The Bible is backed up by zero evidence and is built upon conspicuous inaccuracies, impossibilities, contradictions, bigotry, misogyny, homophobia, racism, and violence.
The Bible is conforming to certainty. It claims to know beyond what is knowledgeable. All backed up with nothing. All backed up with nothing apart from words in a book. The evidence is overwhelmingly at odds with the words of the Bible.
How can you continue to believe something without any evidence at all of its validity or genuineness?
Why would I want to put my morality in the Bible? Why?
Maher, if you don’t have faith, no one on this earth is going to explain it to you adequately.
If you don’t have faith, you can’t possibly interpret the Bible the way it was meant. I didn’t have faith for 33 years. I came back to the Church after a few incidents that I don’t want to get into right now, but during the time of these incidents, I started reading the Bible again, which previously I didn’t understand. For some reason, faith sparked in me this time. I didn’t feel it, but when I read the New Testament, so many passages I took in the wrong context before had jumped out at me like their meaning was hidden from me previsouly. “Why the heck didn’t I see that before!!!” I used to say all the time. Had I read them like a mere novel or textbook, I would have still taken them at face value like you do. But for some reason, faith was allowed to take over at certain times. This has continued to this day. Passages I previously hadn’t understood continue to “jump out at me from the pages”.
Actually I do know why this all happened, but for me to tell you would sound foolish. And Christ in the Gospels that his followers’ deeds would sound foolish to the men of this earth. He meant the unfaithful. The ones who needed proof for everything and didn’t understand God. Only He can give you the grace to read the Bible correctly and in the proper light of faith. Besides, the Bible is a spiritual book, and thus needs to be read in light of that too. It will enable you to tell which stories need to be interpreted differently as to spiritual matters. Since spiritual things probably don’t concern you, then you’ll never understand why.
I would suggest that sometime, just ask God in your head to let you understand. That’s really not that hard is it? No one would know you did it. Do it as an experiment and see what happens next time you decide to read the Bible. But I suggest you read the New Testament first. You’re better off with this because the OT is easier to understand in lieu of the NT. And
mean it when you say it. If you do it flippantly, it probably won’t amount to anything.
Do I still have problems understanding things in the OT? Absolutely, but there are resources I can go to that help in syphoning off the meaningless garble to me. But without faith, those resources won’t help one iota.