OneInFundieville

"The Bible" ("God's Word") as errant is too much to grasp. No fundie will ever fall for that. It's unthinkable. Literally.

There are the big stories. Creation. Flood. Resurrection. So much has been written and preached on that. So much indoctrinated that the chink in the armour isn't there either.

But you may find it in other places.

For me, I lost my inerrancy at the Tower of Babel.

I love reading on language study and language histories and grew in my understanding of language evolution. It was the tower of Babel that was first for me to deem mythical.

The story of the tower of Babel is not in any creed. Nor has it been heavily defended by modern creationists and apologists. The creation account gets defended, the flood gets defended, the resurrection gets defended. Those are take on faith.

Similar the stuff in the creeds. Virgin birth, etc.

If you want to look elsewhere you might find a chink though.

Like one jawbone being able to withstand killing a thousand men at Samon's hand.

Like a talking donkey.

Or Nephilim.

Or the Leviathan.

Stay away from Adam, Eve, Noah, the patriarchs, Moses, Isaiah, Jesus, Peter, Paul, and John, the Beloved. Jonah is a maybe. Elijah too.

Break the seal elsewhere.

Cover a number of those before going after credal elements and other big ticket items.

For a fundie, last to go likely will be heaven, hell, resurrection, original sin, and canon.

Johnny Skeptic

Even if the Bible is inerrant, no one knows what the originals said. In addition, even if the Bible is inerrant, that does not necessarily mean that God inspried it. Copies of the New York Times are inerrant, but they are not inspired. Further, inerrant does not necessarily mean true, just accurately copied. Inerrantists do not have any credible evidence that the Bible is inerrant. They assume that a moral, rational God would provide believers with inerrant texts. However, that does not work because God refused to provide any texts at all, whether inerrant or errant, to hundreds of millions of people who died without hearing the Gospel message. An inspired and accurately preserved Bible indicates a presumption that God would make it available to everyone. Why else would he want to inspire and preserve the Bible?

If God is not obligated to save everyone, he certainly is not obligated to provide believers with inerrant texts.

djrafikie

if you check back I think you'll find that was from the previous poster.. I just buggered up the quotes.

Roger Pearse

Is there any *practical* difference between this position and saying that the only people who should be allowed to study the bible are those who believe it to be wrong?

That would not be a value-neutral position, of course.

The other issue is whether we would prefer someone to write about wine who loves wines, or a teetotaller who hates alcohol.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Chris Weimer

The analogy is not perfect, mi amice. Wines are better compared with religions, and the people who are best to write about wines are those who love wines, but don't have an a priori commitment to any one wine. Certainly we can agree that those who hate wines are just as biased as those who have a commitment to one wine. Likewise, those who hate religion, or hate the religion in question, are disqualified in the same likeness as those who have an a priori commitment to all religions, or to one religion.

I myself would rather everyone to be interested in the truth...

Roger Pearse

Again is there any *practical* difference between saying only those with no commitment to the religion under study may be allowed to study it, and saying that all religions must be studied on the basis that they are untrue?

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Chris Weimer

Yes. The former presumes nothing, while the latter skews the evidence in favor of keeping the latter position true. No commitment can also mean that one may believe that a certain one is true, but that there is no commitment to ensure that - if the evidence leads elsewhere, than you abandon the position.

The same is true for every subject.

Roger Pearse

I'm afraid that if we think through how it works in practice, there is no practical difference.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

djrafikie

I think terms like "hate" or "untrue" are a bit of a misnomer. Maybe I should have been clearer. I wouldn't trust a single word from an academic studying the bible it they "hated" it.
And truth is also relative.
If you are looking to prove the existance or otherwise of god, you're really looking at philosophy I guess. When an academic researcher looks at the bible as a document, shouldn't they really be looking at it's effects on society, which (if any) parts of it tie into archeological finds, and original and related copies of documents..like the talmud (where they can be found), as WELL as it's actual content in relation to itself?


Surely if you start from the position of "believer" you can't really objectively do any of those things, just as much as if you looked at it from the position of "unbeliever"...

It's just a book.. I'm kinda looking at studies of the BOOK, rather than studies designed to critique or prop up the existant faith related to it. For instance, say mount zion exists (or at least, a mountain CALLED mount zion exists). This doesn't prove it was called that before the bible was written, it also doesn't prove it wasn't. The issue of it proving or disproving the content is totally irrelevant. You don't need to look at it from the perspective to learn a lot about the region around mount zions history, or be prodded into trying to. You also don't need to decide it is all "lies" if you were to discover mount zion WAS named so BECAUSE the bible said there was one. If you can pinpoint the date when the name was applied to that particular mountain it will tell you a lot about any further sections of the bible dated AFTER the naming of the mountain (because from then on they would be literally saying they were ON it, and actually be giving a partially factual account).
Again, that would fail to prove that the bible was "true", as in this instance the early biblical texts would be making it up, and the later texts would not. It would only tell you how that area began to be compartmentalised, and how parts of that landscapes population were annexed into the faith.. that would give you clues as to where you might look to find any related artefacts mentioned later on in the book (like graves and such, containing early jewish or christian carvings or symbols).

This is a purely hypothetical suugestion, and once again I'm not sure i am being clear enough..
I just don't see how that would be any different from picking up the diary of a man in the 17th century, and using it to look at origins of house and street names..

Boro Nut

Not a very good analogy. Are you suggesting they start with the same bias toward proving the results? The same ethics? Would they suffer the same punishment and penalties for being caught out doing so? Clearly not. Even the other drug companies would jump on faked results and data to rip them to bits and have a feeding frenzy on their customer base.

Boro Nut