Ditto that about Alter

"ONLY the Bible/Koran/Torah stands up and has its proponents largely claim "THIS IS PERFECT, THE PERFECT AND UNALTERABLE WORD OF GOD!"

No, only the Koran claims this for itself. And those who claim this for the Bible are idiots. They are making an idol out of a book.

Major, the Book of Mormon is just a poorly written fanfic based on the Bible. Joseph Smith was a fraud.

Oh, I thought it was only Global wrming advoctes that said "this is the perfect and unalterable word of God" when they point to Al Gore's fraudulant movie, or the bogus, cherry-picked, manipulated statistics that....well, strangley enough that many on THIS site accept blindly as gospel truth. lol

Anyone can read the Bible, just as anyone in his day could listen to Jesus' parables, but mental understanding comes out of a spiritual willingness to be changed for the better. Otherwise what you end up with is a rant against the Word of God, and that feeling of frustration that shines through everything you write on this topic.

If anyone is interested in reading possibly the best-document source on Mormonism that exists, I recommend the book One Nation Under Gods. I forget the author....

So Mujus hates Mormons? Interesting. Guess all this lovey dovey stuff is just for show.

So if you don't approve of Christianity there is hate in your heart and you have psychological problems and arrogant unwillingness to listen to new ideas, but if you cite hardcore polemics against Mormonism it's perfectly acceptable and there isn't an ounce of hatred of intolerance for new ideas in your body.

I hope we're clear.

This really shouldn't have gone from a "how do you read the bible" forum to a "Let's bash other religions" forum.

In answer to the OP's question:

I made the commitment to get up about an hour or so earlier than normal. It became a habit and over that time I stopped using an alarm clock. I didn't read in any particular order, I started with Acts and then read the Epistles, Revelations, The Gospels, Then The OT. I read about a chapter a day a;though sometimes it was more. It took about three years doing it that way, but going through it that slowly let me pay attention to a lot that I hadn't encountered before.

The OT is four times as long as the NT. My guess is people just don't bother reading it, or maybe read Genesis, Exodus & Job. The NT is only 290 pages, 60 of which are superfluous since the synoptic gospels are repetitive.

Cutting out the useless Psalms reduces the length of the OT by about 100 pages, so it's only about 890.

All in all the Bible isn't that long.

I briefly saw in this thread that there was talk of which translation to use.

Many translations are good enough for the casual reader. The differences are pretty minor and one cant really say that one major translation is better than another. I tend to stick tothe KJV, NKJV, NIV and NASB which has been argued to be the closest word for word translation of the "originals". I often steer clear of the Message Bible and other pseudo-Bibles that are paraphrases or are merely a "newer" copy of an older English version. Anytime you change from Greek/Hebrew/Aramaic to English, you lose some meaning. This os compounded when you go from English to English and use synonyms or approximations in the second version because these additional copies dont use the older manuscripts as a guide and you can go off the deep end with somw things.

Now, it should be noted that for over 1500 years, weve been using non-originals. The original manuscripts have long been lost but we have old copies of copies and when we compare the some 25000 handwritten fragments of the NT alone, we see that they are near perfect in detail. Hence the different translations we have today. Some translations use one fragment for a specific passage while another version uses another with a slight variation. That said, I stick to any trqnslation that uses the old fragments we have as the source of its translation.

obiwan,

Even the link you sent doesn't mention the council of Nicea. Yes, it's often thought that Constantine's Bibles may have given motivation over the next 50-100 years to go ahead and figure out the canon for sure (see also Vulgate). The point is, though, MOST of it was already settled long before that. So the story you're always coming in and telling about Nicea doing a politically motivated hack job doesn't make a lot of sense.

A few points about your Shakespeare stuff. (Good GRIEF you have to learn to write more concisely, obi. )

1) You give various reasons why X or Y plays are not included. For example, "Double Falsehood" is a century too late and only adapted. What you fail to realize is that by and large, the people who developed the NT canon had reasons JUST as good for leaving out the books they did. You're just going back arbitrarily now and criticizing them for leaving out ANY books, without regard to what may have been their reasons.

For example, the Gospel of Thomas was mentioned as a fake already 100 years before Nicea (by Origen), and by the 500's -- about as far out as we are now from Shakespeare -- it was mentioned various places that it had been composed by the Manicheans.

But oh, no, they definitely had to be motivated entirely by political reasons, not historical/textual reasons like you are with Shakespeare. Don't you see that people could come along in 1500 years and do the same thing with us vis-a-vis Shakespeare? "It's obvious that 'Double Falsehood' really is Shakespeare, the whole thing about it being written later by somebody allegedly as an adaptation was made up by its enemies because they didn't like its message. So we have no way of knowing REAL Shakespeare."

2) Your other point, about intertextualism. You said, well, we couldn't know for sure if Exodus was really referring to Genesis, or to "Life of Adam and Eve." First of all, Exodus is an older book than the present form of LoAaE, so that would be remarkable. But there probably are different versions of the latter that extend farther back in time. So anyway, OK, you know how you could analyze that? Read LoAaE! Heck, there might well be intertextual elements. Who knows? As I say, this was all the common literary tradition of a relatively small ancient people, so it seems crazy to suggest there WOULDN'T be a lot of cross-referencing and allusions. That's regardless of whether it's written by the same person or not.

"a Compilation of different texts that may or may not have been intended by their authors to be linked or to be linked to the texts they are linked to"

Well, there is just exceptionally strong evidence that they were written in a single tradition.

To take an example so trivial and obvious that you probably haven't thought to think of it yet, they all teach (in the case of the OT) that the Israelites are to practice Monotheism, which is distinct from the other cultures and texts of the day.

Now, this obviously isn't sufficient to CLOSE the canon -- plenty of non-canonical books do the same. My point is just that they clearly were intended to be taken as related/in the same tradition in at least that simple-minded way.

"you don't have the same ability to say "A and B are connected" because they may not have been INTENDED to be connected"

You have a far too insulting view of Hebrew literary skill, which is sad. Just as we can be pretty sure that "The Sun Also Rises" is not a randomly chosen title, but in fact a literary reference (to Ecclesiastes, in this case), so we can do similar analysis with the OT with use of similar phrases, quoting, allusion, etc.

"Even the link you sent doesn't mention the council of Nicea. Yes, it's often thought that Constantine's Bibles may have given motivation over the next 50-100 years to go ahead and figure out the canon for sure (see also Vulgate). The point is, though, MOST of it was already settled long before that. So the story you're always coming in and telling about Nicea doing a politically motivated hack job doesn't make a lot of sense."

Well, it was mostly to try and make the point vis a vis the Constantine Bible; again, I heard and read that the Council convened by Constantine to create his canonized Bibles canonized/de-canonized works...the History Channel's "Banned From the Bible" piece talks about it, and while I know how "historically accurate" the HC is and won't come in here with that as my sole anchor of "evidence."

As such, I'd ask:

--Most of it was already settled...by who? Not the Hebrews who wrote the scriptures...they had their own canon(s) (I include the plural as, let's face it, in the early ADs, which is when I'm talking about, even if there were canons, they were different canons)...and there are plenty of OT-era/Hebrew writings left out of the Bible the CHRISTIANS put together, so right there already, I'd say the fact that the people who wrote the stories didn't have their say what went in and what didn't into the Bible shows it to be a bit of a pick-and-choose game...maybe that's not as definitive to you as it is to me, but certainly we can at least agree it raises a textual issue in terms of selection and editing when it's someone else compiling the works of many authors from an entirely different group of people? It'd be like my editing a group of Chinese works together with the 250 AD-equivalent of "information" on the subjects...not only am I not going to be fully informed as to the textual history, but any sane person would spot that a typical white American putting together a "definitive canon" of Chinese texts in that way raises a cultural issue in terms of how the text is being treated.

--What's more, I've actually heard the "Thomas was already 100 years past the date" argument before...but the fact it it WAS a popular book in its day nonetheless, and I'd ask, if the other Gospels were written after the fact as it is (I know at least some of them were, I think all of them were, but I'll be tentative enough as I might be in ignorance here) and certainly the OT documents were written after the fact, and many years after the fact (surely a story such as Abraham's or Noah's was written many, MANY years later...after all, not too many people in the Bible when they're around, and unless Adam or Eve penned their own story of Genesis, or we subscribe to the ludicrous notion it was handed down from God--in which case we leave the realm of logical textual discussion and enter superstition entirely--then that was DEFINITELY written after the fact, and hundreds if not thousands of years so, assuming Adam even "existed") why is it so radically different with Thomas? If "Genesis" counts and it was written well after the events, why not "Thomas?" For Shakespeare, it makes sense--one author, so after he's dead, that's it, unless he publishes a work posthumously...thus, even though it's allegedly based off his story, "Double Falsehood" is left out, as it wasn't authored by, well, the one author that makes up a One-Author-Canon. If it's MULTIPLE authors, however, and that's the case with the Bible...well, that's a bit different, you can have multiple authors and a span of many years, and so, to be consistent, if other books written years after the events are let in, why leave out Thomas and the like-not-included books, if not for political or editorial reasons?

For starters.

"A few points about your Shakespeare stuff. (Good GRIEF you have to learn to write more concisely, obi. )"

Well, when I have to for class or for a submission that can be only a certain length, I can be...otherwise, I prefer to be as thorough as possible...

I just figure it's extra there to try and support my position if people want to read it all, and if they don't, well, they can skim parts or, hell, even ignore me, I suppose, that's their right, too...

In any case, I'm probably too far past it to be "concise" this time, so, to move onward...

"hat you fail to realize is that by and large, the people who developed the NT canon had reasons JUST as good for leaving out the books they did. You're just going back arbitrarily now and criticizing them for leaving out ANY books, without regard to what may have been their reasons.

For example, the Gospel of Thomas was mentioned as a fake already 100 years before Nicea (by Origen), and by the 500's -- about as far out as we are now from Shakespeare -- it was mentioned various places that it had been composed by the Manicheans."

As I've already spoken to my question with the issue of time--that is, why is it OK for the books in the Bible to have been written after the fact (and for many of them necessarily decades or centuries so unless, again, "Adam himself" wrote Genesis or something, precluding the "hand of man, Word of God" argument but, again, if we go that route we leave legitimate literary criticism miles behind) but not books like Thomas...

I'd ask as well--

If the Christians could include the Jewish/Hebrew books...why not those of the Gnostics or the Manicheans? Different groups/sects, but still, we can't make a culturally-specific argument and say "Well, they weren't Christian, hence it didn't belong in a Christian Bible" as they let in the Hebrew (and arguably some Zoroastrian via influence) stuff...

I can understand if the answer is "Because they didn't feel like it/they didn't want it in their book," but then again, it becomes an edited compilation of submissions, as it were, some "accepted" and some "rejected"--

Thus, not AT ALL a totally uniform and whole-cloth work...it's not as if it can be said all 66 books included had specific qualities that each of the other 65 share, or that they were all written with the others in mind an so are 66 cohesive books or even the Shakespeare angle of 66 by one author--

The Bible's a diverse compilation, and again, I'm FINE with that...I'm just saying, since they picked and chose what they wanted in and out, to whatever degree, the Bible IS an edited book (or, if you feel that's an unfair term...a "compiled" book over time, rather than one unified whole-cloth work?)

"But oh, no, they definitely had to be motivated entirely by political reasons, not historical/textual reasons like you are with Shakespeare."

Not entirely political, no, but you have to admit, especially given the Roman political setting of the time, politics probably were a factor? (Indeed, it's thought that politics were something a factor with authors of the NT itself, that the Roman Empire provided a sort of political force against which their message acted, and so in some sense, the NT, whether events occurred in real life or not, can be seen in tone as reactionary to the persecution Christians were undergoing within Rome? Again, not a bad thing, just a thing, just another aspect of the text itself...the Bible in its text and textual construction IS and WAS politically-tied to some extents.)

"Don't you see that people could come along in 1500 years and do the same thing with us vis-a-vis Shakespeare?"

...Except we have names, dates, documents, and signed texts proving otherwise, whereas in the case of the Bible, we have little to none of that?

True, some things in Shakespeare are muddied by textual debates--again, sullied vs. solid--but as to authorship, by and larger...

With the exception of fringe theories, which have always been there, I don't see that happening with Shakespeare because of all the evidence for Shakespeare's authorship of the plays given to him and the fact that, indeed, there is no dispute over whether it was Fletcher or Shakespeare, and Fletcher's name is on the manuscript signed and over a hundred years after Shakespeare's death...

So, we have enough evidence to not fall into the issue you propose (I WILL say that I can see where you might be coming from in, say, a post-apocalyptic world or something, where all these documents that prove authorship have been lost, but as we digitally and chemically and otherwise preserve these proving documents and dates and such now, whereas back them there was frail parchment and tablets and no means of mass and lasting information such as the Internet or CD disks, unless we lose all this technology in those 1500 years, I don't see that sort of authorship debate occurring, especially given one last thing--unlike the Bible, written by many men, Shakespeare was ONE man...and obviously men didn't live for the 150 or so years at least he'd need to write Taming of the Shrew and Double Falsehood, and we know that naturally as human beings, and the style is not only not Shakespeare's, it's not even Elizabethan, it'd be like trying to convince us that it was in fact Jane Austen who wrote The Hunger Games--not only does the style clash, but as Austen didn't have cameras or reality TV or the concept of an Orwellian State in her day, and the style isn't of her period or her writing style at all, we'd laugh at the thought.)

"So we have no way of knowing REAL Shakespeare."

Again, if someone made that claim, unless we lost ALL the documents and innumerable works discussing Shakespeare as well...

Born in 1564, died 1616, famous for hailing from Stratford and putting on plays in London, known friend and playwright for Queen Elizabeth I of England...

With the Biblical authors, there was little to no means of preserving such information, but for all muddy points there ARE in Shakespeare's life (as with many who lived in that era) even still, even in THAT era we have more than enough records to say who Shakespeare "was," and could date them using scientific methods if necessary to prove their age and preclude a "they were forged afterwards" argument.

The fact is, we KNOW who Shakespeare was, at least, in that sense.

With the Biblical authors, they didn't even have the relatively-crude methods of record-keeping that Shakespeare had in his day or the advanced methods we have today, so yes, they've slipped through the sands of time...but barring the loss of our technology, that won't likely happen again, at least not as strikingly as you suggest.

"Your other point, about intertextualism. You said, well, we couldn't know for sure if Exodus was really referring to Genesis, or to "Life of Adam and Eve." First of all, Exodus is an older book than the present form of LoAaE, so that would be remarkable. But there probably are different versions of the latter that extend farther back in time. So anyway, OK, you know how you could analyze that? Read LoAaE! Heck, there might well be intertextual elements. Who knows? As I say, this was all the common literary tradition of a relatively small ancient people, so it seems crazy to suggest there WOULDN'T be a lot of cross-referencing and allusions. That's regardless of whether it's written by the same person or not."

From a literary view--alright, fair enough point.

I just am used to hearing of "Biblical intertextualism" in the "prophetic," "See, this predicts this which predicts this which SHOWS that it's the Perfect Unified Word of God!"

But if you mean it in that literary sense you seem to mean above--OK, I can see that, fair point.

"Well, there is just exceptionally strong evidence that they were written in a single tradition."

I didn't dispute their being written in the same literary tradition, and even advocated that view, if I recall, that maybe in the same way "Lady Chatterly's Lover" and "Ulysses" were written in the same Modernist literary movement, maybe the OT and NT authors did the same.

I'M just saying that the same way, then, it'd be absurd for me to say Constance Chatterly of D.H. Lawrence's work was written with Leopold Bloom of Joyce's "Ulysses" in mind and the two books are CLEARLY meant to connect...you can say that there are thematic similarities and whatnot and say Lawrence and Joyce influenced one another...

But you wouldn't "canonize" the two works with the implication that one led directly from or tied directly into another--thus is my argument against all the OT and NT (particularly the OT) texts being written by so many authors at so many different times and yet all still "intended" to interlink, and thus the Bible is "edited" in that it "makes" them interlink in that sense...

The Lord of the Rings? Clearly interlinking, same author and same storyline.
The Harry Potter books? Ditto.
The two meant to "lead in" to one another and be connected the way the Bible forcibly connects books? Hardly.

THAT'S what I mean.

"You have a far too insulting view of Hebrew literary skill, which is sad."

I just speak from what I've read...which admittedly isn't as much as you, probably, but from what I've read, I find the Hebrew stories so far 1. Disgustingly immoral in many cases (and as I've said before, I'm OK with a wicked, immoral or even amoral book, as long as it's a good story, go ahead--but when you try and make the book a morality tale, as the Bible tries to make itself into, and that moral fails...some of the storytelling magic fails with it, in my view) and 2. Incredibly dull and repetitive (which makes sense, given the fact that it stems from an oral tradition and you have to include repetition like that so folks can remember the stories easier so they can be passed on.)

"Just as we can be pretty sure that "The Sun Also Rises" is not a randomly chosen title, but in fact a literary reference (to Ecclesiastes, in this case), so we can do similar analysis with the OT with use of similar phrases, quoting, allusion, etc."

Perhaps so, but even still, books left out displayed this ability to use literary references to allude to other works as well.

(See? Long, but I try and be detailed, if I failed...not for lack of trying.)

:)

Obiwan,

"again, I heard and read that the Council convened by Constantine to create his canonized Bibles canonized/de-canonized works...the History Channel's "Banned From the Bible" piece talks about it"

OK, well, now that I've given you a well-sourced document showing that Nicea was NOT pivotal in the development of the canon, and since you admit that your own source is worthless, can we agree that you won't mention that story ever again unless and until you have a credible argument (with evidence) supporting it?

"Most of it was already settled...by who?"

I mean that that church leaders worldwide already demonstrated consensus about most of the books that should be considered canonical over a hundred years before Constantine. There are various lists and discussions from way before then, and while there are 5-6 books that were controversial or not entirely agreed on, the rest were pretty much settled. Nobody was seriously talking about including Thomas or any of the other controversial NT books you've mentioned, except Shepherd of Hermas. Incidentally, you're always bringing up Nicodemus. It might interest you to know that scholars don't consider that it was even in existence until around 350. Look it up.

As for the OT, again there was near-consensus. There was again some confusion over a couple of books for awhile, and there's always been discussion about whether to treat the OT and the deuterocanon the same. But about the bulk of it, there has always been unanimity.

"and there are plenty of OT-era/Hebrew writings left out of the Bible the CHRISTIANS put together"

Given that the Christians knew nothing about what they were doing, how lucky that the Jews left the same books out of their canon.

"I'd say the fact that the people who wrote the stories didn't have their say what went in and what didn't into the Bible shows it to be a bit of a pick-and-choose game."

Well, trivially it's a pick and choose game, yes. So is what plays to put in Shakespeare. That doesn't mean there aren't criteria to use in either case. And of course, if one accepts the Bible at all, then one believes that God looked over that process itself.

"What's more, I've actually heard the "Thomas was already 100 years past the date" argument before."

Oh, yeah? Well, cool, but... _I_ didn't make it. Which leads me to wonder somewhat if you're reading what I say with any care at all.

"but the fact it it WAS a popular book in its day nonetheless, and I'd ask, if the other Gospels were written after the fact as it is "

The issue with the GoT is not that it was written after the fact. Yes, they all were. The point is that it is (or was considered by the early church to be, anyway) a forgery (not by Thomas or any of his associates) made up by a particular sect to preserve their heretical views -- whereas the other gospels, again, by what tradition and documents the early church had -- were linked to initial Apostles and associates of Christ, or direct associates of apostles.

Again, it's important to note I DIDN'T RAISE the issue of how long afterward Thomas was written. What I raised was that it was already considered a forgery one hundred years BEFORE Constantine. You're an English major -- you understand the difference between after and before, right?

"Well, when I have to for class or for a submission that can be only a certain length, I can be...otherwise, I prefer to be as thorough as possible..."

Thorough is good. Vast quantities of needless detail are not good, and are a disservice to your readers (whose time you waste) and yourself (because your readers end up skimming your writing and not seeing everything you write). This is true whether it's for a paper or not.

"As I've already spoken to my question with the issue of time- [goes on to address for the third time a point I didn't make.] "

Please address the point that I DID make -- that Thomas was already considered illegitimate a century before Constantine.

"I'd ask as well--

If the Christians could include the Jewish/Hebrew books...why not those of the Gnostics or the Manicheans?"

The policy of the church was only to let in something that was apostolic or by a direct associate of an apostle (somebody who worked with them and could be assumed to be passing on their teaching). None of the "church fathers" after the apostles got their things in the Bible. The Manicheans and Gnostics, however, apart from having heretical views, forged things they claimed were from the apostles but weren't.

See?

"Not entirely political, no, but you have to admit, especially given the Roman political setting of the time, politics probably were a factor? "

Well, given that your theory about Constantine is completely wrong and you're off by a century or more for most of the canon, no, I don't think politics were a very big factor.

"...Except we have names, dates, documents, and signed texts proving otherwise, whereas in the case of the Bible, we have little to none of that?"

First of all, this is false; I'll get to that in a minute. Second, it's not parallel. I'm talking about people in 1500 years, not us now. People in 1500 might well conceivably lose a lot of the intermediate texts we have (as you later discuss), and have nothing but our say-so to go on about Shakespearean authorship. We don't have to judge the liklihood of that happening. We just have to figure out if they would be reasonable to trust us if it did.

Anyway, your claim -- above quoted -- is false. First of all, there are the letters of the NT canon themselves, which, apart from being under consideration for the canon, are documents and refer to each other.

There is a letter from Clement of Rome to the Corinthians, probably from the AD 90s, and no later than AD 140 (possibly as early as the 60s) which refers to Paul's letters to the Corinthians and Romans.

There is Marcion's canon c. 140 (which was widely rejected in part, but shows what books were already under discussion), and the various documents referring to it. There are letters from the 180s (see e.g. Iranaeus). Ignatius of Antioch, who died by 120, quoted several NT books, as did Polycarp (died ~150). And so on and on.

Now, as I say, there was not unanimity about every book, but by and large there was agreement and strong traditions of authorship, etc. So a good deal of documentary evidence has survived. But consider also that a lot of these early works have been lost to us, as well. So as the canon developed, there would have been much more material than we now have about the history and status of various books.

I guess you could go down the road of saying, "Well, those letters could all be forged too," blah blah, but I could also do the same thing about Shakespeare, and our hypothetical person in 1500 years could do so even much more.

"but as we digitally and chemically and otherwise preserve these proving documents and dates and such now, whereas back them there was frail parchment and tablets and no means of mass and lasting information such as the Internet or CD disks, unless we lose all this technology in those 1500 years, I don't see that sort of authorship debate occurring"

OK, but that goes exactly to my point. We HAVE lost a lot of the documents they had back then. But from the ones we do have, we have every reason to believe they were very careful and concerned about the same historical questions we're concerned about -- only with more evidence because they hadn't lost the documents.

The rest seems to be more or less saying we kind of agree about the Hebrew literary tradition and cross-referencing, along with some more expressions of dislike on your part. So I won't respond in detail to that.

But just -- c'mon, Obi. Don't come in here with authoritative-sounding proclomations or arguments with nothing more than a History Channel special to back them up (heck, even Wikipedia has no time for the Nicea idea). There's nothing wrong with not being interested enough to learn the history, but there's something wrong with not being interested enough to learn the history AND making arguments based on what you don't know.

Anyway, thanks for the response.

I was glad to see that Obi finally backed down from calling the Bible "edited." :-)

What I would like to know is, why does ANYBODY give this scatterbrained jew the time of day?

'And of course, if one accepts the Bible at all, then one believes that God looked over that process itself'

This kind ends all need for discussion. If one believes in a deist or non-interventionist God then one naturally rejects the bible as infallible and instead takes it as passed down wisdom - some of which is no longer useful.

You choose to wear clothing of cotton and linen because such a prohibition makes no sense to you today. (deutoronomy 22:11, if google is to be trusted, i thought it was one of the rules from leviticus... But apparently i didn't bother reading my bible too closely)

In this case the whole 'who interpreted what and when' can easily result in an attempt to take all the books previously excluded and reading them to see what value they might have today... (or you end up doing this routine: http://www.google.ie/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CFQQtwIwAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3 1KiCEJoX9kE&ei=dYW6T-GCA4rJhAealtX1AQ&usg=AFQjCNGHJunyXX3ZIDONKj0gnmkZuGfXqg )

This would of course open you up to reading hindu vedas, confuscious, tauism, the book of mormon, dianetics, the Qu'oran and the holy books of the Ba'hai faith.

Of course if you remain Christian, but still believe in a non-interventionist God, which ONLY did the miracles attributed to him by the Cannon bible then this becomes a VERY important question - which bits are cannon and why?

I'm not falling into either of those categories, and especially the last one which seems a little inconsistant.

'What I would like to know is, why does ANYBODY give this scatterbrained jew the time of day?'

I preumse you're talking about Jesus there :p no, that was anti-semitism? Oh well M.U.T.E.

Orathaic, if he had said "this scatterbrained Italian," would he be anti-Italian? That's just silly. Or are you one of the uber-semitists?

"This would of course open you up to reading hindu vedas, confuscious, tauism, the book of mormon, dianetics, the Qu'oran and the holy books of the Ba'hai faith."

Funny how a book written by a man who admitted he made it all up to make money is listed with some other real Holy books. I may not agree with all of them, but they do deserve a higher stature than Dianetics. At least for now. Maybe in 3 or 4 hundred years if mankind has forgotten LRH admitted it was a hoax, but not right now.

"You choose to wear clothing of cotton and linen because such a prohibition makes no sense to you today."

Well, that and because the theology of the Bible itself tells you that those laws no longer apply.

Oh, and good point, Mujus, I should have remarked on that. Thank you obi, yes. I do feel that "compiled" is a much fairer and more precise term.

What does "preumse" mean?

One ought to be allowed to mute a moderator, if the moderator in question is a stupid, politically correct ball-less wonder, like orathaic.

It gets cute about the possibility of Jesus being a scatterbrained jew, and then ignores Zmaj's valid question.

What a goof.

"The OT is four times as long as the NT"

No it just isn't.

Actually it almost is: "Words in the Bible: 773,692; Words in the Old Testament: 592,439; Words in the New Testament: 181,253" http://christianteens.about.com/od/understandingyourbible/qt/NumberFacts.htm

Ok, not four times, but definitely more than three times as long.

Putin, I love Mormons, but that doesn't mean that they are right.
Everyone, here's a link to a National Geographic article on the King James Bible that's well worth reading.
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/12/king-james-bible/nicolson-text

Why should raw length of the text matter so much?

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