Why read the Bible literally?

I'm addressing the issue for those who beleive God gave us the Bible as well as our brains. In that case why would we want to put a cross against the hard-to-believe bits?

Well, I do believe the Bible, but I also know it was never meant to be taken literally.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Because you think it disagrees with sceince and archeology and that Genesis is not a narrative?

Because I know it disagrees with science and archeology, but also because it contains internal inconsistencies and absurdities. In addition, it's an anthology of anthologies with multiple authors and redactors. Further, it was not considered as something to be read lierally by the folk who compiled it.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

So what do you make of all the amazing consistencies, prophecies and apologetics from classic to modern? For example, the Messianic prophecies?Or, my favorite, the incredibly consistent symbology linking Christ as the Passover lamb? And the patterns continue to the feats of Pentecost and Tabernacles.Every event that occurred on the passover night has a link to Christ's death? The events in Exodus all have a parellel for Christian's today. Many of these were teased out for us by the apostles but there's so much more in the OT for us today. But if we simply imagine the OT as an inaccurate series of books we'll never join with God to bring about His plan for the end of the age.Is our Christianity a modern version of an anicent cult or is it possible that the triune God revealed himself in stages to man and that all of the Bible is actually true?

First, I've never found a Messianic Prophesy that's was fullfilled.The Exodus of course, never happened or at the least, never happened as described in the Bible.The Bible is true, but not accurate. There was no literal Garden of Eden, no Flood, no Exodus, no certainly conquest of Canaan.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

The Rohl stuff totally de-bunks your statements on Exodus.Although that view was, and mostly is, the prevailing archeoogical view - and it suited atheists and liberal theologians - it is not the only learned view. But you act and speak as if it is, and on a site of 'knowledge and understanding through discussion'!Contrary to what was said here by others, Rohl is a mainstream Biblical archeologist who is not an evangelical or creationist - and he did not shoe-horn his revised Egyptian chronology.If you are basing your view of the Bible on archeology/science you need to carefully read both sides at the very least. Rohl's revised chronology is more consistent with the known facts and he makes the statement that Sure, you can side with the aethistic and liberal academics, I'll side with Rohl - who isn't even evangelical or creationist!This message has been edited by Tranquility Base, 06-16-2005 09:47 PM

It doesn't take much to debunk the Exodus tale.First, there is no indication that there ever was a large Hebrew population in Egypt.Second, if the story were true there would be considerable outside evidence.

• there would have been a power vacuum in the area and the other world powers would have taken notice.
• there would have been a period of internal turmoil while the succession was determined. There are no such periods.
• the troops and supplies lost would have had to be replaced.
  
  • the Egyptians would have had to replace all the horses lost.
  • all the weaponry lost.
  • hundreds or thousands of chariots would have had to be replaced.
  • loss of about one third of the population would have left definte signs.
    
  
  

In addition there are all the internal inconsistencies of the story itself as well as the absolute absurdity of so many of the incidents related in the Biblical tale.Sorry, it's fantasy.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Jar, your statement assumes the old chronology! If you had really read the Rohl's chronology there is plenty of evidence of semitics at the revised chrnology's 1500BC. In the new chronology the Exodus event concides with - and probably represents the overturn - of the Middle Kingdom! The second intermediate period represents a break of 400 years before the relative glory of the New Kingdom.For your info, here is the comparison:STANDARD: Old K (2650-2150BC), Middle K (2050-1700BC), New K (1550-1100BC)
REVISED: Old K (2100-1600BC), Middle K (1750-1450BC), New K (1050-600BC)The revised chronology was dictated by evidence of Egyptian dynasty parallisms as well as Hittite, Assyrian and metal use chronologies and coincidentally now coincides with pre- and post-Exodus Hebrew (Biblical) chronology including Joseph, Moses and Solomon as well as semitic distributions and Biblical metal use).The standard chronology simply placed all the kingdoms and dynasties one after the other whereas Rohl finds plenty of evidence for parellism - even of the major kingdoms but mostly of the dynasties wihtin them and of the major kingdom dynasties and the minor periods dynasties (FIP, SIP, TIP etc).This message has been edited by Tranquility Base, 06-16-2005 10:32 PM

Sorry Charlie. Semite does not equal Hebrew.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Archeological chronologies are built up via consistency between multitudes of small facts, not all-out proofs by one fact. Rohl's chronology is an incredibly parsimonious analysis of all of the facts. And it's absolutely fascinating.This message has been edited by Tranquility Base, 06-16-2005 10:26 PM

i've heard some people here cite the exodus as "destroying egypt." is that neccessary? is it not totally possible that the exodus happened, but on a much, much smaller scale?personally, i have no feelings on it either way, really. but i'd like to keep the possibility of some remote factuality/exageration open.

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אָרַח

Sure. It's entirely possible that it happened on a much smaller scale, one dealing with a family group. But the Biblical account is beyond reason.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Rohl's chronology makes it quite plausable that the Exodus destroyed the Middle Kingdom.Sesostris III is recognized as a period of slavery in Egypt and he represents the 12th dynasty and last pharaoh of the Middle Kingdom. He lines up quite nicely with the Exodus pharaoh 'who didn't know Joseph'(Ex 1:8).It' the same story with Solomon. Go to the layers of 950BC in the new chronology and you find evidence of a glorious city.This message has been edited by Tranquility Base, 06-16-2005 11:22 PM

I think the Rohl chronology would make an interesting new topic (though I know we've dealt with it before). I believe it is becoming a bit focused for this thread.

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