Interpretation of Texts (General)

by dhw, Monday, September 27, 2010, 11:41 (5172 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained

BALANCE_MAINTAINED: No worries about all the questions, I love them.-Thank you. Some people take offence, and so I'm very wary of pushing too hard, but I'll go on pushing now as I know you're happy to push back!-Simple question first. You're not trying to prove that God exists, but simply that the Biblical writers were not crackpots. Why do you want to prove that they were not crackpots?-B_M: Saying that men are responsible for their actions is not the easy way out. [..] If you wrote a cookbook on how to bake the perfect cake, and the baker failed to follow the instructions [...] would you fault the instructions, or the baker?-I had asked you to quote passages from the scriptures that justified the Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition, disastrous missions, the Pope's attitude towards women priests, contraception, homosexuality. I've looked up the Crusades and you're right about the political purpose, although they began with a request from some Byzantine Emperor for help in defending Christianity against the Muslims. However, your cookbook analogy suggests that there are no instructions in the Bible to justify the savage treatment of unbelievers. Seek and ye shall find.-Let's start with my favourite source Deuteronomy, which sets the tone. Chapter 13, verses 6 ... 10 tell us what is to be done to anyone who tries to turn you away from the true (in this case Jewish) God: "[...] thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him with stones that he die." It's all very well you saying: "No where in the bible is anyone given any directive to torture anyone. The closest might be considered stoning." I'm not really sure which I'd prefer ... being stoned, tortured, burned at the stake, but here we have God himself ordering the use of deadly violence against those who do not follow the true faith. And so to the New Testament:-John 3, 36: "He that believeth on the Son shall have everlasting life, and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him."-Mark 16, 15: "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned."-I can't get inside the minds of the priests or the inquisitors, but if you've been told that God will be full of wrath and will damn those who don't believe in Christ, and you've also been instructed to tell the world about it, shouldn't you do your best to convert them? And wouldn't it be better to torture them into saving their souls than to let them go to eternal damnation by denying the true God? The instructions given by Mark certainly don't advocate violence, but they don't forbid it either, and since God himself orders that unbelievers should be stoned to death in Deuteronomy, and the onus is on you to save them from eternal damnation (which is even worse), why not give it a whirl? Now of course you will blame the interpreters for using the holy scriptures in this way ... though I can't see any other way to interpret Deuteronomy ... but who are you to say which is the right way and the wrong way? If only the texts themselves were unequivocal, like your cookbook with its clear instructions, we wouldn't have these problems. Who, then, do you blame for instructions whose lack of clarity can lead to such terrible consequences? -Incidentally, the laws laid down in Deuteronomy do not support your argument that religion in the sense of a man-made organization was not the intent of the Bible. You can't separate religion from society, and the instruction given above makes the identification crystal clear. Stay faithful to your Jewish God or your Jewish society will kill you. If that's not organized religion, what is?-You declined my invitation to support the Pope's bigotry with the scriptures, so here's a quote for you: "Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence." (1 Timothy 2, 11-12).-If a woman can't teach or have authority over a man, what chance women priests, eh? Timothy could hardly make the recipe clearer, and Timothy has been given his place in the Bible. Therefore the Bible is against women priests, and so the Pope is doing God's will. And no doubt the Pope will also have a few quotes to justify his opposition to contraception and to homosexuality.