Problem is that when they see "love they neighbor" they look around and only see straight white folks, so they assume everyone else is excluded for some reason
When I was in Sunday School, we were given a strict (Catholic Catechism) definition: Your neighbor is anyone you meet. It doesn't even specify any "human." My mom always brought home that point whenever animal cruelty was discussed.
Of course, my parents who taught me that lesson are still Catholic and yet super proud of my identity. Very chill with my trans spouse. Even marched with me at a local pride event.
Maybe they're the exception but "love thy neighbor" does still have tangible meaning to some folks.
Race science was created specifically so that they could see non-white people as non-people. This was done so that Christians could (just barely) hold onto their belief system while committing all of the atrocities of the colonial era.
I actually just happened to be reading a relevant part of Lies My Teacher Told Me that quotes Montesquieu (French philosopher who influenced the US founding fathers):
It is impossible for us to suppose these creatures to be men, because, allowing them to be men, a suspicion would follow that we ourselves are not Christian.
It was a racial clause from the beginning. -The word wasn't needed otherwise.
-Same as the sexual clause 'neighbour's wife' instead of 'spouse'.
And context supports that:
'Think not that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets', 'Do not go among the Gentiles', 'I have come only for the lost sheep of Israel', 'it is not meet to take the children's bread and cast it to the dogs'.
I mean the Bible is pretty clear on this. In response to the question, "who is my neighbour," Jesus answered with the parable of the Good Samaritan. In Christianity, everyone is your neighbour.
In Judaism there was a lot of debate about it historically and I don't know where things stand now.
Yeah jesus said didn't come to abolish the law, but he clearly teaches things different to the teachings of the old testament so it should be pretty clear he's adding to it.
It's your problem if you're not able to understand a very simple and obvious parable. There's no ambiguity for anyone else, really.
The rest of your reply is babby's first anti-christian rant. I'm not religious, so direct your tawdry energies elsewhere.
You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt:
Sojourn: "short stay, temporary residence". -That's if they aren't subject to the OTs calls for genocide: Deuteronomy 20:16-17, Joshua 6:21, 1 Samuel 15:3, Numbers 31:17-18, Deuteronomy 2:34, 1 Samuel 15:18, Judges 21:10, 2 Kings 10:7. or appointed to slavery: Leviticus 25: 44 “‘Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. 45 You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. 46 You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.
'Think not that I have come to destroy the law or the prophets' -His sole existence is based on the OT and is referenced in the first chapter of John. You might be thinking Saul of Tarsus.
Exactly. It's not like they weren't instructed to kill and enslave elsewhere in the Bible.
Genocide:
Deuteronomy 20:16-17, Joshua 6:21, 1 Samuel 15:3, Numbers 31:17-18, Deuteronomy 2:34, 1 Samuel 15:18, Judges 21:10, 2 Kings 10:7.
Slavery:
Leviticus 25: 44 “‘Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. 45 You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. 46 You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.
He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”
“Yes it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
Then Jesus said to her, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.” And her daughter was healed at that moment.
Jesus is being called out by the Cannanite woman and is in the wrong here.
“Do not go out among the Gentiles” is in the context of his specific instructions to the apostles at one point in time. The commission is expanded later.
You can’t pick and choose isolated verses - you’re acting like a Christian.
No, you're acting Saulinian. -The guy that never walked with Jewsus, lost the lottery to Matthias, destroys the law, lies, and flip flops.
If you want to play context, don't ignore that Jewsus is the same OT god that subjected women to sex slavery, certain people to brutal racial slavery, and some to genocide. -And don't ignore all the sexist clauses in their laws and teachings.
Even dogs, beasts of the field (synonym for Gentile in Bible) are rewarded. It doesn't mean they're eligible for 'salvation'.
I love the black and white thinking. Obviously, I must be a Christian because I don’t think the Bible is nothing but “kill all unbelievers” scrawled repeatedly in blood.
C’mon Mister Logical - can you tell me what a false dichotomy is?
They’re called to “love thy enemy as themselves” as well. So it’s not just their neighbors, but also the people they hold hatred for that they are called to love.
Publicani were really hated. Roman Empire had a tax farming system where private individuals paid the taxes in certain area out of their own pocket and then tried to make a profit by collecting the taxes from that area to themselves. Made it so that the state didn't have to concern itself with the actual collection and got a guaranteed sum. But it also made it so that it was beneficial to the publicani to try and squeeze as much taxes out of the people to either not have loss or to have maximum profit. Though the term publican covers more than just tax collectors.
Love for Enemies
You have heard that it was said "Love your neighbor and hate your enemy." But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
Did that have to be an image of text that breaks accessibility, searchability, and fault tolerance for no compelling reason while making the web less usable?
Do you always ask rhetorical questions in response to the way a person presented their discussion rather than the substance of what they were discussing?
The thoughtless presentation is exclusionary to classes of people who can't read it when the effort to copy & paste the text would have been about the same with vastly better results.
All the other defects compound the problem.
Trust me, it's mostly Christians taking them out of context and denying clear statements. For example, Charlie Kirk spun: 'but what did the original word for slave mean in the Bible'. Well context actually defines the word for us:
Leviticus 25: 44 “‘Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. 45 You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. 46 You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.
I've never seen a Christian effectively argue context by showing context (as above).
Yes. At one side i liked the thought of making fun of my own statement by making it a oneliner itself.
And now you had a choice to decide respond to the content of what I said or the point out the form. Luckily you do not need a manual to decide which choice was good or bad 😉
a one liner implies simplicity, which is why they’re bad at capturing complex situations… you know what is simple however? saying “that’s complex”… a one liner that admits what you don’t know is simple without hiding complexity: the complexity is captured with the admission of the unknown
I agree.
Thank you for your comment. For me the broad statement that a manual is unnecessary or even a sign of being a bad person when you need one is way to simplistic.
Why have we defined constitutions, civil laws and declared what are to be considered to be human rights? Because it can be difficult to sense the border between protecting yourself, family, minority group or culture and doing actual harm to the rights and freedoms of people around us. To find the courage to truly listen and consider other opinions and beliefs and protecting the 'sanity of mind' by ignoring or denouncing the other.
Then it can help to have some guidelines. Either from religious sources, constitutions, humanistic principles or just knowledge from historic events and their impact.
When someone uses the Bible to justify their hate or bigotry, it’s very easy to throw back in their face. They never believed any of it — especially not anything that radical leftist Jesus taught — it’s a tool that represents whatever they want for their manipulative, selfish, self-centered purposes. What is written there doesn’t matter. It never did.
Watch as they dismiss you anyway, with greatest hits like:
“That’s not what {$DENOMINATION} teaches.”
“That’s just heretical.”
”So your interpretation is right but everyone else is wrong?”
”You’re taking it out of context”, especially after you just added context to a thing they were deliberately taking out of context.
The Muscular Christianity movement of the mid 19th century really took issue with this. Back then church attendance was 4:1 women to men and manly men were having trouble maintaining interest because Jesus' message was "too loving and gentle" so not very manly. They started redefining Christianity according to "manly" virtues, particularly they kicked all the women out of their administrative roles in church, started building sporting complexes next to churchs and reframed the old thinking of physical vigor being a form of vanity to instead being a sign of moral and spiritual excellence.
I'm not kidding but they even changed the appearance of Jesus, commissioning art work where he was depicted with broader shoulders and a more defined chest, signalling readiness for action.
Modern toxic masculinity is a "despiritualized" adaptation of Muscular Christianity.
Which is kind of funny, as some would say Jews of Old Testament times were expecting their coming messiah or king to be some kind of military leader. One who might lead them against the oppression of the Romans. Maybe kind of like Moses.
Attempting to use the bible as a source for good just doesn't work because they are always exceptions and hateful rhetoric in other bible chapters they can point to.
Or they can wholesale just make shit up like all the evangelical rapture crap. Hell, look at even the constitution and how that's been stretched and colored for all of the anti-progressive rhetoric in the past.
Even when I was a religious child, I still found contradictions in the bible. But, as you know, when you were a young naive child like everyone of us and found something odd, we're told to ignore it and just don't think about it.
so, as a gay man i agree with the sentiment however
If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.
it’s real easy to find references, but part of that is shoddy biased (or just ignorant) translations… part of it is selective interpretation (guess we can wear mixed fabric and eat pork… and what was that about the camel and the eye of the needle? i’m pretty sure it applied to billionaires)… and that’s all with the assumption that the bible wasn’t just written by a bunch of people that saw a way to make a (figurative) buck
finding a statement that supports pretty much anything you’re doing is pretty easy… this is how we got the crusades and witch trials after all, despite thou shalt not commit murder
Leviticus is Old Testament. If you actually read the Bible and follow its teachings, a Christian is not supposed to be following the Old Testament. That’s why it’s the “old” testament and now there’s a New Testament that is supposed to be followed instead of “Old Testament 2: zombie boogaloo”. The Old Testament is there for context. The whole idea of the New Testament is god came down to look upon his world as one of his creations, went “this shit’s kinda fucked” and started handing out new rules to make the place a little less fucked. It’s a real shame that most Christians haven’t read the Bible and depend on old guys in strange buildings to tell them what a book says, world would probably be a lot cooler if these people could be bothered to fucking read.
“Love one another” is not a complicated line full of subtext and what-ifs. You don’t need an old dude at the front of a crowd to tell you what it means, unfortunately there’s very few actually good Christians out there so now we’re here.
Anywhere, here’s a few great lines to throw at shitty people who use the Bible as cover for being bastards:
1 Timothy 2:12
I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet.
This one was particularly good at convincing my Bible thumping aunt to leave me alone when I told her I was bisexual and an athiest. She started lecturing Bible verses at me and I hit her with Ye Olde “Shut up bitch”
Mathew 6:1-34
_Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. _
You could credibly claim that Jesus instructed everyone to follow the old laws still.
"[17]“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. [18]For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. 19 Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven."
Depending on how you interpret "heaven and earth disappears", "Fulfill" And "everything is accomplished".
One of the epistles states that the old laws do not apply, and in the gospels jesus certainly seems to put little stock in the law as written, so its absolutely not a stretch either way IMO.
Ok but he said lots of other stuff that's contradictory (John 13:34).
Perhaps more importantly christians haven't followed the law of the old testament for almost 2000 years. Christians definitely eat swine, shellfish, etc. Just for starters.
part of that is shoddy biased (or just ignorant) translations
the point is that finding direct references is really easy - the people that translated the bible had their own prejudices… arguing from that angle is a losing battle… however pointing out that there are lots of ways to interpret “gods word” (never mind the problematic nature of that) helps reasonable people to find an interpretation that matches what you’re trying to persuade them of
SOME christians find bible passages to support their prejudice, but equally there are some that do legitimately want to be a good person. the former you’ll never convince; the latter might just be in need of a push to move from “the bible says” to an understanding of the general intent because the meaning has been lost
I'll be contrary here. It's not easy att all to make the Bible say what you want. You have to commit to incredible mental gymnastics that involves consciously being malicious, including ignoring specific and repeated passages explaining how the practice (of using the bible as a weaponry or deliberately misinterpreting it) is sending you to hell, while simultaneously posing as a believer to convince the other party that they subscribe to only those concering beliefs truthfully, in an insane torrent of cherry picking that only ignorance flavored psychosis or beligerence can explain. While I'm certain many are just swept into the former, at least a disturbing few are engaged in the latter.
Show me the part where Jesus says the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell. I'll wait.
Show me the part where Jesus says conservatives are also people. I'll wait.
Show me the part where Jesus says you can't say fuck on the internet. I'll wait.
I could go on forever. I would love to express how utterly fucking dumb it is to base your moral compass on one book only (which prooooobably doesn't cover all areas of life, society, science, etc.), let alone one that was written more than a millenium ago, but I guess once you ignore everything else (such as scientific proof, actual observations, wellbeing of others) and only stick with whatever a select few people tell you, and believe it unconditionally, there's no point bringing up logic.
On a second read: sorry if I didn't word it clearly; by "you", I meant the general you, not you, personally. I also have no problem with people being religious in general, but what Brandon does in the original post is just plain harmful.
I think that Jesus' meaning was "love one another unconditionally" regardless you are foreigner, woman, LGBT person, or an outlaw. Jesus was a leftist (and of course just a historical person, not a deity).
There's actually no mention of Jesus or the things he seemingly has done outside of religious texts. It was already ca. 150 A.D. just hints that doubtfuls should look it up in roman writings.
A roman historian (Gaius Suetonius Tranquillas) mentions records that
Because the Jews at Rome caused continuous disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus, Claudius expelled them from the city.
but no proof for that either and it's Rome.
Some historians think thus, that the workings of Jesus were just an allegory driven a bit further (Similiar to how Moses is just Gilgamesh/Atrahasis epos series remixed).
There is just about as much historical texts pointing to Jesus as there are to Socrates and Spartacus. Like Jesus, neither of them wrote anything themselves. The writings about Socrates come largely from people he taught. The writings about Spartacus come from two different sources who were doing it over a century after he was dead, and the two have a glaring contradiction in the middle of the story.
This highlights the whole problem with the "Jesus don't real" position. It lacks understanding of how history is pieced together. If you're putting the bar of evidence that high and apply it fairly across all historical sources, you end up deleting a whole lot of history. That is clearly not the intent of the argument, but that's what happens.
It sometimes gets even worse than that by misrepresenting things. For example, "this was an important part of the Roman empire and a center of learning. We should be overflowing with sources". Nope, not at all correct. Judea was a backwater, and it's amazing we have literally any sources at all on a rando peasant preacher like Jesus. He was a nobody who happened to get popular long after his death.
If you think this is all fundie-supporting nonsense, read it again. Fundies don't make arguments like "he was a nobody who happened to get popular later". That's not at all helpful to their position. Same with many of the other arguments involving the historical Jesus. They're not at all complementary to treating the Bible as literal, inerrant truth from beginning to end. The same historians arguing this stuff will also tell you that, in all likelihood, his body was tossed in a big pit with a bunch of other hung criminals, because that's just how the Romans did things.
There’s actually no mention of Jesus or the things he seemingly has done outside of religious texts
Of the sparse selection of texts that have survived over 2000 years, there are a number of Roman histories that mention Jewish Messiahs cropping up during this period up to and around the Siege of Masada, which ended the First Jewish-Roman War.
Past that you can play the "if you excluded..." game with Greek philosophers, Roman emperors, Renaissance artists, hell you can do it with US Presidents.
Everyone from Socrates to Barack Obama is "cast into question" when you throw away the evidence you don't like.
The fact that "Christians" as a religious movement appeared at this time, and that we have an abundance of visual art, transcribed texts, and even physical structures dedicated to him just never seems to matter.
Some historians think thus, that the workings of Jesus were just an allegory
This reminds me of the endless debate surrounding whether Shakespeare was a real person. It's flogged to death, because you can casually assert "the evidence was written by liars".
Well a lot of people professing to be Christians could do a lot better at loving LGBT people than they are doing right now, so I say take them up on that.
"A revolting bit of casuistry," as Christopher Hitchens put it. The problem this justification is that homosexuality is what people are and not what they do, and hating someone's inherent and immutable trait is the same as hating the person themselves.
Using God's name in vain means to misuse or misrepresent God's name, often by invoking it for false oaths, empty promises, or inappropriately associating it with harmful actions. It emphasizes the importance of honoring God's name and not using it lightly or for wrongful purposes.
Every fundamentalist who insists they know god’s will and can inflict it on you is in violation of this commandment
I think you're right about a lot of fundamentalists, but you need to be careful with the "knowing God's will" part because Christianity is based on the Bible and the Bible teaches you what God's will is. So, in so much as someone is basing their words on what the Bible means by what it says, then they are not taking God's name in vain. But the moment they twist what the Bible means to fit their own narrative, then they are.
Romans 1:26-27
"Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error."
Clearly homosexuality is wrong according to the bible. Sorry, you simply aren't going to convince a fundamentalist to agree let LGBT folk be, when you have quotes like this in the book. Saying "jesus said love" isn't going to do it. Best strategy is the one that has been working. Education, so that people don't take religion so seriously or literally.
You're right, the Bible is full of contradictions, which I believe is fully on purpose, so that the devout can point to all the times God says love and say "look, my religion is one of love, my God is a god of love!" And then use that to justify committing all the other heinous act condoned in the Bible.
We won't ever know for sure but treating the contradictions in the Bible as intentional is probably giving more credit to the people who initially created it than they deserve.
More likely, they just just didn't really plan it out and instead shit was added piecemeal over time ultimately leaving a lot of contradictions.
Anyways, it seems much more likely that this happened organically rather than being intentional.
Apologetics is a core function of Christianity, and there is plenty of evidence suggesting entire books were rewritten to serve a specific narrative. If they believed the ends justified the means, they absolutely would add contradictions, even if they believed they were sincere in their actions. Just as Christians today still continue to add their own beliefs to the existing literature.
I probably shouldn't have used the term "organically" since the changes would be intentional and manipulative/manufactured. At a high level that is probably just human nature though so from that sense it kind of was organic.
Anyways yeah, there is nothing like a chain of custody on any of this stuff, it's been translated between languages many, many times. Contradictions, lack of chain of custody, discarding of translation biases, all of them are problematic and are generally dismissed by those faithful. I think that's part of the point for them, their faith covers those things. I don't understand it but I can appreciate how it helps some people. I wish people didn't also use it as an excuse to isolate and hate but I think that is more about humans being flawed than the concept of religion in general..
Yeah that's fair, I suppose saying it's on purpose would require some proof to back up that claim. I think the important part of my point though is that religious people use the contradictions in their books to commit atrocities. Thank you for your nuanced take, hornywarthogfart
Yeah your point totally stands for sure. I mostly replied because everyone I know treats the bible as some static, unchanging thing and I think that influences religious propagation because it kind of buries how such an important religious book came to be. Granted this is by design to help push the religious tenets and imply inviolability.
The council of Nicaea all but confirms your suspicion. It's pretty strange to me that nobody (to my knowledge) in the past 1,700+ years has cared to create a contradiction free Bible. I would cut out unreliable narrators and known forgers from my version. Who knows maybe I'd even include parts of the Apocrypha as well.
Dude this is what I'm SAYING all the time. The only possible valid collection of the Christian Bible is the parts quoting Jesus. Everything after is fan fiction and blatant manipulation.
You don't have to study Christianity deeply to realize it is wrong. I was like 8 years old in catechism and remember thinking "Hey wait a minute... Jesus keeps saying not to worship him, isn't that what we're literally doing? Shouldn't we all be some form of Jewish if we want to follow Jesus' words?"
I mean... there's a substantial difference between agreeing with a lifestyle, and persecuting that lifestyle. I assume you aren't currently picketing churches and harassing religious people, for example. The Bible is clear that an abundance of things are sinful, but Jesus consistently sets an example of loving prostitutes and tax collectors and Roman soldiers and everyone else Jews of that day hated.
So what this tweet is claiming is absolutely valid, the New Testament is immensely clear you should love everyone, and you shouldn't give "fundamentalists" a biblical pass for ignoring one of the most fundamental points the Bible makes, in hopes that they'll be willing to completely discard religion. They should be educated on their own damn book, and it's perfectly reasonable to call them on that.
I blame that damn council of Nicaea for grouping so many random books together. As far as I'm concerned Marcion's writings are the only cannon I would recognize. But seeing as it's almost completely lost, I'll have to be satisfied with ONLY the books of Luke and Acts from the Lexham English Bible translation.
If I'm feeling particularly frisky I'll include the infancy gospel of Thomas and the gospel of Judas..
To me, it seems that every other book in the currently accepted biblical canon was written purely out of Apologetics. "oh shoot I need to justify my opinion.. Oh look I found a new book that fits my agenda" then they said "Contradictions? No, [insert book/verse here] was written for X target audience so it doesn't apply here. My book is relevant to you!"
Please, dick going up a butthole fits too perfectly for it to not be natural. Same goes for sucking. What they are referring to is the Roman practice of grooming children. Having a sexual relationship with a boy you adopted is unnatural.
But the question is about Jesus, and the references are in the new testament so it's correct. idk, the dude is supposed to be the son of god after all...
Normally I would agree but the brutality and whiplash like nature of the comment definitely has some dark humor to it. I was thrown off at first till I realized the context of them roleplaying as "Brandon" from the image. It's crass, but checks out as an attempt for me. Then again, I applaud people who are willing to be downvoted for a good well-hidden joke (the whole woosh thing).
In the Bible, one of the people Jesus heals is the slave of a Roman soldier. In the original Latin version of the text, the word they use is for a specific type of slave, a male usually kept as a concubine or sex slave.
I think John might have had a bit of a crush on Jesus, given that he was very interested about whenever Jesus said 'love'. Maybe he was hoping for a confession?
Almost as if it’s a compilation of books by multiple authors with multiple perspectives, and treating it like it’s supposed to be a cohesive text that’s supposed to have a single message makes it impossible to understand as a historical text…
It just annoys me when atheists do the same thing. “The Bible condones genocide.” Parts of the Bible do, and parts of the Bible don’t. Picking and choosing which parts of the Bible you think are more accurate is good critical analysis. We know some of Paul’s letters were forgeries, we are pretty sure about the agendas of some of the authors of the Pentateuch…
So many take a lazy Reddit tier atheist “it’s all stupid and useless” that is just so fucking boring than struggling with what the document actually is. Because it is fascinating. Parts of it are inspiring and compelling, parts of it are boring instructions for constructing shit, some of it is brutal and evil. But it’s much more than “lol stupid goat herders.”
If a part of the Bible condones Genocide, the whole book condones it. Its inspired from God himself. Did God change his mind from chapter to chapter?
Happy to do critical analysis of it, but you must forgive fundamentalists believing Genocide is ok in certain contexts due to it being written in the bible
it’s a compilation of books by multiple authors with multiple perspectives, and treating it like it’s supposed to be a cohesive text that’s supposed to have a single message makes it impossible to understand as a historical text…
I do not accept the fundamentalists claim that the book was directly inspired by God himself - and many Christians would not agree with that fundamentalist claim either. Different books of the Bible were written by different authors with different purposes. This is a necessary jumping off point to do any critical analysis of it.
The entire point here is that it is stupid as an atheist to accept the fundamentalist’s argument, to treat the compilation of books like it is even supposed to be a unified Voice of God.
Notice how the compilers of the Genesis often included two versions of a story next to each other. Were Adam and Eve created at the same time, or was Eve made from Adam’s rib? How many of each animal did Noah bring on the Ark? These things contradict, because the compiler was trying to include all versions of the story available. I suspect a big purpose is to legitimize a unified political identity - that you have a merging of different groups, different tribes, and you don’t want to piss anyone off by leaving out their traditional story.
Then later, different authors are compiling stories of historic kings, and they include stories of behavior that was genocidal and awful. They throw in some justification, because at the time these books are serving as political history.
Then you have the “prophets” post Exile trying to cope, trying to understand what went wrong and coming up with different explanations.
By the time you get to the New Testament, you have a strong influence of Greek philosophy, and again, political tensions in relation to the Roman Empire.
Saying “the Bible condones genocide” is meaningless. Saying something like “the authors of Samuel condone genocide” is more accurate.
Thats interesting. The history does explain why it jumps around a lot.
My main thinking however is from the point of view that God intended to bring about his message to the world, whatever that would be. If the Bible is humanities' attempt at interpreting whatever that message is, we didn't appear to do a very good job at all.
I understand and agree that there are many things to be learned from the Bible, but its only humans teaching other humans in my view.
The thing about literary analysis is you can do it if you want to. But expecting everyone else to also do it to your satisfaction is a recipe for frustration.
It’s not just literary analysis - it’s historical.
A text being historical does not mean it is a 100% true telling of the events. That is the entire point of analyzing your sources.
Herodotus tells us that a guy got a person escort of dolphins to port when some treacherous sailors threw him overboard and other insane bullshit. That probably didn’t happen. However, he is really really useful if we want to understand the rise of the Achaemenid Empire and pretty accurate there.
If I want to analyze the beliefs and politics of post Exilic period Hebrews, the Bible is an excellent resource. Even things that are mostly mythological are extremely useful. Eg, King David was a historical figure - there is independent corroborating evidence of this. The stories in the Bible about him are probably mostly mythological because they were written a few centuries after his rule, but they are useful in that they indicate a desire to create a shared cultural history - to unify the tribes into one polity.
Every time the Bible comes up on lemmy, it feels like everyone here must have failed every high school history class they took. History has a different methodology than science does, because it is a different field and way of understanding.
Problem is that when they see "love they neighbor" they look around and only see straight white folks, so they assume everyone else is excluded for some reason
When I was in Sunday School, we were given a strict (Catholic Catechism) definition: Your neighbor is anyone you meet. It doesn't even specify any "human." My mom always brought home that point whenever animal cruelty was discussed.
Of course, my parents who taught me that lesson are still Catholic and yet super proud of my identity. Very chill with my trans spouse. Even marched with me at a local pride event.
Maybe they're the exception but "love thy neighbor" does still have tangible meaning to some folks.
I’m glad to hear that they are so supportive, that’s awesome! I hope my Catholic parents are as accepting when I come out to them as trans
Yeah might be a translation issue. In the german version it's not "neighbour" but rather "the one next to you".
In French too. "Aime ton prochain".
I love your parents btw
Me too. Very much.
Race science was created specifically so that they could see non-white people as non-people. This was done so that Christians could (just barely) hold onto their belief system while committing all of the atrocities of the colonial era.
I actually just happened to be reading a relevant part of Lies My Teacher Told Me that quotes Montesquieu (French philosopher who influenced the US founding fathers):
Do they see "love thy neighbor?" I think many ignore that part entirely
I promise you they hate straight white guys too, if you even express a hint of kindness.
It was a racial clause from the beginning. -The word wasn't needed otherwise. -Same as the sexual clause 'neighbour's wife' instead of 'spouse'.
And context supports that:
'Think not that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets', 'Do not go among the Gentiles', 'I have come only for the lost sheep of Israel', 'it is not meet to take the children's bread and cast it to the dogs'.
I mean the Bible is pretty clear on this. In response to the question, "who is my neighbour," Jesus answered with the parable of the Good Samaritan. In Christianity, everyone is your neighbour.
In Judaism there was a lot of debate about it historically and I don't know where things stand now.
Jews are cool with their neighbors. Zios are genocidal. It's not that complicated.
Given that the phrase "love your neighbour" comes from the Torah, it is at least 2500 years old, predating what you mean by Zionism by millenia.
This was a poor excuse to shoehorn irrelevant modern-day issues where it doesn't belong.
Yeah jesus said didn't come to abolish the law, but he clearly teaches things different to the teachings of the old testament so it should be pretty clear he's adding to it.
It's your problem if you're not able to understand a very simple and obvious parable. There's no ambiguity for anyone else, really.
The rest of your reply is babby's first anti-christian rant. I'm not religious, so direct your tawdry energies elsewhere.
If you want to make arguments, use quotes. Don't make shit up.
Are you asking for a quote of the Parable of the Good Samaritan? Or what?
Oh, that phraise goyim/ beasts of the field/ dogs like to take out of context and twist to their favor?
It’s not just “babby’s first anti-Christian rant.” There’s a reason he said “jewsus”…
Strange, because Leviticus says
Sojourn: "short stay, temporary residence". -That's if they aren't subject to the OTs calls for genocide: Deuteronomy 20:16-17, Joshua 6:21, 1 Samuel 15:3, Numbers 31:17-18, Deuteronomy 2:34, 1 Samuel 15:18, Judges 21:10, 2 Kings 10:7. or appointed to slavery: Leviticus 25: 44 “‘Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. 45 You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. 46 You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.
Jesus didn't give a shit about the old testament. Neither should anybody else. It's like the whole point of the gospels...
'Think not that I have come to destroy the law or the prophets' -His sole existence is based on the OT and is referenced in the first chapter of John. You might be thinking Saul of Tarsus.
Are you saying that the term neighbour was chosen here so that there's a way exclude certain people?
Exactly. It's not like they weren't instructed to kill and enslave elsewhere in the Bible.
Genocide:
Deuteronomy 20:16-17, Joshua 6:21, 1 Samuel 15:3, Numbers 31:17-18, Deuteronomy 2:34, 1 Samuel 15:18, Judges 21:10, 2 Kings 10:7.
Slavery:
Leviticus 25: 44 “‘Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. 45 You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. 46 You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.
No need for irrelevant ancient texts.
The obvious interpretation is that Jesus actually meant what he said. There are no tales of Jesus enslaving people or promoting genocide.
You're just a gross fash troll.
"think not that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets"
Typical defender can't quote.
You are totally misrepresenting the last verse.
Jesus is being called out by the Cannanite woman and is in the wrong here.
“Do not go out among the Gentiles” is in the context of his specific instructions to the apostles at one point in time. The commission is expanded later.
You can’t pick and choose isolated verses - you’re acting like a Christian.
No, you're acting Saulinian. -The guy that never walked with Jewsus, lost the lottery to Matthias, destroys the law, lies, and flip flops.
If you want to play context, don't ignore that Jewsus is the same OT god that subjected women to sex slavery, certain people to brutal racial slavery, and some to genocide. -And don't ignore all the sexist clauses in their laws and teachings.
Even dogs, beasts of the field (synonym for Gentile in Bible) are rewarded. It doesn't mean they're eligible for 'salvation'.
But also
You pick and choose like a good little Christian. The anti semitism is always lovely touch too.
I’d love for you to give me an example of a non sexist Bronze Age society.
You defend like a dick skinning death cultist.
Imagine a society not ruled by your sexist/ racist death cult... maybe a non-sexist one! -Suprise suprise!
I love the black and white thinking. Obviously, I must be a Christian because I don’t think the Bible is nothing but “kill all unbelievers” scrawled repeatedly in blood.
C’mon Mister Logical - can you tell me what a false dichotomy is?
They’re called to “love thy enemy as themselves” as well. So it’s not just their neighbors, but also the people they hold hatred for that they are called to love.
They just see the kids in their church.
Wow tax collectors catching strays even 2000 years ago.
Publicani were really hated. Roman Empire had a tax farming system where private individuals paid the taxes in certain area out of their own pocket and then tried to make a profit by collecting the taxes from that area to themselves. Made it so that the state didn't have to concern itself with the actual collection and got a guaranteed sum. But it also made it so that it was beneficial to the publicani to try and squeeze as much taxes out of the people to either not have loss or to have maximum profit. Though the term publican covers more than just tax collectors.
Apostle Matthew was a publican.
The system hasn't changed much since then. That's why Jesus is still popular. Everybody still hates rich people, the state, etc.
Transcription for those who need it:
Matthew 5:43-48 New International Version
Love for Enemies You have heard that it was said "Love your neighbor and hate your enemy." But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
Did that have to be an image of text that breaks accessibility, searchability, and fault tolerance for no compelling reason while making the web less usable?
Do you always ask rhetorical questions in response to the way a person presented their discussion rather than the substance of what they were discussing?
The thoughtless presentation is exclusionary to classes of people who can't read it when the effort to copy & paste the text would have been about the same with vastly better results. All the other defects compound the problem.
Accessibility is about people: for those who don't know by now, a brief introduction and a quick video on this specific issue.
there can be more than one topic being talked about on the internet!
Suddenly, Republican Christians: "You can't just take quotes from the Bible out of context and apply them to your argument! 😠"
Trust me, it's mostly Christians taking them out of context and denying clear statements. For example, Charlie Kirk spun: 'but what did the original word for slave mean in the Bible'. Well context actually defines the word for us:
Leviticus 25: 44 “‘Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. 45 You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. 46 You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.
I've never seen a Christian effectively argue context by showing context (as above).
That's pretty much exactly what I was getting at
Me, 89% of the time when I see or hear Christians use this statement.
What do you do the other 11% of the time?
5% of the time it's this. The remaining 6% is whatever.
funderstandable, thank you for the explanation
If you need a manual to be a good person, you aren't a good person.
Explaining this to my son's kindergarten teacher.
Just purge all the selfish 5 year olds now! They'll never learn if they haven't figured it out already.
So much for every state on the planet. Completely codified morality. Created and maintained by certified "bad people".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_religion
Yeah, what's wrong with wanting to be a good person? Are we going back to eugenics now?
If you think you can classify 'good' and 'bad' people in a oneliner you are incapable to deal with the complex nuances of our reality.
Oh, another oneliner.
Yes. At one side i liked the thought of making fun of my own statement by making it a oneliner itself.
And now you had a choice to decide respond to the content of what I said or the point out the form. Luckily you do not need a manual to decide which choice was good or bad 😉
a one liner implies simplicity, which is why they’re bad at capturing complex situations… you know what is simple however? saying “that’s complex”… a one liner that admits what you don’t know is simple without hiding complexity: the complexity is captured with the admission of the unknown
I agree.
Thank you for your comment. For me the broad statement that a manual is unnecessary or even a sign of being a bad person when you need one is way to simplistic.
Why have we defined constitutions, civil laws and declared what are to be considered to be human rights? Because it can be difficult to sense the border between protecting yourself, family, minority group or culture and doing actual harm to the rights and freedoms of people around us. To find the courage to truly listen and consider other opinions and beliefs and protecting the 'sanity of mind' by ignoring or denouncing the other.
Then it can help to have some guidelines. Either from religious sources, constitutions, humanistic principles or just knowledge from historic events and their impact.
Does it count if you are the one writing your own manual? It's fairly strict. I still need free time to master it.
It's surprisingly nuanced
It's the religion that classifies as good or bad, heaven or hell. We are talking about that, get a hint.
And yeah, generally, goodness has to come from the heart or it's selfishness. Even if you account for the complexities of the human mind.
Love each other. Even trans people? "Complex nuances"
This classification is idiotic! Objectively 'bad'. I classify this opinion as bad. Evil.
I find it sad to fall back on 2000 year old literature to justify our behavior.
When someone uses the Bible to justify their hate or bigotry, it’s very easy to throw back in their face. They never believed any of it — especially not anything that radical leftist Jesus taught — it’s a tool that represents whatever they want for their manipulative, selfish, self-centered purposes. What is written there doesn’t matter. It never did.
Watch as they dismiss you anyway, with greatest hits like:
Oh the irony... you're killing me with that one.
There's no hate quite like Christian love.
The Muscular Christianity movement of the mid 19th century really took issue with this. Back then church attendance was 4:1 women to men and manly men were having trouble maintaining interest because Jesus' message was "too loving and gentle" so not very manly. They started redefining Christianity according to "manly" virtues, particularly they kicked all the women out of their administrative roles in church, started building sporting complexes next to churchs and reframed the old thinking of physical vigor being a form of vanity to instead being a sign of moral and spiritual excellence.
I'm not kidding but they even changed the appearance of Jesus, commissioning art work where he was depicted with broader shoulders and a more defined chest, signalling readiness for action.
Modern toxic masculinity is a "despiritualized" adaptation of Muscular Christianity.
Which is kind of funny, as some would say Jews of Old Testament times were expecting their coming messiah or king to be some kind of military leader. One who might lead them against the oppression of the Romans. Maybe kind of like Moses.
Not to mention the pale skin...
Attempting to use the bible as a source for good just doesn't work because they are always exceptions and hateful rhetoric in other bible chapters they can point to.
Or they can wholesale just make shit up like all the evangelical rapture crap. Hell, look at even the constitution and how that's been stretched and colored for all of the anti-progressive rhetoric in the past.
Even when I was a religious child, I still found contradictions in the bible. But, as you know, when you were a young naive child like everyone of us and found something odd, we're told to ignore it and just don't think about it.
Gotta use what Jesus said, not the "bible".
"then you ain't one of mine. go on, git!" -Jesus apparently, Gospel of John chapter 13 verse 35
Show me the part where Jesus says to stone all the queers. I'll wait.
so, as a gay man i agree with the sentiment however
it’s real easy to find references, but part of that is shoddy biased (or just ignorant) translations… part of it is selective interpretation (guess we can wear mixed fabric and eat pork… and what was that about the camel and the eye of the needle? i’m pretty sure it applied to billionaires)… and that’s all with the assumption that the bible wasn’t just written by a bunch of people that saw a way to make a (figurative) buck
finding a statement that supports pretty much anything you’re doing is pretty easy… this is how we got the crusades and witch trials after all, despite thou shalt not commit murder
That’s Leviticus.
Leviticus is Old Testament. If you actually read the Bible and follow its teachings, a Christian is not supposed to be following the Old Testament. That’s why it’s the “old” testament and now there’s a New Testament that is supposed to be followed instead of “Old Testament 2: zombie boogaloo”. The Old Testament is there for context. The whole idea of the New Testament is god came down to look upon his world as one of his creations, went “this shit’s kinda fucked” and started handing out new rules to make the place a little less fucked. It’s a real shame that most Christians haven’t read the Bible and depend on old guys in strange buildings to tell them what a book says, world would probably be a lot cooler if these people could be bothered to fucking read.
“Love one another” is not a complicated line full of subtext and what-ifs. You don’t need an old dude at the front of a crowd to tell you what it means, unfortunately there’s very few actually good Christians out there so now we’re here.
Anywhere, here’s a few great lines to throw at shitty people who use the Bible as cover for being bastards:
1 Timothy 2:12
This one was particularly good at convincing my Bible thumping aunt to leave me alone when I told her I was bisexual and an athiest. She started lecturing Bible verses at me and I hit her with Ye Olde “Shut up bitch”
Mathew 6:1-34
Depends.
You could credibly claim that Jesus instructed everyone to follow the old laws still.
"[17]“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. [18]For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. 19 Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven."
Depending on how you interpret "heaven and earth disappears", "Fulfill" And "everything is accomplished".
One of the epistles states that the old laws do not apply, and in the gospels jesus certainly seems to put little stock in the law as written, so its absolutely not a stretch either way IMO.
Ok but he said lots of other stuff that's contradictory (John 13:34).
Perhaps more importantly christians haven't followed the law of the old testament for almost 2000 years. Christians definitely eat swine, shellfish, etc. Just for starters.
Indeed. Christianity is designed so one can claim (just about) whatever they like is biblical.
Its a terrible basis for morality or life for that reason.
Shit's kinda fucked again, could probably go for a newer testament at this point
This is most likely a mistranslation, probably originally meant to say with boys as in minors
i agree, which is why i said
the point is that finding direct references is really easy - the people that translated the bible had their own prejudices… arguing from that angle is a losing battle… however pointing out that there are lots of ways to interpret “gods word” (never mind the problematic nature of that) helps reasonable people to find an interpretation that matches what you’re trying to persuade them of
SOME christians find bible passages to support their prejudice, but equally there are some that do legitimately want to be a good person. the former you’ll never convince; the latter might just be in need of a push to move from “the bible says” to an understanding of the general intent because the meaning has been lost
This is a really popular claim which is not well supported in scholarship.
Regardless, it would be advocating for the young boys to also be stoned, which is still abhorrent.
I'll be contrary here. It's not easy att all to make the Bible say what you want. You have to commit to incredible mental gymnastics that involves consciously being malicious, including ignoring specific and repeated passages explaining how the practice (of using the bible as a weaponry or deliberately misinterpreting it) is sending you to hell, while simultaneously posing as a believer to convince the other party that they subscribe to only those concering beliefs truthfully, in an insane torrent of cherry picking that only ignorance flavored psychosis or beligerence can explain. While I'm certain many are just swept into the former, at least a disturbing few are engaged in the latter.
Show me the part where Jesus says the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell. I'll wait.
Show me the part where Jesus says conservatives are also people. I'll wait.
Show me the part where Jesus says you can't say fuck on the internet. I'll wait.
I could go on forever. I would love to express how utterly fucking dumb it is to base your moral compass on one book only (which prooooobably doesn't cover all areas of life, society, science, etc.), let alone one that was written more than a millenium ago, but I guess once you ignore everything else (such as scientific proof, actual observations, wellbeing of others) and only stick with whatever a select few people tell you, and believe it unconditionally, there's no point bringing up logic.
I'll be honest, this was mostly an assumption. I'm not even a Christian. So yes, agreed.
On a second read: sorry if I didn't word it clearly; by "you", I meant the general you, not you, personally. I also have no problem with people being religious in general, but what Brandon does in the original post is just plain harmful.
No worries, I didn't really think you did.
Show me the part where it's okay for priest to have relations with minor male children. I'll wait.
I think that Jesus' meaning was "love one another unconditionally" regardless you are foreigner, woman, LGBT person, or an outlaw. Jesus was a leftist (and of course just a historical person, not a deity).
That's up to debate.
In almost the same way that the earth being round is up for debate
Ok, serious mode.
There's actually no mention of Jesus or the things he seemingly has done outside of religious texts. It was already ca. 150 A.D. just hints that doubtfuls should look it up in roman writings.
A roman historian (Gaius Suetonius Tranquillas) mentions records that
but no proof for that either and it's Rome.
Some historians think thus, that the workings of Jesus were just an allegory driven a bit further (Similiar to how Moses is just Gilgamesh/Atrahasis epos series remixed).
There is just about as much historical texts pointing to Jesus as there are to Socrates and Spartacus. Like Jesus, neither of them wrote anything themselves. The writings about Socrates come largely from people he taught. The writings about Spartacus come from two different sources who were doing it over a century after he was dead, and the two have a glaring contradiction in the middle of the story.
This highlights the whole problem with the "Jesus don't real" position. It lacks understanding of how history is pieced together. If you're putting the bar of evidence that high and apply it fairly across all historical sources, you end up deleting a whole lot of history. That is clearly not the intent of the argument, but that's what happens.
It sometimes gets even worse than that by misrepresenting things. For example, "this was an important part of the Roman empire and a center of learning. We should be overflowing with sources". Nope, not at all correct. Judea was a backwater, and it's amazing we have literally any sources at all on a rando peasant preacher like Jesus. He was a nobody who happened to get popular long after his death.
If you think this is all fundie-supporting nonsense, read it again. Fundies don't make arguments like "he was a nobody who happened to get popular later". That's not at all helpful to their position. Same with many of the other arguments involving the historical Jesus. They're not at all complementary to treating the Bible as literal, inerrant truth from beginning to end. The same historians arguing this stuff will also tell you that, in all likelihood, his body was tossed in a big pit with a bunch of other hung criminals, because that's just how the Romans did things.
Of the sparse selection of texts that have survived over 2000 years, there are a number of Roman histories that mention Jewish Messiahs cropping up during this period up to and around the Siege of Masada, which ended the First Jewish-Roman War.
Past that you can play the "if you excluded..." game with Greek philosophers, Roman emperors, Renaissance artists, hell you can do it with US Presidents.
Everyone from Socrates to Barack Obama is "cast into question" when you throw away the evidence you don't like.
The fact that "Christians" as a religious movement appeared at this time, and that we have an abundance of visual art, transcribed texts, and even physical structures dedicated to him just never seems to matter.
This reminds me of the endless debate surrounding whether Shakespeare was a real person. It's flogged to death, because you can casually assert "the evidence was written by liars".
Erm...
It is not, earth is a oblate spheroid.
Oblate Spheroids are round
They will usually respond with "hate the sin not the sinner" or something like that, idk but never give good reason why being LGBTQ is a sin
Well a lot of people professing to be Christians could do a lot better at loving LGBT people than they are doing right now, so I say take them up on that.
"A revolting bit of casuistry," as Christopher Hitchens put it. The problem this justification is that homosexuality is what people are and not what they do, and hating someone's inherent and immutable trait is the same as hating the person themselves.
Yeah, you are right.
And John 8 while we're at it. He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone.
Show me where in the bible Jesus ever said to place actual laws of government preventing anything LGBTQ+ from taking place
According to the ai, they’re all going to hell
Every fundamentalist who insists they know god’s will and can inflict it on you is in violation of this commandment
I think you're right about a lot of fundamentalists, but you need to be careful with the "knowing God's will" part because Christianity is based on the Bible and the Bible teaches you what God's will is. So, in so much as someone is basing their words on what the Bible means by what it says, then they are not taking God's name in vain. But the moment they twist what the Bible means to fit their own narrative, then they are.
I prefer 'be excellent to each other' from the book of Bill and Ted.
Station!
Don't forget 'Party On, Dudes!' Most of the cults i started had BillandTedology at their hearts.
Also, the Parable of the Good Samaritan.
Romans 1:26-27 "Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error."
Clearly homosexuality is wrong according to the bible. Sorry, you simply aren't going to convince a fundamentalist to agree let LGBT folk be, when you have quotes like this in the book. Saying "jesus said love" isn't going to do it. Best strategy is the one that has been working. Education, so that people don't take religion so seriously or literally.
You're right, the Bible is full of contradictions, which I believe is fully on purpose, so that the devout can point to all the times God says love and say "look, my religion is one of love, my God is a god of love!" And then use that to justify committing all the other heinous act condoned in the Bible.
We won't ever know for sure but treating the contradictions in the Bible as intentional is probably giving more credit to the people who initially created it than they deserve.
More likely, they just just didn't really plan it out and instead shit was added piecemeal over time ultimately leaving a lot of contradictions.
Anyways, it seems much more likely that this happened organically rather than being intentional.
Apologetics is a core function of Christianity, and there is plenty of evidence suggesting entire books were rewritten to serve a specific narrative. If they believed the ends justified the means, they absolutely would add contradictions, even if they believed they were sincere in their actions. Just as Christians today still continue to add their own beliefs to the existing literature.
I probably shouldn't have used the term "organically" since the changes would be intentional and manipulative/manufactured. At a high level that is probably just human nature though so from that sense it kind of was organic.
Anyways yeah, there is nothing like a chain of custody on any of this stuff, it's been translated between languages many, many times. Contradictions, lack of chain of custody, discarding of translation biases, all of them are problematic and are generally dismissed by those faithful. I think that's part of the point for them, their faith covers those things. I don't understand it but I can appreciate how it helps some people. I wish people didn't also use it as an excuse to isolate and hate but I think that is more about humans being flawed than the concept of religion in general..
Yeah that's fair, I suppose saying it's on purpose would require some proof to back up that claim. I think the important part of my point though is that religious people use the contradictions in their books to commit atrocities. Thank you for your nuanced take, hornywarthogfart
Yeah your point totally stands for sure. I mostly replied because everyone I know treats the bible as some static, unchanging thing and I think that influences religious propagation because it kind of buries how such an important religious book came to be. Granted this is by design to help push the religious tenets and imply inviolability.
The council of Nicaea all but confirms your suspicion. It's pretty strange to me that nobody (to my knowledge) in the past 1,700+ years has cared to create a contradiction free Bible. I would cut out unreliable narrators and known forgers from my version. Who knows maybe I'd even include parts of the Apocrypha as well.
Weird how you're downvoted. Religion just isn't a good guide to live by but that's not your fault. Education is key.
There is no "the bible". It's a subjective collection of texts. While lots of people worship Paul as if he were a god, he's not actually Jesus.
Dude this is what I'm SAYING all the time. The only possible valid collection of the Christian Bible is the parts quoting Jesus. Everything after is fan fiction and blatant manipulation.
You don't have to study Christianity deeply to realize it is wrong. I was like 8 years old in catechism and remember thinking "Hey wait a minute... Jesus keeps saying not to worship him, isn't that what we're literally doing? Shouldn't we all be some form of Jewish if we want to follow Jesus' words?"
I've virtually come to the same conclusion after trying to reconcile Paul's legalism with Jesus' teaching.
I mean... there's a substantial difference between agreeing with a lifestyle, and persecuting that lifestyle. I assume you aren't currently picketing churches and harassing religious people, for example. The Bible is clear that an abundance of things are sinful, but Jesus consistently sets an example of loving prostitutes and tax collectors and Roman soldiers and everyone else Jews of that day hated.
So what this tweet is claiming is absolutely valid, the New Testament is immensely clear you should love everyone, and you shouldn't give "fundamentalists" a biblical pass for ignoring one of the most fundamental points the Bible makes, in hopes that they'll be willing to completely discard religion. They should be educated on their own damn book, and it's perfectly reasonable to call them on that.
I blame that damn council of Nicaea for grouping so many random books together. As far as I'm concerned Marcion's writings are the only cannon I would recognize. But seeing as it's almost completely lost, I'll have to be satisfied with ONLY the books of Luke and Acts from the Lexham English Bible translation.
If I'm feeling particularly frisky I'll include the infancy gospel of Thomas and the gospel of Judas..
To me, it seems that every other book in the currently accepted biblical canon was written purely out of Apologetics. "oh shoot I need to justify my opinion.. Oh look I found a new book that fits my agenda" then they said "Contradictions? No, [insert book/verse here] was written for X target audience so it doesn't apply here. My book is relevant to you!"
Bonus content:
Spicehoarder's Heretic Bible - First Edition:
Please, dick going up a butthole fits too perfectly for it to not be natural. Same goes for sucking. What they are referring to is the Roman practice of grooming children. Having a sexual relationship with a boy you adopted is unnatural.
But the question is about Jesus, and the references are in the new testament so it's correct. idk, the dude is supposed to be the son of god after all...
As far as the Bible goes, John was good. Great opening, and an overarching theme of "just be nice".
Fuckin pussy
?
Being nice to people is woke
ngl if "be nice" is woke then i dont want to be anything elss
Sometimes I think there's no way someone could miss how sarcastic I'm being. And yet every time I'm proved wrong.
Sarcasm doesn't work online if someone could say the exact same sentence in seriousness
The problem is that there are people who are stupid enough to actually have the opinions you are trying to sarcastically show.
They also tend to be the loud ones who will post everywhere, so it's far more likely that a really stupid opinion is real than sarcastic.
Corrected.
You gotta throw in the /s
Tone doesn't carry well over text.
Who needs tone to detect sarcasm?
insulting someone isnt satire its just an insult
I hope John the Apostle will forgive me.
Normally I would agree but the brutality and whiplash like nature of the comment definitely has some dark humor to it. I was thrown off at first till I realized the context of them roleplaying as "Brandon" from the image. It's crass, but checks out as an attempt for me. Then again, I applaud people who are willing to be downvoted for a good well-hidden joke (the whole woosh thing).
and satire
Bigots make what the Bible says in John 11:35 happen.
In the Bible, one of the people Jesus heals is the slave of a Roman soldier. In the original Latin version of the text, the word they use is for a specific type of slave, a male usually kept as a concubine or sex slave.
The New Testament was originally written in Greek.
If you want to be a good person (go to heaven (how selfish)), just don't be an ass to people. Especially to people you don't know.
I think John might have had a bit of a crush on Jesus, given that he was very interested about whenever Jesus said 'love'. Maybe he was hoping for a confession?
Sou d logic bucko. Where does it say driving a car is not a sin?
So pretty much just John.
They say he's a pretty chill dude
He did outlive the others, according to some accounts. So he had some time.
And in fairness, it's in a lot of other places too. Some more verbatim, some less.
Jesus fucking himself christ, pastor, really good job there, dipshit. Pure brilliance.
Something something least of something something me
"acshully the hegemonic god idol agrees with me"
fuck jesus
"Did you know that sometimes the bible actually sometimes doesn't command genocide. Isn't it so uplifting and worth defending?"
Almost as if it’s a compilation of books by multiple authors with multiple perspectives, and treating it like it’s supposed to be a cohesive text that’s supposed to have a single message makes it impossible to understand as a historical text…
And yet millions of people insist on trying :(
It just annoys me when atheists do the same thing. “The Bible condones genocide.” Parts of the Bible do, and parts of the Bible don’t. Picking and choosing which parts of the Bible you think are more accurate is good critical analysis. We know some of Paul’s letters were forgeries, we are pretty sure about the agendas of some of the authors of the Pentateuch…
So many take a lazy Reddit tier atheist “it’s all stupid and useless” that is just so fucking boring than struggling with what the document actually is. Because it is fascinating. Parts of it are inspiring and compelling, parts of it are boring instructions for constructing shit, some of it is brutal and evil. But it’s much more than “lol stupid goat herders.”
If a part of the Bible condones Genocide, the whole book condones it. Its inspired from God himself. Did God change his mind from chapter to chapter? Happy to do critical analysis of it, but you must forgive fundamentalists believing Genocide is ok in certain contexts due to it being written in the bible
I do not accept the fundamentalists claim that the book was directly inspired by God himself - and many Christians would not agree with that fundamentalist claim either. Different books of the Bible were written by different authors with different purposes. This is a necessary jumping off point to do any critical analysis of it.
The entire point here is that it is stupid as an atheist to accept the fundamentalist’s argument, to treat the compilation of books like it is even supposed to be a unified Voice of God.
Notice how the compilers of the Genesis often included two versions of a story next to each other. Were Adam and Eve created at the same time, or was Eve made from Adam’s rib? How many of each animal did Noah bring on the Ark? These things contradict, because the compiler was trying to include all versions of the story available. I suspect a big purpose is to legitimize a unified political identity - that you have a merging of different groups, different tribes, and you don’t want to piss anyone off by leaving out their traditional story.
Then later, different authors are compiling stories of historic kings, and they include stories of behavior that was genocidal and awful. They throw in some justification, because at the time these books are serving as political history.
Then you have the “prophets” post Exile trying to cope, trying to understand what went wrong and coming up with different explanations.
By the time you get to the New Testament, you have a strong influence of Greek philosophy, and again, political tensions in relation to the Roman Empire.
Saying “the Bible condones genocide” is meaningless. Saying something like “the authors of Samuel condone genocide” is more accurate.
Thats interesting. The history does explain why it jumps around a lot.
My main thinking however is from the point of view that God intended to bring about his message to the world, whatever that would be. If the Bible is humanities' attempt at interpreting whatever that message is, we didn't appear to do a very good job at all. I understand and agree that there are many things to be learned from the Bible, but its only humans teaching other humans in my view.
Ok.
The thing about literary analysis is you can do it if you want to. But expecting everyone else to also do it to your satisfaction is a recipe for frustration.
It’s not just literary analysis - it’s historical.
A text being historical does not mean it is a 100% true telling of the events. That is the entire point of analyzing your sources.
Herodotus tells us that a guy got a person escort of dolphins to port when some treacherous sailors threw him overboard and other insane bullshit. That probably didn’t happen. However, he is really really useful if we want to understand the rise of the Achaemenid Empire and pretty accurate there.
If I want to analyze the beliefs and politics of post Exilic period Hebrews, the Bible is an excellent resource. Even things that are mostly mythological are extremely useful. Eg, King David was a historical figure - there is independent corroborating evidence of this. The stories in the Bible about him are probably mostly mythological because they were written a few centuries after his rule, but they are useful in that they indicate a desire to create a shared cultural history - to unify the tribes into one polity.
Every time the Bible comes up on lemmy, it feels like everyone here must have failed every high school history class they took. History has a different methodology than science does, because it is a different field and way of understanding.
Yeah... people online prefer easy cliches and pithy remarks to original thought and effort.
Its not just the bible that gets this treatment, its literally everything.
The hegemonic god idol is capital. The other "religions" change from place to place and have very little actual power compared to the state.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_religion