I wish I had never looked at this, I though it was an interesting commentary on the political correctness movement, intended to be a satirical.
This board is a brutal commentary and why internet boards need moderation.

Aunty M,
You play nice on all of the other boards and put yourself off as a nice motherly/aunt friendly person.. When in reality you can be pretty mean and vindicative.
What you see is whay you get with me, i don't sugar coat anything and frankly get labeled as an a$$hole alot of the time, but atleast everyone knows I am. :rolleyes:

My intrepetation of the bible is just that....my interpretation...it's not open for debate. I don't discuss my religious views because they are mine not anyone elses. I do, however, despise those whom try to force their religious views onto others. So there are "official" ways of interpreting the bible. In your mind only. Not mine.

Shthd

You brought up religion and then when challenged on it claim it to be personal ant not open to discussion. Bible scholars of all walks of life use 3 rules for interpreting passages in the bible. You may not but those who study it require their application.

What exactly are those rules? I'm no biblical scholar, so maybe that's why I've never heard of them.

But I did ask a life-long staunch Catholic and a Fundamental Ultra-Conservative Christian (check out that acronym ) and neither of them had heard of the rules. So I'm pretty curious.

Harley,

There are really four when you include common sense or literal which I will.

1) When the scripture makes common or literal sense. All passages should be treated this way unless there is something in the text that shows otherwise. Also called the golden rule.

2) The law of double reference. This law observes that a passage or block of scripture is speaking of two different persons or two different events separated by long periods of time, but in the passage they are blended ino one picture and the gap is not represented in the passage. A good example is the old testament prophecies of the first and second coming of Christ.

3) The Law of Recurrence. This law describes the fact that some passages of scripture there exisits the recording of an event followed by a second recording of the same event giving more detail of the first.

4) A text apart from its context is a pretext. A text only means what it means in its context and cannot be pulled out of its context.

These rules were formulated by Dr. David l. Cooper the late director of the biblical research society.

Harley,

I should aslo note no suprise in people not kowing thses rules. Most churches have a bias in thier doctrine that is why we see 2000 different Christian denominations. It is also why you see one group bashing gays and another railing on another topic. They choose to bend the works to their needs . IMHO the number one reason so many have issues with religion. At least it is why I did for so many years until I came across these rules and it opened up things a bit.

Again, it's not rocket science stlhead.

Sure, historians, theoligins, biblical scholars, etc have generally accepted prinicples they follow to study translations in order to get to not just the meaning of each word, but the ideas being presented in light of historical and cultural contexts.

But all that aside, the average guy like you and me has plenty of tools to study and interpret the Bible. It doesn't take long to realize you can't just pick a few verses and think you know what's being said. That's why they call it 'studying' the Bible and why Christians are involved in self lead Bible studies as well as group Bible studies.

You can usually spot the 'church leaders' or 'denominations' that have some kind of agenda - they are the ones who don't encourage their congregation to actually study the Bible on their own and who just preach their own message down their throats and pick and choose a few verses to 'support' their ideas.

The dangerous people are those that have an agenda and use the Bible as a way to manipulate people (as has been done
throughout history including today. Just watch those idiots on TBN with their 'Crystal Palace' or whatever...). The other dangerous group are those lone individuals who casually pick up a Bible, find a few verses, and think they suddenly understand everything...

As Christians, we have learned to study on our own, compare and discuss studies with others in our church, compare our findings with various respected scholars and church leaders around the world, and I know this sounds hokey, but we are also guided by the Holy Spirit. We don't just rely on any one of the above - but we combine all our resources and in the end it is our own logic and reason that takes the data given and 'interprets' the Bible. Some take this much more lightly that others, but for most, it is a serious matter.

I don't just blindly follow what someone tells me since I know that there are those with agendas - whether that be power, prestige, money, are simply to deceive as many as they can to keep them from actually understanding the word of God.

Anyway, all that just to say that I give about as much credit to those who say 'my interpretation is all that matters' about the same credit I would give to the guy who wets his finger, holds it in the air, and tells you what the weather will be like tomorrow. He may be right, but there is much more to studying, gathering, and interpreting weather data than that kind of shoot from the hip approach.