Christianity is far from being the only religion that emphasizes men as the head of the household, pretty sure all of the monotheistic ones do. That was just the way it was back then, male dominated world for the most part regardless of religion.
Sure, we can agree that patriarchy was 'just the way it was back then'. My problem is that people use a literal reading of the Bible to say that it is the way it ought to be
to-day as well. If it ought to be that way to-day, because the Bible says so, then the Bible is an immoral book; but if women should not be subjugated to-day, then part of the Bible can be selectively ignored, which is an admission that it is not perfect. Which is it, then? Are women to be the property of men and the Bible true, or are women to be treated as human beings and the Bible thought wrong?
The Jewish people I know call it the Torah, not the Hebrew Bible.
Of course. As I said above, Torah is also shorthand for all of the Hebrew scriptures and holy works, all of the law and revelation. It is easy to use Torah to mean the Bible, but this is a convention: it is shorter and easier, and unmistakable in meaning for a Jew.
The Old Testament is a Christian invention due to the fact that there is a New Testament, so the previous chapters have to be considered as "Old".
The Tanakh was appropriated--stolen--by Christians and re-branded, and its meaning utterly changed. It became, in a sense, purely a historical justfication, as the Bible was read to be foretelling Jesus, even if it meant torturing passages out of all logical sense and making people into prophets who were not prophets (Daniel). The 'Old Testament' is part and parcel of the doctrine of supercession, whereby Christians become the 'new Israel' and the chosen of G-d, and Jews get the shaft...
God is used quite frequently by my friend Todd who is Jewish. He will never say Jehovah or Yahweh though from what I remember (I just did, oh noes).
The decision not to spell out 'G-d' is a personal one. Jews do not have a single universal theology, and there is plenty of disagreement over individual practices. The use of a hyphen is extremely common amongst the Orthodox Jews, but much less so in other sects. Many Orthodox also place a hyphen in Lord (L-rd), but I have never adopted that one.
The rationale for each has to do with the permanency (or impermanency) of text. If a Torah scribe makes a mistake on a name of G-d, he cuts that piece from the scroll and buries it. If a name of G-d is written, the medium must be safeguarded and respected. Which means that on casual paper conversations or notes, the names of G-d probably should not be written down in the first place... According to Orthodox Jews, that is.
The Bible is believed to be the word of God written in text by man (women weren't allowed to read and write back then). The rules were made by God, but interpreted by man. What happened to those rules afterwards as far as translations go, is the fault of men leading the church. Another reason why I hate organized religion, it is led by people with agendas who twist it to suit their own purposes. I am no Catholic or any other denomination for that matter.
But here again you deal with changes in belief over time, which is the main current running through my arguments. That the Bible was 'written in text by man' is not even universally agreed, for example. And as interpretations of the text are also done by man, how can you be sure that a church in the USA can read the work better than, say, a Biblical scholar or an Orthodox rabbi? All of the standard interpretations available show the marks of one organised religion or other, or of academia. I tend to trust and emphasise the latter, meself.
As far as God being seen.
http://www.gotquestions.org/seen-God.html
http://scriptures.lds.org/tg/g/78
Their are multiple interpretations of that, and they do contradict eachother at first glance, when read out of context obviously. People pick and choose which to take literally and figuratively. Moses was put in the crevice of a rock so he didn't die from seeing God's glory (not God himself, but his glory aura or whatever). Jacob is seen by some to have wrestled an Angel and others as wrestling God himself.
The way a historian might approach them is through shifts in meaning over time. Jacob wrestled with G-d in the earliest version of the story. Once G-d had taken on more modern aspects, and was no longer believed to be like other gods, the interpretation changed to involve an angel. (It is worth noting, too, that older passages in Torah do not deny the existence of other gods, but only proscribes their worship.) The text itself remained the same but the culture changed around it, hence also the meaning. This is yet another area of Torah scholarship where the names used for G-d are important, as the G-d Moses spoke to and the G-d Jacob wrestled are not the same--Moses took his dictation from YHVH (*) and Jacob wrestled with El.
(* - A typical Orthodox Jew would not write those names out either; but then, I am no Orthodox Jew! I do so with YHVH because it is not a word in English, and the letters are only stand-ins for the Hebrew. I do the same for other transliterations as well. It would be difficult to work in textual criticism without using the English names in some fashion.)
All translations of what Jesus said point to an afterlife. The prophets Elijah and Elisha each ascended somewhere didn't they? That is seen as the afterlife, unless Jews do not believe they ascended.
Their 'ascent' to G-d's presence is not the same as an afterlife, though. Traditional Jews who believe in Moshiach and an 'afterlife' believe that our bodies moulder in the ground until the end of time. Then, G-d will raise everyone (physically!) from the dead, and the earth will be re-made into the paradise it originally was. Not quite the same thing, eh?
Rape isn't religiously justified, that is just plain stupid.
Point one: I was using rape figuratively, to refer to our industrial plunder of the earth's resources.
Point two: However, I disagree with you here; rape in the physical, sexual sense is clearly justified in the Bible (given the right circumstances). What of the sodomites who wanted to bugger Lot's houseguests? (Genesis 19) He offered his young daughters to the mob, to be
gang-raped, and G-d thought that was a
lovely gesture and rewarded him...
We have no idea as Christians when the end is coming and trying to predict it is a waste of time really.
I agree with you here, but many Christians do not. And it does not change the fact that, historically, predictions were an intimate part of scripture. Paul was convinced that the world would end in his own generation! Folks now re-interpret those passages in shameless ways, but there is no mistaking their original intent, especially when one places Paul in his historical and religious context.
The selling of children into slavery is Old Testament material and most do not take it seriously (other than some places in Africa). The New Testament does not endorse, condone or forbid slavery. It is basically neutral.
Bullshit. Paul says that slaves should not be freed, and the Christian Bible thereby directly condones the continuation of slavery as an institution. Note the following--- 1 Corinthians: slaves should not desire their freedom. Ephesians: slaves must obey their masters just as they do Christ. Colossians: Paul equates G-d with a slave-owner. Titus: slaves must please and obey their masters. Philemon: Paul returns a slave to his 'rightful owner'...
You choose to be moral because you want to do the right thing by people. If you don't seriously have it in you to treat people like you would want to be treated, then you won't do it anyways. It is a personal choice regardless of religion, an inconsiderate asshole will not be truly changed by a religion imo. That person just will have to repent constantly until they learn from their mistakes gradually, religion doesn't have to play a role in this though. Karma or them reaping what they sow will bite them in the ass usually and force them to learn.
Or, they can cloak themselves in religion and be assholes to other people, like, umm, Jerry Falwell or Pat Robertson... My problem is not with some people just being natural asses, but with the use of religion to
justify that behaviour.
Name the laws that Jesus broke yourself. The Gospels are really the only things that Jesus did, and there isn't any law breaking there other than performing miracles on the Sabbath.
Okay, I'll play ball. Here are the questionable issues I could think of this morning:
1. A man must have a reverent fear of his father. If Jesus was, as Christians say, fully man and fully G-d, he would need to fear... himself?!
2. And, there is another commandment, to fear G-d himself... What would Jesus do here?
3. When a man reaches maturity, he is obliged to marry and sire children. Where are Jesus' wife and kids?
4. It is forbidden to curse one's father, and one can read Jesus' "Why have you forsaken me?" as a curse, since the statement is apparently false and demonstrates only Jesus'--very human--loss of faith in the moment of death.
5. One is not to inflict suffering on any widow, and it could be argued that having your mother witness your bloody execution is inflicting great suffering!
6. It is not permitted to establish anything as certain by the word of one witness. And yet, the apostles were supposed to go out and convert people to a heretical form of Judaism on the basis of their own word... to teach people to abandon the Law, on their word alone...
7. It is not permitted to add any new laws. But the 'golden rule' and the beatitudes, for example, are not in Torah.
8. And lastly, there is a whole raft of laws against the practicing of miracles!
I don't worship science, but I believe it works obviously. The spiritual experience I am referring to isn't drug induced anyways and isn't some manifestation of my own design. There is no actual miracle that happened for me as much as something that spoke to me when I was at my lowest point and encouraged me to find actual help instead of continuing to destroy myself. Very hard to explain and it was only auditory and is a singular instance that can't really be seen as me being Schizophrenic.
Believing that science works, and ignoring the implications of its work, is a very common state of affairs amongst Christians. One potentially troublesome area is the cognitive sciences & neurology, which is what I was referring to before. If there are natural explanations for the religious experiences people have, which can be replicated by stimulating parts of the brain, what does this say about G-d? Anything? Anyroad... there are plenty of books and articles on the subject, and if you're interested I can recommend some titles.
My opinion on what God should do with this planet isn't the same as saying that we as humans should do nothing to improve ourselves morally. You are making a gigantic jump in logic with that one. In fact we should want to be as close as possible to following God's laws before the actual end. The whole work in progress until the coming of Jesus thing. That is saying you should try to be better, not worse.
It is not
my leap of logic, but the sort of thing that flies from the mouths of too damned many fundamentalist preachers. As for trying to improve the world, that seems to me closer to the Jewish ideal of Tikkun Olam than to Bible-thumping Christian fundamentalism... But maybe I'm just getting cynical and bitter!
The only way you change your life and stop from committing those sins is understanding what causes you to sin. When you find the root of your flaw, then you change that part. Assuming the world is going to end in your lifetime is very dumb to me as a Christian.
I wish more Christians agreed with you here.
