Why do Christians not follow the bible?

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Do you really think anyone stupid enough to follow that law would be intelligent and resourcefull enough to read that text?

Not the point. The Elders of Zion were telling those who might have been inclined to take the TNKH literally not to be so hasty. The Rabinnic Courts were very rarely as bloody as the laws they were supposed to enforce. Which is one of the reasons that Jews have survived as successfully as they have. Mental flexibility is the secret of success. Whatever other faults Jews may have as a religious culture lake of mental flexibility is not one of them.

Judaism morphed into a religious culture based on the Oral Tradition which was finally committed to writing in the G'morrah and the Talmud. The TNKH is not the #1 document for Jewish law any more than the Declaration of Independence is the basis of American Law.

I think to appreciate what the Rabbis did to insure that Judaism has lasted even unto our time despite several serious attempts to rid the world of Jews, one must either be Jewish or at least a carefully student of the Oral Tradition. As philosophical-moral-legal concoctions go it stands right up there with Common Law. And the Jews were able to do it without having the guns or an ocean fleet to impose their will on the world. We did it with good sense, and persistence. We blunted the swords, arrows and spears of the world with our smarts.

Not only is the Pen mightier than the Sword, but so is the Idea.

If Jews were not so politically and stylistically disorganized, they might have ended up running the world, even as the anti-semites have raved and accused. But worry not, getting Jews to synchronize their attitudes and activities is akin to herding cats or squirrels.

ruveyn

If you are going to make generalised comments about Christians, you ought to do a bit of research and educate yourself about what Christianity actually involves first.

For your information, Christians are not obliged to follow Old Testament law. That's what makes them different from Jews. The fact that Christians are no longer under Old Testament law is a very basic fact about Christianity, and if you do not know it, you are not in a position to comment on this thread at all.

People who know nothing about Christianity often make wild claims that Christians are obliged to obey every command given in the Bible. That is untrue. Anyone still following the verse you quote is not a Christian. They are a Jew.

In case you did not know, the Bible consists of two collections of sacred writings. The first collection, known as the Old Testament, is accepted by Jews and Christians alike. That is the one you are quoting from.The second, known as the New Testament, contains an account of when Jesus was down on earth and subsequent events, and is accepted by Christians but rejected by Jews.

The second collection of writings contains an instruction to Christians that they do not need to follow Jewish law any longer, and explains to them that most of the law was merely symbolic and prophetic in any case. The law that you quote symbolises how God is going to punish anyone who sins against him. If you had read the New Testament, you would know that it is stated there that the Old Testament law was largely symbolic, but you clearly have not. Having been freed from the burden of keeping all the Old Testament law, Christians are not obliged to follow the Jewish laws given in the first collection of writings. We read the Old Testament and believe the events that took place back then, but we are no longer bound by those laws. If you want to criticise anyone for following or not following the verse you refer to, you ought to criticise Jews, not Christians. And, if you want to find fault with Christians, you will need to find some New Testament verses to quote at them instead.

The apostles of the early church had a meeting to discuss this very subject: how much of Jewish law should Christian believers be required to follow? The unanimous agreement was that they should only have to do these four things;

"abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood" Acts 15:20

Nothing was mentioned about stoning our children to death, so I am afraid your comments are ignorant and innacurate, and should be addressed to the Jewish community instead. As well as following all of the additional commandments for daily living given by Jesus and Paul in the Old Testament (such as the commandment for modesty referred to by the OP) Christians are required only to observe the above four things from the Old Testament law. Christians are not required to keep the atonement laws or symbolic or prophetic laws given in the Old Testament, because those laws have now been fulfilled by the death and resurrection of Christ. They are not required to observe Jewish feasts and festivals given in the Old Testament, either. The Bible makes that very clear, and it's not a question of "cherry-picking" the things we want to obey and the things we don't, as ignorant people like to claim. Rather, the Bible quite literally tells Christians that they are no longer under the Law. Therefore, they are not required to live as Jews.

It would be helpful if people would research Christianity a bit more before jumping in to make scornful comments based on ignorance and prejudice. As a Christian, I would not jump into a thread about, say, Hinduism, and comment on it before doing some research, because I know little about the Hindu religion and would need to find out about it first. However, it seems that every Tom, Dick and Harry has an ignorant opinion of Christianity, and wants to voice it and tell Christians what they "ought to be doing" by telling us that we ought to be living as Jews.

In terms of moral law, the Ten Commandments of course still stand for Christians, and the moral law must still be kept, but in terms of atonement law, no atonement for sin is any longer required, because Jesus is our atonement. Therefore, no one in a Christian family is punished by stoning any longer. They are forgiven instead.

Generally speaking, a Christian is a person whose atonement is accomplished by the death of Christ, and who is no longer obliged to accomplish their atonement by keeping the Old Testament Jewish law. However, s/he must be obedient and observe the four commandments retained by agreement of the early church, in addition to keeping all commandments regarding Christian living that are given in the New Testament. So, if you want to criticise Christians, you ought to read the New Testament first, and find out what Christians are actually required to do. Then you might actually understand the point behind the OP's question when she asks: "why aren't professing Christians obeying the Bible?" If you haven't read the New Testament, you will have no idea what the point of this thread is, will you?

@Plodder

What you are making is the "Paulian argument" and like many other things in the Bible it's contradicted by other parts of the New Testament. Matthew 5:17 for example. This is one of the reasons why religion is so dangerous because I can make just as good an argument (if not as verbose) as to why the old laws are still valid and quote scripture to back up my position.

There is Luke 16:17, of course that is contradicted by Luke 16:16, (which I think is a record for even the Bible). So, the fact that you make that argument, with that much certainty must qualify for pride, which is one of the seven deadly sins.

That's not even going into my rant on how Jesus makes Leviticus and Deuteronomy look moral and not authoritarian at all.

FYI, the "seven deadly sins" are not mentioned anywhere in the Bible, and are a mere invention of man (they come from Catholicism, and I am not a Catholic. I am a Christian).

Again, please do not attempt to make accusations against Christians unless you know what you are talking about. It is no use attacking Christians by quoting Jewish laws or Catholic inventions at them. Those things are irrelevant. You might as well try attacking a Muslim by quoting Ghandi at him, or attacking a Bhudist by quoting the Quoran. It is illogical.

The "seven deadly sins" are in the same category as "there but for the grace of God go I" and "love the sinner, hate the sin" and "God helps those who help themselves." They fall into a category of things that non-Christians love to quote at Christians, believing they are quoting the Bible. In actual fact, NONE of the aforementioned things are in the Bible at all.

The "seven deadly sins" are an invention of Catholicism, "there but for the grace of God go I" is a popular secular saying, "love the sinner, hate the sin" is a quote from Ghandi, and "God helps those who help themselves" is, again, a popular saying.

I just mention these because you seem to be the kind of person who likes flinging uninformed accusations around. Since you've already accused me of breaking the rules of some Catholic cult of which I am not a member, and accused Christians in general of breaking Jewish laws which they are not bound to follow, I just thought I'd list the most popular misconceptions people quote at Christians, so that you can read them and learn that they do not actually apply. That way, you will be informed in advance, and will be prevented from going ahead and trying to quote secular sayings or things from cults at me, instead of quoting the Bible.

What you refer to as the "Paulian argument" (by which I assume you mean the fact that Paul states that Christians are no longer under the law) is the very basis of the Christian doctrine and faith. Christ redeemed his people from the curse of the law. That is the whole point. Christians view the apostle Paul as a spirit-filled man who spoke under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, and his teachings are as valid as those of Jesus himself. Jesus' words in Matthew, about him saying that he had not come to destroy the law, but to fulfill it, are the very point I was making to you before: the fact that much of the Jewish law was symbolic, and a form of prophecy. Jesus said he had come to "FULFILL" the law. That in itself implies that the law was a prophecy. One fulfills a prophecy. One does not fulfill a literal law. Rather, one keeps it or breaks it. Therefore, Jesus would not have used the word "fulfill" if he had been talking about a literal law. If he had been talking about a literal law, he would have said: "I am not come to destroy, but to reinforce/keep/establish/maintain the law." But he didn't. He used the word fulfil.

That word is always used in the BIble in the context of PROPHECY. Jesus was clearly making the point that much of the law had been symbolism and prophecy ABOUT HIM - and, now that he had finally arrived, those mysterious symbolisms were about to be fulfilled and finally become clear.

For example, the passover, when the Hebrews were instructed to smear blood over their doorposts so that the angel of death would not enter into their houses and kill them, was symbolic of the fact that any person who, in the future, became a Christian and was washed in the blood of Jesus, would not face eternal death. At the time, those people back in the past did not know what God's plan of salvation was, so I am sure that passover made no sense at all, and seemed totally random and bafflling. But now that the prophecy has been fulfilled, and the Lamb of God has appeared and his blood has been shed for his people, that prophetic law can be understood. Anyone who wants to carry on keeping the feast of the passover is missing the point. They are missing the fact that that law was a prophecy that has now been fulfilled. No animal blood will have the power to save people from eternal death; only the blood of Jesus will. So keeping the law will not achieve salvation for Christians - which is why, now that those prophecies have been fulfillled, we choose to believe in the sacrifice made by Jesus instead of keeping laws that were only ever intended as prophecy in the first place.

There is nothing "proud" about a Christian being certain of what they believe. That is a nonsensical accusation with no biblical basis whatsoever; quite the contrary. New Testament Christians are instructed to " be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear" (1 Peter 3:15) which is all that I am trying to do.

@Plodder

My apologies, but you appear to be coming up short. The non-binding of the old laws to Christians, is an interpretation of scripture, not a "set in stone fact" furthermore, this interpretation is a subjective one on your part, and thus not the one that is empirically correct.

The Paulian argument as I know it, is the argument Christians make in order to shed the baggage of The Old Testament and thus free themselves from the very uninventive, uninspiring and rather bland arguments against their death cult. It's an argument that even the most intellectual of Christians hide behind to protect their faith.

The reason I mentioned the 7 deadly sins (which I'm well aware are not in the Bible) was a tongue-in-cheek comment in that for something that requires the very liberal leaps of interpretation you are doing here to justify your death cult, you seem very very certain in that your interpretation is the correct one.

But now that we've dealt with The Old Testament, let's crucify The New Testament.

We can start with that Jesus in dying on the Cross engaged in the age old Middle-Eastern custom of scapegoating, which is an old tradition where you'd put all your sins on a goat then chase it into the desert. If I like you and care for you, I can go to jail for you, I can also pay restitution on your behalf, but I can*t take responsibility for your sins, and Christ claiming to have done so is immoral and repulsive.

If you do wrong against me, I can say "I forgive you" however, if you do wrong against someone else, I cannot say "You are forgiven for doing wrong against them" and neither can Christ. This only makes halfway sense, if Jesus is in fact the God who's laws are broken and who is hurt whenever one of his creatures is hurt, yet even an allmighty god would have to concede that forgiving someone when he himself isn't the entity who has been hurt is questionable.

So from vicarious redemption, to loving of enemies, to having no thought for tomorrow, to loving Christ more than your family or being unworthy of him, are immoral teachings. I recommend that you read some C.S Lewis, he has some very good writings on just this topic.

*PS* You cannot say that someone is ignorant of a topic, because they are not mind readers who can know your personal interpretation amongst that of about 1 billion Christians at the time.

Last edited by TM on 07 Oct 2012, 5:42 pm, edited 1 time in total.

So, loved the rest of your quote, but wasn't C.S. Lewis pro-Christian?

He was but he wrote on the immorality of some Christian teachings but I can't for the life of me remember where. I believe the jist of the argument is that if Jesus isn't god, then because he claims to take the sins of other's he must be either a lunatic or the devil in hell, then he makes a non sequitur and concludes that Jesus must be god. It's a quite classic Christian logical fail.

J.R.R. Tolkein somehow convinced his friend C.S. Lewis to re-accept Christ, but then became upset because C.S. Lewis chose the Anglican Communion instead of the Roman Catholic Church.


So, not only was Mr. Lewis pro-Christian, but for most of his life he actually was a Christian.

Well, I guess no one's going to give you the satisfaction of calling you a militant atheist. Not me, for certain, and I'm a follower of the "vile" Luther guy. Too bad, so sad.
And by the way, I honestly have nothing against atheists - I tend to be in agreement with them here on WP than I am with a lot of the believers. But I just don't need to have it hammered into me.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

http://bible.cc/matthew/5-17.htm What does this quote by Jesus mean then? Matthew 5:17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil."

Podder, What in the bible are we all supposed to follow and not follow? Now I am really confused. I'm am willing to accept reproof and correction. Maybe I am misunderstanding what it truthfully says and what one is supposed to do and not do.

What's immoral about any of those things?

Taking such teachings seriously renders one irresponsible and potentially dangerous.

ruveyn

I have explained that verse in my post above. Jesus had come to fulfil the law because most of the law was prophecy and symbolism. The fact that he used the word fulfil rather than using the word keep is an indication that the law mainly consisted of prophecies. The word fulfil is only ever used elsewhere in the Bible in the context of prophecies. Much of the law was merely a prophecy - and that is what blind people fail to see, because they are blind. Hence why they try to criticise things they know nothing about.

If you want to know what laws you need to be keeping as a Christian, you need to read the outcome of the discussion held by the early church in the book of Acts, chapter 15:

"it seemed good to the Holy Ghost, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things; that ye abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication: from which if ye keep yourselves, ye shall do well. Fare ye well."

What that verse is saying is that not only the early apostles, but also the Holy Ghost himself, are saying that any non-Jewish converts to Christianity are not required to live under full Jewish law. Therefore, anyone who takes it upon himself to order Christians to keep the law is contradicting the Holy Ghost.

The apostles and the Holy Ghost highlighted those four things that Christians must do, but other than those things, we do not need to keep any New Testament symbolic laws, because those were only prophecy. Now that those prophecies have been fulfilled, we have the real deal. Jesus has come. We do not need to obey prophetic laws any more. However, it stands to reason that we still need to keep the moral laws. If you examine the ten commandments, only one of them is a symbolic, prophetic commandment, and the other nine are literal, moral commandments that Christians need to be following. The one that is symbolic and prophetic is the one about keeping the Sabbath.

Christians do not need to keep the Sabbath like Jews did because the Sabbath was only ever a prophetic symbolic way of telling us that we were going to have to work long and hard for Jesus down here on earth, but then one day we are going to be going to heaven, and are going to rest. There will be no more work to do up there. You can read about God's explanation of what the symbolic significance of the sabbath day was by reading Hebrews Chapter 4.

There are a lot of non-Christian people who seem to take delight in criticising Christians and tell us that we ought to be keeping the law, but they are wrong. Paul, speaking under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, says: "Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ." There you have it. We are not supposed to let people judge us. We follow the things that God has commanded us - and the Bible states very clearly that all of those early things were only ever "a shadow of things to come" meaning that they are symbolic prophecies or parables. Call them what you will - shadows, prophecies, symbolisms - but they aren't literal commandments any more.

As well as keeping any literal non-prophetic laws, such as not killing or committing adultery etc., Christians also need to keep any instructions given to us in the New Testament for daily living. Women are commanded to dress modestly, cover their heads when praying and prophesying, be keepers at home, and submit to their husbands. Men are commanded to love their wives. Children are commanded to obey their parents. Those are the sort of things the OP was talking about; the things that most professing Christians are not doing. There are an awful lot of instructions given to Christians in the New Testament, and all you need to do in order to find out how you ought to be living is to read it, and then disbelieve anyone who is telling you that it doesn't mean what it says. Just do what Jesus tells you.

Vicarious redemption is immoral, because the basis of morality is being responsible for one's actions. However, if you can be forgiven by asking Christ for forgiveness instead of the person you wronged, then you are not taking responsibility of your actions.

No thought for tomorrow is immoral because it tells you to throw off all sense of duty and obligation to society, to have no solidarity with the community in which you live and to do nothing to better it.

Loving Christ more than your family or not being worthy of heaven, literally means that if Christ tells you to kill your entire family to show your love to him, you have to otherwise you are going to hell. Charles Manson or Caligula make better rolemodels than this.

It means nothing of the sort. Nowhere in the New Testament will you find Christ commanding his followers to kill people. Quite the contrary. Christians are commanded to suffer violence that is motivated by hatred of Christ and not retaliate.

"I say unto you which hear, Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you, Bless them that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully use you.And unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other; and him that taketh away thy cloak forbid not to take thy coat also." Luke 6:27-29

Loving Jesus more than your family means being prepared to give them up for his sake if they demand that you choose. This often happens to people who become Christians. Their families often demand that they renounce their new faith or be disowned. A lot of Christians are kicked out of their homes and disinherited and abandoned by their families due to following Jesus. In Muslim countries, some people who become Christians are even murdered by their own families.

That was what Jesus was talking about: making the choice to leave your old life and family behind if they demand that you choose between them and Christ. Jesus does not command Christians to kill their entire family (or anyone else, for that matter). You are making up wicked lies.