, never does evil, is holy, righteous and just, and the many other attributes He has.

How do we know this from the whole Bible? Is it required to be more specific about what we mean by "evil"? Perhaps this works if we define God as "that which is good, never does evil, is holy, righteous and just", but is that not then a circular definition?

 

[spblat]

I hope I'm not pushing too hard on this. It's not my intention to provoke a debate; what I most want is to understand how the thought process works.

 

[BigNorsk]

Thank you both for these answers. I admit that I am still confused. hlaltimus tells me (please let me know if I have misunderstood you) that the Bible in general and the Old Testament in particular are genuinely divine works that are beyond full understanding, particularly by such inferior and fallible creatures such as we. From this it is understandable and normal and expected that we might struggle with it. Indeed, if I understand your meaning, that's part of what God intended for us.

BigNorsk, I wonder if I could ask you for some clarification, as the questions I asked were not the ones you answered. Am I missing the point with my questions? What I'm most interested in is how Christians come to agreement on how they should reconcile their differences when it comes to passages in the Bible that could be seen to someone new to the faith as troubling for one reason or another. You gave one type of example, and of course you can anticipate that there are a few others sticking in my mind. Is there a place a new Christian can go to learn the truth of these troubling passages? How is the new Christian to be assured that the clarifications he or she receives are as divinely inspired as the original Word?

I kind of went past your questions to show why some things that didn't seem to make sense really do.

You'd think that there was some universal this is the way, but there really isn't. Some people decide to trust certain other people, like Roman Catholics decide to trust their church, many Protestants trust the Bible, other groups of Protestants go with the Catholics in trusting certain people.

I don't believe there is any way that you can trust a clarification to the extent you can the Bible. The Bible is inspired, God breathed, someone's interpretation is not.

There are lots of types of troubling. Here's how I personally handle it. I found the thing to do is to accept that one will not understand it all, but to keep studying. It isn't worth it to get hung up on one or several problems. What you find is if you just keep studying that many of the problems resolve themselves.

There are those types of people who specialize in problems. They are called apologists. www.carm.org is an example of one. You can find a lot of answers to a lot of problems on such a site. Not all of them will perfectly satisfy you, some will.

A lot of the problems will turn out not to be problems at all. But we must admit that there are certain things that we think we know, but we can't be certain. Some numbers in the Bible are that way, very difficult to copy repeatedly and there are some that are probably mistakes or simply conflict with another passage. Still, instead of just changing it to what we think they are kept unless and until evidence is found that clears it up.

As a christian, you are an individual. When it is time to stand in front of the judgement seat you can't point to other people or make those others responsible for your life. Yet at the same time we are all part of one body. Quite the mystery that.

One big thing that a lot of christians don't grasp is all the different styles of writing in the bible. You may hear someone say that they literally interpret everything. Well, that's kind of not the best. For instance, the Psalms are poetry, they should be read as poetry. Not as some absolutely literal type of prose. Revelation is an example of apocalyptic literature, it needs to be read as such, reading it literally you are going to get some awfully strange interpretations.

If that doesn't answer your questions, it's because there isn't a universal answer.

Marv

 

[spblat]

there isn't a universal answer.

I find this to be a perfectly honest, genuine, legitimate and satisfactory response. Ask me how we got here, I'll tell you about evolution; I think natural selection is rock solid (a debate for another time and another forum). But if you ask me how the spark of life was ignited, I'll shrug and hypothesize about comets, organic compounds, ...then I'll trail off and shrug again. We don't really know, but as atheists we think a natural answer exists, even though we don't have it yet.

Ask me how the stars and planets got here, and I'll tell you a story of ten thousand million years, dust and gravity and fusion and supernovae and the Big Bang. But if you ask me what happened before the Big Bang, I'll shrug and mumble something about quantum electrodynamics, the theory that there was no "time" therefore no "before"...then I'll trail off and shrug again. We don't have any idea what happened before the Big Bang, and that's especially troubling for a scientist because it's hard to imagine a way to gather evidence about it. (Then again, I'm okay with mystery tantalizingly hanging in the air before us. Gives us something to strive toward.)

So in the same way a Christian must study the Bible and pray for God's meaning to be revealed, a scientist studies the evidence and works with his peers to uncover the answers. We may differ on where truth comes from and how to recognize it, but we both have processes for taking ourselves from uncertainty towards certainty.

 

[tapero]

Hi,

Thanks for writing back.. I copied/pasted again so will reply in blue.

Quote:
Originally Posted by tapero
So, it is by faith, that when we come to difficult things, if we don't understand, that we trust God told others what was in His wisdom the right thing to command.

This is the key to my question. Do I understand you to be saying that clarification regarding the most difficult passages is delivered by men, who have received this clarification from God? Since we know that men are weak and fallible, how can we be sure that they truly received this clarification from God, and are not deceiving us?

I think I wrote it wrong.

I wrote:

So, it is by faith, that when we come to difficult things, if we don't understand, that we trust God told others what was in His wisdom the right thing to command.

What I meant to say, was when God commanded others to do such and such; being a difficult thing to grasp from the old testament, that we trust that God in His wisdom did the right thing. That is of course because of His nature that we understand from what we know of God by the bible and by our relationship with God that He never does evil, and we understand His attributes from the bible also, and what we do this all through faith, and what we don't understand, we still don't attribute wrong to God in any way, because God does no evil or wrong.


So, no, not clarification from other men. Unless of course we are speaking of the bible, then yes, I trust the bible speaks to things and clarifies some things, but other than that, no God didn't clarify to other men why He did such and such, tho I've no doubt there's many who believe differently, however not mainstream. However in the bible, God spoke with Moses, and Paul (saul), and others, which we only know what is written, not what was not written, and we go by that, at least I do.
Quote:
Some are troubled by things in the OT. However, from the whole bible we know that God is good, never does evil, is holy, righteous and just, and the many other attributes He has.

How do we know this from the whole Bible? Is it required to be more specific about what we mean by "evil"? Perhaps this works if we define God as "that which is good, never does evil, is holy, righteous and just", but is that not then a circular definition?


I have a feeling your very intellectual, and I am clearly not, so you really need to break things down for me.

In the bible, I am saying, we know God's qualities from what is written and from the many scriptures and events that occured. So it is from that we know that God is not evil, nor does evil. You said, what do we mean by evil? Maybe you can give me your definition of evil.

They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless.

I note here that evil is listed separately from other characteristics of man. It could be if a theologian explained it, but I'm just guessing that here God is just reinforcing the depravity of man by the adjectives used above.

By the way this is from romans 1, and describes us before Christ, and after Christ, we still commit some of these sins, though many will say they don't. Which is good if they don't, but we do in our hearts, and outwardly as well, and will struggle all our lives with sin.

So in re to evil, let me know your thoughts about what it means.

Okay, above you describe what I wrote were some attributes of God as a circular definition. Way over my head. Can you explain that?

Thanks,
tapero

 

[ebia]

Thank you both for these answers. I admit that I am still confused. hlaltimus tells me (please let me know if I have misunderstood you) that the Bible in general and the Old Testament in particular are genuinely divine works that are beyond full understanding, particularly by such inferior and fallible creatures such as we. From this it is understandable and normal and expected that we might struggle with it. Indeed, if I understand your meaning, that's part of what God intended for us.

It's in struggling to understand that we learn. One doesn't learn much from being given the answers - one learns from struggling with the questions.

BigNorsk, I wonder if I could ask you for some clarification, as the questions I asked were not the ones you answered. Am I missing the point with my questions? What I'm most interested in is how Christians come to agreement on how they should reconcile their differences when it comes to passages in the Bible that could be seen to someone new to the faith as troubling for one reason or another. You gave one type of example, and of course you can anticipate that there are a few others sticking in my mind. Is there a place a new Christian can go to learn the truth of these troubling passages?

There generally isn't a single agreed on answer to those passages.

How is the new Christian to be assured that the clarifications he or she receives are as divinely inspired as the original Word?

One should steer very clear of any clarifications that claim that.

Christianity isn't about having a neatly packaged set of certainties. It's about struggling with the difficult questions, but doing so in the light of Christ.

In an attempt to compete with the promises of Modernism some people try to turn it Christianity into the neatly packaged set of certainties, but they mutilate the faith beyond recognition in the process.

 

[tapero]

BigNorsk, I wonder if I could ask you for some clarification, as the questions I asked were not the ones you answered. Am I missing the point with my questions? What I'm most interested in is how Christians come to agreement on how they should reconcile their differences when it comes to passages in the Bible that could be seen to someone new to the faith as troubling for one reason or another. You gave one type of example, and of course you can anticipate that there are a few others sticking in my mind. Is there a place a new Christian can go to learn the truth of these troubling passages?

Hi, hope you don't mind me bringing this bit current again. I've found in the bible that the things that are not explained, very common questions to Christian and Non Nicene Christian, and non believers alike that there simply is no explanation and thus we go by faith and trust in God.

However, there are those who are greatly studied and offer their opinions and then it gets preached and some come to believe these things, but I find for myself, if it's not in scripture, then I can't conjecture an answer, can only guess at things. It's an awe thing; to try and understand the many things that are not answered in the bible.

So to me, those who unravel things in the bible, I take with a grain of salt, cause it's to me obvious there is no answer to many questions I have which are not explained in the bible.

So, again, many do take their preachers words for things, many take commentaries words for things, but if they are speaking beyond scripture to me it is not good, and again, they are mere men, doing their best to understand, but it's really just their opinions. Unless of course something is clearly explained in scripture.

Some with a great grasp and understanding of God's word, can help greatly by pulling contexts together, but again, they are just giving their best effort to explain difficult passages etc.

We just do not know the answers to many things, and so it goes to faith.

Also, as you know there are different theological stances. And all can back it up with the word, yet have 4 or 5 different stances on the same subject.

I think it's best not to know about those things, and read the word, and try to understand by oneself, and to wonder in awe of God at what we don't understand.

Though I do reach out to others for their take on things, but I don't make it mine, unless it fits with my comprehension of the subject.

ETA in thinking of what I'm writing here, I think I sound awful. I do have pre concieved notions in my head and understandings in my head from days past, and though it wasn't till recent years that I started to seek on my own more.

by the way, I don't study much, so I'm just spouting along here.

On another topic, i noticed in my last post that I said something about God, that we don't attribute evil to Him, that He is all good, etc.

I neglected to say that some Christians do believe that God causes them to suffer (which is not true), however it is what they understand. Some get angry at Him for their lives (which is a normal reaction for some), but not for others. I just wanted to point that out, as I didn't mean to say we all feel this way. I know we all have different personalities and understanding of God, how He works in our lives and in the lives of others. Much is a mystery, but we have promises..such as He works all things to the good for those who believe in Him. The promises and truths of scripture helps us daily.

 

[spblat]

Ebia, thank you for the clarification. My post #10 on the previous page is my respectful response to your ideas.

Tapero, I am touched by your honesty and uncertainty, and I can see that this is a perfectly OK aspect of your faith: the process of learning and stumbling along as a human looking up to God seems more clear to me. You asked me for some clarifications, which I will try to provide.

How do we know this from the whole Bible? Is it required to be more specific about what we mean by "evil"? Perhaps this works if we define God as "that which is good, never does evil, is holy, righteous and just", but is that not then a circular definition?

I have a feeling your very intellectual, and I am clearly not, so you really need to break things down for me.

In the bible, I am saying, we know God's qualities from what is written and from the many scriptures and events that occured. So it is from that we know that God is not evil, nor does evil. You said, what do we mean by evil? Maybe you can give me your definition of evil.

I guess I do think of myself as somewhat intellectual. This is a major part of my makeup as a nonbeliever. For me, this means that I seek verifiable truth to life's mysteries, reject what seems improbable based on what I accept as evidence, and leave the rest in the "unexplained mystery, try to figure this out someday" pile.

A circular argument is known to logic people as "begging the question". Wikipedia has a great article on this and gives the following example:

The Bible says God exists, and the Bible must be right since it is the revealed word of God, so God exists.

It's not logically inconsistent, but for the argument to work one has to assume the truth of what one is trying to prove, which is a no-no in logic. (We probably shouldn't go too far down this path on this thread. Let us disagree for now on the importance of rigorous logic in defining how we live our lives.)

In terms of evil in a circular argument, it's something like this: "God is not evil, nor does evil. We know this because he tells us so in the Bible." This only works if you have already submitted your life to Him in absolute faith and trust. For someone who lacks that trust, the claim is less convincing. If I do not know God, then I don't trust Him. And if I don't trust Him, then I don't believe Him when he says He is good in the face of what I think of as His evil deeds. (In fact this is not how I think, since I believe that the Bible was written by men without any supernatural influence. This too is dangerous territory, and not part of what I meant to ask you about in this thread.)

To answer your other question, since I do not believe in the supernatural, I admit that I define evil in human terms. We know good from bad, and that which is really REALLY bad is evil. Rape is heinous and wanton and evil. Killing is evil with a spectrum of troubling "grey area" exceptions. I guess I could claim that gross violations of the golden rule are evil. I also believe that an infinite punishment for a finite crime (death penalty for stealing a pack of gum, or eternal damnation for failing to believe) falls into this category. Ditto for killing or ostracizing another for his or her beliefs/non-beliefs.

We've diverted into a few topics that I enjoy debating, but I suspect they are unsuited for this forum. May I summarize our conversation like this?

ATHEIST: "The Bible seems inconsistent and self-contradictory. And it has passages which disturb me. And the God of the Old Testament is often scary and sometimes does things that look to me like evil. How do you guys sort this out?"

CHRISTIAN: "God is good. The Bible is His word to us. We are imperfect, and He is perfect, and we are incapable of full understanding. But we do our best, through prayer and study and by placing our absolute faith in Him."

If I have captured your ideas accurately, my question is answered (though it raises other questions I'll have to consider and ask another time if you'll indulge me).

Cheers!

 

[GodSoLovedTheWorld]

Yes the OT God was a pretty nasty piece of work at times. Mind you can you blame Him? Such disobedience...
Anyway, Christians have been killing each other for centuries over certain Biblical passages and despite the flow of blood drying up, the underlying tension is still there.
Sadly, you will never get all Christians to agree with each other. The Reformation was a one way ticket (at least in my opinion).
That may sound overly negative, but just think about some of the differences and you will, perhaps, come to the same conclusion.

 

[salida]

Most agree on the basic concepts as their is a basic theological standard. Other things are minor and arn't relevant to salvation.

 

[ebia]

Ebia, thank you for the clarification. My post #10 on the previous page is my respectful response to your ideas:

I find this to be a perfectly honest, genuine, legitimate and satisfactory response. Ask me how we got here, I'll tell you about evolution; I think natural selection is rock solid (a debate for another time and another forum). But if you ask me how the spark of life was ignited, I'll shrug and hypothesize about comets, organic compounds, ...then I'll trail off and shrug again. We don't really know, but as atheists we think a natural answer exists, even though we don't have it yet.

Ask me how the stars and planets got here, and I'll tell you a story of ten thousand million years, dust and gravity and fusion and supernovae and the Big Bang. But if you ask me what happened before the Big Bang, I'll shrug and mumble something about quantum electrodynamics, the theory that there was no "time" therefore no "before"...then I'll trail off and shrug again. We don't have any idea what happened before the Big Bang, and that's especially troubling for a scientist because it's hard to imagine a way to gather evidence about it. (Then again, I'm okay with mystery tantalizingly hanging in the air before us. Gives us something to strive toward.)

So in the same way a Christian must study the Bible and pray for God's meaning to be revealed, a scientist studies the evidence and works with his peers to uncover the answers. We may differ on where truth comes from and how to recognize it, but we both have processes for taking ourselves from uncertainty towards certainty.

No problem with any of that. But science and theology aren't either/or. Rather they are trying to answer different sorts of questions.

Science is very good at answering factual, how, questions about creation itself such as "how is a snowflake formed", "how old is the universe", "why does my thumb hurt when I hit it with a hammer", but very bad at answering 'why' questions like "why are we here", "why is there so much suffering in the world", "what is love all about".... because such questions don't fit the enlightenment model that is foundational to science.

If you only want to be able to answer the sorts of questions that science can answer then stick to science - it's very good at giving it's sort of answer to those sorts of questions. If you want to be able to answer the other sorts of questions then you have to look elsewhere, perhaps to theology. But don't expect to be able to do theology the same way you do science.

Note that many questions are really multiple quesitons in one, eg your:

Ask me how the stars and planets got here?

An answer about hydrogen clouds and super-novea is one sort of answer to that. "God created them to be jewels in the sky" is another sort of answer to that. Both are correct - but they are answering different questions implicit in the same text.

 

[spblat]

No problem with any of that. But science and theology aren't either/or. Rather they are trying to answer different sorts of questions.

Science is very good at answering factual, how, questions about creation itself such as "how is a snowflake formed", "how old is the universe", "why does my thumb hurt when I hit it with a hammer", but very bad at answering 'why' questions like "why are we here", "why is there so much suffering in the world", "what is love all about".... because such questions don't fit the enlightenment model that is foundational to science.

If you only want to be able to answer the sorts of questions that science can answer then stick to science - it's very good at giving it's sort of answer to those sorts of questions. If you want to be able to answer the other sorts of questions then you have to look elsewhere, perhaps to theology. But don't expect to be able to do theology the same way you do science.

An answer about hydrogen clouds and super-novea is one sort of answer to that. "God created them to be jewels in the sky" is another sort of answer to that. Both are correct - but they are answering different questions implicit in the same text.

I almost totally agree with you. In fact, I don't see my atheism as a religion at all: atheism does not supply me with answers (spiritual or otherwise), it only labels me as someone who either lacks belief or actively disbelieves in God. My use of the label can tell you what I don't believe, but it doesn't tell you much about how I live my life. If I label myself as a skeptic and/or a scientist, then you'll have a clearer idea about how I view the world, how I "know" things.

 

[MikeMcK]

I will refrain from naming the specific passages unless asked, as I do not wish to provoke.

I wish you would. It's very difficult to know how to answer your question without knowing what you're referring to.

 

[spblat]

I wish you would. It's very difficult to know how to answer your question without knowing what you're referring to.

OK, but please let me emphasize: I really don't want to debate the significance of these passages. What I want to do is acknowledge that these can be seen as controversial and/or confusing, and I want to understand whether Christians have a consistent method for managing the controversy among themselves, particularly among the newer members of their flock.

I quote from my blog:

Genesis 22. Ezekiel 9. Ezekiel 23. Exodus (all of it, but I was especially struck by the fact that there are way way more than 10 commandments). Leviticus (all of it, but check out Lev 26 for some transcendent wrath). The astonishing 2 Kings 2:23-24. Job. {deleted} Job! And those are just the bits I happen to have noticed in my first week’s study.

Again: I don't think the exercise is necessary, because I feel that I already have the answer. Unless you deny that any of those passages can be seen as startling?

May I summarize our conversation like this?

ATHEIST: "The Bible seems inconsistent and self-contradictory. And it has passages which disturb me. And the God of the Old Testament is often scary and sometimes does things that look to me like evil. How do you guys sort this out?"

CHRISTIAN: "God is good. The Bible is His word to us. We are imperfect, and He is perfect, and we are incapable of full understanding. But we do our best, through prayer and study and by placing our absolute faith in Him."