Misquoting Jesus - Page 2

abqfriend · #11 (**permalink**) 07-02-2008, 12:26 PM

Yes, it is easy to get caught up in a very minor point or what you feel may be a discrepency in Sacred Scripture-and miss the major message being presented. I do not believe that Sacred Scripture/Bible is full of errors in matters of faith.
I have begun my study of the Book of Mormon and Doctrine and Covenants---I am Roman Catholic. It is easy to question minor points and miss the major points being brought out in my reading.
It is very easy to get caught up in the trap of majoring in minors rather than majoring in the major things of the Sacred Texts of faith.
-Carol

Quote:

Originally Posted by Traveler

The way to understand if someone understands a concept is in the manner that they use it. If someone says they understand math and have trouble with simple addition they are incorrect in their understanding. One will have to conclude that they are either silly (stupid) or insane. Every Math book I have ever seen is chuck full of errors - but that does not mean that one cannot learn math. It just means that you have to do the math yourself.

Likewise scripture. There are errors and the literal believers can miss the basic concepts. If one focuses on the errors or literal content of scripture they will have all the excuse they desire for their poor behavior. But for those willing to "do the math" the richness of enligntnment and knowedge is theirs.

The Traveler

Moksha · #12 (**permalink**) 07-02-2008, 10:27 PM

california_ave · #13 (**permalink**) 07-14-2008, 05:48 PM

I first bought a bundled set of Lost Christianities and Lost Scriptureby Ehrman. They were about 1.5 books stretched into two. I like Ehrman in that he takes subjects usually left to scholars and explains them simply for the masses. Because of these books, I also bought Misquoting Jesus when that came out. There seems to be some dislike for the book on this thread, but I enjoyed reading the text. Ehrman raises some good questions and provides a good introduction of textual criticism applied to sctipture. I feel that Ehrman does want to disabuse people of believing scripture can be divine, and a reader needs to understand Ehrman's position, but don't discount the issues he raises because you disagree with his conclusions. He does a great job sparking a discussion. I've learned many things about scripture from his book.

My criticism of his book is that Ehrman doesn't fully build his arguments and glosses over many points. This is probably a result of him addressing a lay audience. Though, he could do better. I wonder if his publishers asked him to not be as weighty as he could have been in order to sell more books.