Bible Study Pilot Thread

Bio-logical · Post by **Bio-logical** » Tue Dec 22, 2009 1:39 pm

I am currently reading the bible. I purchased "The HarperCollins Study Bible : New Revised Standard Version With the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical Book"
and just started, but I would like to discuss it with others. I was wondering if anybody might be interested in a weekly bible study/discussion/debate.

My wife does not like discussing it with me, since I am an atheist looking at it academically, but I would love to have a Christian, especially a biblically well-versed Christian, to go though this with and get their interpretation.

Depending on interest, I will start a user group and lead the discussion with a timeline. My goal is to read the entire bible over the next year.

I am considering switching versions if anybody would prefer KJV or basically whatever, specifically since I found a website that offers a timeline we could follow and complete it cover to cover over the next year, starting January 1.

http://www.ewordtoday.com/year/48/b.htm

I would like to point out that the format I propose is a weekly discussion of the scriptures read that week, debates will be asked to be held to that timeline or to spur into a new thread after that week is finished. I will post a link to the scripture being read next week with each coming week.

Heterodoxus · Post by **Heterodoxus** » Sat Dec 26, 2009 4:38 pm

Bio-logical wrote:I am still for diversity of translations since I will be posting links to the KJV online for every reading we do.

Thanks for the input!

X-lent!

Jayhawker Soule · Post by **Jayhawker Soule** » Sun Dec 27, 2009 2:21 pm

Heterodoxus wrote:
Bio-logical wrote:I am still for diversity of translations since I will be posting links to the KJV online for every reading we do.

Thanks for the input!
X-lent!

I will be using the JPS Torah Commentary supplemented by Alter, Fox, and Plaut (and, perhaps Hamilton (NICOT)).

Cathar1950 · Post by **Cathar1950** » Sun Dec 27, 2009 2:49 pm

I am going to just go with the flow and depend on everyone else. If I got a problem there are a number online and I have a few here as well as a few commentaries and such. I have a few Anchor Book commentaries for various books in the Bible. I also think we need to look at the history and evolution of the writings as well as the background and not read it through some modern ideology. This is of course nearly impossible which make it all the more fun and interesting.

Heterodoxus · Post by **Heterodoxus** » Sun Dec 27, 2009 4:58 pm

Cathar1950 wrote:we need to look at the history and evolution of the writings as well as the background and not read it through some modern ideology. This is of course nearly impossible

But doable

Bio-logical · Post by **Bio-logical** » Mon Dec 28, 2009 11:26 pm

Ok, I think I have found a suitable plan to get through the bible in a rational sense.

I was running into difficulty when we were disregarding the "1 year" plan so that we could discuss as necessary without having catch-up time and reconciling that with making sure the reading we were doing was not arbitrarily truncated in the middle of a story. I considered a few plans including topical plans, linear and chronological. The topical plan seems to be the most effective for discussion, but it involves the most jumping around and can be often taken out of context. The linear plan arbitrarily chooses stopping points. For this reason, I propose the chronological "scholar's plan".

http://70030.netministry.com/images/Sch ... lePlan.pdf

This plan follows stories as they are written and separates them into stories with a very explicit topic outline and is divided out into "days" of reading so that we can estimate reading load. This may take more dedication to read some of the larger sections and it will make my job of linking to the reading more difficult, but I think it will be the best for discussion. I would love to have feedback ASAP so I can get the user group set up for it.

Paul2 · Post by **Paul2** » Tue Dec 29, 2009 5:01 am

Bio-logical wrote:This plan follows stories as they are written and separates them into stories with a very explicit topic outline and is divided out into "days" of reading so that we can estimate reading load. This may take more dedication to read some of the larger sections and it will make my job of linking to the reading more difficult, but I think it will be the best for discussion. I would love to have feedback ASAP so I can get the user group set up for it.

If we don't expect to stay strictly to schedule and are flexible, as has been discussed previously, this seems a good plan to follow.

Jayhawker Soule · Post by **Jayhawker Soule** » Tue Dec 29, 2009 9:47 am

I'll participate in whatever 'plan' is agreed upon, but my strong preference is the 'plan' that resulted in the text as we now have it. Stuffing Job in between Genesis 11 and 12 strikes me as absurd, disruptive of the discussion of Genesis, and guaranteed to short change the wisdom literature.

Bio-logical · Post by **Bio-logical** » Tue Dec 29, 2009 10:06 am

Jayhawker Soule wrote:I'll participate in whatever 'plan' is agreed upon, but my strong preference is the 'plan' that resulted in the text as we now have it. Stuffing Job in between Genesis 11 and 12 strikes me as absurd, disruptive of the discussion of Genesis, and guaranteed to short change the wisdom literature.

The reason Job is stuck in the middle is because according to scripture Job lived sometime between creation and Abraham, so he is put there. This can cause a bit of jumping and I normally would prefer to read the bible cover to cover if I were reading it alone, but this allows us to study the narrative of the bible and get a better understanding of it. The other reason I prefer this one if you look is because the Psalms and proverbs are broken up into the books that they pertain to, which makes for an easier overall read of them and allows them to be kept in context. I would have difficulty reading the psalms straight through, not a big poetry guy.

Jayhawker Soule · Post by **Jayhawker Soule** » Tue Dec 29, 2009 11:40 am

Bio-logical wrote:
Jayhawker Soule wrote:I'll participate in whatever 'plan' is agreed upon, but my strong preference is the 'plan' that resulted in the text as we now have it. Stuffing Job in between Genesis 11 and 12 strikes me as absurd, disruptive of the discussion of Genesis, and guaranteed to short change the wisdom literature.
The reason Job is stuck in the middle is because according to scripture Job lived sometime between creation and Abraham, so he is put there.

There are various views regarding when (or if) Job lived, but I fully suspect it was written for a Torah-aware audience.

cnorman18 · Post by **cnorman18** » Tue Dec 29, 2009 12:02 pm

Jayhawker Soule wrote:
Bio-logical wrote:
Jayhawker Soule wrote:I'll participate in whatever 'plan' is agreed upon, but my strong preference is the 'plan' that resulted in the text as we now have it. Stuffing Job in between Genesis 11 and 12 strikes me as absurd, disruptive of the discussion of Genesis, and guaranteed to short change the wisdom literature.
The reason Job is stuck in the middle is because according to scripture Job lived sometime between creation and Abraham, so he is put there.
There are various views regarding when (or if) Job lived, but I fully suspect it was written for a Torah-aware audience.

The book of Job as we have it today was no doubt redacted post-Torah, but the narrative that is its root may very well date back to the Sumerian civilization and be the oldest part of the Bible. Maybe we should start with it first.

This is the problem with any "chronological plan." Who can say when the original oral traditions were composed or formed? One reading plan is as good as another, as long as the plan is coherent in some fashion.

I suspect that problems will arise not about chronology, but when some begin to claim that certain passages contain "figures" or "types" or "prophecies" of Jesus while Jewish members disagree.

Jews and Christians, and I would suppose atheists, read the Bible in entirely different ways with entirely different preconceptions and assumptions. Atheists, for instance, often focus on the brutality and atrocities in the OT and claim that those have certain implications about the nature of God and His relationship to humans. While both Christians and Jews largely reject those implications, they bring other readings and interpretations to the table. I doubt that those will be reconciled anytime soon.

I propose that we begin with the following assumptions and no others:

The Bible is an ancient document produced by humans, and does not, or at least does not necessarily, constitute the literal Word of God. Conclusions about the nature of God cannot properly be drawn from the Biblical text, but only conclusions about the beliefs and practices of those who wrote it. As far as I am concerned, all this is non-negotiable.

While one may oneself believe that the Bible is God-authored, for the purposes of this discussion that assumption will not be productive. If that isn't established at the outset, the discussion is not likely to move beyond that disagreement.

Debating Christianity and Religion

Bible Study Pilot Thread

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Bible Study Pilot Thread