Why do Christians WANT to read the Bible?

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I’m okay with hearing the opinions of Christians / Theists on this one as well. There’s a guy that I work with. He loves that damn book. He’s writing scripture out of it on a notepad. He’s reading out loud. He’s obsessed with it. I found it to be a very boring and ridiculous read. I was basically just pounding my head up against a brick wall just trying to finish reading the Bible.

I just couldn’t get passed the parts that supported slavery, tribalism, racism, incest, statutory rape, more rape, mention of omnicide, genocide of other clans, the torture of children, hypocrisy on sexual immorality even though it makes it like it’s okay to fuck your sister or like Lot to get drunk and sleep with his daughters, and all of the off the wall miracles. Then there’s vague things with the scripture, poems, and things that make no sense at all. Not to mention the plot holes that come in to question.

How can anyone read that jargon and take it seriously?

I don’t know why Christians think it’s all great and wonderful. Can’t they read it and stand back and think that this isn’t what we learned in public school? or is public school bad because it focuses on the historical facts and is secular?

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Many do not. Catholics for example. There are allegedly around 2 billion of them.

Asa teen I became interested in the Bible. My reasons were that the bible is the inspired world of god and the foundation of my faith. Why wouldn’t I want to read it? At my Catholic school, we were actively discouraged from reading the bible, “lest you become confused” (I swear) So naturally I read the whole thing over the next few months.

Logical fallacy. Argument from personal incredulity and irrelevant.

Having said that ,it’s my perception that very few Christians have ever actually read the entire bible and those who have done so critically are a tiny portion of those.

Further, most people swallow their faith is small, uncritical chunks before the age of seven. After that, they never think seriously about the matter again.

Are believers stupid? Mostly not, seeing as they make up around 85% of the world population. Probably not even especially gullible, except in this one area. That was my experience growing up chronically catholic.

Career criminals and murderers, rapists etc tend to be believers. Religious faith is about belief, not behaviour. I read recently that in US prisons only 0.07% of inmates identify as atheist…

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Something like 40% of Americans believe dinosaurs and humans coexisted in the past; essentially that The Flintstones is a documentary. You aren’t going to be able to reason with those people.

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Indeed.

“If you could reason with religious people there wouldn’t be any” (Greg House)

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Do they read it or don’t they?
My experience shows either, they don’t and rely on ministers, priests, pastors to tell them in sermons what’s in there, or they use to read but now only rely on faulty memory, or they only read select parts, their favourite bits which are usually either vague or non-contentous ‘deepities’, seeking only the comfort derived, or some read all of the Bible and steadfastly accept it is the holy, true and inerrant word of their god and they are unworthy enough to be able to understand all the ‘esoteric wisdom’ behind it, and then for the majority they let others read and direct them to the ‘easier’ parts like evangelical bible study organisations who make that selection for them, avoiding the darker bits from the Old Testament and the disputatious sections of the New.
From all of these come honest believers who decide to strengthen their faith by reading and critically analysing the text for meaning and relevance. From some of these discerning people come atheists.

The bible is either used as a mysterious, impenetrable tome of ancient wisdom and divine commands to dictate to the congregation or it is used almost like a weapon to demand awe, unquestioning respect and contractual behaviour or it is personally and privately cherished and read for comfort, direction and endurance.
Or it is understood to just be a book of old myths, laws, customs, a little history, poems, proclamations, prophecies and for the most part not particularly well edited or written.

In my discussions with most professed Christians, I have found I have usually had the superior knowledge of the contents of their sacred text and that I have had the least favoured interpretation.

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I was raised into a protestant family. Everything I knew about religion was dictated to me in the weekly sermons. I remember cute bible story books scattered around the house, not no bible. Only at a much advanced age did I decide to truly read the bible in it’s entirety. Part way through it I was convinced it was a pile of shit, and that was the trigger that propelled me into becoming an atheist.

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I was indoctrinated into religion as a young child. There were three Churches within walking distance to my school. For some reason, my mother thought I would benefit by attending…

Side note; Single mom without a clue. She always put me in shit I hated because I didn’t have a father. Boy Scouts, Church, and Baseball. Fuck I hated little league baseball.

So I make the little macaroni Jesus in a frame. Sang all the Jesus loves me songs. And got all the little bible school stories. What was really interesting is that I recall some of the apocraphal stories as well. For some reason, we were told of the Childhood Stories of Jesus. Jesus and his father cutting wood. Jesus and the little mud birds. Jesus and the boy he kills. etc…

They slip that shit into your brain before the ability to think critically even develops.

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As a jonger I was spared two subversive organisations; school cadets ( a bit like ROTC) and the Boy Scouts. At 8 all I knew about scouts was they went camping and that I hated camping. (today I loathe camping with a passion) Plus, a couple of offensively cheerful, energetic kids from school went. I was certain I would hit one with half a house brick*** and get chucked out. I just saved everyone a lot of trouble :innocent:

*** at that age I had no conception of fighting fair. Kid hit me, I would bean him with the nearest blunt object or bite him until blood came. I was a nasty little stinker. I’ve never known how I avoided doing some kid a mischief and/or getting expelled from Saint Rose Of Lima convent school.

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Ha ha ha ha ha…

Damn how similar. I just hated groups of people though. Scouts would have been fine if it werent for all the clicks. I like camping and fishine and all that outdoorsy stuff. I just want to do it alone. Something about going camping with a group of beer drinking drunks, is just not appealing to me. Seems that most camping trips turn out this way. As for the boyscouts, a camping trip with 15 boys is completely insane.

I took 6 boys on a camping trip to Big Bear Lake. They were inner city kids who had never been in the snow. We did a quick stop at a roadside turn off. One boy saw a snow mound off the side of a cliff, with a drop of about 15 feed, and jumped. Holy Fuck, I thought the kid would kill himself. He had no fucking idea what was under that snow.
Lucky for me, who gives a shit about the kid, it was just a mound of snow and the littel shit survived.

Later, we all went down the side of the small cliff to a stream. They had fun slipping on the ice and breaking through the ice to soak their shoes. Okay, time to go home. We start up the steep little cliff and the bad ass of the bunch begins crying that he can’t make it. Awwww fuck. I walk half way down the slope, grab the kid by the collar of the shirt and drag his ass to the top. This is a reall inner city tough guy, dressed in cammo and ususlly punking the other kids because of his size. So much for all his bravado.

I still don’t know that there are rules in fighting. I am too old to worry about such nonsense. I don’t do head kicks any more. My reflexes are not what they used to be. I can’t run. I am very aware of all of this. That makes me a very dangerous human being when it comes to rules. They just don’t exist.

Kid hit me once in 5th grade. He was bigger than me. I jumpped the SOB, to his surprise, grabbed him by the hair and swong him around until he tumbled. When he got up, he was graced with two new bald spots on his head, and I was standing there with a tuff of hair in each hand. The group of kids around us began laughing. The guy noticed his bald spots and began laughing as well. The fight was over.

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It rarely snows in South Australia. I’ve seen snow once, over 60 years ago. In the Adelaide hills, a patch about 2 meters across. Have seen snow falling once. That was in the Italian alps. Bloody driver refused to stop the bus. Once I stayed at ski lodge on Mt Rainier, Washington state.

Trivia; Our Victorian Alps receives more snowfall than Switzerland.

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Didn’t know that. I’ve also been atop the Alps. I have been skiing one time and one time only in my life, Hoch Yeebrig, Switzerland. I am sure I messed up the spelling of the name. We just happened to roll into town on the week a new ski resort was trying out all its equipment. It was a free week for all the town’s people. We stayed in a Lodge that was not open to the public. No fire in the grand fire pit but the bar was open for the town’s people. Rooms were really cheap, they charged us something like $20 for the night. About 4 feet of snow fell on our first day there.

Mind you, I have no idea how to ski. I grew up surfing. Not even close to the same thing. I have a ski story that can wait for another time.

Also went to Mt. Plates, the highest point in the Italian Alps. Wow! An ocean of snow covered mountains as far as the eye can see. Loved it.

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Me neither, nor skate.

Did some waterskiing in the army. My battalion had its own boat. Some beaches in Malaysia were good for skiing. However, the best for a learner like myself was in some of the lagoon surrounded by small islands around Singapore .

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I’m okay with hearing the opinions of Christians / Theists on this one as well. There’s a guy that I work with. He loves that damn book. He’s writing scripture out of it on a notepad. He’s reading out loud. He’s obsessed with it. I found it to be a very boring and ridiculous read. I was basically just pounding my head up against a brick wall just trying to finish reading the Bible.

did you finish as the bits you mentioned you could not get past, are in the beginning of the book.

I just couldn’t get passed the parts that supported slavery,

Actually it highly regulated slavery in a time when your ancestors had no rules concerning slavery God demanded they be treated with far more dignity then the world had seen up to this point. everyone like to take slavery in the bible out of context. but if you great xs10 gpop pop wasn’t a slave he has no issues owning one without any restrictions.

tribalism, racism, again,

what were you ancestors doing at that time?? because there was not one surviving people who did not follow suit with tribalism and racism. diversity corrupted societies and killed back then. You had to be a member of the tribe in one way or another. strangers always meant danger.

incest,

incest was not applauded.

statutory rape,

that’s funny as there were no statutes concerning underage rape until the law given by god.

do i need to keep asking what were your ancestors doing? or do you get in that time humanity could have died out completely… now that said if not for the progressive jews and their one God there was nothing to say across the board rape is wrong. perhaps in regions of city states but no one collective morality.

which is still taking place today if we label a country a threat to national security… IE look what happened to ISIS. thereis not one surviving member of the Islamic state left. those who were not killed were assimilated.

the torture of children don’t remember that one might have to provide book chapter and verse for me.

[quote], hypocrisy on sexual immorality even though it makes it like it’s okay to fuck your sister [/quote] where do you get all this incest?

[quote]or like Lot to get drunk and sleep with his daughters, [/quote] 1) lot was not a godly man… if you read the story how did you miss all of his shenanigans? 2) he did not get drunk and rape his daughters. he was made drunk ot he point he passed out, and they raped him… again not an example of good godly people but rather the type of people who lived back then that god did not like too much

and all of the off the wall miracles.Then there’s vague things with the scripture, poems, and things that make no sense at all.Not to mention the plot holes that come in to question.

Like??

Why do people read the bible? because they experienced the holy spirit in some way and the bible contains the information you need to further develop yourself into someone who can more easily tap into the Spirit/Spiritual gifts.

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Many royal families in Europe practiced incest/inbreeding. They were staunch theists, but married close family members. The most obvious is the Hapsburg family.

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That is factually incorrect. Just one example, the Egyptians also had rules on slavery. Practically every ancient civilization practiced slavery and had rules on slavery.

@Drich Please understand that you will be fact-checked, and your statements will not be blindly accepted.

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What a truly asinine statement. The very act of owning another human being negates any possibility of dignity, and Exodus 21 claims it is ok to beat them, even to death, as long as they survived the beating by more than 48 hours, that doesn’t sound like it affords much dignity to me, and I am not an omniscient and omnipotent diety with limitless choice, who could have explicitly and emphatically denounced slavery as egregiously immoral. Given that same deity managed to include multiple commandments out of ten to demand the different ways it wanted the saccharine worship of its pets, you’d think it might have spent the time to explicitly denounce things like slavery, rape and child abuse, not a bit of it though.

Are you claiming there is any context when buying and owning slaves is moral, or owning their children as slaves, let alone beating them, even to death? That’s obscene.

What has that to do with the revolting actions the bible claims a deity advocates and encourages and even indulges? No one is claiming evolved apes are perfectly merciful are they, unlike religions claims for the biblical deity, which simply aren’t supported by many of the narratives in the bible, and Exodus 21 is an obvious example.

Tell that to the prisoners taken in ethnic cleansing wars that the bible claims a deity encouraged, and the sex trafficking of female prisoners.

No, as it is an irrelevant red herring, as no one is claiming their ancestors were omniscient and omnipotent deities with limitless mercy. Do you really not see the comparison is nonsensical?

Oh please, I’d love you to try and pretend you can evidence that ludicrous claim. While I finish laughing can you tell me why you think rape is wrong, beyond blindly obeying divine diktat?

And this justifies the barbaric and sadistic actions of the biblical deity how exactly? A deity that according to the bible feels it is ok to torture a new-born baby to death over 7 days, just because it was conceived in an adulterous relationship.

Noah’s flood, King David’s baby being tortured to death by god, god explicitly giving his self proclaimed chosen people the right to sex traffic female prisoners if they were virgins, and slavery slavery slavery slavery slavery slavery…to name a few off the top of my head.

Why would you say that, that same deity encourages its adherents to rape prisoners of ethnic cleansing? It seems ok with rape when it suits.

I don’t believe you, evidence please?

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That is factually incorrect. Just one example, the Egyptians also had rules on slavery. Practically every ancient civilization practiced slavery and had rules on slavery.

@Drich Please understand that you will be fact-checked, and your statements will not be blindly accepted.

perhaps you should have looked a little harder.

There were three levels of slaves Chattel, force labor, and skilled labor. while skilled labors were prized and well taken care of and protected by the laws, chattel weren’t. if you remember their shrewd treatment was the reason for the exodus.

they key to the statement was what were your ancestors doing… i didn’t claim no one had rules for slave i said your ancestors did not. meaning “westerners at the time”/barbarians were not know for their progressive focus on human rights.

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do i seriously need to preface that statement? we were discussing incest in the bible… Why would you bring up a society that had nothing to do with the bible.

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And the bible did not advocate for human rights. The bible advocated slavery, genocide, torture, all manner of nasty things.

I suggest you read Numbers 31.

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Holy cow, Adam and Eve had children. They had children. Who do you think they had sex with in order to have children?

I referenced the Hapsburgs and many European royal families because all of them, EVERY ONE were devout theists. But they were screwing their cousins, aunts, sisters and brothers.

https://www.encyclopedia.com/religion/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/incest-bible

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