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njlauren -> RE: Do Liberal Christians Hate The Bible? (7/12/2013 9:29:12 PM)
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ORIGINAL: Phydeaux
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ORIGINAL: tazzygirl
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ORIGINAL: PeonForHer
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An excellently written piece of literature
What makes you say that, Tazzy? Could you say how it's excellently written next to, say, a work by Shakespeare? Or even Stephen King?
I ask you, particularly, because I know you're capable of answering without being snide, sarcastic, smug, pompous and in general the worst possible advertisement for that which you support. [;)]
Im sorry, I missed your question until now.
Its a piece of literature that has withstood the test of time, is probably more recognizable that even Shakespeare.
Beyond that, the beauty of the text is hardly mistakable. Parables, poetry, history, fiction, all rolled up into one book.
Lets not overlook how long it took to write, how labor intensive it was compared to S. King. Original versions had such beautiful drawings from many masters.
As devisive as the Bible may be now, many people learned to read and write from the bible, whole family histories can be found within a Bible.
The tales within consist of familes, lovers, enemies... betrayal and loyalty... honor and wisdom...deceit and anger... if looked at from those vantage points, it is easily one of the best written pieces of literature. And one of the best selling. [;)]
Is that non-snarky enough for ya? [:D]
I think you just very well exemplified the difference between liberals and non liberal Christians.
To liberals - its literature.
To people on the right its the inerrant word of God.
Seems to me that if you want to *be* a Christian you have to follow Christian beliefs - you don't really get to pick and choose the convenient bits and the non convenient bits.
I don't think you get to choose one from column a and two from column b. At least not and call it Christianity. You can call it the very popular cult of bob, if you like.
For example the God that wrote Psalm 139:13-16 ESV
"For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother's womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them"
Acts 3:15 says that God is the Author of life.
It seems obvious to me that, for example, if God chooses to create life that he didn't intend his followers to destroy it. I don't see how you can be pro- abortion and consider yourself Christian.
No, to liberals, it is a book of faith that tries to explain the experience of God through the Bible writers eyes, and liberals recognize that it might be inspired, but it is the work of men. To call it the innerent word of God is something no one but the fundamentalists claim, the Catholic Church does not consider the bible innerrant, it is why they have church teaching because the bible may not be all clear....
As far as pick and choosing, "real" Christians as you call them pick and choose all the time. The fundamentalists, for example, have decided that Jesus wants people to be wealthy, and a large subset of them subscribe to notions like the poor are lazy and don't want to work, and you hear preacher claiming the eye of the needle story was a joke.......when that contradicts what Christ said, in spades. Jesus said divorce is out of the question except for adultery, yet most evangelical churches allow divorce. The Bible says love your fellow man as you love yourself, yet many of the 'true believers' are nasty, judgemental people who think because they are buddies with Jesus, why, all else doesn't matter. They certainly pick and choose when it comes to the OT, they cherry pick stuff and everything else is "Jewish Cultural Law".
And yes, even the idea of an inerrant book is in many ways a bit of a misnomer. Claiming that being Christian means you follow everything is problematic, because the NT itself is, it didn't drop from the sky, it wasn't written by Jesus, it wasn't written by his disciples, the canonical texts were written 30,40, 60, 70 years after Christ's death, and worse, many of those stories were oral tales passed down from mouth to mouth, were written down, copied, edited, botched, to the point that there are no original texts, the earliest ones we have are from the 4th century, and St. Jerome commented on the frustration of trying to figure out which was the true scripture....there are over 1500 greek texts of the NT, and they have 350,000 discrepencies between them.....inerrant, right?
The difference between liberal Christians and Orthodox Christians is primarily that liberal Christians see the bible as a book of inspiration,but also recognize it has large cultural and human aspects to it, whereas Orthodox Christians like to pretend they read it the right way, follow all the laws, while doing exactly what the liberals have done, i.e pick and choose, and with Orthodox Christians, it is usually using the bible to pick out from the bible things that fit their own prejudices to use against others to show how they 'aren't Christians". BTW, saying that liberal Christians aren't really Christian is insulting and demeaning, since in the end, there is probably more proof to the contentions of liberal Christians about the nature of the Bible then there is to the fundamentalist view. More importantly, Matthew among other parts of the bible chastises followers from saying things like that, he says don't use your faith in me to put yourselves above others. One of the fundamental differences between liberal Christians and Orthodox ones is that liberal ones recognize that everyone finds their own path to God, and their views are as valid as their own, whereas the Orthodox ones seem to believe that only they know the truth.
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