2022-11-13
I'm not keen on featuring the contribution below for a number of reasons, because for all this guy says (and he's an American who has no trouble pouring out his no doubt sincerely held beliefs so that we can all benefit from his enormous wisdom - if only we could slow him down and take a week or two to digest it all), his narrative is based upon a few unspoken points which seem to me to be highly questionable.
But it does give me an opportunity to give a hobby-horse of mine an outing.
If I had to profess a religion it would be Christianity - just not the perverted versions peddled by the great hypocritical religions that (a) used to burn their heretics to death ("judge not that thou be not judged") and (b) seek to persuade us that we are so helpless that we should simply cast ourselves into unquestioning faith in Jesus Christ (oh, and the Bible) in order to be "saved". That is redolent of the simplistic scams offered by charlatans proffering snake oil across the ages ("just take this 'free' injection and you will be protected from disease!").
In my view, the Good Lord (or God or your chosen Creator) gave us the most remarkable organ between our ears precisely so that we can think independently for ourselves, and avoid the easy false options proffered by said charlatans since time immemorial.
It would therefore be the height of ingratitude (and probably folly) not to use that said organ to the full, and that includes reading the "word of God" in proper awareness of the possible corruptions therein. We need to sort the wheat from the chaff. That may seem impossible but I'll bet we can make a reasonable job of it - and there'll be plenty of stuff that ends up in the "not sure about this" box. No worries.
We know that all men are imperfect ("sinners" in the language of religion), so how is it reasonable to expect that everything written (and translated) by men over the centuries, will retain unchanged the perfection of the "word of God"? And that is before we consider that it was written by peoples of very different customs conventions and times to our own. Perceived meaning now may not exactly match the received meaning then, and nuances are important.
Nevertheless the Good Book does tell us a great deal about Jesus, and his reported actions speak every bit as coherently as his words. If a Christian is a follower of Jesus, then count me in as an individual who finds a great deal of inspiration in his story, whilst not necessarily fully accepting all parts of the conventional narrative. Discernment and maybe interpretation is required. There is no need to be hesitant to try it.
All that said, here is your dose of Biblical doom and gloom for today. It's up to you what to make of it:
(44 minutes)
Footnote:
Precisely in an attempt to avoid corruptions introduced into the various versions of the Bible proffered by organised religion, the "Keys of the Kingdom" Bible was recently released by a translator (known to me) who professes to follow no religious dogma, but based his mammoth work on accurate translation of the precise words in the "original texts". Being neither a religious scholar nor a linguist I can't vouch for it, but it does seem to me a heroic step in the right direction.
