christian faith without the bible as foundation

[trablano]

Hello there,

I wanted to ask you if you think it's possible to have a christian faith without accepting the bible as a foundation for it.

It is rather odd. I started out as an atheist but since I was 16 I had a fascination for Jesus and the gods. I never read the bible back then and simply followed my intuition, reason and my heart. I saw in Jesus a god man who desired men to be both free and loving. Jesus felt like a name for freedom for me.

Later after some very bad years I came to search God in a christian church setting. I was not very successful and ended up being afraid of God, mainly because the christians I asked for help were relying mostly on the bible for their faith and either could not answer my questions at all or when they had answers they usually did not satisfy me.

But out of fear I accept the ideology and began trying to base my faith on the bible.

Now after leaving evangelical christianity I am trying to live the christian part of my faith (I also worship God in the hindu traditions) without using the bible. But it's very difficult. I am always thinking, if it were not for the bible, how could I know something about Jesus? I thought, maybe it's a passing on of traditions. That the tale of Jesus incarnating, living here, dying for mankind and being raised up later was passed on orally, and the bible only records some parts of it. It's odd anyway that while the bible is very large it doesn't speak all that much about the resurrection and what the resurrected Jesus said and did.

That is my trouble, the bible feels awfully insufficient, but I have no other holy book. I wish I had one. My life is such that I grave a loving God to be my friend in all of it, and sometimes I have it, but when I get insecure the biblical things I read and was told rise to the surface and beat me up.

Do you see the dilemma? How do you live christian faith without using the bible? What books would you read?

 

[Woberts]

You don't have to confine yourself to the "Big Three". (Christianity, Judaism, Islam)
Your probably not a Christian in the sense the most Christians are, but that doesn't matter.
As long as your particular flavor of Christianity brings you joy, what does it matter?

 

[WalterTrull]

My life is such that I grave a loving God to be my friend in all of it,

Yeah, we all would like a life saver. Most of the "holy" books have their good points, but I think that life itself is the biggest teacher. I totally believe in the Christ concept, even though it has been misconstrued more often than not. I also don't believe Jesus was the only recipient. I try to remember "...the lilies of the field..." to not be afraid, and to stay open. Yeah, I know, easier said.

 

[Jainarayan]

I wanted to ask you if you think it's possible to have a christian faith without accepting the bible as a foundation for it.

Look into Jesuism and the Jefferson Bible. They necessarily rely on the gospels because that's where the teachings of Jesus are. But they reject Paul and mainstream Christianity. The Jefferson Bible goes even further by rejecting all miracles, the resurrection, and claims of Jesus's divinity. That's why even as Hindu I don't reject Jesus and his teachings out of hand because I look through that filter and lens... only the gospels.

 

[exchemist]

Hello there,

I wanted to ask you if you think it's possible to have a christian faith without accepting the bible as a foundation for it.

It is rather odd. I started out as an atheist but since I was 16 I had a fascination for Jesus and the gods. I never read the bible back then and simply followed my intuition, reason and my heart. I saw in Jesus a god man who desired men to be both free and loving. Jesus felt like a name for freedom for me.

Later after some very bad years I came to search God in a christian church setting. I was not very successful and ended up being afraid of God, mainly because the christians I asked for help were relying mostly on the bible for their faith and either could not answer my questions at all or when they had answers they usually did not satisfy me.

But out of fear I accept the ideology and began trying to base my faith on the bible.

Now after leaving evangelical christianity I am trying to live the christian part of my faith (I also worship God in the hindu traditions) without using the bible. But it's very difficult. I am always thinking, if it were not for the bible, how could I know something about Jesus? I thought, maybe it's a passing on of traditions. That the tale of Jesus incarnating, living here, dying for mankind and being raised up later was passed on orally, and the bible only records some parts of it. It's odd anyway that while the bible is very large it doesn't speak all that much about the resurrection and what the resurrected Jesus said and did.

That is my trouble, the bible feels awfully insufficient, but I have no other holy book. I wish I had one. My life is such that I grave a loving God to be my friend in all of it, and sometimes I have it, but when I get insecure the biblical things I read and was told rise to the surface and beat me up.

Do you see the dilemma? How do you live christian faith without using the bible? What books would you read?

Religion is not just about reading books.

If you belong to one of the major Christian denominations, you get the bible read to you in church with explanations and teaching from the priest or minister, who knows his way around it better than you do. He will often teach also the ideas of theologians, saints and other thinkers who have spent time considering the messages for mankind that the bible contains.

Many people find that quite sufficient without reading the bible at home as well.

A large proportion of the bible is the Old Testament, which Christianity inherited from Judaism. The New Testament is by far the most important for the Christian as it supersedes a lot of the old law and morality with the teaching of Christ. The OT has to be read with awareness that it was written a very long time ago in a primitive culture. That is probably why it is so full of warfare, bloodshed and claims to land. (I sometimes think the modern Israeli state has barely moved on from those days!) But the Gospels contain most of what you need to know and are quite short. I find the Epistles a bit of a mixed bag: St Paul was very important to the creation of Christianity but some of what he is either obscure or rather jarring to modern sensibilities.

I have come across a theory that Christianity may have in part originated from Eastern religion: a synthesis of Judaism with Hellenistic Greek philosophy and also maybe a dash of Buddhism. More here: Buddhist influences on Christianity - Wikipedia

 

[Kiss of Mystery]

Hello there,

I wanted to ask you if you think it's possible to have a christian faith without accepting the bible as a foundation for it.

It is rather odd. I started out as an atheist but since I was 16 I had a fascination for Jesus and the gods. I never read the bible back then and simply followed my intuition, reason and my heart. I saw in Jesus a god man who desired men to be both free and loving. Jesus felt like a name for freedom for me.

Later after some very bad years I came to search God in a christian church setting. I was not very successful and ended up being afraid of God, mainly because the christians I asked for help were relying mostly on the bible for their faith and either could not answer my questions at all or when they had answers they usually did not satisfy me.

But out of fear I accept the ideology and began trying to base my faith on the bible.

Now after leaving evangelical christianity I am trying to live the christian part of my faith (I also worship God in the hindu traditions) without using the bible. But it's very difficult. I am always thinking, if it were not for the bible, how could I know something about Jesus? I thought, maybe it's a passing on of traditions. That the tale of Jesus incarnating, living here, dying for mankind and being raised up later was passed on orally, and the bible only records some parts of it. It's odd anyway that while the bible is very large it doesn't speak all that much about the resurrection and what the resurrected Jesus said and did.

That is my trouble, the bible feels awfully insufficient, but I have no other holy book. I wish I had one. My life is such that I grave a loving God to be my friend in all of it, and sometimes I have it, but when I get insecure the biblical things I read and was told rise to the surface and beat me up.

Do you see the dilemma? How do you live christian faith without using the bible? What books would you read?

I find it uncanny you post this today. Just yesterday...I was trying to write up a 'about me' type of page. I believe in God/trinity etc..but found it hard to type 'I don't read the bible'. I have tried... I know various scripture out the gate for various situations, but..how do you put this across to other 'christians'...

My point being..I do what you do..I follow my heart and discernment, so my friend..you are not alone in this conflict, for lack of better word right now..lol

 

[exchemist]

I find it uncanny you post this today. Just yesterday...I was trying to write up a 'about me' type of page. I believe in God/trinity etc..but found it hard to type 'I don't read the bible'. I have tried... I know various scripture out the gate for various situations, but..how do you put this across to other 'christians'...

My point being..I do what you do..I follow my heart and discernment, so my friend..you are not alone in this conflict, for lack of better word right now..lol

It's perfectly normal. I suspect most Catholics don't read the bible at home - I only do when I want to look something up - but they do read it at Mass every Sunday: one Old Testament reading, one Epistle reading, and one from the Gospels. The Church of England is much the same and so are many other established branches of the church.

 

[Kiss of Mystery]

It's perfectly normal. I suspect most Catholics don't read the bible at home - I only do when I want to look something up - but they do read it at Mass every Sunday: one Old Testament reading, one Epistle reading, and one from the Gospels. The Church of England is much the same and so are many other established branches of the church.

This is true..and also, I know alleged deep and sincere Christians that quote scripture all day long..and not one bit of it is lived in their life or heart. Hypocrisy I believe its called
But the OP posting this..just strikes my attention, cuz the past few days I've thought to myself 'can I believe in and follow God, but yet put away the guideline for that belief.
Heck...I didn't even know how to define myself when registering here..lol I dislike labels

 

[trablano]

Thanks for the comments. Well, I am not a jesuist in the jeffersonian traditions. The words of Jesus as recorded in the bible seem more scary to me than the concepts of wonders, his divinity or the resurrection. I mean the stuff about self hate, the parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man, the parable of the talents, the stuff about hating your family, and so on. The bible is full of crap in many places. I am thinking it is a forgery designed by religious evil men to control people. I still trust Jesus but I cannot trust the bible anymore.

 

[Kiss of Mystery]

Thanks for the comments. Well, I am not a jesuist in the jeffersonian traditions. The words of Jesus as recorded in the bible seem more scary to me than the concepts of wonders, his divinity or the resurrection. I mean the stuff about self hate, the parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man, the parable of the talents, the stuff about hating your family, and so on. The bible is full of crap in many places. I am thinking it is a forgery designed by religious evil men to control people. I still trust Jesus but I cannot trust the bible anymore.

You are not alone

 

[osgart]

I find myself caring about the Jesus account of things, and i have no idea why.

The biggest question for me is Jesus' major influence on humanity.

I have no problem with the message that sinners ought not love his/her very life. Why? Because its a life lived by way of evil.

I mean what if there really was a man Jesus, whom was crucified on the cross, as accounted for by Josephus, a roman historian.

Why was he crucified? And what impacted all these different writers to write about him.

Why would anyone create the whole story up from nothing, if there wasn't a real jesus?

Otherwise the whole thing is from pure imagination.

Why would the writers need to invent a messiaha?

 

[pearl]

I wanted to ask you if you think it's possible to have a christian faith without accepting the bible as a foundation for it.

The NT is the product of Christian faith, not the foundation. That's why they are referred to as 'faith testimonies'.

That the tale of Jesus incarnating, living here, dying for mankind and being raised up later was passed on orally, and the bible only records some parts of it. It's odd anyway that while the bible is very large it doesn't speak all that much about the resurrection and what the resurrected Jesus said and did.

30Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book. 31But these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in His name.

Jesus did not preach himself, but the coming reign of God which he inaugurated. But Jesus understood as the Christ came only through post resurrection faith and the Holy Spirit.

Do you see the dilemma? How do you live christian faith without using the bible? What books would you read?

The Gospels are not only to be read, but prayed, meditated on, to 'hear' in the Hindu form if you are comfortable with that form of prayer.

 

[Jainarayan]

Thanks for the comments. Well, I am not a jesuist in the jeffersonian traditions. The words of Jesus as recorded in the bible seem more scary to me than the concepts of wonders, his divinity or the resurrection. I mean the stuff about self hate, the parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man, the parable of the talents, the stuff about hating your family, and so on. The bible is full of crap in many places. I am thinking it is a forgery designed by religious evil men to control people. I still trust Jesus but I cannot trust the bible anymore.

You have to understand that those statements are not to be taken literally. They are allegorical, metaphorical and parables.

 

[Windwalker]

I wanted to ask you if you think it's possible to have a christian faith without accepting the bible as a foundation for it.

Yes. Christians were Christians before there was a bible. And there are those who identify as Christian despite the bible today. Worshiping the bible as though it were God is foolishness on display. It's quite flawed.

It is rather odd. I started out as an atheist but since I was 16 I had a fascination for Jesus and the gods. I never read the bible back then and simply followed my intuition, reason and my heart. I saw in Jesus a god man who desired men to be both free and loving. Jesus felt like a name for freedom for me.

So you see, your attraction had nothing to do with the literature about Jesus. That you made Jesus meaningful to you so early on, indicates you were already well-ahead of those you later looked to for guidance.

Later after some very bad years I came to search God in a christian church setting.

Ooops! Despite our good intentions, we make innocent errors.

I was not very successful and ended up being afraid of God, mainly because the christians I asked for help were relying mostly on the bible for their faith and either could not answer my questions at all or when they had answers they usually did not satisfy me.

I'll state this another way for you. They weren't relying on the bible, they were driven by their fears, which found a reflection of that in their reading of the bible. I see you as not having been in that fear, and so you couldn't relate to that God they saw there. You saw the God of Love instead.

But out of fear I accept the ideology and began trying to base my faith on the bible.

That led to a lot of conflict with what your heart was telling you, versus what they were telling you God was like, didn't it? Did they try to tell you that the bible says you shouldn't listen to your heart? Did they try to instill and stoke that flames of a fear of being wrong and resulting in you being lost and rejected by God?

Now after leaving evangelical christianity I am trying to live the christian part of my faith (I also worship God in the hindu traditions) without using the bible. But it's very difficult. I am always thinking, if it were not for the bible, how could I know something about Jesus?

Here's the thing. A jewel can be buried underneath mountains of earth and never lose its beauty. It's up to you to pull forth the gems from the debris. It doesn't need to be a package deal. You don't have to keep the bathwater when you've found the Baby.

I thought, maybe it's a passing on of traditions. That the tale of Jesus incarnating, living here, dying for mankind and being raised up later was passed on orally, and the bible only records some parts of it. It's odd anyway that while the bible is very large it doesn't speak all that much about the resurrection and what the resurrected Jesus said and did.

The bible has a lot of problems in light of the myth that these particular 66 books that were selected by various committee meetings were divinely directed, and that everything else is flawless, etc. It's kind of hard to believe people can believe that.

That is my trouble, the bible feels awfully insufficient, but I have no other holy book. I wish I had one.

All of the world is my scripture. God speaks in all that is. It's really just a matter of "not reading" it, but seeing and hearing it speak real-time.

Other books can help inspire though of course. You could look into many directions, like the Tao Te Ching, the Bhagavad Gita, the Upanishads, etc. These can help to open the door at the moment for you to see the world as it is; to see God.

My life is such that I grave a loving God to be my friend in all of it, and sometimes I have it, but when I get insecure the biblical things I read and was told rise to the surface and beat me up.

Fear is the opposite of Love. God is Love. If you experience fear, it is not God. Fear does not exist in God.

Do you see the dilemma? How do you live christian faith without using the bible? What books would you read?

I think you should live whatever faith you care to make it for yourself. I think that is what is infinitely more important than conforming to others ideas of what being a "Christian" should look like. Who are they to judge another man's servant? Who are they to play God?

 

[Samantha Rinne]

Hello there,

I wanted to ask you if you think it's possible to have a christian faith without accepting the bible as a foundation for it.

It is rather odd. I started out as an atheist but since I was 16 I had a fascination for Jesus and the gods. I never read the bible back then and simply followed my intuition, reason and my heart. I saw in Jesus a god man who desired men to be both free and loving. Jesus felt like a name for freedom for me.

Later after some very bad years I came to search God in a christian church setting. I was not very successful and ended up being afraid of God, mainly because the christians I asked for help were relying mostly on the bible for their faith and either could not answer my questions at all or when they had answers they usually did not satisfy me.

But out of fear I accept the ideology and began trying to base my faith on the bible.

Now after leaving evangelical christianity I am trying to live the christian part of my faith (I also worship God in the hindu traditions) without using the bible. But it's very difficult. I am always thinking, if it were not for the bible, how could I know something about Jesus? I thought, maybe it's a passing on of traditions. That the tale of Jesus incarnating, living here, dying for mankind and being raised up later was passed on orally, and the bible only records some parts of it. It's odd anyway that while the bible is very large it doesn't speak all that much about the resurrection and what the resurrected Jesus said and did.

That is my trouble, the bible feels awfully insufficient, but I have no other holy book. I wish I had one. My life is such that I grave a loving God to be my friend in all of it, and sometimes I have it, but when I get insecure the biblical things I read and was told rise to the surface and beat me up.

Do you see the dilemma? How do you live christian faith without using the bible? What books would you read?

Every book.To prove this point, let's open Magic Kingdom for Sale–Sold! The novel is about a lawyer who after his wife dies, buys a fantasy world through catalogue. It is an in-depth look at how God repairs the brokenness in our lives using a ruler as an example. Or how about Tolkien's Fellowship of the Ring? We have waters washing away Nazgûl, straight out of Moses. And Gandalf's sacrifice (followed by his rebirth later on) is reminiscent of Jesus's resurrection.

It is very possible to have Christianity without the Bible. I only recently started reading the New Testament, before that I got alot of my Bible secondhand.

The early Church hadn't written many of these books, but they managed. As do churches in areas without enough books to go around.

The Christian faith is not about the Bible, in fact, believing in sola scriptura is idolatry. It's just a book. Jesus is Savior.

How I Spent 20 Years in Ministry Without the Bible

The Bible-less Christian - Modern Reject

https://www.onfaith.co/onfaith/2009/05/01/do-christians-have-to-believe-in-the-bible/1210

In many lands, Christians are persecuted. Their Bibles are burned or banned. Yet they manage to hold on to the truth of the scripture despite everything. And you can find the word of God in a great number of books hiding among what appears to be fantasy or mystery.

 

[ChanaR]

Christians can correct me if I get this wrong. I know that different Christians define a Christian differently, but as best as I can word it, a Christian is some who comes to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God (and this means God the Son as well), who died to saved us all from our sins, and if we believe, repent, and are baptized, God will forgive us and give us eternal life. Chrisitans disagree among themselves how to interpret the Bible (i.e. some bellieve in evolution, others of YE creationists), but the things that are believed literally are laid out in the Creed (i.e. virgin birth, raised bodily from the dead, etc.) And Chrisitanity is a religion of belief, so if one doesn't believe those things, one really isn't a Christian, or at best, one is a backslidden Christian.

It's difficult for me to find vocabulary to discuss what you are describing. But it seems to me that you are saying you are culturally a Christian, even though it is no longer your religion. There are things about it that are always, always going to be deeply meaningful to you, even though you have left the faith, i.e. Christmas.

One of those things is going to be the Bible, although you'll be reading it very differently. For example, a lot of things you took literally as an Evangelical, you will understand aren't literal at all. But why throw it away? It is full of wisdom, history, teaching stories, proverbs, and incredible songs of worship and praise. Even non-Christians find portions of it inspiring. So hang on to it my dear. Cherish its words in your heart.

 

[Marcion]

Do you see the dilemma? How do you live christian faith without using the bible? What books would you read?

That will not be easy because after the very short mission of the historical Jesus (Yeshua), the sects who originally worshipped Him in their own way all disappeared within a few centuries or were absorbed into the ideology of the christians who wrote, edited and collected (!) the christian scriptures they now call their Bible.

The Ebionites e.g. followed Yeshua in a Jewish cultural setting with their own gospel and they seem to have lived more or less like Yeshua originally taught, in poverty and as vegetarians. They seem to have rejected the teachings in the so-called 'letters of Paul'.

The original teachings of Yeshua as reconstructed in Q-lite (see link below) were later changed and re-interpreted in the christian gospels of Matthew and Luke.
They were perhaps still known in their original version to the Ebionites although their gospel is now unfortunately lost.

 

[IndigoChild5559]

I'm not a Christian, but I have studied it at length.

If something works, why fix it? Pull out a thread, and where does it end? It reminds me of "practicing Judaism" without observing all the laws. It's like playing Jenga -- you pull out the pieces and you never know which one will cause the tower to come crashing down.

Christianity functions as a whole. It is a religion of belief, and part of that means believing in what the Christian scriptures teach. Even liberal denominations, which play fast and loose, still hang on to the scriptures as their rightful heritage.

I would consider that in determining your answer.

 

[tayla]

if it were not for the bible, how could I know something about Jesus? I thought, maybe it's a passing on of traditions.

The writings of the early church fathers are good sources of information about what Christianity was at the time, but they quote writings that later became included in the canon of scripture, in other words, in the Bible.

There is no such thing as verbal-only tradition that has been passed on from generation to generation unchanged. Maybe some creeds such as the apostles' creed or the Nicene creed are useful. But anything else was likely modified significantly even if the people claiming they are valid traditions claim they have been passed on without modification.

 

[ObjectOfMercy]

I wanted to ask you if you think it's possible to have a christian faith without accepting the bible as a foundation for it.

You may have a faith without the Bible, but it won't be Christian. God has revealed Himself in His Word. All saving knowledge of God comes from the Word. His gospel is contained in the Bible. God has breathed out these Scriptures. It is His verbally inspired Word, so that God chose all the words to use, in the original texts and in the preservation of them for the salvation of sinners. God has chosen to save sinners by sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth. Salvation comes through the preaching of the gospel. This is the means God has chosen to save sinners.