We have seen how:
1) God inspires without negating our humanity.
2) We should interpret with an understanding of the cultural context and discern what is absolute truth.
3) We should interpret scripture collectively and see what God is saying to us through it all.
Considering this, we can see how the humanity of the authors was not negated when discussing slavery. We can see that it was the culture of the time to have slaves. Does this imply that God encouraged slavery? Absolutely not. When interpreting scripture collectively, we can see that God loved slavery no more than He loved divorce. However, he permitted it out of the hardness of their hearts. For elsewhere we can see that,
Not only does God remind the people that they once were also slaves (Deut. 5:15), but He also tells us that, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Gal. 3:28)
As someone had suggested in another blog, anyone can form any doctrine if they take one verse and run away with it. That is why it is essential that in order to understand God’s Word, we must be good interpreters of the text. This is why we see various denominations in Christianity, for we all have different interpretations of different verses. However, we all agree that Christ is the only way, the truth, and the life. We are not saved by any of our works, but by God’s gift of grace alone through faith.
When considering that we have 66 books from different cultures, various experiences, multiple authors, varying geographical locations, written over the span of centuries, agreeing on 95% of content, and without contradiction on the fundamental principles of Christianity, we can see why there is absolutely nothing like The Bible. Although they had no idea they were writing “The Bible,” the gift of God’s Word, through humanity, comes to us in an incredible way.
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3 comments:
So how do we know that all the books are compiled from different authors. Maybe I have been fed some bad information but, until all these stories were actually written (centuries AFTER Jesus was on earth) who is to say they are not just different interpretations of the same stories being told to others for years and years?
Jason,
You make an excellent point. God loves slavery no more than he loves divorce. To God, it is all bad. However, if God was going to force us not to divorce then we would have no free will. He allowed it to happen because the hardness of man's heart. However, that doesn't mean he commanded it.
1) God inspires without negating our humanity.
While I understand your point there is no evidence to support your premise other than you reading and interpreting the bible to fit your view.
2) We should interpret with an understanding of the cultural context and discern what is absolute truth.
And how do you do this? What makes you decide what is cultural and what is absolute truth?
3) We should interpret scripture collectively and see what God is saying to us through it al
This interpretation is where your biggest problem lies. Nothing suggests that we are to interpret the bible other than literal. nothing! except your wish for it to makes sense in a contemporary world.
It is okay for God to say: Thou shalt not kill but he may not say Thou shalt not make slaves of other humans??? We harden our hearts and kill anyway. And you suggest we hardened our hearts and kept slaves. For thousands of years. Surely slavery is a bit more extreme than divorce?
The thing is with your divorce theory there are actually the two contradictions and you explain it away (not very satisfactory imo) But nowhere in the bible is any indication that God frowns on slavery. You are assuming he does because your sense of morals says he should. You are placing words in God’s mouth!!
God is very vocal on how he should be revered and how jealous he is of other gods
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