Subject:
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Re: The Parable ot the Tortured Debtor
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Wed, 24 Mar 2004 19:54:08 GMT
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Viewed:
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440 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Brendan Powell Smith wrote:
> In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Bruce Hietbrink wrote:
> But usually Jesus's death is seen as more than just a time-saver for the rest of
> us, right?
Sure. We would see it as accomplishing several things. In addition to acting
as one-time, complete forgiveness (in contrast to repeated, limited sacrifices),
more significantly by Christ standing in our place on the cross, we are then
able to share his place--adoption as full children of God (after we gave that up
by sinning), with all that entails.
> OK, but I guess my perspective is this: OF COURSE God should forgive people.
> What less should anyone expect of a supreme being? That's not news.
I would politely suggest that you think so because you live in a civilization
dominated for 2000 years by Christian thinking on the matter. I believe that
that was news to the people of the day.
> So if we can imagine for a moment that sin didn't exist, we
> wouldn't need God's forgiveness, and nobody would need Jesus to die for them.
Of course. The Christian would say that Christ's sacrifice was necessitated by
the Fall.
> My desire was to approach the Bible without any later
> theology attached to it -- to just take it at face value.
> I still try to
> maintain the approach toward the Bible of someone just reading the it for the
> first time, someone without later theological knowledge of "how to properly
> interpret the stories".
In some ways I think this is a really good idea. OTOH, scholarship is not
simply indoctrination--understanding of the culture the text was written in is
also very important. For instance, if I read Shakespeare with no external
sources, I'll get a good story. External sources can add to that enjoyment, but
there are two types of external sources. There is the type that says "This is
the TRUE theme of this play as agreed upon by all intelligent people (i.e.
professors of English literature), and you must interpret these
characters/speeches/actions in a particular manner. On the other hand there are
external sources that tell you about the history of King Henry V that
Shakespeare drew upon, the meaning of this word that is now obscure, the
political situation of the day that colors why Shakespeare wanted to show the
house of the current king in a good light, etc. This type of source material
could really aid the understanding and enjoyment of a particular play. So to
with biblical scholarship.
> I guess the over-arching idea is that: this is the Bible, God's one guidebook
> for mankind.
I think, and I've thought this in the past, that you want something different
from the Bible--a straightforward set of rules for living. I think of the Bible
more as a narrative that traces the relationship between God and Man. Along the
way there are of course rules for living, but also the history of Israel, poems,
myths, prophecy, morality plays, theological treatises, etc. I suspect that the
straightforward set of rules for living would not have inspired the Sistine
Chapel, the Hallaleuia Chorus, and the Brick Testament, much less a religion
that affected anyone's lives.
> Seems that any individual should just be able to pick it up and
> read it and glean knowledge without needing other people to come in and tell
> them "what the stories *really* mean".
Again, I agree and disagree. I challenge you to write the one book that
explains all of science, or even simply all of organic chemistry, that anyone
could come along and pick and completely grok without any assistance. What is
more complex--the reactions of carbon-based compounds, or all of human
relationships, morality, society, spirituality, etc.?
Bruce
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: The Parable ot the Tortured Debtor
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| (...) It must be noted, however, that once you draw upon contextual and historical guidelines to interpret an author's work, you are by definition no longer reading the work but are instead infusing it with material external to the work. Even (...) (20 years ago, 24-Mar-04, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: The Parable ot the Tortured Debtor
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| (...) That makes sense. (...) OK. I don't think I'll ever understand why killing an animal would incline God toward forgiveness. But even taking for granted that that system of atonement exists, I am further completely baffled as to how/why the act (...) (20 years ago, 21-Mar-04, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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