Scriptural literalism

jonathan180iq said:

Do you any evidence whatsoever to support that claim?


How so? Also, citation?


Saying you have no evidence to support it would be more accurate.


Can you give me 3 examples of this happening?


So then you have no problem with my claim that Leprechauns are real, right?

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Since the Bible has proven reliable historically, scientifically, and otherwise, there is no valid reason to doubt it's accuracy when recording the long lifespans of pre-flood men.
As to examples of the Bible being confirmed by archeological discoveries: "At one time, prominent scholars held that Assyrian King Sargon II, whose name appears in the Bible at Isaiah 20:1, never existed. In 1843, however, near present-day Khorsabad, Iraq, on a tributary of the Tigris River, Sargon’s palace was discovered. It covers some 25 acres. Raised from secular obscurity, Sargon II is now one of the best-known kings of Assyria." (g11/07)
"The Bible book of Daniel tells us that a man by the name of Belshazzar once ruled as king in Babylon. (Daniel 5:1) However, some secular sources have stated in the past that Belshazzar, though powerful, was never king. Was the Bible wrong? Archaeologists have uncovered a number of clay cylinders in the ruins of Ur in Mesopotamia. The cuneiform inscription on one cylinder included a prayer by Babylonian King Nabonidus for “Bel-sar-ussur, my eldest son.” Later findings confirmed that Belshazzar had “acted as regent for more than half his father’s reign,” states the New Bible Dictionary, “during which time he was to all intents and purposes king.” (g1/11)

rusra02 said:

Since the Bible has proven reliable historically, scientifically, and otherwise, there is no valid reason to doubt it's accuracy when recording the long lifespans of pre-flood men.
As to examples of the Bible being confirmed by archeological discoveries: "At one time, prominent scholars held that Assyrian King Sargon II, whose name appears in the Bible at Isaiah 20:1, never existed. In 1843, however, near present-day Khorsabad, Iraq, on a tributary of the Tigris River, Sargon’s palace was discovered. It covers some 25 acres. Raised from secular obscurity, Sargon II is now one of the best-known kings of Assyria." (g11/07)
"The Bible book of Daniel tells us that a man by the name of Belshazzar once ruled as king in Babylon. (Daniel 5:1) However, some secular sources have stated in the past that Belshazzar, though powerful, was never king. Was the Bible wrong? Archaeologists have uncovered a number of clay cylinders in the ruins of Ur in Mesopotamia. The cuneiform inscription on one cylinder included a prayer by Babylonian King Nabonidus for “Bel-sar-ussur, my eldest son.” Later findings confirmed that Belshazzar had “acted as regent for more than half his father’s reign,” states the New Bible Dictionary, “during which time he was to all intents and purposes king.” (g1/11)

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If the Bible has proven reliable, I'm sure you'll be able to give some corroboration that Herod's slaughter of the first-born or the zombie invasion of Jerusalem actually happened.

9-10ths_Penguin said:

If the Bible has proven reliable, I'm sure you'll be able to give some corroboration that Herod's slaughter of the first-born or the zombie invasion of Jerusalem actually happened.

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or that Jesus died on the Cross. Jesus did not die on the Cross, he survived a cursed death on the Cross and was delivered from the Cross in near dead position but still alive.
Regards

metis said:

Allegories and metaphors are meant to read as if they were real events, much like parables. I think it would be really hard to find a theologian today who would feel that Job was based on real events because there are some really serious problems with taking the entire narrative at face value.

For example, can you really imagine God and Satan gambling on whether Job has a strong faith by having some of Job's family being killed off, then Job being infected with appears to be a very nasty case of boils, all just in order to see if his faith can be shaken? Doesn't that sound just a little fishy. Heck, anyone who actually believes a story like that likely also believes in a talking snake.

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The Bible reveals that "talking snake" was no other than Satan, the same wicked spirit who attacked Job so mercilessly. (Revelation 12:9)
I believe the account of Job reveals that Jehovah values our integrity. Satan has slanderously accused that all of us will only serve God for selfish reasons, and he (Satan) can induce us to abandon God. The rest of the Bible supports the fact that Job existed and proved Satan a liar. (James 5:11)

rusra02 said:

The Bible reveals that "talking snake" was no other than Satan, the same wicked spirit who attacked Job so mercilessly. (Revelation 12:9)
I believe the account of Job reveals that Jehovah values our integrity. Satan has slanderously accused that all of us will only serve God for selfish reasons, and he (Satan) can induce us to abandon God. The rest of the Bible supports the fact that Job existed and proved Satan a liar. (James 5:11)

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The story of Job didn't "prove Satan a liar". In fact, I'd say that it shows the opposite.

If Job was loyal to God for good reasons and was a good person himself, then he should have abandoned God after the God-sanctioned murder of his family. The story plays out the way it does because:

- Job considers his family possessions like livestock: if an ox or a wife dies, you're really just out the money it will take to buy another ox or wife. He doesn't seem to respect them as people with lives that have inherent worth.

- Job seems to be focused on the end point and through most of the story that God will reward him later for the losses he's suffering at the time. It isn't that he's not selfish; he's selfish and pragmatic, willing to endure short-term hardship if it means a better result overall.

metis said:

Allegories and metaphors are meant to read as if they were real events, much like parables. I think it would be really hard to find a theologian today who would feel that Job was based on real events because there are some really serious problems with taking the entire narrative at face value.

For example, can you really imagine God and Satan gambling on whether Job has a strong faith by having some of Job's family being killed off, then Job being infected with appears to be a very nasty case of boils, all just in order to see if his faith can be shaken? Doesn't that sound just a little fishy. Heck, anyone who actually believes a story like that likely also believes in a talking snake.

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OTOH, as a moral fable or the like, it also has issues... maybe even more serious issues than a literal reading, because the moral lessons from Job are absolutely awful.

I could be convinced either way whether Job was intended to be literal or not. I certainly don't think everything in the Bible was meant to be interpreted literally... but I do think everything in the Bible was intended to be interpreted in some way.

I think that too often, non-literal believers use the excuse "oh - it's allegory/metaphor/parable/poetry/etc." to get out of difficult or ridiculous implications of interpreting a passage literally but then stop and don't bother to think about the passage's meaning beyond this.

Even symbolic passages were included to express some sort of idea. Well, if the passage really is symbolic, what does that imply about what the author was trying to express? It can't be nothing; if he had nothing to express, he wouldn't have written anything down in the first place.

Interpreting things non-literally also creates a difficulty that literal interpretations don't have: explaining coincidence.

Every word on the page has a purpose. If someone is just faithfully recording a witness account of an event, coincidences are no big deal: at any real event, there's always stuff happening in the background that's unrelated to the thing we care about. But if the whole account has been crafted for a purpose, then every detail is there deliberately and has a purpose of its own; if the interpretation is non-literal, then it doesn't contain any meaningless coincidences... so every detail calls for meaning to be derived from it in light of the overall intended meaning.

rusra02 said:

The Bible reveals that "talking snake" was no other than Satan, the same wicked spirit who attacked Job so mercilessly. (Revelation 12:9)
I believe the account of Job reveals that Jehovah values our integrity. Satan has slanderously accused that all of us will only serve God for selfish reasons, and he (Satan) can induce us to abandon God. The rest of the Bible supports the fact that Job existed and proved Satan a liar. (James 5:11)

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Actually I made a mistake by calling it a "snake" whereas actually the word used refers to "serpent", which could be a snake. Personally, I don't believe in talking serpents nor a talking Satan.

But you actually avoid my question in regards to why would a loving God allow someone to be killed and Job to be disfigured just for a supposed bet? Doesn't that strike you as being rather brutal and odd? If that's the case, then I guess we have to drop the "loving" part from a "loving God".

9-10ths_Penguin said:

OTOH, as a moral fable or the like, it also has issues... maybe even more serious issues than a literal reading, because the moral lessons from Job are absolutely awful.

I could be convinced either way whether Job was intended to be literal or not. I certainly don't think everything in the Bible was meant to be interpreted literally... but I do think everything in the Bible was intended to be interpreted in some way.

I think that too often, non-literal believers use the excuse "oh - it's allegory/metaphor/parable/poetry/etc." to get out of difficult or rudiculous implications of interpreting a passage literally but then stop and don't bother to think about the passage's meaning beyond this.

Even symbolic passages were included to express some sort of idea. Well, if the passage really is symbolic, what does that imply about what the author was trying to express? It can't be nothing; if he had nothing to express, he wouldn't have written anything down in the first place.

Interpreting things non-literally also creates a difficulty that literal interpretations don't have: explaining coincidence.

Every word on the page has a purpose. If someone is just faithfully recording a witness account of an event, coincidences are no big deal: at any real event, there's always stuff happening in the background that's unrelated to the thing we care about. But if the whole account has been crafted for a purpose, then every detail is there deliberately and has a purpose of its own; if the interpretation is non-literal, then it doesn't contain any meaningless coincidences... so every detail calls for meaning to be derived from it in light of the overall intended meaning.

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Traditional Jewish literature is loaded with allegory, metaphor, parable, and symbolism of all sorts, typically leading to a message(s). One can easily see that with the Psalms or the book of Revelation, for just two examples. A commonly heard phrase within Jewish circles on this is "the meaning behind the words". IOW, what is the author really saying?

What's also important is that scripture needs to interpreted in the context of the culture, the time, the related event(s), and the position of the author. A mistake so many make is that they view scripture through modern western eyes versus ancient western Asiatic eyes.

metis said:

Traditional Jewish literature is loaded with allegory, metaphor, parable, and symbolism of all sorts, typically leading to a message(s). One can easily see that with the Psalms or the book of Revelation, for just two examples. A commonly heard phrase within Jewish circles on this is "the meaning behind the words". IOW, what is the author really saying?

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Sure. That's a reasonable approach.

What's also important is that scripture needs to interpreted in the context of the culture, the time, the related event(s), and the position of the author. A mistake so many make is that they view scripture through modern western eyes versus ancient western Asiatic eyes.

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That's the part that I think many non-literalists who still want the Bible to be "inspired by God" tend to forget.

When deciding whether to interpret a passage literally or not, I think that there's a strong tendency to use our current understanding of the world - or how embarrassing a literal interpretation would be to modern believers - as the benchmark: if we now know that a literal interpretation would be incorrect or morally outrageous, then that's when it's interpreted as "non-literal".

"Of course 'the firmament' in Genesis doesn't mean that the sky is a literal solid dome where the stars are holes to let light through. We now know that this is laughably wrong, so it couldn't have been the intended meaning to people who lived thousands of years before Galileo or Ptolemy."

jonathan180iq said:

The Bible alluding to previous Biblical stories does not necessarily mean that the authors thought the alluded story was factually true. I can reference Star Wars as a way of teaching you something about life or politics, but that doesn't mean that I think the events of Star Wars actually happened...

But more importantly, even if they did, it simply highlights the problem with claims of Biblical perfection and expands on the flaws in the Biblical narrative. The inability of a later author to recognize the allegorical and disconnected nature of a book like Job shows why there is very little than can be taken literally.


Not true at all. There are real life lessons that can be taught about the Boy Who Cried Wolf. That doesn't mean that the boy actually existed.



He also purposefully left them open-ended and didn't explain them, using the ambiguity as a test of faith and understanding. (Matthew 13:10-17)
(Also, if the Disciples truly had ears of discernment, then why did Jesus have to explain things to them... Think about it.)

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It is clear to me you do not accept the Bible as God's word. Fair enough. I find the evidence compelling the Bible is God's word. The Bible writer James points to the example of God's dealing with Job to show Jehovah's qualities toward his worshippers. "Look! We consider happy those who have endured. You have heard of the endurance of Job and have seen the outcome Jehovah gave, that Jehovah is very tender in affection and merciful." (James 5:11) If Job were a mere fable, like the boy who cried wolf, there would be no valid basis to believe that Jehovah is merciful and will help us if we wait patiently on him.

rusra02 said:

It is clear to me you do not accept the Bible as God's word. Fair enough. I find the evidence compelling the Bible is God's word. The Bible writer James points to the example of God's dealing with Job to show Jehovah's qualities toward his worshippers. "Look! We consider happy those who have endured. You have heard of the endurance of Job and have seen the outcome Jehovah gave, that Jehovah is very tender in affection and merciful." (James 5:11) If Job were a mere fable, like the boy who cried wolf, there would be no valid basis to believe that Jehovah is merciful and will help us if we wait patiently on him.

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No. Obviously I don't regard the Bible to be the "Word of God".

James is a good example. Read that whole passage, imaging just or a moment that Job is entirely allegorical. Does the lesson of the Job story change at all? Do the implications about God's character change at all? Is James' message altered in anyway? Does the main purpose for that passage become pointless, just because it references a well-known, albeit mythological, story?

Like the Boy Who Cried Wolf, which we agree is a fictional tale, the point of the story relies not on the factual existence of the little boy and his herd, but on truths of the human experience. I'm sure you have someone in your life that you don't fully trust because of exaggerations that they've made in the past, right? I know I do. That alone makes the story of the Boy Who Cried Wolf factual, even if that particular boy never existed. It's a philosophy, and an observation about the human experience that we can all share. The same is true of stories like Job's, where the worldview of the pious is transposed onto a fantastic background for the purpose of highlighting and giving meaning to the ideals that the writers attributed to God and to the value of faith that they had. They are factual observances about what that culture valued. But that does mean that the story itself is a factual part of history.

9-10ths_Penguin said:

Are there any species that you accept are extinct?

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Sure. Why do you ask?

rusra02 said:

Sure. Why do you ask?

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Because the conclusion that a species is extinct is drawn from a lack of evidence, not from positive evidence.

thats how someone reflect life from one generation unto another
that is
and if someone deny or disregard it
then this sounds insane too me

yes it me
:read: (and try to adapt it unto every human reasoning in this planet)
as they say
But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.

now im just thinkin cuz its free to think unless someone would get hurt becaused of someone by thinking as they say
and again as im saying
im just thinkin
about this
freethinkin cuz the very meaning of reasoning doesnt fit unto what reality is telling so
cuz freethinkin is for everyone and not for one who thinks whats best for anyone or somebody so
Yea, let none that wait on you be ashamed: let them be ashamed which transgress without cause.

by the way
those who thinks only of themselves were never been free at all


:ty:



godbless
unto all always

metis said:

Actually I made a mistake by calling it a "snake" whereas actually the word used refers to "serpent", which could be a snake. Personally, I don't believe in talking serpents nor a talking Satan.

But you actually avoid my question in regards to why would a loving God allow someone to be killed and Job to be disfigured just for a supposed bet? Doesn't that strike you as being rather brutal and odd? If that's the case, then I guess we have to drop the "loving" part from a "loving God".

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If not for Jehovah being a loving God, we would not have even lived at all, IMO. So I think it ill behooves us to criticize God for what he allows. The Bible teaches that all of us are sinful and deserving of death, but that God has provided the means to save our lives everlastingly. (Romans 6:23) I believe Jehovah can and will undo all the harm Satan has caused, bringing back to life the innocent victims that have been slaughtered by the wicked. There was no bet. Simply a statement by God of Job's integrity and Satan's despicable slander.

rusra02 said:

It is clear to me you do not accept the Bible as God's word. Fair enough. I find the evidence compelling the Bible is God's word. The Bible writer James points to the example of God's dealing with Job to show Jehovah's qualities toward his worshippers. "Look! We consider happy those who have endured. You have heard of the endurance of Job and have seen the outcome Jehovah gave, that Jehovah is very tender in affection and merciful." (James 5:11) If Job were a mere fable, like the boy who cried wolf, there would be no valid basis to believe that Jehovah is merciful and will help us if we wait patiently on him.

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Where was God's tenderness or affection for Job's family?

rusra02 said:

If not for Jehovah being a loving God, we would not have even lived at all, IMO. So I think it ill behooves us to criticize God for what he allows. The Bible teaches that all of us are sinful and deserving of death, but that God has provided the means to save our lives everlastingly. (Romans 6:23) I believe Jehovah can and will undo all the harm Satan has caused, bringing back to life the innocent victims that have been slaughtered by the wicked. There was no bet. Simply a statement by God of Job's integrity and Satan's despicable slander.

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Well, here's from just one of many a Christian sources that disagrees with you:
In the book of Job, as best as I can see, God ruined Job's life over a bet (Job 1:9-12, 2:4-6). People and livestock who weren't even involved died (Job 1:13-19). Moreover, God literally made this deal with the devil. -- http://christianity.stackexchange.com/questions/8680/how-can-a-loving-god-make-a-deal-with-the-devil

BTW, I do know how to read, rusra, so don't go telling me what's clearly obvious to those who read the source objectively.

And contrary to what you wrote above, I did not "criticize God" as that's not the same as dismissing the literalistic interpretation of the source that has God acting as a tyrant. As allegory it makes some sense, but at the literalistic level it simply paints God as a mean-spirited homicidal maniac.

metis said:

As allegory it makes some sense, but at the literalistic level it simply paints God as a mean-spirited homicidal maniac.

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How does it make sense as an allegory?

How does it not also paint God that way when it's taken as an allegory?

Augustus said:

Something I've been thinking about but don't really know a great deal on. Any answers would be appreciated.

When did people start to interpret religious scriptures in a highly literal manner? Which was the first religion to do so?

Is there any reason to believe any of the early followers of any religious tradition adopted a literalist approach or was it always a much later development?

Is this something unique to certain forms of Abrahamic religions, or is it present in other faiths too?

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Interesting question, to be sure. The various stories cobbled together into the Bible over the ages were written by bronze-age goat herders in the desert, so I am certain they believed in all sorts of things modern man would find repugnant, such as concubines, slavery, blood sacrifice, etc. I think it would be difficult to know with certainty what they actually believed literally, but I would suggest nearly all of it. Older texts from other religions often share similar aspects of the story-line.

how come it came to known literally authentic as they say
:read: (think it as a scenario)
Now it came to pass, when they had heard all the words, they were afraid both one and the other, and said unto Baruch, We will surely tell the king of all these words.
17 And they asked Baruch, saying, Tell us now, How did you write all these words at his mouth?
18 Then Baruch answered them, He pronounced all these words unto me with his mouth, and I wrote them with ink in the book.

looks like this baruch authenticated it when it was been heard and wrote it after that

also when weve ask by a child about this question how come washington dc became a place when on the first place
it is named after george washington and his human not a place
so we just tell this child that
everything has a purposed like the term planet earth
when humans called it earth while in reality
one third of its existence is base on water
meaning why putting it on a literal point of view and call it as earth only
then the child spoke this thing to ask
so thats why human cant live underwater
like those fishes on the sea

now
about this so called allegory
(while we prepared to call it as proverb)
as it is written
:read:
For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a freewoman.
23 But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh; but he of the freewoman was by promise.

24 Which things are an allegory: for these are the two covenants; the one from the mount Sinai, which genders to bondage, which is Agar.

25 For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answers to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children.
26 But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.

27 For it is written, Rejoice, you barren that bear not; break forth and cry, you that travail not: for the desolate has many more children than she which has an husband.
28 Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise.
29 But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, b even so it is now.

30 Nevertheless what says the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman.
31 So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free.

well idontknow about this things for sure
if you would ask me
says one of our fellows here
thats why we are not all knowing
but we are not liar


:ty:



godbless
unto all always