[Lalwendë]

There was a fantastic talk on Stewardship and its function in real history (including with regard to the Scots) at Birmingham last year, but I think Esty was not there, and I cannot remember all the detail, so your last hope on that one is to recall davem for more information...

Originally Posted by Aiwendil

There is a character in the Torah called God. There is a character in the Koran called God. In a sense, they seem to refer to the same entity. It is sensible for Jews and Muslims to discuss God, and even perhaps argue about God; they basically mean the same thing when they say "God", even if they have different beliefs about that thing. Consider the question "Is Allah God?" from the point of view of a Jew or a Christian. The question might be understood in several different ways, and thus elicit several different answers. The Jew might understand the question to mean "Is 'Allah' the word Muslims use for God?", in which case he or she will answer "yes". Or the question might be understood as "Does Allah of the Koran present a true picture of God?" in which case the answer will presumably be "no".

The very thorny sticking point that fascinates me so much is this very one. And note I'm talking Real World now. That God can be God for so many different religions yet they all have to fight over him; my own belief is that there is One God, but no one religion has it 'right', even if we can personify whatever God is. That's why I call myself a Universalist. And why I also resist categorising Eru.

And is also why, ultimately, I like to stick to thinking of Eru as Eru (or Illuvatar, depending on the text...) and examining what he does from within the context of the secondary world, otherwise it all gets far too thorny.

Originally Posted by Aiwendil

I'm sorry if I seem to be belaboring the point. What I'm getting at is that a question like "Is Eru God?" is vague and could in fact mean several different things. Some of those possible meanings will bear an affirmative answer (e.g. "Is Eru the God of Arda?"), some will bear a negative (e.g. "Is the presentation of Eru identical in every way to the presentation of God in the New Testament?"), and some will be debatable ("Is Eru fundamentally very similar to the God presented in the New Testament?").

This is what I'm getting at myself! If we assume that Eru = God then we can get into some real tangles of interpretation and most likely, not get anywhere.

Originally Posted by Bethberry

This suggest, dearie, that you was brung up Protestant, because in the Catholic pedagogic tradition, individual reading of The Bible was not the purview of each believer. There were other ways of learning faith and that was through the Church catechism.

I was, but with a gloomy and not entirely fully renounced Catholic grandmother who liked to make me read the Catechism. Again though, she'd have told me that God's Word was only in those texts approved by the Pope (Bible, prayer book, catechism). And believe me, I'd hear some squabbles between her and one of her sisters about this and that from the Bible (usually to do with what it said about gambling ), so they didn't leave it all up to the Priest to decide what it meant.