You know that follower of christ existed long before bible
Religion, what's the point?
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You know that follower of christ existed long before bible
No, please, don't stop. I can take it, give me a minute...
Oh please. You've ruined it now.
And the scriptures, laws, and prophesies that make up the majority of it existed before followers of Christ.
Again - Jesus literally talked about this multiple times in his life. It’s the whole reason all the stuff that happened before him is included in the book…
...yeah, no biggie but I'm afraid it wasn't just sitting on the shelves getting updated each year. Fair bit of debate, healthy I should think. I've no money on it.
https://www.learnreligions.com/when-was-the-bible-assembled-363293
Wiki too!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_canon
https://www.learnreligions.com/when-was-the-bible-assembled-363293
Wiki too!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_canon
I’m sorry, but if your argument is “you can believe in Jesus and not the Bible because Christians existed before it was put into a single volume” then that’s silly and pedantic and fully misses the point that Jesus is the physical embodiment of the full message of the scripture itself and ignores the fact that an omnipotent and omniscient deity would know that the Bible is going to be the version of said scripture that will exist after he’s left earth again since he planned for it to exist from the beginning.
Yeah, that's the argument. Yeah, put me down for two of them.
I suppose just the tiniest of side points might have been that there may even be some scriptures in the 'book' that he had never even heard of quite apart from those which came following his life. Not a finished neat item flying off the shelves until many many people had had their say, least of all Jesus. But it's not such a vital point. Tricky to take on board maybe... probably not worth mentioning. The Book.
He’s God. He knows everything.
Once again, if your version of Jesus isn’t and doesn’t, then I again reiterate… I have no clue what type of Christianity you believe in.
Good grief.
Doesn't that make you an agnostic theist @oates? Or do you mean you don't believe all parts of it? I don't see how you can believe in Jesus, be a Christian and not believe in the Bible.
When you drill down into the details it seems like most Christians are their own personal Jesus. Just right for them and not really related to anything in the bible.
Yes. This is something that I said at the very beginning of the discussion. We're basically going around in circles because I made a statement that we are Christians, not Biblians, that is maybe better understood if we could imagine a missionary visiting a tribe never seen before or met by 'civilisation' who lost his Bible at sea, or in the Jungle. The tribe had no hang ups about a book but could understand the central messages of the faith, maybe not word for word but the gist etc. This being one of the reasons not to get bogged down in the book. That in my opinion also the whole bible could not be relied upon to have remained intact over the years. It's confusing apparently.
I apologize, I misunderstood. I was just generally curious. It makes sense now though, I couldn't do the math how you could be a Christian without believing (anything) in the Bible.
Well, I was asked how as a child I could hear about Jesus without reading the Bible. From atheists telling me how I should find my faith I admit I found it funny and said so. A fair amount of umbrage was taken and the discussion bogged down.
It has to be presumptive from anyone not knowing a childhood to imagine that they are fully qualified to tell that child how the child must find its faith. But no, apparently it's perfectly normal.
I grew up with my grandparents who were very religious and I was told about God and the Saints (Orthodox), I was christened. I believed my grandmothers stories about how the world and everything came to be (from the Bible). All this without ever reading the Bible myself, so I understand what you mean. As I grew older I became an atheist because it fit my beliefs and my view of the world but let's say I never lost my faith, I would essentially be a Christian without ever reading the Bible.
Jesus, reading the conversation you were doing the image of the arrogant, condescending zealot a world of good! These people are finding quite logical (to me) difficulty in understanding belief in a religion or religious figure without the most readily available source of religious teachings.
One question I would ask, you say that you don’t need the Bible to believe in Jesus, having heard other people give teachings, or sermons. My question is where would they have (generally) learned about Jesus?
I don't get why this is so controversial.
For a lot of historical figures or happenings we know that the source material we have is unreliable. Take Pythagoras, for instance. As far as we know he didn't write anything. Neither did his followers, really, and we don't have good contemporary sources. Heraclitus and Xenophanes mentioned him, but not in any biographical detail, and in the case of Heraclitus it was an attack on Pythagoras which brings with it its own interprative problems. A lot of the later sources are stuff of legends, I assume a lot of people here have heard about the golden tigh. There are also a lot of fake writings attributed to him.
Despite of this few people doubt that Pythagoras was a real person, and most people believe that we have a reasonable idea of some facts about his life and some of his views on certain topics, though there are many disagreements about details and in some cases bigger disagreements about what is real and what is forgery or legend.
Surely Christians can have similar views about Jesus, God and the Holy Spirit, or Jesus/God/Holy Spirit if they're among the Christians who believes in the Trinity: That Jesus is real, that he is the Son of God, but that some of the source material - also things included in the Bible - is unreliable or untrue.
In fact, most atheists and agnostics have a similar view of Jesus as they do about Pythagoras. Namely that he was a real historical person who did stuff, but that the supernatural stuff is not true. That a lot of the writings about his life is either exaggerated, fakery or untrue, including most of or all of the Bible. I don't see why some Christians can't have a similar view, but that they accept more of the sources than an atheist or an agnostic would.
Add in that there's a long history of various Christian movements accepting stuff outside of the Bible as sources of knowledge about Jesus or God, like personal revelation, then a Christian, as in a person accepting Christ as the Son of God, has many potential paths to belief without necessarily having to accept the infallibility of the Bible.
For a lot of historical figures or happenings we know that the source material we have is unreliable. Take Pythagoras, for instance. As far as we know he didn't write anything. Neither did his followers, really, and we don't have good contemporary sources. Heraclitus and Xenophanes mentioned him, but not in any biographical detail, and in the case of Heraclitus it was an attack on Pythagoras which brings with it its own interprative problems. A lot of the later sources are stuff of legends, I assume a lot of people here have heard about the golden tigh. There are also a lot of fake writings attributed to him.
Despite of this few people doubt that Pythagoras was a real person, and most people believe that we have a reasonable idea of some facts about his life and some of his views on certain topics, though there are many disagreements about details and in some cases bigger disagreements about what is real and what is forgery or legend.
Surely Christians can have similar views about Jesus, God and the Holy Spirit, or Jesus/God/Holy Spirit if they're among the Christians who believes in the Trinity: That Jesus is real, that he is the Son of God, but that some of the source material - also things included in the Bible - is unreliable or untrue.
In fact, most atheists and agnostics have a similar view of Jesus as they do about Pythagoras. Namely that he was a real historical person who did stuff, but that the supernatural stuff is not true. That a lot of the writings about his life is either exaggerated, fakery or untrue, including most of or all of the Bible. I don't see why some Christians can't have a similar view, but that they accept more of the sources than an atheist or an agnostic would.
Add in that there's a long history of various Christian movements accepting stuff outside of the Bible as sources of knowledge about Jesus or God, like personal revelation, then a Christian, as in a person accepting Christ as the Son of God, has many potential paths to belief without necessarily having to accept the infallibility of the Bible.
Moby (the poster who asked him about his childhood) made multiple posts about this very point last night… that a child would still learn of Jesus via the Bible because the storyteller would be quoting / paraphrasing it to them.
It's similar enough in a way except that I was not a Christian as a child or young person, like you I heard the spoken word and never had a Bible or noticed one which is the truth, if I'd been at a Sally Army service they weren't obvious to me, if I'd seen one I wouldn't have known it was 'The Book'. I drifted from the church but came back as an adult, when I needed help but stayed even after.
And I've just answered yet again. It seemed to me like someone was trying to batter me into submission with a bit of wet cardboard. You have to laugh really. It's not something I expected from one half of the team.
Okay.
The magical transformation of the primordial soup of random chemicals to living, functioning cells with readable genetic code in strands which could be transcripted to unprecedented proteins by transcriptase (which had to come from somewhere by the way) to form new living cells, with the ability and 'desire' to reproduce themselves takes just as much faith as believing in a deity / intelligent design.
Empirical science has been able to prove neither, but sure, dump on folks who believe something other than yourself - you're way more smarter (very dangerous thinking by the way).
Add that to the fact that random selection (or whatever scientific postulation you believe) somehow over the years transformed that mess (which magically reacted to create a force called life of which's origin folks can't explain or recreate) to the complex and interconnected flora and fauna we see today with enough intelligence (when did intelligence get coded in the journey and from where did it come btw?) to even comprehend the subject we're talking about, and you realise that takes a leap of faith in itself.
Said my piece, perhaps made some enemies, but I'd urge you to be inclusive and understanding in your thinking.
Bigotry and non-acceptance is the child of religion that's caused atrocities through the centuries. What people don't recognise is atheists can be as bigoted as anyone if not more.
The notion of faith isn’t complicated or defined to a book, you either believe or you don’t. I find it strange a bunch of atheists are having a go at you for not being devoted enough to scripture.
Because you have on one hand the belief that believing in Jesus is the only path to salvation and on the other hand the belief that the Gospels and Jesus himself held that he was the physical embodiment and fulfillment of scriptural prophesy (i.e. the Old Testament).
Casting away parts of the OT would mean casting away the parts that Jesus specifically said he came to fulfill and keep unchanged while casting away parts of the NT would mean casting away the parts that deal with Jesus life, teachings, miracles, resurrection, and the final prophesy of his return. They are joined at the hip.
Agreed and well said. I’d add that we have to remember that many cultures relied on oral testimony as opposed to written testimony and documented their history as such, as well. This idea that if it isn’t literally written in a book that it can’t exist is a disservice to (mainly) non-European history.
Aboriginal tribes relied on the oral tradition and it was a way of keeping knowledge intact from one generation to the next. Storytelling is such an important part of Native American culture and tradition as well. And spoken testimony is an integral part of epistemology throughout history.
Yeah, it's very odd, a bizarre experience that I tried to explain but I'm not one to stand down in the face of such preposterous behaviour. Being dictated to by people who have neither the knowledge or being willing to believe what they are told regarding a period in a life nor the understanding they propound to claim as theirs attempting to batter away over and over is something now I'm quite sure they'll not have the emotional intelligence to appreciate.
I'm afraid this has become a bit of a bearpit unlike I would have thought the vast majority of Current Event threads where people share experience and knowledge and maybe enjoy debate. Claiming to ask what the point is in Religion isn't the question but an opportunity for like minded individuals to have a good har har sesh while attacking anyone with the temerity to attempt to share more. It won't change.
It’s not casting away parts of the Old or New Testament it’s being opened minded enough to realise they have been written by different authors many years apart and that inaccuracies or different interpretations can be made..
Hence the controversy… since that’s not what the Gospels have Jesus saying at all.
Only a fool would deny the existence of God at this point, the evidence is there for all to see.
It’s not controversial at all, it’s only controversial if you are looking for it to be. Even though with differing interpretations they all follow the same base ideas.
No time for Johnny Cash..Only a fool would deny the existence of God at this point, the evidence is there for all to see.
What have I become...
I suppose if Christians hadn't put people to death for a thousand years or more for not believing certain parts or misinterpreting other parts we might all be a bit more relaxed about it.
My dearest friend.
That’s why this thread was created -https://www.redcafe.net/threads/religion-discussion-read-the-op-before-posting.424322/
Once again: you don’t have to believe in something to know about it
I’m sorry, but it absolutely is controversial in a theological sense.
Case in point, a BBC commissioned study in Britain in 2017 found that “a quarter of people who describe themselves as Christians in Great Britain do not believe in the resurrection of Jesus”.
It's a point, maybe the Caf or modmins need to decide if this thread wants balanced discussion or a circle-jerk for atheists.
Oh dear.