[littlemanpoet]

Originally Posted by davem

So why does the pig suddenly become 'clean' after the resurrection - cf Peter's dream which I referred to earlier?

Because the death and resurrection of Jesus fulfills all the Law. Like the sacrificial sheep of Leviticus, He became unclean by shedding his blood, and being without sin, and being God, his death renders all uncleanness redeemed ..... if those we claim it. But the resurrection is God's victory over the sting of death, which is sin.

The reason for uncleanness laws in the Old Testament was so that the people of Israel could have kept before them tangibly that humans (and therefore they themselves) were fallen. It's not a matter of value or worth, being clean or unclean, but a matter of condition before God. Maybe everybody here understands that, but I just wanted to be sure.

Originally Posted by davem

This is what worries me about all believers - if the Bible ... says one thing, & the 'scholars' (basing their statements on ... archaeology, historical record, common sense) say different the text is given primacy & the scholars "either dismissed as fools or sent to the stake[sic]".

They shouldn't be dismissed, not even if their motivations are less than perfect. It does indeed come down to a matter of whether one is a "person of the Book" or a "person the World". This is not meant as a pejorative, but a naming of which place you choose to place greater authority. The problem I have with the World is that it is all based on human knowledge, we hope the best there is. The Bible is (as I see it) God's revelation, and that makes all the difference. I understand that you see the Bible as just one more piece of human knowledge, and therefore I can't blame you for understanding things the way you do. Makes lots of sense if you come from that point of view. However, I have found that acknowledging the Bible to be God's revelation, has brought much that was at war in me, to peace; much that had been cowardly, to courage; much that had been bitter and full of resentment, to compassion; much that had been depressive and unremitting gloom, to joy. What in this world has the power to do that in a human life? I don't know. But I do know that the Person presented in the Bible has done this in mine.

Originally Posted by davem

The Bible says Jesus was the Son of God, the Koran denies that. To the followers of each the others are heretics, unbelievers. LMP, you scare me. Sorry, but you do. I know you would never light the fire, but you would create the climate, make it possible for the fire to be lit.

Far be it from me to create the climate. It is hate and fear and lust (for power) and envy in the heart of humans that creates such a climate, not beliefs based on religious or spiritual texts.

Originally Posted by davem

Belief is the single most dangerous approach to life.

Belief is unavoidable. Every human chooses to believe something. The content of my belief is as I have stated in many posts on this thread. Yours is as you have stated.

But regarding my seeming cop-out. I was using short-hand. I am not an anti-intellectual. I was referring to certain scholars who refuse to accept the historicity of pretty much any of the old testament writings. That seems like a benighted point of view, and the one to which I was referring. There are plenty of scholars who make no such refusal.

By the way, there are a few scholars who have written about how the resurrection is the best answer to fit the facts. One is Malcom McDowell; but a more insightful and thoroughgoing writer on this topic is N.T. Wright. He's really worth a look. He's Church of England, and I believe he's with Oxford or another of the major British Universities. But I digress.....

I think you mean not simple belief, but belief based on an authority found in a text as opposed to the authority of experience by means of evidence and proven experiment. But you should know that the more we learn through our experience, and through evidence of experiment, the more we realize how much there is we don't know ... and can't know through these means. One must choose one's beliefs, because science and mere experience can't take you where the questions we can't help asking ourselves, takes us.

..... and at this point I finally come full circle to Tolkien. It is story and poetry that can take us there. Tolkien's story does take us there, and it's a great part of what draws us to LotR and The Silmarillion. Tolkien wrote about real things and we are rewarded by entering into Middle Earth in ways that we can't even write about successfully, and we are rewarded with riches we can't even explain. Tolkien's stories do this for us. The stories in the bible also do this, but not for everyone; not for those for whom the bible feels alien because it has become tied to negative correlations in our own lives that we don't even understand. (up to 116)