She said spit-roasted.

Agrippina wrote:One book that has never interested me enough to read it (mostly because I fall asleep when I do) is the bible.

I've decided that in order to argue against it, I have to have read it at least once, but in the first sentence I'm already irritated. So to make myself more enthusiastic about it, I've decided that I shall embark on an effort to read it all the way through and in the reading to apply some common sense as well as my knowledge of what the ancient world was really like to rewrite it in a way that includes the fantasy but with more of the reality thrown in.

Before I post anything that I've started to work on, please clarify for me that I'm not breaking some copyright laws and that I'm allowed to do this, also some suggestions would be welcomed before I spend too much time, starting with...

1.Once upon a time, around thirteen point seven billion years ago, a deity emerged from the rubble of the explosion that came to be known as the “Big Bang,”

Also, can I claim some sort of rights over this?

Edit to fix typo.

Here's a religious story, written by myself;

In the beginning, Lucifer created the Light, and the Light showed him the way through the darkness that lay within, but the darkness that was beyond him, was too great for his Light to conquer; and so he created, through a ritual of blood, Jesus the righteous and Muhammad, the prophet.

Lucifer knew that even they could not make it through the dark, but sent them forth as a final sacrifice, to what end, he knew not of. Each was given half of his Light to hold, leaving Lucifer in the void of himself to watch over them, as they and his Light, showed him the ways.

There soon came a time where the dark overcame their Lights, it forced them to go dim, and the once departed became the lost, each alone, and unknowing the other.

Muhammad threw his Light into the darkness beyond, following his Father's footsteps, but Jesus kept hold of his Light, against his Father's footsteps.

Muhammad was then consumed by the darkness, but Jesus, encircled by the dim light, was saved.

From the depths that lay beyond Jesus had come a mystical force; it caused Jesus to draw in the Light that encircled him; but then, he expulsed with a great Light, and rushed into the darkness...

This would make a great trilogy, which could then be expanded with a prequel, itself a trilogy. The key protagonists would wield... Light sabers.

LucidFlight wrote:This would make a great trilogy, which could then be expanded with a prequel, itself a trilogy. The key protagonists would wield... Light sabers.

It could be written better, if you're referring to my story.

Utter bloody nonsense, s13ep.

You are polluting a serious discussion thread - admittedly about a book of another load of utter bloody nonsense...

No-one in this forum will ever take you seriously, except to have a laugh at your ideas and wonder if you are receiving some form of treatment.

s13ep wrote:

LucidFlight wrote:This would make a great trilogy, which could then be expanded with a prequel, itself a trilogy. The key protagonists would wield... Light sabers.

It could be written better, if you're referring to my story.

So no comment then about the laws of Exodus?

hackenslash wrote:She said spit-roasted.

Just think about it. If Israel Finkelstein could prove, conclusively, that the Exodus didn't happen, absolutely without a shadow of a doubt, would the Jewish people then be obliged to dump at least one festival of slaughtering little lambs just to stroke the ego of a megalomaniacal god they invented as an excuse to rape and pillage their neighbours?

Alan B wrote:Utter bloody nonsense, s13ep.

You are polluting a serious discussion thread - admittedly about a book of another load of utter bloody nonsense...

No-one in this forum will ever take you seriously, except to have a laugh at your ideas and wonder if you are receiving some form of treatment.

You know my views on your kind.

Agrippina wrote:

s13ep wrote:

LucidFlight wrote:This would make a great trilogy, which could then be expanded with a prequel, itself a trilogy. The key protagonists would wield... Light sabers.

It could be written better, if you're referring to my story.

So no comment then about the laws of Exodus?

Nope, this is a story based on religion. I thought OP, if he was being serious, would benefit from my creativity. That's if he's wise enough to see off the perversity.

s13ep wrote:

Agrippina wrote:

s13ep wrote:

LucidFlight wrote:This would make a great trilogy, which could then be expanded with a prequel, itself a trilogy. The key protagonists would wield... Light sabers.

It could be written better, if you're referring to my story.

So no comment then about the laws of Exodus?

Nope, this is a story based on religion. I thought OP, if he was being serious, would benefit from my creativity. That's if he's wise enough to see off the perversity.

She, not he, and I'm pretty wise thank you. I don't want to discuss someone else's version of the Bible, I'm doing nicely on working on my own interpretation. Please start a new thread about your story. Your posts are off-topic.

Agrippina wrote:

s13ep wrote:

Agrippina wrote:

s13ep wrote:
It could be written better, if you're referring to my story.

So no comment then about the laws of Exodus?

Nope, this is a story based on religion. I thought OP, if he was being serious, would benefit from my creativity. That's if he's wise enough to see off the perversity.

She, not he, and I'm pretty wise thank you. I don't want to discuss someone else's version of the Bible, I'm doing nicely on working on my own interpretation. Please start a new thread about your story. Your posts are off-topic.

It includes Jesus though, so it's definitely related to the Bible. What's so different from your own 'interpretation?", I thought it missed some stuff out and I amended it. Same as you...

Come back with New Atheism, if you want. I think countered that pretty much to the core in my thread.

"My kind"?

Oooh! I belong to a 'kind'.

Ah, well. Enough OT.

Agrippina wrote:Here's another point to ponder. I'm working on Exodus now, verse by verse, and coming across little tidbits I overlooked in the previous general reading, like:

Levi's daughter, Jochabed, marries her nephew, Kohath. They breed two sons: Moses and Aaron. Moses marries a daughter of a Midianite priest, who circumcises her son, according to Abraham's covenant, while Moses it says remains uncircumcised, even though this is only two generations after Jacob, who's son Simeon, Moses' mother's brother, circumcised a whole town when one of them raped his sister Dinah, Wouldn't the Hebrews till be doing this? Moses would have been circumcised before he was put into a boat in the river, and if not then, he would have been circumcised according to Egyptian practice at some time before reaching full maturity, seeing he was 40 when he absconded after killing an Egyptian. Herodotus tells of the practice among Egyptians but not only that, there are inscriptions on walls demonstrating them doing this. It makes my eyes roll.

Looks like another contradiction: The jews were supposed to have been enslaved for 400 years after the time of Joseph.

scott1328 wrote:

Agrippina wrote:Here's another point to ponder. I'm working on Exodus now, verse by verse, and coming across little tidbits I overlooked in the previous general reading, like:

Levi's daughter, Jochabed, marries her nephew, Kohath. They breed two sons: Moses and Aaron. Moses marries a daughter of a Midianite priest, who circumcises her son, according to Abraham's covenant, while Moses it says remains uncircumcised, even though this is only two generations after Jacob, who's son Simeon, Moses' mother's brother, circumcised a whole town when one of them raped his sister Dinah, Wouldn't the Hebrews till be doing this? Moses would have been circumcised before he was put into a boat in the river, and if not then, he would have been circumcised according to Egyptian practice at some time before reaching full maturity, seeing he was 40 when he absconded after killing an Egyptian. Herodotus tells of the practice among Egyptians but not only that, there are inscriptions on walls demonstrating them doing this. It makes my eyes roll.

Looks like another contradiction: The jews were supposed to have been enslaved for 400 years after the time of Joseph.

It is a contradiction. If they were there for 400 years, there'd be at least 12 generations. They fix this with claims that Joseph and Moses lived for more than 100 years. Moses's mother married to her nephew, being second generation after Joseph would have been strict about circumcision, so that alone would have identified him as a Jew to the Egyptians. Seeing they were killing Jewish babies, being adopted by the king's daughter would not have saved him. The Egyptians didn't circumcise their babies, they waited at least until the boy knew what they were doing to him.

I wonder if the people who claim that the ten commandments is all they need as their law, actually read the way the book is written.

It's not the way Hollywood shows it in the movies, that Moses goes up a mountain, sits there for 40 days chipping words into stone, and then coming down with 10 rules etched into the stones. "God" reads the laws out to the people sitting at the bottom of the mountain, from a "book" which Moses then takes and reads out to them again, before ascending the mountain to get the stone version, and there are altogether, with the five laws given before they get to Mt Horeb, 96 laws in all. (I'm counting them as I go along).

There are more laws to come in the subsequent books, but in this episode at the mountain where the commandments are handed down, there are four chapters devoted to the laws that apply to them. Is it because Deuteronomy 5 mentions only the summarised version of 10? Because that's what those are, they're a summary of the laws that come in the next four chapters of Exodus. Just like Genesis 1 is a summary of creation, and Genesis 2 explains how it happened, Exodus 20 (Deuteronomy 5) is the summary, and the details are given afterwards. This is evidenced by Moses reading a "book" to the people in verse 7 of chapter 24 of Exodus. He wouldn't need a "book" to quote only 10 laws.

What with all this hoo-ha by the FFRF in the USA about the 'Ten Commandments' on public display, I think they should change their tactics and call the Christian-minded numb-skulls to account.

Display ALL 96 laws (and any others you might discover) or none at all.

613, I think.

hackenslash wrote:613, I think.

That should keep them occupied for a bit...

hackenslash wrote:613, I think.

That's what other people have counted them to be. I'm going through it carefully. So far I've added up 96, just to the 23rd chapter of Exodus. More to come.

I've come across a glaring error I made in discussing the chapter on Ecclesiastes. I got a little mixed up between the Apocrypha "Ecclesiasticus" and the Book of Ecclesiastes, or the Preacher in the KJV. With this:

My biggest problem with this book is that it promotes the oppression of women:
Ecclesiastes 25:13 Give me any plague, but the plague of the heart and any wickedness, but the wickedness of a woman.  
Ecclesiastes 25:22 Of the woman came the beginning of sin, and through her we all die.  
Ecclesiastes 25 26; If she go not as thou wouldest have her, cut her off from thy flesh, and give her a bill of divorce, and let her go.  
Ecclesiastes 26:9-10 The whoredom of a woman may be known in her haughty looks and eyelids. If thy daughter be shameless, keep her in straitly, lest she abuse herself through overmuch liberty.  
Ecclesiastes 26:14-15 A silent and loving woman is a gift of the Lord and there is nothing so much worth as a mind well instructed. A shamefaced and faithful woman is a double grace, and her continent mind cannot be valued.  
Ecclesiastes 26:25  A shameless woman shall be counted as a dog; but she that is shamefaced will fear the Lord.
Ecclesiastes 42:13-14 For from garments cometh a moth, and from women wickedness. Better is the churlishness of a man than a courteous woman, a woman, I say, which bringeth shame and reproach.

Which only goes to show how easily one can get misled by information on the internet. Especially when one is looking for errors and then makes a huge mistake thinking the error is that of the writer of the Bible.

Any of you who already have pdf copies of Rationalising the Bible. I'm removing that text from the chapter on Ecclesiastes and Song of Solomon, Chapter 40, and I'll make make a mention of the confusion in that chapter, with a brief mention of the Apocrypha, which I'm not going to go into unless I do a long thing about it later. I really am never going to be done editing this book.