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Julius
Joined: 27 Jul 2006
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 Posted: Thu Jul 30, 2009 7:05 am Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
No, especially when the unverifiable parts of it deal in magic powers and people coming back from the dead. But then, I've read a lot of fantasy |
just because something cannot be replicated to order in a laboratory does not mean it doesn't exist.
�She kept saying the house was filled to capacity with souls that she didn�t know, but they were all angels, and they were here to heal her,�
http://pastorlinda.com/prayer-works-brain-dead-woman-continues-miraculous-recovery
What do you think of the above, for example? There are numerous other examples... |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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| Posted: Thu Jul 30, 2009 7:13 am Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
| Kuros wrote: |
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All logic, reason, and rationality sides strongly against the Christian God. That doesn't mean said God doesn't exist, just that:
1) It's probably unlikely.
2) Even if he does, the people who were incidentally correct about it were correct through no merit of their own. |
Reason sides against the Christian God? I don't see how. |
That's because you don't want to see how, regardless of what is said on the topic (and a lot has been in this thread alone, much less in society in general). And that's fine. But surely even you must recognize that there's a reason the defenders of Christianity have been forced to fall back from literal to figurative interpretations of their holy book, and have been forced to invent increasingly more convoluted and questionable defenses of the actions of their alleged God. It's because they do not have a strong, intellectually sound case, and if you do not have a strong, intellectually sound case, reason is not on your side. |
Right, literalists do not have a sound case. Don't forget though that biblical inerrancy is a modern invention. One problem with the God in the Gaps idea is that it supposes an ancient literalist view that gets worn down day by day as science progresses, when really literalism came into the fore after 1870. That makes sense, since early Christians didn't even have a New Testament and were writing their own, Christians centuries later could still easily read the texts and easily understand that they were letters and whatnot written by their allies, and it wasn't until later on that the idea came forth to give everybody the ability to interpret Christianity on their own simply by reading the Bible and figuring it out for themselves (i.e. without the Church), by which time a knowledge of Greek had largely been lost along with all the earliest documents. So in a sense it's a "falling back" to figurative interpretations, but simply a falling back to an earlier (and superior) form of Christianity. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Thu Jul 30, 2009 11:04 am Post subject: |
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| Julius wrote: |
| Fox wrote: |
No, especially when the unverifiable parts of it deal in magic powers and people coming back from the dead. But then, I've read a lot of fantasy |
just because something cannot be replicated to order in a laboratory does not mean it doesn't exist. |
Agreed. However, if you make an extraordinary claim, and then can't repeat it in laboratory conditions, don't be surprised when no one of any particular intelligence believes you.
I've all ready told you like I think: so long as people like you are out there in the world, who will believe things without solid evidence or logic, the words of individuals -- unaccompanied by evidence or solid deductive logic -- will be insufficient to sway the intellectually correct.
To state it more clearly: I have no reason to think such individuals are not either insane or liars, and have substantial reason to disbelieve their accounts. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Thu Jul 30, 2009 11:29 am Post subject: |
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| mithridates wrote: |
| So in a sense it's a "falling back" to figurative interpretations, but simply a falling back to an earlier (and superior) form of Christianity. |
I think you'd have a very hard time convincing me of this. I do not necessarily doubt that Dr. Ehrman is correct about the immense importance of the Bible beginning when he dates it (though I don't necessarily agree either; I don't have enough information on hand to know for certain, so I'll simply provisionally accept it), but I don't think that necessarily demonstrates that Christians before that had a more figurative understanding. Rather, I think it simply demonstrates exactly how incoherent and blurry Christian tradition really was before that.
Can you show me some things that demonstrate that the average Christian's understanding before this 1878 conference was figurative rather than literal, such that modern figurative shifts are a "return" of sorts? As it stands, all I see is that the Bible became a more important part of the religion at that point, not necessarily that it started being interpretted in a substantially different fashion. |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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| Posted: Thu Jul 30, 2009 5:48 pm Post subject: |
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| Fox wrote: |
| mithridates wrote: |
| So in a sense it's a "falling back" to figurative interpretations, but simply a falling back to an earlier (and superior) form of Christianity. |
I think you'd have a very hard time convincing me of this. I do not necessarily doubt that Dr. Ehrman is correct about the immense importance of the Bible beginning when he dates it (though I don't necessarily agree either; I don't have enough information on hand to know for certain, so I'll simply provisionally accept it), but I don't think that necessarily demonstrates that Christians before that had a more figurative understanding. Rather, I think it simply demonstrates exactly how incoherent and blurry Christian tradition really was before that.
Can you show me some things that demonstrate that the average Christian's understanding before this 1878 conference was figurative rather than literal, such that modern figurative shifts are a "return" of sorts? As it stands, all I see is that the Bible became a more important part of the religion at that point, not necessarily that it started being interpretted in a substantially different fashion. |
Well, in the earliest forms of Christianity it was pretty obvious: they were writing the letters themselves so unless they believed that their own letters (and these were often dictated to scribes to write for them) were the complete and literal word of God, then no, literalism would be impossible. Don't forget that the Bible in its current form with its 27 books in the NT wasn't even proposed until the 4th century. At the time it wasn't even sure which gospels were to become canon, and it could have easily been five, or one, or some other number.
Add to that the fact that one powerful (powerful enough that it could have won had they played their cards right) early branch of Christianity saw the God of the OT as an evil demiurge and proposed throwing out the whole thing, and the idea that biblical literalism in Christianity somehow extended back that far is laughable.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcionism |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Fri Jul 31, 2009 6:04 am Post subject: |
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| mithridates wrote: |
| Well, in the earliest forms of Christianity it was pretty obvious: they were writing the letters themselves so unless they believed that their own letters (and these were often dictated to scribes to write for them) were the complete and literal word of God, then no, literalism would be impossible. |
1) Given the type of person that fully and whole heartedly believes in a religion, I've honestly got no particular faith that they didn't believe their own written words were the literal word of God. I've certainly met people who genuinely do believe such things. I'm not saying that's necessarily true of these individuals, but I'm not going to assume it's not.
2) I'd further say that there's a difference between believing your own written words are the literal word of God, and meaning what you write in a literal sense as opposed to a figurative sense.
| mithridates wrote: |
| Don't forget that the Bible in its current form with its 27 books in the NT wasn't even proposed until the 4th century. At the time it wasn't even sure which gospels were to become canon, and it could have easily been five, or one, or some other number. |
Again, though, this doesn't really lead me to feel anything about literal vs figurative interpretation, just that the the religion itself was a confused mess at that point.
| mithridates wrote: |
| Add to that the fact that one powerful (powerful enough that it could have won had they played their cards right) early branch of Christianity saw the God of the OT as an evil demiurge and proposed throwing out the whole thing, and the idea that biblical literalism in Christianity somehow extended back that far is laughable. |
The fact that different fringes had (sometimes wildly) different beliefs doesn't in and of itself mean anything regarding literal vs figurative interpretation. If I say "The Old Testament is a lie," I'm not saying it's figurative or literal, I'm saying it's simply untrue.
Further, this Marcion fellow actually agreed some of the Old Testament was literally true (e.g. that Yahweh created the Earth). Figurative vs literal doesn't enter into the equation here, only truth vs lie. I don't see him saying one should have a figurative understanding of the Old Testament, I see him saying the Old Testament should be rejected by Christians. In fact, his justification for its rejection requires a literal interpretation of the Old Testament, as he claims the actions of Yahweh as described therein are not compatible with the teachings of Jesus as part of his basis for its rejection.
I definitely agree with you that the earliest form of Christianity was substantially different than modern Christianity, but I'm still inclined to feel that the main difference was that it was merely totally lacking in real structure, with different people wanting to go in different directions. Nothing you've provided me with so far has made me feel like the majority of early Christians interpretted their stories merely as figurative allegory. Rather, it sounds very much like Christianity simply didn't have its act together at all back then, and honestly what you've presented so far seems to me more like another very good platform from which to attack religion than anything else.
Were there some early Christians who were for figurative interpretation? No doubt, because the religion was such a confused mess that there was room for many conflicting viewpoints (I believe one such subsect flourished in Alexandria). Is there any reason to consider such subgroups the "legitimate, superior" ones which best characterize early Christianity and which modern Christianity is to some extent reverting to? Not that I've seen, especially given the fact that having some measure of figurative understanding doesn't imply total figurative understanding. |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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| Posted: Fri Jul 31, 2009 7:53 am Post subject: |
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Fox:
Figurative reading of scripture has been around since the dawn of Christianity. Take a look at this excerpt from Augustine's book on Genesis from the year 415:
http://college.holycross.edu/faculty/alaffey/other_files/Augustine-Genesis1.pdf
| Quote: |
| In the case of a narrative of events, the question arises as to whether everything must be taken according to the figurative sense only, or whether it must be expounded and defended also as a faithful record of what happened. No Christian will dare say that the narrative must not be taken in a figurative sense. For St. Paul says: �Now all these things that happened to them were symbolic.� |
| Quote: |
But perhaps we should take �heaven� to mean spiritual beings in a state of perfection and beatitude from the first moment of their creation and take �earth� to mean bodily matter in a state that is not yet complete and perfect. �The earth,� says Holy Scripture, �was invisible and formless, and darkness was over the abyss�8 These words seem to indicate the formless state of bodily substance. Or does the second statement9 imply the formless state of both substances, so that bodily substance is referred to in the words, �The earth was invisible and formless,� but spiritual substance in the words, �Darkness was over the abyss?� In this interpretation we should understand �dark abyss� as a metaphor meaning that life which is formless unless it is turned towards its Creator. Only
in this way can it be formed and cease being an abyss, and be illumined and cease being dark. |
You seem to be backtracking here:
| Quote: |
| Were there some early Christians who were for figurative interpretation? No doubt, because the religion was such a confused mess that there was room for many conflicting viewpoints (I believe one such subsect flourished in Alexandria). Is there any reason to consider such subgroups the "legitimate, superior" ones which best characterize early Christianity and which modern Christianity is to some extent reverting to? Not that I've seen, especially given the fact that having some measure of figurative understanding doesn't imply total figurative understanding. |
No one doubts Augustine of Hippo as one of the main people characterizing early Christiany. I'm not referring to some minor subset here. |
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some waygug-in
Joined: 25 Jan 2003
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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| Posted: Fri Jul 31, 2009 8:07 am Post subject: |
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One more quote for Fox from Origen in the 3rd century:
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| "For who that has understanding will sup�pose that the first, and second, and third day, and the evening and the morning, ex�isted without a sun, and moon, and stars? And that the first day was, as it were, also without a sky? And who is so foolish as to suppose that God, after the manner of a husbandman, planted a paradise in Eden, towards the east, and placed in it a tree of life, visible and palpable, so that one tasting of the fruit by the bodily teeth obtained life? And again, that one was a partaker of good and evil by masticating what was taken from the tree? And if God is said to walk in the paradise in the evening, and Adam to hide himself under a tree, I do not suppose that anyone doubts that these things figuratively indi�cate certain mysteries, the history having taken place in appearance, and not literally." |
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Julius
Joined: 27 Jul 2006
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| Posted: Fri Jul 31, 2009 8:08 am Post subject: |
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| mithridates wrote: |
| in the earliest forms of Christianity it was pretty obvious: they were writing the letters themselves so unless they believed that their own letters (and these were often dictated to scribes to write for them) were the complete and literal word of God, then no, literalism would be impossible. Don't forget that the Bible in its current form with its 27 books in the NT wasn't even proposed until the 4th century. At the time it wasn't even sure which gospels were to become canon, and it could have easily been five, or one, or some other number. |
I think you're overstating the importance of it all, of the books that were controversial, and the level of ambiguity.
The very earliest christian church did not have the new testament, yet it still flourished because the people lived a faith that had been personally taught to them by the apostles themselves, or passed down and taught orally. No written word necessary at that stage. The basics of christianity are really quite simple.
There is evidence to show that the modern canon was unambiguous from the deaths of the apostles onwards, as it was referenced by all the early fathers of the church. Our modern canon does not differ significantly from that time.
Sure there were a few contested books on the side such as Thomas, Enoch, Epistle of barnabus, etc. But their removal has still left us with a canon united by an internal harmony, justified by its survival, teachings, and influence through history.
In any case God has preserved the faith with or without available scriptures for 6000 years.. through his Holy spirit, that discerns what is correct, something that guided e.g Abraham even when he had no book...because christianity also depends on a living day-to-day relationship with God. |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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| Posted: Fri Jul 31, 2009 8:43 am Post subject: |
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| Julius wrote: |
| mithridates wrote: |
| in the earliest forms of Christianity it was pretty obvious: they were writing the letters themselves so unless they believed that their own letters (and these were often dictated to scribes to write for them) were the complete and literal word of God, then no, literalism would be impossible. Don't forget that the Bible in its current form with its 27 books in the NT wasn't even proposed until the 4th century. At the time it wasn't even sure which gospels were to become canon, and it could have easily been five, or one, or some other number. |
I think you're exxagerating the level of ambiguity.
The very earliest christian church did not have the new testament, yet it flourished because the people lived a faith that had been personally taught to them by the apostles themselves, or passed down and taught orally. No written word necessary at that stage. |
I'm not necessarily talking about ambiguity, but rather a lack of literalism. The absence of literalism is what makes it easier for people to arrive at conclusions through thought and debate instead of just looking up a passage, dusting off one's hands and saying that's that.
| Quote: |
| There is evidence to show that the modern canon was unambiguous from the deaths of the apostles onwards, as it was referenced by all the early fathers of the church. Our modern canon does not differ significantly from that time. |
I suppose that would depend on what you mean by significantly. The jury's still out though on just how much it differs since we still lack the earliest documents.
I myself prefer more books to less, and never liked the idea of having a standard canon. Maybe a "preferred selection", but I don't like the idea of throwing out the others. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Fri Jul 31, 2009 8:47 am Post subject: |
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| mithridates wrote: |
Fox:
Figurative reading of scripture has been around since the dawn of Christianity. Take a look at this excerpt from Augustine's book on Genesis from the year 415:
http://college.holycross.edu/faculty/alaffey/other_files/Augustine-Genesis1.pdf
| Quote: |
| In the case of a narrative of events, the question arises as to whether everything must be taken according to the figurative sense only, or whether it must be expounded and defended also as a faithful record of what happened. No Christian will dare say that the narrative must not be taken in a figurative sense. For St. Paul says: �Now all these things that happened to them were symbolic.� |
| Quote: |
But perhaps we should take �heaven� to mean spiritual beings in a state of perfection and beatitude from the first moment of their creation and take �earth� to mean bodily matter in a state that is not yet complete and perfect. �The earth,� says Holy Scripture, �was invisible and formless, and darkness was over the abyss�8 These words seem to indicate the formless state of bodily substance. Or does the second statement9 imply the formless state of both substances, so that bodily substance is referred to in the words, �The earth was invisible and formless,� but spiritual substance in the words, �Darkness was over the abyss?� In this interpretation we should understand �dark abyss� as a metaphor meaning that life which is formless unless it is turned towards its Creator. Only
in this way can it be formed and cease being an abyss, and be illumined and cease being dark. |
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That's very interesting. Sounds more likely musing than anything authoritative to me, but it's still quite interesting. As I've admitted though, yes, it's clear at least some Christians have historically at least considered figurative interpretation (and at least some have also fully endorsed it). It's less clear to me if it was ever sufficiently common to have been characterized as "the norm" to which Christianity could "return," as opposed to a minority opinion.
It's further important exactly which parts of the texts are interpretted figuratively or literally. I find Augustine's (and Origen's) musings about a figurative interpretation of Genesis to be very interesting, for instance, but whether or not it was ever thought of that way seriously by a majority of Christians is not clear to me.
| mithridates wrote: |
You seem to be backtracking here:
| Quote: |
| Were there some early Christians who were for figurative interpretation? No doubt, because the religion was such a confused mess that there was room for many conflicting viewpoints (I believe one such subsect flourished in Alexandria). Is there any reason to consider such subgroups the "legitimate, superior" ones which best characterize early Christianity and which modern Christianity is to some extent reverting to? Not that I've seen, especially given the fact that having some measure of figurative understanding doesn't imply total figurative understanding. |
No one doubts Augustine of Hippo as one of the main people characterizing early Christiany. I'm not referring to some minor subset here. |
I dislike your characterization of me as backtracking, primarily because although I'm questioning what you're saying, it's ultimately to seek information. I'm fairly unsure on the topic of figurative vs literal understanding in ancient Christianity, and you seem very certain, so I'm questioning you. If you feel my questioning is excessively aggressive, I apologize; that's just my style. If you completely convince me, I'll do more than "backtrack," I'll simply agree with you.
That said, unless at the time the majority of Christians had a figurative understanding of the works in question, those that did have a figurative understanding were a minority subset. What the majority of Christians at the time felt is what I am curious about. You seem very certain about how they felt; I'm less certain, but I'm also certainly not discounting what you're providing, as if nothing else it shows that some very prominent people did feel that way.
Why didn't you respond to my response on Marcionism? Especially since after you implied he was quite important to your case, you then bring up Origen, who said, according to your own wikipedia link:
| Wikipedia wrote: |
| According to a remark by Origen (Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew 15.3), Marcion "prohibited allegorical interpretations of the scripture". |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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| Posted: Fri Jul 31, 2009 9:02 am Post subject: |
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Okay. What I meant by backtracking was that at the beginning you seemed to propose an original completely literal Christianity that has been consistently turned into a figurative one in the modern age, and then when shown some examples then said that you wanted more, even though your original claim seemed to imply a 100% literalism in the beginning due to lack of scientific knowledge. Anyway, that's how I read what you wrote. I have pretty much the same debating style as you so I understand that you're just in it for information and a robust conversation.
As for Marcionism, I merely meant that as an example that there really wasn't any such thing as a common Christian doctrine in the beginning, and he was one of them. It was a bit of a mess, but I prefer it to the stuffy order of today. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Fri Jul 31, 2009 9:08 am Post subject: |
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| mithridates wrote: |
| Okay. What I meant by backtracking was that at the beginning you seemed to propose an original completely literal Christianity that has been consistently turned into a figurative one in the modern age, and then when shown some examples then said that you wanted more, even though your original claim seemed to imply a 100% literalism in the beginning due to lack of scientific knowledge. |
I don't believe it ever could have been 100% literalism simply because in any age there are going to be intelligent men who see the problems in a literal interpretation of these texts and want to resolve them without giving up their faith (which is what I feel I'm seeing when I read your quotes from Augustine, Origen, etc). I'd be lying if I said my intuition didn't make me feel like the average Christian in the ancient world tended towards a literal interpretations, though. Whether or not that's factual, I'm still unsure. I'm also unsure of whether the Church is best categorized by its average members or its rare, exceptional ones.
| mithridates wrote: |
| Anyway, that's how I read what you wrote. I have pretty much the same debating style as you so I understand that you're just in it for information and a robust conversation. |
Cool.
| mithridates wrote: |
| As for Marcionism, I merely meant that as an example that there really wasn't any such thing as a common Christian doctrine in the beginning, and he was one of them. It was a bit of a mess, but I prefer it to the stuffy order of today. |
Okay. |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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| Posted: Fri Jul 31, 2009 9:24 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| I don't believe it ever could have been 100% literalism simply because in any age there are going to be intelligent men who see the problems in a literal interpretation of these texts and want to resolve them without giving up their faith (which is what I feel I'm seeing when I read your quotes from Augustine, Origen, etc). I'd be lying if I said my intuition didn't make me feel like the average Christian in the ancient world tended towards a literal interpretations, though. Whether or not that's factual, I'm still unsure. I'm also unsure of whether the Church is best categorized by its average members or its rare, exceptional ones. |
I don't know how much quantitative data there is out there on literalism among early Christians, but I think it would be hard simply due to the lack of books. Literacy was low, and books that were painstakingly written by hand were then read out in public places for people to hear, and that's how most people got their information on what was being written after which they would discuss among themselves, so there was no convenience of simply looking up a passage and saying that that was the truth. The act of writing their own content in the beginning and spending a lot of time debating it seems to be really expansive, as in that pdf of Augustine going over Genesis and trying to find out what it really means, and the lack of scientific data at the time is part of that. You can see him trying to expand on Genesis and what it might mean in the real world with a curiosity that modern literalists simply lack, and that's because in order to be a literalist nowadays you have to purposely ignore a lot of common knowledge, and that's quite the opposite of what early Christianity seems to have been about. |
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