The Mustard Seed..
It seems to me that you are trying to read God's mind and work out what he 'really meant'. Why not just say that the mustard seed is 'one of the smallest' instead if that's what was meant. If you are saying that Jesus was just making a point then he did not intend for a literal interpretation of his story. This begs the question, how many other parts of the Bible are not meant to be taken literally? Genesis for example?
To liken the statement as a 'figure of speech' does not work as there is no reason to suspect that it was intended in this way. It seems clear that it was a statement of fact. The analogy between the marbles and the seed also makes no sense as it is obvious that one cannot have a million marbles in a lunchbox but stating that the mustard seed is the smallest (or least) of all, seems, on the face of it, quite reasonable.
The whole point of a 'figure of speech' is that it is obviously not so. For example, "That was a piece of cake". Therefore this particular hypothesis can be disregarded.
The fact that the explanation for this particular parable runs to nearly 3,000 words shows exactly the sort of mental gymnastics that must be entertained in order to offer some kind of meaningful explanation to, what is in reality a plain and simple error which can easily be explained by the Bible being a work of the human imagination.
Flat Earth...
The explanation for this seems to be that the devil uses supernatural powers to show Jesus all of these kingdoms. Doesn't say that though does it when it so easily could. It's not as if the Bible shies away from using supernatural explanations elsewhere in its texts.
Simple Answer:- This was written at a time and by people who assumed that the Earth was flat.
Fowls do not go upon all fours.
All this seems to be saying is that the Bible doesn't actually mean what it says. It either means all fours or it doesn't. You can't say that when it says all fours it's simply referring to the act of walking on the ground. You shouldn't take it literally!! I agree..
Hares do not chew the cud.
This is simply ridiculous. How anyone at the time these passages were written would or even could have known this and therefore understood this verse as explained here is non-nonsensical.
To conclude, all that I have read here seems to lead to the conclusion that you should not take anything that you read in the Bible as absolute truth. Genesis should be no exception to this.
(November 14, 2009 at 5:43 pm)rjh4 Wrote: Answer
It seems to me that you are trying to read God's mind and work out what he 'really meant'. Why not just say that the mustard seed is 'one of the smallest' instead if that's what was meant. If you are saying that Jesus was just making a point then he did not intend for a literal interpretation of his story. This begs the question, how many other parts of the Bible are not meant to be taken literally? Genesis for example?
To liken the statement as a 'figure of speech' does not work as there is no reason to suspect that it was intended in this way. It seems clear that it was a statement of fact. The analogy between the marbles and the seed also makes no sense as it is obvious that one cannot have a million marbles in a lunchbox but stating that the mustard seed is the smallest (or least) of all, seems, on the face of it, quite reasonable.
The whole point of a 'figure of speech' is that it is obviously not so. For example, "That was a piece of cake". Therefore this particular hypothesis can be disregarded.
The fact that the explanation for this particular parable runs to nearly 3,000 words shows exactly the sort of mental gymnastics that must be entertained in order to offer some kind of meaningful explanation to, what is in reality a plain and simple error which can easily be explained by the Bible being a work of the human imagination.
Flat Earth...
rjh4 Wrote:Answer
The explanation for this seems to be that the devil uses supernatural powers to show Jesus all of these kingdoms. Doesn't say that though does it when it so easily could. It's not as if the Bible shies away from using supernatural explanations elsewhere in its texts.
Simple Answer:- This was written at a time and by people who assumed that the Earth was flat.
Fowls do not go upon all fours.
rjh4 Wrote:See the following from Answers
All this seems to be saying is that the Bible doesn't actually mean what it says. It either means all fours or it doesn't. You can't say that when it says all fours it's simply referring to the act of walking on the ground. You shouldn't take it literally!! I agree..
Hares do not chew the cud.
rjh4 Wrote:Hare and cud
This is simply ridiculous. How anyone at the time these passages were written would or even could have known this and therefore understood this verse as explained here is non-nonsensical.
To conclude, all that I have read here seems to lead to the conclusion that you should not take anything that you read in the Bible as absolute truth. Genesis should be no exception to this.
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