If you don't believe all the bible, why believe any of it?

reply to post by SpaceGoatFarts


No i don't really think that.

However, I believe it is innate within social groupings (which I think is what I said upthread).

I suspect one of the reasons natural selection will select for it is that evolution happens at the species level (not at the individual level), and thus will favour groups over individuals.

This pic sort of sums up my perception of the religious position -

ReturnofTheSonOfNothing
This pic sort of sums up my perception of the religious position -

FWIW I think no one but fundamentalists are saying the Bible is the ultimate truth. So only a few % of the Christian world.

Thus I think most Christians have 0 problems with the fact the Bible is full of metaphors, allegories and myths. Doesn't make it a less interesting book.

Actually, makes it even more interesting ("What were they trying to say? Why?" instead of "There were giants and a flood and, and, ...").

i kinda don't even listen anymore.

it's the same crap.

they don't understand anything.

like a 5th grade book report.

how can anyone think that you can believe in the bible..


you can only believe in the interpretations of the bible...

and they are always flawed and limited..
Dont make an image of god..

kauskau
how can anyone think that you can believe in the bible..

Biblical literalism. Modern American Christians invention to distance themselves from evil Catholics.

reply to post by SpaceGoatFarts


But that's like picking up one of those collaboration novels where authors write a bunch of short stories about a topic and a publisher combines them into a book, this one being a fantasy collaboration, and trying to worship and base your life off of it. The Stand is a great book, but I didn't feel like going on a cross country pilgrimage to Boulder, CO while looking out for the Walking Dude when I finished reading it.

Krazysh0t
reply to post by SpaceGoatFarts

 

But that's like picking up one of those collaboration novels where authors write a bunch of short stories about a topic and a publisher combines them into a book, this one being a fantasy collaboration, and trying to worship and base your life off of it.

As far as I know, Christians worldwide don't worship the Bible. Christians worship Jesus and God, which are entirely different things. You could go on and tell me that the character of Jesus never existed and that God is a stupid concept, but it's obviously a whole other debate that leaves much more room for both opinions than the fact that the Bible must be worshiped and read literally.


I seem to really have a hard time explaining this to Americans since American Christian faith is so different from the rest of the world, most people on board like here only know the American version of Christian faith which is indeed worshiping a book, literalism, in one word: fundamentalism no different than Jewish or Muslim fundamentalism.

Do you know any other country than the US in the whole world where it's common for Christian to read Genesis as a literal account of the creation, and where the Bible is considered as literally the indisputable word of God? I don't.


"Christian fundamentalism is a movement that began in the late 19th- and early 20th-century among British and American Protestants."

As far as I know these people only represent a minority of the Christians worldwide so basing your opinion about the Christian faith on American Christians is like saying the Wahhabi movement is a correct representation of Islam as a whole.

It's just not the case. The perception of Christian beliefs in the US is biased by fundamentalism, hence why most Americans think you are either religious either rational, and that there is no common ground.


That's just incorrect

Krazysh0t
reply to post by SpaceGoatFarts

 

The Stand is a great book, but I didn't feel like going on a cross country pilgrimage to Boulder

You could have. I don't see what's so shocking about this? Plenty of non-religious people are deeply moved by fictions or biographies and decide to travel in the steps of their favorite heroes...

A Christian is not so different.

reply to post by SpaceGoatFarts


Well where do you stop believing the literal and start seeing the metaphor? I mean with all the lacking evidence, we could easily play this game all the way up to the concept of god himself since there isn't any hard evidence that one exists. So by that rationale, god in the bible could also be a metaphor. So what then? What is left to worship if everything can be viewed as a metaphor? I get your point about American Christian literalism, but even with the rest of the world, at SOME point you have to take a part of the bible literally and this requires suspending rational thought. Religious people say it all the time, it requires faith. At least for the god argument while there is no evidence FOR god, there isn't much against him either, so the suspension of rationality is less extreme then believing in the literal creation account in the bible. But why do we want to suspend rational thought to believe in something with no evidence? Because it feels good to think that it exists? What's wrong with saying "I don't know"?

Though of course my arguments tend to get washed out by the polarizing sides of the American religion debate just like the arguments from the non-literalists that you mentioned. Believers seem to think all non-believers don't believe as hard as they believe. This is also incorrect. I'm an agnostic, and just want good, quality evidence. If some were to be presented to me I'd be overjoyed that a god existed, but that hasn't happened yet. I'm ok with saying "I don't know." It doesn't scare me to the point of keeping me up at night to accept that this is the case.

reply to post by SpaceGoatFarts


I'm an atheist...... But seems to me the Christian lower tech countries would still have a literal interpretation. As religious as south and Latin America are, they arnt creationists? Seems weird that only American Christians are crazy. Especially since we have the most internet access and tech....

ArtemisE
reply to post by SpaceGoatFarts

 

I'm an atheist...... But seems to me the Christian lower tech countries would still have a literal interpretation. As religious as south and Latin America are, they arnt creationists?

No.

Some poor countries are being targeted by American evangelist and baptist sects today, but historically they aren't fundamentalists.

Actually, most of these countries blended their own pagan beliefs with Christian faith, without any moral issue, like in the Santeria in Cuba and all the other Christian traditions worldwide in Asia, Africa and South America. It's really a fascinating subject to see how often the missionaries tried to teach basic moral virtues without forbidding the locals to continue their old traditions as long as they did not involve depraved behaviours.

ArtemisE
reply to post by SpaceGoatFarts

 

Seems weird that only American Christians are crazy. Especially since we have the most internet access and tech....

It is weird but it's like that. The whole Evangelical and fundamentalist movements within Christian faiths are modern and Anglo-saxon, probably to mark their opposition with the Church of Rome and because the pilgrims and the New world were a good soil for a simple; down-to-earth Christian current, far from the intellectualism of Catholicism.

The Church of Rome isn't exempt of defects but at least it's not advocating literalism and always promoted critical and scientific education.


Christian fundamentalism is an American problem and must be understood in such a context.


Also sorry but your education system is # and you have fundamentalist lobbies pushing for retrograde views in school books.

This is legit crazy that a country like the US allows things like this to happen. It's basically jeopardizing the country's future and setting the precedents for a new modern dark age.

Krazysh0t
reply to post by SpaceGoatFarts

 

at SOME point you have to take a part of the bible literally

I don't agree. You could be a Hindu today, following the philosophy and values it promotes without believing Ganesh has literally the head of an elephant. Spirituality and philosophy deal with abstract concepts, so there's no need for literal interpretation at all.

Krazysh0t
reply to post by SpaceGoatFarts

 

I'm ok with saying "I don't know." It doesn't scare me to the point of keeping me up at night to accept that this is the case.

Same for me and most priests I talk to. They know perfectly well it's hubris to claim to know, and they even say it's really hard to keep believing that Love can prevail when things go down the #ter.

If a religious person tells you he knows God is real he is lying and deluded. Religion and a critical mind aren't exclusive.

God is, for most Christians, an abstract concept like Love or Fate, so something that it's hard to relate to.

That's where Jesus comes into play, because he showed to Christian how you can be closer to that divine concept through your words and acts. How to be the divine incarnated.


Critical Christians don't believe it's all about supernatural stuff, the Creation in 6 days, miracles and the 2nd coming of Christ, etc...

They have interpretations of these concepts which are closer to philosophy, and often don't limit themselves to a single view, they explore other faiths and philosophies because they mostly teach the same.

They call themselves Christians because they decided that Jesus was a role model they wanted to follow and to identify with.

Everything else you postulate about what Christians believe in is preconceptions as you have as many views/interpretations as you have people.


Basically you are perfectly right, it's sad that in the US the debate has become so polarized people only see atheists or christians as bad caricatures when they are complex human beings.

Don't you go a-hatin' on Religion Pigeon now..

ArtemisE


This is for those Christians who don't believe in the literal truth of creation and the bible. But do believe and concierge them selves Christians.

How do you decide what to believe and what not to? To an atheist it looks like cherry picking what people wish were true. While ignoring the things you don't agree with. It seems to me that almost every Christian as a nearly completely different take on what all consider to absolute truth. Logically how can any truth be found when no one even agrees on the fundamentals?

When you read any non-fiction book, do you believe all you read?

With regards to the Bible: it was written thousands of years ago, so by definition you must take much of it as an object lesson in parable form and, indeed, much of it was written in parable form. Obviously a parable regarding a goat herder cannot apply directly to our modern lives in a direct manner, so we would accept it as a parable for the message in the story.

The book of Genesis, in parts, is very close to modern cosmological theory as well as modern evolutionary theory. Not bad for something written millennia before.

Man has been given free will and choice for a reason. I am sure that God is not particularly happy about how the Bible as it currently is came to be and was written but I believe he would still, for the most part, agree with the underlying message.

Much of the Bible has been misinterpreted down the ages. Thou shalt not kill is actually: Thou shalt not murder.... if you go back to the earliest versions. Significant difference between kill and murder.

reply to post by SpaceGoatFarts

Do you know any other country than the US in the whole world where it's common for Christian to read Genesis as a literal account of the creation, and where the Bible is considered as literally the indisputable word of God? I don't.

Apparently you do not get out much....

SpaceGoatFarts

kauskau
how can anyone think that you can believe in the bible..

Biblical literalism. Modern American Christians invention to distance themselves from evil Catholics.

Most ignorant thing I have ever heard.

Hardly a Modern invention at all and I doubt sincerely there is any thought of Catholics involved...at least not by most normal people.

bbracken677
reply to post by SpaceGoatFarts

 

Do you know any other country than the US in the whole world where it's common for Christian to read Genesis as a literal account of the creation, and where the Bible is considered as literally the indisputable word of God? I don't.

Apparently you do not get out much....

edit on 10-4-2014 by bbracken677 because: (no reason given)

Cite one country outside the US. Just one where literalism is common.

Good luck.

bbracken677

The book of Genesis, in parts, is very close to modern cosmological theory as well as modern evolutionary theory. Not bad for something written millennia before.

You have the nerve to posit such nonsense while having Walter Bishop as your avatar????

Disgraceful!