Which parts?

[Northern Christian]

Yes, you've seen this before, but here it is again.

How do we know which parts of the Bible should be believed and which parts shouldn't be? How do we know which parts are historical, and which parts are not?

 

[Bushido216]

All of the Bible should be believed.

As for Biblical literacy. You can't look at the Bible as a self-contained work. You have to look at God's word and God's creation. They're helpers.

 

[lucaspa]

Yes, you've seen this before, but here it is again.

How do we know which parts of the Bible should be believed and which parts shouldn't be? How do we know which parts are historical, and which parts are not?

Ditto Bushido. That "should be believed" is biased. As we have pointed out, it's not about "believing" in God or about the Bible, but about a particular interpretation.

You already have some rules. For instance, you don't read poetry as literal, do you? You know they are full of metaphors, allusions, and other non-literal devices. So you don't read the Psalms as literal.

What you don't realize is that the whole Pentateuch is poetry in Hebrew! The English doesn't come off that way; you lose that in translation. But go to a synagogue sometime and listen to the cantor before service. You can detect the meter of the poem from him.

We also use extrabiblical evidence. Where the extrabiblical evidence is strong against a literal interpretation, we defer to the extrabiblical evidence. And don't say evolutionists do this! All Christians do. I often bring up Luke 2:1. We use extrabiblical evidence to know that the whole world was not enrolled in Caesar's census. At one time many passages were interpreted literally that the earth did not move. This led Christians to support geocentrism and oppose Copernicus, Galileo, and others advocating heliocentrism. The extrabiblical evidence won and the intepretation of the passages was changed.

In fact, we often see literalists here using extrabiblical evidence to change Is. 40. They change the literal "circle" to a sphere. Why? Because the extrabiblical evidence shows the earth is not flat. So they insist that "circle" was really sphere!

What we discuss here is whether the extrabiblical evidence is strong enough to mandate a reinterpretation of Genesis 1-11 and to abandon the scientific theories based on the literal interpretation. Theistic evolutionists say "yes". Creationists say "no".

I personally tend to accept that an account is historical unless I have evidence to falsify that it is. There is such evidence to falsify the historicity of Genesis 1-11.

 

[MagusAlbertus]

All of the Bible should be believed.

As for Biblical literacy. You can't look at the Bible as a self-contained work. You have to look at God's word and God's creation. They're helpers.

Is this honestly your opinion? or if you found out that it's scientifically *naturaly* imposable to rise someone from the dead then Jesus never rose? how about a virgin birth? how about the existence of Giants? what if some archeologist says that only 10,000 Jews left Egypt? what if someone said the flood doesn’t make scense? what if someone said that man came from woman? what if someone said God didn't speak existence into being?



where do you put and end to 'the book of nature' as you see it through what inherently fallible science contradicting the word infallible word of God?

where do the 'mericals' end and the 'metaphors' begin?

 

[Nova]

I was curious, should I "believe" the part where it says Eve was formed from Adams rib?

From what I have read on this forum the Thiestic Evolutionist would say that you should not believe that Eve was formed from Adams rib, rather she evolved

 

[Bushido216]

Is this honestly your opinion? or if you found out that it's scientifically *naturaly* imposable to rise someone from the dead then Jesus never rose? how about a virgin birth? how about the existence of Giants? what if some archeologist says that only 10,000 Jews left Egypt? what if someone said the flood doesn’t make scense? what if someone said that man came from woman? what if someone said God didn't speak existence into being?



where do you put and end to 'the book of nature' as you see it through what inherently fallible science contradicting the word infallible word of God?

where do the 'mericals' end and the 'metaphors' begin?

Lucaspa gave a very eloquent response to the Resurrection point you bring up, and I will attempt to recreate it here.

The Resurrection is data. You cannot use data to disprove a theory. The theory was "people do not rise from the dead after three days". The Resurrection disproved that theory, causing a necessary revision to the theory. It now exists as "people do not rise from the dead after three days unless God intervenes.

The rest of your "points" are illogically ordered.

And I never said that God's word is fallible. Do you comprehend? I simply said that God's word and God's creation are helpers to understanding each other. The data shows that evolution is the way that God created. So instead we evaluate what else Scripture could possibly be telling us and look for a new interpretation.

 

[Bushido216]

I was curious, should I "believe" the part where it says Eve was formed from Adams rib?

From what I have read on this forum the Thiestic Evolutionist would say that you should not believe that Eve was formed from Adams rib, rather she evolved

She didn't evolve from Adam. Rather, the whole population that originally made up H. sapiens evolved.

 

[MagusAlbertus]

So all of the questions, many of which are also brought up by people who say science is right and the bible is wrong, are equally dismissible.. because?



if you say birds came after beasts you are saying the word of God is wrong, I’m not saying your saying God is infallible.. I’m saying your saying the word of God is, as such their is no basis for faith, because the rest of the bible might well be equally a 'good, or Godly story';



if you can move verse 20 in front of verse 25 you can do anything you like to distort the word of God to fit whatever worldly knowledge you think you have.

 

[wblastyn]

Why can't you creationists tell the difference between "non-literal" and "not true"?

 

[wblastyn]

if you say birds came after beasts you are saying the word of God is wrong, I’m not saying your saying God is infallible.. I’m saying your saying the word of God is, as such their is no basis for faith, because the rest of the bible might well be equally a 'good, or Godly story';

JESUS is the Word of God, not the Bible.

 

[Didaskomenos]

This is an excellent question. The Bible is not meant to be completely and immediately obvious in every ounce of its meaning. Otherwise it would be successful at that, and even the more conservative or literalist readers could name some passages that don't suggest an obvious interpretation (the whole book of Revelation, for instance!). Peter said that the "natural man" does not understand the things of God, because they are spiritually discerned. I think this not only means that believers will glean spiritual truth in ways non-believers will miss, but also highlights the difference in the "natural" and the "spiritual" hermeneutic applied across the board; a "natural" reading is not going to recognize the spiritual intent of the Scripture at hand. Aside from this, there are a number of ways I decide what I think is historical and what is not:

1) Literary mode or genre. Revelation is apocalyptic. Psalms is poetry. Genesis 1-11 is undisguisedly written in mythological speech, while the rest of Genesis seems to follow somewhat the same type of writing as the sagas of 12th-13th century Iceland. The history in the Samuels, Kings, and Chronicles, which used exaggeration of figures (man-count in armies, for instance) and lack of concern for dispassionate objectivity is exactly what is to be expected from the Ancient Near East of the time, and is to be distinguished from the empirical, scientific goals (goals, not realizations!) for historiography that do not really appear until centuries later (even the fathers of such historiography, Herodotus and Thucydides, were often notoriously subjective). The shift in the goals and methods for telling history that had taken place by the time of Jesus is one reason the historical narratives of the NT are much likelier to represent the historical events accurately. If the early Christian was to write history, it had to be "true" in the sense that was acceptable for the genre at his own time. The same goes for the OT writers - their view of the genre was not that "dispassionate, precise, objective" = "history", and could thus meet the demands of truthfulness while not being completely scientifically factual.

2) The spritual value of the passage in question is almost invariably to be taken the same whether read as history or as another type of narrative. For example, Jonah and the big fish: does it matter if it really happened? Don't we get the point either way?

3) The historical church has laid the groundwork for some basic meaning in Scripture passages, just as the believers before them had been guided by God to author the Scriptures to reflect their theological beliefs.

4) I think more spiritual significance of each individual passage is to be sought by asking the Holy Spirit for illumination.

5) I also think that no one will have read this whole thing, but it's helpful for me to have written it down. I do not find hermeneutics a walk in the park myself, but I don't think I should have to. God is much bigger than my half-hearted and surface-level attempts at understanding him and his ways, so shouldn't it take a considerable amount of work to understand it all?

 

[MagusAlbertus]

JESUS is the Word of God, not the Bible.

How do you know about Jesus, did a man tell you or did the word of God? and Jesus is the SON of GOD that being GOD HIMSELF, the word of God is God speaking to man, the SON of God is God with man.



how do you know the words quoted from Jesus aren’t manipulated, verse 20 in front of verse 25 in some sermon?



what's your basis of faith? and what, and who, do you have faith in? Jesus? who's he if you don't know anything about him for sure?



I"M NOT A YEC *i have no idea HOW God did what he did, but i know the bible is true* I’m saying that the bible doesn't lie! and your saying that it does by saying beast then birds occurred.



why can't you even submit to the word that you'd be willing to give over such a small, easily fallible point?

 

[Didaskomenos]

The testimony of the believers who followed Jesus gave us the Bible. It's the testimony to the Word, who is a person. Jesus is the only infallible, inerrant Word of God, and making the Bible another one 1) subtracts from Jesus' sole authority 2) adds to your own authority, since the Bible can be interpreted a billion different ways, and you'll believe your own supremely.

 

[MagusAlbertus]

there is no basis for what Jesus has said if you do not have the bible as infallible.

 

[Karl - Liberal Backslider]

Nonsense. There is no infallibility doctrine attached to Hansard but we still take it as a good record of what MPs say in the House of Commons.

 

[lucaspa]

I was curious, should I "believe" the part where it says Eve was formed from Adams rib?

You should believe it for the theological message that says that men and women are intimately linked even though it sometimes seems like they are totally different. You should also believe it as a patriarchal society trying to justify the secondary role it gave to women.

Again, there are different types of truth. I find it very ironic that the scientists here are arguing that science is not the only truth and that creationists are arguing that it is.

From what I have read on this forum the Thiestic Evolutionist would say that you should not believe that Eve was formed from Adams rib, rather she evolved

As Bushido noted, humans as a population, men and women together, evolved from a previous species. Notice that Genesis 1:26-27 also has God creating man and woman (both plural in Hebrew) together.

Notice that the truths I pointed out above -- the intimate link between men and women and the subservient role of women in a patriarchal society -- are also true with humans having evolved.

 

[lucaspa]

How do you know about Jesus, did a man tell you or did the word of God?

Five men did. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Paul. Or are you denying that humans wrote the Bible. Read Mark 10 and Matthew 19. Jesus was very clear that a man, Moses, wrote the Pentateuch. He didn't call scriptures the "word of God", but rather "what Moses wrote".

I hate to say this Magus, but you are making a god out of the Bible. That's worship of a false idol.

Jesus is the SON of GOD that being GOD HIMSELF, the word of God is God speaking to man, the SON of God is God with man.

You just denied Christian theology here. Jesus is the Living Word. See John 1:1.

how do you know the words quoted from Jesus aren’t manipulated, verse 20 in front of verse 25 in some sermon?

Some of them are. That's what Biblical scholarship has shown. Compare the sayings of Jesus in the canonical gospels with the Gospel of Thomas and you will see how men manipulated the words of Jesus.

what's your basis of faith? and what, and who, do you have faith in? Jesus? who's he if you don't know anything about him for sure?

I"M NOT A YEC *i have no idea HOW God did what he did,

Well, then, you can relax, sit back, and let science -- studying God's Creation -- tell you HOW God created, can't you?

but i know the bible is true* I’m saying that the bible doesn't lie! and your saying that it does by saying beast then birds occurred.

Then why aren't you a YEC? After all, would the Bible lie about the generations, according to you? And counting back generations gives you a creation at 4004 BC.

What we are saying is that the human authors of Genesis 1 did not know what the sequence was. Instead, they wrote a theologically true document to reinforce the faith of the Hebrews during a very trying time.

The really important truth in Genesis 1 is that God created. Is the "how" really that important? I don't think so.

why can't you even submit to the word that you'd be willing to give over such a small, easily fallible point?

Because God told us plainly in His Creation that beasts came before birds. I don't ignore God. Why do you? I also do not worship the Bible like you do. That violates the First Commandment.

Why do you insist that there is only one type of truth when we all know there are many types of truth? Why do you not look for the theological truths in Genesis 1?

 

[lucaspa]

Is this honestly your opinion? or if you found out that it's scientifically *naturaly* imposable to rise someone from the dead then Jesus never rose? how about a virgin birth? how about the existence of Giants? what if some archeologist says that only 10,000 Jews left Egypt? what if someone said the flood doesn’t make scense? what if someone said that man came from woman? what if someone said God didn't speak existence into being?

Bushido already gave my answer about the Resurrectiona and Virgin birth. Your statements are inaccurate science.

Now, let's take the rest of them in order:
1. Giants. The data says these did not exist. If they really existed, God would have left evidence in His Creation.
2. Some archeologists and theologians have already hypothesized that less than 1,000 Jews left Egypt. However, as to 10,000, just how many slaves were there? 10,000 sounds like a reasonable number for the day.
3. By 1831 all Christians had said that the Flood, as a world-wide event, not only "didn't make sense" but never happened! See Rev. Adam Sedgwick's Farewell Address to the Royal Geological Society in 1831.
4. Several theologians have proposed that Genesis 1 is talking about manipulating existing matter and thus did not speak existence into being. See Bernhard Anderson for a summary of this.

Magus, Christianity has survived all these dire events. It did so because none of these affect the essentials of Judeo-Christianity.

where do you put and end to 'the book of nature' as you see it through what inherently fallible science contradicting the word infallible word of God?

Here's the crux of the problem. You are denying that God created! You see what you call "the book of nature" as being unconnected to God. But it's not and cannot be. After all, what did God create? NATURE. That "book of nature" is just as much the word of God as the Bible. More, because God directly wrote the book of nature but had to go thru fallible humans to write the Bible.

Tell me, how can the Bible be "infallible" when it is written by fallible humans?

 

[mrversatile48]

Type "Creation Science Research Assoc" to a search & you will see that modern science disproves the above assertions of atheists & liberal theoogians

Click my name, then "all posts" & see the report I posted in Friendship Court @ 3 hours ago, headed "Fight unjust book-banning campaign"

See the details of 23 top PhD creationists' "Grand Canyon: Different View" - causing panicky evolutionists into desparate, futile attempts to hide their own folly

My poem, "All The Wonders Of The Universe" - posted here @ a week ago - may also prove helpful

God bless!

Ian

 

[Karl - Liberal Backslider]

Liberal theologians? Hardly.

Lucaspa does not come across as a liberal to me. Nor does Wblastyn. I'm not a liberal either - more of a post-evangelical.

You posted your poem the other week didn't you? I seem to recall we did a critical analysis of the misconceptions in it.

I also can't help notice that your spam in Friendship Court was quite rightly spanked down by Susan.