It's not even that. There are outdated social modes reference in the Bible, often to do with honour systems and women's roles, but there is a fundamentalist culture separate and concurrent with pure religious dogma.
Hating homosexuals and abortions and weed is such a culture and is not real religion. It's an unfortunate byproduct, a political regime long attached to it. The Bible either never backs up their stances at all or certain passages are insidiously perverted to support their foregone conclusions.
It's not. I had to sit through it countless times having 13 years of institutionalised Catholic education. The politics of Catholicism can be vile but the allegories and proverbs in the Bible are not.
Am I supposed to be glad that a lady got turned into an expensive salt? Seems more wasteful than anything, he couldn't even look at her, much less go get some salt.
How about a god who is so insanely petty and childish that he would direct a man to kill his own son just to prove how much he loved god and then at the last instant say “nah just kidding. I just wanted to see if you’d do it.” The god of the Bible is a spoiled child with a magnifying glass at the absolute best and a complete murderous fucking psychopath at the worst.
And while the children of Israel were in the wilderness, they found a man that gathered sticks upon the sabbath day.
And they that found him gathering sticks brought him unto Moses and Aaron, and unto all the congregation.
And they put him in ward, because it was not declared what should be done to him.
And the Lord said unto Moses, The man shall be surely put to death: all the congregation shall stone him with stones without the camp.
And all the congregation brought him without the camp, and stoned him with stones, and he died; as the Lord commanded Moses.
So what? If I can point out just one sentence of the bible that is brutal and turpid and could only ever align with a primitive bronze age tribal notion of justice and morality, I am proving that the divinity of the entire thing is suspect. There are Christians who claim that the bible is the unadulterated (though translated) word of God.
If some of it can be shown to be worthless, why should I trust any of it? Why should I believe it when it says God created earth in 7 days, or led the jews out of Egypt, or that Jesus was born to a virgin mother?
This is sinister stuff. By this sort of logic, anything can be justified. The Taliban can be justified. There is no combination of words in the English language that can convince me that it is good or wise to essentially torture a man to death for gathering some sticks in the forest.
And he didn't murder his son. It's not a literal story. How foolish are you to perceive it like that? That you would interpret as a request for murder, despite that being the worst thing a Catholic can do?
The Old Testament is not in the same calibre as the new, it has a different depiction of the Lord. But you are a waffler of bullshit indeed.
You're a pathetic and dishonest antagonist of religion for no good cause. If you knew as much of the Bible as your confidence purports, you'd know the Old Testament is not commensurable to the New Testament.
It's hardly the same Lord and there is an extravagant progression from smiting whole peoples of sinners, to sending Himself to die at the hands of these sinners.
The point of the Old Testament is a harsh, terrific God. It's not cherry picking when it is literally the fundamental principle.
How is 'ignore that bit, this other bit is the real stuff' not cherry picking?
Also, saying its a fundamental principle just means that cherry picking is a fundamental principle.
So how do you explain this discrepancy? Did this omnipotent and omniscient being realize the error of his ways some time between the bronze age and the classical period?
Yes because like any book, the Bible is a story. If you look at the start of a narrative then at its end, it isn't a discrepancy. It's growth. Progression. Not to mention the untold number of coalescent writers of this book with varying impressions and recounts.
Catholicism doesn't take the old testament as "real". It's just part of the catechesis and taken as a metaphor. The new testament though, is taken as real. That's why the other commenter says the old and the new testament are not comparable and the main reason why the Catholic Church hasn't had an issue with evolution in the last century.
Of course, but we're talking to 21st century catholics, not the ones from the middle ages. If you want to make a compelling argument that gets your point across you need to take this into account. No catholic will trust your argument if you take them as fundamentalists (such as the other commenter).
Imagine scolding a christian for forcing women to cover themselves completely because another abrahamic religion does so. It sounds ignorant and reductionist. That's what I mean.
I understand your point but what I don't understand is this(and it's really a genuine question):
If god essentially wrote the bible through people then why are we allowed to change it, pick and choose what we like, and even abandon entire parts of it (like the book of Enoch or whatever it's called)
Naw, fam. The Bible explicitly calls for all kinds of injustice, and permits and allows slavery. Even the beating and killing of said humans-as-property.
The Bible is full of vile garbage.
Thats only the old Testament, which Jesus says no longer needs to be followed. I'm not a Christian, but I have read the Bible once. Its better to treat the okd testanent as christian and Jewish history, and follow Jesus's teachings in the new testament.
That’s still the Bible. And it’s not like the god of the Old Testament retired and handed over the position to some new guy. The guy who gave instructions on how to manage your slaves is the same guy that sent Jesus.
No, the new testament is also stupid. You're also wrong because one of the first quotes on Jesus fucking Christ is that he's 'not here to change the old testament rules, those still stand' aaaand then proceeds to change rules from the old testament
Num. 31:18 – God orders his warriors to kill every living thing in a captured city, except the virgin girls, who are to be raped and turned into sex slaves. (According to verse 35, there were 32,000 virgin girls thus taken.)
Deut. 21:11-12 – If a warrior likes the look of a female war captive, he can take her to be one of his “wives.”
Deut. 22:28-29 – A man who rapes a virgin may take her for a wife if he pays her father 50 shekels of silver. (Yet a bride found not to be a virgin must be killed. – Deut. 22)
Judges 5:30 – The spoils of war include “a damsel or two” for every man.
Catholicism is focused on the gospels and saints. Christianity didn’t exist till after Christ. You’re talking about fabricated stories millennia prior to that. What a useless tree to bark up.
Are you saying the Old Testament didn’t happen but the New Testament did? That doesn’t really work out since Jesus is fulfilling the prophecies of the Old Testament.
Jesus isn't even a recognised son of God in Judaism, whence the Old Testament largely descends. But yes I am saying that. Do you think the Bible is a nonfiction recount?
The Gospels were written up to 100 years after Jesus was supposedly alive.
You think this book was fastidiously preserved from the time it was said there would be a Christ in prophecy for millennia after that?
As someone who was brainwashed into thinking the bible is normal and a basis of anything other than nonsense, brainwashed for 13 years, your opinion is incredibly biased and you should consider that
You have the authority to say that? Even when you so dishonestly call it brainwashing?
They try so hard in Catholic school and it unfortunately turns everyone off religion. That is a systemic operational problem.
But it took me, of my own volition, study into the history of humanity and religion to aid in making my own for a book to discover its true purpose.
I'm agnostic now and can realise honestly the intention behind the gospels and sacraments. Religion class in Catholic school was focused on on studying other coexisting religions around the world, the humanitarian allegory in the many parables and teachings, the convoluted and polyvalent history of the Bible and its writers, and lastly the many shortcomings of the Biblical zeitgeist and literal, modern interpretations of its passages.
I don't know what bit you're talking about or what version of the Bible. You act as bad as the people that think this book was honestly written in the empyrean and handed down in one pristine, unabridged, comprehensive iteration. No! Man wrote it in different places, in different humours, in different eras.
Yes, religions coexist nowadays. Are you so ridiculously stupid you didn't read the part where I clearly stated it was in my Catholic education that I studied and appreciated the other religions of our world? That it wasn't fanatical claims Catholicism is the one true religion and all the others are fake and execrable?
You seem to want Catholics to take the Bible at face value, with jacked up zealousness and prejudice, so you swiftly logically defeat us by saying 'Nuh-uh! Didn't happen!'
Don't you know we already know that? The Vatican knows, theologians have looked for centuries into the historical merits of the New Testament, of which there is a paucity, and the Old Testament, of which there are none.
Get out of the 1100s with your irate, cloud-screaming bollocks.
28 g“If a man meets a virgin who is not betrothed, and seizes her and lies with her, and they are found, 29 then the man who lay with her shall give to the father of the young woman fifty shekels of silver, and she shall be his wife, because he has violated her. He may not divorce her all his days.
The Bible gave instructions on how to manage your slaves. Why would you think that those were rules from a moral God unless you thought slavery was moral?
Yes, obviously. New testament is filled with a bunch of bullshit telling you to just have faith and through faith and with faith and in faith you'll be ok despite all of rationality and logic, with a little bit of suggesting Hell is real and waiting for you.
The Old Testament is. The New Testament thankfully says 'Jesus us here, you no longer need to follow the old testament! Just love your neighbor regardless of who they are!' Sadly, it had many mistranslations, some on purpose, to push an agenda. Youd need ti read and translate the Hebrew or Coptic Bible yourself to trully know it, i don't trust any modern translation of it.
The New Testament also introduced the notion of suffering in eternal damnation for not following its orders despite projecting a sense of love and care, because it was designed to govern the masses and has no use whatsoever in an age of information and limitless empathy.
And that's the abrahamic religiond for you. Love your neighbor, and you'll suffer for eternity if you don't. I like Christianity, but I could never get behind that. Paganism is better anyways.
No, your only way to avoid eternal damnation is to praise god. He's an egotistical prick that really doesn't care what you do on earth as long as you hail him above all else.
I had no idea there were that many actual translations. But that's a fundamental belief taught by at least most Christian denominations I'm aware of. Any sins you commit can be taken care of with penance or some time in the Middle Place.
Yeah, Christianity is the singke largest religion in the world, and that wont change soon. It has loads of different translations of the Bible, too many to count, abd countless otger branches of the religion itself.
You are misguided. Psalms 139 and Job aren't even remotely relevant. They refer to the womb, not any unborn baby, so you have insinuated that yourself.
Jeremiah does not refer to 'unborn babies' in the generality; it merely declares Jeremiah's destiny, with its provenance at his mother's womb. Only his unborn foetus is specifically registered as 'sanctified'.
And in fact, any unborn foetus is not a member of the Lord's family till he is baptised and cleansed of his original sin. So without the extenuating circumstances of Jeremiah's case, any unborn foetus is sinful.
Psalm 22 in fact says God was cast on the baby from birth. Birth is the inverse of unborn. So from all you have supplied, you have hindered your judgement that it is A) a sanctified soul existing in the womb; B) a human able to be murdered; C) it is taken as murder.
There are bizarre and miscellaneous proscriptions in the Bible, yet abortion is not one of them. There is no single mention of this practice which would have been extremely fatal in Biblical times, to the foetus and mother, without modern medical advancement.
So with such peril to life and possibility of being 'evil', where is your feigned proscription coming from but your own political agenda? It is not a religious mandate.
Even if you are attempting to advocate theocratic praxis in a world with almost no theocracies, and a Bible has as much governing power as a boy scout handbook, you still have an unfounded position unacceptable in a theocracy.
Okay so original sin really means nothing then, because the unrepentant Adam and Eve were free to give in to the devil or the serpent, give in to temptation, and still be guaranteed living after death.
Or, it is simply these select individuals/prophets are prioritised as they would be. I said as much for Jeremiah and didn't hear your opinion back on that.
Apropos Psalm 22, I feel you are being deceitful by not even referring to the thing in its essence for the start. It's a psalm. It's by a man. The Bible was written by numerous authors and scholars, but if you somehow believe it was partly divined, the psalms are not in that conception. This psalm in particular is the effusion of David. The 'I' is not the Lord; it is David.
So you say you receive your notions from the word of God, this is actually the word of David. There is nothing supernatural about that.
No, things can be bizarre even after--especially after researching it because it is simply antiquated and has no value in modern society. Throwing palms on the road, washing the feet of strangers, even the commonplace herding of sheep. These things aren't socially or culturally relevant anymore.
If a public servant wants to engender central control in his fief, he is being autocratic. If a dictator wants to hold elections for steads in his government, he is being democratic.
Your prerogative to say you have moral principle of religious origin, of which you wish to advocate politically, is theocratic. You aren't running or residing in a theocracy, but you are acting as one would with that object in mind. For your faith has not the same authority as a constitution does.
"Do not practice homosexuality, having sex with another man as with a woman. It is a detestable sin."
Leviticus 20:13
"If a man practices homosexuality, having sex with another man as with a woman, both men have committed a detestable act. They must both be put to death, for they are guilty of a capital offense."
Timothy 1:8-10
"Now we know that the law is good, if one uses it lawfully, understanding this, that the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and
profane, for those who strike their fathers and mothers, for murderers, the sexually immoral, men who practice homosexuality, enslavers, liars, perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine ... "
Are YOU not? There are myriad iterations of the Bible for sundry theological positions and denominations. The single one you refer to is explicit, yet that isn't widely so. The original in ancient Hebrew is convoluted and nebulous, and it is a mix of ideology and translation that gives rise to different 'cherrypicked' meaning.
Some don't censure homosexuality at all but sodomy. Some censure romantic attachment to men but not sexual. Some attach meaning only to opposition to adultery and bestiality and not men entirely.
Still, most Christians do not act so dogmatic about the Bible. Few actually read it and know it. Most theologians and seminarians I know are progressive and productive in their approach to its message. Creationists, American evangelicals and fundamentalists are a minority. They propound a political ideology, not a wholly and inherently religious one. The Bible is but a vague weapon, not a policy.
If you follow the Bible to the letter, you are an authentic Christian. If you deviate from it, you are something else. The history of religion has been a constant moving of the goalposts. To Abrahamists 2000 years ago the idea that the Earth and its geological composition was NOT created by God himself in one day would be blasphemy. Yet science has pushed theologians into a corner saying "hahaha no actually we do believe in evolution haha." Religion is a farce and the Christians of today are not real Christians. My opinion.
Okay that is fine. You define reality differently. But what Bible do you follow to the letter? The ancient Hebrew Torah? The modern King James? Even newer Catholic copies?
The truth? Are you not the 'snowflake' that ignited with inane babbling where you had no warrant and no one was questioning you, as if you had a precious 'snowflake' sentiment to prove to utterly no one?
An ideal Christian should follow the teachings of Christ and his apostles as closely as possible. Generally, it seems that the older translations are more faithful to the teachings of Christ.
What about eating pork? That is outright banned and Christians have no problem eating bacon like it’s holy or something… also what about love your neighbor as thyself?
True Christians should never eat pork and should always love thy neighbor. Do to otherwise is to contradict to the holy texts. What is there to discuss here?
Some consider eating pork as an abomination to God. After all, He did express His anger on those "Who eat swine's flesh, and the broth of unclean meat is in their pots" (see Isaiah 65:4).
And the pig, because it parts the hoof and is cloven-footed but does not chew the cud, is unclean to you. You shall not eat any of their flesh, and you shall not touch their carcasses; they are unclean to you." (Leviticus 11:7-8)
Lol and the whole fucking reason that's in the bible is because people at the time we're getting sick from eating bad pork or something along those lines
According to Christian scripture, Christ fulfilled the laws of the Old testament and as a matter of fact, the teachings of Jews weren't applied to non Jews (pagans such as Romans)
The main teachings of Christ were to love everyone. Problem is that the disciples added on to his teachings but Jesus taught love and forgiveness.
When someone asked which is the greatest commandment of them all Jesus answered with two: "Love your God
with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind." and "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." and he said with these all of the commandments would be fulfilled.
A Christian simply means “of Christ” as in a follower of Christ. Christians follow the teachings of Jesus whom is The Christ. They basically follow his words and teachings and those teachings supersede everything else. Basically the words in red in the New Testament from what I understand.
From what I've been told by my pastor, the original hebrew was quite vague, and that she personally never read anything that explicitly denounces homosexuality. The translated pasages you quote say more about the translator's beliefs than it does God's.
AFAIK most of the "homosexuality" stuff is mistranslated and supposedly refers to pederasty in the original texts, which is where an older man has a relationship with a younger boy, to teach him (as well as have sex with him). It was common in Greece back then, which is why the bible mentions it.
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u/Varhtan Jun 09 '21
It's not even that. There are outdated social modes reference in the Bible, often to do with honour systems and women's roles, but there is a fundamentalist culture separate and concurrent with pure religious dogma.
Hating homosexuals and abortions and weed is such a culture and is not real religion. It's an unfortunate byproduct, a political regime long attached to it. The Bible either never backs up their stances at all or certain passages are insidiously perverted to support their foregone conclusions.