The best answer I can give, and it has no proof whatsoever, is that I am unsure what happened. Based on physical evidence (or the lack thereof) along with the other info/sources, no, the story was not literal. Perhaps they made the laws up? Just a theory, not my opinion.
However, we can't say for certain that SOMETHING did not happen, even if not on that grand of a scale. If that is the case, then perhaps a smaller group DID leave Egypt, received the laws from God, and made their way to Canaan. Perhaps the story grew from humble beginnings into legend. I have no problem giving that theory due consideration.
Ultimately, I can't prove one way or another. No one can. It is up to personal faith as to what you believe. I just know that as a progressive moderate, I do not take the entire Bible literally. Yes, you have to dive deep into textual criticism with this type of position in order to differentiate between what is literal, metaphorical, allegorical, etc.
Sorry to throw the Joseph Smith thing out there, but you got the point.
Hi PA,
Yes, you'll probably find as we discuss throughout these threads that I'm not really as dull as some might make me out to be. I understood your point perfectly well, and allowed that it is a valid question. Why do we believe one man's testimony over another's. That is ultimately the question that I have put to you in this discussion. Why do you believe the testimony of rabbi Wolpe and the others that you alluded to, over and above the testimony of the Scriptures?
I'm sure that the foundation of that answer rests upon how we each perceive the Scriptures, i.e., where they came from, how we got them, God's purpose in giving them to us, if in fact God did give them to us.
Let me just say, friend, that there was a time in my life that I most likely would have agreed with much of what you have written, claim to believe, and the various testimonies of the extrabiblical witnesses that you have posted. However, much the same as Paul's testimony, there came a time in my life that I know, however for your understanding I will use the words, 'I believe' that God and Jesus by the power of God's Holy Spirit grabbed a hold of me and shook me by the collar and opened my eyes to the truth. This is what happened to Paul. He was a man who believed in a God, and in fact believed in the very same God that Moses wrote about, but he really had no understanding of how the Scriptures were laying out a plan. A plan of God's salvation. He merely believed, as many Jews still today believe, that if they keep to Torah and the practice of the feasts and keeping of the law that they are fulfilling what their God desires of them.
Paul wrote that he was a Jew above all Jews. Scrupulous in keeping every jot and tittle of the law. Above reproach in his adherence to the law, yet...
One day God, through His Son and His Spirit, reached out to that man who had really so little understanding of God and His plan and purpose in this realm, and opened that man's eyes. We are told that scales fell from his eyes. He went from being a blind man whose eyes were covered by scales of darkness, but had oh so much training and adherence to the law in his life, to being a man with understanding.
Now, many Jews are still like Paul was before God removed those scales from his eyes. As a matter of fact, most Jews still believe that it is some adherence to the law that will bring them their eternal salvation even though the new covenant tells clearly that it is not by the keeping of the law that any man be saved. Why don't they understand this? Further, why would you, not a Jew, place your hope in those without understanding.
You seem to have built this idea in your mind that a dozen or a hundred rabbis who, as you put it, 'new age rabbis', are right. Why? Is there some reason that you have, to believe that these rabbis are any different than Paul? That they are not just as blind; have the same scaly eyes, that Paul had before the Lord had mercy on him.
Your answers seem to be constantly couched in terms of 'I don't know...'
Well, why don't you know? Don't you believe that Paul knew the truth? Peter, John, Barnabas, Timothy and the many other first believers? Are you really satisfied that the answer, "I don't know", is what Jesus meant when he said that the Spirit would guide us into all truth?
Well, I hope that you'll pray about it and that one day your icon of a shining knight who leads the lost into the knowledge of the truth will truly represent who you are. But you are a young man yet. I was in my 40's before I found the truth.
God bless you.
In Christ, Ted
