Job 32-34

[wolfpurplemoon]

Just read an appropriate post at Pharyngula: The idea that the Bible should be interpreted as a metaphor is a good one — because it melts the superstition away.. I guess I need to stop trying to take every word of the bible literally, not that I know how else to take it.

Elihu was showing respect for his elders by just listening while they squabbled, but now they've reached a dead end in their discussion he's decided to let them know he thinks their arguments were flawed. He is very sure that he knows better than them.

Comments

[bill_sheehan.livejournal.com]

History also is subject to revision in light of later information. Earlier writers gave glory to God for causing the indigenous people of our continent to sicken and die in sweeping plagues after encountering Christian settlers. It must be a Manifest Destiny! The germ theory of disease and the fact that Indians lacked antibodies for smallpox and other European bugs was not discovered until the late nineteenth century. Few would now be insane enough to assert that God wiped out the native Americans to make room for white people.

Miracles, on the other hand, brook no subsequent correction.

People rise from the dead all the time, in fiction. The Imperial Death Star can vaporize a whole planet, in fiction. Superman flies without regard to Newtonian physics, in fiction. We know all about making up stories. We do it all the time. How many miracles - the real deal, inexplicable by science and natural laws - have you observed today?

We know how easily we can be mistaken or misled. My mother told me of a priest in her town who enjoys the gift of bilocation - he can be miraculously in two places at the same time. I did not of course, tell her what I would tell you if you came to me with such a story - she is my mother, after all. But I tried to find our how she knew. Had she ever seen the phenomenon? She had not, she had the story from a friend from church whose word she trusted. My mother, who is otherwise quite sane and rational, and could catch me in a lie while the words were still on my lips, simply suspended critical faculties when it came to religion.

There's a charismatic wonder worker in my own town who, it is said, can heal the sick and pull gold coins out of thin air. Here's the thing: he himself has never made any such claims, just as I doubt the priest my mother heard of has ever declared his possession of miraculous gifts. They know better. They would be too easy to test and debunk. They are merely humble servants of God. Who are they to silence their enthusiastic if credulous supporters? Hosannah!

The account in Luke's Gospel cannot be considered an historical document, because it does not withstand historical scrutiny. There are elements that can be verified (a man named Pontius Pilate was Prefect of Judea between 26 and 36 CE), and other elements that cannot (Pontius Pilate agrees that a itinerant apocalyptic preacher "What is truth?" isn't really conspiring against Rome, but authorizes his execution anyway to appease the mob). It is easy, based on our daily experience, to see how certain features of the story are more likely to be imaginative interpolations than actual truth. Moreover, just as I would demand proof that my mother's priest can really be in two places at once, we must demand extraordinary evidence for the extraordinary claims of Luke's narrative. Speculative rationalizations are not evidence.

The Lukan gospel is a religious text or cultural heritage, not a history. It is legend.

[vequenor.livejournal.com]

Germ theory did not, however, change the fact that indigenous peoples died out. Ill-advised religious assertions that had no theistic backing were shown to be false, but that has little to do with Luke.

I haven't been looking for miracles. I have heard and seen as much record for mircales as I have for the existence of Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Victoria Falls, and all manner of things that I'm told actually exist. Of course, there are apparently theological explanations as to why miracles seem to be less prevalent, such as the fact that the church is now the chief instrument of God's activities, leaving little need for modern miracles. Really, it doesn't matter whether or not modern miracles have been observed or not; I haven't observed elephants crossing Alps, mounted combat, chariots, or anything of the like. That has little to do with their existence of such actions and objects in their proper historical setting.

I note that you seem to have no actual evidence against these two people, other than the fact that they seem ridiculous to you.

Luke's account has withstood all historical scrutiny that I am aware of. If you were aware of the circumstances surrounding Pilate's descision, I'm sure you would realise how necessary his descision to appease the mob and leaders of the Jewish people was. Did you know that Pilate was already in considerble trouble with his superiors due to a bit of a massacre earlier on in his tenure? Pilate was required to keep the peace to the best of his abilities, and random slaughtering the locals was forwned upon at this point. As such, a policy of appeasement was in order, particularly since Pilate knew from experience how tenacions Jewish mobs typically were. At no point have successful shown one bit of significant failure of Luke's to withstand historical scrutiny. As such, the Lukan account itself functions as evidence for these events. This evidence would seem to be quite satisfactory, particularly considering that miracles are not all that improbable.

Rational thought would seem to disagree.