The UNholy Book

  • Thread starter Thread starter James_S_Saint
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
J

James_S_Saint

Guest
The very first web forum that I ever encountered was due to an invitation to “debate” the existence of God. I had made an argument concerning the existence of God on a chat program where the owner of the website was trolling. He invited me to debate the topic and gave me the link.

I was expecting a rather high-brow logical debate, but discovered rather the opposite, an entirely political atmosphere and intent. The site was extremely anti-Christian and entirely pathos oriented. If they could disrupt your Internet connection or edit your post faster than you could re-edit it so as to make you appear wrong or unpopular, as far as they were concerned, they “won” the debate.

After a degree of what they deemed my “whining” about their irrational methods, I decided that being rational wasn’t going to get me anywhere, so I thought to just get along with them for a while so as to investigate rather than confront.

I proposed several thoughts as OPs that were much more anti-Christian friendly in appearance just to calm the waters a bit. One of those threads was labeled, “The UNHoly Bible”.

In that thread, I explained the meaning of “holy” and that it involved both purity AND completeness. I gave examples of certain incompleteness and mentioned even some impurities. From that, I declared that I could not accept that the Bible was truly a “Holy” book.

As expected, my posting got cheers from the members and owner of course, even though I had already been declared the enemy. From that point on, I found it much easier to be able to post something without immediately having to sort through 5-10 pestering or distracting off topic commentaries.

I found it very interesting that even though they always professed that God was purely imaginary and an insidious plot to force their submission to the selfish power mongering of the old people, they really only hated, and I mean seriously hated, the Christians, not Jews or Muslims, or any other faith. If anyone mentioned anything the slightest bit negative about Jewish beliefs, they all rushed to defend the Jews with every kind of aggression they could muster.

But I never felt that I was lying about what I posted. The word “holy” really does mean both “pure” and “complete” yet it can be easily seen that the Bible is actually neither. There are very many things to be known about God that are not mentioned in the Bible at all. It is well known by many scholars that both Jesus and Moses said many things that just never got recorded and in the recording the opportunity for impurity is seriously ever present.

This reality had really no effect on my particular understanding (or “faith” if you wish) in that I was well aware that reading a 3000 year old document from an entirely different culture was not something to take on without expecting to have to forgive many practical realities merely in the communication attempt.

But now I look upon the Catholic Church as it claims holiness and have to, in all sincerity, be honest about the idea of what Holy really means and how dangerous it is to proclaim such a title.

“Pure” means being void of anything other than the essence of the topic. This also implies complete consistency.

“Complete”, in this context means that the topic is considered in “whole” void of anything being not considered or left out that is relevant to the topic.

Completeness is much easier to establish than purity in most cases merely by being logical about the concerns of the “whole picture” and ensuring that nothing has been over looked. This has been the essence of concern from the very beginning of Hebrew history and certainly a serious concern to Jesus.

Are the “holy documents” of the Church and the Church itself truly pure and truly complete in this context of considering the truly whole picture of life?
 
Are the “holy documents” of the Church and the Church itself truly pure and truly complete in this context of considering the truly whole picture of life?
Click to expand...
Unless God himself wrote it or said it, it’s at minimum been filtered by humans and at worst invented by them.

By the way, where in the world was this place you were debating?? They seem to have broken just about every netiquette there is!
 
liquidpele said:
Unless God himself wrote it or said it, it’s at minimum been filtered by humans and at worst invented by them.

By the way, where in the world was this place you were debating?? They seem to have broken just about every netiquette there is!
Click to expand...
It was years ago and when I search for it now, I can’t tell which of the many “exChristian” sites might be the one from years ago that has merely grown up a bit.

One to consider would be ExChristian.net, but I can’t be certain that was the one. There seems to be many “copies” now.
 
As Catholics, we do not consider the Word of God to be a book. The Word of God is supernatural in power. It is complete and holy and pure. But it is transmitted through a temporal medium (words, languages, pages). In Catholicism, God works with humans to transmit his Word. God’s Word is Holy and Pure. But it also existed in the Catholic Church before the Bible was written – through oral teaching, given through the apostles of Christ.

The Bible is Holy because it communicates the Word of God. But it is not Pure and Holy because of the syntax, vocabulary, punctuation or style.

The Word of God was given by Christ to His Church. It belongs to the Church and is an expression of the Faith of the Church – just as the Sacred Liturgy is.

Someone may want to take the liturgy of Holy Mass and make a sporting event out of it, for example. Then they might complain that Mass doesn’t make a very interesting sporting event – so therefore, it’s not Holy or Complete.

The Mass was given by Christ to His Church. It’s not to be stolen or misappropriated. It is holy and complete for what Christ intended it – a channel of supernatural grace.

The same is true with the Bible. It is not meant as a written document to be analyzed outside of the community of believers. The Scriptures require an interpreter, given by Christ for that purpose.

The sola scriptura error leads to a devaluation of the Scriptures. This happens by exaggerating and exaulting the written word (to the point that some believe that the King James version is the only infallible text) and using private interpretation.

After a while, it’s very easy to see that if the Bible is used like a textbook on mathematics, that there will be some paradoxical aspects difficult to reconcile. This then leads people to distance themselves from the Bible and claim that it is “not holy”.

But the method itself is flawed. One should consult the Church when trying to understand the Sacred Word that was given to Her by Christ.

Consulting schismatic, sectarian or heretical communions – or consulting one’s own imperfect, fallible knowledge in order to understand the Scripture is a path to confusion and misunderstanding.
 
reggieM said:
Consulting schismatic, sectarian or heretical communions – or consulting one’s own imperfect, fallible knowledge in order to understand the Scripture is a path to confusion and misunderstanding.
Click to expand...
I understand what you are saying, but my question isn’t really about the Bible. :o
 
There are more than one books which are truly unholy and the bible is not one of them.
 
geometer said:
There are more than one books which are truly unholy and the bible is not one of them.
Click to expand...
Ohh? Care to share?

…but be warned. When it comes to the word “Holy”, I am pretty precise. :o
 
James_S_Saint said:
Ohh? Care to share?

…but be warned. When it comes to the word “Holy”, I am pretty precise. :o
Click to expand...
Catholics are not allowed to read books written by Henry Cornellius Agrippa Von Nettesheim. I am not catholic, but I have encountered his most famous work, and banning his books is not without justification. If you should read what I had read, you would have a real feeling for what evil is.

As you read a sentence some kind of spiritual electricity floats off the page and affects your eyes.
 
geometer said:
Catholics are not allowed to read books written by Henry Cornellius Agrippa Von Nettesheim. I am not catholic, but I have encountered his most famous work, and banning his books is not without justification. If you should read what I had read, you would have a real feeling for what evil is.

As you read a sentence some kind of spiritual electricity floats off the page and affects your eyes.
Click to expand...
Oh, I know that feeling well. 😃

But how does that make it “Holy”? That merely sounds insidiously dangerous.
 
James_S_Saint said:
Oh, I know that feeling well. 😃

But how does that make it “Holy”? That merely sounds insidiously dangerous.
Click to expand...
Sorry, I do not know what you are talking about at this point.

How does what, make what holy?

Your claim is that the bible is unholy.
 
Most debates can be summed up entirely “I’m right.” “You’re wrong.”

. .
 
Well it is hard to recognize anything as being holy without understanding what that word means.

We get the word “holy” from the concept of being whole and pure.

If we are talking about Truth, the truth expressed in a holy book must cover the whole Truth in a whole manner. But in addition, it must tell of that whole truth in a pure fashion, being void of corruptions, deceptions, and ambiguities.

A very short example might be;
“Reality is composed of big things, small things, and everything in between.”

That statement can be said to be holy as long as the words are defined properly. If one is likely to read the word “thing” as meaning only material things, then the statement would not be holy in that it did not include things of energy, spirit, or principle. But otherwise, even though a bit useless, it does speak of the whole of reality.

Many theologians and philosophers speak of the Bible in terms of merely Body and Spirit. These people make the Bible into something not really holy when they see it in that light because in reality, where there are 2, there is always a third - that which is either, both, or neither of the other categories. The Bible actually does speak of that third category of the in-between, but most miss that part of the understanding. I think Hume was one, if I remember correctly.

Agrippa writes of magical things. Magic is fundamentally an art of deception and occult (hidden). But I’m not aware of any effort he made to write of the make of truly all of reality, but perhaps it is implied.

But even if Agrippa had written of the total of reality, he writes in an unholy fashion in that he uses deception in the writing itself. This makes it impure. He leads the reader into believing that many things being done are in themselves the cause of prosperity when in reality they are merely a disguise for the actual cause which is not to be revealed.

A proper Science book would come closer (if there really is such a thing any more). A Science book should explain every detail of how things work openly and honestly. If such a book could really include the entirety of all reality, that book would be a Holy book (good luck getting anyone to do that).

To me, without a lexicon, which used to be a required part of Science, any book is very likely to become impure even if it wasn’t originally. All forms of communication become corrupt if the transmitter/speaker and the receiver/listener cannot 100% agree on definitions of terms.

====================

But I was asking in the OP, not so much of the Bible, but of the Catholic Church. The CC, in order to be truly holy, must also follow such a concern.

Churches are about dealing with life and all that is involved in life. If a church only concerns itself with spiritual things and never with material things, then that church cannot be said to be holy. If a church addresses only scriptural things and leaves out practical day to day living concerns, that church cannot be said to be holy either.

But even more difficult than ensuring that all concerns of life are addressed in some fashion, to maintain holiness, it must also maintain purity. This can be quite a challenge.

Impurity within a church would include any deception or even mis-communication. But interestingly in a Jesus church, it has no need to be without error because a part of the Jesus design is to expect error and forgive (counter-balance). This is what gives it its only real hope.

But even more importantly, the issue of purity requires that no concern be out of priority. If the highest priority is to love, for example, then no action by the church can be for any other purpose at all even though it might end up accomplishing other purposes as by-product.

So I was really hoping to discuss the actual holiness concerns of the CC in this thread. Claiming holiness is a very dangerous thing to do, but that doesn’t mean it was done in error.
 
James_S_Saint said:
Agrippa writes of magical things. Magic is fundamentally an art of deception and occult (hidden). But I’m not aware of any effort he made to write of the make of truly all of reality, but perhaps it is implied.

But even if Agrippa had written of the total of reality, he writes in an unholy fashion in that he uses deception in the writing itself. This makes it impure. He leads the reader into believing that many things being done are in themselves the cause of prosperity when in reality they are merely a disguise for the actual cause which is not to be revealed.

A proper Science book would come closer (if there really is such a thing any more). A Science book should explain every detail of how things work openly and honestly. If such a book could really include the entirety of all reality, that book would be a Holy book (good luck getting anyone to do that).

To me, without a lexicon, which used to be a required part of Science, any book is very likely to become impure even if it wasn’t originally. All forms of communication become corrupt if the transmitter/speaker and the receiver/listener cannot 100% agree on definitions of terms.

====================
Click to expand...
No one said that Agrippa wrote holy books.

Earth to James, earth to James…

Come in James…
 
geometer said:
No one said that Agrippa wrote holy books.

Earth to James, earth to James…

Come in James…
Click to expand...
I wasn’t accusing. I was using Agrippa (only because you mentioned him) as an example of a book that is not holy for the reasons being discussed.
 
James_S_Saint said:
I wasn’t accusing. I was using Agrippa (only because you mentioned him) as an example of a book that is not holy for the reasons being discussed.
Click to expand...
His books are, unholy. His books head the list of unholy books.
 
geometer said:
This is really nothing to joke about. I believe that a person could be struck dead, from reading enough of his writing.😦
Click to expand...
Still doesn’t compare to watching TV… no joke. You are just less aware of the source of troubles (making it even more insidious).
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top