In the course of our lives, we come across many rules, rules which we find annoying and cumbersome. Rules in general are used to guide a person's actions so that they can peacefully exist with other humans. As such, rules serve a vital function. However, I think people get lost in interpreting rules such as the ones in the Bible to the extent that they entirely miss the point of the rules themselves.
Man inherently knows what is evil and what is good. Thus, long lists of rules are unnecessary. However, God decided to interpret some of what we inherently know into some rules called the Ten Commandments. He did that because he is merciful, not because we don't know what to do. Then, as an act of further mercy, He wrote, or actually had Moses write, the book of Deuteronomy. I've read Deuteronomy and found it to be extremely meticulous, almost painfully so, in its descriptions of exactly what to do in every circumstance. I also noticed that a good portion of it is common sense. Jesus said that loving the Lord, and by extensions your neighbor, is the greatest commandment on which the law and the prophets hang, or something like that.
However, when people are interpreting laws and other similar things in the Bible, they seem to be missing one essential thing: they are missing that the application of all these laws and rules should simply be an outward manifestation of trying to love your neighbor as yourself.
From my observation, I think that many Christians, whether consciously or not, operate on the premise that they must figure out exactly what the Bible says to do in every situation so that they will be doing what God wants. Such devotion to studying the Bible that is the inevitable result of such a wish is still valuable. I'm not trying disparage the value of Bible study. The Bible has a wealth of information, accumulated over the course of about fifteen hundred years. Such a book is a marvel simply because it was written over such a long period of time by so many authors who ranged from fishermen to doctors. I think the Bible is an invaluable source of wisdom, but the single most important piece of wisdom in it is the commandment to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. All other aspects of the Bible are accumulated wisdom that enumerate the results when people loved their neighbors and when they didn't and what happened as a result in each case.
It's so easy to rely on the Bible to guide in every circumstance because you can interpret it to mean almost anything you want. A group of people can all look at the same Bible verse and come away with many different interpretations. Naturally, there are people who will misinterpret the Bible just to justify their own purposes.Thus is why, to some degree, much of what the Bible says needs to be taken with a grain of salt. It was written a long time ago when traditions and customs were far different. The general message never changes but it's interpretation from society to society must. For instance, it's not acceptable to stone your child because he has disobeyed you like it was in biblical times. We just don't do that. There would be a lot of dead children if we did.
You can find a Bible verse that will justify almost anything now matter how heinous, depending on the way you interpret it. The Bible is an excellent book, but we are each born with an inherent sense of right and wrong that is even more excellent. No amount of Bible study will replace that. And it's also important to remember that all rules should be balanced with the commandment to love one another.
Man inherently knows what is evil and what is good. Thus, long lists of rules are unnecessary. However, God decided to interpret some of what we inherently know into some rules called the Ten Commandments. He did that because he is merciful, not because we don't know what to do. Then, as an act of further mercy, He wrote, or actually had Moses write, the book of Deuteronomy. I've read Deuteronomy and found it to be extremely meticulous, almost painfully so, in its descriptions of exactly what to do in every circumstance. I also noticed that a good portion of it is common sense. Jesus said that loving the Lord, and by extensions your neighbor, is the greatest commandment on which the law and the prophets hang, or something like that.
However, when people are interpreting laws and other similar things in the Bible, they seem to be missing one essential thing: they are missing that the application of all these laws and rules should simply be an outward manifestation of trying to love your neighbor as yourself.
From my observation, I think that many Christians, whether consciously or not, operate on the premise that they must figure out exactly what the Bible says to do in every situation so that they will be doing what God wants. Such devotion to studying the Bible that is the inevitable result of such a wish is still valuable. I'm not trying disparage the value of Bible study. The Bible has a wealth of information, accumulated over the course of about fifteen hundred years. Such a book is a marvel simply because it was written over such a long period of time by so many authors who ranged from fishermen to doctors. I think the Bible is an invaluable source of wisdom, but the single most important piece of wisdom in it is the commandment to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. All other aspects of the Bible are accumulated wisdom that enumerate the results when people loved their neighbors and when they didn't and what happened as a result in each case.
It's so easy to rely on the Bible to guide in every circumstance because you can interpret it to mean almost anything you want. A group of people can all look at the same Bible verse and come away with many different interpretations. Naturally, there are people who will misinterpret the Bible just to justify their own purposes.Thus is why, to some degree, much of what the Bible says needs to be taken with a grain of salt. It was written a long time ago when traditions and customs were far different. The general message never changes but it's interpretation from society to society must. For instance, it's not acceptable to stone your child because he has disobeyed you like it was in biblical times. We just don't do that. There would be a lot of dead children if we did.
You can find a Bible verse that will justify almost anything now matter how heinous, depending on the way you interpret it. The Bible is an excellent book, but we are each born with an inherent sense of right and wrong that is even more excellent. No amount of Bible study will replace that. And it's also important to remember that all rules should be balanced with the commandment to love one another.
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