Politcally Correct Christ

There was a writer and translator, Vladimir Nabokov, who grew up in Russia but who immigrated to the US and wrote his later novels in English, who had the theory that the only true translation was a literal rendering with the addition of copious notes, explaining all the connotations of various passages. He tried that with translating Pushkin's poem Eugene Onegin into English. The end result was several volumes, mostly notes.If one tried that for the Bible, it would be a massive tomb, but might be the most accurate.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

There seems to be a lot of that going around these days. I guess he's "modernizing" as you suggested.

So as long he admits that he's modernizing, that's ok as far as you're concerned? He can still call his view in basic agreement with the scriptures.

When I said "ok with you," I meant in a logical not in an emotional sense.

Yes, but that's not what I'm asking you. Apart from any inconsistency on his part, do you think it is proper for him to interpret those Biblical passages the way he did?

Well, obviously you do think what he does is proper since you do the same thing yourself by "modernizing"--except that your (and Jar's) "interpretations" are even further from some fairly obvious meanings that the authors had in mind.As regards the uncertainty of interpretation, it depends on what passages are in question and how frequently the same apparent meanings appear.Not all interpretations are equally plausible.Some passages are obscure, some not obscure.

Do you believe that?

Oh, well, in that case we can interpret it any way we please, such as what follows.Mat 26:26 And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed [it], and brake [it], and gave [it] to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body.Mat 26:27 And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave [it] to them, saying, Drink ye all of it;Mat 26:28 For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.So if we adopt the interpretive philosophy outlined by you above, we might say something like this:In the old days, they interpreted this passage as meaning that Jesus is going to die as payment for our sins. But God is giving me another message here, different from that old message. In this scene, we are symbolically eating God. Now what does this mean?It means that God is getting inside of us and becoming a part of us, just as the potatoes we eat become a part of us. In the same way, the body and blood of Christ become us. Or another way of putting it is to say that we are becoming God. Through our various scientific advances, we can move things around real fast, and heat things up and cool things off real fast, and make complicated things out of many simple ingredients, and cure some diseases. In that way, we are becoming more and more Godlike. We are performing miracles. If we keep eating God, we will be able to do all of manner of things just as God does. God wants us to do this.As regards that last bit about shedding the blood for the remissions of the sins of many, the new way of thinking of this is not that it is a propitiation. Notice that word "remission." If our taxes are remitted, it means we don't have to pay them. And so, in effect, we never had any taxes to begin with. Such is the meaning here. We never had any sins to begin with. What Jesus is saying is that this old idea that God expects payment for "sins" is nonsense. It's not a propitiation; it's an explanation of the new modern philosophy. The remission is that of the IDEA of sin, not sin per se. It is the "blood of the New Testament" that is being remitted--in other words, all those ancient ideas such as propitiation that were believed by the people who lived during the writing of the New Testament are hereby remitted.That will do as well as another.

That was supposed to be an example of a very implausible interpretation.

You got to be kidding me. I just made that up.

I was interpreting a particular passage not speaking generally of the New Testament. I have not seen your interpretation of that passage. I deny that. I am very familiar with Jar's views. I have indeed summarized them at variious times. But I have never seen any interpretation by him of that particular passage of Matthew. You tend to be rather coy about your own views however. If you spell them out, I will know what they are. Edited by robinrohan, : No reason given.

No, this won't do. You wouldn't even take a stand in the poll.

Declare your beliefs.

This is foolish. You tell me I'm copying your beliefs in my wild interpretation, which was meant as satire, and then when I ask you what you believe, you refuse to say.Everybody knows what I believe. And everyone knows what Jar believes, and Crashfrog, and Schrafinator, and Faith and Iano.So we are all subject to criticism. But you apparently want to stay mysterious, in which case you can always deny that you believe this or that.

Well, you are just a damned coward.