Of course I'm being nit-picky Stephen,
I believe the bible to be a good book, and to have
some excellent lessons for our society, but I do not
believe it to be the revealed word of God as you
obviously do.
The main point is that the bible you and I read is not
only a translation of a translation, but the original
written text had been passed by oral tradition for
hundreds, if not thousands, of years.
Fundamentalists always cite that God influenced those
keepers of knowledge so that the translation is just
as accurate as the original, but I have problems
believing that. History abounds with examples of men
misinterpreting scripture to justify heinous acts.
--- "Stephen A. Lawrence" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>
> Merlyn wrote:
> >As for prophecy, that's all in the interpretation,
> >
> >
> Oh, dear, you're being much too nit-picky here.
>
> Check out the book of Isaiah, which, one could
> argue, is the most
> important OT book (that's Old Testament, not
> Off-Topic) for most
> liturgical Christians.
>
> But first, note well that scholars and Christians
> agree that Isaiah
> lived and died a number of decades _before_ the
> Exile. OK so far?
>
> Now let's look at Isaiah 45:1 (NRSV):
>
> "Thus says the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus,
> whose right hand I have
> grasped to subdue nations before him and strip kings
> of their robes, to
> open doors before him -- ...."
>
> This verse NAMES CYRUS, specifically, and designates
> him the instrument
> to be used in ending the Exile. Cyrus was born
> perhaps 150 years after
> Isaiah died. No way this was just a lucky guess!!
> And it's not open to
> much "interpretation".
>
> So, if we accept that the book of Isaiah was written
> by Isaiah (which,
> surely, all those who accept the entire Bible as
> being 100% divinely
> inspired and accurately transmitted and properly
> attributed must agree
> is the case), this seems to prove, in one easy step,
> the miraculous
> nature of Biblical prophecy. And whatever it is,
> it's certainly not
> just a matter of interpretation!
>
> Of course, the more skeptical among us might feel
> this example could be
> taken to indicate that parts of Isaiah were not
> correctly attributed,
> but such an absurd and heretical viewpoint can
> surely be safely
> dismissed. After all, if we accept that parts of
> Isaiah were
> mis-attributed and anachronistic, then we might have
> to consider that
> some other parts of the Bible could have been
> similarly mis-dated, which
> could affect the interpretation of other examples of
> highly inspired
> prophecy, perhaps even some in the New Testament
> itself...
>
> If I didn't think the Bible was a truly fine text I
> would not have read
> it a second time. But I make no attempt to "explain
> away" the
> anachronisms, peculiarities (e.g., the incident of
> Melchizedek),
> 4-legged insects, or strange fate(s) of Judas.
>
Merlyn
Magickal Engineer and Technical Metaphysicist
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