In the bible how do you tell whats true and whats just fundie nonsense?

Question

This is just a question thats been buggging me for a while. Does anyone have any good answers?

Answer 1

Use common sense, think about whether God would honestly feel that way, or if it was just the feelings of some bias, corrupt disciple or church authority. Obviously God doesn't want us to kill each other, but I doubt he cares whether we go to church every single Sunday, or to starve ourselves to worship him.

Answer 2

What makes any given part of the bible "fundie nonsense" is how you approach scripture. If you read the bible literally, you are likely to find "fundie nonsense". It is illogical to read a text such as the bible, that comes from many different sources, many different authors, though arguably "inspired" by God, as fact, as history. The bible is not a history text, but that doesn't mean that it isn't rich with lessons and stories that all people can learn something from. The people in scripture help us understand our relationship with God and each other, but it isn't as simple as "the bible is the truth" or it is the "literal word of God", that doesn't meant that truths cannot be found in the bible or that we can't better understand our relationship with God by reading it. Its a cop out to simply claim that "the bible is the truth", faith requires more individual thinking and involvement than blind believing. Questioning, thinking, and occasional doubt is integral to faith, fundamentalism often does not allow for this critical understanding, making it a shallow way to read the bible or any scripture and an ultimately unfulfilling type of belief.

Answer 3

I don't care who out there thinks they have all the answer's because it says so in the bible. People misconstrue stories all the time now, so what would have made it any different when the Bible was being put together. People read the bible and can come away with many different thoughts on what they are reading. Many people believe what they want to believe. Prime example is, the pope believed you should bear all the children you could. If the catholics were listening and believing, they all should have had at least 15 children. Which tells me, they do as they want, their not really doing what is being taught.

Answer 4

The problem with how to approach the Bible (one of the problems at least) is that there are so many different genres of writing written by many different people. This goes without mentioning text transmission, translation problems, copying mistakes, authorial bias, omissions, additions, etc.

It is not possible to discern with much degree of certainty what was intended to be taken literally and what was intended to be taken metaphorically, as symbol, etc. Additionally, what is written as history is not approached in the same way that 21st century persons approach history writing. Fable, metaphor, subjective bias, and mythology were commonly written into the history of the so called historiographical texts of the Bible.

What seem fairly clear is that the stories of the creation, the flood, the virgin birth, and the resurrection narratives just to name a few of the big ones appear to be based on legends of the surrounding culture (they are similar in content and form). So, take that for what you will, but from my own exegesis of the text it appears that much more of the text is allegory and metaphor (as opposed to history) than many may like to discover.

At the end of the day, you kind of have to figure it out for yourself. One answerer was right on, methodical exegesis is the best way to interpret the text. Once language, textual, grammatical, historical, social, cultural, literary, (and even psychological) factors are taken into account (that is just to name a few of the critical methods), then one can move to an interpretation that most likely rests within the bounds of authorial intent as well as the context in which it was written. Sadly, what passes for interpretation these days is little more than personal opinion and uninformed subjective analysis of the text.

I know that doesn't exactly answer your question. But if you are looking to eschew fundie nonsense, then looking to authors and scholars who practice sound exegesis of the text is the best place to look (that goes for both conservative and liberal sides of every argument). Take care.

Answer 5

The Bible shows you what you can do to be saved. What people do with it is add their Fundie nonsense.

Stick with the Gospel message. You can spot a Fundie a mile away with this one thing. A fundie will attempt to add some kind of message against a group of people. That wasn't what Jesus said that the Gospel is. If you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, you shall be saved. He didn't say, 'except you fags, and you drunks, and you sexual perverts.' Anyone can be saved IF they trust God. That's the Gospel and it is applied by trusting God for it through Jesus Christ.

The fundies will preach a message that comdemns them. They point their pharisaical finger and make that their message. It's really easy to see once you understand it.

Answer 6

the bible consists of letters written by people and there version of the events or stories they saw or heard by word of mouth. it's up to you to determine right from wrong. P.S the first six book's of the Bible were written by moses who was raised in Egypt and was well educated the people were very ignorant of many things, the were slaves for many years. Then here come the great leader, of cause they'll believe anything said to them example: like paradise (eden) most people tell you they were the only people in the world. not so because supposely when Cain killed his brother he went to the land of NOD and married it's in the bible first chapters- go figure i hope info is useful

Answer 7

The book you hold in your hand is the process of many years of editting and modification. For instance, several gospels were dropped early on. These can be read as the "Gnostic Gospels." Just because the church uses a modern translation of a medieval english version of a roman-era latin text translated from hebrew does not mean it is the full story.

Everything with a grain of salt, since you are reading hebrew that was translated to latin that was translated to Anglo-Saxon (Old English) which was translated into Middle English and then into several different modern english versions.

Answer 8

The Bible is a compilation of other people's interpretations... different languages/influences. Everyone who reads the Bible has their own interpretations as well... which parts are the most important.

You read it and make up your own mind. It's your relationship with God that matters, not what others will tell you it should be.

Answer 9

Almost every thing in the bible has been altered to create a certain view. This was started at the start of the catholic church. even the books were choosen or omited to do this. It all fundie nonsense.

Answer 10

Listen for the kindness. Thomas Jefferson wrote out the gospels selecting only what he thought a kind Jesus would have said. You can find it as "The Gospel According to Jesus" edited by Stephen Mitchell.