No Offense, but that is kinda like saying pizza is good without the sauce. (which it is...and could be considered a quesadilla...but isn't really a pizza.)

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Another obstacle to true understanding of the bible is the language barrier. Find me someone not of the clergy that speaks like English is written in the bible. I am sure that words in the bible have lost their original meanings and or have been morphed into something entirely different. I read an article in Dec 2007 Scientific America that roughly an average of 4 or 5 words are changed (they were talking about tenses and verb relation). They even fore casted that a word like "wedded" which isn't even a true word, will have to be added to the dictionary in the near future.

Trying to translate the bible is like trying to translate Shakespeare, and as Don and Viv pointed out, it depends upon who you speak to as to whether or not Hamlet loved Ophelia.

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- Wisdom comes when you stop looking for it. -
"If God were alive today, he'd be an atheist" - Kurt Vonnegut

Please visit my foster dog blog: The Colbert Report.

"The Bible is difficult to understand" .

Yes and it is that way for a Valid reason . Even with it the way 'you' say , it is still admired as the Holy Book .

You stated that the Bible is hard to understand but Darling it is not even the Bible when it is interpreted with the missing links or Chapters in it and it presents as a wonderful Healing Book with answers to Healing mysteries that would change the world . Jesus had that knowledge and was stopped .

The Bible helps many many people from much hurt and sorrow and in all aspects of love the Bible presents this . It is not about pizza although l do like anchovies and fetta cheese on mine

I think Wendy makes a valid point in saying that we also encounter a language barrier. The words used at the time the bible was written have changed their meaning. You can see how that happens even now. Fat used to mean someone identified themselves with having over weight. Teenagers use the word "fat" now as an expression of something positive. Universe used to mean the physical appearance of planets, stars and so on. Today the universe is given a living identity that has metaphysical laws that we supposably live under.

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May your awareness be perfection

...the instructions that came with your VCR?

Or maybe, in a more serious vein, like the Law, since we all know how clear and straightforward that is....

Or taxes..what could be more clear and starightforward than the Income Tax Act?

Hmmm, come to think of it, very few things are that clear and straightforward. So why whould the Bible be any different.

"Be seeing you..."

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Grassaf, Eolas

To go along with what you posted above, about 1/3 of the birds mentioned in Torah that were declared as being "unclean" (we're not allowed to eat them) we're uncertain as to what they are today. Another example is that Noah's ark was supposedly built from "wormwood" according to Genesis, but we have no clue as to what kind of tree that is today. By chance, do you have a wormwood tree growing in your yard? If so, you can solve this mystery!

Shalom,
Vern

Wormwood tree is not the name of a tree...Dear Metis. You still have so much to learn. A wormwood tree is a tree made out of real wood and not plastic like most things back then : )

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May your awareness be perfection

hehehe - thanks for sharing that bit of history with us Viv!

I think everyone on this thread has a really interesting and valid viewpoint. I'm thinking maybe they're all a little bit right. I definitely think it's a good thing that God didn't lower an instruction book down from the sky. We'd never get past the outer world to the inner one if that were the case.

I never like those "10 steps to God" kind of books anyway.

Wormwood

Wormwood is related to the western sagebrush. The oil from the plant is used to flavor Absinthe, a liqueur. The plant was used to symbolize bitterness (Revelation 8:11)

Well we should appreciate the fact that the Bible was revealed over about a thousand years or so and spans at least two major religions Judaism and Christianity over the millenia. It also is much of the spiritual basis for Islam and my own Faith.

Also it has been translated in several languages from antiquity to the present day...every language say from Hebrew to Aramaic and Greek and so on..means there are subtle nuances of meaning that are associated with the various words in these languages.

Another aspect is that there was no punctuation as we have today in modern languages..so when Jesus is on the cross He says:

Luke 23:43

Jesus answered him,

"Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise."

or He could say:

"Truly I tell you today, you will be with me in paradise."

Both equally valid translations.

All denominations from Ethiopia to Armenia to Western Europe and Russia have over the years cultivated their own special perspective and orientation.

The Qur'an really has only one authorized language that is used and that is Arabic... so anyone who seriously wants to study Qur'an and Islam studies Arabic.

In my own Faith we have only one line of interpretation and translation authorized of the Baha'i Writings and so far my Faith continues to be united.

- Art

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"it benefits us to be thoughtful, not of the glory of our minds, but rather, above all else, of the glory of God."
- Johannes Kepler

Because it wasn't written or intended to be. The Bible wasn't even written as a single book. There are many books making up the Bible, written over a very long span of time, which included vastly different social and political conditions, including the captivity of the Jews, the destruction of the temple (twice). Even the New Testament is nothing more than 4 (out of many available) "Gospels," or stories about Jesus, a sort of history composed by Luke (the Acts), a lot of letters, written to various communities around the Mediterranean, by quite a few people (including those pretending to be other people), trying to resolve any number of different problems in the early church, and Revelation, whatever the heck that is.

And human language, which changes far too quickly, cannot possibly be the language of a permanent revelation.

So why would we expect the Bible to be anything other than confusing and a mish-mash of different viewpoints, all open to as many interpretations as there are people?

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evangelicalhumanist: Greek "eu"=good and "angelos"=messenger. Spreading the good news of Humanism.