When I was a teenage boy in the 1960s attending a Jesuit private boys school, I found contradictions in the Bible that have never been able to reconcile. Please help if you can.
I am not a biblical scholar . I work more to an inner knowing. How does this feel to me ? As you have indicated the Bible has had many authors and rewrites. If the passage does not resonate with you then move on. At some time it may come around again and hold a meaning missed on previous times. Do not dismiss the amount of control religions want to have over the parish. Do not give the Creator of All human attributes. The Creator of All is Love and we are evolving to that understanding.
I believe that we all have a unique Life Lens (mind, consciousness) that is informed by a lifetime of unique circumstances and experiences. This is why we reach an exclusely personal understanding of our lives and the events and people who influence us.
As a Catholic child, I was brainwashed in the teachings of that faith and, upon realizing this fact, I rebelled and began a personal journey to discover “truth”. That journey offered great riches of wisdom and insights that the Bible could not provide.
As a parent, I did not want my children to be brainwashed by any one religion. I guided them to be open to all possibilities and to become critical thinkers. I reasoned that they could undertake their own spiritual journey after adulthood if they felt the urge to do so. So far, neither religion or the Bible is “calling” them to follow even though their stepfather was a church minister and their mother favours the teachings of the Bible over other sources of moral wisdom. She has never read any great philosophers, however, and her taste in reading was mainly romantic novels.
I have waited almost two months to comment on this post. I now feel ready to give a relevant and honest answer.
I myself have been appalled by God’s apparent lack of sympathy in biblical stories where he wipes out, not only pursuant warriors (as in the Moses account) , but whole families and their livestock. So, when you used this example to cite God’s unfairness and lack of moral consistency, I had to agree, even though these instances of apparent “meanness” never deterred my overall Faith. They were , to me , “mysteries” as the catechism priests used to say about any questions I had that they couldn’t answer.
Now …I’ve had encounters with evil (and I don’t mean when a person said something mean to someone else, or a person stole something) I am talking about systemic views and actions so contrary to benevolent human co-existence that whole groups of people are acting in a fashion that not only oppresses but morally and physically subjugates other individuals to the point of abject poverty and death.
I can now see how a Creator would think twice about His ordinance of “Free Will” and impose some instant Karma on those genocidal fools.
Another reason I am able to come to terms with many of the quandaries that used to plague me, is the knowledge that my God is bigger than Space , exists without Time and Created all Matter. My teeny tiny brain simply is not equal to the task of holding Him to account.
My parents never said this (but I have heard some who did) “I brought you into this world and I can take you out.” Perhaps, that was God’s thought train atm? 🤣
Regardless of your Faith designation, we all believe in Something and serve Someone consciously, willingly, or not.
Just as the Declaration of Principals can be a Universally agreed upon tenet there must be written (Biblical) and other (oral and moral tradition) Universal Laws and Truths that elicit an eventual consequence - be it Divine intervention or “Karma”.
I am not a biblical scholar . I work more to an inner knowing. How does this feel to me ? As you have indicated the Bible has had many authors and rewrites. If the passage does not resonate with you then move on. At some time it may come around again and hold a meaning missed on previous times. Do not dismiss the amount of control religions want to have over the parish. Do not give the Creator of All human attributes. The Creator of All is Love and we are evolving to that understanding.
Thanks for sharing your experience and advice.
I believe that we all have a unique Life Lens (mind, consciousness) that is informed by a lifetime of unique circumstances and experiences. This is why we reach an exclusely personal understanding of our lives and the events and people who influence us.
As a Catholic child, I was brainwashed in the teachings of that faith and, upon realizing this fact, I rebelled and began a personal journey to discover “truth”. That journey offered great riches of wisdom and insights that the Bible could not provide.
As a parent, I did not want my children to be brainwashed by any one religion. I guided them to be open to all possibilities and to become critical thinkers. I reasoned that they could undertake their own spiritual journey after adulthood if they felt the urge to do so. So far, neither religion or the Bible is “calling” them to follow even though their stepfather was a church minister and their mother favours the teachings of the Bible over other sources of moral wisdom. She has never read any great philosophers, however, and her taste in reading was mainly romantic novels.
I have waited almost two months to comment on this post. I now feel ready to give a relevant and honest answer.
I myself have been appalled by God’s apparent lack of sympathy in biblical stories where he wipes out, not only pursuant warriors (as in the Moses account) , but whole families and their livestock. So, when you used this example to cite God’s unfairness and lack of moral consistency, I had to agree, even though these instances of apparent “meanness” never deterred my overall Faith. They were , to me , “mysteries” as the catechism priests used to say about any questions I had that they couldn’t answer.
Now …I’ve had encounters with evil (and I don’t mean when a person said something mean to someone else, or a person stole something) I am talking about systemic views and actions so contrary to benevolent human co-existence that whole groups of people are acting in a fashion that not only oppresses but morally and physically subjugates other individuals to the point of abject poverty and death.
I can now see how a Creator would think twice about His ordinance of “Free Will” and impose some instant Karma on those genocidal fools.
Another reason I am able to come to terms with many of the quandaries that used to plague me, is the knowledge that my God is bigger than Space , exists without Time and Created all Matter. My teeny tiny brain simply is not equal to the task of holding Him to account.
My parents never said this (but I have heard some who did) “I brought you into this world and I can take you out.” Perhaps, that was God’s thought train atm? 🤣
Regardless of your Faith designation, we all believe in Something and serve Someone consciously, willingly, or not.
Just as the Declaration of Principals can be a Universally agreed upon tenet there must be written (Biblical) and other (oral and moral tradition) Universal Laws and Truths that elicit an eventual consequence - be it Divine intervention or “Karma”.