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edwest211
Guest
So Jesus did not literally raise the dead? Or rise from the dead Himself? Figurative and symbolic are words that are often used to distract from the truth.
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TheLittleLady
Guest
When people have trouble distinguishing between the parables of Christ and the miracles of Christ in the New Testament, it is wonderful that we have the Church to help guide.
The entire section may be found here:
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p1s1c2a3.htm
109 In Sacred Scripture, God speaks to man in a human way. To interpret Scripture correctly, the reader must be attentive to what the human authors truly wanted to affirm, and to what God wanted to reveal to us by their words.75
110 In order to discover the sacred authors’ intention , the reader must take into account the conditions of their time and culture, the literary genres in use at that time, and the modes of feeling, speaking and narrating then current. "For the fact is that truth is differently presented and expressed in the various types of historical writing, in prophetical and poetical texts, and in other forms of literary expression."76
The entire section may be found here:
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p1s1c2a3.htm
109 In Sacred Scripture, God speaks to man in a human way. To interpret Scripture correctly, the reader must be attentive to what the human authors truly wanted to affirm, and to what God wanted to reveal to us by their words.75
110 In order to discover the sacred authors’ intention , the reader must take into account the conditions of their time and culture, the literary genres in use at that time, and the modes of feeling, speaking and narrating then current. "For the fact is that truth is differently presented and expressed in the various types of historical writing, in prophetical and poetical texts, and in other forms of literary expression."76
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Bradskii
Guest
Your examples were miracles that some might consider neccesary for your belief as a matter of faith. The flood is not.
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edwest211
Guest
Your Biblical scholarship is lacking here.
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Bradskii
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Because…
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otjm
Guest
I did not say there was no flood, so we can start from there.
Evidence of floods puts them back to the ending of the ice age, which is in the range of somewhere around 10,000 years ago to 12,500 years ago. Were there floods? Absolutely; we have evidence, for example, of both the Bonneville Flood and the Missoula floods, with evidence pointing back to that time frame. And scientists generally agree that the last ice age covered large areas of the earth, which from evidence indicates that large areas were flooded. For example, estimates put the lake which when released caused the Bonneville Flood at covering some 32,000 square miles. Estimates of when the natural dam let go are that there was a 410 foot high flood crest and the volume of water was around 33,000,000 cubic feet per second. Not minute, not hour, per second.
Short of cave glyphs, the earliest existing examples of writing are in china and in Mesopotamia (cuneiform).
So help me out here: if the flood described in Scripture goes back to the end of the ice age, we have a gap of give or take 6500 years to 9500 years between someone floating around in a flood and someone writing about it. Please explain the gap.
Oh, and do I doubt there were floods; see above, and consider the fact that the Gilgamesh has a similar story.
You are considering that the Old Testament reports history as people in the 21st century consider history - they didn’t. They had a vastly different understanding of the cosmos (as set out in Genesis); and they were writing to tell of how God created the world and what part/place they had in it.
No, Christ was not a liar. He was not a liar when he gave the story of the man who owned the vineyard; the point was not about a man, or a vineyard either or both of which existed in Israel (or for that matter anywhere in their known world); he was telling something to convey that God looks on both justice and mercy differently than humans do.
Scripture is about our relationship with God, and while I will readily grant that archaeology has uncovered much to verify various sites mentioned in the Bible, and there have been many searches for the Ark, my faith doesn’t hinge on it. If an Ark is found, that is great; if an ark is not found, I have no loos of faith. But I see certain subsets of Protestantism trying to create a specific timeline through genealogy in the Bible and that, again, and they keep bumping up against information which does not only not fit, but indicates a way larger gap than they can deal with.
People who start looking at the details are like someone looking at a tree; and they cannot see the forest.
The point I am trying to make is that getting wrapped up in Scripture as if it were an historical account written in the last century are starting off on the wrong foot. There are stories to tell an historic fact and stories to tell a theological one. Not everything noted in the Old Testament was written to prove the truth of the facts as being historically accurate. they may be, but if they are not, it does not change the theological message contained in the story.
Evidence of floods puts them back to the ending of the ice age, which is in the range of somewhere around 10,000 years ago to 12,500 years ago. Were there floods? Absolutely; we have evidence, for example, of both the Bonneville Flood and the Missoula floods, with evidence pointing back to that time frame. And scientists generally agree that the last ice age covered large areas of the earth, which from evidence indicates that large areas were flooded. For example, estimates put the lake which when released caused the Bonneville Flood at covering some 32,000 square miles. Estimates of when the natural dam let go are that there was a 410 foot high flood crest and the volume of water was around 33,000,000 cubic feet per second. Not minute, not hour, per second.
Short of cave glyphs, the earliest existing examples of writing are in china and in Mesopotamia (cuneiform).
So help me out here: if the flood described in Scripture goes back to the end of the ice age, we have a gap of give or take 6500 years to 9500 years between someone floating around in a flood and someone writing about it. Please explain the gap.
Oh, and do I doubt there were floods; see above, and consider the fact that the Gilgamesh has a similar story.
You are considering that the Old Testament reports history as people in the 21st century consider history - they didn’t. They had a vastly different understanding of the cosmos (as set out in Genesis); and they were writing to tell of how God created the world and what part/place they had in it.
No, Christ was not a liar. He was not a liar when he gave the story of the man who owned the vineyard; the point was not about a man, or a vineyard either or both of which existed in Israel (or for that matter anywhere in their known world); he was telling something to convey that God looks on both justice and mercy differently than humans do.
Scripture is about our relationship with God, and while I will readily grant that archaeology has uncovered much to verify various sites mentioned in the Bible, and there have been many searches for the Ark, my faith doesn’t hinge on it. If an Ark is found, that is great; if an ark is not found, I have no loos of faith. But I see certain subsets of Protestantism trying to create a specific timeline through genealogy in the Bible and that, again, and they keep bumping up against information which does not only not fit, but indicates a way larger gap than they can deal with.
People who start looking at the details are like someone looking at a tree; and they cannot see the forest.
The point I am trying to make is that getting wrapped up in Scripture as if it were an historical account written in the last century are starting off on the wrong foot. There are stories to tell an historic fact and stories to tell a theological one. Not everything noted in the Old Testament was written to prove the truth of the facts as being historically accurate. they may be, but if they are not, it does not change the theological message contained in the story.
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TheLittleLady
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Sometimes I vastly underestimate the influence that American Protestant Fundamentalism has had on Catholics in the Western world.
Your clear post sums up one of the things that brought me TO the Church from Fundamental Protestantism. :clap:t4::clap:t5::clap:t6:
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edwest211
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Pope Pius XII addressed this in Humani Generis:
"8. In all this confusion of opinion it is some consolation to Us to see former adherents of rationalism today frequently desiring to return to the fountain of divinely communicated truth, and to acknowledge and profess the word of God as contained in Sacred Scripture as the foundation of religious teaching. But at the same time it is a matter of regret that not a few of these, the more firmly they accept the word of God, so much the more do they diminish the value of human reason, and the more they exalt the authority of God the Revealer, the more severely do they spurn the teaching office of the Church, which has been instituted by Christ, Our Lord, to preserve and interpret divine revelation. This attitude is not only plainly at variance with Holy Scripture, but is shown to be false by experience also. For often those who disagree with the true Church complain openly of their disagreement in matters of dogma and thus unwillingly bear witness to the necessity of a living Teaching Authority.
“9. Now Catholic theologians and philosophers, whose grave duty it is to defend natural and supernatural truth and instill it in the hearts of men, cannot afford to ignore or neglect these more or less erroneous opinions. Rather they must come to understand these same theories well, both because diseases are not properly treated unless they are rightly diagnosed, and because sometimes even in these false theories a certain amount of truth is contained, and, finally, because these theories provoke more subtle discussion and evaluation of philosophical and theological truths.”
“22. To return, however, to the new opinions mentioned above, a number of things are proposed or suggested by some even against the divine authorship of Sacred Scripture. For some go so far as to pervert the sense of the Vatican Council’s definition that God is the author of Holy Scripture, and they put forward again the opinion, already often condemned, which asserts that immunity from error extends only to those parts of the Bible that treat of God or of moral and religious matters. They even wrongly speak of a human sense of the Scriptures, beneath which a divine sense, which they say is the only infallible meaning, lies hidden. In interpreting Scripture, they will take no account of the analogy of faith and the Tradition of the Church. Thus they judge the doctrine of the Fathers and of the Teaching Church by the norm of Holy Scripture, interpreted by the purely human reason of exegetes, instead of explaining Holy Scripture according to the mind of the Church which Christ Our Lord has appointed guardian and interpreter of the whole deposit of divinely revealed truth.”
"8. In all this confusion of opinion it is some consolation to Us to see former adherents of rationalism today frequently desiring to return to the fountain of divinely communicated truth, and to acknowledge and profess the word of God as contained in Sacred Scripture as the foundation of religious teaching. But at the same time it is a matter of regret that not a few of these, the more firmly they accept the word of God, so much the more do they diminish the value of human reason, and the more they exalt the authority of God the Revealer, the more severely do they spurn the teaching office of the Church, which has been instituted by Christ, Our Lord, to preserve and interpret divine revelation. This attitude is not only plainly at variance with Holy Scripture, but is shown to be false by experience also. For often those who disagree with the true Church complain openly of their disagreement in matters of dogma and thus unwillingly bear witness to the necessity of a living Teaching Authority.
“9. Now Catholic theologians and philosophers, whose grave duty it is to defend natural and supernatural truth and instill it in the hearts of men, cannot afford to ignore or neglect these more or less erroneous opinions. Rather they must come to understand these same theories well, both because diseases are not properly treated unless they are rightly diagnosed, and because sometimes even in these false theories a certain amount of truth is contained, and, finally, because these theories provoke more subtle discussion and evaluation of philosophical and theological truths.”
“22. To return, however, to the new opinions mentioned above, a number of things are proposed or suggested by some even against the divine authorship of Sacred Scripture. For some go so far as to pervert the sense of the Vatican Council’s definition that God is the author of Holy Scripture, and they put forward again the opinion, already often condemned, which asserts that immunity from error extends only to those parts of the Bible that treat of God or of moral and religious matters. They even wrongly speak of a human sense of the Scriptures, beneath which a divine sense, which they say is the only infallible meaning, lies hidden. In interpreting Scripture, they will take no account of the analogy of faith and the Tradition of the Church. Thus they judge the doctrine of the Fathers and of the Teaching Church by the norm of Holy Scripture, interpreted by the purely human reason of exegetes, instead of explaining Holy Scripture according to the mind of the Church which Christ Our Lord has appointed guardian and interpreter of the whole deposit of divinely revealed truth.”
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edwest211
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“23. Further, according to their fictitious opinions, the literal sense of Holy Scripture and its explanation, carefully worked out under the Church’s vigilance by so many great exegetes, should yield now to a new exegesis, which they are pleased to call symbolic or spiritual. By means of this new exegesis of the Old Testament, which today in the Church is a sealed book, would finally be thrown open to all the faithful. By this method, they say, all difficulties vanish, difficulties which hinder only those who adhere to the literal meaning of the Scriptures.”
“10. If philosophers and theologians strive only to derive such profit from the careful examination of these doctrines, there would be no reason for any intervention by the Teaching Authority of the Church. However, although We know that Catholic teachers generally avoid these errors, it is apparent, however, that some today, as in apostolic times, desirous of novelty, and fearing to be considered ignorant of recent scientific findings, try to withdraw themselves from the sacred Teaching Authority and are accordingly in danger of gradually departing from revealed truth and of drawing others along with them into error.”
“10. If philosophers and theologians strive only to derive such profit from the careful examination of these doctrines, there would be no reason for any intervention by the Teaching Authority of the Church. However, although We know that Catholic teachers generally avoid these errors, it is apparent, however, that some today, as in apostolic times, desirous of novelty, and fearing to be considered ignorant of recent scientific findings, try to withdraw themselves from the sacred Teaching Authority and are accordingly in danger of gradually departing from revealed truth and of drawing others along with them into error.”
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otjm
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I am not aware of any practicing Christians who are doing so.
Perhaps the struggle is over the meaning of “True”.
Some Protestants are literalists; that is, they insist that every word of the Bible must be taken literally; and in doing so, they end up attempting to show how something set out in the Bible (most particularly in Ole Testament Scripture) occurred exactly as the story sets out.
The Catholic Church is contextualist; it asks “what is the context in which something is stated?” The Church does not deny the truth of the Bible; but it recognizes that there are a number of issues which may or may not reflect an historical fact, but rather that they convey a theological fact (for example, covenant); so we have a divergence as to the definition of “true”. It is not that the Church holds there never was a Noah, or there never was a flood - it doesn’t so hold; but neither does it require that we believe we can take genealogical references and backdate to when something (e.g. the flood) occurred.
Perhaps the struggle is over the meaning of “True”.
Some Protestants are literalists; that is, they insist that every word of the Bible must be taken literally; and in doing so, they end up attempting to show how something set out in the Bible (most particularly in Ole Testament Scripture) occurred exactly as the story sets out.
The Catholic Church is contextualist; it asks “what is the context in which something is stated?” The Church does not deny the truth of the Bible; but it recognizes that there are a number of issues which may or may not reflect an historical fact, but rather that they convey a theological fact (for example, covenant); so we have a divergence as to the definition of “true”. It is not that the Church holds there never was a Noah, or there never was a flood - it doesn’t so hold; but neither does it require that we believe we can take genealogical references and backdate to when something (e.g. the flood) occurred.
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otjm
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Thank you for your quotes from Pope Pius XII.
From the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
From the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
- In order to discover the sacred authors’ intention, the reader must take into account the conditions of their time and culture, the literary genres in use at that time, and the modes of feeling, speaking, and narrating then current. “For the fact is that truth is differently presented and expressed in the various types of historical writing, in prophetical and poetical texts, and in other forms of literary expression”.
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edwest211
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It doesn’t help anyone unless they read Humani Generis in its entirety. From the Catechism:
III. THE HOLY SPIRIT, INTERPRETER OF SCRIPTURE
109 In Sacred Scripture, God speaks to man in a human way. To interpret Scripture correctly, the reader must be attentive to what the human authors truly wanted to affirm, and to what God wanted to reveal to us by their words.75
110 In order to discover the sacred authors’ intention, the reader must take into account the conditions of their time and culture, the literary genres in use at that time, and the modes of feeling, speaking and narrating then current. "For the fact is that truth is differently presented and expressed in the various types of historical writing, in prophetical and poetical texts, and in other forms of literary expression."76
111 But since Sacred Scripture is inspired, there is another and no less important principle of correct interpretation, without which Scripture would remain a dead letter. "Sacred Scripture must be read and interpreted in the light of the same Spirit by whom it was written."77
The Second Vatican Council indicates three criteria for interpreting Scripture in accordance with the Spirit who inspired it.78
112 1. Be especially attentive “to the content and unity of the whole Scripture”. Different as the books which compose it may be, Scripture is a unity by reason of the unity of God’s plan, of which Christ Jesus is the center and heart, open since his Passover.79
113 2. Read the Scripture within “the living Tradition of the whole Church”. According to a saying of the Fathers, Sacred Scripture is written principally in the Church’s heart rather than in documents and records, for the Church carries in her Tradition the living memorial of God’s Word, and it is the Holy Spirit who gives her the spiritual interpretation of the Scripture (". . . according to the spiritual meaning which the Spirit grants to the Church"81).
114 3. Be attentive to the analogy of faith.82 By “analogy of faith” we mean the coherence of the truths of faith among themselves and within the whole plan of Revelation.
III. THE HOLY SPIRIT, INTERPRETER OF SCRIPTURE
109 In Sacred Scripture, God speaks to man in a human way. To interpret Scripture correctly, the reader must be attentive to what the human authors truly wanted to affirm, and to what God wanted to reveal to us by their words.75
110 In order to discover the sacred authors’ intention, the reader must take into account the conditions of their time and culture, the literary genres in use at that time, and the modes of feeling, speaking and narrating then current. "For the fact is that truth is differently presented and expressed in the various types of historical writing, in prophetical and poetical texts, and in other forms of literary expression."76
111 But since Sacred Scripture is inspired, there is another and no less important principle of correct interpretation, without which Scripture would remain a dead letter. "Sacred Scripture must be read and interpreted in the light of the same Spirit by whom it was written."77
The Second Vatican Council indicates three criteria for interpreting Scripture in accordance with the Spirit who inspired it.78
112 1. Be especially attentive “to the content and unity of the whole Scripture”. Different as the books which compose it may be, Scripture is a unity by reason of the unity of God’s plan, of which Christ Jesus is the center and heart, open since his Passover.79
Code:
The phrase "heart of Christ" can refer to Sacred Scripture, which makes known his heart, closed before the Passion, as the Scripture was obscure. But the Scripture has been opened since the Passion; since those who from then on have understood it, consider and discern in what way the prophecies must be interpreted.80114 3. Be attentive to the analogy of faith.82 By “analogy of faith” we mean the coherence of the truths of faith among themselves and within the whole plan of Revelation.
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edwest211
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The senses of Scripture
115 According to an ancient tradition, one can distinguish between two senses of Scripture: the literal and the spiritual, the latter being subdivided into the allegorical, moral and anagogical senses. The profound concordance of the four senses guarantees all its richness to the living reading of Scripture in the Church.
116 The literal sense is the meaning conveyed by the words of Scripture and discovered by exegesis, following the rules of sound interpretation: "All other senses of Sacred Scripture are based on the literal."83
117 The spiritual sense. Thanks to the unity of God’s plan, not only the text of Scripture but also the realities and events about which it speaks can be signs.
119 "It is the task of exegetes to work, according to these rules, towards a better understanding and explanation of the meaning of Sacred Scripture in order that their research may help the Church to form a firmer judgement. For, of course, all that has been said about the manner of interpreting Scripture is ultimately subject to the judgement of the Church which exercises the divinely conferred commission and ministry of watching over and interpreting the Word of God."88
115 According to an ancient tradition, one can distinguish between two senses of Scripture: the literal and the spiritual, the latter being subdivided into the allegorical, moral and anagogical senses. The profound concordance of the four senses guarantees all its richness to the living reading of Scripture in the Church.
116 The literal sense is the meaning conveyed by the words of Scripture and discovered by exegesis, following the rules of sound interpretation: "All other senses of Sacred Scripture are based on the literal."83
117 The spiritual sense. Thanks to the unity of God’s plan, not only the text of Scripture but also the realities and events about which it speaks can be signs.
- The allegorical sense. We can acquire a more profound understanding of events by recognizing their significance in Christ; thus the crossing of the Red Sea is a sign or type of Christ’s victory and also of Christian Baptism.84
- The moral sense. The events reported in Scripture ought to lead us to act justly. As St. Paul says, they were written “for our instruction”.85
- The anagogical sense (Greek: anagoge, “leading”). We can view realities and events in terms of their eternal significance, leading us toward our true homeland: thus the Church on earth is a sign of the heavenly Jerusalem.86
Code:
The Letter speaks of deeds; Allegory to faith;
The Moral how to act; Anagogy our destiny.87But I would not believe in the Gospel, had not the authority of the Catholic Church already moved me.89
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otjm
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Sorry, but I support science. I also support the Catholic Church, founded on Peter. Further, there are a multitude of Christian churches which also support science.
The bottom line is that within Protestantism, if there is a disagreement over a major issue, what happens? There is a split, and a new church is formed; that is why we now have something in the range of 30,000 different churches, with no end in sight of the constant disagreements and further foundations of new factions. Christ founded a church, provided a means of resolving issues, and that church can be traced from the time of the Apostles to today.
Much of what led to the Protestant revolution had to do with disagreements over theology; but what is little spoken about is what else was a driving force; and that was politics. Rightly or wrongly the Catholic Church, after the fall of Rome, stepped into the void. And as a significant force within various tribal councils, and later various courts of kings and queens, princes and other rulers, it was perceived as “the enemy”. It wasn’t until The mid 1800’s that The Church lost the Papal states, the Pope was confined to the Vatican, and the Church started the long process of removing itself (mentally) from direct influence over local, regional and national politics.
Memories tend to be enormously long; we still have people who have not really moved on from our Civil War; but in that, we are mere pikers as memories in Europe (as well as the rest of the world) go back far, far longer to wrongs perceived and real.
The net result is that it becomes near impossible to sort out feelings (as opposed to facts) underlying the disputes which people have had with the Church. And many a Protestant feels that the Holy Spirit has anointed them or their predecessors in that Church, ignoring the 2,000 years of consistency in the authority granted by Christ and handed down through the ages.
It is interesting that you take umbrage with my comment concerning contextualism, as you take it, apparently, that I was describing a universal rule: I was not.
Rather than continue a debate on the matter, I will echo the words of John Henry Cardinal Newman: to be immersed in the Fathers of the Church is to cease to be Protestant.
God bless.
The bottom line is that within Protestantism, if there is a disagreement over a major issue, what happens? There is a split, and a new church is formed; that is why we now have something in the range of 30,000 different churches, with no end in sight of the constant disagreements and further foundations of new factions. Christ founded a church, provided a means of resolving issues, and that church can be traced from the time of the Apostles to today.
Much of what led to the Protestant revolution had to do with disagreements over theology; but what is little spoken about is what else was a driving force; and that was politics. Rightly or wrongly the Catholic Church, after the fall of Rome, stepped into the void. And as a significant force within various tribal councils, and later various courts of kings and queens, princes and other rulers, it was perceived as “the enemy”. It wasn’t until The mid 1800’s that The Church lost the Papal states, the Pope was confined to the Vatican, and the Church started the long process of removing itself (mentally) from direct influence over local, regional and national politics.
Memories tend to be enormously long; we still have people who have not really moved on from our Civil War; but in that, we are mere pikers as memories in Europe (as well as the rest of the world) go back far, far longer to wrongs perceived and real.
The net result is that it becomes near impossible to sort out feelings (as opposed to facts) underlying the disputes which people have had with the Church. And many a Protestant feels that the Holy Spirit has anointed them or their predecessors in that Church, ignoring the 2,000 years of consistency in the authority granted by Christ and handed down through the ages.
It is interesting that you take umbrage with my comment concerning contextualism, as you take it, apparently, that I was describing a universal rule: I was not.
Rather than continue a debate on the matter, I will echo the words of John Henry Cardinal Newman: to be immersed in the Fathers of the Church is to cease to be Protestant.
God bless.
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Gorgias
Guest
Hmm… are you sure you’re talking about the truth or falsity of God’s Word? Or, perhaps, aren’t you really talking about the truth or falsity of a particular interpretation of God’s Word?
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