Quote:The Bible is a spiritual book, yet it deals with every day life as well, the scriptures are great to study when one studies for the correct reason. Those who do not have the guidance of the Holy Spirit will not get much form the Bible.

Translation: It is worthless pulp unless you beef yourself up with a large amount of confirmation bias.

The correct reason to study any work is to examine it critically for truth or falsehood. If you study the Bible so as to justify or dismiss it, you are reading it correctly. If you study it so that you can refine your interpretation to the point that it coexists with your expectations, desires, or morals, you're lying to yourself and you get nothing out of the study except a reinforcement of your own stupidity.

(March 25, 2013 at 3:39 am)Ryantology Wrote:

Quote:The Bible is a spiritual book, yet it deals with every day life as well, the scriptures are great to study when one studies for the correct reason. Those who do not have the guidance of the Holy Spirit will not get much form the Bible.

Translation: It is worthless pulp unless you beef yourself up with a large amount of confirmation bias.

The correct reason to study any work is to examine it critically for truth or falsehood. If you study the Bible so as to justify or dismiss it, you are reading it correctly. If you study it so that you can refine your interpretation to the point that it coexists with your expectations, desires, or morals, you're lying to yourself and you get nothing out of the study except a reinforcement of your own stupidity.

I look not to my own understanding, I seek the wisdom of the eternal, omniscient God of creation.

(March 24, 2013 at 8:48 pm)CapnAwesome Wrote: The main attribute I think of when I think of the bible is just how boring it is. Many Atheists paint the bible as this book of horrors but in truth it's mostly just long and boring. It clearly shares attributes with other literature of the period. Most ancient literature is also fairly tedious. Clearly it's a product of it's time. I think that Christians who claim to find something special in it are basically lying or haven't read it. Large sections of ancient genealogy and poorly put together poetry, clumsy metaphorical stories make up a huge chunk of the old testament.

Christians will talk of these beautiful passages, but they are a miniscule part of the bible. It's mind numbingly dull. The new testament is likewise mind numbingly dull, and don't blame the translation. The Iliad far exceeds it in terms of actual good writing. Is this God's test of our patience?

I have spoken to many a devout Christian who have considered a lot of the bible to be boring. I can't blame them either, for example; Leviticus is a cure for insomnia.

(March 24, 2013 at 10:47 pm)jstrodel Wrote: I personally think that studying theology is more interesting than the Bible. When you see how all the pieces of scripture fit together, it makes the study of the scriptures more enjoyable. I have trouble with studying the Bible because of the familiarity and the fact that the nature of reading one book at a time tends to obscure overarching themes and systemic theology, which is the most enjoyable part of studying theology for me.

Reminds me of something in Hodge's Systematic Theology. Theology is to the Bible as natural science is to nature. The Bible is raw material, and God largely left it for man to draw truth from it. Skeptics don't realize this.

Atheists pay lip service to science, but most of them don't read a single peer-reviewed journal, because:

1. They're expensive
2. Unless you have a significant background in that particular field, they're typically hard to read and boring

What actually gets read is stuff by Dawkins and the like writing about science. It's more accessible.

Similarly, there are plenty of works about the Bible which are more accessible. I recall reading some of the Warren Wiersbe Be... series way back in the day, and it helped make sense of what I was reading.

Acts 8
30 So Philip ran to him, and heard him reading the prophet Isaiah, and said, “Do you understand what you are reading?”

31 And he said, “How can I, unless someone guides me?” And he asked Philip to come up and sit with him.

(March 25, 2013 at 9:05 am)John V Wrote: Reminds me of something in Hodge's Systematic Theology. Theology is to the Bible as natural science is to nature. The Bible is raw material, and God largely left it for man to draw truth from it. Skeptics don't realize this.

Atheists pay lip service to science, but most of them don't read a single peer-reviewed journal, because:

1. They're expensive
2. Unless you have a significant background in that particular field, they're typically hard to read and boring

I guess that's a fair point. I do find science journals to be extremely boring as well, however science written for a scientific audience makes no claim to be accessible to the layman. The bible is supposed to be such, but fails, as it does in so much else.

Quote:I look not to my own understanding, I seek the wisdom of the eternal, omniscient God of creation.

I'd aim lower if I were you, G-C. The really deep stuff seems way beyond you.

(March 25, 2013 at 11:59 am)CapnAwesome Wrote: I guess that's a fair point. I do find science journals to be extremely boring as well, however science written for a scientific audience makes no claim to be accessible to the layman. The bible is supposed to be such,

How do you reach that conclusion? You ignored the passage I posted which indicates the opposite.

The critical difference is that understanding science is not necessary. Whether or not one understands how electrons are transmitted has no bearing on whether one can use electronic devices, much less what happens to one after one dies. It is definitely useful, and of immense benefit, to understand how things work, but you can get by in life without most of it.

If you don't get God's 'truth' right, however, you pay for it forever.

The Bible is difficult to read because it badly-written and inconsistent. Centuries of theologians have perpetrated a giant fraud by making it out to be far more obtuse than it really is, but it's understandable: without the hard work of such useless people, the Bible would have been rightly discarded ages ago as the useless pulp fiction it really is.

Read it straightforward and you get the distilled truth of the Judeo-Christian God. Listen to theologians if you want the intellectual equivalent of a paid testimonial in an infomercial for bra-filling silicone inserts.

I must be the odd man out. I find scriptures endlessly fascinating. It has to be read in small doses that you ponder throughout the day, then reread.

I like Hosea. And the Song of Solomon. The romantic parts of the Bible. Also the sermon on the mount, I like thinking about Biblical ethics. Some of the psalms are really amazing.


Very true about theology versus the Bible, John V.

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(March 25, 2013 at 2:53 pm)Ryantology Wrote: The critical difference is that understanding science is not necessary. Whether or not one understands how electrons are transmitted has no bearing on whether one can use electronic devices, much less what happens to one after one dies. It is definitely useful, and of immense benefit, to understand how things work, but you can get by in life without most of it.

If you don't get God's 'truth' right, however, you pay for it forever.

The Bible is difficult to read because it badly-written and inconsistent. Centuries of theologians have perpetrated a giant fraud by making it out to be far more obtuse than it really is, but it's understandable: without the hard work of such useless people, the Bible would have been rightly discarded ages ago as the useless pulp fiction it really is.

Read it straightforward and you get the distilled truth of the Judeo-Christian God. Listen to theologians if you want the intellectual equivalent of a paid testimonial in an infomercial for bra-filling silicone inserts.

If it is so simple, why do you make so many mistakes about it?