mens_sana

"How and why" is part of the approach found in Rainer Albertz's 2-volume History of Israelite Religion in the Old Testament Period— a work written more for the determined rather than the adventurous.

The Bible is alleged to be God's word, revealed to men and preserved by them. While that belief is prevalent and considered persuasive, "God" can be blamed.

Note: I do not know how to "conceal" a link to Amazon "under" a book title. If someone could explain how that is done, in 1-2-3 type steps, using 6th-grade vocabulary, I would appreciate it.

mens_sana

I would suppose that text-critical studies might become relevant when one has to date one passage in relation to another, or one school of thought in relation to another. Ehrman is not the first to write in the theodicy area. A number of securely-employed Catholic thinkers have done so down through the ages. Everyone who has read in this area is aware of this, so I think your question must be more from a "Defender of the Faith" stance than it is from curiosity.

Brian63

As an agnostic, I somehow doubt that that is his position. It seems instead that he intends to show that many of the popular arguments used by apologists fail.

Good on him. He seems to have a wide audience of people interested in his books on textual criticism, and hopefully that will translate into an audience for this subject also.

Brian

gregor

I'm just being selfish, wishing that he keeps providing me with more analytical fare (and avoids being grouped with more popular writers).

gstafleu

The question "Why is life the pits?" (so quaintly called "theodicy," "divine justice," because of the apparent lack of this faculty in Christianity) is a valid area of mythological research. The Buddhists for example also have a pithy word for the idea: Dukkha. So, with any luck, Ehrman will illuminate the subject using a lantern with a beam a bit wider than Christianity.

Gerard Stafleu

~M~

God's Problem: How the Bible Fails to Answer Our Most Important Question--Why We Suffer (or via: amazon.co.uk)


I will be purchasing this book, but I must stress a particular caution for Ehrman not to trangress the limitations of his expertise by focusing on the philosophical problem of evil. I would be happy to see this book discussing whether the Bible fails to talk about our suffering at all but not whether the Bible sufficiently reconciles 'God's Problem' of suffering. The former can be a historical issue, but the latter is a wholly philosophical issue. The latter is where I suspect Ehrman will be weak and food for the fishes. I can imagine Craig, Plantinga, Swinburne, and Van Inwagen salivating at the mouth.

Jeffrey Gibson

Where else would they salivate?

Jeffrey

gregor

We had a prior, short thread about this book two months ago.

There was light discussion about whether the book's topic or approach risks making Ehrman a more 'popular' (in the quasi-perjorative sense) author and whether that is a positive or negative.

Toto

merged to bring in the prior discussion, which ties this into BCH themes.

~M~

youre not funny, jeff.