(April 16, 2011 at 5:04 am)fr0d0 Wrote: What you're saying, I think, is that you questioned that and came to a point where you disagreed. Thinking about the extra information you were unconvinced of the validity of it.
I don't know if I questioned how I was saved, just why, in light of some of the questions I raised earlier in this thread.
(April 16, 2011 at 5:04 am)fr0d0 Wrote: Take the literal interpretation of the Genesis creation story: I have never ever thought that this was a literal account of the beginnings of the cosmos, yet some are adamant about it, despite what I see as clearly overwhelming evidence in the bible to the contrary.
What is the evidence that's it's supposed to be taken figuratively? If some passages are supposed to be literal and some figurative, how are you to know the difference? I was taught that the Holy Spirit gave believers discernment, but that seems like such a wishy-washy, have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too view of biblical interpretation. If the Bible is such a great book, why isn't it clearer? And if you it is clear with the proper amount of studying, what is the proper amount? I thought Christianity, if it was anything, was a religion for simple, lay folk. Why the need for all this studying to be able to "get it?" I did a bunch of studying and I, in fact, didn't get it.
(April 16, 2011 at 5:04 am)fr0d0 Wrote: If I thought I had to compromise either my beliefs or my understanding of reality as described by science then I'd be very torn.
So why aren't you? Genesis says God made the heavens, Earth and stars, etc., presumably in their complete form as we know them today, or else, man would not have been able to habitat the Earth. This didn't happen. Suppose God was the fuel behind the big bang. While, I suppose that's slightly more likely, why would the Bible not have just said that? Sure, millions of people would be a little confused for a few thousands years, but eventually, we would come to find, that, the Bible got some things right about science after all and could be more trustworthy. Instead, it happened in the reverse way. Millions of people thought Genesis made perfect sense for centuries until science began closing in the gaps. Now, it's modern man who is confused by the Bible. So I'm not sure why you aren't torn. The Bible reads exactly as we would expect it to if it were written in ancient Palestine by fearful and superstitious people. Unfortunately, creation stories are as old as the mind of man.
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We have lingered in the chambers of the sea | By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown | Till human voices wake us, and we drown. — T.S. Eliot
"... man always has to decide for himself in the darkness, that he must want beyond what he knows. ..." — Simone de Beauvoir
"As if that blind rage had washed me clean, rid me of hope; for the first time, in that night alive with signs and stars, I opened myself to the gentle indifference of the world. Finding it so much like myself—so like a brother, really—I felt that I had been happy and that I was happy again." — Albert Camus, "The Stranger"
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We have lingered in the chambers of the sea | By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown | Till human voices wake us, and we drown. — T.S. Eliot
"... man always has to decide for himself in the darkness, that he must want beyond what he knows. ..." — Simone de Beauvoir
"As if that blind rage had washed me clean, rid me of hope; for the first time, in that night alive with signs and stars, I opened myself to the gentle indifference of the world. Finding it so much like myself—so like a brother, really—I felt that I had been happy and that I was happy again." — Albert Camus, "The Stranger"
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