I've started a full read-through of the Bible

[realisticphish]

granted its via the Skeptic's Annotated Bible, but it's still a hefty task. I sense that it will take me a long time to slog through it, but I feel that I need to do it just so I can one-up those Christians who've never read it :D

[trotsky]

1. And most of them certainly haven't.

I'm always surprised at just how little most Christians know about their own bible, and who did (or more importantly, DID NOT) write it.

[TZ]

2. I surprised some (agnostic) friends

This weekend- I told them the only time I read anything from the bible was a children's illustrated picture book of the Old Testament. Nice pretty pictures:) ah, how lucky I am to have a secular family:)

[lazarus]

3. I've done the same thing

but I got bored during Exodus...

[SkyDaddy7]

17. It gets freaky in Leviticus!

[onager]

4. Good luck! Keep us posted on your progress.

Personally, I'd like to thank the Buy-bull for introducing me to porn at a very young age.

No, not the Lot's daughters/Song of Solomon verbal hijinx. But the pictures!

When I was a kid, my parents bought a deluxe giant-size, full-color-illustrated "family Bible." This was the South, so everybody had a big honkin' family Bible, usually on prominent display in the living room. That allowed neighbors to do a Holy-As-Us Check.

Anyway, at a very young age, I was flipping thru the Good Book and...

Holy Crap! I see naked people!

Not just Adam 'n Eve, either. Lots of the full-color illustrations in our Bible seem to have been heavily influenced by the Greek School - if you get my drift.

I thought about that recently when I saw the movie Liam, about a 7-yr-old boy growing up in Belfast during the Depression. The flick (directed by Stephen Frears) has some snarky things to say about Catholic schooling.

Much like I did, Liam spends a lot of time looking at classic Biblical art. Then he accidentally sees his Mom naked, and decides she must be sick because (unlike the women in the art) she has pubic hair.

He decides to tell that to the priest during confession...

[laconicsax]

5. It's definitely a hefty task.

It took me a few attempts before I made it out of Deuteronomy, then a lot of psyching myself up to not just call it quits at the end of the Old Testament. Malachi is basically the straw that could break the camel's back.
Malachi 4 (last chapter in the OT):

¹For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the LORD of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch. ²But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall. ³And ye shall tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I shall do this, saith the LORD of hosts.

⁴Remember ye the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel, with the statutes and judgments. ⁵Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD: ⁶And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.

The only consolation for continuing is the knowledge that the New Testament is shorter.

[realisticphish]

6. another consolation

is that mentally, I can throw in "three is the number of the counting, and the number of the counting shall be three. Though shalt not count to four, nor shalt thou count to two. Five is right out." and "and the Lord did grin"

That and "blessed are the cheesemakers"

[onager]

7. Yep. All those croaking prophets are a hard slog.

You can only stick around because you know the Bronze Age equivalent of a car chase might be coming (a she-bear killing 42 kids etc.)

[trotsky]

9. "the Bronze Age equivalent of a car chase"

:spray: :rofl:

[realisticphish]

8. Just finished Genesis

Now these are the generations of Esau...

I am VERY grateful for the SAB. It's easier to skim over names. Because, look: I do NOT give two shits about whose kid someone is. Especially when they are never, ever mentioned again. But those passages are giving me nightmares about later parts of the old testament.

I have to say, to me, it's very clear that the original "God" was a Babylonian-type god, who walked on the Earth, etc. He ate with Abraham, wrestled with Jacob... the dude liked to micromanage

I also noticed that there's a Skeptic's Annotated Book of Mormon, which I'll do after this (if I survive). It looks like a lot more fun :D

[Warpy]

10. Well, the "begats" are beyond tedious

and since they attempted to trace the patriarchal line, an exercise in futility, but the rest of it is a collection of many of the Bronze Age myths around the Mediterranean and is interesting literature for that, alone.

I found it an interesting read. My mother didn't read it until she was well into her 60s and had quite a different reaction. She was angry at herself for not reading it sooner and realizing what an utter load of crap it all was. That was the end of any pretense of religion for her.

Given my mother's reaction, I often think that the only way Christians, especially fundy Christians, can sustain such a load of utterly silly and contradictory beliefs is if they never sit down and read it all the way through, something that's assisted by their babble study groups that give them workbooks that have them assign chapter and verse to favorite catch phrases of their particular sects. That makes sure they stick to Leviticus and Paul, with only occasional forays into Genesis or Proverbs.

If you read it as a mythic history and as the mythic basis of Mediterranean culture, then it's a great read. If you try to read anything else into it and you've got more than two active synapses, then you're going to be in for a very rough time.

[realisticphish]

11. one thing I've found fascinating

is the Christian apologists that have responded to the SAB (which he links to as he goes, depending on the subject)

The mental gymnastics they do to weasel out of some of the controdictions is amazing. The ones they CAN'T figure anything out for, they ignore.

If you have to go to that much trouble to defend your book, and ignore most of the problems, how can you call it uniformly uplifting, and divinely inspired?

[pauliedangerously]

18. Well, ya know what old Jack Burton always says in a situation like this....

If your beliefs don't agree with reality, get new ones.

[Deep13]

12. If you feel like you want to shoot yourself, just stop reading. nt

[realisticphish]

13. or, more appropriately

stone myself to death

[onager]

14. Or drink the Kool-Aid.

Oh, sorry. REV. Jim Jones wasn't a real Xian.

:rofl:

[realisticphish]

15. I read his biography

incredibly fascinating. The funny thing is, he also considered himself a left winger, if not a socialist, or even a communist

[ChadwickHenryWard]

16. Well, there you go.

More victims for the body count of the evil, vile, nasty, Marxist atheists. Wait...

[amyrose2712]

19. Good luck and thank you.. I think I'll give it a try that way myself.

I have read many parts but never all the way through. Tried it as a kid but those begats! I realize, now that I can skim through them.