The bible is written in such a way

It’s almost as if the Bible was cobbled together from dozens of disjointed stories written by multiple authors that were not intended at the time of their writing to be grouped together.

 

The two are one in the same. When I say "which God" - the name of this God is irrelevant. The question is what is it that one is to have faith in and what does this mean in relation to how one lives their life ?

Do you place your faith in a flip flopping irrational genocidal xenophobic God with the most petty of human characteristics - a God who makes a rule stating that children should not be punished for the sins of their parents and then commands his people to go out and kill children "because of the sins of their parents".

or

Do place your faith in a God who says "love neighbor as self", Judge not, Let ye who is without sin cast the first rock, do unto others as you would have done to you / Treat others as you would be treated.

Which God do you choose ?

 

Assuming the Bible reveals something about God - the Bible depicts a God who is "Good" and a God who is "Evil".

You previously stated that you have found God in the Bible - or something akin to this (correct me if I am wrong).

My question was simple. Which God is the one that you claim is the God that attracted you to the Bible- claiming that this is the only Book in which you personally have found God.

 

But you are all talking as though the Bible is one discreet book. It is a library - many of the narratives were never written to be used as a book-of- rules for a way of life many centuries hence. Many other possible writings were excluded for various reasons. Each book has to studied on its own merits. (I am a Biblical theologian.)

 

To say there are no contradictions in the Bible is like saying ‘are there any contradictions in Des Moines Public Library?’ It is not a magic book straight from the mouth of God which will answer all the worlds problems, and trying to paper over contradictions, of which there are many, is not a useful exercise

 

Ex -totally-actly!

 

Matthew says Joseph went to Egypt to escape Herod according to Hosea 11:1 (but that verse ins only part of the context of the prophecy. According to that Israel (Jesus) must have worshipped Baal and used incense to idols) and didn't return till Herod had died. Matthew also says that Joseph was told not to go back to Bethlehem, but to go to Nazareth. Considering his home was in Nazareth that's not unreasonable. What was Joseph doing in Bethlehem in the first place? He didn't have a home there. Luke has to get Joseph to Bethlehem from Nazareth by some means, so he dreams up 'the house and lineage of David' excuse. Joseph may have been of the house of David, but David was 1000 years in the past. Bethlehem had been through turbulent times in those 1000 years. Most of its occupants had been taken to Babylon. Did any return to Bethlehem? Many Jews stayed in Babylon and others had migrated to Egypt, Greece and North Africa to escape the invasions. If Joseph had gone to Bethlehem it would have been against Roman Law which required people to remain where they were for censuses. And Mary need not have gone anyway. And she was heavily pregnant. Surely Joseph and God would not have put Mary through a long 90 mile - 7 day walking journey in her state.

Luke says that Joseph took Jesus to Nazareth 40 days after his birth (after Mary's purification) and they remained there.

40 days. Jewish Law required Jesus to be circumcised after 8 days and presented at the Temple to be redeemed.

It's a long journey into Egypt along the road, and going via the desert would have been arduous and dangerous for a woman and baby. So what vehicle did they use to get to Egypt and back in 40 days?

Now if Luke is correct about the 'house and lineage of David' then David had 20 sons that we know about, and daughters we don't. Given the large families of the time descendants of David over 1000 years would have multiplied to hundreds of thousands - ALL THE FAMILIES DESCENDING ON THE SMALL VILLAGE OF BETHLEHEM AT THE SAME TIME.

No room at the INN. There would n't have been room within 20 miles - given the sparsity of villages in the area. Jerusalem would have been overflowing.

Was the 'Last Supper' a Passover meal or a friendship meal. Both are indicated in the stories. There's actually no way of knowing as we don't know the year of Jesus Birth. What day was Passover in the year Jesus died? Perhaps you can explain those for me.

 

The Bible was written by a committee over the span of just a few years. All of the stories are based on one or more of the Ten Commandments found in Exodus chapter 34:11-28. The miracles are based on Exodus 34:10. The stories show the effects of following and disobeying the rules. When people heard the ancient oral stories the intent was for them to associate the story with the appropriate Commandment. All of the stories teach complete obedience and total loyalty to the Boss. You are supposed to simply obey without question and do as you are told to do. It is like a military code of conduct for the general population. It is also a very effective way to condition people to fork over their money to con men so that they can live in wealth and without working like the poor slobs they are controlling with their hocus-pocus.

Moses and his gang of thieves, the Levites, were masters of the con. They got a fully funded retirement plan at fifty years of age where they didn't have to do any work of any kind = Numbers 8:24-26. You can't pull off a con like that without conditioning people that they will go to hell if they eat shrimp.

All religions are about the money. You have it, they want it. That is why they will kill you if you try to leave their insane asylum.

 

What was the significance of Bethlehem in the overall fairy tale? Who founded the town? You need to know that to understand its role in the Jesus story.

 

I don't think we know who founded the town. The Amarna letters of the 14th century mention it as a staging post between Egypt and Syria. It was in a strategic position and was fortified by various rulers both Philistines and the Hebrews. I don't think anyone actually knows who founded it -or when. Trade between countries north of Bethlehem and Egypt and shipping to the East. If you believe the story of the Patriarchs, then Jacob is supposed to have been near it when his wife Rachel died giving birth to Benjamin - Jacobs youngest son. That must have been in the 20th century BCE. What was Bethlehem then? I guess still a 'staging' post.
Take your pick as to the interpretation of the Name House of Bread, House of Meat, Canaanite god Leheem. I'll take one of the Arabic translations. After all Latin comes much later and translations prove difficult.
I am aware of the Horites and their ancient history in Sudan, but there is evidence of sites of human habitation in the area in the previous 100,000 years. When did these people first form a community that was the birth of Bethlehem.

My own view is that Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Zebulon. Just a couple of hours walk from Nazareth. Matthew just uses Ephrata to bring the story into line with a prophecy that has nothing to do with Jesus. It makes more sense if you think, as I do, that Jesus was a human Jewish Preacher. It's quite possible for Joseph and Mary to have been spending Christmas at friends in Bethlehem.

 

I am a UK Biblical theologian specialising in New Testament Greek. I am fascinated that so many posts on this site deify the Bible as some sort of magical oracle emanating directly form the mouth of God. The Bible is a series of books, written at another time by people of various cultures in other languages. Written by people. The writers did not expect what they wrote to be part of an infallible book of rules for life. That is a cop out. We have to think for ourselves, not lean on quotes from these writings as a prop for every decision we make in life.

Incidentally, the ‘Every-word-of-the-Bible-is true’ idea is quite a recent one, and, from what I read, seems very popular in the USA.

Quite simply, if you study the origins and translations of the Bible as we know it, you are entitled to say, ‘That bit probably didn’t happen’, or ‘ That bit was intended as a parable. The writer would be amazed to think we were taking it as simple truth.’ (Think Tower of Babel)

Your faith will not be compromised, I promise you

 

Still waiting for your answer to my post regarding contradictions.

 

Which one?

 

Matthew says Joseph went to Egypt to escape Herod according to Hosea 11:1 (but that verse ins only part of the context of the prophecy. According to that Israel (Jesus) must have worshipped Baal and used incense to idols) and didn't return till Herod had died. Matthew also says that Joseph was told not to go back to Bethlehem, but to go to Nazareth. Considering his home was in Nazareth that's not unreasonable. What was Joseph doing in Bethlehem in the first place? He didn't have a home there. Luke has to get Joseph to Bethlehem from Nazareth by some means, so he dreams up 'the house and lineage of David' excuse. Joseph may have been of the house of David, but David was 1000 years in the past. Bethlehem had been through turbulent times in those 1000 years. Most of its occupants had been taken to Babylon. Did any return to Bethlehem? Many Jews stayed in Babylon and others had migrated to Egypt, Greece and North Africa to escape the invasions. If Joseph had gone to Bethlehem it would have been against Roman Law which required people to remain where they were for censuses. And Mary need not have gone anyway. And she was heavily pregnant. Surely Joseph and God would not have put Mary through a long 90 mile - 7 day walking journey in her state.

Luke says that Joseph took Jesus to Nazareth 40 days after his birth (after Mary's purification) and they remained there.

40 days. Jewish Law required Jesus to be circumcised after 8 days and presented at the Temple to be redeemed.

It's a long journey into Egypt along the road, and going via the desert would have been arduous and dangerous for a woman and baby. So what vehicle did they use to get to Egypt and back in 40 days?

Now if Luke is correct about the 'house and lineage of David' then David had 20 sons that we know about, and daughters we don't. Given the large families of the time descendants of David over 1000 years would have multiplied to hundreds of thousands - ALL THE FAMILIES DESCENDING ON THE SMALL VILLAGE OF BETHLEHEM AT THE SAME TIME.

No room at the INN. There would n't have been room within 20 miles - given the sparsity of villages in the area. Jerusalem would have been overflowing.

Was the 'Last Supper' a Passover meal or a friendship meal. Both are indicated in the stories. There's actually no way of knowing as we don't know the year of Jesus Birth. What day was Passover in the year Jesus died? Perhaps you can explain those for me.

 

What exactly is the contradiction?

 

Jesus is apparently in 2 places at once. Egypt and Nazareth,
One Gospel tells us that the Last Supper was a Passover Meal and another indicates a friendship meal. Can't be both.

 

I'm failing to see any dates there.

Why do you assume he was there at the same time?

 

You don't need dates, just history and Jewish ritual.

If Joseph went home to Nazareth after Jesus birth and Mary's ritual cleansing as Luke says, they would have been in Nazareth after 40 days. And Luke tells us they stayed there while Jesus grew up.
On the other hand Matthew says Joseph took Jesus to Egypt to escape Herod. Now it was at least a year after the birth that Herod died. How could Joseph and Jesus be in Egypt and Nazareth at the same time. Then when Herod was dead Joseph was told to go to Nazareth. Why was it necessary to tell home to go to his real home - Nazareth. Bethlehem was not his home anyway. Joseph had no property there. .Luke says they had to find somewhere to stay.

 

It's midnight here. I'm off to bed. Read any reply in the morning.

 

Actually, its not even close. I was sincerely unable to find anything even remotely close to a necessary being in any of the other gods on offer. Most of the people who do believe that the God of the bible is the Creator do not believe that He is necessary; or better I should write that, they do not believe that they are contingent. Understanding God's sovereignty is one thing; understanding one's own subjectivity is altogether something else.

 

To us, its never so much that ideas are really ever proved to us as it is that all of the other ideas that we have considered have been, to our satisfaction, disproved. Whatever is left is what we are left to believe, Then, that's tested, and so on, and so on.
Knowledge is what one is left to believe. Understanding is knowing what to do with what one knows. Wisdom is the synthesis of multiple perspectives. The wise are able to synthesize multiple perspectives.
The first thing one learns when one begins working with prints or any other type of mechanical drawing is that no one can build anything that has any integrity from only one point of view. I am left to believe that the same holds true for opinions, even opinions about God.

 

God is good; indeed, good is what God is. Evil is what God is not. God reveals both good and evil. God reveals both what He is and what He is not because anything, even God, is revealed just as much by what it is not as it is by what it is.
So, how does a God, who can only do good, who can only create good, also reveal evil? The solution was genius. God gave us a law to break; so that when we broke it, our eyes would be opened, and we would know both good and evil.
Sin wasn't the beginning of man's problems; it was the beginning of the solution. Sin is the cure that kills you. God can, and did, take upon Himself our penalty for our sin, but God cannot take upon Himself our ignorance of what He is not.
Did you know that the devil never sinned? The devil never sinned because the devil was never given a law to break. One can say that the devil sins by-proxy, and the devil continues to try to get from sin by-proxy what man got from sin directly. Because the devil never sinned, evil remains unrevealed to him; and even though he has become the very personification of evil, he is left to sincerely believe that he is as good as God. We were well on our way to the same fate as is evidenced by the fact that we sinned before we became sinners.
The revelation of evil allows man to calibrate good. This includes, but is not limited to, the ability to distinguish the good that God is and whatever good we may be. The inability to make that distinction properly is called pride. Pride is the problem that necessitated sin.

 

Maybe you should read the biblical fairy tale sometime.

1 Chronicles 2:24 (TLB) = *Soon after his father Hezron’s death, Caleb married Ephrathah, his father’s widow, and she gave birth to Ashhur, the father of Tekoa.

1 Chronicles 4:4 (GNT) = *Hur was the oldest son of his father Caleb's wife Ephrath, and his descendants founded the city of Bethlehem. Hur had three sons: Etam, Penuel, and Ezer. Etam had three sons: Jezreel, Ishma, and Idbash, and one daughter, Hazzelelponi. Penuel founded the city of Gedor, and Ezer founded Hushah.*

1 Chronicles 4:3-4 (TLB) = *The descendants of Etam: Jezreel, Ishma, Idbash, Hazzelelponi (his daughter), Penuel (the ancestor of Gedor), Ezer (the ancestor of Hushah), the son of Hur, the oldest son of Ephrathah, who was the father of Bethlehem.*

Micah 5:2 (CEB) = *As for you, Bethlehem of Ephrathah, though you are the least significant of Judah’s forces, one who is to be a ruler in Israel on my behalf will come out from you. His origin is from remote times, from ancient days.*

If you bother to read the story you will discover that the writers screwed it up. The way they wrote some of the passages they have changed peoples names into place names. It becomes even more confusing because they also changed some women's names into place names.

 

I'm not asking you if it was close, I'm asking you about the specific things that make or break your conclusion.

I'm no Torah scholar, but it seems to me the Jewish interpretation has less inconsistencies (simply by virtue of there being less information about him). Of course, I know very little about your actual interpretation, but doesn't the interpretation of Jesus as part of God and the fact that Jesus goes back and forth between human form and otherwise (explicitly as a response to humans, which would be contingent) make God contingent?

How do you decide to look for the truth in scripture? If so many religions got it wrong, isn't that proof that humans are fully able to make stuff up, and the truth might be outside any book?

 

I disagree with the basic premise of the OP.

The books in the bible canon were written by a specific author, with a specific intent and message. Sure, anything can be 'spiritualized', for some personal edification, but that does not mean the passage or book did not have a clear exegetical intent by the writer.

Claiming, 'the bible is full of errors!', or that it is all allegory and mysticism is contradictory to historical Christianity, and those who have studied, translated, and preserved the scriptures for over 2 millennia. There is a long history of scholarly hermeneutics and exegesis in all of the books in the biblical canon.

They mean what they mean, and just because some people are confused, or have an anti-bible agenda, does not reflect on the accuracy, meaning, or validity of the bible, in any way.