Could the bible be true?… If read properly.
Offline One of the main defenses that a religious person will make when the bible is challenged is that the book is written metaphorically. A counter argument I like to make is if the bible is metaphor then why can’t “god” be a metaphor? I will use the example of “Mother Nature”, people often refer to Mother Nature but no one I’ve ever met actually thinks of Mother Nature as an actual walking talking being. Now if the term “God” was simply just another metaphor for nature, then it might actually add some truth to the bible. For instance the story of Adam and Eve… Adam was created from mud and Eve from his rib. Could that be metaphor for the beginning of life where the first life form came from the elements and then reproduced by splitting to create the next. So the story of Adam and Eve could be metaphor for the spawning of the first unicellular life form, which reproduces by dividing? The Garden of Eden could have simply been the spawning ground where all the conditions were right. If the term “God” were just another term for the elements then the statement that God has always been and always will be, would have some truth to it. The elements did create the Earth, the oceans and everything else that the universe provides. Granted it took a bit longer than a week, but we’re talking metaphor here... Just a random thought, what do you guys think?
Free your mind.
- Login to post comments
Hmm.. Where's the metaphor that represents all of the dead people that were killed at the request of, or in the name of...god ?
Explain the dead people !
"In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act."
George Orwell
No no no... George Bush comes way after the bible. But there were plenty of angry volcanos back then that ate people.
Free your mind.
It could also explain the flood. I can't wait to see the angry NO NO NO posts some theists are gonna reply, you dirty non-believer!!
Did you guys know that Jesus was actually an identical twin? His twin brother, Easter, lived a few hundred miles north where he worked as a ranch hand. When word got to him that Jesus was going to be crucified, he jumped on his donkey and raced down to be with him. Unfortunately, he was three days late.
Free your mind.
Oh, that was terrible. Just terrible. (In a good way.)
As for your first question, can't anything be taken as a metaphor?
Welcome to the boards!
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
That's actually the point I was trying to make, if the bible is written in metaphor, why can't God also be merely a metaphor? Sure it's written that he spoke to people, but we have people today that say they speak to nature. I myself have been known to yell at my car, my television and various lottery machines. Everyone has occasions where they talk to nonliving things as if they were living, but no one actually believes those things can actually listen to you. If I wrote a book, could it be picked up 2,000 years in the future and actually create a cult following where people believe that in ancient times, the mighty god known as 'Lottery' gave riches to those most worthy and inflicted suffering to those who sinned?
Free your mind.
Here's what bothers me: metaphor or no metaphor, it is mostly a work of fiction. Trying to make a case for the Bible holding metaphorical truths is about as pointless as trying to make a case for any other fictional story. Not that historians are wrong for researching and interpreting, but the whole "is it true?" question is needless.
Not that it lacks literary merit. Plenty of concepts/phrases have "come out" of the many versions of the Bible.
*Our world is far more complex than the rigid structure we want to assign to it, and we will probably never fully understand it.*
"Those believers who are sophisticated enough to understand the paradox have found exciting ways to bend logic into pretzel shapes in order to defend the indefensible." - Hamby
Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.
"God" is nothing but the utterance of ignorace in the refusal to accept one's on mortality.
God/god(s) are nothing but a gap answer in the face of the reality that the ride does not last forever.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
Is it a work of fiction or intended to be a work of fiction? Couldn't it have simply been the writings of people trying to explain the world as they understood it? If I had no concept of science, I might think that a simple chemical reaction were magic or a strange animal skeleton might be a demon. I used to have a dinosaur book as a child that showed a t-rex walking upright, dragging it's tail. We now know that such an image is a misrepresentation, but it wouldn't mean that the book was a work of fiction, just how people understood it at the time.
Now if there were a group of people that tried to use that 30 year old book to disprove more modern science, I would definitely consider those people to be idiots.
Free your mind.