Re: Not Exhausted

[Rich Ater]

Gilberto: Ok, occasionally whole villages get wiped out in modern times as well. But then I'm a little lost or confused in terms of what you are saying. It seems like you are changing the focus and emphasizing the question of whether or not massacres and genocides occured in the past. I agree with you that they did but the question is whether or not God approved them. And at least in my mind it was connected to the discussion of Progressive revelation and Biblical corruption. I see your point. I was a little confused on the main point, but I agree I switched the focus. It was unintentional. And there is actually many other passages of the Bible which reiterate variations of these genocidal commandments. And if you read the book of Joshua you would see how these commandments were implemented by the armies of the children of Israel when they started to take over the "promised" land. Personally, I have a really hard time believing that God would ever inspire anyone to do that. So in terms of Biblical corruption, I think the above is an example of text which is in the Biblical Penteteuch but probably wasn't in the Torah revealed to Moses. I am familiar with these Biblical verses and I agree with you. My take is that massacres happened and the biblical version of revisionist historians tried to justify them, but I agree with you. So the Quran the children of Israel are told to enter the city with forgiveness and humility, but the commandment was changed. I was fasmiliar with these verses as well and have used them in talks. By the way, have you had a chance to peruse Majid Fakry's translation of the Qur'an it was approved by Al-Azhar and is really very good. In any case, if the Bible has not been substantially changed in any way, then the genocidal commandments in the Bible are actually from God, and then you have to find some sort of way to justify or explain such behavior through progressive revelation. But if you do apply certain minimal moral standards to the children of Israel then their behavior was unacceptable and couldn't have originated with God, and so those commandments in the Old TEstament must have had some other source. There are a lot of issues in these last paragraphs, all worth discussing, but for brevities sake I'll leave at an agreement about corruption in the sense that you mean it. I do, however, believe that the coruuption in this case does not prevent the believer from gleaning the true word of God. So I guess that what I'm saying is that I believe that the entirety of the Torah and Gospel are imbedded in the Bible, but that everything in the Bible is not necessarily the true Torah and Gospel. Rich __________________________________________________ You are subscribed to Baha'i Studies as: mailto:archive@mail-archive.com To unsubscribe, send a blank email to mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe, use subscribe bahai-st in the message body to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Baha'i Studies is available through the following: Mail - mailto:bahai-st@list.jccc.edu Web - http://list.jccc.edu/read/?forum=bahai-st News - news://list.jccc.edu/bahai-st Public - http://www.escribe.com/religion/bahaist Old Public - http://www.mail-archive.com/bahai-st@list.jccc.net New Public - http://www.mail-archive.com/bahai-st@list.jccc.edu