On Apr 5, 2005, at 12:34 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
On Apr 4, 2005, at 1:14 PM, Warren Ockrassa wrote:
This is one of the problems with most of the modern interpretations of
the Gospels. Where Iasus was being metaphorical, he is taken literally;
and where he was being literal, he is taken metaphorically.
I attended a seminar by Marcus Borg
(http://www.united.edu/portrait/borg.shtml) on Friday, a Jesus Seminar
fellow and prominent defender of the faith against Biblical literalism.
He described two forms of Christianity: an earlier "belief-based" paradigm
and an emerging "transformational paradigm." The interpretations you
rightly criticize above are the product of the former paradigm. The
latter may well be the antidote to it.
I sure hope there is an antidote. American Christianity is rapidly beginning to resemble Middle East Islam. Both in the sense of insistence on hardline radical fundamentalism steeped in narrow interpretations of marginally-relevant texts; and in the sense of trying to turn our government into a theocracy.
Those who consider themselves moderate Christians really need to mobilize and push the radicals back into the fringe, where they belong. Else we're going to see more actions like the ridiculous Congressional invasion of the Schiavo case.
And with "No Child Left Behind" -- a patent lie if ever there was one -- Fed standards dictate what's taught. Given the fact that Bush can't even pronounce "nuclear" correctly, do we really want his administration making decisions about what constitutes good education? "Abstinence only" and "Intelligent Design" are likely to be the bywords for a long time to come if these jack-booted thugs have their way.
This kind of garbage should piss off any moderate; since I suspect a lot of the agenda is right-wing driven, there's got to be a backlash that originates in the Christian community to really have an effect.
The emerging paradigm emphasizes that the Christian life is about a relationship with God that transforms us.
This form of Christianity holds that scripture is a human product -- the
"wisdom tradition" of Christianity's Jewish and Christian spiritual
ancestors. It takes a historical/metaphorical view of Scripture, rather
than a literal/factual view. As one wag put it, "The Bible is true, and
some of it actually happened." Biblical stories are "poetry plus and not
science minus," in the words of a Swedish proverb. Salvation is a
process of transformation that begins now, is both personal and
political, spiritual and social, affects temporal life, and is
universally available.
As you have noted this isn't that emergent; it might be one side of a seesaw though. The Enlightenment and Reformation, I thought, were also about emphasizing rational discourse over theocracy and monotheistic imperialism.
Lay people *really need* to study the Bible's history as well as its contents, and they need to *not* rely on clergy to interpret the text for them. That was one reason James translated the Vulgate into (at the time) modern English. He wanted to get away from the text being under the control of the priesthood.
Knowing that the pentateuch was not authored by one individual, but several, is alone a transformative experience for many of the faithful. Knowing that the Gospels were not written by eyewitnesses is another. Those threatened are they who hold the Bible to be infallible. Ignorance allows that idea to remain present in the churchgoing population. How anyone can, in good conscience, allow that ignorance to persist -- even encourage it -- is beyond me, but I am not a greedy, power-mad bastard.
Personally, I think that this is what Jesus was talking about when (OK, if) he said "I have come that you might have life, and have it abundantly," and "the kingdom of God is among you." It's now, folks: enjoy it!
Yes. "The Kingdom of God is at hand" does not mean there will be a second coming or an establishment of Heaven on Earth. It means, very simply, this is it. This is the kingdom of god, right here, right now. It's within your grasp. Pick it up or miss the message entirely.
There are analogues in other teachings. Buddhists believe that we're all fundamentally good, that we all carry in us the seeds of enlightenment, realization, buddhahood. That's diametrically opposed to the Christian tenet of original sin. But I think that's what Iasus was trying to convey -- the Kingdom of God is within. It's already there. You don't have to do anything special to get there. Just uncover it in yourself.
Ironically, viewing the Bible metaphorically strengthens, rather than weakens it, freeing it from the crazy idea that it must be considered factual in every respect. Untold millions of intelligent, sensitive people have been turned off by this unsupportable idea. The Bible is completely pre-scientific, assumes a world view in which slavery is a routine and acceptable form of labor, and plainly contradicts itself time and again. Viewing it as fact is killing it.
Seeing scripture as metaphor does strengthen it massively. There may be some that could get troubled by the next step, which would be to take its declarations of supernatural events as mythology. There are others of us who've already taken that step and, I can say for certain, it is tremendously freeing.
I don't mean freeing in the sense of "Now I get to do whatever I want because there's no heaven or hell, ha ha ha"; I mean freeing in the sense of "Now I have complete ownership over my actions and life -- as well as full responsibility for everything I do", which makes me, I think, more of a free agent.
Also, since I don't have to weigh a given set of beliefs against my own to see if they agree -- and are therefore "true" -- I'm free to see validity in many different religious ideas. Where faith speaks of gods I can ignore it; where faith speaks of human values, I can cherish it.
Of course there are those who say atheism is a faith. Twaddle. I don't believe in fairies; does that constitute an expression of faith? I don't believe in Santa Claus either -- am I expressing faith in saying so? There's actually more prima facie evidence of the existence of Claus, at least in November and December, than of any god; so how is it a declaration of faith to say I don't believe there's a god?
-- Warren Ockrassa, Publisher/Editor, nightwares Books http://books.nightwares.com/ Current work in progress "The Seven-Year Mirror" http://www.nightwares.com/books/ockrassa/Flat_Out.pdf
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