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Topic: More quotes: Biblical (Read 5702 times)
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Art
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A better translation is the NIV, which puts it as "It is better to marry than to burn with desire". The "burning" here is a figure of speech for sexual desire. In the early church there were a whole lot of people who wanted to become celibate so they could devote their lives to God, and Paul is telling them that in the grand scheme of things they'll serve God better if they indulge their romantic and sexual sides rather than trying to bottle up their sexual needs and "burning".
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0xDEC0DE
*Many bubbles*
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Posts: 175
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My personal favourite Bible passage is 2 Kings 2:23-2:24:
And he went up from thence unto Bethel: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, "Go up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head." And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the LORD. And there came forth two she-bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two children of them.
God hates kids!
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"I’m not a robot like you. I don’t like having disks crammed into me… unless they’re Oreos, and then only in the mouth." --Fry
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Art
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Well... no. John 11:35-36 is "Jesus wept. Then the Jews said, 'See how he loved him!'" (Jesus is at the funeral of one of his best friends, Lazarus, whom he subsequently resurrects.)
"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (one of Jesus' last statements on the cross) is in both Matthew 27:46 and Mark 15:34; John's Gospel doesn't mention it.
Also, on the story about Elisha getting the kids eaten by bears: that story's often interpreted these days to be God randomly and unjustly killing off small children for being annoying, but most scholars agree that in context the word "children" in the KJV is better translated "youths" (as it is in the NIV) and actually refers to not-yet-grown teenage boys. The "baldhead" slur aside, "going up" in Hebrew is idiomatic for dying and going to heaven (as in "He was taken up", something you hear a few times in other contexts), and it seems like they were mocking Elisha by making veiled death threats to him. Whether it's just for God to miraculously kill people or not, the situation isn't one of innocent kids teasing -- it's of teenagers surrounding an old man and threatening him.
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Clay
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Too serious or not, I find Art's explanations fascinating on a random factoid level.. But then again, I love random factoids!
Now if only someone knew why Greenish's bridge turns Purple....
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Art
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And to those who would claim that Art is too serious, I would rebuke that claim. Offering "self-defense" as an explanation for the story of Elisha going to Bethel is the most hilarious thing I've read in YEARS.
Well... it's true. No modern Bible translation uses the word "children" there, and the idiomatic meaning of "go on up" is pretty well-known to people who read the Bible.
There are certainly places where the Biblical God acts in ways that are very hard to defend, but the Elisha story is not a good pick, precisely because the interpretation people get from reading the King James Version of the story is so outrageous.
FWIW the OP said that we were going to not try to take things out of context or be unnecessarily offensive to people who take these texts as sacred, and I think the whole practice of "quoting funny verses" makes both of those inevitable.
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Culture20
Enlightened
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Posts: 917
Thraddash Flower Child
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Hi All, been away a while w/ RL stuff.  This topic piqued my interest though.
John 11:35-36: Jesus wept. "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?"
This is a verse which I think has a different conotation than many people infer. Most people that I talk with think that this phrase was uttered by Jesus because of the sins of the world that he accepted (and the resulting seperation from YHWH). I tend to believe that He was starting to sing Psalm 22 (Remember that the Psalms would have been known to everyone at that time, not just the learned readers. Psalms are songs, and songs are an easy way to pass tradition in a mostly illiterate society).
The first verse of Psalm 22 (KJV) is:
"My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? why art thou so far from helping me, and from the words of my roaring?"
There are several verses of Psalm 22 which mirror events that just took place during His crucifixtion;
- People Mocking,
- "I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint; my heart is like wax, it is melted within my breast;" (crucifixtion disjoints the shoulders, and the spear used to poke Jesus' side likely punctured the membrane surrounding the heart, as the fluid in this sac is very much like water and blood & water are described as coming from the wound: "John 19:34, KJV But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water"),
- they have pierced my hands and feet
- for my rainment they cast lots
To me, it always seemed that Jesus was trying to get people to realize that David had written a song about perseverance in the face of adversity, and that this situation fit better to this Psalm than any before it.
Now I'm off to hide into the shadows from whence I came again; I'm taking advantage of the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday to violate my company's internet usage policy (which includes no websites devoted to computer games). Maybe I should get an internet connection soon. 
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« Last Edit: November 25, 2004, 01:35:00 am by Culture20 »
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0xDEC0DE
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There are certainly places where the Biblical God acts in ways that are very hard to defend, but the Elisha story is not a good pick, precisely because the interpretation people get from reading the King James Version of the story is so outrageous.
I never said that it was indefensible, I said that the defense you offered could only be facetious, since on its face it's WELL BEYOND laughable.
Forty and two youths mauled by bears. The total size of the crowd was not given, but I'll not digress into quibbling over numbers, since even one youth getting mauled would be suitable to get the point across for "self-defense" purposes. Youths see one of their party attacked by bears, youths scatter, prophet goes up the mountain, end of chapter.
Also, unless these were "suicide bomber she-bears" that dashed into the crowd strapped with dynamite and blew themselves up, I'd reckon that for a bear to chase, catch and maul twenty-one people (on average) would take quite a while. Hours, if not days. Especially given the habit of people to, you know, run away from vicious bears that would be attacking them. And if they were actually adolescents, they would be able to run faster than little children, which would make it take longer still.
Put more tersely, the punishment does not fit the offense by a longshot, no matter how you try to frame the offense. Which to my mind is the entire point. It is an affirmation to followers, and a warning to outsiders: it says, "Our god is powerful, and watches over his followers. Do not presume to interfere with one of our prophets on a mission from god, for the costs of doing so are very, very dear. No exceptions."
I would consider the explanation I just gave to be one of the simplest possible explanations, and perfectly in character for a god of the Old Testament. Trying to paint it otherwise is like putting lipstick on a pig; it makes the pig look better, but nobody thinks it makes the farmer look smarter.
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"I’m not a robot like you. I don’t like having disks crammed into me… unless they’re Oreos, and then only in the mouth." --Fry
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