Sunday, April 23, 2006
Opps I did it again
OK, this time a serious, serious post.
I recently read the Gospel of Judas (pdf). I found it really intresting. I'm thinking of picking up some of the other gnostic gospels. I find it interesting how other traditiong (even other/former christian traditions) explain some of the complicated things in the bible, or dare I say; some of the contradictions (John Schuit would be so disappointed in me). I mean from my limitied understanding, some of the gnostics believed that the god of the old testament was actually satan. This explains the genocide and the child killing, and why Jesus often seems so different from the god of the old testament. Some of the Doukhobor's only accepted the gospels as scripture.
Some of the answers I've gotten (ie from bible college) about the issues in the old testament stuff are less then satisfying. For instance 'you have to have faith that God's justice is just'. Well, sorry, but I have trouble justifying genocide and killing children. Maybe it's because I've been raised and educated in a liberal society. But it seems that 'thou shalt not kill' and 'kill them all' are two very different things. Now maybe 'thou shalt not kill' only meant 'thou shalt not kill your fellow jew', but that doesn't seem to work well either. Another answer is, 'we'll never know, you just have to have faith'. Well sorry, but I only have so much faith to go around. Most of it gets tied up in believeing there is a God above, believeing that there is some sort of super natural hierchy, and believing that God has a son, and the son has a ghost (a holy one at that) and that these 3 things are actually the same. So maybe i'm still on 'milk' when I should be on 'meat', or maybe this is the 'meat'. I dunno. (gotta love arm chair theology)
(seriously, I'll do anything not to study)
I recently read the Gospel of Judas (pdf). I found it really intresting. I'm thinking of picking up some of the other gnostic gospels. I find it interesting how other traditiong (even other/former christian traditions) explain some of the complicated things in the bible, or dare I say; some of the contradictions (John Schuit would be so disappointed in me). I mean from my limitied understanding, some of the gnostics believed that the god of the old testament was actually satan. This explains the genocide and the child killing, and why Jesus often seems so different from the god of the old testament. Some of the Doukhobor's only accepted the gospels as scripture.
Some of the answers I've gotten (ie from bible college) about the issues in the old testament stuff are less then satisfying. For instance 'you have to have faith that God's justice is just'. Well, sorry, but I have trouble justifying genocide and killing children. Maybe it's because I've been raised and educated in a liberal society. But it seems that 'thou shalt not kill' and 'kill them all' are two very different things. Now maybe 'thou shalt not kill' only meant 'thou shalt not kill your fellow jew', but that doesn't seem to work well either. Another answer is, 'we'll never know, you just have to have faith'. Well sorry, but I only have so much faith to go around. Most of it gets tied up in believeing there is a God above, believeing that there is some sort of super natural hierchy, and believing that God has a son, and the son has a ghost (a holy one at that) and that these 3 things are actually the same. So maybe i'm still on 'milk' when I should be on 'meat', or maybe this is the 'meat'. I dunno. (gotta love arm chair theology)
(seriously, I'll do anything not to study)
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