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I honestly don't think anyone here wants to know my opinion of the Bible. It's far from the majority of opinions expressed so far.

NYCPORT wrote:I honestly don't think anyone here wants to know my opinion of the Bible. It's far from the majority of opinions expressed so far.

I would, seriously.

sy wrote:

RinglingRingling wrote:

sy wrote: and Soraya, please don't feel like you can't share your opinions. Occasionally you might come across someone who will become overzealous in expressing their own opinion, but really, I've never left an discussion feeling like it wasn't met overall with respect. And trust me, I understand that 'overzealous bible belters'. I live next door to one and regularly am met with their propaganda.

I have one in the family. Everything done on Earth is for "the greater glory of God"; like an omnipotent, omniscient being really needs a lot of help in the glory department from an AmWay saleswoman from Seattle...

Nice.

I apparently moved into some sort of bermuda triangle of religion, so I regularly have people showing up at my door trying to 'save my soul'. I think my neighbor sends them.

Did you ask if you get S&H Green Stamps with the saving?

RinglingRingling wrote:

sy wrote: I apparently moved into some sort of bermuda triangle of religion, so I regularly have people showing up at my door trying to 'save my soul'. I think my neighbor sends them.

Did you ask if you get S&H Green Stamps with the saving?

I should! I'll remember that next time before I slam the door.

Soraya wrote:

ph4ever wrote: I have 3 things to say.

I have friends that are pagens, athesists and Christians, spritiualists, naturalists. We all get along together discussing our different beliefs because of respect. I've seen a known athiest of this board participate in religious discussions with no problem because everyone respected the other.

It seems to me as if no matter who you pray to - should you decide to pray - be it mother earth, father sun, Jah or God the ultimate supreme being is all the same, just known by different names.

People can obviously tell by the title of the thread what the subject is, if it is something that you don't believe or don't like you don't have to read it.

**I know I will live to regret this**

I do not mean to pick a fight..but you've just proven my point.

#1 - Respect is great...no quibble there. However Pagan is capitalized....just like any other religious group.

#2 - No, not everyone feels that all Gods are one God with just a different name. That is quite an insult to a hard polytheist when you basically say, "Oh, you really worship my God...you just use a different name." That is not how they see it.

#3 - Here is where you prove my poin and why I feel little good ever comes from religious discussion in a diverse group. You've just said "People can obviously tell by the title of the thread what the subject is, if it is something that you don't believe or don't like you don't have to read it."
Now, to me, and I may be reading this wrong because I am new here, that says, if you don't agree with the Christian view (because it is Christians that believe in the Bible) shut up and don't post.

I am sure that I will be considered a pariah after this....well...it was fun while it lasted.

Soraya- Others have expounded on my view but because you address me specificially please allow me to explain


I did not mean to offend anyone with the capilitization or not of any word. Something you're not aware of and most people here are - i'm going thru chemo and right now some days I'm doing good to spell right.

Nowhere did I state if you don't agree with the Christian view don't read the thread. What I ment is that it's like a TV show or radio station you don't like - you have the choice to go to something you do like is all.

And while I understand your culture shock of moving from the north to the south please understand that not all "christians" are bad. There's good and bad in people, no matter what their spiritual beliefs are. To lump one group of people and label them in a negative light is just something I don't do. To me it's the same prejudice and bigotry as to not like a certain group of people because of their ethenicity.

My spiritual walk in life began with Christianity as that's the environment I was born into. My mother was a free thinker and always welcomed my interest in exploring the different religions - no matter what they were. Including the native American heritage that came from my father's side of the family.

Because of this my spiritual beliefs include different asspects of differrent religions. There have been some things I've gone thru in my life that I couldn't have made it thru on my own without some supreme force helping me. I perfer to call that supreme force God. Sometimes I call him Jah sometimes Mother Earth. That supreme force knows who I am talking about. But there also a lot of things in my life that "Christians" can't explain and some can't tolerate. I believe in reincarnation - not that you come back as a bug or animal but that you come back as a person and you continue to do it until you learn whatever it is you have to learn to be a good person. I believe that some people never become a good person and they relive this hell on earth over and over again. I believe "heaven" is a parallel universe appx 1 foot higher than ours. I believe there is communication to us from that universe. I believe spirit guides and angels are among us to help us thru life. Not one Christian church has been able to explain why throughout my life I've known and seen things before they happened or why people who have died come and "visit" me. It's not unusual for me in one day to pray to God, sprinkle some salt around the house and burn herbs, pray to Father Sun thanking him for being there, have a conversation with a friend that died a couple of years back because he's visiting me and when he does he messes with electronics and it pi$$es me off and then head outside to meditate with nature.

I no longer attend church - I used to and it was good for me because I learned FAITH. Without faith I personally could not make it through life. But church was negative on me as a child as well because of the things that I have happen. When I DO attend church I focus on the positive. I have impressed ministers with my knowledge and understanding of the Bible.

But then again I don't fit the "Christian" mold so I really don't know what I am.

sy wrote:

NYCPORT wrote:I honestly don't think anyone here wants to know my opinion of the Bible. It's far from the majority of opinions expressed so far.

I would, seriously.

So would I. Really. And knowing you, I'm sure it is far from the majority opinion.

And now for something completely different ......

Imagine that the pieces of a very large jigsaw puzzle have been scattered over hundreds of square miles. One day, fortune smiles upon you and you discover one of these pieces. It appears to be a beautiful picture of some sort although you can't quite discern exactly what it is. Being unaware of the existence of all the other puzzle pieces, you believe that what you've found is the entire picture.

I believe the Bible is that puzzle piece .... beautiful in itself (albeit at times confusing) but part of a much larger picture. Somewhere exists the rest of those pieces. We haven't seen those yet, either because they aren't relevant to our existence or because we're unprepared for (or perhaps incapable of comprehending) what they contain.

To me, the first four words of the Bible invite questions. In the beginning, God .... If God was already there then it truly wasn't THE beginning. It may well have been OUR beginning (metaphorically, the design of our puzzle piece) but it wasn't THE beginning. So what happened before our beginning? Were there other beginnings? Of whom? Where? It's impossible for me to go outside on a starry night and believe that the entirety of sentient creation occured on this one little rock. Surely, all of those celestial objects aren't out there just to look pretty in the night sky.

I just hope some day I get to see the rest of the puzzle.

NYCPORT wrote:I honestly don't think anyone here wants to know my opinion of the Bible. It's far from the majority of opinions expressed so far.

you and me both

NYCPORT wrote:I honestly don't think anyone here wants to know my opinion of the Bible. It's far from the majority of opinions expressed so far.

Hey, Don't leave me in the deep end of the pool by myself!!

RAGTOP wrote:

NYCPORT wrote:I honestly don't think anyone here wants to know my opinion of the Bible. It's far from the majority of opinions expressed so far.

you and me both

Hey! If you two don't post, it's going to blow my theory that we can have totally opposing viewpoints and still be friends!

And where's Lee when you need him?

C'mon, you guys.... I'll think the world is tilting on it's axis if someone doesn't offer the usual "the Bible is a nice fairy tale and God is the same as the Tooth Fairy".....

I would too NYCport.

If I wanted an all positive response I could have posted this on a Christian knitting club board. But I wanted real response from real people with a wide range of views and I feel that I have gotten that, so thank you all for your thoughts and I think we have had a really good conversation going on.

I beleive the Bible is the inspired Word of God. That is that God had a hand in the construction, but has often happens, human distractions (money, politics, etc.) cloud the vision that God had. I do not beleive that the Bible is infallible, there are too many contradictions, however I do think that certain parts can be taken literally while others are allegorical. I think that one needs to first understand the historical, cultural context of the part of the Bible in which your reading. I think God gave us brains for a reason and that reason was to think. The thing about fundamentalists is that the preacher preaches and the people listen and do not investigate for themselves.

UAHparrothead wrote:I would too NYCport.

If I wanted an all positive response I could have posted this on a Christian knitting club board. But I wanted real response from real people with a wide range of views and I feel that I have gotten that, so thank you all for your thoughts and I think we have had a really good conversation going on.

I beleive the Bible is the inspired Word of God. That is that God had a hand in the construction, but has often happens, human distractions (money, politics, etc.) cloud the vision that God had. I do not beleive that the Bible is infallible, there are too many contradictions, however I do think that certain parts can be taken literally while others are allegorical. I think that one needs to first understand the historical, cultural context of the part of the Bible in which your reading. I think God gave us brains for a reason and that reason was to think. The thing about fundamentalists is that the preacher preaches and the people listen and do not investigate for themselves.

Wow. I'm sitting back on my heels a little bit. I think you're the first preacher I've ever heard admit he/she didn't think the Bible was infallible. Often, they're too busy trying to hit you over the head with that infallible book.

I'm more impressed by your honestly every day, Brad.

Wow.

wSGH said. You give me hope for organized religion.

East Texas Parrothead wrote:wSGH said. You give me hope for organized religion.

yep . .it's true. .

we have the greatest Preacher goin. . hey, he's a ParrotHead . .! !

and in my book. . any religious leader that wears Tropical shirts and calls out members of his " congregation " as a$$hats. .

I'm for sure going to listen . .! !

Hey, stop makin' fun of my hat!

SchoolGirlHeart wrote:

UAHparrothead wrote:I would too NYCport.

If I wanted an all positive response I could have posted this on a Christian knitting club board. But I wanted real response from real people with a wide range of views and I feel that I have gotten that, so thank you all for your thoughts and I think we have had a really good conversation going on.

I beleive the Bible is the inspired Word of God. That is that God had a hand in the construction, but has often happens, human distractions (money, politics, etc.) cloud the vision that God had. I do not beleive that the Bible is infallible, there are too many contradictions, however I do think that certain parts can be taken literally while others are allegorical. I think that one needs to first understand the historical, cultural context of the part of the Bible in which your reading. I think God gave us brains for a reason and that reason was to think. The thing about fundamentalists is that the preacher preaches and the people listen and do not investigate for themselves.

Wow. I'm sitting back on my heels a little bit. I think you're the first preacher I've ever heard admit he/she didn't think the Bible was infallible. Often, they're too busy trying to hit you over the head with that infallible book.

I'm more impressed by your honestly every day, Brad.

Wow.

I used to think that, I really did, but then I began to realize that trying to "prove" the Bible is 100% true (i.e. fundmentalism) is not faithfulness it is in fact the opposite. Fundamentalists find themselves struggling to prove to the world (and most times to themselves) that the Bible is historically accurate. If the Bible was completely infallible then that would mean that if one part was found to be untrue the way it was written then that rest of the Bible would be false as well. I feel that there are parts that are infallible to the Christian faith (if Jesus was not raised on the third day then what's the point of the rest of it). If you don't beleive that then you really can't be a Christian. But parts of the Bible can be fallible and yet still be understood in the context of in which it was meant.

For example, According to Exodus 12:37, there were 600,000 men that left Eygpt with Moses and crossed the Red Sea, now if you take into account women and children, one could estimate about 2 million persons , not counting animals, carts, etc. Now it would take how many months to make that crossing? Does it mean that it didn't happen, no necessarily, but the point of the story is that God delievered his people, not the historical account.

UAHparrothead wrote:

SchoolGirlHeart wrote:

UAHparrothead wrote:I would too NYCport.

If I wanted an all positive response I could have posted this on a Christian knitting club board. But I wanted real response from real people with a wide range of views and I feel that I have gotten that, so thank you all for your thoughts and I think we have had a really good conversation going on.

I beleive the Bible is the inspired Word of God. That is that God had a hand in the construction, but has often happens, human distractions (money, politics, etc.) cloud the vision that God had. I do not beleive that the Bible is infallible, there are too many contradictions, however I do think that certain parts can be taken literally while others are allegorical. I think that one needs to first understand the historical, cultural context of the part of the Bible in which your reading. I think God gave us brains for a reason and that reason was to think. The thing about fundamentalists is that the preacher preaches and the people listen and do not investigate for themselves.

Wow. I'm sitting back on my heels a little bit. I think you're the first preacher I've ever heard admit he/she didn't think the Bible was infallible. Often, they're too busy trying to hit you over the head with that infallible book.

I'm more impressed by your honestly every day, Brad.

Wow.

I used to think that, I really did, but then I began to realize that trying to "prove" the Bible is 100% true (i.e. fundmentalism) is not faithfulness it is in fact the opposite. Fundamentalists find themselves struggling to prove to the world (and most times to themselves) that the Bible is historically accurate. If the Bible was completely infallible then that would mean that if one part was found to be untrue the way it was written then that rest of the Bible would be false as well. I feel that there are parts that are infallible to the Christian faith (if Jesus was not raised on the third day then what's the point of the rest of it). If you don't beleive that then you really can't be a Christian. But parts of the Bible can be fallible and yet still be understood in the context of in which it was meant.

For example, According to Exodus 12:37, there were 600,000 men that left Eygpt with Moses and crossed the Red Sea, now if you take into account women and children, one could estimate about 2 million persons , not counting animals, carts, etc. Now it would take how many months to make that crossing? Does it mean that it didn't happen, no necessarily, but the point of the story is that God delievered his people, not the historical account.

Have you ever watched or listened to Joseph Campbel's, "Power of Myth?" You nailed his beliefs with this comment. He goes much deeper into understanding the need of us to listen to stories and learning the lesson in the myth.

i do not understand how someone can take the english language version of the king james bible as the literal word of god as some people do.

historically, the original texts were written in ancient hebrew and other period languages, then translated into greek & latin and now into contemporary english and other languages. with the amount of serious biblical scholarship comparing the original texts to the king james version identifying the differences which amount to everything from lousy translation skills to literary license to blatant alteration for socio-political reasons, how can anyone make the argument the modern bible is the literal word of god?

Okay, I’m going to try and do this without my usual tongue in check sense of humor, but I have this one snippet that almost sums it up for me. I don't know if I heard this once or if I actually made it up.

"The only difference between a cult and a religion is about 2,000 years."

Here are my thoughts. Religion was brought about because it made it much easier to control the uneducated masses. They were told by their leaders that there was a supernatural being that would look after you if you did what "He" told you to do (all the while the leaders were the ones "translating" what "He" wanted you to do.) If you didn't do what he wanted you to do you were in a world of trouble forever!
This also made it a lot easier to explain so called natural phenomenon, like volcanoes, floods, storms, etc.
Moving forward a few thousand years religion was again used to control the masses in a slightly different way, you don't do it the way we do it you will be tortured or killed.
All the while there is no real proof of any of the existence of this Supreme Being.
Throw in the fact that most wars, or regional differences a started because of a difference in religion and I question the good in this even more.
Present times have brought us to a point where the central organizations that run religions are wealthy beyond comprehension, I'm aware of the good these organizations do as well. Sell off the works of the Sistine Chapel and I but that would put a dent in world hunger!
What I see here is a system the starts indoctrinating the next wave of members as children and continues to add to its masses generation after generation after generation. Cult like, huh?
In 5,000 years we have no real proof such a supreme being exists. I don't except answers like "I know he exists in my heart." That's not proof. The Red Sea wasn't parted, it was low tide. There wasn't only one day of oil left in the temple, they made a mistake when they measured, an angel of death didn't kill Ramses first born son, some well timed disease did. You get my point.
Why do I need someone else to tell me how to live my life? I'll figure it out. And if I'm not sure I'll go to one of you, my friends for advice, not someone working off a book I know to be in large part fiction with no proof to dissuade me of my thoughts.
What I see is people looking for answers that can't be answered and people taking advantage of human weakness to "guide" them. To me it's a lot like being a weatherman. It's going to snow today. Ooops, it didn’t snow, you know how the weather is!
God will save you if you do things his way. Well, I know you lived a good life according to Gods teaching but still had a very hard life and experienced a lot of tragedies in your life. God works in strange ways! Sounds very similar to me.
I could go on and on. I think you can get an idea of what I'm trying to say.
Again, you asked, not trying to p*** anyone off.

NYCPORT wrote:Okay, I’m going to try and do this without my usual tongue in check sense of humor, but I have this one snippet that almost sums it up for me. I don't know if I heard this once or if I actually made it up.

"The only difference between a cult and a religion is about 2,000 years."

Here are my thoughts. Religion was brought about because it made it much easier to control the uneducated masses. They were told by their leaders that there was a supernatural being that would look after you if you did what "He" told you to do (all the while the leaders were the ones "translating" what "He" wanted you to do.) If you didn't do what he wanted you to do you were in a world of trouble forever!
This also made it a lot easier to explain so called natural phenomenon, like volcanoes, floods, storms, etc.
Moving forward a few thousand years religion was again used to control the masses in a slightly different way, you don't do it the way we do it you will be tortured or killed.
All the while there is no real proof of any of the existence of this Supreme Being.
Throw in the fact that most wars, or regional differences a started because of a difference in religion and I question the good in this even more.
Present times have brought us to a point where the central organizations that run religions are wealthy beyond comprehension, I'm aware of the good these organizations do as well. Sell off the works of the Sistine Chapel and I but that would put a dent in world hunger!
What I see here is a system the starts indoctrinating the next wave of members as children and continues to add to its masses generation after generation after generation. Cult like, huh?
In 5,000 years we have no real proof such a supreme being exists. I don't except answers like "I know he exists in my heart." That's not proof. The Red Sea wasn't parted, it was low tide. There wasn't only one day of oil left in the temple, they made a mistake when they measured, an angel of death didn't kill Ramses first born son, some well timed disease did. You get my point.
Why do I need someone else to tell me how to live my life? I'll figure it out. And if I'm not sure I'll go to one of you, my friends for advice, not someone working off a book I know to be in large part fiction with no proof to dissuade me of my thoughts.
What I see is people looking for answers that can't be answered and people taking advantage of human weakness to "guide" them. To me it's a lot like being a weatherman. It's going to snow today. Ooops, it didn’t snow, you know how the weather is!
God will save you if you do things his way. Well, I know you lived a good life according to Gods teaching but still had a very hard life and experienced a lot of tragedies in your life. God works in strange ways! Sounds very similar to me.
I could go on and on. I think you can get an idea of what I'm trying to say.
Again, you asked, not trying to p*** anyone off.

sounds like something i'd write.....