Why read the Bible literally?

Then you must not have read the Talmud. Even a cursory glance at the Talmud will show that there are differing interpretations of nearly every part of the Tanaka and Torah.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

It says that Jews of the period did not take the OT literally.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

You keep repeating that but so far you've never shown any evidence that anyone ever took the Bible literally.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

but you've never supplied any evidence to support your assertion.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

I can and have read the sources, Faith. And so far you have shown no reason to consider them as factual as opposed to metaphor. To simply point to what we can all read does not support the usage or intent of what was said.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Nope. In fact it's pretty clear that most of those things never happened. Because GOD gave us brains to think with, eyes to see with and a wonderful world to explore.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Well, I do believe the Bible, but I also know it was never meant to be taken literally.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Because I know it disagrees with science and archeology, but also because it contains internal inconsistencies and absurdities. In addition, it's an anthology of anthologies with multiple authors and redactors. Further, it was not considered as something to be read lierally by the folk who compiled it.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

First, I've never found a Messianic Prophesy that's was fullfilled.The Exodus of course, never happened or at the least, never happened as described in the Bible.The Bible is true, but not accurate. There was no literal Garden of Eden, no Flood, no Exodus, no certainly conquest of Canaan.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

It doesn't take much to debunk the Exodus tale.First, there is no indication that there ever was a large Hebrew population in Egypt.Second, if the story were true there would be considerable outside evidence.

• there would have been a power vacuum in the area and the other world powers would have taken notice.
• there would have been a period of internal turmoil while the succession was determined. There are no such periods.
• the troops and supplies lost would have had to be replaced.
  
  • the Egyptians would have had to replace all the horses lost.
  • all the weaponry lost.
  • hundreds or thousands of chariots would have had to be replaced.
  • loss of about one third of the population would have left definte signs.
    
  
  

In addition there are all the internal inconsistencies of the story itself as well as the absolute absurdity of so many of the incidents related in the Biblical tale.Sorry, it's fantasy.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Sorry Charlie. Semite does not equal Hebrew.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Sure. It's entirely possible that it happened on a much smaller scale, one dealing with a family group. But the Biblical account is beyond reason.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

I've been struggling over the issue of whether such people have weak faith or whether it is simply that they have lost track of the object and their faith is strong but totally misplaced. Over time I've come to the potential conclusion (tenatively held I must add) that their faith is strong but misplaced.I think that such people have lost track of what the purpose of the Bible really is, they have set up their own Golden Calf and are happily worshipping at that altar. Their faith is as strong, perhaps even stronger than that of other Christians and people in general, it's simply that they've lost sight of GOD.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Exactly. You and all those like you continue the Blaspheme GOD and his word. What you practice is not religion but willfull ignorance. God does not demand or desire the continued peversion of his word. It's time for Christians to stand up and declare that folk like you cannot continue to play the religious trump card. It's time for all Christians to stand up and denounce YECs and Classic Creationists and to point out that their behavior has nothing to do with Christianity and is only a means to enslave youth to a life of ignorance.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

No, but folk like Faith rely on everyone backing off when they pull out the Religion Card. They bring up things like tolerance.It's reasonable to expect tolerance for handicaps, for sexual orientation, for political beliefs, for skin color, for differing viewpoints on the existance, non-existence or identity of GOD.But should willful ignorance be tolerated?

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion