my summary of the nature of Bible: agree?

Discuss either theological doctrines, ideas about God, or Biblical criticism. I don't want any debates about creation vs evolution.

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my summary of the nature of Bible: agree?

Post by Metacrock » Sun Aug 14, 2011 2:34 pm

I think the phrase I use for OT is apt and it is precise. writings by those who experienced divine/human encounter. Those encounters did not provide them with unmediated understanding of the divine. They still must filter those experiences through their culture. Their culture was violent and primitive.


If humanity survives this period there will come a time when our decedents will say the same thing about us and all our science.
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Re: my summary of the nature of Bible: agree?

Post by mdsimpson92 » Sun Aug 14, 2011 3:22 pm

Though I must ask, is science an experience of the divine? Some with more immanent views on God might well say so. I believe Spinoza wrote a work covering this very subject, granted his was a bit more deistic but it had a similar gist.
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Re: my summary of the nature of Bible: agree?

Post by Kane Augustus » Sun Aug 14, 2011 9:45 pm

Metacrock wrote:I think the phrase I use for OT is apt and it is precise. writings by those who experienced divine/human encounter. Those encounters did not provide them with unmediated understanding of the divine. They still must filter those experiences through their culture. Their culture was violent and primitive.

If humanity survives this period there will come a time when our decedents will say the same thing about us and all our science.
I think you're pretty close to the mark, yes. However, I would offer one modification: "writings by those who claimed to have experienced divine/human encounter (sic)."

Fair?

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Re: my summary of the nature of Bible: agree?

Post by Metacrock » Mon Aug 15, 2011 11:03 am

mdsimpson92 wrote:Though I must ask, is science an experience of the divine? Some with more immanent views on God might well say so. I believe Spinoza wrote a work covering this very subject, granted his was a bit more deistic but it had a similar gist.
It could be.
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Re: my summary of the nature of Bible: agree?

Post by Metacrock » Mon Aug 15, 2011 11:04 am

Kane Augustus wrote:
Metacrock wrote:I think the phrase I use for OT is apt and it is precise. writings by those who experienced divine/human encounter. Those encounters did not provide them with unmediated understanding of the divine. They still must filter those experiences through their culture. Their culture was violent and primitive.

If humanity survives this period there will come a time when our decedents will say the same thing about us and all our science.
I think you're pretty close to the mark, yes. However, I would offer one modification: "writings by those who claimed to have experienced divine/human encounter (sic)."

Fair?
I haven no problem with that! :mrgreen:
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Re: my summary of the nature of Bible: agree?

Post by mdsimpson92 » Mon Aug 15, 2011 4:23 pm

Metacrock wrote: mdsimpson92 wrote:Though I must ask, is science an experience of the divine? Some with more immanent views on God might well say so. I believe Spinoza wrote a work covering this very subject, granted his was a bit more deistic but it had a similar gist.It could be.
That would be a case with some panentheistic concepts. Especially with Spinozists.
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Re: my summary of the nature of Bible: agree?

Post by Metacrock » Tue Aug 16, 2011 6:34 am

mdsimpson92 wrote:
Metacrock wrote: mdsimpson92 wrote:Though I must ask, is science an experience of the divine? Some with more immanent views on God might well say so. I believe Spinoza wrote a work covering this very subject, granted his was a bit more deistic but it had a similar gist.It could be.
That would be a case with some panentheistic concepts. Especially with Spinozists.
right
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Re: my summary of the nature of Bible: agree?

Post by KR Wordgazer » Tue Aug 16, 2011 2:11 pm

I can only partially agree with "writings by those who had a divine/human encounter." I cannot agree at all with "writings by those who claimed to have had a divine/human encounter."

There's more to it than just a bunch of guys having spiritual experiences or claiming to have spiritual experiences and just writing down whatever they personally thought about it. In some sense, I believe, God divinely inspired them to write what they wrote-- filtered through their own cultural mindsets and experiences, certainly, but still inspired. I believe this because I do experience grace when reading the Bible-- an inflow of goodness and spiritual insight that I don't obtain from other books. I believe God did have a part to play in the formation of the scriptures; that though the revelation of God is accommodated to the understanding of the human writers, and though their very human limitations and conceptions affected the way they received and understood the revelation, it is still a revelation.

In short, I see an interaction between divine messages and human transmission of those messages, in the Bible. I don't see a book written by God such that the humans were little more than writing utensils-- but I don't see a book written so completely by humans that any message of God in it, must be seen as accidental, that we must try to glean somehow out of what the humans thought about their divine encounters.
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Re: my summary of the nature of Bible: agree?

Post by Metacrock » Wed Aug 17, 2011 10:12 am

KR Wordgazer wrote:I can only partially agree with "writings by those who had a divine/human encounter." I cannot agree at all with "writings by those who claimed to have had a divine/human encounter."

There's more to it than just a bunch of guys having spiritual experiences or claiming to have spiritual experiences and just writing down whatever they personally thought about it. In some sense, I believe, God divinely inspired them to write what they wrote-- filtered through their own cultural mindsets and experiences, certainly, but still inspired. I believe this because I do experience grace when reading the Bible-- an inflow of goodness and spiritual insight that I don't obtain from other books. I believe God did have a part to play in the formation of the scriptures; that though the revelation of God is accommodated to the understanding of the human writers, and though their very human limitations and conceptions affected the way they received and understood the revelation, it is still a revelation.

In short, I see an interaction between divine messages and human transmission of those messages, in the Bible. I don't see a book written by God such that the humans were little more than writing utensils-- but I don't see a book written so completely by humans that any message of God in it, must be seen as accidental, that we must try to glean somehow out of what the humans thought about their divine encounters.
Yes but that's the encounter. I might take back the notion of "claimed to." That kind of pulls the teeth out of it. I mean it should go without saying that if you don't accept the tradition and and you don't believe and you are not part of the community of faith then you don't accept that they had a divine encounter. Shouldn't have to spell out the possibility that we are wrong every time we talk about our beliefs.

I accept that some aspects of Scripture are Divinely prescriptive. The idea of speaking in terms of divine-human encounter is not to exclude purposeful communication from the divine. It is to indicate that we are getting it through a human agent, and the encounter is in many ways just the residue effect of an encounter not a direct communication. Sometimes it's even the effects upon the psyche of the redactor.
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Re: my summary of the nature of Bible: agree?

Post by KR Wordgazer » Thu Aug 18, 2011 11:15 am

I think I will say we are in agreement-- if you agree that the writings themselves are engendered by, and in a sense part of, the divine encounter-- and not solely the human's thoughts about the encounter after the fact.

You see, I believe that in some sense God guided what got written down, even though what was written was subject to the understanding and cultural concepts/limitations of the human doing the writing. Do you agree? Or do you believe only the words that are introduced with "thus says the Lord" can be considered in any sense to be divine communication?
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