There's a difference between drawing a conclusion based on the evidence and sticking with a presupposition in spite of the evidence. They are not both "accepting a premise."
There is a difference, TLC, between reasoning and rationalizing:
reasoning -- the action of thinking about something in a logical, sensible way.
rationalize -- attempt to explain or justify (one's own or another's behavior or attitude) with logical, plausible reasons, even if these are not true or appropriate.
The Bible says "all scripture is God-breathed." Fundamentalist/evangelicals in general, and Wierwille in particular, say this means that the Bible cannot be God-breathed if it contains any errors or contradictions.
However, the Bible DOES contain errors and contradictions.
Wierwille rationalized this by saying they are not real errors and contradictions, that they are only "apparent" until we figure out some way to make it seem as if they aren't real.
But they ARE real...
It seems to me, not based on reasoning from what the scriptures say, but from my own personal spiritual experience, that the Bible IS God-breathed. I cannot reconcile my actual experience of both the Spirit and the Bible with the fundamentalist/evangelical definition of what it means to be God-breathed.
To say that the original autographs were perfect as originally given implies that they had a single meaning which is accessible to everybody. That defies the fundamental nature of language, that it operates by comparison in the form of simile and metaphor, and that the meaning a person draws from a particular statement will be colored by all of the person's previous experience. No verbal expression can be "perfect" in the sense implied by the fundamentalists. There are as many different meanings as there are recipients of the communication. Some of those meanings are bound to be erroneous. All of them, each and every one, will contradict another one to some degree.
I am not trying on this thread to rationalize the fundamentalist/evangelical definition of what it means to be "God-breathed." I am trying to find a reasonable way to express what it means to be "God-breathed" that accords with my actual experiences of life (literally, how my cells work and have kept working even when they shouldn't have), of the Spirit and of the Bible.
Raf doesn't agree with me, and I don't expect him to. His life experiences have been different from mine. I find his reasoning helpful because it gives me a counter-balance to keep me from going too far overboard, which I sometimes have a tendency to do.
You are certainly welcome as much as any one else is, TLC, to participate in this thread. I find it an excellent exercise in learning to recognize and flush from my own thinking the rationalizations I learned from Wierwille.
...I am trying to find a reasonable way to express what it means to be "God-breathed"...
Steve:
Perhaps the translation "given by inspiration of God" isn't a bad translation
I believe that Wierwille's pseudo-intellectual and shallow understanding of biblical languages often (usually?) led him to wrong conclusions about what words really meant. A common TWI methodology was to look at the root word and assume that its derivative retained the exact meaning. While the two elements of theopneustos do indeed come from the words for "God" and "breath", pneustos, in the form pneuma that we are familiar with of course is usually translated "spirit" - and has more than one meaning.
My opinion about the bible is that at best it is the musings and thoughts of men who were inspired to write down what their subjective experience of God was.
Not very rigorous, but perhaps that will give you an idea
(btw - while I'm not an atheist, I have long given up the belief that the bible contains "the truth" or that it has any divine origins - I find that scholars like Bart Ehrman articulate my opinions about the bible pretty well)
There's a difference between drawing a conclusion based on the evidence and sticking with a presupposition in spite of the evidence. They are not both "accepting a premise."
Well, if you read exactly what I wrote (in post #194), I didn't call it "accepting a premise." I said that it (referring to choices, or conclusions, however you want to say it) "involved accepting a premise", which I think is still accurate.
In post #200, where "reasons" were being discussed, points directly to "accepting a premise" as the reason why inerrancy is plausible.
Had you not put quotes as you did around "accepting a premise," perhaps I could think that you weren't referring back to either of these two posts and distorting what was said by lifting said phrase entirely out of the context it was used within, and alluding to a less intelligent (and less credible) use of it. Maybe I'm mistaken, but that's what the intent of your post looks like from my point of view. (Just sayin' what it looks like. But please feel free to explain otherwise, and/or correct me if I'm wrong - it won't be the first nor the last time that I am.)
There is a difference, TLC, between reasoning and rationalizing:
reasoning -- the action of thinking about something in a logical, sensible way.
I don't see that anyone here has cornered the market on that yet.
Wierwille rationalized this by saying they are not real errors and contradictions, that they are only "apparent" until we figure out some way to make it seem as if they aren't real.
He wasn't the originator of that, as you should (and ought) to know.
To say that the original autographs were perfect as originally given implies that they had a single meaning which is accessible to everybody.
That's hogwash. I see no such implication. Take, for instance, the parables that Jesus Christ spoke in. Do you suppose that they had a single meaning which was accessible to everybody?
You are certainly welcome as much as any one else is, TLC, to participate in this thread. I find it an excellent exercise in learning to recognize and flush from my own thinking the rationalizations I learned from Wierwille.
Separating truth from error is a life long task for all of us. Where and how any of us may have started on that journey, or how focused upon it any of us have remained, varies greatly, and in many ways we live in difficult times of sensory overload. (very close to the end time, I dare say.) My personal decision to accept the inerrancy and the authority of scripture didn't began with, nor did it end with, VPW.
I did indeed write, "There is a difference, TLC, between reasoning and rationalizing:
reasoning -- the action of thinking about something in a logical, sensible way."
And right there you stopped reading there to respond, "I don't see that anyone here has cornered the market on that yet."
But you stopped too soon, TLC. My complete thought included a contrast to reasoning, "rationalize -- attempt to explain or justify (one's own or another's behavior or attitude) with logical, plausible reasons, even if these are not true or appropriate.
Rationalizing may be logical, but it fails to be reasonable because it is not sensible, that is, it's premises or conclusions do not accord with what is verifiable by the senses. The truth of a premise depends on how closely it accords with objective reality. The soundness of a logical argument doesn't just depend on whether or not it properly follows the rules of logic, it depends on the truth of the premises. A logical argument can be valid, but not sound if it depends on false premises.
The argument that "the Bible contains no errors or contradictions because it is God-breathed" is not sound because, as is obvious to even the most casual of observers, the Bible DOES contain errors and contradictions. And many of the contradictions were purposefully intended by the writers and editors of the Bible. When Wierwille tried to "reconcile" the "apparent" contradictions, he often defeated the purposes of the original writers, and gummed-up our understanding of the scriptures even more than it had been gummed-up before we heard Wierwille's rationalizations.
The author of 2 Timothy 3:16 said that all scripture (the Septuagint version of the Tanakh) is God-breathed. It would seem that the descriptor "God-breathed" meant something different to him when he wrote it than it does to fundamentalist/evangelicals (including the departed Wierwille) when they read it today.
If you pay attention to what is being written here by Raf and others as well as by my self, TLC, without a knee-jerk defensive response, you will learn some things about how to think critically. Critical thinking was what the PFAL series, and especially the Corps training, was designed to eradicate.
Love,
Steve
P.S. - Welcome, TLC, and good luck to you in our life-long task of separating truth from error!
And right there you stopped reading there to respond, "I don't see that anyone here has cornered the market on that yet."
But you stopped too soon, TLC.
You're right, I shouldn't have stopped there.
No one has cornered the market on either of them.
The truth of a premise depends on how closely it accords with objective reality.
Well, I don't see truth as necessarily (or exclusively) dependent upon someone's objective verification of it.
As for what "reality" is and/or isn't, well, there is this little matter of how completely reality is (or can be) detected with our senses.
Which, probably doesn't make any sense whatsoever if your view is that anything and everything is (or can be) detected with our senses.
The soundness of a logical argument doesn't just depend on whether or not it properly follows the rules of logic, it depends on the truth of the premises.
Granted. But sometimes there are premises that are overlooked or missed. (Which, if missed, can fail to expose the fragility of a logical argument.)
The argument that "the Bible contains no errors or contradictions because it is God-breathed" is not sound because, as is obvious to even the most casual of observers, the Bible DOES contain errors and contradictions.
So, in short, I question whether all the premises supporting that statement are clearly revealed.
And many of the contradictions were purposefully intended by the writers and editors of the Bible. When Wierwille tried to "reconcile" the "apparent" contradictions, he often defeated the purposes of the original writers, and gummed-up our understanding of the scriptures even more than it had been gummed-up before we heard Wierwille's rationalizations.
That's mostly conjecture. But anyway, I'll agree that some of the "apparent contradictions" have been gummed-up by other men's rationalizations.
If you pay attention to what is being written here by Raf and others as well as by my self, TLC, without a knee-jerk defensive response, you will learn some things about how to think critically. Critical thinking was what the PFAL series, and especially the Corps training, was designed to eradicate.
How thoughtful of me you are.
Perhaps some of my "knee-jerk defensive" responses won't appear to be so knee-jerk or defensive some day.
Or, maybe not. I don't know.
P.S. - Welcome, TLC, and good luck to you in our life-long task of separating truth from error!
That chore (if that's what it is) will all be over someday. (And its maybe not all that far away.)
It's hard to take you seriously when you address a serious subject like
authorship of the books of the Bible,
and dismiss it with a glib comment and then a change of subject.
Yeah, I was trying to be a funny guy. But chiding accepted. It wasn't warranted, so, my apologies.
Given that I view scripture from the vantage point of inerrancy (which I realize is a premise that others here are opposed to), I simply don't see the merit of involving myself in much discussion over authorship. Being a theology major some 40+ years ago before my involvement with TWI, I was exposed to more JEPD theory than I care to remember, and need few reminders of how easily the arguments for and against it can go 'round and 'round. So, it's just hard to draw me much further or deeper into a more detailed discussion of it.
You're getting people with VERY different opinions and points of view,
who DISagree with each other on many of the most fundamental points,
to start agreeing that you're ducking issues and pretending you're not.
I don't see there being any pretense about it, I simply prefer to move on to other more interesting or pertinent discussion. I think we all make choices at times to ignore certain things posted on these board (probably not often enough), and it may be more a matter of seeing or learning about the intent of the what is posted rather than getting stuck on or squabbling over every little detail or innuendo.
Ever consider that all of them found common ground on this because
they're all correct?
After seeing that Paul and the apostles at Jerusalem never really arrived on common ground (and yes, I understand that they shook hands and agreed in essence to let each other have their own gospel and go there separate ways), I really don't hold any confidence or hope that they were all correct, or that they all found common ground.
However, that said, I do find Steve's take (though not yet clarified or well defined) on this thread to be somewhat interesting, and am curious to see what might come of it.
I've ended up changing my position on a number of things largely because
discussions here showed too many things on the other side,
and mostly conviction on the side I preferred.
(Ask me and I'll post examples.)
Likewise, I also have ended up changing my position of a number of things, some number of them due in part to things that were discussed on some of these boards showing (as you said) "too many things on the other side." Not so much doctrine, per se (as more of that change came from personal study of the scripture, my spouse, and from listening to a layman farmer's teachings), but of the practical error that was in place throughout TWI in the 70's and mid-80's.
But, since you made the invitation, what might some of the examples of your doctrinal adjustments or changes be?
(Or, were you thinking not so much about doctrinal position changes?)
Mind you, they weren't what I consider the biggest issues-
the existence of God, salvation, and so on-
but you might have come to the same conclusions based on the
same discussions. (They're still here as threads.)
Perhaps I've already taken a gander at them, or made (similar?) adjustments in my position for other reasons.
BTW, there's a LOT of disagreement here, so the idea that there's
a "party line" is more of an idea and a perception than a reality.
Except almost all the current posters agree about the harm that
vpw did, and that it was due to his freewill decisions to do the
wrong things for his own benefit that the harm existed.
Unwinding certain misperceptions and illusions of TWI has been no small or easy feat, and was not painless.
Nevertheless, it is past, and there is yet time to grow and improve before the return, for those that love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity. (Which seems to be a bit of a rarity anymore in our society. Maybe it's where I live. I don't know.)
You missed the poster who elevated vpw's materials above the Bible
and said THAT had the key to salvation. Now, HE really got static.
You'd think somebody that read much of anything here before posting would have had more of a clue. But, they probably just thought they were here to save y'all. Static? Is that all? Not cross-shredded into itsy bitsy pieces?
What did I change position on, TLC? The most blatant
"I changed my mind because of this thread" stuff was probably the
result of the "Speaking in Tongues" threads.
But really, we're way off-topic.
Ask me and I can find some links to those threads.
Ugh. What a controversial issue to bring up in a forum of such divers "ex-twi" beliefs.
Given the level it was elevated to and the issues that that resulted in, there's undoubtedly far more said about it here at GSC than I have time for or have enough interest in to find or read. (I've read some things, somewhere on GSC previously.) It probably falls into a category of acceptance (yes, I believe its true) that defies reason or logic, and after so many years of benefiting from personal use of it, there simply isn't a lot of reason (or room) left for me to change how or what I think of it. So, I'd rather pass on that one.
Ugh. What a controversial issue to bring up in a forum of such divers "ex-twi" beliefs.
Given the level it was elevated to and the issues that that resulted in, there's undoubtedly far more said about it here at GSC than I have time for or have enough interest in to find or read. (I've read some things, somewhere on GSC previously.) It probably falls into a category of acceptance (yes, I believe its true) that defies reason or logic, and after so many years of benefiting from personal use of it, there simply isn't a lot of reason (or room) left for me to change how or what I think of it. So, I'd rather pass on that one.
The original sin was taught wrong, so I don't give a flip about your alluding to it. And as far as considering or entertaining thoughts that are contrary to anything I've learned, it's not verboten in my mind, and probably never has been. But, once a matter has been tested and proven (to myself) long enough, it really doesn't take long to weigh any "new" (if it even is) evidence against it.
So, if you suppose there is something new that I haven't already heard or considered, and can condense it to a hundred or so words or less, I'd be more than happy to read and consider it. But if you think I'm going to spend hours and hours looking down some rabbit hole looking for some, as of yet unknown or new (to me), thing... well, you're not a very good salesperson, and I'm not buyin' it.
The original sin was taught wrong, so I don't give a flip about your alluding to it. And as far as considering or entertaining thoughts that are contrary to anything I've learned, it's not verboten in my mind, and probably never has been. But, once a matter has been tested and proven (to myself) long enough, it really doesn't take long to weigh any "new" (if it even is) evidence against it.
So, if you suppose there is something new that I haven't already heard or considered, and can condense it to a hundred or so words or less, I'd be more than happy to read and consider it. But if you think I'm going to spend hours and hours looking down some rabbit hole looking for some, as of yet unknown or new (to me), thing... well, you're not a very good salesperson, and I'm not buyin' it.
No, I'm not a very good salesperson. But then, I'm not really selling anything so it doesn't matter. I'm not sure why you keep giving this reference to the original sin. That's not what session #7 is about. It may be mentioned in there but the essence of the session is that we are never to question what we believe to be the truth. (whatever that is) Instead, we're supposed to "STAND!" and not budge, no matter what. Bad things can happen if we don't. We could end up a grease spot by midnight. I assume you're very familiar with that expression, no?
"So, if you suppose there is something new that I haven't already heard or considered, and can condense it to a hundred or so words or less, I'd be more than happy to read and consider it. But if you think I'm going to spend hours and hours looking down some rabbit hole looking for some, as of yet unknown or new (to me), thing."
HERE is something to chew on for a while. It's definitely NOT 100 words or less. Well, I guess you could just take the session #7 route. "STAND!" on what you already think you know.....or give some careful consideration to other viewpoints. There are lots of other thought provoking discussions here on a variety of subjects. You'll never know that if you're focused on falling down rabbit holes.
I'm not sure why you keep giving this reference to the original sin. That's not what session #7 is about. It may be mentioned in there but the essence of the session is that we are never to question what we believe to be the truth. (whatever that is) Instead, we're supposed to "STAND!" and not budge, no matter what. Bad things can happen if we don't. We could end up a grease spot by midnight. I assume you're very familiar with that expression, no?
Familiar with the LCM expression, of course. But I honestly don't (and never did, as best I can recall) associate that (what you say above) being taught in session#7. Maybe I was just too thickheaded or stubborn to hear it mean that, I don't know.
HERE is something to chew on for a while. It's definitely NOT 100 words or less. Well, I guess you could just take the session #7 route. "STAND!" on what you already think you know.....or give some careful consideration to other viewpoints. There are lots of other thought provoking discussions here on a variety of subjects. You'll never know that if you're focused on falling down rabbit holes.
I've (previously) read a number of pages there (beginning and ending), and nothing either surprised me or perked my interest to read more than what I did. Maybe that defies logic and doesn't make any sense to you, but that's my candid take on it. Aside from seeing where some number of folks here thoughts on it are, the thread doesn't interest me and nothing stirred within me caring to discuss it further. And by the way, I said nothing about falling down (indicative of fear) rabbit holes.
I've been thinking about what has happened in my thinking since I started this thread last Halloween eve.
Thinking about what you're thinking about is one of the two key elements to exercising judgment, as I used to teach my seventh-graders. The other key element is paying attention to what you're paying attention to!
I just went back and re-read my first post.
How has my thinking changed? What conclusions can I draw from the experience?
One thing that influenced the way I think now was Jesus' statement in John 6:63, "the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life."
This is a statement of poetic knowledge expressed in the form of a metaphor. This particular metaphor compares three things: life, spirit, and words. What do life, spirit and words have in common? How are these three things similar to each other?
First, spirit... spirit consists of the purposefully regulated flow of air in and out of my lungs. My breath (spirit) supports the purposefully regulated flow of oxygen into and out of (eis and ek in the Greek) my cells. Cellular respiration is the purposefully regulated flow of electrons in my cells that powers all of the chemical and mechanical functions (purposefully regulated flow of component elements) of my cells. The flow of component elements in my cells are purposefully regulated by the information encoded in my DNA. That purposefully regulated flow of component elements is what constitutes life itself. If the purposefully regulated flow ceases, all the physical components would still be there. They just wouldn't be moving. That's what death is, on a cellular level.
So we see that the thing spirit and life have in common is purposefully regulated flow. One of the reasons this comes home to me is because I am on oxygen as a result of my anemia. I am on three liters per minute in order to keep the O2 concentration as high as possible in what little blood I have. My body purposefully regulates the flow of blood around my body, depending on what I'm doing. I can feel the blood in me sloshing around when I am digesting a meal. I can feel the blood sloshing around in me when I get drowsy. Between my O2 tank and my nose-hose there is a little mechanical device called a "regulator." I can set the regulator to feed me any volume of oxygen up to five liters per minute, and I can change the setting from continuous flow to on-demand pulse flow. So you see, the flow of my spirit is very purposefully regulated... literally.
So... in order to understand the poetic truth communicated by Jesus in John 6:63, we need to examine "words" with a view to discovering what the component elements are, how they flow, and how their flow can be purposefully regulated.
Here's a kicker... the words Jesus spoke were life-giving, but it's not the case that ALL words are life-giving. "Death and life are in the power of the tongue." (Proverbs 18:21) If we view the purposefully regulated flow of words as "thought," then words that promote thought are life-giving words. Words that stop thought are deadly.
Many of Wierwille's words were intended to stop people from thinking. That's why PFAL and TWI turned out to be toxic in the long run.
So much for similarities between spirit/life and thought (the purposefully regulated flow of words). What are some of the differences?
One big difference is that our words are taught to us from the outside. We have natural capabilities for language, but the actual use of specific language is something we learn from our parents, family and acquaintances. Where my spirit and my life are concrete and individual, my words (and thoughts) are abstract and communal. I can breath and live by myself, but can I maintain thought by myself? I know some of the ways my thinking changed on the submarine when we were on an extended run. I've heard and read accounts of people who were in solitary confinement or isolated in some other way. I have participated in mental health support groups for twenty-five years...
I personally believe the Bible is God-breathed, but not because I read 2 Timothy 3:16. As Raf so aptly pointed out, "If you are going to tie your faith in the inspiration of the Bible to a belief that this book is an accurate telling of events that took place in history, without error or contradiction, then you are going to be walking on a very fragile faith." I believe it because the Lord who taught me to understand the things of my heart in terms of the purposefully regulated flows of a nuclear-powered submarine engine room ALSO led me to the Bible and taught me how to find the same things in it. It breaks my heart to see people lose their faith in a loving God because they were mistakenly taught that the Bible "is an accurate telling of events that took place in history, without error or contradiction."
All for now, I suppose... maybe more later...
Love,
Steve
Well, yes... there will be more later... communication theory says that there are four elements: the sender, the message, the channel and the receiver. These are components of the extra-individual or the inter-personal flow of words. This is how we receive our language as infants. It is how we participate in the great conversation..., and then there is the role of feedback in all this!
Many of Wierwille's words were intended to stop people from thinking. That's why PFAL and TWI turned out to be toxic in the long run.
If he's as much a plagiarist as has been revealed that he was, why credit him as the source of the toxicity?
As Raf so aptly pointed out, "If you are going to tie your faith in the inspiration of the Bible to a belief that this book is an accurate telling of events that took place in history, without error or contradiction, then you are going to be walking on a very fragile faith."
I'd say that it's certainly not as fragile from the inside looking out as it is from the outside looking in. Consider, for example, the lives of men like Martin Luther or John Wesley.
If he's as much a plagiarist as has been revealed that he was, why credit him as the source of the toxicity?
For the same reason you prosecute the user of a gun and not the manufacturer.
I'd say that it's certainly not as fragile from the inside looking out as it is from the outside looking in. Consider, for example, the lives of men like Martin Luther or John Wesley.
Utterly meaningless. By which I mean, it doesn't address the issue in the slightest.
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waysider
I buried Paul. Sincerely, The Walrus
Steve Lortz
There is a thing we've been taught to do at Anderson University (all the way from freshman introductory Bible courses to grad school exegetical papers) called the hermeneutic or the exegetical circle.
Steve Lortz
I don't understand why you have a hang-up about the authorship of Luke-Acts. There are parts of the NT whose authorship is very much open to question, especially Paul's pastoral epistles, and serious
Oakspear
Or accepting evidence...
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Raf
There's a difference between drawing a conclusion based on the evidence and sticking with a presupposition in spite of the evidence. They are not both "accepting a premise."
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Steve Lortz
There is a difference, TLC, between reasoning and rationalizing:
reasoning -- the action of thinking about something in a logical, sensible way.
rationalize -- attempt to explain or justify (one's own or another's behavior or attitude) with logical, plausible reasons, even if these are not true or appropriate.
The Bible says "all scripture is God-breathed." Fundamentalist/evangelicals in general, and Wierwille in particular, say this means that the Bible cannot be God-breathed if it contains any errors or contradictions.
However, the Bible DOES contain errors and contradictions.
Wierwille rationalized this by saying they are not real errors and contradictions, that they are only "apparent" until we figure out some way to make it seem as if they aren't real.
But they ARE real...
It seems to me, not based on reasoning from what the scriptures say, but from my own personal spiritual experience, that the Bible IS God-breathed. I cannot reconcile my actual experience of both the Spirit and the Bible with the fundamentalist/evangelical definition of what it means to be God-breathed.
To say that the original autographs were perfect as originally given implies that they had a single meaning which is accessible to everybody. That defies the fundamental nature of language, that it operates by comparison in the form of simile and metaphor, and that the meaning a person draws from a particular statement will be colored by all of the person's previous experience. No verbal expression can be "perfect" in the sense implied by the fundamentalists. There are as many different meanings as there are recipients of the communication. Some of those meanings are bound to be erroneous. All of them, each and every one, will contradict another one to some degree.
I am not trying on this thread to rationalize the fundamentalist/evangelical definition of what it means to be "God-breathed." I am trying to find a reasonable way to express what it means to be "God-breathed" that accords with my actual experiences of life (literally, how my cells work and have kept working even when they shouldn't have), of the Spirit and of the Bible.
Raf doesn't agree with me, and I don't expect him to. His life experiences have been different from mine. I find his reasoning helpful because it gives me a counter-balance to keep me from going too far overboard, which I sometimes have a tendency to do.
You are certainly welcome as much as any one else is, TLC, to participate in this thread. I find it an excellent exercise in learning to recognize and flush from my own thinking the rationalizations I learned from Wierwille.
Love,
Steve
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Oakspear
Steve:
Perhaps the translation "given by inspiration of God" isn't a bad translation
I believe that Wierwille's pseudo-intellectual and shallow understanding of biblical languages often (usually?) led him to wrong conclusions about what words really meant. A common TWI methodology was to look at the root word and assume that its derivative retained the exact meaning. While the two elements of theopneustos do indeed come from the words for "God" and "breath", pneustos, in the form pneuma that we are familiar with of course is usually translated "spirit" - and has more than one meaning.
My opinion about the bible is that at best it is the musings and thoughts of men who were inspired to write down what their subjective experience of God was.
Not very rigorous, but perhaps that will give you an idea
(btw - while I'm not an atheist, I have long given up the belief that the bible contains "the truth" or that it has any divine origins - I find that scholars like Bart Ehrman articulate my opinions about the bible pretty well)
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TLC
Well, if you read exactly what I wrote (in post #194), I didn't call it "accepting a premise." I said that it (referring to choices, or conclusions, however you want to say it) "involved accepting a premise", which I think is still accurate.
In post #200, where "reasons" were being discussed, points directly to "accepting a premise" as the reason why inerrancy is plausible.
Had you not put quotes as you did around "accepting a premise," perhaps I could think that you weren't referring back to either of these two posts and distorting what was said by lifting said phrase entirely out of the context it was used within, and alluding to a less intelligent (and less credible) use of it. Maybe I'm mistaken, but that's what the intent of your post looks like from my point of view. (Just sayin' what it looks like. But please feel free to explain otherwise, and/or correct me if I'm wrong - it won't be the first nor the last time that I am.)
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TLC
I don't see that anyone here has cornered the market on that yet.
He wasn't the originator of that, as you should (and ought) to know.
That's hogwash. I see no such implication. Take, for instance, the parables that Jesus Christ spoke in. Do you suppose that they had a single meaning which was accessible to everybody?
Separating truth from error is a life long task for all of us. Where and how any of us may have started on that journey, or how focused upon it any of us have remained, varies greatly, and in many ways we live in difficult times of sensory overload. (very close to the end time, I dare say.) My personal decision to accept the inerrancy and the authority of scripture didn't began with, nor did it end with, VPW.
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Steve Lortz
I did indeed write, "There is a difference, TLC, between reasoning and rationalizing:
reasoning -- the action of thinking about something in a logical, sensible way."
And right there you stopped reading there to respond, "I don't see that anyone here has cornered the market on that yet."
But you stopped too soon, TLC. My complete thought included a contrast to reasoning, "rationalize -- attempt to explain or justify (one's own or another's behavior or attitude) with logical, plausible reasons, even if these are not true or appropriate.
Rationalizing may be logical, but it fails to be reasonable because it is not sensible, that is, it's premises or conclusions do not accord with what is verifiable by the senses. The truth of a premise depends on how closely it accords with objective reality. The soundness of a logical argument doesn't just depend on whether or not it properly follows the rules of logic, it depends on the truth of the premises. A logical argument can be valid, but not sound if it depends on false premises.
The argument that "the Bible contains no errors or contradictions because it is God-breathed" is not sound because, as is obvious to even the most casual of observers, the Bible DOES contain errors and contradictions. And many of the contradictions were purposefully intended by the writers and editors of the Bible. When Wierwille tried to "reconcile" the "apparent" contradictions, he often defeated the purposes of the original writers, and gummed-up our understanding of the scriptures even more than it had been gummed-up before we heard Wierwille's rationalizations.
The author of 2 Timothy 3:16 said that all scripture (the Septuagint version of the Tanakh) is God-breathed. It would seem that the descriptor "God-breathed" meant something different to him when he wrote it than it does to fundamentalist/evangelicals (including the departed Wierwille) when they read it today.
If you pay attention to what is being written here by Raf and others as well as by my self, TLC, without a knee-jerk defensive response, you will learn some things about how to think critically. Critical thinking was what the PFAL series, and especially the Corps training, was designed to eradicate.
Love,
Steve
P.S. - Welcome, TLC, and good luck to you in our life-long task of separating truth from error!
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TLC
You're right, I shouldn't have stopped there.
No one has cornered the market on either of them.
Well, I don't see truth as necessarily (or exclusively) dependent upon someone's objective verification of it.
As for what "reality" is and/or isn't, well, there is this little matter of how completely reality is (or can be) detected with our senses.
Which, probably doesn't make any sense whatsoever if your view is that anything and everything is (or can be) detected with our senses.
Granted. But sometimes there are premises that are overlooked or missed. (Which, if missed, can fail to expose the fragility of a logical argument.)
So, in short, I question whether all the premises supporting that statement are clearly revealed.
That's mostly conjecture. But anyway, I'll agree that some of the "apparent contradictions" have been gummed-up by other men's rationalizations.
How thoughtful of me you are.
Perhaps some of my "knee-jerk defensive" responses won't appear to be so knee-jerk or defensive some day.
Or, maybe not. I don't know.
That chore (if that's what it is) will all be over someday. (And its maybe not all that far away.)
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WordWolf
It's hard to take you seriously when you address a serious subject like
authorship of the books of the Bible,
and dismiss it with a glib comment and then a change of subject.
You're getting people with VERY different opinions and points of view,
who DISagree with each other on many of the most fundamental points,
to start agreeing that you're ducking issues and pretending you're not.
Ever consider that all of them found common ground on this because
they're all correct?
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TLC
Yeah, I was trying to be a funny guy. But chiding accepted. It wasn't warranted, so, my apologies.
Given that I view scripture from the vantage point of inerrancy (which I realize is a premise that others here are opposed to), I simply don't see the merit of involving myself in much discussion over authorship. Being a theology major some 40+ years ago before my involvement with TWI, I was exposed to more JEPD theory than I care to remember, and need few reminders of how easily the arguments for and against it can go 'round and 'round. So, it's just hard to draw me much further or deeper into a more detailed discussion of it.
I don't see there being any pretense about it, I simply prefer to move on to other more interesting or pertinent discussion. I think we all make choices at times to ignore certain things posted on these board (probably not often enough), and it may be more a matter of seeing or learning about the intent of the what is posted rather than getting stuck on or squabbling over every little detail or innuendo.
After seeing that Paul and the apostles at Jerusalem never really arrived on common ground (and yes, I understand that they shook hands and agreed in essence to let each other have their own gospel and go there separate ways), I really don't hold any confidence or hope that they were all correct, or that they all found common ground.
However, that said, I do find Steve's take (though not yet clarified or well defined) on this thread to be somewhat interesting, and am curious to see what might come of it.
Fair enough?
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WordWolf
At least, I'd agree with you on that.
I've ended up changing my position on a number of things largely because
discussions here showed too many things on the other side,
and mostly conviction on the side I preferred.
(Ask me and I'll post examples.)
Mind you, they weren't what I consider the biggest issues-
the existence of God, salvation, and so on-
but you might have come to the same conclusions based on the
same discussions. (They're still here as threads.)
BTW, there's a LOT of disagreement here, so the idea that there's
a "party line" is more of an idea and a perception than a reality.
Except almost all the current posters agree about the harm that
vpw did, and that it was due to his freewill decisions to do the
wrong things for his own benefit that the harm existed.
You missed the poster who elevated vpw's materials above the Bible
and said THAT had the key to salvation. Now, HE really got static.
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TLC
Likewise, I also have ended up changing my position of a number of things, some number of them due in part to things that were discussed on some of these boards showing (as you said) "too many things on the other side." Not so much doctrine, per se (as more of that change came from personal study of the scripture, my spouse, and from listening to a layman farmer's teachings), but of the practical error that was in place throughout TWI in the 70's and mid-80's.
But, since you made the invitation, what might some of the examples of your doctrinal adjustments or changes be?
(Or, were you thinking not so much about doctrinal position changes?)
Perhaps I've already taken a gander at them, or made (similar?) adjustments in my position for other reasons.
Unwinding certain misperceptions and illusions of TWI has been no small or easy feat, and was not painless.
Nevertheless, it is past, and there is yet time to grow and improve before the return, for those that love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity. (Which seems to be a bit of a rarity anymore in our society. Maybe it's where I live. I don't know.)
You'd think somebody that read much of anything here before posting would have had more of a clue. But, they probably just thought they were here to save y'all. Static? Is that all? Not cross-shredded into itsy bitsy pieces?
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Raf
Cross shredded into itsy bitsy pieces would be a fair assessment. Half the rules we have on this site addressed various ways I let him have it.
Of course, my views have changed since then, but that's another, longer story.
Let's not discuss that particular fellow unless he comes back and is able to defend himself.
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WordWolf
Certainly no names, but yes, let's not get into him or anyone else who
posted some rather "controversial" posts.
===================
What did I change position on, TLC? The most blatant
"I changed my mind because of this thread" stuff was probably the
result of the "Speaking in Tongues" threads.
But really, we're way off-topic.
Ask me and I can find some links to those threads.
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waysider
Well, if he does come back, I'm sure he'll have a PFAL book in his hand.
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TLC
Ugh. What a controversial issue to bring up in a forum of such divers "ex-twi" beliefs.
Given the level it was elevated to and the issues that that resulted in, there's undoubtedly far more said about it here at GSC than I have time for or have enough interest in to find or read. (I've read some things, somewhere on GSC previously.) It probably falls into a category of acceptance (yes, I believe its true) that defies reason or logic, and after so many years of benefiting from personal use of it, there simply isn't a lot of reason (or room) left for me to change how or what I think of it. So, I'd rather pass on that one.
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Raf
I will be sending you a dry cleaning bill for that one. Coffee stains are very hard to get out of new clothes.
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waysider
You asked about session #7?
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TLC
The original sin was taught wrong, so I don't give a flip about your alluding to it. And as far as considering or entertaining thoughts that are contrary to anything I've learned, it's not verboten in my mind, and probably never has been. But, once a matter has been tested and proven (to myself) long enough, it really doesn't take long to weigh any "new" (if it even is) evidence against it.
So, if you suppose there is something new that I haven't already heard or considered, and can condense it to a hundred or so words or less, I'd be more than happy to read and consider it. But if you think I'm going to spend hours and hours looking down some rabbit hole looking for some, as of yet unknown or new (to me), thing... well, you're not a very good salesperson, and I'm not buyin' it.
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waysider
No, I'm not a very good salesperson. But then, I'm not really selling anything so it doesn't matter. I'm not sure why you keep giving this reference to the original sin. That's not what session #7 is about. It may be mentioned in there but the essence of the session is that we are never to question what we believe to be the truth. (whatever that is) Instead, we're supposed to "STAND!" and not budge, no matter what. Bad things can happen if we don't. We could end up a grease spot by midnight. I assume you're very familiar with that expression, no?
"So, if you suppose there is something new that I haven't already heard or considered, and can condense it to a hundred or so words or less, I'd be more than happy to read and consider it. But if you think I'm going to spend hours and hours looking down some rabbit hole looking for some, as of yet unknown or new (to me), thing."
HERE is something to chew on for a while. It's definitely NOT 100 words or less. Well, I guess you could just take the session #7 route. "STAND!" on what you already think you know.....or give some careful consideration to other viewpoints. There are lots of other thought provoking discussions here on a variety of subjects. You'll never know that if you're focused on falling down rabbit holes.
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TLC
Familiar with the LCM expression, of course. But I honestly don't (and never did, as best I can recall) associate that (what you say above) being taught in session#7. Maybe I was just too thickheaded or stubborn to hear it mean that, I don't know.
I've (previously) read a number of pages there (beginning and ending), and nothing either surprised me or perked my interest to read more than what I did. Maybe that defies logic and doesn't make any sense to you, but that's my candid take on it. Aside from seeing where some number of folks here thoughts on it are, the thread doesn't interest me and nothing stirred within me caring to discuss it further. And by the way, I said nothing about falling down (indicative of fear) rabbit holes.
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Steve Lortz
I've been thinking about what has happened in my thinking since I started this thread last Halloween eve.
Thinking about what you're thinking about is one of the two key elements to exercising judgment, as I used to teach my seventh-graders. The other key element is paying attention to what you're paying attention to!
I just went back and re-read my first post.
How has my thinking changed? What conclusions can I draw from the experience?
One thing that influenced the way I think now was Jesus' statement in John 6:63, "the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life."
This is a statement of poetic knowledge expressed in the form of a metaphor. This particular metaphor compares three things: life, spirit, and words. What do life, spirit and words have in common? How are these three things similar to each other?
First, spirit... spirit consists of the purposefully regulated flow of air in and out of my lungs. My breath (spirit) supports the purposefully regulated flow of oxygen into and out of (eis and ek in the Greek) my cells. Cellular respiration is the purposefully regulated flow of electrons in my cells that powers all of the chemical and mechanical functions (purposefully regulated flow of component elements) of my cells. The flow of component elements in my cells are purposefully regulated by the information encoded in my DNA. That purposefully regulated flow of component elements is what constitutes life itself. If the purposefully regulated flow ceases, all the physical components would still be there. They just wouldn't be moving. That's what death is, on a cellular level.
So we see that the thing spirit and life have in common is purposefully regulated flow. One of the reasons this comes home to me is because I am on oxygen as a result of my anemia. I am on three liters per minute in order to keep the O2 concentration as high as possible in what little blood I have. My body purposefully regulates the flow of blood around my body, depending on what I'm doing. I can feel the blood in me sloshing around when I am digesting a meal. I can feel the blood sloshing around in me when I get drowsy. Between my O2 tank and my nose-hose there is a little mechanical device called a "regulator." I can set the regulator to feed me any volume of oxygen up to five liters per minute, and I can change the setting from continuous flow to on-demand pulse flow. So you see, the flow of my spirit is very purposefully regulated... literally.
So... in order to understand the poetic truth communicated by Jesus in John 6:63, we need to examine "words" with a view to discovering what the component elements are, how they flow, and how their flow can be purposefully regulated.
Here's a kicker... the words Jesus spoke were life-giving, but it's not the case that ALL words are life-giving. "Death and life are in the power of the tongue." (Proverbs 18:21) If we view the purposefully regulated flow of words as "thought," then words that promote thought are life-giving words. Words that stop thought are deadly.
Many of Wierwille's words were intended to stop people from thinking. That's why PFAL and TWI turned out to be toxic in the long run.
So much for similarities between spirit/life and thought (the purposefully regulated flow of words). What are some of the differences?
One big difference is that our words are taught to us from the outside. We have natural capabilities for language, but the actual use of specific language is something we learn from our parents, family and acquaintances. Where my spirit and my life are concrete and individual, my words (and thoughts) are abstract and communal. I can breath and live by myself, but can I maintain thought by myself? I know some of the ways my thinking changed on the submarine when we were on an extended run. I've heard and read accounts of people who were in solitary confinement or isolated in some other way. I have participated in mental health support groups for twenty-five years...
I personally believe the Bible is God-breathed, but not because I read 2 Timothy 3:16. As Raf so aptly pointed out, "If you are going to tie your faith in the inspiration of the Bible to a belief that this book is an accurate telling of events that took place in history, without error or contradiction, then you are going to be walking on a very fragile faith." I believe it because the Lord who taught me to understand the things of my heart in terms of the purposefully regulated flows of a nuclear-powered submarine engine room ALSO led me to the Bible and taught me how to find the same things in it. It breaks my heart to see people lose their faith in a loving God because they were mistakenly taught that the Bible "is an accurate telling of events that took place in history, without error or contradiction."
All for now, I suppose... maybe more later...
Love,
Steve
Well, yes... there will be more later... communication theory says that there are four elements: the sender, the message, the channel and the receiver. These are components of the extra-individual or the inter-personal flow of words. This is how we receive our language as infants. It is how we participate in the great conversation..., and then there is the role of feedback in all this!
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TLC
If he's as much a plagiarist as has been revealed that he was, why credit him as the source of the toxicity?
I'd say that it's certainly not as fragile from the inside looking out as it is from the outside looking in. Consider, for example, the lives of men like Martin Luther or John Wesley.
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Raf
For the same reason you prosecute the user of a gun and not the manufacturer.
Utterly meaningless. By which I mean, it doesn't address the issue in the slightest.
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