Why read the Bible literally?

Yes, I didn't get saved by reading the Bible but by reading Christians such as C.S. Lewis and many others who explained the Bible and made the idea of salvation understandable, but part of that being saved was the certainty that the Bible is God's word, which is faith in Him. There was much of it in the beginning that I couldn't grasp -- most of it I think -- and there are still parts I can't grasp, but eventually I may understand them too, and if not, that is God's will and it is not necessary to my salvation, and I will have an eternity to learn all its meanings anyway.The Bible only yields itself to faith. That's just a fact. If you want to understand it you must believe it. The exact opposite of how it is treated here. All those who subject it to empirical methods and to their own profane logic-chopping just get farther and farther away from what it means.

I disagree with you, even vehemently disagree with you but I don't hate your guts! What are you talking about a personal attack? Would you tell me the msg. number you are talking about?I've no idea whether you've been a nuisance or not to the admins but that was what Percy had said. I'm sorry you find it a nightmare, but like a nightmare you can always wake up, that is log out and look around and there you are safe and sound where ever you are. Just feel yourself breathing and notice nothing is threatening you and begin to relax a bit.I do hope you will tell me which of my posts you regard as a personal attack and if you really feel I should be suspended you could email Phatboy, I'd think he would be the easiest admin for you to talk to though I could be wrong. If I've done something to warrant suspension well then I'll take my suspension and work it out.lfen

Which, despite quite a few attempts, you have been unable to do! The closest that you have got is along the lines of "I don't really know, I just know when something should be taken literally and when it shoud be taken figuratively". You cannot even explain why you believe what you believe.Why even bother posting to a thread that is asking a question that you don't have an answer to? Really? So, what is scientific about declaring the FACT that the Bible has been edited countless times?You don't even answer Bible based questions, you keep ignoring the fact that no one has God's Word because there are no original documents, there are extant biblical texts that prove that the texts we have now have been altered, what you have is the end result of countless editings, and the Bible now only contains what a particular editor thinks it should. The entire stance fails before it gets off the ground, it was discredited in the 17th cebtury, and it is still a fundamentally flawed stance. Let's get soemthing straight, I posted a reply to post someone and you, who was supposed to be ignoring me, replied to me, was there anything in that reply that mentioned being off-topic? No, you are only now trying to slither and wriggle and twist your way out of things again. This is typical of literalists, any little distant hope gets grabbed with both hands.Everyone knows, including you, what you meant by "nothing whatever", we all know that you were applying that to ALL discussions and not just the Bible Study forum. We all know that you have now seen a possible way to save face and you are grabbing that with both hands, you are fooling no one, except maybe yourself, but then again fooling yourself is the primary function of a literalist's life.To answer the topic question DOES require scientific evidence anyway, the originator was asking why read the Bible literally, I answered that question with what I believe to be true. The post certainly made a lot of sense to quite a few people as they acknowledged here and in private e-mails.Now, you are the one moaning about external evidence being brought into Bible Study, so why don't you tell us what there is IN the Bible that requires us to read it literally? Can you tell me where I find the rules for this forum and where it specifically says that evidence based arguments will lead to suspension?Brian.

You know, I was saved by the enormous sacrifice of Jesus the Christ. He suffered greatly even though He was innocent, He took all our all sins upon Himself and died for us so that when we acknowledge His victory over death we can have Eternal Life with our father in Heaven. God's gift to us is Eternal Life.The Bible, and C. S. Lewis, cannot save anyone.You are worshipping the wrong thing, maybe if you even thought about Jesus for five minutes a day then you might start to see things clearly. Making the Bible into a gimmick, and placing it at the centre of your faith, is a pointless process.Brian.

So you have a problem with English grammar or is it just hostile misrepresentation of what you know I meant?This message has been edited by Faith, 06-22-2005 05:07 AM

The point was that the Bible is clear in a way the universe is not. You can't read the universe the way you can read the Bible. Schrafinator accused me of thinking there is nothing true in the universe because I said the Bible is the only way we know anything about God. My answer was that the universe may be full of truth but if we can't grasp it then it might as well not be -- this isn't about what the universe may contain of truth, it's about what fallible minds are capable of recognizing in it. The Bible is addressed to us in a way that we can grasp, in words, and contains revelations that we are unable to know on our own; the universe is not readable in the same way. If it were, science would not have waited for millennia to develop and then have taken a millennium to grow to its present knowledge, which for all we know is very far from the extent of knowledge that is possible to be had.

Sorry, I gave a lot of good answers to this question earlier in the thread, and the constant refusal to accept any of it and asking for more was getting to me. If I get a second wind I may try to do a better job of it.

I gotta ask - what isn't true when you approach it like that? The problem with circular reasoning is that you can "prove" anything with it.

This is another misuse of the idea of circular reasoning. To say one thing is true is not the same thing as trying to prove something true by a circuitous route in which the conclusion is identical to the premise though this is not obvious. That's circular reasoning. I am merely *saying* the Bible is true, not arguing for its truth.If you read it in faith you learn from it. And the only reason somebody WOULD do this is by being persuaded it is the word of God. And I guess there is no way to *prove* that it is the word of God no matter how certainly I know it is, not by its own testimony to the fact, which people can deny, not by its incredible internal consistencies which people just don't recognize no matter how you lay them out, not by the fact that millions have believed it, not by the fact that Western civilization would not have existed without it, or science for that matter, not by anything new that I can think of. Objections are always possible.SO, if proof beyond these things is required I guess I've come to the end of my rope and there's no more point in trying to prove anything to anybody.

Great. You can say anything is true. How does that help you determine what is true and what is not?

Please read things in context. I was answering the idea that the statement is circular reasoning, showing that it is not circular reasoning but a statement.To move on to the other topic, as I said, I have given up trying to determine what is true about anything. I've run out of proofs. They've all been rejected. I think they're solid proof; they stand as evidence to my mind, but apparently not to you or anybody else, so I'm giving up trying.

The question was about what would disprove THE BIBLE. It was not about anything else.

I showed the wrongness of all this at GREAT length on other threads months ago. I don't even know why you are bringing it up here.This message has been edited by Faith, 06-22-2005 08:46 AM

From Message 1: Let's return to the topic. Pick whatever part of the Bible you like, whether it's creation or the fall or the flood or Jonah or whatever, and explain why it should or shouldn't be taken literally. Or argue more generally. But argue on-topic.

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

I just wanted to point out that CS Lewis was definitely not a literalist. There is more in post 108 of this thread but here is one quote. C.S. Lewis was a brilliant Christian scholar and I just don't want to see him being misused by literalists as an example to support their position.Actually the book that started off my Christian walk, when I decided to figure out just what it was that I believed, was "Mere Christianity". Since then I have read it 7 or 8 more times.In my view there is not a better book to explain Christianity. He certainly believed that one of the gifts of God was wisdom and that God intended for us to use it.