Let's all celebrate the christening of the very first Tangent Topic discussion officially entering full-fledged debatehood! Starting as an offshoot about the Bible's directions on homosexuality as a sin punishable by death and how the relevant passages might be alternately interpreted, this has become a good case of some intelligent and meaningful literary criticism.
Rather than try to explicate further and interupt the discussion from the Tangent Topic, I'll just quote the last couple of content-heavy posts there to start this thread off.
Rather than try to explicate further and interupt the discussion from the Tangent Topic, I'll just quote the last couple of content-heavy posts there to start this thread off.
TheFightingPikachu said:First, I must sincerely apologize for waiting so long to get back on the forums. Indeed, I thought this tangent topic would surely be finished after my two-week absence! In any case, I think, JDavidC, hat your most recent response did a lot to simplify my response. So here I go:
1. Regarding Homosexuality:
I'm not going to be able to guarantee that I can find unbiased sources, so I'll try to find several:
http://www.lionking.org/~kovu/bible/section05.html - mentions 'toevah' to mean ritually unclean, not 'abomination'.
First, just to clarify, I never said that homosexuals "are abominations." I believe the actions are the abominations, and some of your "brain bleach" comments tend to suggest you have some idea what I'm talking about. There is a big difference between hating actions and hating people, and I constantly seek to preserve that distinction.Be careful, the meaning of the word may change with context. If you want to quote passages as examples, you have to provide an analysis of the examples, and state how 'toevah' appears. I'm having trouble finding where 'toevah' appears in those passages you quoted (and in any case, technically, it is not my job to search for evidence to support your claim), so I'm afraid you will have to provide links to actual translations to back up your claims that those passages are good examples.
Also, before anything else, I'd like to return to an earlier discussion. That website with the Christopher Hitchens quote was dead wrong about the King James translators changing this word. I checked the Bishop's Bible of 1568 and in it Leviticus 18:22 says, "Thou shalt not lye with mankynde as with womankynde, for it is abhomination." Furthermore, even the late 1300s translation made by John Wycliffe and his followers renders this verse, "Thou schalt not be medlid with a man bi letcherie of womman, for it is abhomynacioun." Thus whoever put up that page was incorrect, they really didn't take their own advice about asserting things without evidence. Whoever wrote that knows that there are people who distrust monarchy and authority, so feels he or she can get away with such slander.
Now, when I cite examples and don't happen to link to them, that's not me requiring you to search for evidence to support my claim. It would be if I said, "I know there are passages which refute that definition," but since I know you have enough resources right in front of you, my citations provide much more information than that. The real problem is that for my prime example I made a typographical error. I meant Proverbs 16:12, so for that I must apologize. Take a look:
"It is an abomination for kings to commit wickedness, For a throne is established by righteousness."
In this verse, the word "abomination" is used to translate the same Hebrew word used in Leviticus. Just try swapping the word out for the definitions in the links you've mentioned:
"It is [ritual uncleanness] for kings to commit wickedness, For a throne is established by righteousness."
"It is [a cultural taboo] for kings to commit wickedness, For a throne is established by righteousness."
It doesn't work, because that's not how the word was used. The word means "abomination," and modern conspiracy theories don't provide anywhere near enough evidence to refute the definition known to be correct by linguistic scholars.
That's just about the heart of the problem here. If you want to show that something has a different definition than most scholars believe, you still need to show scholarly sources. I have no idea of the qualifications of the person who runs that "Lion King" website, but they cited no sources on that page (unless you count their passing reference to Boswell, who, as I've said before, was not a linguistic scholar). Basically, I need to see some Hebrew or Greek linguistic source for these claims, not some person on the internet who says so.
2. Regarding eternal punishment:
Can you show me anywhere in the Bible where any statement is made about hell to the effect that it could be for purifying? I seriously don't see that, and even if a few did seem like that, using a few passages to contradict the many clear ones is an unsound interpretive method.There may very well be a 'Hell', if it is defined as a separate dimension with lots of fire (and it may not be of the destructive/torturous kind, there may well be a purifying nature in there), where Satan and his demonic angel buddies are holed up, yet it need not be a place of ETERNAL punishment/torture. I am not going to deny the possibility of Hell altogether. It may well be a prison for its current occupants, and it may well serve much the same purpose as human prisons are supposed to serve.
Since you have several times allowed for the possibility of there being a place of temporary punishment, I need to point out something crucial. In objecting to the biblical teaching about hell, skeptics sometimes say things like, "I couldn't send anyone to hell for a minute!" Since you seem to be saying this, do you think God sending everybody to temporary hell gets you out of this difficulty?
In fact, I'd say it puts you in a much worse difficulty regarding God's moral character. If hell exists as a place of temporary punishment, and people get out when they stop rebelling against God, isn't God still trying to get something out of them? What do we call it when a person inflicts pain on another until they give in to what that person wants?
3. Finale:
First, the teaching that Jesus Christ died as a substitute does not fall apart utterly. Just think of someone paying the bail for someone in jail.The literal interpretation of Jesus Christ dying to pay for sins just falls apart utterly, as that in no way absolves people of their sins. People who do so still have to be put through correcctive punishment and to pay for ALL of their sins. The thought of 'believing' in someone else to take your place for something that YOU deserve is nonsensical. My brain just can't understand the reason for Jesus Christ dying on the cross if it was a literal payment of sin debt, and that's because the reason is contradictory under that interpretation. This begs the question, what is the REAL reason Jesus Christ was crucified and killed? Was it 'troll logic' for people who would not work under proper logic? It's the only alternative that could make sense to me.
Second...do you hear what you're saying? You really believe one of the fundamentals of the faith is "troll logic"? What would you have said if I'd defended the existence of an eternal hell as an instance of troll logic? I say this with no malice, but once you make a statement like that, your view hardly puts up a fight. It kicks its own butt.
JDavidC said:I've been away from this for far too long, my apologies.
The problem is, figuring out precisely, down to the last detail, what the actions are, and, in some cases, to which people those actions are condemned. I view the Bible as one of two things. A. A historical document, and B. A prophetical document. It's the best way of viewing the book, without trying to go along with common assumptions about the Bible, beyond the basic one about it being written by prophets inspired by God. I have to take into account what is happening in the world when God applies his laws to people, and to the state of society/culture for those people.Respectfully, when the Bible plainly says "Thou shalt not" its not an instance of some random person today making up new rules. The Bible quite plainly condemns certain actions. Its not just a matter of personal interpretation.
What I'm thinking of may not be a denomination, but it is this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_universalism . The question is, which denomination, or group, is right? I could go into detail about Universalism if needed to (and an epic length post with my Theory of God if you're really not convinced).Concerning eternal punishment, I can't think of a single denomination anywhere that rejects the doctrine of eternal punishment.
I'll provide a transciption error, and a fallacious error by the author of 1 Kings.Concerning whether or not the Bible has been "changed incorrectly (whether accidentally or maliciously)"; again, I'd have to ask you to provide an example. Respectfully, you haven't been able to so far. In absence of an example of such an error, I'd have to believe that the Bible doesn't contain one.
First, the transcription error.
2 Chronicles - 2:22 http://bible.cc/2_chronicles/22-2.htm - You will note, that in some cases, Ahaziah's age was listed as 22 (the correct age), yet for some reason, in some of the translations, you will see it listed as 42 (the transcription error I was talking about).
In 2 Kings - 8:26 , this does not happen: http://bible.cc/2_kings/8-26.htm .
Next, an equivocation fallacy. What do I mean by this sort of fallacy? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equivocation
I am going to show a part of the Bible where the term 'reign' is used in two senses, in the same verse.
OK, the first italic part is year 27 of Asa's reign, when Omri becomes (disputed) king.15 In the twenty-seventh year of Asa king of Judah, Zimri reigned in Tirzah seven days. The army was encamped near Gibbethon, a Philistine town.
16 When the Israelites in the camp heard that Zimri had plotted against the king and murdered him, they proclaimed Omri, the commander of the army, king over Israel that very day there in the camp.
17 Then Omri and all the Israelites with him withdrew from Gibbethon and laid siege to Tirzah.
18 When Zimri saw that the city was taken, he went into the citadel of the royal palace and set the palace on fire around him. So he died, 19 because of the sins he had committed, doing evil in the eyes of the Lord and following the ways of Jeroboam and committing the same sin Jeroboam had caused Israel to commit.
20 As for the other events of Zimri’s reign, and the rebellion he carried out, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Israel?
21 Then the people of Israel were split into two factions; half supported Tibni son of Ginath for king, and the other half supported Omri.
22 But Omri’s followers proved stronger than those of Tibni son of Ginath. So Tibni died and Omri became king.
23 In the thirty-first year of Asa king of Judah, Omri became king of Israel, and he reigned twelve years, six of them in Tirzah.
24 He bought the hill of Samaria from Shemer for two talents[a] of silver and built a city on the hill, calling it Samaria, after Shemer, the name of the former owner of the hill.
25 But Omri did evil in the eyes of the Lord and sinned more than all those before him.
26 He followed completely the ways of Jeroboam son of Nebat, committing the same sin Jeroboam had caused Israel to commit, so that they aroused the anger of the Lord, the God of Israel, by their worthless idols.
27 As for the other events of Omri’s reign, what he did and the things he achieved, are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Israel?
28 Omri rested with his ancestors and was buried in Samaria. And Ahab his son succeeded him as king.
29 In the thirty-eighth year of Asa king of Judah, Ahab son of Omri became king of Israel, and he reigned in Samaria over Israel twenty-two years.
The emboldened part is when he becomes the undisputed king.
The second italic part puts his death in the 38th year of Asa, whiich is close enough to 12 years (bear in mind that there would be rounding going on here, so being off by one is acceptable).
Now, there are two problems. The first one is minor, but the author says Omri becomes king twice, but at least it is easy enough to see that the sense of the word is different each time. However, the author messes things up by doing this again with an equivocation fallacy, right here:
This is an error. When he started his reign as undisputed king, it was 4 years into his actual reign as king, disputed or not; he lived only 8 more years after that, so he could not have reigned twelve years as undisputed king. However, if you take into account when he first became king, disputed or not, THEN the twelve years makes sense. The problem is, the author used reign in two ways, one starting with the reign, and the other with the undisputed reign, leading to apparent contradictions, when the actual problem is equivocation, the word reign being used in multiple senses in one sentence. When Omri became king of Israel, his reign would start at THAT time, not 4 years before, yet that is what seems to have happened, because there was a disputed section, it would have been correct to say his UNDISPUTED reign started in the 31st year of Asa being king, and he reigned for EIGHT years after that. His TOTAL time reigning as king was indeed 12 years, but that verse I pointed out was poorly written, and made it seem like a contradiction was in the Bible.Verse 23 of the above said:In the thirty-first year of Asa king of Judah, Omri became king of Israel, and he reigned twelve years, six of them in Tirzah.
The point of this is to show that the prophets that wrote the Bible are NOT perfect, they make mistakes. The ONE time that they should be expected to be perfect in every way, is when they are prophesying. There, the slightest mistake will see them swiftly branded as a false prophet. i.e. God's prophets may have written the Bible, but they were fallible human beings nonetheless, outside of prophesies from God. I want to dispel the myth that everything in the Bible is supposed to be 100% perfect. A lot of history would be rather difficult to record. e.g. There's a 'contradiction' where 2 different prophets view a census at 2 different times, and the 2nd prophet there is viewing an updated census, even though this does not seem to be explicitly mentioned.
I would argue that in many cases, it does condemn it, but between heterosexual people. However, some people have a different nature, or programming, in their brain, that they can't explain (I know about this first hand, but I don't want to talk about it). I don't see why someone would actually WANT to choose homosexuality over heterosexuality if they were given a choice. Furthermore, just because millions of people interpreted things in a specific way, it does not mean they're right. However, that very same argument can also be applied to me.And finally concerning whether or not the Bible condemns the act of homosexuality; I've already addressed this, but there really are no other ways to interpret those various scriptures. You have to do hermeneutical backflips to make them mean anything else than what they plainly mean and have been interpreted to mean by millions of people throughout thousands of years.
I'll get to TFP's post later.