HammerOfJustice
Since: Apr, 2013
09/12/2018 00:00:00
Certainly doesn\'t help that a lot of what we know of culture around that era comes form this in the first place and few other records survived. The Dead Sea Scrolls didn\'t really contain much new stuff. Their key role was being written about fifty years to a century after it had all happened, meaning some authors likely personally knew people who were involved in/witnessed the events recorded, and very little of what was recorded had changed as of their discovery in 1946.
If you're going to put up a review of something, MAKE SURE IT HAS A PAGE FIRST!Leave a Comment:
Can this book be reviewed (or read) without bias?
With the countless different interpretations of scripture this is extremely difficult. Yet everyone claims that they as: an atheist, a conservative Christian, a liberal Christian, a Muslim, a Jewish person, etc. hold the keys for objective interpretation. Atheists tend to be pretty objective, yet they introduce cultural bias in their reading. Conservative Christians can (to the dismay/surprise of some of these other groups) display interdenominational unity with their interpretation, while arguing about nonessential issues like holy ghost vs holy spirit, or KJV only-ism. Liberal Christians engage in Biblical criticism while still claiming to take the work "seriously", they accept almost any interpretation (except the conservative one). Islam is basically a faith that positions itself as a "clarification" of Judeo Christianity (there are some misinterpretations). Judaism is the most complicated of all, while Judaism predates Christianity the latter is a continuation of Judaism. Here the Jewish person notes that they share the faith of the founder and most of the writers of Christianity, and therefore they can judge the scriptures the most objectively. The issue with Judaism is that this faith wasn't unified by any means when Christianity took off in the 1st century. Ergo "being Jewish" doesn't grant objectivity here.
What's worse is that we can find "experts" and "scholars" to defend or interpret from these perspectives (Bart Ehrman, William Pane Craig, etc). With everyone having their own facts, objectivity can't come through information alone (unless we have a time machine). Instead of presuming our position is better than someone else's, let's look at the scripture from another perspective. In my case, I'm a Conservative Christian who subconsciously roots for the liberal side. So I give the burden of proof to them. So far, they still manage to be attractive in their beliefs, but provide nothing to win me over (substantive arguments). I would suggest this as well to anyone approaching this work. Interpret the scriptures as another person besides yourself. If you "like" or feel loyal to one side, interpret it from the opposite. You may not change what you believe, but you'll see the other perspective more clearly.