Origins of Christian God- Through Cultural, Historical, Anthropology lens

[SerenityLives]

this is a topic I would like to explore more. I have questions regarding whether God the Father is the same as God in the Old Testament, the differences between Elohim, Jehovah, and similarities of Israel’s God to those dieties worshipped among the Canaanites, Ancient Mesopotamians, Amonites, and “pagans”, even having similarities to greek and roman gods and goddesses and Egyptian mythology. . I learned the El Shaddah (Israelites God) originated from El who was was the main Canaanite God with Asherah, the mother of mankind. So did the Israelites plagiarize the pagan’s main God and made their own stories about an Israelite God? There is compelling evidence due to the words and letters used in those ancient transcriptions by the canaanites.

See inscriptions of Hebrew God names similarity to Yahweh of Samaria and his Asherah-
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetragrammaton

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahweh

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anci...anite_religion

[awareness]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

originated from El who was was the main Canaanite God with Asherah, the mother of mankind.

This thread has a wide range of topics, some that go back into the fog of history.

But I wanted to point out that, Asherah was not only the mother of mankind, but was the wife of Yahweh. Male Jewish Bible author's and scribes edited it out.

God's Wife Edited Out of the Bible -- Almost

https://www.seeker.com/gods-wife-edi...766083399.html

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by awareness

This thread has a wide range of topics, some that go back into the fog of history.

But I wanted to point out that, Asherah was not only the mother of mankind, but was the wife of Yahweh. Male Jewish Bible author's and scribes edited it out.

God's Wife Edited Out of the Bible -- Almost

https://www.seeker.com/gods-wife-edi...766083399.html

This is quite interesting. It makes sense- I wonder where else in the bible we can find hints of Asherah.

And I also wonder if the female personification of Wisdom may have something to do with it in the Book of Proverbs and Job (carbon dated to be the oldest book in the entire Old Testament).
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/woman-wisdom-bible

and this makes me wonder even more the implications of Lilith (woman created by God before Eve for Adam) being editted out but still remaining in Jewish mythology texts.

[SerenityLives]

So I’ve been doing some reading, and it seems like while the Israelites were attempting to make their religion unique, there were multiple instances listed in the Old Testament where the kings of Israel forbade the people to worship Asherah, Baal and other gods. This started the “divorce” of Asherah from association with El or Yahweh. In fact the symbol of Asherah is interestingly a tree or cross ( like the one Jesus was on) and these cultic symbols were in front of the Temple of Solomon at the time. Biblical character Jezebel wanted people to worship Asherah, but the authors of the Old Testament looked down upon such worship and Jezebel became a villain.

Check out this article for more information: https://www.google.com/amp/s/mytholo...n-of-eden/amp/


This article has some references to Asherah in the Old Testament- https://bibleinterp.arizona.edu/arti...Hadley_Asherah

https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article...hasherim-bible

What is an Asherah pole? Connection with Garden of Eden-
https://www.christianity.com/wiki/bi...erah-pole.html

There’s another theory: “ Perhaps what the question is intended to ask is not why there’s no mention of Asherah in the Bible (which there is), but rather why Asherah in her role of wife of El/Yahweh was edited out of the Bible. The answer is simple: she was never there. It is of course true that the Israelite religion evolved out of Canaanite polytheism through a stage of monolatry into, at least by the post-exilic era, monotheism; it is true that in the older ‘parent’ religion, El/Yahweh was the head of a pantheon with Asherah as his wife and various divine children, like Ba’al. However, the transition from polytheism to monolatry is quite ancient, maybe dating back in origin to about the time Hebrew culture first became distinct from other Canaanite cultures, 1200 BCE or so. Although I’m sure it was never a neat and clear transition, but ran on for centuries with attributes of other gods occasionally merged into Yahweh (such as Ba’al’s nature as a storm god), that’s still much earlier than the Bible: the very oldest biblical text is probably Amos ca. 750 BCE, and the five books of the Torah are much later still, dating to some time around the Babylonian exile (maybe during it, maybe just after) in the 6th century BCE. In other words, although Asherah was originally worshipped as a goddess and wife to Yahweh, by the time the Bible was written, the Hebrews no longer believed that and hadn’t believed it for half a millennium or so. Since they did not believe it, they didn’t write it down in the first place; hence it never had to be edited out.” from Quora.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

This is quite interesting. It makes sense- I wonder where else in the bible we can find hints of Asherah.
I guess the translators of KJV didn't like Asherah. They translate it as "groves"


And I also wonder if the female personification of Wisdom may have something to do with it in the Book of Proverbs and Job (carbon dated to be the oldest book in the entire Old Testament).
https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/woman-wisdom-bible

and this makes me wonder even more the implications of Lilith (woman created by God before Eve for Adam) being editted out but still remaining in Jewish mythology texts.

Asherah appears 40 times in the OT. But it's translated "groves." I guess the the KJV translators were embarrassed about Asherah. But they went with "Queen of Heaven," in Jeremiah 7:16–18 and Jeremiah 44:17–19, 25. Likely Asherah was that queen.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by awareness

Asherah appears 40 times in the OT. But it's translated "groves." I guess the the KJV translators were embarrassed about Asherah. But they went with "Queen of Heaven," in Jeremiah 7:16–18 and Jeremiah 44:17–19, 25. Likely Asherah was that queen.

There are a lot of tree imageries in the old testament that parallel Asherah’s function as fertility goddess, including the “tree of life” and eating of the trees in the Garden of Eden. Interestingly, she was also correspondent to serpents, as identified by Eve (mother of humankind) talking to the serpent, and Moses’ staff becoming a serpent and being healing for the Israelites. She was also associated with the golden calf, whom the israelites were worshipping when Moses came down from the mountain. You have to start to wonder why the Israelites kept worshipping other gods and goddesses or idols, and it qould make sense that it was because they were used to it; they were polytheists who worshipped Asherah and other Canaanite gods in addition to El or Yahweh, or even preferred her over Yahweh. In fact in the book of Jasher, Miriam, not Moses was the protagonist, and thus worship of Asherah over Yahweh.

The Canaanite god Molech (associated with the underworld and child sacrifices) has traits similar to the angry Jehovah in the Old Testament, who demanded Abraham to sacrifice Isaac or for firstborns of cattle and sheep to be sacrificed; in addition to killing of firstborns, a common motif throughout the Old Testament. Satan can also be derived by him, due to association of of a fiery hell which child sacrifices in pagan rituals demanded or interestingly, the horns the Devil is commonly illustrated to have is very similar to Molech’s images.

The Canaanite god Ba’al interestingly was probably absorbed in the character of Israelite God: “The title baʿal was a synonym in some contexts of the Hebrew adon ("Lord") and adonai ("My Lord") still used as aliases of the Lord of Israel Yahweh. According to some scholars, the early Hebrews did use the names Baʿal ("Lord") and Baʿali ("My Lord") in reference to the Lord of Israel, just as Baʿal farther north designated the Lord of Ugarit or Lebanon.[50][6] This occurred both directly and as the divine element of some Hebrew theophoric names. However, according to others it is not certain that the name Baal was definitely applied to Yahweh in early Israelite history. The component Baal in proper names is mostly applied to worshippers of Baal, or descendants of the worshippers of Baal.[55] Names including the element Baʿal presumably in reference to Yahweh[56][6] include the judge Gideon (also known as Jerubaʿal, lit. "The Lord Strives"), Saul's son Eshbaʿal ("The Lord is Great"), and David's son Beeliada ("The Lord Knows"). The name Bealiah ("The Lord is Jah"; "Yahweh is Baʿal")[7] combined the two.” (source- https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baal)

[SerenityLives]

Okay this website has been my go -to for the topics in this thread: ANCIENT ORIGINS
https://www.ancient-origins.net/huma...sherah-0010611

And this article reveals a Moabite story showing that their god Chemosh defeated Yahweh, Israelite’s god. -

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.haa...aism-1.6469415

Contrast that to 2 Kings portrayal of same fight/battle between the gods. Is this an instance of lack of omnipotence in portrayal of God back then due to existence of other powerful deities who had different duties.

[awareness]

I was down the last couple of days, but when able I've been doing my best to keep up with this thread.

I love learning more about the Bible and the early Israelite's, but I doubt others out here will want to venture into learning about these subjects.

That Yahweh had a wife early on in Israelite history will not be accepted because they are hung on the popular conception of the Bible and Israelite history.

Their conception is that the Israelite's have always been monotheist, and God is against Asherah. It's in their Bible.

And archaeology be damned. It's the work of the devil.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by awareness

I was down the last couple of days, but when able I've been doing my best to keep up with this thread.

I love learning more about the Bible and the early Israelite's, but I doubt others out here will want to venture into learning about these subjects.

That Yahweh had a wife early on in Israelite history will not be accepted because they are hung on the popular conception of the Bible and Israelite history.

Their conception is that the Israelite's have always been monotheist, and God is against Asherah. It's in their Bible.

And archaeology be damned. It's the work of the devil.

non worries, take care of your emotional well being first. there’s a lot of ground to cover no hurry. im just startingnto delve deep in this- very fascinating.!it makes a lot more sense if the Israelites started out with a God who wasnt omniscient omnipresent or all knowing. they prob added these attributes to him later due to all the babylonian and assyrian exiles to cope with their situations by producing and trusting jn an all powerful God and having Hope for the future

[awareness]

Just between you and me, it seems, why is it the we can readily accept, without a hint of question, that, God had sons, yet we don't readily accept with the same ease that God had a wife? It kinda all goes along together.

She may have been one of the us, that God said Adam and Eve had become after receiving the knowledge of good and evil.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by awareness

Just between you and me, it seems, why is it the we can readily accept, without a hint of question, that, God had sons, yet we don't readily accept with the same ease that God had a wife? It kinda all goes along together.

She may have been one of the us, that God said Adam and Eve had become after receiving the knowledge of good and evil.

She was demonized. She was probably Lilith. It’s because Christians want gays to be celibate like God and dont want to admit God had a companion and couldnt do it all by Himself. The wife was erased and became nothing. Or God was gay but you know that theory didnt go well on the other thread.

[Boxjobox]

This is just an off topic aside, but somewhat related to the considering the OT and Israel and God.
Today, in every city are homeless vets, and in institutions are PTSD vets, and basically, young people who went to war and saw too much, and never could cope with what they went through. When I read in the OT of Israel’s wars, they were often commanded to go into towns, villages, tribes and wipe out everything that breathed- men, women, infants, children, animals. This was not done by bombs and rockets,, but by face to face, hand to hand combat. I don’t see how a human being could obliterate others in such a fashion and not be psychologically damaged for life and suffer, and as a nation not be severely dysfunctional. It would be like Columbine on a national level. Yet, it was a God commanded action. It was not like God sending hornets, or plagues or drought or locust that breath fire and have scorpion tails, it was God’s people going into intact communities and massacring everything with blood, guts, horror, stench everywhere..
How do I relate to this?

[awareness]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

She was demonized. She was probably Lilith. It’s because Christians want gays to be celibate like God and dont want to admit God had a companion and couldnt do it all by Himself. The wife was erased and became nothing. Or God was gay but you know that theory didnt go well on the other thread.

The question of God's sexual orientation arises because God is so male obsessed. It's a matter of appearances.

I blame the author's of the Bible ... that were all male ... in the days when women were grouped with livestock. - Exodus 20:17

It started with Eve, who got the wrap for the fall. Blame the women ... God buried Asherah in the back yard. For being a pain in the behind.

That's hyperbole, but you get my point. Male authors suppress and blame women, for men's failures. Paul's the worst. God can have sons, but not daughters. And definitely not a wife. And because it's in the Bible it's not questioned. We carry it on. We still today elevate men above women ; where all human life comes from.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

This is just an off topic aside, but somewhat related to the considering the OT and Israel and God.
Today, in every city are homeless vets, and in institutions are PTSD vets, and basically, young people who went to war and saw too much, and never could cope with what they went through. When I read in the OT of Israel’s wars, they were often commanded to go into towns, villages, tribes and wipe out everything that breathed- men, women, infants, children, animals. This was not done by bombs and rockets,, but by face to face, hand to hand combat. I don’t see how a human being could obliterate others in such a fashion and not be psychologically damaged for life and suffer, and as a nation not be severely dysfunctional. It would be like Columbine on a national level. Yet, it was a God commanded action. It was not like God sending hornets, or plagues or drought or locust that breath fire and have scorpion tails, it was God’s people going into intact communities and massacring everything with blood, guts, horror, stench everywhere..
How do I relate to this?

Shame on me. I never thought of that. But you're undeniably right. Thanks for pointing it out.

But I don't think it was so for the early Israelite's. They seemed to blend in well. They were henotheists, not warriors, polytheists.

Then Yahweh took over in their minds, and just like the first monotheistic religion -- Atenism, Egypt 1400BCE -- Yahweh wasn't tolerant.

And how do you relate?

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by awareness

Shame on me. I never thought of that. But you're undeniably right. Thanks for pointing it out.

But I don't think it was so for the early Israelite's. They seemed to blend in well. They were henotheists, not warriors, polytheists.

Then Yahweh took over in their minds, and just like the first monotheistic religion -- Atenism, Egypt 1400BCE -- Yahweh wasn't tolerant.

And how do you relate?

I like the word henotheists, I think it makes the most sense in how the world is organized, the gods are organized like that too.

[SerenityLives]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hebrew_Goddess

What we were discussing earlier with zeek, I think it would be a really on book written by an anthropologist to look into- the connection between Asherah and Shekhinah

And this one especially which connects the trinity to the female entity:
http://yeshuas-kin-dom-of-heaven.blo...chive.html?m=1

[awareness]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hebrew_Goddess

What we were discussing earlier with zeek, I think it would be a really on book written by an anthropologist to look into- the connection between Asherah and Shekhinah

And this one especially which connects the trinity to the female entity:
http://yeshuas-kin-dom-of-heaven.blo...chive.html?m=1

There's not much evidence that God had a wife. She would have straightened Him out from the get-go.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by awareness

There's not much evidence that God had a wife. She would have straightened Him out from the get-go.

This is true. Hence why the Bible is so full of male violence and God’s anger and wrath, especially the Old Testament. The only book without violence that I can see is the Song of Solomon. Temember, Somolon was considered as having so much wisdom and Wisdom/Sophia is personalified as female. If there were more female aspects of God revealed by the Bible writers, the Bible as we know it wouldnt be so full of violent stories or based on fear (hell and other concepts, etc).

[awareness]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

This is true. Hence why the Bible is so full of male violence and God’s anger and wrath, especially the Old Testament. The only book without violence that I can see is the Song of Solomon. Temember, Somolon was considered as having so much wisdom and Wisdom/Sophia is personalified as female. If there were more female aspects of God revealed by the Bible writers, the Bible as we know it wouldnt be so full of violent stories or based on fear (hell and other concepts, etc).

Seems as the Bible goes God snuffed His wife.

[Trapped]

You know the phrase “hell hath no fury like a woman scorned”? (Or like a woman’s scorn.....not sure which). Either way, women can be hellaciously angry/wrathful/violent too.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Trapped

You know the phrase “hell hath no fury like a woman scorned”? (Or like a woman’s scorn.....not sure which). Either way, women can be hellaciously angry/wrathful/violent too.

Haha true dat. Like in shakespeare

[awareness]

Originally Posted by Trapped

You know the phrase “hell hath no fury like a woman scorned”? (Or like a woman’s scorn.....not sure which). Either way, women can be hellaciously angry/wrathful/violent too.

My great grandma was a moonshiner and mean as a snake, after getting kicked out of the Nunnery. Those were tough times. I can't even imagine how tough it was 2000 and 3000 years ago ... not to mention 100,000.

But men don't have a womb, and motherly nature's. That's got to count for something.

Here's an interesting question : If God had a wife, like early Israelite's recorded, Asherah, did she have a womb? and additionally, is that where God's sons came from?

This God wife thing is new to me. I'm having trouble wrapping my brain around it. But that would explain that God made us in His image. God was human-like before us.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by awareness

Here's an interesting question : If God had a wife, like early Israelite's recorded, Asherah, did she have a womb? and additionally, is that where God's sons came from?

This God wife thing is new to me. I'm having trouble wrapping my brain around it. But that would explain that God made us in His image. God was human-like before us.

Your grandma got kicked out of the nunnery? haha I was kicked out of the LC.

To answer your question about the womb, I would assume so since she was the fertility goddess known back then. People were more simple minded and didnt come up with the concept of the trinity until further down the road. According to Canaanites, she had multiple sons, some of them are mentioned in the Old Testament that the Israelites were told not to worship (ie Baal, Molech, etc)
Here is an interesting article- https://sites.google.com/site/yahweh...he-sons-of-god

I guess it’s because we grew up in monotheism. If we were Native American, we would have no trouble wrapping our brains around it.

This is an interesting read. (Scroll all the way down).
https://publicism.info/religion/jewish/3.html

Methinks Cain was a personification of some of the “bad” sons Asherah had, and Abel is the opposite.

[SerenityLives]

Now Awareness, this one will mindboggle you even more. Were there two Yahwehs in the Old Testament? https://sites.google.com/site/yahweh...eh/two-yahwehs

[awareness]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

Now Awareness, this one will mindboggle you even more. Were there two Yahwehs in the Old Testament? https://sites.google.com/site/yahweh...eh/two-yahwehs

I can't even handle one Yahweh ... much less two.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by awareness

I can't even handle one Yahweh ... much less two.

I have an alternate hypothesis for the Genesis creation story- it says that “Let Us create” man in our image,.. male and female he created them. If you look at the Hebrew translation, it’s El talking to his divine council, hence the other lesser gods and goddesses’ image that men and women were created. At the time, the Trinity concept did not exist for the Israelites; they only had the other polytheistic religions and their pantheons as models for their own creation story.

[SerenityLives]

Satan was prob one of God’s divine council. After all his name means daystar, another canaanite god. Like in Job, they were wagering.Satan was the prosecutor and God was like the defense in a courtroom, they were more like at equal grounds. Kind of like Zeus and Hades.

Check it out- https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.the...ligion-judaism

[awareness]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

Satan was prob one of God’s divine council. After all his name means daystar, another canaanite god. Like in Job, they were wagering.Satan was the prosecutor and God was like the defense in a courtroom, they were more like at equal grounds. Kind of like Zeus and Hades.

Check it out- https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.the...ligion-judaism

Great conception difference of Satan to Jews and Christians.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

Satan was prob one of God’s divine council. After all his name means daystar, another canaanite god. Like in Job, they were wagering.Satan was the prosecutor and God was like the defense in a courtroom, they were more like at equal grounds. Kind of like Zeus and Hades.

Satan is different in the OT than in the NT. In Job he prances around like one of the divine council. He was at one point God's top dog, so to speak, if Exodus 28:12-16 is speaking of him.

In the NT he's a fiery red dragon.

And where did you find that Satan's name is daystar?

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by awareness

Satan is different in the OT than in the NT. In Job he prances around like one of the divine council. He was at one point God's top dog, so to speak, if Exodus 28:12-16 is speaking of him.

In the NT he's a fiery red dragon.

And where did you find that Satan's name is daystar?

“We can begin with the translation of the Old Testament into Greek around 200 BCE, a version now known as the Septuagint. Jewish scholars assigned to the task came across this phrase in Isaiah 14:12: Helel ben Shahar. Shahar was the Canaanite god of dawn (to this day, the word in Arabic for dawn is sahar) and Helel, the morning star, was his son. In Greek this phrase became Heosphoros ho proi anatellon. Heosphoros, or Dawn-Bringer, is a variant of Phosphorus, Light-Bringer. (If things had fallen out only slightly differently, it wouldn’t be uncommon for a contemporary preacher to exhort his congregation to “Beware the snares and wicked ways of Phosphorus!”) At the writing of the Septuagint, then, nowhere in any Bible on earth could the name Lucifer be found.”

https://partiallyexaminedlife.com/20...ad-rap-part-1/

http://www.kjvtoday.com/home/lucifer...in-isaiah-1412

Isaiah 14:12-14 is where the Devil shows up under the name "Lucifer" (or "Day Star") for the first time. it actually does allude to an older Canaanite myth about a god who revolted against Ba'al (the king of the gods) and was forced to retreat into the underworld.

This is an article about the Hebrew to greek translations of the hebrew word meaning “morning star” https://bible.org/article/lucifer-de...n-translations

[awareness]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

“We can begin with the translation of the Old Testament into Greek around 200 BCE, a version now known as the Septuagint. Jewish scholars assigned to the task came across this phrase in Isaiah 14:12: Helel ben Shahar. Shahar was the Canaanite god of dawn (to this day, the word in Arabic for dawn is sahar) and Helel, the morning star, was his son. In Greek this phrase became Heosphoros ho proi anatellon. Heosphoros, or Dawn-Bringer, is a variant of Phosphorus, Light-Bringer. (If things had fallen out only slightly differently, it wouldn’t be uncommon for a contemporary preacher to exhort his congregation to “Beware the snares and wicked ways of Phosphorus!”) At the writing of the Septuagint, then, nowhere in any Bible on earth could the name Lucifer be found.”

https://partiallyexaminedlife.com/20...ad-rap-part-1/

http://www.kjvtoday.com/home/lucifer...in-isaiah-1412

Isaiah 14:12-14 is where the Devil shows up under the name "Lucifer" (or "Day Star") for the first time. it actually does allude to an older Canaanite myth about a god who revolted against Ba'al (the king of the gods) and was forced to retreat into the underworld.

This is an article about the Hebrew to greek translations of the hebrew word meaning “morning star” https://bible.org/article/lucifer-de...n-translations

I just could never accept it. I remember way back when I was told this was about the fall of Satan from heaven.

I read the verses and then read the chapter. It was clear to me the verses were speaking about the king of Babylon. But all my Christian friends didn't see that. They had an eye to see the devil. Seemed like they needed it that way ... for reasons beyond me.

I am, tho, a fan of Venus, the real morning star. But if it fell from heaven there'd be no earth to be a part of the new heaven and new earth. And Satan would no longer have a playground.

[zeek]

How about this? The spiritual perspective of Christianity is based on a traditional cosmology that answers different questions than the materialistic modern one which asks how does it work? What is it made of? Instead, the spiritual perspective asks what does it mean? What higher truth does it embody?

Materialistic cosmologies describe phenomena in terms of energy, matter, space and time. The biblical cosmology describes reality in terms of heaven, earth, space and time.

In the context of the spiritual worldview a symbol is a fact that embodies higher meaning. Symbols have a metacognitive function in this cosmology because they're miniature representations of the entire cosmos.

The traditional cosmology doesn't describe the natural world. It's a model in which consciousness mediates between spiritual and corporeal realities as symbolized by heaven and earth.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by zeek

How about this? The spiritual perspective of Christianity is based on a traditional cosmology that answers different questions than the materialistic modern one which asks how does it work? What is it made of? Instead, the spiritual perspective asks what does it mean? What higher truth does it embody?

Materialistic cosmologies describe phenomena in terms of energy, matter, space and time. The biblical cosmology describes reality in terms of heaven, earth, space and time.

In the context of the spiritual worldview a symbol is a fact that embodies higher meaning. Symbols have a metacognitive function in this cosmology because they're miniature representations of the entire cosmos.

The traditional cosmology doesn't describe the natural world. It's a model in which consciousness mediates between spiritual and corporeal realities as symbolized by heaven and earth.

This is a very intellectual way of putting it. Thats why I dont understand Bible literalists.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

This is a very intellectual way of putting it. Thats why I dont understand Bible literalists.

Fundmentalist-leaning Evangelicals lack a symbolic understanding of the scriptures. They conflate a symbolic cosmology with a modern science based one. Witness Lee largely worked out of a symbolic biblical worldview. But, he lapsed into literalism particularly in the area of eschatology. And he taught his followers through a method of rote indoctrination instead of giving them the tools to think symbolically for themselves. In part, that may be due to the fact that, he may not have a meta-understanding of his own methodology. And doing so might have conflicted with his understanding of himself as MOTA. In any case, looking at the Bible symbolically is an alternative to the historical speculative method.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by zeek

Fundmentalist-leaning Evangelicals lack a symbolic understanding of the scriptures. They conflate a symbolic cosmology with a modern science based one. Witness Lee largely worked out of a symbolic biblical worldview. But, he lapsed into literalism particularly in the area of eschatology. And he taught his followers through a method of rote indoctrination instead of giving them the tools to think symbolically for themselves. In part, that may be due to the fact that, he may not have a meta-understanding of his own methodology. And doing so might have conflicted with his understanding of himself as MOTA. In any case, looking at the Bible symbolically is an alternative to the historical speculative method.

This is an old story. I'm reading Elaine Pagel's "The Origin of Satan." She's talking about why some books made it into the canon and others didn't. Basically, the criteria was based upon the need of the proto-orthodox to form the institutional church. Also, that the Comforter/Paraclete/Spirit wasn't allowed for the same reason. The Spirit can't be controlled, and so conflicts with the institutional church, that requires control. (The Gospel of Thomas, for example, wasn't selected to be in the canon because in it Jesus promotes an independent relationship with the divine, not dependent on the church).

Same with Lee. Just Bible symbolism wasn't enough. His recovery and the MOTA required something more, something real. So rote training works, right up to today. Lee has a history of stamping out the Holy Spirit, for the same reasons.

Basically that's what I see as the shortcoming of symbolism. It's a handy interpretation tool, but it's not enough. We need something real, and we need to think that the Bible stories are literal and historical. Symbolism doesn't accomplish that.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by awareness

This is an old story. I'm reading Elaine Pagel's "The Origin of Satan." She's talking about why some books made it into the canon and others didn't. Basically, the criteria was based upon the need of the proto-orthodox to form the institutional church. Also, that the Comforter/Paraclete/Spirit wasn't allowed for the same reason. The Spirit can't be controlled, and so conflicts with the institutional church, that requires control. (The Gospel of Thomas, for example, wasn't selected to be in the canon because in it Jesus promotes an independent relationship with the divine, not dependent on the church).

Same with Lee. Just Bible symbolism wasn't enough. His recovery and the MOTA required something more, something real. So rote training works, right up to today. Lee has a history of stamping out the Holy Spirit, for the same reasons.

Basically that's what I see as the shortcoming of symbolism. It's a handy interpretation tool, but it's not enough. We need something real, and we need to think that the Bible stories are literal and historical. Symbolism doesn't accomplish that.

Bible stories that are merely literal and historical and occurred 2,000 years ago or more have nothing to do with us. So what do we need them for?

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by zeek

Bible stories that are merely literal and historical and occurred 2,000 years ago or more have nothing to do with us. So what do we need them for?

It doesnt pertain to modern society- case in point (same sex relationships in the ancient times vs in modern times are different). But yet some people use the bible as a universal (transcending space and time) ruler for morality and ethics. Which I dont understand.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

It doesnt pertain to modern society- case in point (same sex relationships in the ancient times vs in modern times are different). But yet some people use the bible as a universal (transcending space and time) ruler for morality and ethics. Which I dont understand.

Another reason why if you look at it only as a literal historical document and makes no sense. So where are you going to go for your morality and ethics?

[awareness]

Originally Posted by zeek

Bible stories that are merely literal and historical and occurred 2,000 years ago or more have nothing to do with us. So what do we need them for?

As examples for us to live by. I can't tell how many times I've been told that so and so was like Abraham, or some other Bible character. It kinda works for them.

And look at Lee, copying the one church one city, the apostle on the earth, and even the supposed minister of the age. Those 2 and 3 thousand year old stories have sticking power. You know that.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by awareness

As examples for us to live by. I can't tell how many times I've been told that so and so was like Abraham, or some other Bible character. It kinda works for them.

And look at Lee, copying the one church one city, the apostle on the earth, and even the supposed minister of the age. Those 2 and 3 thousand year old stories have sticking power. You know that.

The Bible makes people Bible-crazy. You know that. Or at least a guy I know has been telling me that for years like a broken record.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by zeek

The Bible makes people Bible-crazy. You know that. Or at least a guy I know has been telling me that for years like a broken record.

Whoever that guy is tell him to shut up. But I have to admit, in my case at least, he's right.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by zeek

Another reason why if you look at it only as a literal historical document and makes no sense. So where are you going to go for your morality and ethics?

I would go to my "God-given" conscience and ask myself if it's wrong or right. Which choice has the least amount of suffering for people? Example: Christian behaviors that lead vast amounts of people to commit suicide must be wrong. Something interesting is that morality and ethics is subjective based on culture and historical context. I remember taking a philosophy class in college about the ethics of cannibalism- it grossed me out to read it but under certain cultures, it was acceptable.

Below is an article about high rates of suicide among LGBTQIA raised in Christian families, which is connected with the wrong biblical interpretation of homosexual relationships that many churches have today. These interpretations still resemble medieval perspectives about sex and do not take into account the evolution of the meaning of the word "sodomy" throughout centuries.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/tra...oundly-flawed/

[ExChurchKid]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

I would go to my "God-given" conscience and ask myself if it's wrong or right. Which choice has the least amount of suffering for people? Example: Christian behaviors that lead vast amounts of people to commit suicide must be wrong. Something interesting is that morality and ethics is subjective based on culture and historical context. I remember taking a philosophy class in college about the ethics of cannibalism- it grossed me out to read it but under certain cultures, it was acceptable.

Below is an article about high rates of suicide among LGBTQIA raised in Christian families, which is connected with the wrong biblical interpretation of homosexual relationships that many churches have today. These interpretations still resemble medieval perspectives about sex and do not take into account the evolution of the meaning of the word "sodomy" throughout centuries.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/tra...oundly-flawed/

Hey guys,

The rest of the forum is currently more or less a disaster, but this seems like a sane thread, and actually something I'm interested in. Sorry I'm late to the party. I've often asked myself, if the Bible is supposed to be taken as the ultimate authority on God and such, how do we know the Bible is real? Like, really God-inspired. How do we know the men who wrote it down didn't mess up? Why didn't any women get to write anything? Also, what got left out? Who decided what was and wasn't in the Bible, and why do Catholics have the Apocrypha? Not to mention it's rumored that the Vatican secret library has a copy of the gospel of Thomas that no one's seen before. What's with that? Sorry if these topics have already been covered, feel free to ignore and carry on with your discussion.

Anyways, I agree that if a Christian practice causes harm to people (and having been suicidal myself, I know that driving someone to suicide is one of the worst damages that can be done), it is terrible. I don't care what the Bible or a bunch of old men say.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by awareness

Whoever that guy is tell him to shut up. But I have to admit, in my case at least, he's right.

Viewing Bible heroes as examples is fine as far as it goes. But it strips them out of the biblical cosmology, the narrative context in which they act. Their heroism may or may not make any sense in a modern. Looking at the Bible that way may contribute to becoming Bible crazy.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

I would go to my "God-given" conscience and ask myself if it's wrong or right. Which choice has the least amount of suffering for people? Example: Christian behaviors that lead vast amounts of people to commit suicide must be wrong. Something interesting is that morality and ethics is subjective based on culture and historical context. I remember taking a philosophy class in college about the ethics of cannibalism- it grossed me out to read it but under certain cultures, it was acceptable.

Below is an article about high rates of suicide among LGBTQIA raised in Christian families, which is connected with the wrong biblical interpretation of homosexual relationships that many churches have today. These interpretations still resemble medieval perspectives about sex and do not take into account the evolution of the meaning of the word "sodomy" throughout centuries.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/tra...oundly-flawed/

It seems to me that your idea about following your God-given conscience in a direction of inclusion compassion and love, is a higher vision of Christianity than the ones that push people toward suicide. The Spirit calls us to find the balance between reverence for tradition and authentic ethical innovation.

How about this? "We are here to be the site of the sacred marriage of heaven and earth of the primordial light and matter to be the place where fusion of all dimensions is affected so that divine passion through us can remake and reshape every arena and institution, every art and science of the world." (Andrew Harvey quoting an anonymous kabbalist in the forward to Zohar, translation and annotation by Daniel C. Matt)

[awareness]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

I would go to my "God-given" conscience and ask myself if it's wrong or right. Which choice has the least amount of suffering for people? Example: Christian behaviors that lead vast amounts of people to commit suicide must be wrong. Something interesting is that morality and ethics is subjective based on culture and historical context. I remember taking a philosophy class in college about the ethics of cannibalism- it grossed me out to read it but under certain cultures, it was acceptable.

Below is an article about high rates of suicide among LGBTQIA raised in Christian families, which is connected with the wrong biblical interpretation of homosexual relationships that many churches have today. These interpretations still resemble medieval perspectives about sex and do not take into account the evolution of the meaning of the word "sodomy" throughout centuries.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/tra...oundly-flawed/

But we're pretty much speaking to Bible believers of long standing traditional interpretations, using traditional Bible symbology to gather meanings.

I find your link to be very educational concerning the Bible, and it's original meanings.

I wonder how others out here take it ... those that have no problem forgiving King David ... if they take it at all.

[Boxjobox]

1In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2And the earth was waste and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep: and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

3And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. 4And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness. 5And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.

6And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. 7And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so. 8And God called the firmament Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, a second day.


This is obviously a section from “ the beginning”. A firmament between the waters below and the waters above was called “heaven”. Later lights were added to the heavenly firmament including the big light for day and the lesser light for night. Later, birds flew in the lower part of the firmament. But my understanding is that in this firmament called heaven is where God and his angels dwelt. Jacob saw a vision of a ladder that spanned from earth to heaven and the angels going up and down. Thunder, lightning, rain, hail, fire, brimstone, came from heaven, which was between the waters below and the waters above. The angelic beings often portrayed with wings. Jesus would look up to heaven when he prayed. Jesus ascended up and and a cloud received him. John gives a view of what takes place in this heaven. Much of what is spoken in scripture involves this place between the waters below and the waters above.

This place plays a major role in the concept of God in relation to events on earth and the situation of man. Man, who knew very little about this heaven, other than what he saw with the naked eye, eventually developed aides to see far more than anyone imagined. Then came the airplane, which took man higher than the birds, then jets- even further, and rockets and technical satellites which showed us that the stars an the two big lights were light years apart.

The thought of heaven- dare I carefully say the myth that has stood through 6000 years, has changed, yet how does one adapt their thinking about God, and all things related to God in light of these relatively recent discoveries. When the crude telescope was first introduced, it created no small hubbub among the church shepherds. When the Russian first went into space, he said he did not see God. But today we talk in somewhat expectatious terms of going to Mars. The church makes no comment on where God is now dwelling. And no talk of the water above the firmament.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

This place plays a major role in the concept of God in relation to events on earth and the situation of man. Man, who knew very little about this heaven, other than what he saw with the naked eye, eventually developed aides to see far more than anyone imagined. Then came the airplane, which took man higher than the birds, then jets- even further, and rockets and technical satellites which showed us that the stars an the two big lights were light years apart.

The thought of heaven- dare I carefully say the myth that has stood through 6000 years, has changed, yet how does one adapt their thinking about God, and all things related to God in light of these relatively recent discoveries. When the crude telescope was first introduced, it created no small hubbub among the church shepherds. When the Russian first went into space, he said he did not see God. But today we talk in somewhat expectatious terms of going to Mars. The church makes no comment on where God is now dwelling. And no talk of the water above the firmament.

Maybe God is in everything. Maybe He/She /It is outside the universe and the earth is just a speck to Them. Or, as my father, a physicist once told me, God is outside the plane of existence and there is an alternative “universe” or “reality” where God/the gods dwell. We cant see them but they can see us.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

Maybe God is in everything. Maybe He/She /It is outside the universe and the earth is just a speck to Them. Or, as my father, a physicist once told me, God is outside the plane of existence and there is an alternative “universe” or “reality” where God/the gods dwell. We cant see them but they can see us.

My cousin was so thrilled when his 11 yr old daughter accepted Jesus. A few yrs go by and she comes home and asks, where's heaven?

He tells her, out beyond the universe. She says, how did Jesus ascend to heaven, if he traveled at the speed of light he wouldn't be out of the Milky Way galaxy yet?

He was downfallen.

[Boxjobox]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

Maybe God is in everything. Maybe He/She /It is outside the universe and the earth is just a speck to Them. Or, as my father, a physicist once told me, God is outside the plane of existence and there is an alternative “universe” or “reality” where God/the gods dwell. We cant see them but they can see us.

You, of course, must realize in saying this you are creating your own myth and your own god. Scripture, in the opening chapter, gives us the location of heaven, which is between the waters below the earth and the waters above the earth. If you alter this view, then you alter a lot of the narrative of the scripture which presents this scenario.. The firmament which is between the waters below and the waters above. This was not an intangible location, or something way, way out there which no one could fathom. It doesn’t appear to be in scripture as some alt-universe.

[Boxjobox]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

Maybe God is in everything. Maybe He/She /It is outside the universe and the earth is just a speck to Them. Or, as my father, a physicist once told me, God is outside the plane of existence and there is an alternative “universe” or “reality” where God/the gods dwell. We cant see them but they can see us.

In scripture, God is identified as “HE”, Father. If we are going to discuss the Christian God, then it is important to grasp this. If we want to create our own version, start our own mythology and try to overlay that on scripture, well, it wouldn’t be the first time that has been done, but it really wouldn’t be a discussion of the Christian God.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by awareness

My cousin was so thrilled when his 11 yr old daughter accepted Jesus. A few yrs go by and she comes home and asks, where's heaven?

He tells her, out beyond the universe. She says, how did Jesus ascend to heaven, if he traveled at the speed of light he wouldn't be out of the Milky Way galaxy yet?

He was downfallen.

Your cousin and his daughter are thinking of the story of the Ascension in terms of the modern scientific cosmology whereas the story was written in the context of a traditional cosmology. SerenityLives' father's views harmonizes nicely with the latter. It's the vision that The Infinite is within and surrounds the world of appearance.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

You, of course, must realize in saying this you are creating your own myth and your own god. Scripture, in the opening chapter, gives us the location of heaven, which is between the waters below the earth and the waters above the earth. If you alter this view, then you alter a lot of the narrative of the scripture which presents this scenario.. The firmament which is between the waters below and the waters above. This was not an intangible location, or something way, way out there which no one could fathom. It doesn’t appear to be in scripture as some alt-universe.

The biblical cosmology is not the same is it the modern scientific one. Conflating the biblical cosmology with the modern scientific one has resulted in much confusion.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

In scripture, God is identified as “HE”, Father. If we are going to discuss the Christian God, then it is important to grasp this. If we want to create our own version, start our own mythology and try to overlay that on scripture, well, it wouldn’t be the first time that has been done, but it really wouldn’t be a discussion of the Christian God.

Do you suppose that the scriptures literally mean that God is male? Have you considered the possibility that the writers of the Bible understood and were using analogic theological language?

[awareness]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

In scripture, God is identified as “HE”, Father. If we are going to discuss the Christian God, then it is important to grasp this. If we want to create our own version, start our own mythology and try to overlay that on scripture, well, it wouldn’t be the first time that has been done, but it really wouldn’t be a discussion of the Christian God.

So here's how it's presented : God is a male, that sits on a throne. That means He has an ass. And if He's a male, with an ass, then He also has a penis.

Do you see how God as a male is absurd? It's absurd to anthropomorphize God. Not unless forgetful God walked in the garden like a human. That would mean we're flawed cuz God is a flawed human God.

There's lots of mythologies out there, that's been around a long long time, that built civilizations, and the pyramids. I guess you prefer Biblical mythology.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

You, of course, must realize in saying this you are creating your own myth and your own god. Scripture, in the opening chapter, gives us the location of heaven, which is between the waters below the earth and the waters above the earth. If you alter this view, then you alter a lot of the narrative of the scripture which presents this scenario.. The firmament which is between the waters below and the waters above. This was not an intangible location, or something way, way out there which no one could fathom. It doesn’t appear to be in scripture as some alt-universe.

Haha, did you actually read the first few posts of this thread? We’re talking alternative views of God here, not just the God in the Bible. My dad is still in LC and even he believes theres alternate universes

[awareness]

Originally Posted by zeek

Your cousin and his daughter are thinking of the story of the Ascension in terms of the modern scientific cosmology whereas the story was written in the context of a traditional cosmology. SerenityLives' father's views harmonizes nicely with the latter. It's the vision that The Infinite is within and surrounds the world of appearance.

The ascension was written back when they knew nothing about the real cosmos, back when they pictured the earth like a three-layered cake. In that conception, heaven wasn't very far up ; close enough for Jesus to levitate to heaven.

Of course reality didn't and doesn't match that conception. Where Jesus went we don't know.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

In scripture, God is identified as “HE”, Father. If we are going to discuss the Christian God, then it is important to grasp this. If we want to create our own version, start our own mythology and try to overlay that on scripture, well, it wouldn’t be the first time that has been done, but it really wouldn’t be a discussion of the Christian God.

Again read the first few posts of how historically, the wife of God was erased from Jewish mythology. Let me remind you, the title of this thread- “Origins of God from HISTORICAL, CULTURAL AND ANTHRO lens , not BIBLICAL LENS.

[Boxjobox]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

Again read the first few posts of how historically, the wife of God was erased from Jewish mythology. Let me remind you, the title of this thread- “Origins of God from HISTORICAL CULTURAL AND ANTHRO lens , not BIBLICAL LENS.

I’m not quite sure what you feel I’m missing. I’m merely ( or maybe significantly) pointing out that God is labeled as male, he, Father. Particularly in the NT, the term Father is over prevalent and most significant. That would be the Christian God, that would be the presentation in the NT. The title of this thread is actually the origins of the CHRISTIAN God.

[Boxjobox]

Originally Posted by awareness

The ascension was written back when they knew nothing about the real cosmos, back when they pictured the earth like a three-layered cake. In that conception, heaven wasn't very far up ; close enough for Jesus to levitate to heaven.

Of course reality didn't and doesn't match that conception. Where Jesus went we don't know.

That is somewhat my point- where did Jesus go? The entire narrative of scripture is written from this perspective- that heaven- the firmament, where God dwells is that God created space which came about when a separation was made between the waters below and above. In the narrative given, Adam, et al were virgin hard drives ready to be filled with understanding of all things created. It seems in the narrative God did not choose to inform man of the galactic picture, let alone the concept of the universe. Of course, Genesis was written way down the line from Adam’s sojourning. The important thing I think to consider in talking about God is that the context in which the whole “Bible” is set is not up to par with what we know from our technology today. That technology is relatively recent, during the advancement of man’s understanding, the question would be, why doesn’t the Almighty, all-knowing God give us an updated version? Why do we have to rely on clever men who try to conform this old narrative with modern science. When we speak of God wanting man to be right and close to HIM (if we follow the scriptural gender assignment), it seems like it would behoove God to present an updated, relevant account. Clever men seem to be doing such a pathetic job of it, and really have just created a business of “ speaking for God”. So where did Jesus go?

[Boxjobox]

Originally Posted by awareness

So here's how it's presented : God is a male, that sits on a throne. That means He has an ass. And if He's a male, with an ass, then He also has a penis.

Do you see how God as a male is absurd? It's absurd to anthropomorphize God. Not unless forgetful God walked in the garden like a human. That would mean we're flawed cuz God is a flawed human God.

There's lots of mythologies out there, that's been around a long long time, that built civilizations, and the pyramids. I guess you prefer Biblical mythology.

I’m still trying to figure out who the sons of God were that had relations with beautiful women? And also, the Holy Spirit “overshadowing” Mary, and Jesus came about. And, there was the time Moses wanted to see God, and God showed Moses His backside.

[Boxjobox]

Originally Posted by zeek

Do you suppose that the scriptures literally mean that God is male? Have you considered the possibility that the writers of the Bible understood and were using analogic theological language?

The writer’s of the “Bible” were few and far between. I doubt they were thinking in terms of analog theological language. Jesus talks about God as Father. If it is analogically written, the main concept would be that we view God in the light we humans view the male and fathers. It’s not presenting God as female and mother. Let’s face it, humans are male and female. The two sexes are not the same in function or mannerisms. They are not equal in the sense of sameness (I’m not talking superior/ inferior). There are unique qualities which we apply to male and father and female and mother. Scripture puts God as exhibiting male/ father qualities. Real or analogically speaking, that seems to be the approach we have to God and God to us. I mean people can reject the Christian paradigm and create their own versions of “truth”, but I think it is futile to try to adopt Christian scripture to a different set of values.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

I’m not quite sure what you feel I’m missing. I’m merely ( or maybe significantly) pointing out that God is labeled as male, he, Father. Particularly in the NT, the term Father is over prevalent and most significant. That would be the Christian God, that would be the presentation in the NT. The title of this thread is actually the origins of the CHRISTIAN God.

You’re not going back far enough. We’re looking at the ORIGINS of the Christian God (before the Bible was written, way before the NT, and before the Israelites put their writings on papyrus), from polytheism or henotheism roots. God is only labeled as male in some parts of the books of the bible after Genesis. But look at Genesis, it says “Let Us make man in our image”
Who’s Us? the other gods and goddesses of the Canaanite pantheon? Thats what im trying to get at.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by awareness

The ascension was written back when they knew nothing about the real cosmos, back when they pictured the earth like a three-layered cake. In that conception, heaven wasn't very far up ; close enough for Jesus to levitate to heaven.

Of course reality didn't and doesn't match that conception. Where Jesus went we don't know.

That's how the Ascension appears from a modern materialistic perspective. Of course it appears absurd from that point of view. The Bible was written from a spiritual perspective. it makes more sense when it's read that way.

From a modern materialist perspective humans are heaps of atoms, animated by chance. Life is a spasm in a meaningless universe. The modern technoscience perspective has brought us nihilism of a God-is- dead world where everything is permissible. Science is great at determining how things work and what things are made of. But science doesn't seem to be enough. It doesn't offer a complete picture.

The Bible doesn't make sense looked at it through a modern materialistic lens. That way of looking misses the symbolism. From a symbolic perspective a more fitting question about the Ascension than whether it's scientifically possible would be: What does it mean? Does it embody some higher spiritual truth?

[zeek]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

The writer’s of the “Bible” were few and far between. I doubt they were thinking in terms of analog theological language. Jesus talks about God as Father. If it is analogically written, the main concept would be that we view God in the light we humans view the male and fathers. It’s not presenting God as female and mother. Let’s face it, humans are male and female. The two sexes are not the same in function or mannerisms. They are not equal in the sense of sameness (I’m not talking superior/ inferior). There are unique qualities which we apply to male and father and female and mother. Scripture puts God as exhibiting male/ father qualities. Real or analogically speaking, that seems to be the approach we have to God and God to us. I mean people can reject the Christian paradigm and create their own versions of “truth”, but I think it is futile to try to adopt Christian scripture to a different set of values.

I'm not sure what you mean by saying the writers of the Bible were few and far between. They may have been more sophisticated than you give them credit for.

To say that a father in ancient Israelites society is a suitable model for God is not the same as saying that God is male. The writers notably did not attribute male or female sexuality to God.

They seem to view sexuality as an attribute of created order, not something that can be applied to God the Creator. The Canaanite fertility cults emphasize the sexual functions of both gods and goddesses. The Old Testament refuses to endorse that idea. Any attribution of sexuality to God is reversion to paganism.

That said, while the Old and New testaments use male language about God and the analogies are mostly masculine, God also has feminine attributes.
For example in Isaiah 42:14 Yahweh says "I groan like a woman in labor.

Isaiah 49: 14-15 says, "But Zion said the Lord has forsaken me my Lord has forgotten me can a woman forget her suckling child that she should have no compassion on the sun of her womb

Deuteronomy 32:18 says, "You forget the rock who begot you unmindful now of the God who gave you birth."

Job 38:8 speaks of the sea as leaping "tumultuous from the womb".

In John 3:6 Jesus says "What is born of the flesh is flesh what is born of the Spirit is spirit. Doesn't that make the Spirit our mother analogically speaking?

[awareness]

Originally Posted by zeek

I'm not sure what you mean by saying the writers of the Bible were few and far between. they may have been more sophisticated than you give them credit for. to say that a father in ancient Israelites society is a suitable model for God it's not the same as saying that God is male. They notably did not attribute mail or female sexuality to God. They seem to view sexuality as an attribute of created order, not something that can be applied to God the Creator. the Canaanite fertility colts emphasize the sexual functions of both gods and goddesses. The old Testament refuses to endorse that idea. Any attribution of sexuality to God is reversion to paganism. That said, while the old and New testaments use male language about God and the analogies are mostly masculine, God also has feminine attributes. For example in Isaiah 42:14 Yahweh says I grown like a woman in labor. Isaiah 49: 14 to 15 says but Zion said the Lord has forsaken me my Lord has forgotten me can a woman forget her suckling child that she should have no compassion on the sun of her womb Deuteronomy 32:18 says you forget the rock who begot you on mindful now of the God who gave you birth. Job 38:8 speaks of the sea as leaping tumultuous from the womb. John 3:6 says what is born of the flesh is flesh what is born of the Spirit is spirit. Doesn't that make the Spirit our mother analogically speaking?

Add :

Mat_23:37* O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!

And Luk_13:34* O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killest the prophets, and stonest them that are sent unto thee; how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not!

If God is a literal male, then He's also a literal hen.

[Boxjobox]

Originally Posted by awareness

Add :

Mat_23:37* O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!

And Luk_13:34* O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killest the prophets, and stonest them that are sent unto thee; how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not!

If God is a literal male, then He's also a literal hen.

Oh, am I a silly goose! I am not saying God is a literal male- what I am saying is that we are to view God as humans view a male as opposed to a female and as Father as opposed to a mother. This has extreme significance throughout the NT- the God of the Christian, the God of Jesus, is portrayed as Father.

As to my statement the writers of “the Bible” being few and far between: Jesus had 120 solid disciples on the day of Pentecost, and 12 who were come to be called apostles; wouldn’t it be great if we would have 120 accounts? Wouldn’t it be nice if we had a history of John’s actions so there would be understanding of his late writings? Gaps create controversy.

[Boxjobox]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

You’re not going back far enough. We’re looking at the ORIGINS of the Christian God (before the Bible was written, way before the NT, and before the Israelites put their writings on papyrus), from polytheism or henotheism roots. God is only labeled as male in some parts of the books of the bible after Genesis. But look at Genesis, it says “Let Us make man in our image”
Who’s Us? the other gods and goddesses of the Canaanite pantheon? Thats what im trying to get at.

I think one of the main points of the narrative of Abraham on was to show the one true God from the interactions of that one true God with the various subjects involved with that one true God. Obviously, there were other, I guess I’ll dangerously use the word, deities floating around and interacting with people. Scripture shows all kinds of supernatural occurrences of people with them. Best wishes in trying to make sense of them all.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by awareness

The ascension was written back when they knew nothing about the real cosmos, back when they pictured the earth like a three-layered cake. In that conception, heaven wasn't very far up ; close enough for Jesus to levitate to heaven.

Of course reality didn't and doesn't match that conception. Where Jesus went we don't know.

Here's in an alternative symbolic view. According to the traditional view of reality there is a hidden world behind the world of appearance. So in the story of Christ's Ascension he disappears into a cloud as he rises. And that is the case that he is present to the believer he is nevertheless invisible.

Now the heavens are the source of spiritual truths and powers. Each planet represents a concentric sphere of truth and power. The resurrected Christ rises above them all to the place of preeminent power at the right hand of God. Thus he is said to have conquered the principalities and powers and encompasses them. His way of life and his mode of being--the way of love and sacrifice--are thus symbolically shown to be the highest possible pattern of human life.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

I think one of the main points of the narrative of Abraham on was to show the one true God from the interactions of that one true God with the various subjects involved with that one true God. Obviously, there were other, I guess I’ll dangerously use the word, deities floating around and interacting with people. Scripture shows all kinds of supernatural occurrences of people with them. Best wishes in trying to make sense of them all.

Since you love the Bible so much, I’ll play along. Why did the Israelites keep trying to worship the other gods and goddesses? Moses came down and the commandments include “You shall have no other gods before me”. This is generally believed that there is one particular God that the Israelites should be worshipping but it also implies that at the time, I’m sure Moses and the Israelites were aware of the existence of other gods and goddesses. El (who became Yahweh) had a wife, Asherah, and she was generally portrayed as a calf. The golden calf the Israelites were worshipping. It seems some of them preferred the female deity to the male one.

Jezebel is an interesting character in the Bible. She was worshipping the other Canaanite gods and goddesses, including Baal, son of El and Asherah, or another god. In the end, she was trampled to death, and then eaten my dogs, or so the male Bible writers wrote. Clearly, they are sending the message: If you dont worship El, this is what happens to you.
When Jacob was at Bethel, God appeared to him and he named the place Bethel. It seems that certain gods appear only in certain places at a time. This hearkens back to the ancient practice from.Roman and Greek gods and goddesses being patron “saints” of particular greek or roman villages/cities. Back then, they would pay their respects to whichever (aphrodite, hermes, dionysus) god/goddess was the patron god//goddess represneted in that particular town.

See this link: https://isthatinthebible.wordpress.c...god-of-israel/

In fact, Christianity was greatly influenced by greek culture- The Roman Catholic Church used Latin . Why wasnt it Chinese or some other eastern language?

In linguistics, we call getting to the truth as finding the “signpost”. There’s no such thing as objective truth. Even the laws of physics and math collapses in a vacuum of a blackhole and once you get out of our solar system, the rules sometimes dont apply (there’s evidence of planets orbiting outside laws of gravity and scientists cant figure out inconcievably why this is so.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by zeek

Now the heavens are the source of spiritual truths and powers. Each planet represents a concentric sphere of truth and power. The resurrected Christ rises above them all to the place of preeminent power at the right hand of God. Thus he is said to have conquered the principalities and powers and encompasses them. His way of life and his mode of being--the way of love and sacrifice--are thus symbolically shown to be the highest possible pattern of human life.

I would like to read more on this.. it’s no wonder the planets in our solar system are named after greek gods and goddesses.

[Boxjobox]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

Since you love the Bible so much, I’ll play along. Why did the Israelites keep trying to worship the other gods and goddesses? Moses came down and the commandments include “You shall have no other gods before me”. This is generally believed that there is one particular God that the Israelites should be worshipping but it also implies that at the time, I’m sure Moses and the Israelites were aware of the existence of other gods and goddesses. El (who became Yahweh) had a wife, Asherah, and she was generally portrayed as a calf. The golden calf the Israelites were worshipping. It seems some of them preferred the female deity to the male one.

Jezebel is an interesting character in the Bible. She was worshipping the other Canaanite gods and goddesses, including Baal, son of El and Asherah, or another god. In the end, she was trampled to death, and then eaten my dogs, or so the male Bible writers wrote. Clearly, they are sending the message: If you dont worship El, this is what happens to you.
When Jacob was at Bethel, God appeared to him and he named the place Bethel. It seems that certain gods appear only in certain places at a time. This hearkens back to the ancient practice from.Roman and Greek gods and goddesses being patron “saints” of particular greek or roman villages/cities. Back then, they would pay their respects to whichever (aphrodite, hermes, dionysus) god/goddess was the patron god//goddess represneted in that particular town.

See this link: https://isthatinthebible.wordpress.c...god-of-israel/

In fact, Christianity was greatly influenced by greek culture- The Roman Catholic Church used Latin . Why wasnt it Chinese or some other eastern language?

In linguistics, we call getting to the truth as finding the “signpost”. There’s no such thing as objective truth. Even the laws of physics and math collapses in a vacuum of a blackhole and once you get out of our solar system, the rules sometimes dont apply (there’s evidence of planets orbiting outside laws of gravity and scientists cant figure out inconcievably why this is so.

I readily admit scripture is my main influence and anchor point. I’m 67 and have been around the block more than a few times. In reading your last post here, it’s hard to determine if you find validity in Greek, Roman, ancient mythology or whether you feel that that there is a whole heaven full of deities, and the scriptures just favor one of them at the neglect of all others. Greek, Roman, Chaldean, etc. accounts have pretty much become material for Bulfinch’s Mythology. The amazing thing to me is that there is still the nation of Israel today, people that claim ancestors to the twelve tribes and a whole lot of world trouble over that little piece of land. You can chalk that up to coincide, but I look at it as a sign of objective truth that validates scripture and the whole One True God thing. Then, of course, there is this person Jesus, who definitely is a stumbling block and a rock of offense. Myths are things that may have a small amount of some kind of truth, but become, grow into bigger than life systems. It’s within the human race to love power over others- two branches that seem to exist are the kings and the priests. One wields a physical power over people and the other reigns with a spiritual stick. There are structures which allow both to rule. The scariest thing is when the two collaborate in some league to have absolute rule. Fear and myths subdue people. I think it is good to adhere to scripture because everything seems to connect to it-if you think about it, all your statements seem to bring you back to scripture either to validate something or to oppose something. I think you are doing yourself a great disservice by not pursuing truth in the scripture.. I think it’s great to question and compare and flesh out what is myth and what has validity and contrast that with various “ Christian” practices and beliefs- it’s why some of us were removed from the main sight!

[Boxjobox]

Originally Posted by zeek

Here's in an alternative symbolic view. According to the traditional view of reality there is a hidden world behind the world of appearance. So in the story of Christ's Ascension he disappears into a cloud as he rises. And that is the case that he is present to the believer he is nevertheless invisible.

Now the heavens are the source of spiritual truths and powers. Each planet represents a concentric sphere of truth and power. The resurrected Christ rises above them all to the place of preeminent power at the right hand of God. Thus he is said to have conquered the principalities and powers and encompasses them. His way of life and his mode of being--the way of love and sacrifice--are thus symbolically shown to be the highest possible pattern of human life.

So, would you say that the Christian thing is just for our galaxy? Aren’t we still trying to determine how many planets there actually are in our galaxy? Symbolism has its place- the gospel of John was full of it. Matthew end with Jesus up on the mountain- closer to heaven? Mark has him go up to heaven, Luke same, John has him eating fish on the sea shore- except he does talk earlier to Mary Mag about ascending.

Heaven plays a major concept in the whole bible and I suspect, up until the Wright brothers, it was still somewhat assumed that heaven was just beyond the clouds, just out of sight. Today, heaven is as nebulous to Christians as 6000 years creation. To say “ Oh, they just didn’t have a full view of the cosmos” or the Bible really wasn’t giving a scientific view of creation, kind of leaves us with a what else is not real- the flood, David, a real Jesus, resurrection? Heaven is one of those things that lost importance, as did discussing creation.

Symbolism doesn’t seem to account for the activities in the book of Acts.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

Symbolism doesn’t seem to account for the activities in the book of Acts.

How do you explain how Act’s emphasis on the Holy Spirit and the event of the Pentecost as not being symbolic?

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

. You can chalk that up to coincide, but I look at it as a sign of objective truth that validates scripture and the whole One True God thing. .. I think it is good to adhere to scripture because everything seems to connect to it-if you think about it, all your statements seem to bring you back to scripture either to validate something or to oppose something. I think you are doing yourself a great disservice by not pursuing truth in the scripture.. I think it’s great to question and compare and flesh out what is myth and what has validity and contrast that with various “ Christian” practices and beliefs- it’s why some of us were removed from the main sight!

Just because someone/nation has strong faith in something doesnt mean it’s full objective truth. In fact all religions inherently have a part of truth in them, they’re just portrayed differently but not completely. I think it’d be best to understand commonalities between all the religions besides just focusing on Christianity (which is one of the more recent religions). That said, you have the right to believe what you want.

The problem with adhering to scripture is that it misses the point that scripture was influenced by many outside factors, so the scripture in itself was plagiarism/other’s opinions from other belief systems at the time. My statements are only bringing back to scripture because thats the topic you want to explore in this dialogue. You can do yourself some service to yourself by seeing which parts are myth in the bible. How am doing a disservice to myself by ignoring the so called “truths” which are nebulous concepts in the bible? Concepts in the bible originated from somewhere else- the cultures, heritage, and experiences and situations of the exiled Israelites at the time. The concepts are not divine inspiration. Or maybe you do believe in divine inspiration.

What do you think are the truths in scripture, and how can you prove it besides just blind faith? God in the Bible is a nebulous being, and different aspects of God’s personality are empahsized in the various books, which shows that the human authors’ different perspectives and attitudes affect the way they write about God.

Besides, I started this thread on the premise that the concept and origins of God would not be seen through biblical lens primarily, even though the Bible can be referenced at times to connect to older ideas that are pre-biblical. but that you seem to be adamant about using the Bible for most of your arguments. I suggest you create a new thread- “Concepts of God from Biblical standpoint.”

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

..become material for Bulfinch’s Mythology. The amazing thing to me is that there is still the nation of Israel today, people that claim ancestors to the twelve tribes and a whole lot of world trouble over that little piece of land.

The Israelites were originally Canaanites.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/api.nat...ern-arabs-jews

Taiwan is also a small country and its amazing they have kept their independence from China for so long. Even the U.S had to help them out during the world wars.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

So, would you say that the Christian thing is just for our galaxy? Aren’t we still trying to determine how many planets there actually are in our galaxy?

You may be unto something; maybe there’s whole other worlds out there. Watch this video- our sun is just a speck and we are a microspeck. maybe there are alternate worlds/humanoid species that do not have any concept of what Christianity or even religion is.

https://youtu.be/3mnSDifDSxQ

[SerenityLives]

I copied and pasted this whole article here for you guys’ convenience, since you have to subscribe in order to view the whole article-

How the Jews Invented God, and Made Him Great
The God of the Old Testament started out as just one of many deities of the ancient Israelites. It took a traumatic crisis to make him into the all-powerful creator of the world.
Jews, Christians and Muslims all believe in a single, omnipotent deity that created the heavens and earth. But if he was and is the only god, why would God need a name?
The Bible explicitly tells us that God has one, which indicates he had to be distinguished from other celestial beings, just like humans use names to identify different people.
What that name might be is another matter. The Jewish prohibition on speaking God’s name means that its correct pronunciation has been lost. All we know is that the Hebrew Bible spells it out as four consonants known as the Tetragrammaton – from the Greek for “four letters,” which are transliterated as Y-H-W-H.
The existence of a proper name for God is the first indication that the history of Yhwh and his worship by the Jews is a lot more complicated than many realize.

In gods we trusted-
Modern biblical scholarship and archaeological discoveries in and around Israel show that the ancient Israelites did not always believe in a single, universal god. In fact, monotheism is a relatively recent concept, even amongst the People of the Book.
Decades of research into the birth and evolution of the Yhwh cult are summarized in “The Invention of God,” a recent book by Thomas Römer, a world-renowned expert in the Hebrew Bible and professor at the College de France and the University of Lausanne. Römer, who held a series of conferences at Tel Aviv University last month, spoke to Haaretz about the subject.
The main source for investigating the history of God is, of course, the Bible itself.

When exactly the Jewish holy text reached its final form is unknown. Many scholars believe this happened sometime between the Babylonian exile, which began after the fall of Jerusalem in 587 BCE (some 2600 years ago), and the subsequent periods of Persian and Hellenistic rule.

However, the redactors of the Bible were evidently working off older traditions, Römer says.Biblical texts are not direct historical sources. They reflect the ideas, the ideologies of their authors and of course of the historical context in which they were written,” Römer explains.

Still, he notes, “you can have memories of a distant past, sometimes in a very confusing way or in a very oriented way. But I think we can, and we must, use the biblical text not just as fictional texts but as texts that can tell us stories about the origins.”

What's in God's name

The first clue that the ancient Israelites worshipped gods other than the deity known as Yhwh lies in their very name. “Israel” is a theophoric name going back at least 3200 years, which includes and invokes the name of a protective deity.

Going by the name, the main god of the ancient Israelites was not Yhwh, but El, the chief deity in the Canaanite pantheon, who was worshipped throughout the Levant.

In other words, the name "Israel" is probably older than the veneration of Yhwh by this group called Israel, Römer says. “The first tutelary deity they were worshipping was El, otherwise their name would have been Israyahu.”

The Bible appears to address this early worship of El in Exodus 6:3, when God tells Moses that he “appeared to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as El Shaddai (today translated as "God Almighty") but was not known to them by my name Yhwh.”

In fact, it seems that the ancient Israelites weren't even the first to worship Yhwh – they seem to have adopted Him from a mysterious, unknown tribe that lived somewhere in the deserts of the southern Levant and Arabia.

The god of the southern deserts

The first mention of the Israelite tribe itself is a victory stele erected around 1210 BCE by the pharaoh Mernetpah (sometimes called "the Israel stele"). These Israelites are described as a people inhabiting Canaan.

So how did this group of Canaanite El-worshippers come in contact with the cult of Yhwh?

The Bible is quite explicit about the geographical roots of the Yhwh deity, repeatedly linking his presence to the mountainous wilderness and the deserts of the southern Levant. Judges 5:4 says that Yhwh “went forth from Seir” and “marched out of the field of Edom.” Habbakuk 3:3 tells us that “God came from Teman,” specifically from Mount Paran.

All these regions and locations can be identified with the territory that ranges from the Sinai and Negev to northern Arabia.

Yhwh’s penchant for appearing in the biblical narrative on top of mountains and accompanied by dark clouds and thunder, are also typical attributes of a deity originating in the wilderness, possibly a god of storms and fertility.

Support for the theory that Yhwh originated in the deserts of Israel and Arabia can be found in Egyptian texts from the late second millennium, which list different tribes of nomads collectively called "Shasu" that populated this vast desert region.

One of these groups, which inhabits the Negev, is identified as the “Shasu Yhw(h).” This suggests that this group of nomads may have been the first to have the god of the Jews as its tutelary deity.

“It is profoundly difficult to sort through the haze of later layers in the Bible, but insofar as we can, this remains the most plausible hypothesis for the encounter of Israelites with the Yhwh cult,” says David Carr, professor of Old Testament at Union Theological Seminary in New York City.

The many faces of god

How exactly the Shasu merged with the Israelites or introduced them to the cult of Yhwh is not known, but by the early centuries of the first millennium, he was clearly being worshipped in both the northern kingdom of Israel and its smaller, southern neighbor, the kingdom of Judah.

His name appears for the first time outside the Bible nearly 400 years after Merneptah, in the 9th-century BCE stele of Mesha, a Moabite king who boasts of defeating the king of Israel and “taking the vessels of Yhwh.”

While Yhwh’s cult was certainly important in the early First Temple period, it was not exclusive.

“Jeremiah speaks about the many gods of Judah, which are as numerous as the streets of a town. There was certainly worship a female deity, Asherah, or the Queen of Heaven,” Römer told Haaretz. “There was certainly also the worship of the northern storm god Hadad (Baal).”

The plurality of deities was such that in an inscription by Sargon II, who completed the conquest of the kingdom of Israel in the late 8th century BCE, the Assyrian king mentioned that after capturing the capital Samaria, his troops brought back “the (statues of) gods in which (the Israelites) had put their trust.”

As the Yhwh cult evolved and spread, he was worshipped in temples across the land. Early 8th-century inscriptions found at Kuntillet Ajrud probably refer to different gods and cultic centers by invoking “Yhwh of Samaria and his Asherah” and “Yhwh of Teman and his Asherah.” Only later, under the reign of King Josiah at the end of the 7th century BCE, would the Yhwh cult centralize worship at the Temple in Jerusalem.

Nor, in ancient Israel, was Yhwh the invisible deity that Jews have refrained from depicting for the last two millennia or so.

In the kingdom of Israel, as Hosea 8 and 1 Kings 12:26-29 relate, he was often worshipped in the form of a calf, as the god Baal was. (1 Kings 12:26-29 explains that Jeroboam made two calves, for the sanctuaries at Bethel and Dan, so the people could worship Yhwh there and wouldn’t have to go all the way to Jerusalem. Ergo, in northern Israel at least, the calves were meant to represent Yhwh.)

In Jerusalem and Judah, Römer says, Yhwh more frequently took the form of a sun god or a seated deity. Such depictions may have even continued after the destruction of Jerusalem and the Babylonian Exile: a coin minted in Jerusalem during the Persian period shows a deity sitting on a wheeled throne and has been interpreted by some as a late anthropomorphic representation of Yhwh.

Römer even suspects that the Holy of Holies in the First Temple of Jerusalem, and other Judahite sanctuaries, hosted a statue of the god, based on Psalms and prophetic texts in the Bible that speak of being admitted in the presence of “the face of Yhwh.”

Not all scholars agree that the iconography of Yhwh was so pronounced in Judah. The evidence for anthropomorphic depiction “is not strong,” says Saul Olyan, professor of Judaic studies and religious studies at Brown University. “It may be that anthropomorphic images of Yhwh were avoided early on.”

The God of the Jews

In any case, many scholars agree that Yhwh became the main god of the Jews only after the destruction of the kingdom of Israel by the Assyrians, around 720 BCE.

How or why the Jews came to exalt Yhwh and reject the pagan gods they also adored is unclear.

We do know that after the fall of Samaria, the population of Jerusalem increased as much as fifteenfold, likely due to the influx of refugees from the north. That made it necessary for the kings of Judah to push a program that would unify the two populations and create a common narrative. And that in turn may be why the biblical writers frequently stigmatize the pagan cultic practices of the north, and stress that Jerusalem alone had withstood the Assyrian onslaught – thereby explaining Israel's embarrassing fall to Assyria, while distinguishing the prominence and purity of Judahite religion.

Religious reforms by Judahite kings, mainly Hezekiah and Josiah, included abolishing random temple worship of Yhwh and centralizing his adoration at the Temple in Jerusalem, as well as banning the worship of Asherah, Yhwh’s female companion, and other pagan cults in the Temple and around the capital.

The Israelites don't keep the faith

This transformation from polytheism to worshipping a single god was carved in stone, literally. For example, an inscription in a tomb in Khirbet Beit Lei, near the Judahite stronghold of Lachish, states that “Yhwh is the god of the whole country; the mountains of Judah belong to the god of Jerusalem.”

Josiah’s reforms were also enshrined in the book of Deuteronomy – whose original version is thought to have been compiled around this time – and especially in the words of Deut. 6, which would later form the Sh’ma Yisrael, one of the central prayers of Judaism: “Hear, O Israel, Yhwh is our God, Yhwh is one.”

But while Yhwh had, by the dawn of the 6th century BCE, become “our” national god, he was still believed to be just one of many celestial beings, each protecting his own people and territory.

This is reflected in the many biblical texts exhorting the Israelites not to follow other gods, a tacit acknowledgement of the existence of those deities, Romer explains.

For example, in Judges 11:24, Jephtah tries to resolve a territorial dispute by telling the Ammonites that the land of Israel had been given to the Israelites by Yhwh, while their lands had been given to them by their god Chemosh ("Will you not take what your god Chemosh gives you? Likewise, whatever Yhwh our god has given us, we will possess.")

Snatching God from the jaws of defeat

The real conceptual revolution probably only occurred after the Babylonians' conquest of Judah and arson of the First Temple in 587 B.C.E. The destruction and the subsequent exile to Babylon of the Judahite elites inevitably cast doubts on the faith they had put in Yhwh.

“The question was: how can we explain what happened?” Römer says. If the defeated Israelites had simply accepted that the Babylonian gods had proven they were stronger than the god of the Jews, history would have been very different.

But somehow, someone came up with a different, unprecedented explanation. “The idea was that the destruction happened because the kings did not obey the law of god,” Römer says. “It’s a paradoxical reading of the story: the vanquished in a way is saying that his god is the vanquisher. It’s quite a clever idea.

“The Israelites/Judahites took over the classical idea of the divine wrath that can provoke a national disaster but they combined it with the idea that Yhwh in his wrath made the Babylonians destroy Judah and Jerusalem,” he said.

The concept that Yhwh had pulled the Babylonians' strings, causing them to punish the Israelites inevitably led to the belief that he was not just the god of one people, but a universal deity who exercises power over all of creation.

This idea is already present in the book of Isaiah, thought to be one of the earliest biblical texts, composed during or immediately after the Exile. This is also how the Jews became the “chosen people” – because the Biblical editors had to explain why Israel had a privileged relationship with Yhwh even though he was no longer a national deity, but the one true God.

Over the centuries, as the Bible was redacted, this narrative was refined and strengthened, creating the basis for a universal religion – one that could continue to exist even without being tied to a specific territory or temple. And thus Judaism as we know it was established, and, ultimately, all other major monotheistic religions were as well.

[Boxjobox]

SerenityLives- I would say your long article reinforces what I said: The Bible is the hub of all the discussion concerning God. The presentation was not dissimilar to that style W Lee used: make suppositions based on small fragments, expand those suppositions, and then proceed as if the suppositions were gospel truth, and then pat yourself on the back as being wise.

Scripture presents the good, the bad and the ugly concerning Israel. The main thing about the scripture is it presents the Living God as opposed to idols that represent mythical gods and contrived practices. I actually find it fascinating to follow the development of the interaction of the God of Israel with what started with one nomadic person. And they still exist today, and are in the center of world events- good, bad and ugly! And that not unpredicted!

I do think you are doing yourself a disservice chasing after the ugly and associating your thinking with those who do likewise. But, have at it, and I’ll leave off interfering with your posted goals.

Peace,

Boxjobox

[Trapped]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

In linguistics, we call getting to the truth as finding the “signpost”. There’s no such thing as objective truth. Even the laws of physics and math collapses in a vacuum of a blackhole and once you get out of our solar system, the rules sometimes dont apply (there’s evidence of planets orbiting outside laws of gravity and scientists cant figure out inconcievably why this is so.

Is your statement in bold objectively true? If so, then it falls apart on its own truth because it would mean there is such a thing as an objective truth. If not, then the claim doesn't matter because it's just your opinion over someone else's opinion.

It's a classic example of a self-refuting claim.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

I would like to read more on this.. it’s no wonder the planets in our solar system are named after greek gods and goddesses.

I was attempting a symbolic reading of the event. Obviously the New Testament writers weren't thinking of things according to the modern cosmology. In Romans 8:38 Paul refers to principalities and powers. The Greek word translated principalities is transliterated as archon. It has the same root as the word archetype. In the ancient cosmology the planets had archetypal significance. In other words they were considered divine beings. The biblical term "principalities and powers" the principalities maybe considered to correspond with the pagan gods and the powers with their spheres. The seven planets are those that are visible to the naked eye and include the sun and the moon. The Earth of course is not included because in the ancient symbolic cosmology it's not considered a planet.
In Revelations 5:6 the lamb that receives the book with the Seven seals has seven horns and seven eyes which are the spirit seven spirits of God sent out into all the Earth. The seven eyes signify the seven planets. The names of the planets designate the spirits incarnate in them as their intelligence. By ascending beyond them, Christ overcame their power and incorporates they're positive character into himself symbolically. This idea shouldn't be totally foreign to local church people as it is related to the all-inclusive Christ as preached by Nee and Lee.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

So, would you say that the Christian thing is just for our galaxy? Aren’t we still trying to determine how many planets there actually are in our galaxy? Symbolism has its place- the gospel of John was full of it. Matthew end with Jesus up on the mountain- closer to heaven? Mark has him go up to heaven, Luke same, John has him eating fish on the sea shore- except he does talk earlier to Mary Mag about ascending.

Heaven plays a major concept in the whole bible and I suspect, up until the Wright brothers, it was still somewhat assumed that heaven was just beyond the clouds, just out of sight. Today, heaven is as nebulous to Christians as 6000 years creation. To say “ Oh, they just didn’t have a full view of the cosmos” or the Bible really wasn’t giving a scientific view of creation, kind of leaves us with a what else is not real- the flood, David, a real Jesus, resurrection? Heaven is one of those things that lost importance, as did discussing creation.

Symbolism doesn’t seem to account for the activities in the book of Acts.

No. I was interpreting the Ascension according to the biblical cosmology. You seem to be thinking in terms of the modern scientific cosmology. The ancient writers didn't have access to that. Their symbolism was based on what they could see with the naked eye.
It seems to me that speculating about whether it was real or not real in terms of the modern scientific cosmology leads one down a bottomless rabbit hole. On the other hand reading the text symbolically one may answer the questions what does it mean and what higher truth does it embody in terms of the texts themselves? That would seem to make it relevant to everybody who is conscious.
I'm not sure what you mean about symbolism not accounting for the activities in the book of Acts. Can you explain what you see as the problem?

[SerenityLives]

Dear Box, How am I associating with the ugly? You can call everything you disagree with “ugly”, that wont get you anywhere. Maybe your small mind cant take the fact that God is a concept. And thanks for comparing me to Witness Lee. Unlike Witness Lee, I’m having a discussion here about how “God” originated, culturally, historically and not claiming it to be true or not, but the evidence sure piles up one way.
You should look at yourself. You are doing detrimental service to yourself by claiming that God is biblically based when it is not. The bible is used to understand the origins of God but not the only source. The bible gives clues to other pagan practices and ideas at the time. It seems like you want the bible to be the only source, discounting that the bible had its own sources as well. Dont tell me what I can and cannot express on this thread.

Dont misunderstand, I’m not making this thread gospel truth, just presenting ideas that may/may not be true. Very ironic for you to claim that the deities are idols, you have your own gosepl truth too.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

SerenityLives- I would say your long article reinforces what I said: The Bible is the hub of all the discussion concerning God. The presentation was not dissimilar to that style W Lee used: make suppositions based on small fragments, expand those suppositions, and then proceed as if the suppositions were gospel truth, and then pat yourself on the back as being wise.

Scripture presents the good, the bad and the ugly concerning Israel. The main thing about the scripture is it presents the Living God as opposed to idols that represent mythical gods and contrived practices. I actually find it fascinating to follow the development of the interaction of the God of Israel with what started with one nomadic person. And they still exist today, and are in the center of world events- good, bad and ugly! And that not unpredicted!

I do think you are doing yourself a disservice chasing after the ugly and associating your thinking with those who do likewise. But, have at it, and I’ll leave off interfering with your posted goals.

Peace,

Boxjobox

Why are you commenting on this thread if you already know what the origin of God is and you’re just shoving the bible in our faces?

[awareness]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

So, would you say that the Christian thing is just for our galaxy? Aren’t we still trying to determine how many planets there actually are in our galaxy? Symbolism has its place- the gospel of John was full of it. Matthew end with Jesus up on the mountain- closer to heaven? Mark has him go up to heaven, Luke same, John has him eating fish on the sea shore- except he does talk earlier to Mary Mag about ascending.

Heaven plays a major concept in the whole bible and I suspect, up until the Wright brothers, it was still somewhat assumed that heaven was just beyond the clouds, just out of sight. Today, heaven is as nebulous to Christians as 6000 years creation. To say “ Oh, they just didn’t have a full view of the cosmos” or the Bible really wasn’t giving a scientific view of creation, kind of leaves us with a what else is not real- the flood, David, a real Jesus, resurrection? Heaven is one of those things that lost importance, as did discussing creation.

Symbolism doesn’t seem to account for the activities in the book of Acts.

Bro zeek is just offering an alternative way to interpret the Bible, that makes it more palpable to modern minds.

Today, with science explaining most everything, it doesn't make sense that the man Jesus just lifted off the earth into a cloud, and vanished, and end up on high sitting at the right hand of his Father.

In truth it does need to be spiritualized. After all, maybe they could watch Jesus rise up to the cloud, but how could they see him at the righthand of God? (Not to mention that God has a right and left hand, and sits His ass on a throne -- how's that for both a Christian and Jewish God? -- it was Christian Jews writing the NT books - don't claim Luke wasn't a Jew - they were anonymous).

So spiritualizing all the fantastical stories allows us to get the ethical values in the NT. Bro zeek is just creating a different method of making the Jefferson Bible -- not having to cut them out, leaving them but spiritualizing them.

It is an alternative way of reading the NT ... howbeit, not the traditional Christian way.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by awareness

Bro zeek is just offering an alternative way to interpret the Bible, that makes it more palpable to modern minds.

Today, with science explaining most everything, it doesn't make sense that the man Jesus just lifted off the earth into a cloud, and vanished, and end up on high sitting at the right hand of his Father.

In truth it does need to be spiritualized. After all, maybe they could watch Jesus rise up to the cloud, but how could they see him at the righthand of God? (Not to mention that God has a right and left hand, and sits His ass on a throne -- how's that for both a Christian and Jewish God? -- it was Christian Jews writing the NT books - don't claim Luke wasn't a Jew - they were anonymous).

So spiritualizing all the fantastical stories allows us to get the ethical values in the NT. Bro zeek is just creating a different method of making the Jefferson Bible -- not having to cut them out, leaving them but spiritualizing them.

It is an alternative way of reading the NT ... howbeit, not the traditional Christian way.

Not true. It is a traditional way of reading the Bible that goes back at least as far as Philo who was a contemporary of Jesus and has been practiced by many Christian theologians including Origen and Augustine of Hippo to name only two examples.

[Boxjobox]

Originally Posted by awareness

Bro zeek is just offering an alternative way to interpret the Bible, that makes it more palpable to modern minds.

Today, with science explaining most everything, it doesn't make sense that the man Jesus just lifted off the earth into a cloud, and vanished, and end up on high sitting at the right hand of his Father.

In truth it does need to be spiritualized. After all, maybe they could watch Jesus rise up to the cloud, but how could they see him at the righthand of God? (Not to mention that God has a right and left hand, and sits His ass on a throne -- how's that for both a Christian and Jewish God? -- it was Christian Jews writing the NT books - don't claim Luke wasn't a Jew - they were anonymous).

So spiritualizing all the fantastical stories allows us to get the ethical values in the NT. Bro zeek is just creating a different method of making the Jefferson Bible -- not having to cut them out, leaving them but spiritualizing them.

It is an alternative way of reading the NT ... howbeit, not the traditional Christian way.

Throughout my life, I have attended 1000s of Christian gatherings of all sorts- I would say most contained a large element of spiritualizing scripture- from traditional denominations to little home gatherings of reading a passage and asking “ what did you get out of that”. I would say that permanent gatherings centered around a common interpretation or interpreter. The LC was a typical model of this, a commonality many of us observed in its beginnings and evolution into what it has become today. In this case, the interpreter was and is the center, because people bought into WL’s interpretations. Spiritualizing the scripture is not a new thing. But the coming about of the N T writings, unless you think some 3rd century think-tank cranked them out, were recordings of a new phenomenon in relation to the idea of God and God’s work. If you take scripture as just some like thinking fellows that decided to create a new religion, then Christianity is in the same category as Islam. But the writings of the NT, and the accounts given in them, particularly in the book of Acts, show not a think-tank religion, but a new phenomenon of where, apart from the established Hebrew religion ( which at the time definitely had squabble over tradition vs interpretation and spiritualizing- consider the Pharisees vs the Sadducees vs the Herodians vs the Gnostics vs all the others), and that new phenomenon came out of people who were with Jesus, saw him die, saw him in resurrection, and saw him ascend. The also had the element of the phenomenon called the Holy Spirit, which was ( not interested here to get into a discussion of Holy Spirit which is definitely subject to interpretation) . The people who saw, with the people who believed their account, began to meet together, sans a “Bible” or NT and I don’t think they were meeting according to spiritualizing some scripture, but in “real time”.

This is the Christian foundation and the Christian God! To bounce back to early Semitic settings and occurances, culture, history, etc., and to then set up an image of a Christian God, is an exercise in foolishness- it is creating your own personal myths, or if there is some agreement- group myth. It really is, I think, an attempt to discount the phenomenon that occurred with the coming of Jesus and the recorded events that followed.

The problem, as I see it today, is the missing Holy Spirit. I would say, missing because of strange interpretations, practices, spiritualizing, and a whole lot more that departed from the actually of the Christian belief of the foundation of the church, which changed into a interpretation business for self gain and self aggrandizement. I think NT writings came about to preserve that which was from the beginning so we would have a good benchmark to compare and contrast with current practices.

[Boxjobox]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

Why are you commenting on this thread if you already know what the origin of God is and you’re just shoving the bible in our faces?

Note- I was not comparing you to WLee, but the style and approach of the writer of the article you presented ( unless, of course, you wrote the article).

I comment, because your presentations are so full of holes, and missives, and false conclusions, and it is a public forum talking about the Christian God, and I am a Christian who has skin in the game. You seem to reject the God of Jesus, and seek a substitute. If you are going to tear down the God of Jesus, and rebuild an edifice of your own choosing and liking, then you are creating your own scripture, religion, rules.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

I comment, because your presentations are so full of holes, and missives, and false conclusions, and it is a public forum talking about the Christian God, and I am a Christian who has skin in the game. You seem to reject the God of Jesus, and seek a substitute. If you are going to tear down the God of Jesus, and rebuild an edifice of your own choosing and liking, then you are creating your own scripture, religion, rules.

All your responses to me are off topic because I am not merely talking about the Christian God portrayed in the Bible, I am talking about the historicity of God, including Greek mythology and other scriptures/archaelogical evidence besides the bible. So WHAT if I reject the God you are not rejecting? This is alternative views. Box, just stop attacking me, This thread was clearly not meant for you.

your conclusion that the bible was written in real time has holes in it too.

btw, I am not rewriting the Bible, I am investigating what happened before the Bible.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

This is the Christian foundation and the Christian God! To bounce back to early Semitic settings and occurances, culture, history, etc., and to then set up an image of a Christian God, is an exercise in foolishness- it is creating your own personal myths, or if there is some agreement- group myth. It really is, I think, an attempt to discount the phenomenon that occurred with the coming of Jesus and the recorded events that followed.

The entire thread is supposed to be an exercise of “foolishness”. Thats why I asked you, why are you here? To merely point that out? Sure it can be myth, but it can also be true. The things I presented have as much evidence, if not more, than what you claim to be evidence. Stop it with your Christian talk on a thread that is exploring the history and culture of the Jews before the Bible was in diapers.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE TRYING TO PUSH THEIR CHRISTIANITY ON ALT VIEWS WHEN THE TOPIC ISNT EVEN ABOUT IT? GO DO THAT IN THE MAIN FORUM

Your interpretation on the title of this thread is a misunderstanding that you should seriously look at.

If you post anymore, I’m not going to reply. I am just going to add to awareness and zeek’s interpretations.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by zeek

Not true. It is a traditional way of reading the Bible that goes back at least as far as Philo who was a contemporary of Jesus and has been practiced by many Christian theologians including Origen and Augustine of Hippo to name only two examples.

And by using a metaphorical method they are doing midrash, and rewriting the Bible. Just as you are doing.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by ExChurchKid

Hey guys,

The rest of the forum is currently more or less a disaster, but this seems like a sane thread, and actually something I'm interested in. Sorry I'm late to the party. I've often asked myself, if the Bible is supposed to be taken as the ultimate authority on God and such, how do we know the Bible is...

It was until Boxy came along, sorry to say

[SerenityLives]

If there was a moderator, posts number 51,59, 88, by Boxy should be censured

[Trapped]

This is a long article, maybe prohibitively long, but I wonder if it is more in line with what you have in mind? Or at least, it might be a middle ground between the spectrum of what is being said here. It doesn't discount the Bible, but it delves into many other lenses also.....kind of a pull-back, wide-range view.

https://www.bu.edu/arion/archive/vol...d_get-started/

As an aside, the irony of the phrase "origins of Christian God" is that it is itself an oxymoron. The Christian God has no origins. To speak of the Christian God otherwise means it's not the Christian God.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Trapped

This is a long article, maybe prohibitively long, but I wonder if it is more in line with what you have in mind? Or at least, it might be a middle ground between the spectrum of what is being said here. It doesn't discount the Bible, but it delves into many other lenses also.....kind of a pull-back, wide-range view.

https://www.bu.edu/arion/archive/vol...d_get-started/

As an aside, the irony of the phrase "origins of Christian God" is that it is itself an oxymoron. The Christian God has no origins. To speak of the Christian God otherwise means it's not the Christian God.

Maybe the Christian God had origins. Or at least the Jewish God. I meant it as in historical and cultural development of the concept of God by humans, not the concept that God has no beginning, a concept developed later by humans too.

Love the article, I sped read it, exactly what I was getting at with Boxy. For some reason, he’s not understanding what I’m trying to get at.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by awareness

And by using a metaphorical method they are doing midrash, and rewriting the Bible. Just as you are doing.

The use of symbolism has a long and ancient history. What makes you think the biblical writers weren't using symbolism in the first place?

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

Note- I was not comparing you to WLee, but the style and approach of the writer of the article you presented ( unless, of course, you wrote the article).

I comment, because your presentations are so full of holes, and missives, and false conclusions, and it is a public forum talking about the Christian God, and I am a Christian who has skin in the game. You seem to reject the God of Jesus, and seek a substitute. If you are going to tear down the God of Jesus, and rebuild an edifice of your own choosing and liking, then you are creating your own scripture, religion, rules.

Please look at my beginning post of this entire thread. Read and reread. If you dont have anything to continue the discussion on the topics presented there, then there’s nothing worthwhile for you here. Your mind cant take the fact that God is a concept. Or that the concept had beginnings. Maybe it’s causing you an existential crisis about your entire belief system. I suggest you continue your ignorance in bliss but do it politely.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by zeek

The use of symbolism has a long and ancient history. What makes you think the biblical writers weren't using symbolism in the first place?

I agree with zeeks statements that the bible was meant to be read symbolically.

[UntoHim]

SerenityLives is the thread starter.

Boxjobox and others: Please respect that she is the thread starter, and thus gets to guide the discussions. Please refrain from injecting things into the conversation that she has explicitly asked not to be injected.

Even though this is the wild, wild west of Alternative Views, I still would expect everyone to behave and interact with each other as adults. I think the subject matter is relevant for Alt Views. If I were you guys, I would let SerenityLives and zeek lead the dialogue. SerenityLives because it's her thread, and zeek because of his comprehensive knowledge of the subject matter.

In any event, please keep the temperature down. Let cooler heads prevail. Don't be like us conventional Christians over on the main forum who can't seem to get through 2 posts without spewing out ad hominems and flaming each other.

"Better to Remain Silent and Be Thought a Fool than to Speak and Remove All Doubt"
-

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by UntoHim

SerenityLives is the thread starter.

Boxjobox and others: Please respect that she is the thread starter, and thus gets to guide the discussions. Please refrain from injecting things into the conversation that she has explicitly asked not to be injected.

Even though this is the wild, wild west of Alternative Views, I still would expect everyone to behave and interact with each other as adults. I think the subject matter is relevant for Alt Views. If I were you guys, I would let SerenityLives and zeek lead the dialogue. SerenityLives because it's her thread, and zeek because of his comprehensive knowledge of the subject matter.

In any event, please keep the temperature down. Let cooler heads prevail. Don't be like us conventional Christians over on the main forum who can't seem to get through 2 posts without spewing out ad hominems and flaming each other.

"Better to Remain Silent and Be Thought a Fool than to Speak and Remove All Doubt"
-

Thank you Untohim.
Now guys, where were we? Lets get back to symbolism and the purpose of it in the evolution of the concepts of God, pre biblical.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

Thank you Untohim.
Now guys, where were we? Lets get back to symbolism and the purpose of it in the evolution of the concepts of God, pre biblical.

Consider this:

Imagine you were alive thirty thousand years ago and had a vision of all that was to come: symbolic language, naming and labeling the world; agriculture, the domestication of the wild, dominion over other species and the land; the Machine, the mastery of natural forces; the forgetting of how beautiful and perfect the world is; the atomization of society; a world where humans fear even to drink of the streams and rivers, where we live among strangers and don’t know the people next door, where we kill across the planet with the touch of a button, where the seas turn black and the air burns our lungs, where we are so broken that we dare not remember that it isn’t supposed to be this way. Imagine you saw it all coming. How would you help people thirty thousand years thence? How would you send information, knowledge, aid over such a vast gulf of time? Maybe this actually happened. So, we came up with the three seeds.

The first seed was the wisdom lineages: lines of transmission going back thousands of years that have preserved and protected essential knowledge. From adept to disciple, in every part of the world, various wisdom traditions have passed down teachings in secret. Wisdom keepers, Sufis, Zen masters, Kabbalists, Taoist wizards, Christian mystics, Hindu swamis, and many others, hiding within each religion, kept the knowledge safe until the time when the world would be ready to reclaim it. That time is now, and they have done their job well. Many spiritual leaders, even the Dalai Lama, are saying that the time of secrets is over. Released too early, the knowledge was co-opted, abused, or usually just ignored. When we had still not covered the territory of Separation, when we still aspired to widening our conquest of nature, when the story of humanity’s Ascent was not yet complete, we weren’t ready to hear about union, connectedness, interdependency, interbeing. We thought the answer was more control, more technology, more logic, a better-engineered society of rational ethics, more control over matter, nature, and human nature. But now the old paradigms are failing, and human consciousness has reached a degree of receptivity that allows this seed to spread across the earth. It has been released, and it is growing inside of us en masse.

The second seed was the sacred stories: myths, legends, fairy tales, folklore, and the perennial themes that keep reappearing in various guises throughout history. They have always been with us, so that however far we have wandered into the Labyrinth of Separation, we have always had a lifeline, however tenuous and tangled, to the truth. The stories nurture that tiny spark of memory within us that knows psyche. You get the feeling that something else has been transmitted alongside the plot, something invisible. Usually, such stories bear rich symbolism often unknown even to their authors. A comparison of two twentieth-century children’s books illustrates my point: compare a Berenstain Bears story with How the Grinch Stole Christmas! Only the latter has a psychic staying power, revealing the spirit of a true story, and it is rich with archetypal symbolism.

The third seed was the indigenous tribes, the people who at some stage opted out of the journey of separation. Imagine that at the outset of the journey, the Council of Humanity gathered and certain members volunteered to abide in remote locations and forgo separation, which meant refusing to enter into an adversarial, controlling relationship to nature, and therefore refusing the process that leads to the development of high technology. It also meant that when they were discovered by the humans who had gone deeply into Separation, they would meet with the most atrocious suffering. That was unavoidable. These people of the third seed have nearly completed their mission today. Their mission was simply to survive long enough to provide living examples of how to be human. Each tribe carried a different piece, sometimes many pieces, of this knowledge. Many of them show us how to see and relate to the land, animals, and plants. Others show us how to work with dreams and the unseen. Some have preserved natural ways of raising children, now spreading through such books as The Continuum Concept. Some show us how to communicate without words—tribes such as the Hadza and the Pirahã communicate mostly in song. Some show us how to free ourselves from the mentality of linear time. All of them exemplify a way of being that we intuitively recognize and long for. They stir a memory in our hearts, and awaken our desire to return.
Eisenstein, Charles. The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know Is Possible (Sacred Activism) . North Atlantic Books. Kindle-Version.

[Boxjobox]

I’ll add to Zeek

Picture yourself in a boat on a river
With tangerine trees and marmalade skies
Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly
A girl with kaleidoscope eyes
Cellophane flowers of yellow and green
Towering over your head
Look for the girl with the sun in her eyes
And she's gone
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds

John Lennon

[Boxjobox]

Originally Posted by UntoHim

SerenityLives is the thread starter.

Boxjobox and others: Please respect that she is the thread starter, and thus gets to guide the discussions. Please refrain from injecting things into the conversation that she has explicitly asked not to be injected.

Even though this is the wild, wild west of Alternative Views, I still would expect everyone to behave and interact with each other as adults. I think the subject matter is relevant for Alt Views. If I were you guys, I would let SerenityLives and zeek lead the dialogue. SerenityLives because it's her thread, and zeek because of his comprehensive knowledge of the subject matter.

In any event, please keep the temperature down. Let cooler heads prevail. Don't be like us conventional Christians over on the main forum who can't seem to get through 2 posts without spewing out ad hominems and flaming each other.

"Better to Remain Silent and Be Thought a Fool than to Speak and Remove All Doubt"
-

Untohim- perhaps it would be better if she changed the title of the thread to reflect what she wants to discuss. And also, to remove any Bible references from her posts to be consistent with her demands.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by Boxjobox

I’ll add to Zeek

Picture yourself in a boat on a river
With tangerine trees and marmalade skies
Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly
A girl with kaleidoscope eyes
Cellophane flowers of yellow and green
Towering over your head
Look for the girl with the sun in her eyes
And she's gone
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds
Lucy in the sky with diamonds

John Lennon

That seems like a non-sequitur argument my friend. In fairness I suppose I didn't make clear how my previous post is relevant to the discussion of the topic of this thread. I see it as relevant in terms of the Bible as part of the world's traditional wisdom and sacred stories that Eisenstein refers to as seeds one and two.

[awareness]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

I agree with zeeks statements that the bible was meant to be read symbolically.

Based upon what I grew up with, the Bible was not meant to be read symbolically. And those in the past that did read it that way did not produce orthodoxy. The orthodox way prevails.

But then, speaking of the ascension, the first quandary is when did it take place? One account has it 40 days after the resurrection, and another has it happening right after the resurrection. A spiritual symbolic reading doesn't help that, nor does it provide a deeper or higher meaning. Reading it symbolically leave us guessing as to meaning. Where Jesus ascending to the Father doesn't. It doesn't require reading it symbolically. Factual does the job.

But doesn't a symbolic reading strip out the historicity of Bible accounts?

That way means that Jesus rose after 3 days because every month the moon dies and rises from its death after 3 days. And the 12 tribes of Israel, and 12 disciples, represent the 12 signs of zodiac.

Does that provide a higher degree of meaning?

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by awareness

Based upon what I grew up with, the Bible was not meant to be read symbolically. And those in the past that did read it that way did not produce orthodoxy. The orthodox way prevails.

But then, speaking of the ascension, the first quandary is when did it take place? One account has it 40 days after the resurrection, and another has it happening right after the resurrection. A spiritual symbolic reading doesn't help that, nor does it provide a deeper or higher meaning. Reading it symbolically leave us guessing as to meaning. Where Jesus ascending to the Father doesn't. It doesn't require reading it symbolically. Factual does the job.

But doesn't a symbolic reading strip out the historicity of Bible accounts?

That way means that Jesus rose after 3 days because every month the moon dies and rises from its death after 3 days. And the 12 tribes of Israel, and 12 disciples, represent the 12 signs of zodiac.

Does that provide a higher degree of meaning?

And why non canonical books have more symbolism like the waking talking cross. I’ not sure if you and zeek are using sarcasm.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

And why non canonical books have more symbolism like the waking talking cross. I’m not sure if you and zeek are using sarcasm.

I haven't used sarcasm.

[zeek]

Originally Posted by awareness

Based upon what I grew up with, the Bible was not meant to be read symbolically.

I thought your problem with religion was based on the religion you grew up with. Now it seems your defending it. I don't get it.

And those in the past that did read it that way did not produce orthodoxy. The orthodox way prevails.

Not true. Orthodoxy is highly symbolic. Here are examples from a cursory Google search:

The Church is both material and spiritual. Things in the material
world are on earth and include a building and objects used for services.
Those things that are of the spirit are revealed to us through symbols.
The word symbol comes from the Greek words “syn” and “balo”
which means to bring two things together and place them side by side.
There is a difference between a sign and a symbol. A sign shows
something we can see or think about. A symbol shows more.
To understand a sign is to translate the meaning of an object to another object, event, thought, or idea.
To understand a symbol is to participate in something spiritual. Symbols represent knowledge of God and things eternal.
The Orthodox Church has a history of more than two thousand years
and a rich tradition of signs and symbols that still today help people to
understand the Faith. Because signs and symbols do not use words,
anyone of any language can understand their meaning.
LIGHT - The Church uses candles to symbolize Christ, the Light of
the world, as well as the mystical presence of God as the Uncreated
Light. Candles are a way of communicating our reverence for the
Holy. A candle set before an icon helps us to communicate our prayer
to Christ, the Theotokos, or a Saint.
INCENSE - The Orthodox Church follows the Bible in its use of
incense. Incense is the symbol of the rising of our prayers to God,
to His Saints and Angels, and of the sweet-smelling fragrance of the
Kingdom of God.
ALPHA - OMEGA (first and last letters of Greek alphabet) - Jesus
Christ, the beginning and the end of all things
CIRCLE - Eternity, the Kingdom of God
CROWN - Christ the King; royal martyrs, “the crown of life”
EYE - the “all-seeing eye of God” - God is omnipresent (everywhere)
FISH - the initial letters in Greek: “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior”
form the word ICHTHUS, which means “fish”
FLAME - God’s energies, God’s Uncreated Light, God’s presence
OIL - God’s healing, blessing, forgiveness; “seal of the Holy Spirit”
STAFF - Jesus Christ the Good Shepherd, God’s guidance
SUN - Jesus Christ, the “Sun of Righteousness,” the source of Light
TRIANGLE - The Trinity - one God in three persons, undivided
VINE - Jesus Christ the Savior; grapes symbolize Holy Communion
WHEAT/BREAD - Christ the Bread of Life, Eternal Life
Source: https://stmichaeljermyn.org/files/CH...doxSymbols.pdf

https://www.atlantaserbs.com/learnmo...dox_symbol.htm

https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14373b.htm

https://www.patheos.com/library/prot...lism/symbolism

But then, speaking of the ascension, the first quandary is when did it take place? One account has it 40 days after the resurrection, and another has it happening right after the resurrection. A spiritual symbolic reading doesn't help that, nor does it provide a deeper or higher meaning. Reading it symbolically leave us guessing as to meaning. Where Jesus ascending to the Father doesn't. It doesn't require reading it symbolically. Factual does the job.

Those are historical, factual and/or textual problems not symbolic ones. The 40 days clearly has a symbolic meaning as shown here: https://jesusalive.cc/number-forty-s...ance-in-bible/

But doesn't a symbolic reading strip out the historicity of Bible accounts?

I don't see how. Why would that be?

That way means that Jesus rose after 3 days because every month the moon dies and rises from its death after 3 days. And the 12 tribes of Israel, and 12 disciples, represent the 12 signs of zodiac.
Does that provide a higher degree of meaning?

The cycles of the moon and the signs of the zodiac are heavenly patterns from a traditional point of view. The microcosm reiterates the macrocosm. It's like a fractal. The traditional principle was "as above, so below". Jesus taught his disciples to pray 'Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." Looking at event cosmically certainly does imbue them with a higher degree of meaning. Symbols are doors connecting the phenomenal to the spiritual world.

[zeek]

In the first chapter of the Bible, Genesis 1:27 says "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them." If God doesn't have a feminine side, how could the female be created in God's image?

[awareness]

Originally Posted by zeek

Consider this:

Imagine you were alive thirty thousand years ago and had a vision of all that was to come: symbolic language, naming and labeling the world; agriculture, the domestication of the wild, dominion over other species and the land; the Machine, the mastery of natural forces; the forgetting of how beautiful and perfect the world is; the atomization of society; a world where humans fear even to drink of the streams and rivers, where we live among strangers and don’t know the people next door, where we kill across the planet with the touch of a button, where the seas turn black and the air burns our lungs, where we are so broken that we dare not remember that it isn’t supposed to be this way. Imagine you saw it all coming. How would you help people thirty thousand years thence? How would you send information, knowledge, aid over such a vast gulf of time? Maybe this actually happened. So, we came up with the three seeds.

The first seed was the wisdom lineages: lines of transmission going back thousands of years that have preserved and protected essential knowledge. From adept to disciple, in every part of the world, various wisdom traditions have passed down teachings in secret. Wisdom keepers, Sufis, Zen masters, Kabbalists, Taoist wizards, Christian mystics, Hindu swamis, and many others, hiding within each religion, kept the knowledge safe until the time when the world would be ready to reclaim it. That time is now, and they have done their job well. Many spiritual leaders, even the Dalai Lama, are saying that the time of secrets is over. Released too early, the knowledge was co-opted, abused, or usually just ignored. When we had still not covered the territory of Separation, when we still aspired to widening our conquest of nature, when the story of humanity’s Ascent was not yet complete, we weren’t ready to hear about union, connectedness, interdependency, interbeing. We thought the answer was more control, more technology, more logic, a better-engineered society of rational ethics, more control over matter, nature, and human nature. But now the old paradigms are failing, and human consciousness has reached a degree of receptivity that allows this seed to spread across the earth. It has been released, and it is growing inside of us en masse.

The second seed was the sacred stories: myths, legends, fairy tales, folklore, and the perennial themes that keep reappearing in various guises throughout history. They have always been with us, so that however far we have wandered into the Labyrinth of Separation, we have always had a lifeline, however tenuous and tangled, to the truth. The stories nurture that tiny spark of memory within us that knows psyche. You get the feeling that something else has been transmitted alongside the plot, something invisible. Usually, such stories bear rich symbolism often unknown even to their authors. A comparison of two twentieth-century children’s books illustrates my point: compare a Berenstain Bears story with How the Grinch Stole Christmas! Only the latter has a psychic staying power, revealing the spirit of a true story, and it is rich with archetypal symbolism.

The third seed was the indigenous tribes, the people who at some stage opted out of the journey of separation. Imagine that at the outset of the journey, the Council of Humanity gathered and certain members volunteered to abide in remote locations and forgo separation, which meant refusing to enter into an adversarial, controlling relationship to nature, and therefore refusing the process that leads to the development of high technology. It also meant that when they were discovered by the humans who had gone deeply into Separation, they would meet with the most atrocious suffering. That was unavoidable. These people of the third seed have nearly completed their mission today. Their mission was simply to survive long enough to provide living examples of how to be human. Each tribe carried a different piece, sometimes many pieces, of this knowledge. Many of them show us how to see and relate to the land, animals, and plants. Others show us how to work with dreams and the unseen. Some have preserved natural ways of raising children, now spreading through such books as The Continuum Concept. Some show us how to communicate without words—tribes such as the Hadza and the Pirahã communicate mostly in song. Some show us how to free ourselves from the mentality of linear time. All of them exemplify a way of being that we intuitively recognize and long for. They stir a memory in our hearts, and awaken our desire to return.
Eisenstein, Charles. The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know Is Possible (Sacred Activism) . North Atlantic Books. Kindle-Version.

Charles has a vivid imagination. We can't gather blessings from folklore or anything else from 30,000 yrs ago. The advent of written records starts around 5,500 yrs ago.

[SerenityLives]

Originally Posted by zeek

In the first chapter of the Bible, Genesis 1:27 says "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them." If God doesn't have a feminine side, how could the female be created in God's image?

This is true. God said let “Us”. Can the Us encompass another godess or goddesses? or even female angels/companions, God’s female council? Or God is without gender

[zeek]

Originally Posted by SerenityLives

This is true. God said let “Us”. Can the Us encompass another godess or goddesses? or even female angels/companions, God’s female council? Or God is without gender

Sandra M Schneiders, professor emerita in the Jesuit School of Theology at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California, in "Women and the Word: the Gender of God in the New Testament and the Spirituality of Women" begins by pointing out that theology never assigned sex to God for the Bible says that God is pure spirit and spirit does not have sex. She quotes John 4:24 in this connection in which Jesus says to the Samaritan woman "God is Spirit and those who worship must worship in Spirit and Truth."

As for the language that denotes God as the Father and the Son, Schneiders notes that Gregory of Nyssa well represented the tradition when he affirmed that the terms Father and Son as applied to persons of the Trinity were not names of natures or essences but of relations and furthermore the terms are used metaphorically.

Our God image, Schneiders points out, is determined largely by our imagination and our imagination is shaped by the metaphors that are used to depict the nature of the God that Judaism and Christianity espouse. Because the church and purportedly the Bible used so many masculine metaphors with reference to God it produces a situation in which a woman who reads the Bible must see herself as an inferior version of humanity subject first to human men and ultimately to the infinite Divine male who established the patriarchal world organization. What is needed she says is "a therapy of the religious imagination."

[awareness]

Originally Posted by Trapped

This is a long article, maybe prohibitively long, but I wonder if it is more in line with what you have in mind? Or at least, it might be a middle ground between the spectrum of what is being said here. It doesn't discount the Bible, but it delves into many other lenses also.....kind of a pull-back, wide-range view.

https://www.bu.edu/arion/archive/vol...d_get-started/

As an aside, the irony of the phrase "origins of Christian God" is that it is itself an oxymoron. The Christian God has no origins. To speak of the Christian God otherwise means it's not the Christian God.

Hey Trapped, hope you are well. Great article. Thanks.

Okay, God has no origin. But when did the concept of the Christian God originate? And is the Christian God God? Then why differentiate?