21st Century Reformation

Philosophy Forums Religion and Spirituality
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A common attack used by non-bible-believers against bible-believers is the notion of “cherry picking”. CP is the act of referring to a collection of information and blatantly choosing the bits you like while also blatantly shunning the bits you do not like. For example it is not unheard of for a self proclaimed Christian to hold the bible as words directly from God, yet when presented certain immoral passages from Deuteronomy or Leviticus (like the ones about rape, stoning unruly children, not eating shellfish, not working on Sunday, yada yada) the Christian says something to the effect of “Oh well thats just the OLD testament… We have the new one now”. The irony/hypocrisy in this hypothetical quote is that the 10 commandments are from the old testament. Oh and so was the story of CREATION!

CP is very easy to spot. Its also just as hard to deny. What I don’t get is that people do it all the freakin time. Why do some Christians persist on using SOME of the bible as their divine inspiration? Do children in bible study classes even skim the bad stuff in the old testament? Do they know it exists? I know that I’m making a judgment call on the “badness” of the bible, but I would wager that not very many people are fans of stoning to death unruly children.

On that note. Why do so many Christians when presented the “cherry picking” accusation, simply shrug off the “bad” stuff as not literal, and that they are simply metaphors or whatever? After the thousands upon thousands of variant copies of the bible, these “metaphors” are still printed in the same general way. Why don’t they print the bible in such a way that there would be no room for ambiguity or vagueness.

Better yet, if you aren’t even going to bother reading the portions of the bible that do not fit into your own set of morals, then don’t keep printing those portions. There needs to be a new Martin Luther of the 21st century to stand up and say “All right look people. We can’t keep using this book if we’re going to keep picking out the stuff we like and not even mentioning the bad stuff. What we need to do is physically take out the bad stuff and only print the stuff we care about. Think of how much paper we’d save!” I’d do it myself, but theres the whole lack of belief in the bible thing going for me.

Just think of how much time and headache would be saved over biblical interpretation. If the bible were written in a straight forward, obvious, literal, NON-ambiguous, NON-vague fashion then things would be more easy going. It would be a lot easier to teach, and it would be a lot easier to congregate around it.

The Quran is a good example of a book that has at least be able to dodge the word processor. Granted I am not very familiar with what it actually says in the Quran, however I do know that a “true Quran” is only written in Arabic. All other versions are not considered pure because they are not in the word of Allah. I was told this by the guy who ran the gift shop at the local Mosque when i attended a service for my comparative religions class.

But seriously. Lets convene at Nicea again this year and discuss the new bible. One that can and SHOULD be taken literally. Would that be so hard?

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It’s a Protestant thing. You have to understand, the Bible is very long, and apparently every single line is of tremendous importance. If you plunk a heathen down with a Bible and expect them to get religion, there’s almost no chance of them getting it right. Not because of any deficiency in the Scriptures, but because
1.) It wasn’t written for them, and
2.) They haven’t the discipline or time to learn the whole thing.

So, somebody that learns that way will have a very piecemeal understanding of the Scriptures.  This would include most mouthy religious Westerners, of course. In this situation, it's easy for someone who reads the text slightly differently to point out some passage that seems to contradict the person's view, and then yes, it becomes about cherry-picking.  
In that set up, it may well be that cherry-picking is nearly inevitable.  The casual student of religion simply will not and cannot put in the necessary time and effort into having a coherent understanding of the entire Bible on their own. Luckily, we were never expected to do this.

The reason why people in this position (and I’m talking about entire denominations, here) ignore certain parts of the Bible instead of simply removing them is that removing parts of the Bible is an admission of heresy, even in the free-thinking west where the word hardly appears. That ‘we all read the same Bible’ is the final sign of orthodoxy left in these situations.

The simpler, more correct assumption is to find a tradition of interpreting the Scriptures that is consistent back to the time they were written, and submit oneself to it. One will still be guilty of a sort of cherry picking, as there will be parts of the Bible one knows, and part one doesn’t know yet, but at least they have a consistent resource to fall back on in those sorts of situations.

Also, it is not cherry picking to find parts of the Scriptures difficult. If a skeptic says "What about stoning children, HUH?!!?!" and tries to cause trouble, one isn't cherry picking to simply admit that they aren't sure how those verses fit into their broader understanding of the Scripture. There's no obligation on the believer to adopt the meanings the atheist attributes to these passages to avoid 'ignoring them'- and who cares how an atheist interprets the Bible, anyway?
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There is an obvious explanation for this ‘cherry picking’ and it reveals alot about Christianity. So many leading Christians in the west cherry pick and effectively rewrite the scripture that they claim to represent in a desperate attempt to keep Christianity alive and relevant in a modern society which is more diverse, liberal and open-minded and where many of the scripture’s fundamental principles are becoming increasingly irrelevant. It’s funny that as political values and public opinion changes nowadays, the church or at least the leading factions follow suit. As a result, Christianity, which was once a huge religion with one Catholic Church and one absolutist belief system, has segregated into two big churches (Catholic and Protestant) that are declining in size and influence due to their conservative stances (despite their own attempts to tweak laws) and hundreds of small churches and movements that conflict with eachother over the interpretation of scripture. This modern trend sparks the beginning of the death of Christianity as a mainstream religion over the next two centuries or so.

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Ucc,

Sounds easy enough. So what is this universal unifying tradition of interpretation? Who has the authority to declare this “official” interpretation? It seems from observation that the thousands of splinter groups loosely calling themselves Christian reserve the right of interpretation to themselves.

It would be interesting to see how the interpretation of a few of the books of the bible would manage to fit in todays society. I’m not sure that tradition is particularly helpful in that regard. But since I rejected religion a long time ago, it is possible I may have missed something. So tell me what is the correct tradition of interpretation?

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You’re right to point out that it’s a process of elimination, but identifying aims brings one closer to it. By acknowledging that Paul was a real person who lived, had authority (from which the Scriptures gain theirs) and conferred authority on others, we have the ability of a chain of authority that may or may not extend into the present day, that we can look into. The Catholics would lay claim to it, but they aren’t the only ones- what’s important is that looking at it this way will do a great bulk of the elimination for us- there’s only a select few Biblical outlooks that could possibly meet this standard, and they probably don’t deviate from each other all that much, either.

If you’re talking about ‘thousands’ of groups, you must be including the Protestants as many of them, and it’s rare for one Protestant denomination to begrudge the others, and say they are wrong enough to really make a difference. I’ve never heard the Prebyterians claim sole interpretative authority over against the Methodists, or what have you. So no, it’s not a matter of thousands of groups claiming to have authority, it’s a matter of them claiming there IS NO authority, and so interpreting by what seems best to them. I can’t see why you’d have a problem with that.

As far as I can tell, The Orthodox Church lays greatest claim to the tradition from which the Bible gets it’s authority, and seems to have deviated the least.

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Well, If there is a line of authority, it needs to be obviously clear and convincing. Little “differences” in interpretation could make the difference between heaven and hell. I can’t settle for “As far as I can tell”. If one is to submit to a particular tradition of interpretation, it is an up - down issue since the quality of afterlife hangs in the balance, does it not? I don’t have any problem with the concept, but I do have a problem with how one arrives at the guaranteed genuine article. From my perspective, it is much like watching the Presidential candidate debates.

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It is, to me. Again, there is some room for argument, but there's also plenty of argument that has been removed- by my standard of following a line of authority, perhaps the Catholics can make an argument, but the Jehovah's Witnesses surely can't.  So even if this simple principal doesn't put us in the right pew of the right church all by itself, it certainly removes a great deal of the confusion.

Then don’t ask me, look into it yourself. I’m confident you’ll find the same thing I did- the Orthodox Church has by far the greatest claim to apostolic authority.

No, I don’t think so, do you? Far as I know, Orthodoxy doesn’t make any claims about the eternal fate of Christians who aren’t in their Church. I’m pretty sure the only denomination to make claims like that would be the Catholics, and even they don’t do it anymore since the development of purgatory. Besides, if your motivation is really to avoid eternal damnation for choosing wrong, then making your best choice is necessarily better than not choosing at all. Again, though I really don’t think it comes down to that.

To put the analogy in context, I’m assuming then that you don’t vote?

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No, I always vote for the lesser of evils. :laughing:

Can you see that the individual is thrown back on themselves? That there is no way to find that definitive instruction manual short of simply making the best-informed guess? It calls into question the veracity of any or all religious certainty, both individually or collectively. Ultimately, such certainty is built on a foundation of sand no matter how fervently one wishes it to be otherwise. Making the “best choice” becomes an attempt to buy “fire insurance” with nothing supporting the policy but best guess. In short, traditional authority remains a shell game with nothing more than “I believe” to back it. If I’m on my own - and that is what I see, then the granting of authority will be to myself, since church authority isn’t likely to want to stand in for me at hell’s gate.

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No, I can’t see that, because I’ve spent several hundred words in this thread explaining to you quite clearly why that’s not the case, and you’ve ignored every one of them. You’re carrying on as though there’s nobody else talking, here.

No, I'm sorry, it doesn't.  If Principal A suggests that Church B is the most authoritative, Church B's veracity is not called into question merely on the grounds that people have to reflect on Principal A in order to see it. Rather, people ignorant of principal A call Church B's authority into question because that's what ignorance does- make mistakes.   This isn't about 'best guessing', this is about informed decision making. 

No. I've given you a foundation. It's right here in writing, a common-sense method to discern good interpretation from bad.  Use the method and see what conclusions it suggests, or tell me why the method isn't a good one.

Why do you ask questions and then ignore the answers? I already told you that almost no denomination teaches that all the others are in danger of hellfire, and you haven’t even interacted with my claim, you’re just going back to telling me how it is. Well, no, it’s not. You are quite demonstrably wrong on this. Read what the Church fathers say about followers of Christ who aren’t in the Church.

Is this even a conversation anymore? Were you looking for me to say anything in response to this?

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Ucc,

All I’m trying to point out is that ANY claim to religious authority, regardless it’s pedigree, is bases only on choosing to believe. There is no proof beyond opinion, no matter how carefully studied and constructed, that establishes authority. Authority=belief. Belief=authority. Fervent belief may grant authority, but only to the extent that one chooses to grant that authority. Authority granted from belief is not necessarily reality - unless of course, it becomes the same as any other mind construct.

What is so difficult with that?

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Hi Airex,

Yes, this is a problem for many contemporary Christians. The problem arises, however, from the fact that they are far removed from the cultural background of the OT and NT alike – and they belong to the Hellenised Christians. The influences of Greek thought shouldn’t be underestimated since they amount to a paradigm change. The fusion of Platonic and Aristotelian theology with Christianity brought, for example, the concepts of strict omnipotence and omniscience with which many Christians now struggle.

Paul was struggling against this influence in his letters (1 Corinthians 1:23-25):
“…we, on the other hand, preach Christ crucified (truly an offence to Jews, and foolishness to Greeks), but to those called out, both to Jews and to Greeks, Christ is the power of God (the pulsating life force) and the wisdom of God (the incarnate “chôkmâh”); because the foolish thing of God is wiser than men, and the weak thing of God is stronger than men…”
(Colossians 2:8 ): “See that no one carries you away as spoil through philosophy and vain deceit, according to the transmission of men, according to the fundamental principles of the world, and not according to Christ…”

The thing about CP is that it is only a problem when you start debating the Bible as a universal and infallible authority, to which you may not add and may not question. Otherwise, it is quite apparent that it is an anthology of writings which have been know to be helpful spiritually, even if as a “bad example” in some places. I find that even the most “difficult” texts can inspire in some way at some time, and I don’t expect them all to inspire all of the time.

It is precisely to prevent CP that those who have safeguarded scripture haven’t started radically editing it. It is easy to see what the accusations would be if the Bible was ridden of all those parts that are uncomfortable.

Unfortunately, you are showing your ignorance here. Just because our society has difficulties understanding such ancient wisdom, it isn’t the answer to make a comic version.

We have a Hebrew, and Aramaic and a Greek Bible. We just have too few people who can read these ancient languages – Arabic, which also belongs to the Semitic languages like Aramaic and Hebrew, is a further development of these and is a living language. That is the advantage of the Qumran. There are similar problems with Pali.

Shalom

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The whole bible could be reduced to the command: ‘Thou shalt not think!’.

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[-X Errantists bray that we naturalists use inerrancy to discredit all religon,but as show above, errancy has its own problems. Errantists say the Bible is not about how the heavens move but how we move to Heaven. That is absurd in that its message of redemption through Christ is absurd itself. He was no god and no real reformer of morality. His was the morality of the times- barbaric ones.We save ourselves through reason and facts, not through a dead Galilean! Errantists cherry picking should lead them to atheism. Bishop John Shelby Spong almost is an atheist but he has to have his silly faith to sustain him nevertheless :^o . He finds the evil parts of the book horrid and advocates a humanistic morality. Walter Kaufmann shows at length the cherry picking in his books on religion.One should read them for their gleanings! [-X

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tentative

Well, ok. You pointed it out. Congratulations!

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Ucc,

Thanks for the congrats, but I’m not done. If authority is based on belief, then does not the believer have the obligation to grant disparate beliefs to others? In short, there is no basis for your beliefs to have any more credence than my beliefs. Regardless each of our claims of “authority”, there is no factual basis for any religion to make claims about or for anyone other than it’s adherents. While you may grant authority and submit to the dogma put forward by your particular religion, you may not do so for me. Any problem with this so far?

Assuming that thinking people understand and accept this, then all social conflict must find a different basis other than religious belief to create the necessary compromises to live side by side. To continue pushing personal religious beliefs is, at best, anti-social behavior because it denies the personal beliefs of others. Taken to it’s extreme, we find the extremist violence that exists today, and while there are many mitigating factors, the root cause is religious beliefs being forced on others.

Either religious authority discovers a way to begin approaching compromise, or the religious wars will of necessity continue. Is this really what God would want for the children?

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tentative

 I know it doesn't matter, but you haven't established this.  Given that authority gains it's legitimacy from people's belief, it does not follow that all those beliefs are equally (non)credible- unless by 'belief' you always mean 'unfounded belief', and then you're just stating a tautology.  The system I described above is precisely a way of showing that not all belief IS equally credible, and that's why it would have been important to address. 
 Another thing you would need to argue for,  is this concept that a lack of objectivity requires us to respect differences. It's as if you want to simultaneously argue that factuality is impossible and irrelevant to spirituality on the one hand, and yet some ultimate arbiter of our religious behavior on the other. I don't think you can have it both ways- once I grant that rationality is impossible in my faith, why should I let it's absence phase me? If I can't kill the Christians because I'm right and they're wrong, then I can always kill them because I don't like the way they sing- and you've left yourself with no rational grounds on which to oppose me.    
 The rest of what you're saying builds on this set up, so there's really not much point in getting into it, since I couldn't disagree more with that set up.
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Not everyone cherry picks.

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Ucc,

I’m not sure that you are seeing the circularity of your argument, but I’ll go along with it. Lets start with something simple. What is the criteria for the term credible? What are those things that make a belief, yours or mine, convincing? What is the common basis for either of us to even say the word credible?

That is exactly what I am saying, with one caveat: To the extent that your beliefs affect only you, I could care less what those beliefs might be. But when your religious practices affect me, then there might be a problem.

I’m not trying to have it both ways unless your claim is that spirituality and religion are one and the same thing. If your religious practices demand the irrational killing of the “unbelievers”, I have plenty of “rational” objections that can be brought to bear. But that is a discussion for later. First, I want to hear the definition of credible and then the rationale in finding inequality in belief systems.

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tentative

Well, in this case the common basis for credibility would be the Scriptures. Keep in mind, the whole point of the discussion is how we know which interpretation to go with, and how we know which parts of the Scriptures to take what way- that means that for the purposes of the discussion, the Scriptures have implicit credibility, and my argument is relying on that.
Now, in answer to your question, what makes a belief ‘convincing’ is that it has the tendency to convince people. That’s the purest answer. Unless I’m mistaken, we respect reason because of it’s overwhelming tendency to convince people.

Yes, there might be a problem, I might scalp you and ram your head on a spit. If you don’t like it, tough-titty: get more guns or more friends. Or at least, that what we’re left with if rationality really isn’t a factor. Rationality really governs all- without it, you don’t get your caveat.

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A quote from William H. Burr’s 1860 “Self-contradictions in the bible” Where he listed 144 different contradictions on matters theological, moral historical and speculative. Most of them are indeed perfect self-contradictions. That is, one cannot be true without the other being false.

To whit:

I suppose they could have all been typos.