Maksutov wrote:See, that's the thing, Quasi. Back in the day, these illiterate sheepherders needed entertainment. There weren't any stories about Ents or The Day of the Trifids so they had to make do with what they had. And so, like the Greeks and the Hindus, they all made up crazy stories about their gods to kill time, scare the kids, and come up with lame analogies. They justified their dickishness with crap like God saying it was okay to genocide the Canaanites, and dissing the goat herders and swine herders and the other Jews, even to the point of blaming them for the actions of the Romans. Mean stories made up to rewrite history.
Really good for explaining the unexplainable, too.
A neolithic boy, after a family tragedy, asks "Grandpa, why do people have to die?"
Grandpa "Well it wasn't always that way. Adam and Eve didn't have to die in the beginning. God meant them to live forever, but once they started having babies, God had to create death to make room for all the new people."
This, or any other post that I have made or will make in the future, is strictly my own opinion and consequently of little or no value.
"Faith is believing something you know ain't true" Twain.
SPG wrote:There are many inconsistencies with the story of Noah's Ark. It is easy to find flaws in the story and quickly dismiss it. That is the doubters way. However in the search for evidence of Noah's Ark many fascinating elements of nature have been found. There is evidence of a flood. And there are stories and several cultures about the flood. There are also stories of the last ice age in the melting of it. But there are also other spiritual considerations that the ark was some sort of symbol. I don't believe that it was a boat necessarily. Or that it had two of every animal on Earth. But in the old books there are references to the god of the world trying to kill the human race with the flood.
Ya, they are all fictional stories developed over thousands of years based on common flood events all around the world. Floods can have real impacts on humans so they become part of the many stories humans create.
SPG wrote:There are many inconsistencies with the story of Noah's Ark. It is easy to find flaws in the story and quickly dismiss it. That is the doubters way. However in the search for evidence of Noah's Ark many fascinating elements of nature have been found. There is evidence of a flood. And there are stories and several cultures about the flood. There are also stories of the last ice age in the melting of it. But there are also other spiritual considerations that the ark was some sort of symbol. I don't believe that it was a boat necessarily. Or that it had two of every animal on Earth. But in the old books there are references to the god of the world trying to kill the human race with the flood.
Ya, they are all fictional stories developed over thousands of years based on common flood events all around the world. Floods can have real impacts on humans so they become part of the many stories humans create.
Earth quakes, lunar and solar eclipses, meteor showers, epidemics, animal migrations--all become supernatural if you adopt a prescientific world view.
SPG wrote:There are many inconsistencies with the story of Noah's Ark. It is easy to find flaws in the story and quickly dismiss it. That is the doubters way. However in the search for evidence of Noah's Ark many fascinating elements of nature have been found. There is evidence of a flood. And there are stories and several cultures about the flood. There are also stories of the last ice age in the melting of it. But there are also other spiritual considerations that the ark was some sort of symbol. I don't believe that it was a boat necessarily. Or that it had two of every animal on Earth. But in the old books there are references to the god of the world trying to kill the human race with the flood.
Floods are common. The melting of glaciers at the end of the Pleistocene probably impressed people a great deal and caused a lot of moving around at the time. "God did it" is a good explanation for anything someone doesn't understand very well. Religion is a perfect Catch 22 until science gets around to finding a better explanation.
This, or any other post that I have made or will make in the future, is strictly my own opinion and consequently of little or no value.
"Faith is believing something you know ain't true" Twain.
Maksutov wrote: Earth quakes, lunar and solar eclipses, meteor showers, epidemics, animal migrations--all become supernatural if you adopt a prescientific world view.
It's a reasonable assumption given their lack of knowledge about how the world works. It's not for people today.
Maksutov wrote: Earth quakes, lunar and solar eclipses, meteor showers, epidemics, animal migrations--all become supernatural if you adopt a prescientific world view.
It's a reasonable assumption given their lack of knowledge about how the world works. It's not for people today.
I think that the "reasonable" word is key. People living in a scientific age don't always accept it or want to understand it. You can have nostalgia for the "old time religion" to a point. Where is that point? That question generates a million interpretations, movements and preachers.
Case in point: Lemuria. Lemuria was a hypothesis when we understood the distribution of species differently and before grasping continental drift. It was discredited but not before it passed under the sacred umbrella through the works of Blavatsky and others. Now we have Lemurians hanging out at Mount Shasta when they're not zipping in and out of the hollow earth in their flying saucers on their way to Zeta Reticuli.
bomgeography wrote:Some of the Bible stories are viewed figuratively such as the creation of the earth and the flood. I personally believe the flood was local. But I would consider myself regular believing member and same for others who believe the flood was local.
So, do you have a list of Bible stories that are dependable and those that aren't? How do you decide?
If that is how you view the Bible, do you have the same sort of doubts about the Book of Mormon and the Book of Abraham? If not, why not?
