The fact that you can’t find any value in it doesn’t mean no-one else can.
Why on earth would you say that?
As I said, I’m Jewish. Rabbis have been interpreting the bible for 25 centuries now, and I’m happy to say that no two agree. That’s part of the fun.
Faith, by definition, is about believing that which you cannot independently establish to be true. If you can’t respect that, then there is no room for discussion.
If The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is not literally true, then what possible value is it?
I was aware that the catholic church in the distant past did not want people reading the bible? How does that make the bible true, either now or then? how does that make belief in the bible, either now or then, any more reasonable?
Why would one want to do such a thing? As if this were something to aspire to?
It’s basically willful ignorance and being proud of said ignorance.
Entertainment value. Huckleberry Finn doesn’t set out to be the ultimate authority on morality, however. Mark Twain’s sense of ethics is better than what is in the bible though…
It’s better written than the Bible?
Really, you are just inadvertently supporting Robert163’s argument; you are equating the Bible with a novel, a work of fiction - the Bible is fiction of course, but admitting it to be fiction robs it of all its supposed importance.
The thing is, once it’s admitted that the entire Bible isn’t unquestioningly true that leads right to questioning all of it; and it can’t survive skepticism very well. The fundamentalists are quite right about that if about nothing else.
Would it be more “sound” and more “logical” if these people were “consistent” about a literal understanding of all of the Bible - rather than some of the Bible? If so, why? How would it be “sound,” and how would it be “logical”?
Speaking of consistency: Are you yourself consistent in this?
Do you believe that, say, a Platonist must believe that every word Plato ever wrote is literally true - including the bit about Atlantis?
That a Cartesian must believe that Descartes was 100% correct about everything he ever wrote - including that bit about how his “science” would make him live for “more than 920 years”?
That a Darwinist must believe, as Darwin did, that women carry within them much of “the lower races, and therefore of a past and lower stage of civilization”?
Why on Earth not, if they feel strongly attached to a certain religion?
Wrong again.
The Bible is remarkably adept at surviving skepticism, allegorical interpretation and all the rest of it.
As this article points out, in the third century, Origen of Alexandria - one of the fathers of the church, mind you - wrote like so:
Almost two millennia later, Christianity lives on.
Huck Finn is fiction, but it describes things which were true to the experience of Samuel Clemens and many other people of his generation. Was there an individual named Huckleberry Finn? No. Were blacks enslaved and abused in the antebellum South? Yes. The point is, it’s not necessary for every single word of a given work to be literally true for it to be a worthwhile source of wisdom.
I, personally, am an atheist and I do not in any sense believe in the supernatural events described in the Bible, but I nonetheless find that it contains certain teachings that are important and good to live by - that all men are equal and no one is inherently better than anyone else by virtue of birth, that the best way to improve your life is to help improve the lives of others who have less than you do, that wealth is no fount of virtue in and of itself, that he who would condemn others should first look and see whether he himself is worthy of condemnation, and that the power to understand and forgive those who have wronged you is more worthy of respect than the power to avenge yourself against them.
I do not think less of any person who has faith in the divine aspects of the Bible if that faith leads them to be a better person and subscribe to those teachings.
Assuming an all powerful god, it is possible that he told one group to not eat pork, another to not drink coffee, etc. The many paths isn’t a problem.
When I explained things to my two year old son, I used simplified things and gave different answers than I would have given when he was twelve, twenty-one or thirty. At the time the bible was being written (dictated by god), there would have been no frame of reference to a big bang or evolution.
Sure you can argue that god should have dictated an updated version but you can also argue that god is leting us figure it out.
That said, I am an atheist. I just find the “inconsistency means no god” as weak as the “science can’t explain this so there must be a god”.
The Bible however is not a “worthwhile source of wisdom”; it’s the collected myths and teachings of people ~2000 years ago who were by modern standards barbarous and almost completely ignorant. It can’t stand on its own merits.
Would you say that about any work of ficction written 2000 years ago, or were the Jews particularly barbarous and ignorant?
Anything written at the time, fictional or not. We’ve advanced a great deal in 2000 years. The Romans were what passed for “civilized” at the time, and I wouldn’t look to them for moral leadership any more than I’d look to the Bible.
So you’d say that studying Homer or Virgil is basically pointless?
If you’re looking for advice on how to live your life, yes.
That’s not the sole purpose of literature.
I don’t think studying the bible is a waste of time, but studying something is different from being religious about something.
I’m sorry that the OP has a hard time respecting me, but I don’t find much merit to his arguments. When Jesus walked the earth, he didn’t say “read the book”. He told his disciples how to live. Some things in the Bible are important, such as the divinity of Jesus and the resurrection. Some things not in the Bible are important, such as the Trinity. Some things in the Bible are mere allegories. No rational person believes in the flood and that Noah built an ark to house two of every species. No rational person believes the story of Jonah or that of Job. But they’re useful in that they illustrate points, just as the fables of the hare and the tortoise or the grasshopper and the ant serve their purpose. I personally find that approach to be more logical and satisfying than the mindless approach that one must believe every word in the Bible is literally true. A biblical story can be simultaneously divinely inspired and not historic truth. I don’t think it is inconsistent or illogical to recognize that oral traditions passed on for centuries and then written down to be subsequently translated are not always to be taken literally.
I’ve been saying this for years now, but I wish atheists would drop this type of complaint. It’s wrong, shows no ability to prioritize, and it’s not going to work. The message it sends is that atheists are knowitall jerks who look down on religious people. If you go up to someone who is moderately religious and say “You have to believe all of this stuff or none of it!” they are not going to side with you. Partly because you’re making a stupid claim: of course they can believe just some of it. Everybody picks and chooses. Some people are just unwilling to be honest about it. If a moderately religious person is willing to be your ally on some issues, whether they’re social or whatever else, you would be wise to work with that person. You may have noticed there are a lot of religious fanatics out there; we need all the allies we can get.
There’s nothing in the Bible about the world being 10,000 years old. The typical number for Christians is 6,000, and that’s a matter of Biblical interpretation. There’s also no reason you can’t believe in a god and also believe that either humans told a flawed version of his messages or that he told some stories through metaphors and parables. I mean, Jesus says the same thing, so that’s a pretty defensible position.
People have been making up religions for thousands of years. Why quit now?