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The Bible isn’t a rule-book, and the more we pretend it is, the more we don’t take those 66+ books seriously.
It’s just…it’s really immature — and embarrassing — to treat it this way.
Too many Christians still operate with a Sunday school mentality of their faith.
It’s just…it’s really immature — and embarrassing — to treat it this way.
Too many Christians still operate with a Sunday school mentality of their faith.
Nothing against Sunday school at all, PS. Or children in the faith tradition. Jesus says children get it more than adults do sometimes. Fully.
And also. Still looking at the faith tradition and encountering the bible at 39 in exactly the way you did at 13 is…not great.
And also. Still looking at the faith tradition and encountering the bible at 39 in exactly the way you did at 13 is…not great.
Like, seriously. What is prescriptive in the Bible, and what is descriptive?
Evangelicals will swear by the description of one man/one woman (which is debatable, since ‘adam’ in Hebrew simply means ‘humankind') as being prescriptive, but then balk at looking at the story of Jael and Sisera (Judg. 3) the same way: i.e. women, you should kill your enemies.
Who gets to decide what is prescriptive, and what is simply describing things (the horrific things that happen to unnamed women all over the place, for example)?
Church history has shown us that faith communities decide.
Church history has shown us that faith communities decide.
My Lutheran tradition?
It leans on the idea that we all have a lens when we encounter the bible (even ‘bible-believing’ fundamentalists have a lens).
And our lens is the Christ child in the manger. Everything in the Bible is affected by that lens for us.
It leans on the idea that we all have a lens when we encounter the bible (even ‘bible-believing’ fundamentalists have a lens).
And our lens is the Christ child in the manger. Everything in the Bible is affected by that lens for us.
Thus, anything prescriptive (anything that somewhat relates to what we’d call a ‘rule’) must be viewed through that lens.
Should LGBTQ+ people be punished for their identity?
Well…what would the Christ who came to free the captive and liberate the oppressed say?
Should LGBTQ+ people be punished for their identity?
Well…what would the Christ who came to free the captive and liberate the oppressed say?
Sidenote: that’s just a good rule of thumb (ha) when it comes to Christians considering anything in the Bible.
"Well…what would the Christ who came to free the captive and liberate the oppressed say about this?"
"Well…what would the Christ who came to free the captive and liberate the oppressed say about this?"
ANYWAYS.
Point of this thread: very little of the bible, percentage-wise, is prescriptive.
And what is prescriptive is rooted in the radical rabbi from Nazareth, and his movement that turned the world upside down.
Point of this thread: very little of the bible, percentage-wise, is prescriptive.
And what is prescriptive is rooted in the radical rabbi from Nazareth, and his movement that turned the world upside down.
@markstoryteller If you want to know what God would condemn, what God would celebrate, what God would ‘punish,’ look no further than what Jesus said and did during his 30-some years in first-century Palestine and Judea.
