Quote:
Originally Posted by Flash Walken
And I think that this explanation renders classic religious texts to be practically meaningless as well.
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Only if you consider "meaning" to be something static as opposed to variable. Does the fact that Isaiah's concept of God as an enthroned warrior in some way negate the legitimacy of his experience?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Flash Walken
If I'm not going to believe some of it, why any of it? It's all equally as preposterous.
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It is preposterous if you demand from primitive ideas and expressions a modernly contrived meaning. The religious texts in Judaism and Christianity achieved the status they did in large part on the basis of their malleability. It may seem nonsensical to you and me, but people just simply did not apply the same interpretive conventions to the things that they read as we demand today. The reason for "scripture"'s success is very much due to how its meaning changed—and continues to change—over time.