ideologyhunter
Contributor
Here's a short list of injunctions from Holy Writ that God's associates (in the WalMart sense) seem to want nothing to do with. All Bible quotations are from the UPV (Unauthorized Personalized Version).
Ex. 21:22-3: If men fight and hurt a pregnant woman, causing her to miscarry, and yet no harm follow, the one who hurt her shall be fined, the amount to be set by her husband. But if any harm follow, you shall give a life for a life, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a hand for a hand, a foot for a foot.
So the unborn do not have the same status as me as I write this or you as you read it. And the second sentence is generally interpreted as meaning harm to the mother. Which means the Right to Lifers never preach from this passage.
Christian blowback: I've read one on-line rebuttal in which the writer claims that the RSV got the word 'miscarriage' wrong -- that the real meaning of the passage is that a pregnant woman gives birth prematurely, the baby survives, and the 'any harm' passage means any harm that befalls the baby. I find that a fantastic bit of apologetics -- it just seems like an unjustified reach that, if true, would have required more verbiage in Exodus, besides the fact that the text is from four (five?) thousand years ago, when there would have been very few premature births resulting from injury that produced a live baby.
Jer. 10:3-5: ...for the religion of these people is worthless. They cut a tree down in the forest, a craftsman works it with an axe, and they decorate it with gold and silver. They fasten it with hammer and nails so that it cannot move. Such idols are scarecrows... they can do you no good.
In a phrase, you & your Christmas tree are goin' to hell.
Christian blowback: They say that the passage refers to carving idols, and that the craftsman/axe passage shows that; that this scripture was written centuries before it was customary to have a decorated tree for religious holidays. Here, I'm ready to concede the point. I don't care. But it's so much fun to have a Bible passage that seems to describe just how Christmas trees are made, and to rebuke the practice. It makes a perfect message for an anti-Christmas card (I used it last year.)
Mt. 19:16-21: One young man approached him, saying, Teacher, what good deed must I do, to earn eternal life? And Jesus said... if you would enter life, keep the commandments. ...The young man said, I have kept the commandments. What else must I do? Jesus said, if you would be perfect, go, sell all your possessions, and give the money to the poor, for you will have treasure in heaven. Then follow me.
There it is, a guy asking the savior point-blank for the key to eternal life and Jesus tells him to give away all his possessions. Of course it harmonizes with a number of other anti-materialist teachings from Jesus (not worrying about tomorrow, rich man/camel, etc, etc.) So apparently the Religious Right has its head way up its ass, and the true Christians are monks and nuns. Who preaches this, or ever preached this, to a mainstream congregation? How important is the vow of poverty, to Jesus?
Christian blowback: The prosperity gospel types, like Osteen et al, but I don't really know how they address this specific passage.
Mt. 5:40, 42: (Jesus speaking): When someone asks you for your coat, give him your shirt as well... When anyone asks you for something, give it, if someone seeks to borrow from you, lend it to him.
This is from the Sermon on the Mount, which should give it definitive status, for the faithful. It is reinforced by Jesus in Luke 6:30: Give to everyone who begs of you. And if someone takes your goods, do not ask for them back.
If I were religious, I'd resist these teachings, too. They're zany. They would reduce you to an impossible existence. They make sense, just a little sense, if you're a free-loading hippie hitchhiker relying on handouts. They are also explicit and seem to have little wiggle room. (It may be apocryphal, but I read somewhere that an atheist wrote to Jerry Falwell, citing Mt. 5:42 and demanding that Falwell, as a faithful Christian, give him his car. Falwell declined.) But there is Christian blowback -- I've read a commentary on these teachings (on a website called Tektonics or something like that) to the effect that these are true teachings of Jesus but they no longer apply to us!! According to this writer, they applied to a time and place where there was no practical law enforcement, so that you had to acquiesce to force and give up what you had. I find this ludicrous on every level -- the passage makes no mention whatever of personal danger, it puts forth the act of giving as an altruistic act of pure virtue, not a self-defense strategy. Furthermore, it is the (Christian) writer who is claiming these teachings no longer apply -- so, what else in the Bible is no longer binding? In reality, it's a modern-day Christian who sees that a teaching is zany and wants to get out from under it.
Prov. 27:2: Let others praise you, not your own mouth; a stranger, and not your own tongue.
I'm including this simply because it's one fine little Bible verse, one that I can endorse. I wish my fellow citizens could embrace it. We're a country that is addicted to blowhard boasting that must really bore (or provoke, or amuse) the rest of the planet. Nothing makes us look sillier than American Exceptionalism (aka Self-Love from Lard-Asses.)
Ex. 21:22-3: If men fight and hurt a pregnant woman, causing her to miscarry, and yet no harm follow, the one who hurt her shall be fined, the amount to be set by her husband. But if any harm follow, you shall give a life for a life, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a hand for a hand, a foot for a foot.
So the unborn do not have the same status as me as I write this or you as you read it. And the second sentence is generally interpreted as meaning harm to the mother. Which means the Right to Lifers never preach from this passage.
Christian blowback: I've read one on-line rebuttal in which the writer claims that the RSV got the word 'miscarriage' wrong -- that the real meaning of the passage is that a pregnant woman gives birth prematurely, the baby survives, and the 'any harm' passage means any harm that befalls the baby. I find that a fantastic bit of apologetics -- it just seems like an unjustified reach that, if true, would have required more verbiage in Exodus, besides the fact that the text is from four (five?) thousand years ago, when there would have been very few premature births resulting from injury that produced a live baby.
Jer. 10:3-5: ...for the religion of these people is worthless. They cut a tree down in the forest, a craftsman works it with an axe, and they decorate it with gold and silver. They fasten it with hammer and nails so that it cannot move. Such idols are scarecrows... they can do you no good.
In a phrase, you & your Christmas tree are goin' to hell.
Christian blowback: They say that the passage refers to carving idols, and that the craftsman/axe passage shows that; that this scripture was written centuries before it was customary to have a decorated tree for religious holidays. Here, I'm ready to concede the point. I don't care. But it's so much fun to have a Bible passage that seems to describe just how Christmas trees are made, and to rebuke the practice. It makes a perfect message for an anti-Christmas card (I used it last year.)
Mt. 19:16-21: One young man approached him, saying, Teacher, what good deed must I do, to earn eternal life? And Jesus said... if you would enter life, keep the commandments. ...The young man said, I have kept the commandments. What else must I do? Jesus said, if you would be perfect, go, sell all your possessions, and give the money to the poor, for you will have treasure in heaven. Then follow me.
There it is, a guy asking the savior point-blank for the key to eternal life and Jesus tells him to give away all his possessions. Of course it harmonizes with a number of other anti-materialist teachings from Jesus (not worrying about tomorrow, rich man/camel, etc, etc.) So apparently the Religious Right has its head way up its ass, and the true Christians are monks and nuns. Who preaches this, or ever preached this, to a mainstream congregation? How important is the vow of poverty, to Jesus?
Christian blowback: The prosperity gospel types, like Osteen et al, but I don't really know how they address this specific passage.
Mt. 5:40, 42: (Jesus speaking): When someone asks you for your coat, give him your shirt as well... When anyone asks you for something, give it, if someone seeks to borrow from you, lend it to him.
This is from the Sermon on the Mount, which should give it definitive status, for the faithful. It is reinforced by Jesus in Luke 6:30: Give to everyone who begs of you. And if someone takes your goods, do not ask for them back.
If I were religious, I'd resist these teachings, too. They're zany. They would reduce you to an impossible existence. They make sense, just a little sense, if you're a free-loading hippie hitchhiker relying on handouts. They are also explicit and seem to have little wiggle room. (It may be apocryphal, but I read somewhere that an atheist wrote to Jerry Falwell, citing Mt. 5:42 and demanding that Falwell, as a faithful Christian, give him his car. Falwell declined.) But there is Christian blowback -- I've read a commentary on these teachings (on a website called Tektonics or something like that) to the effect that these are true teachings of Jesus but they no longer apply to us!! According to this writer, they applied to a time and place where there was no practical law enforcement, so that you had to acquiesce to force and give up what you had. I find this ludicrous on every level -- the passage makes no mention whatever of personal danger, it puts forth the act of giving as an altruistic act of pure virtue, not a self-defense strategy. Furthermore, it is the (Christian) writer who is claiming these teachings no longer apply -- so, what else in the Bible is no longer binding? In reality, it's a modern-day Christian who sees that a teaching is zany and wants to get out from under it.
Prov. 27:2: Let others praise you, not your own mouth; a stranger, and not your own tongue.
I'm including this simply because it's one fine little Bible verse, one that I can endorse. I wish my fellow citizens could embrace it. We're a country that is addicted to blowhard boasting that must really bore (or provoke, or amuse) the rest of the planet. Nothing makes us look sillier than American Exceptionalism (aka Self-Love from Lard-Asses.)
