06-14-2016, 04:48 PM
(06-14-2016, 04:26 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: No, it's just what SOME "Christians" like Barna, MacArthur or Bonhoeffer deem to be "true Christian belief," but in REALITY has nothing to do with Christianity, which is what Jesus taught; NOT what religious authorities and preachers (whether local or organizational) have taught.
Did Jesus teach anything about abortion? pornography? Give me specific chapter and verse now, about those specific topics. I'm waiting............
I would admit (at least according to the Bible we have) that he was against "adultery" and "fornication," without being too specific about those things.
I mentioned earlier that I have many friends who like the book, chapter , verse approach( I call this the engineering approach). For my personal study , I prefer a more holistic approach. So, I will hold off for now on this approach. If I think of something something relevant, I will post it.
I do like a dialogue, but there needs to be an exchange as Bohm defined it.
Quote:https://www2.clarku.edu/difficultdialogu.../index.cfm
..."The object of a dialogue is not to analyze things, or to win an argument, or to exchange opinions. Rather, it is to suspend your opinions and to look at the opinions—to listen to everybody's opinions, to suspend them, and to see what all that means.... We can just simply share the appreciation of the meanings, and out of this whole thing, truth emerges unannounced—not that we have chosen it.
Everything can move between us. Each person is participating, is partaking of the whole meaning of the group and also taking part in it. We can call that a true dialogue.
Dialogue is the collective way of opening up judgments and assumptions"
Perhaps that is one thing I find appealing about Ravi Zacharias.
Quote:http://whatiwannaknow.com/2012/03/ravi-zacharias/
… "In “Why Jesus?” you write that Jesus is an Eastern man, and that the Bible is an Eastern text. Do you think that reality is often ignored in cross-cultural debates?
RZ: I think it’s a huge gap. I think it’s the biggest gap in hermeneutics* today. I think about it so often. You see this misunderstanding so often in the New Testament criticism’s. For example, if I read in the New Testament that “all Jerusalem went out to hear him.” I’m from India, and if I read that in the newspaper I know that doesn’t mean that every man, woman, child, dog, and elephant came out to hear him – it means a large crowd turned up for him. The way the Western critics scrutinize the parables, and Eastern texts, reveals a total lack of understanding of how Eastern wisdom and metaphor is used. This is not to take away from the authority of the scriptures, it’s just to help people understand that when generic terms are used we take them that way. Nothing demeans or takes away the person of Jesus Christ. Kenneth Bailey, who is probably one of the finest scholars of our time, has written this massive volume called Jesus through Middle Eastern eyes. It’s a powerful book and so well sustains the argument I’m making here.”…
… whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Phil 4:8 (ESV)