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Old 08-22-2013, 06:52 PM
 
Location: New England
37,337 posts, read 28,126,183 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Wardendresden View Post
The Bible is a faith book written by fallible men trying to point to an infallible God.

When Mark says that Jesus was crucified the day after the Passover meal was eaten (Mark 14:12, 15:25) and John says he died the day before it was eaten (John 19:14)--was that was a genuine difference that each of the authors knew about, or a mistake made by scribes copying copies of copies of copies of copies of the original?

Or when Luke indicates in his account of Jesus's birth that Mary and Joseph returned to Nazareth just over a month after they had come to Bethlehem (and performed the rites of purification; Luke 2:39), whereas Matthew states they instead fled to Egypt (Matt 2:19-22)--was it in the originals or in the copies?

Or when Paul says that after he converted on the way to Damascus he did not go to Jerusalem to see those who were apostles before him (Gal. 1:16-17), whereas the book of Acts says that was the first thing he did after leaving Damascus (Acts 9:26), who was incorrect? The original authors or the copyists?

Pointing out that the original autographs are inerrant is something of a moot point if we don't even HAVE the original. And in may cases the earliest copies are decades after what is considered the original date of writing. Further complicating this is those copies all differ from on another in thousands of places.

In order to make this easier to understand, there are more differences in the existing NT manuscripts than there are WORDS in the NT. And scholars of those texts, whether liberal or conservative agree there are mountains of differences.

Now people who are without faith, must have a Bible that is a "sure" thing. It is not faith that drives their perspective, but a solid object, like the golden calf in the Sinai desert. That isn't faith at all, because faith is in things not seen, in things hoped for.

But across all the threads of Christianity we have Christians, including myself, engaged in interpreting what the Scripture means when we don't even know what the words of the original manuscripts are!!

So get out the magnifying glass of faith and begin to trace the Spirit of God through fallible men. If God could accomplish His work through Moses, Sampson, David, and a reluctant Jonah, then He can accomplish His work in spite of the multitude of errors within Scripture. Our failure continues as humans, however, when we become dogmatic about what they mean.

To really worship God in spirit and in truth, requires a really BIG faith, and some servanthood thrown in.
Such a good post
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Old 08-22-2013, 07:23 PM
 
Location: Ontario, Canada
31,374 posts, read 20,045,735 times
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Originally Posted by pcamps View Post
Such a good post
I agree.

Yet, I can't help but think that very many folks in this forum are totally preoccupied with the trees and have no real clue about the forest.
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